August 27, 2020 · 9:40 am

In Pod We Trust

Well would you look at that—another COVID post! But really, what else is there to talk about these days, right? Besides schools opening, the election, the undermining of the postal service, the inherent value of Black lives, and, well, you get the picture.

How has it been a whole month [edit: and a half] since my last post? It’s not like things have happened or anything. But what is time, really?

In my last post I mentioned (in passing—you don’t have to go back and find it) that we had joined forces to pod with a neighboring family. They wouldn’t necessarily have been my top choice (although, to be honest, there’s a fair bit to lose by podding with people you’re very close to, as many friends-turned-roommates can tell you) but the arrangement worked. We wrote up a memorandum of understanding before our first quaranteam gathering, establishing the baseline of acceptable activities and the protocols for deviation and permission-seeking. I think their risk tolerance was higher than ours—for example, had we not vetoed a sports camp for Julia on account of no masking and multi-week commitment, they surely would have signed their daughter up for it—but it was never a problem. When they decided to go camping in another state (one whose motto may or not present freedom and death in a false dichotomy) with people who weren’t us we stepped back and didn’t see them for two weeks.

Our kids missed the other kids, but we were reunited recently and wow, did it turn Julia’s mood around. I know I said in my last post that one family of friends was not enough, but, well, it’s been a month, and half of it was spent back in isolation with only her moms and sister and the occasional phone/video buddy so…happy happy Julia. That kid is SUCH an extrovert. And, at the risk of jinxing things [edit: I didn’t, but it did wear off naturally], an absolute delight those past few days. And Clementine was much more patient with Julia, once Julia wasn’t relying on Clementine to be her One and Only Peer.

To be honest and more than a little bit of a mood killer, the influx of happiness doesn’t bode well for their remote learning experience this fall, but because we can keep them home without undue hardship, we shall. There is, as is true in so many other cities and towns across these great divided states of America, a great deal of, how shall we say, tension between families who intend to send their kids back to school and those who do not.

I appreciated a recent post circulating on social media about the stress of the decision (for those of us who indeed have options to decide between). The poster bemoaned the un-winnable forced prioritization between physical and mental health and the ever-growing divide between The Reckless and The Paranoid (hey 2020, I’ve got your signature soap opera title right here!).

When I started typing this post, the district was offering families a choice between remote and hybrid. Now it’s full remote for at least the first month…but class groupings are still being created based on the choice between remote and hybrid…and there’s a good chance the elementary remote classes will be spread across two or more schools if the numbers don’t work out to keep full classes of kids with same-grade cohorts in their neighborhood school.

The district did a survey asking which options parents would choose and the split was less even than I anticipated—2/3 hybrid, 1/3 remote. Teacher survey went out last night, so we’ll see if the numbers align when it comes time to actually make the classes. Not to mention the actual personalities and teaching/learning styles. But I came here to talk about pods, didn’t I?

I recently learned (on Facebook no less!) that our fellow pod family has been going to an indoor museum regularly. This is not something I knew about, nor is it something I’m immediately okay with. I might be okay with it, but I would have liked to have been consulted, or at least informed, as per the aforementioned agreement. I knew they were considering it back when the museums announced their impending openings and expressed something between curiosity as to how they would handle crowds, masking, distancing, and licking of signage and doorknobs (hey, I’ve worked behind the scenes at museums, I know how these things go) and concern. Before I jump to conclusions, I need to find out if they consulted my wife (who, last time we discussed the matter, shared my curiosity/concern). But even if they did, it’s still not a loop I love being left out of. I have more feelings on this (of course I do—this is me we’re talking about and the news is both fresh and unexpected but also unsurprising so now I’m too annoyed to sleep) but by the time I get around to posting this, I’m sure I’ll have calmed down and discussed it in a rational, emotion-suppressing way with my cooler headed wife. (She has less baggage with the family than I do; my unpublished posts folder still contains a drafty old rant about an offhand comment one of the parents made two, maybe even three, years ago.)

Edited to add: They talked with my wife about it and she approved their approach (early morning, masked as per museum guidelines). But I still think it’s worth revisiting the “contract” as we reach the ostensible end of the summer. Especially since the family seemed surprised when we told them we’d be stepping away from the pod if they sent their kids back to school in the hybrid model. But even with a remote start, I don’t expect our respective risk tolerance levels to coexist within that nebulous margin of error for very much longer.

