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A family outing to the races

Jay and I thought it would be fun to take Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat to the Seattle Soapbox Derby yesterday. We thought Fruit Bat might like the little buggies and that Kitty Cat wouldn’t think it was too terrible a way to spend part of an afternoon.

It started merrily enough. There were lots of people. Lots and lots of people. And many of them were, um, different-looking, and so interesting to watch. Mostly they were polite and friendly. A large proportion of them smoked (it was hip and cool Fremont after all). Try explaining smoking to a four-year-old. It goes something like this:

What is that man doing?

Well, honey, he’s sucking smoke into his lungs.

Why?

Because some people like it. That man must like it.

Why?

I don’t know.

But that’s weird. Why would that man do that?

Uh, I don’t know.

Fruit Bat and I have had several of these exchanges and I haven’t yet come up with more sound reasoning as to why some people smoke. I dabbled in smoking, a long time ago, so I can sort of understand the draw (for me is was my big chance to be a bad ass. Or as bad of an ass as I could be, which wasn’t, it turned out, very bad). But I also think it’s a stupid thing to do and, when explaining it to a child, the habit does seem, indeed, completely absurd.

But I digress.

Family un-friendly music thumped through speakers mounted along the street. Songs such as: “Party like a Rock Star” and “Posse on Broadway”—Sir Mix-a-lot was one of the Derby judges, so I guess they had to play his song–– and a bunch of Rihanna, none of which is horrible, but none of which I’d choose to play to my four and two-year-olds.

Then there was the waiting. Much waiting. Into which was injected the whining. Fruit Bat hated the standing around. And there was a lot of it. One funny “soapbox” would zip down the street, then, when it crossed the finish line, there was yammering about the soapbox and judging of the soapbox. John Curley yammering and judging. Sir Mix-a-lot yammering and judging. None of the judges, amazingly, were dressed up like Diego or Blue or singing She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain When She Comes, so were totally uninteresting to my children.

When the drizzle began, after the fourth car and an hour or so of derby fun, we decided to split. Not the most successful outing in the history of our family, but I was proud of us for braving the crowds and traffic and tempers of Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat.

I was provoked

I committed an act yesterday that could be construed as the erratic exploit of an unstable woman who couldn’t get her two-year-old to nap.

I pulled my hair into a ponytail and lopped it off. Isn't that, after all, what distraught ladies do on TV?

Okay, it wasn’t quite that dramatic. I cut a little less than three inches, so it’s still longish, still hits my shoulders. But it felt good. And, despite the 500 residual hairs still sproinging out around my head, it looks a lot better.

I had to do something. I had spent the morning galloping, tiptoeing and skipping around a room at Kitty Cat’s Tot Bop class (which was both fun and humiliating in a Gymboreeish way), took Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat to the playground, made meals, grocery shopped, weathered the preschool drop off, etcetera, etcetera. I had to get a little crazy, man. I had to wield some scissors and shock the kids a little.

So, I was cheered. Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat were in good moods. We went to our friends’ house where she fed them dinner and me wine. Fruit Bat, at some point in the evening handed me something (I don’t remember what) and said, “Here you go, nice lady.” Jay came home happy because it was a Friday night. The kids went to bed with nary a peep.

And all was okay with our world.

I cannot think

I'm trying to compose a semi-coherent blog post for today (ideas of all sorts are swirling around my brain), but Kitty Cat will not nap, she is, in fact, lounging on my bed, watching Mr. Rogers (she's trying valiantly to overcome her fear of Lady Elaine, and I think she's succeeding). Actually, she's not so much watching as commenting and asking questions and chasing my cat, Ollie, around the bed and singing Hokey Pokey.

And Fruit Bat is in his room, watching a DVD about school buses. So, we have two TVs going at once in the house. We've hit a new low.

I keep telling myself it's just until Kitty Cat recovers from having her pacifier pulled and resumes her naps (Please God), but still, TWO tvs. It's ludicrous really.

And so is having a cat lying on my stomach and Kitty Cat's head on his rump so that I can barely move my fingers across the keyboard.

My Mirror

I wish...
• I liked sushi, because Jay does and it seems like something a 38-year-old Seattlelite should relish.
• Fruit Bat wasn't so deathly allergic to peanuts. I'm scared all the time that he'll get a hold of some peanut-containing product and be with a person too jittery to use the Epi-pen.
• That my kids were a little older.
• That I wasn't so addicted to the internet (and the fabulous transfusion of information directly from someone else's brain into mine).
• That I didn't have a NyQuil hangover.
• That I loved a hearty five-mile run.
• I could make enough money to support Jay, Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat.
• I lived closer to my parents and sister.
• I had more patience.
• No one had to be hungry or hear gunshots in the night.

I'm glad...
• I'm not hungry and do not have to hear gunshots in the night.
• I had the upbringing to be as self-aware as I am.
• I can talk to my parents and sister often.
• I get to stay home with Fruit Bat and Kitty Cat and be part of so many amazing childhood moments.
• I have working legs and arms.
• I only have a cold and not cancer.
• I don't watch much TV.
• My kids are young enough to sit on my lap and let me tickle their necks.
• Fruit Bat is otherwise healthy and hasn't had an anaphylactic reaction.
• I like coffee and Cadbury and pastries of all sorts. They make me happy.

Swimming in a murky pool of chaos and tears, where zebras sometimes come to drink

We're two-and-a-half weeks into preschool this year and dropoffs have greatly improved. There is no leg-clinging now. No abundance of tears.

It's easier this week, but I'm not sure Fruit Bat's stoicism at the preschool door is worth the price we have to pay.