If we do split the pod, my kids’ mood will undoubtedly suffer. They will be sad to lose regular contact with their buddies and I know they’ll be jealous of friends returning to school and/or forming learning pods for remote schooling.

Learning pods, by the way, is a minefield I am not entering. We have plenty of other friends (well, plenty of friendly acquaintances and few good friends) who will be learning remotely but considering whether or not we’ll see them in person to share any sort of educational experience, individually or grouped (honestly, my hope is that the school will follow through on their intent to allow outdoor in-person meetings with teachers), remains a giant question mark until the school delivers us a plan for how the days, weeks, and months will go. Throw in the health variables, and the equity issues and we’ve got a great big steaming kettle of worms and another whole can of fish (yes, we’re boiling worms and canning fish because in 2020 we mix metaphors for ultimate chaos), both of which are best left unopened.

As is this post. No, not unopened. Closed. I am closing the post. Good luck to all the other parents out there navigating the rough waters on the Good Ship Back to School, and to all those caught in the winds of Inadequate Childcare and Employers Who Can No Longer Make Allowances for Your Inability to Clone Yourself and Be In Two Places at Once. Fun times, people, fun times. There but for the grace of pod go I.

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July 15, 2020 · 9:51 pm

COVID the destroyer

Things are not going well. Even putting aside the whole mediocre mother thing and the mediocre employee thing and the mediocre partner thing that comes with unsustainable work-life balance situations (because two parenting working from home in a one bedroom apartment with both kids’ camps cancelled sure as shitake mushrooms ain’t sustainable), I think COVID anxiety has finally caught up with me.

(Please pardon the ableist appropriation of the word “anxiety” in the absence of both a medical diagnosis and lack of mental wherewithal to come up with a better term.)

Y’all, I am so scared this is going to destroy my kids. Not, like, physically (although I sure as portobello don’t want them to catch it) and not in terms of their day to day life. I have a strong belief that we’re going to come out of this okay. But I’m not sure they’ll be the same people they were going in.

Obviously, none of us will be unchanged. But I was under the impression we’d become the stronger, better, truer versions of ourselves. And early on, I thought that was especially true for Clementine and the relationship I have with her. She and I were spending time together in ways we couldn’t when we were living our overscheduled lives and thanks to some really lovely evening walks and shared media and other bonding type activities I had visions of tender moments and whispered truths and confidences. And now it’s just  emerging adolescent emotions all over the place and a long strip of toilet paper inscribed with a frustrated message (yes, she was sulking in the bathroom because it’s the only room with a lock that isn’t her parents’ bedroom and that was the only paper product she had to write us her note) about how our expectations for calmness and kindness are unreasonable. 

Of course I’m glad she feels comfortable telling us this. And I’m glad we’re confident enough in our parenting to stand back and let her lash out. Until she turns violent, of course. And then it always gets worse before it gets better. Those big feelings really know how to transform demureness into chaos. She didn’t explicitly say that her inner turmoil stemmed from interactions with her sister, but I have no doubt that’s what kicked things into high gear.

Julia has not taken to isolation. She’s an extrovert who loves to be busy. Who wants undivided attention and showers of appreciation at every moment of her waking day. When she deigns to go to bed, she crashes hard. But every minute between wake up and lights must be occupied by activity and human contact. At school she was honing her project skills—focused time with a specific goal. Our attempts to recreate these have not gone well. But everyone else in the house desperately needs the downtime. Alone time. She does not. At least not in the same way. And so, by imposing a regular family quiet time each day, we are asking her to be someone she’s not.

When we tell her to leave us alone or to just be quiet for five minutes so we can concentrate on something that isn’t her—so we can do something to make her life better, even—she just falls to pieces. And I’m worried that the underlying message—the one that will persist—is that she doesn’t belong. That we don’t like her. That there’s something wrong with her joyful, exuberant spirit and her endearingly eager zest for life. Julia is a people person in the very best sense of the phrase. Loves being around them and cares deeply about them. She’s compassionate and considerate (except when she’s not because, you know, she’s still the age that she is) and she misses her friends terribly. I sometimes think we could be enough for during this difficult time because she loves us so deeply and we love her back. But even so, we all have our own tasks to complete, inner needs to fulfill. Tasks and needs that make no sense to her as she stumbles through these last few months of so-called “early childhood.”

The thought of her going through kindergarten in the isolation of our small apartment just breaks my heart. But it’s nothing compared to the growing fear that we may be breaking her by asking her to conform to the needs of the other personalities of our home—the two introverts that are her most frequent companions due to my own attempts to tread water for 40 hours a week at a job that does not deserve to be done at a desk in the corner of a bedroom, and the stressed out mother whom she idolizes and loves mostest of all despite the fact that the quality time to reinforce that love is all but nonexistent. Basically, none of us can provide the structure and constant activity she so desperately craves, nor can she model her own coping methods after ours.

We have a pod family now, a quaranteam if you will, but it’s not enough for Julia. It’s better than not having them, thankfully, but it’s a far cry from the summer of camp samplers and activities we had planned for her. And that’s true for Clementine too. Again, the quaranteam makes things better, but she’s the oldest kid in the group—only by six months, mind you, but it shows. The burden we place on her to help out with the little ones or model good behavior for the medium ones (yes, there are a lot of kids in our pod family). It’s taking a toll and it’s certainly not helped by aforementioned impending adolescence. Clementine, for all her introversion, misses her friends, her peers. She has virtual activities, including a regular Zoom where she and her BFF enjoy a much-needed weekly gripe fest about their parents, but these online pockets of human connection are no substitute for the empowering, horizon-expanding spring and summer we had planned for her.

Our kids need their village back. And I need it back for them, even more than for me. It’s okay that I wasn’t the best parent in the world before because I wasn’t operating in a vacuum. But COVID-19 has sucked the support structures and backup network right up. It’s finally starting to wear on me, now that we’re four months in. Four months in with who knows how many more to go. 

I’m working remotely for the rest of the calendar year, you see. It’s good to know that, of course, but the thought of doing that with kids underfoot and a wife desperate for alone time in this apartment that could have been her castle, now that both kids were finally going to school full-time, at the same school even? It’s pretty much the opposite of what this year was supposed to bring. And because we’re us, and we deal with stress in such different ways, it’s not something we’re talking about. Not until our school district makes its decisions about what will happen this fall.

Because that’s the elephant in the room, isn’t it? The elephant in the socially and emotionally distant classroom. Turns out, that’s where I stop laughing at memes. That’s where my signature dark humor fails to comfort me or provide temporary solace or even perspective. With all the terrible news in the world and all the difficult yet important reading to do, these are the articles I can’t bring myself to read,. I cannot bear to see in print exactly how nefarious the plan to bring down public education is and how truly awful all the so-called options for moving forward are. Uncertainty wasn’t any better of course, not really, but I think I’ve been so stressed about the uncertainty that I didn’t even know I was stressed about reality. I didn’t realize how deeply furious I am at the federal government and how deeply frustrated I am at the local one for not using even a fraction of these last four months to figure this porcini out. What the chanterelle were they thinking? And here I am typing at a screen, using mushrooms for curse words. Mushrooms, man. Mushrooms and viruses. I am not doing well at all.

Edited to add: The day after I wrote this, I got my period and boy do I feel better now. But I’m posting it anyway because writing is cathartic, especially after a long hiatus, and putting it out there into the world makes me feel a little less alone.

 

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May 23, 2020 · 9:15 am

Summer Grudging

Had me a blast? It certainly isn’t happening fast. And yet, here we are, more than two months in. Memorial Day weekend, the unofficial start of summer. And soon after, a birthday.  Another sure sign that summer is coming.

I’m trying very hard not to begrudge anyone their summers. But coronavirus is a green-eyed monster (with protein spikes all over its back? Points if you got that stretch of a literary reference…) and I do admit to jealousy. I’m sad, of course, that our grand adventures and not-so-grand-but-nonetheless-eagerly-anticipated summer camps have for thoroughly reasonable reasons beyond our control disappeared from our calendars (to be honest, I’m a bit relieved about the latter since I didn’t really want to be the one to make the decision about whether or not to send the children into those mostly-open-but-sometimes-closed air petri dishes) but the sadness is only part of it.

For the past few years, we’ve used this Memorial Day weekend to kick off our camping season, teaming up with other local families to collectively immerse ourselves in arboreal chaos and countryside. Campgrounds as one predicted weeks and months ago are closed so the trip didn’t happen, but so many of our would-be site-mates have set up tents in their own backyards for a homespun hideaway of suburban simulated survivalism this weekend. We, however, do not have a backyard. And therein lies the trouble.