Because when we get home...it is a freaking apocalyptic meltdown. To be fair, it hasn't been everyday that he's fallen apart as soon as we've crossed the dusty, pine-needlely threshold of our house. This day just happened to be bad.

Once last week we ate lunch in the basement which, considering there is no table or chairs down there, only a big couch and lots of floor, was a treat. And since we mixed it up that one time, changed things around like the crazy people we are, we now have to do it the same way EVERY DAY from now on.

That was his big request when he got home (and the impetus for his wrathful vent that left us all gasping and teary): that we eat lunch in the basement. I said yes. At first. Until he tormented Kitty Cat to the point where I withdrew the privilege of cellar dining.

Fruit Bat let loose with a bray like a plains Zebra warning his herd of approaching lions (I know what a plains Zebra might sound like because of the Zootles magazine, all about, yes, Zebras, that Fruit Bat and I have been reading).

Kitty Cat vaulted into my arms and buried her face in my chest. Fruit Bat refused all offers of hugs and validation until I had to shove my fingers in my ears waiting for him to drop a few decibels.

He howled like that for a while, then, because he's four-and-a-half and has figured out some nifty new negotiating tricks, proceeding to haggle. He wailed, "Eating in the basement would really cheer me up! That is what would really, really cheer me up!" Over and over.

When this tactic failed to impress me (though it did amuse me a little), he tried the dinner angle. Couldn't we eat dinner in the basement then?

No, we're having soup for dinner. Same as last night. Soup is not a table-free meal. How about a snack, later today, in the basement?

FB: A snack right after lunch? Right. After. Lunch.

No, I said. After your rest. Later. LATER today.

He was trying to save face. Trying to preserve his dignity by getting his way, in some shape or form. How much dignity, though, can a little boy have with snot and tears darkening his sleeves, still coursing down his red cheeks?

I felt sorry for him. I know he's going through a lot with readjusting to preschool and a new class (in which there are no little boys his age. The other boys in his class for four and five year olds are three-and-a-half. I don't get this.)

But I felt sorry for me too. It was all so unreasonable. So uncivilized. So chaotic. And I hate unreasonable, uncivilized and chaotic. I have to remind myself 500 times a day what it is like to be a kid: the confusion, the fears, the lack of social skills. If I don't, I will end up hurling that dinosaur lunchbox of his off our second-story balcony (which almost happened today), then regretting it forever.

So, I sucked it up. I tried to be calm. I gritted my teeth. I prayed an agent would quickly take me on and sell my novel for big money so I could justify hiring a nanny and writing every morning away, emerging in the afternoon, refreshed and easily charmed by my children.

I really just tried to make it through, banking on the fact that better times were just the other side of his collapse.

All that and no Cadbury in the house.

Fifi Fluff

Fruit Bat has been really into card games lately. I recently dug out my Old Maid deck that I've had since the age of 8 (or so). The images are so awesome and vintagey. At the time, I just liked the colors and the characters, but now I can really appreciate the illustrations.

And I want to know: is it too late to rename my second born?

Someday maybe, but not yet

A woman was getting out of her car. It was a slow extrication, old bones and joints mutinous, her face set in a disappointed grimace. Her hair was dyed a dull brown, too dark for skin that had turned to rice paper.

She looked right at me as Kitty Cat and I weaved, slowly, yet surely, around her open door.

The gaze she settled upon me was this: defeat, envy, portent.

Or maybe that's just how I took it.

Instead of sleeping

This is what Kitty Cat does in her crib when she's supposed to be napping. Warning: there's audio involved.

Don't know what she's saying? Me neither.

Girly girl

I meant to post this photo with yesterday's entry. Leopard-print pants and pink pumps. I'm positively giddy when Kitty Cat chooses to wear these.

The peculiarities of dressing children

I think my two kids believe themselves to be child stars deserving of mile long riders stipulating the precise presentation of their dinners across their little plastic plates, the music playing in the car and even the layout of the cushions across the back of the couch.

They are nothing if not particular. Especially Fruit Bat, who is at the selective age of 4. He wants a say in everything, including, of course, what duds he will and will not put on his body.

Here are the ensembles he refuses to acknowledge:

1. Shirts with buttons. No button-downs. No rugbys. No henlies. No buttons. Period.
2. New finery. Whatever I buy him, even if I purchased it already used, must sit in the dresser drawer for two months before it is deemed worthy of wear.
3. Black t-shirts with Spider Man emblazoned across the chest. Okay, this is my preference.
4. Layering! No sweaters. No sweatshirts. No long sleeved shirts under a t-shirt.
5. Shorts and short-sleeved shirts. Until he has warmed up to the idea. This usually occurs in late August, when he can reasonably sport shorts for about three weeks before we have to readjust to the concept of full-length.

Fruit Bat can at least often, though illogically, explain his preferences. Whereas Kitty Cat’s fashion predilections are, as far as I can tell, completely arbitrary:

1. No dresses. This pains me greatly seeing as how I’m a girly girl and want to parade her around in adorable little frocks. Alas, she won’t let me.
2. Similarly, no tights and no legwarmers (which she calls legwarms. No fair! Have you seen the Babylegs?)
3. No cuffing of her shirt sleeves.
4. No t-shirts with "Princess" or "High Maintenance" emblazoned across the chest. Okay, this is my preference.
5. No hair accoutrements. If I attempt to brush her curly locks back into a quick ponytail, she will whip the rubberband to the floor in disgust.

Oddly, neither of them is at all concerned with wearing clothes that match.