Someone in one of my social media parenting groups asked why inflatable pools were suddenly sold out. The group went much easier on her than I was expecting. Indeed there is an abundance of aquatic apparatuses popping up all over the neighborhood, not to mention social media. As if I didn’t have enough to envy with the whole “privately owned outdoor spaces,” now they have to fill them up with splashes, squeals, and self-contained fun? Let’s please not discuss the people who choose do this in their front yards for my sad, masked children out for their daily constitutional to see.

It’s ridiculous of me, of course, because we’re all safe and we were even gifted a season pass to a now-limited-access beach (granted, we still have to make an advance reservation) but that lack of yard was one of the deliberately considered trade-offs we made when we decided to live in a big building with an indoor pool. The pool, you understand, is closed because it is “semi-public” (and let’s be honest, that’s not a bad thing on the logical level as I do NOT trust my neighbors to be safe and smart, especially watching them in the building’s other common spaces) and that means our main saving grace, the reason it’s okay we can’t build snow people in the dead of winter without journeying to a local park, or run sprinklers in the heat of summer, is not an option. And it would have been a such a great way for the kids to burn energy and move their bodies (raise your hand if you also have a bookworm thrilled by the new stay-at-home norms, much to the detriment of daily exercise—and to think that ours was supposed to be in a running club this spring!). Except there’s at least a month to go before it opens, and that’s assuming everyone (businesses and the people they serve) comports themselves in a manner befitting…well, a more reasonable populace. So we know how that will go.

Pessimism aside, however, it’s not shaping up to be a bad summer, per se. I just don’t relish the thought of spending it in a constant state of jealousy. As I’ve said before, envying people’s houses has never been my thing (I’d much rather seethe over their vacation photos, but haha everyone’s in that fully anchored boat now…except for the people who own second homes in idyllic wilderness, or even just plain different, locations…and dammit, I just did it again). Suffice it to say, I am disproportionately annoyed about my bitterness on this topic. It’s so unlike me and I don’t much want to be stuck in a house with this person I could become if I let myself wallow in it. So, once again, I turn to the blog to dump my feelings on the page, confess my privilege that this is my biggest frustration at the moment, and make you all feel guilty for posting fun summer pictures from your backyards on the Internet. (No, no, fellow bloggers, of course I don’t mean you. Your posts are actually some of my favorites, probably I only know you on the Internet (well, minus one of you, but that playground date was lovely (remember when we had playground dates?) and didn’t come with extra baggage like my local parenting networks).)

Wow, I just did three sets of embedded parentheses there; I should probably expand that out into an insightful analysis of online friendship and how knowing someone in person colors one’s reaction to their social media persona. Or not. But some non-whining, non-pandemic content would be good.

In the meantime, pandemic summary from Casa Citrus is as follows: We’re doing okay. Emotions can be a roller coaster,  but we’re safe, healthy, and unencumbered by the ongoing and impending collapse of social and economic systems. We’re going to donate stimulus money and refunded camp fees to various causes and do our part for the economy by buying a portable toilet for our car. Yeah, you heard me, friends and neighbors. One that fits grown-up butts (recommendations appreciated, by the way). Who’s jealous now, backyard campers, who’s jealous now?!

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April 29, 2020 · 10:18 am

Va-va-vroom

What is it called when drivers make allowances for other drivers who drive the same make and model of their car? Brand courtesy? I read it in a book once. And then, last year, when we needed a new car

In any case, I took Clementine to an art museum recently. [Edit: Not so recently now. I wrote this before the pandemic hit, obviously.] We were looking at a display and something in it reminded me of something her donor had written in his profile. I told her and she was thoroughly uninterested.

It made me glad that Lime and I decided to let her and Julia take the lead in any connections they want to make with their donor. This isn’t to slam anyone else’s choices, mind you, or imply superiority in my own. I’m not even saying it was the best course action for us. I’m just noting that it’s working out well. Clementine doesn’t care. Even though she’s old enough to. She doesn’t want more info about her donor and she doesn’t feel the need to meet any so-called diblings.

I know plenty of people who have. I’ve seen many more in my online queer parenting circles. Most of them are pleased to have done it. For their kids and also for themselves. “It’s great,” so many of them say, “to find these commonalities, between our kids and yes, between us, the parents, too.”

Turns out (if the stories are to be believed) there’s an affinity between people who choose the same anonymous donor. They’re looking for similar things. Have found similar things. Beyond the measurements and the catalogue of experiences, there’s a certain humanity, a personality, that people are looking for. I know that. I experienced that myself. There was a line in the profile, an answer he gave in his own words, that suddenly made me care less about his background, his health history, all the things I expected to care most about going in.

Did the other families who chose that donor also fall in love with that line? Would that suddenly make them people I want to be friends with? Would it mean they share my values? That they are raising their children with the same values as mine? Is that what actually drives those intangible connections between donor families or siblings, regardless of genetic similarities? Were we all in the market for the same thing, and that’s why we feel connected to each other?

I certainly do perk up when I see another car like mine. And when its driver behaves badly, I shake my fist at them for besmirching our league of drivers so egregiously. There’s an illogical tribalism to it. But it’s also true that we all made the choice to purchase that make and model for a reason. It seems ridiculous to compare our donor with a car, vehicles though they both were for moving our life forward. After all, despite the very similar research processes and on-paper comparisons, there was absolutely no way we were going to take the donor on a test drive.

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April 25, 2020 · 10:32 am

A Bouquet of Sadness

Let me say this up front: We are fine. Good even. Safe, healthy, happy. Privileged. The losses closest to me have been two degrees of separation. Everyone in my first degree circle who has had the disease (friends, family members, and acquaintances) has recovered. So without crushing grief, I am left with spots of sadness.

Sadness for Clementine, who this year was assigned a teacher who turns out to be both exemplary and her favorite one yet, and a shockingly wonderful combination of kids. I am so sad they don’t get to be in the classroom together this spring (although my sadness is nothing compared to the teacher’s—she is holding it to together but you can see how it breaks her heart).

Sadness for Julia, the extrovert who misses her friends and the structured socialization of preschool. I learned with Clementine that preschool friends don’t last (our preschool is not in the town we live in) but Julia needs that day-to-day human connection and it’s also sad she won’t get to close the year out with a portfolio and a moving on ceremony (although that’s nothing compared to the high school and college seniors who are graduating virtually this year, or even the elementary and middle school students who are leaving schools they’ve been in for many more hours of their lives).

Sadness that the birthday celebrations we had carefully planned for them did not and will not happen as planned. A sleepover, live theater, a whole host of outings (most which we carefully bought discount tickets for well in advance so we could afford full price on the ones that did not offer a discount), and a large gathering of loved ones in a public place (Julia’s actual birthday is on a weekend this year and she had such plans for the guest list!).

Sadness that the summer road trip we planned (with our new car that perhaps we should have waited to buy after all?) will not happen. It’s a trip I’ve been wanting to take since I was a kid, that I’ve been waiting to take until the kids were old enough to appreciate it. (The saving grace is that we hadn’t actually booked anything, so we haven’t had to cancel anything.)

Sadness about the summer camp and camping reservations we’ve made, which haven’t been cancelled yet, but probably will be. We had things so carefully mapped out—the perfect balance of being away and being at home. Clementine’s first overnight camp and Julia’s first full day camp, carefully coordinated with the grownups’ work schedules for maximum productivity. Instead, it’s more of the same—all of us, at home together, in our very small apartment (but at least we can afford to lose the deposits if it comes to that, and neither of us is out of a job).

Sadness about the work events I had scheduled. One in particular was a special celebration for people who had been working very hard on things they were very proud of. As the pandemic crept into visibility, my signature event of the year was slowly whittled down to nothing—or nothing more than a recorded video call—and although part of me was relieved not to be hosting it, I was so sad for the celebrants. Maybe we’ll schedule it when we go back to work…whenever that is. But our team (read: director) has been so bad at planning over the years and this was the year we finally did it (the director left, you see, for another job). So many events postponed indefinitely, and when we reschedule them, it will be in fierce competition with the events we had planned for next year.

Sadness about next year, even. A major anniversary, milestone birthdays, and even a wedding. Balancing that with my workplace’s own milestone year was going to be tricky but we had advance notice! Until the uncertainty set in. So much uncertainty. (I can only imagine how the wedding couple is feeling…)

Sadness about our apartment. We love our apartment. The location, the coziness of it, the stuff we filled it with. There are reasons, good ones even, we never moved to a house. But now the condo feels so cramped. The pool in the building is closed, for good reason (even if it were open, I don’t know if I trust my neighbors enough to throw my children into that vast chlorinated puddle) but to unfortunate effect. It’s the less-apocalyptic version of that article I read stating, beautifully, “so much for stockpiling weaponry; it’s not the butchers who will get out of this but the bakers”—it’s okay that we didn’t have a yard to play in because we have a pool and live near parks. So much for that. (But of course our ability to shelter and feed ourselves is not in question.)

And plenty of little moments as well. The greenery to round out the flowering disappointments. None of it lasts forever or even very long. Most of it is fleeting like the colorful blossoms popping up in the world we can only sort of explore, and curls back up until its next bloom. This post is not a complaining post; it is a documenting post. I don’t need validation or sympathy or perspective. This post is a vase, collecting the flowers for in the moments that I have them.

We used to get flowers at the grocery story, you see, as a special day-brightening treat when the budget allowed. Although this post is not the collection of cheerfulness that those bouquets were, the comparison is apt. The things I am sad about are not essential things. They are luxuries, a detour from the aisles of daily life. But seeing them on our table—tabled, even—is helpful. Acknowledgement. Reminders that these are losses we can handle. I do not have a green thumb; I cannot keep a garden or even a houseplant alive. But the bouquet I can manage.

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March 22, 2020 · 2:30 pm

Notes From a Social Distance

Well, this seems as good a place as any to chronicle my thoughts about being stuck at home with more people than there are rooms with doors. (Methinks open floor plans will not be so popular when the housing market picks back up again.)

  1. I wonder if phone calls will make a triumphant return in this age of texts and telephonaphobia!
  2. Remote work is not grating on me yet, although I do miss my desk chair. Folding chair and folding table in the corner of the bedroom are not exactly the ergonomic dream of the apocalypse.
  3. It’s amusing to see the stark difference in attitudes (and Zoom meeting requests) between my group members who desperately miss the office and its collegiality and those who are utterly thrilled to be remote and secretly (okay, not so secretly) hope the mandate to work off-site goes on for months even after the crisis resolves (because it will, dammit).
  4. My kids are an almost-perfect age for this. Julia could stand to be a bit older (read: self sufficient) but neither of them is annoyingly underfoot (toddlers!) or pissed at us for forbidding them contact with their friends (teens!) and their academics are not so demanding that I worry about them missing out. Mostly I’m annoyed that this is going to interfere with summer vacation and camp.
  5. I do not enjoy being on Facebook. My feed is actually a decent mix of news, creativity, and support, but I find the whole thing so overwhelming. Sometimes it’s the tenuous balance between information-sharing and fear-mongering but more often than not, it’s the other parents. Invitation to join groups and virtual gatherings, suggestions for activities and ways to help—I am simultaneously grateful and embittered. And behind it all, there’s a bizarre balance of fatalistic joking (the “send more wine” and “if I murder my children, I’m blaming it on virus” moms) and smug optimism (“I’m so glad to be spending this time with my children” and “look at this amazing artwork we did”) that makes me want to never be friends with any of these people IRL ever again. (Except I really DO like them in real life!)
  6. I’m really glad I like the people in my family. And I’m really glad we decided to have that second kid. Things are not totally smooth sailing but we’ve been okay at entertaining each other in various combinations. And thank goodness we spent all that time working on our children’s self-awareness regarding introversion and extraversion. There are those memes going around about how introverts have been preparing their whole lives for social distancing and how introverts really need to check on their extrovert friends who are probably not okay, but thus far, we’re not seeing that pattern, on either side of the Myers-Brigs. Routines and regular outdoors time are our current keys to happiness. (Related: May I just say that I am Very Conflicted about the prospect of a state- or city-wide lockdown?)
  7. I 100% appreciate that my wife has scattered printed-out crossword puzzles and word searches around the vertical surfaces of our apartment.
  8. Yeah, we bought a printer. Sorry trees.

I am sure I have more thoughts, about the current situation (and other things as well) but that feels like enough for now. Thank you to the folks out there on the frontlines, and to everyone who is doing the right thing and erring on the side of caution so the frontline people can be at their best possible readiness, and a giant CURSE WORD to the policymakers whose actions and inactions have contributed to and are exacerbating this period of uncertainty and danger. Here’s a little online quiz for you:

Fill in the blank. ________________ now.

a. Apocalypse
b. Revolution
c. Any day

We’re all educators these days, people.

 

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December 31, 2019 · 9:25 am

Trapped

But in the best possible way.

Clementine’s holiday present to Julia was a “special sister sleepover” and last night was the night. We set up the beloved but culturally appropriative play tent in the living room (our apartment is really small so that’s the only non-bedroom space available), bedecked it with fairy lights, laid out their sleeping bags, placed an order for pizza, and sequestered ourselves in our bedroom (“you can come out to use the bathroom, but that’s IT! Well, or to tell us to go to sleep if we’re up late like 10:30. And you can get water.”) for the night.

Over the course of the evening, we heard strains of a recorder concert (yes, it’s That Year in school for Clem and while I recognize the value of the instrument in a solid music education, it’s not exactly the most pleasant homework she has to complete) drifting over the clangs and bangs of our own media entertainment and the quiet giggles of two girls enjoying unlimited access to the Girl Scout cookies Clem had purchased for the occasion. Eventually Julia went to sleep (did they brush their teeth? probably not…) and Clementine snuggled down with a book until far too late (as per usual). I was called in at various points to to assist with the noise machine, fix the ties on the tent, and deliver craft supplies, but now I’m still sequestered in my bedroom, typing this on my phone, wife asleep by my side, and wondering if it’s Quiet Too Quiet out there. (I know they’re awake. Have they eaten? Is hanger imminent?!) But I will not investigate, even if my stomach is ready to eat itself. Because what is a bit of hunger in exchange for ending the year with a bit of sisterly magic. Dude. We made SISTERS.

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August 21, 2019 · 6:52 am

Having two moms is lousy!

Well, I’ve inadvertently stumbled on a disadvantage to being a two-mom family. Statistically speaking, moms get head lice more frequently than dads. And, as the expert told us last week, good moms get them more often than bad ones!

Okay, that was kind of judge-y. Obviously it’s about behaviors and choices—long hair vs. short, being present, tendency to snuggle with kids, etc.—not inherent personality traits or gender essentialism. But one looks for humor and validation where one can find it, you know? Especially when one is elbows deep in tea tree, eucalyptus, and peppermint oil, stuck in front of the television watching inane children’s shows while your daughters’ hair is carefully combed through.

Yes, Clementine managed to host an impressive number of head lice this summer. Apparently they’d been building their community since before school let out, resulting in approximately 150 adults, several hundred nymphs, and even more nits. Julia, Lime, and I only had a hundred or so between the three of us.

I tell you this here rather than posting on Facebook—which is a shame, really, because I wanted to both recommend the local lice treatment center AND make fun of their vaguely sexist video intended to reassure panicked mothers—because I don’t want to make all our friends itchy. (We did tell the friends who hang out with us most often and whose children are most likely to have snuggled with ours, of course, so they could do their own checks/treatment. It was touch and go for a while, but I think Clem’s BFF’s mom is going to forgive us…eventually.)

So this is a fun way to end the summer, isn’t it? And what’s that stereotype about lesbians who overanalyze everything? I mean, I’m not a lesbian myself but I’m married to one and I do love to nitpick! This just wasn’t what I had in mind.

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August 2, 2019 · 9:55 am

Playing anti-favorites

It is no secret that I am Julia’s favorite. Among her three moms, I am by far the preferred one. The feeling…is not mutual. I love her and I love Clementine. (I love Lime too, but that’s not the conversation we’re having.) Not equally of course—that’s impossible—but not unevenly either. Lime on the other hand? Well, that’s trickier.

I know Lime enjoys our older child’s company more. And there are a lot of good reasons for it. Three year olds are…donkeybutts. Preschool is only a few mornings a week. Clementine is in school six hours a day and absorbed in her books the other eighteen. (I kid—she does sleep every now and then. When her in-bed reading light runs out of charge.) Julia is clingy and few things make one crave distance quite so much as someone who won’t let you call your body or your thoughts your own. Clementine is coming up on new levels of independence, on that embarrassed-by-her-parents stage, so quality time is at a premium. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and familiarity breeds contempt. Et cetera, et cetera. Lime is, after all, the at-home parent. With a second child who is more challenging than the first. And that’s truly what it is. It’s not an NGP thing. We established that already. But here’s the catch: As the GP, I am weirdly offended.

You see, many of the things that (rightly!) frustrate Lime about Julia are things she has in common with me. The inability to stop talking. The poor handling of criticism. The inability to sleep for long periods of time. The tendency to yell when things don’t go her way or someone dares tell her no. Personality things. Nature-over-nurture things. Things I very well could have passed down to her through genes (or epigenetic factors, I suppose). This is probably the “weird genetic stuff” one of my local queer parent acquaintances was talking about when I asked them about their own swapping uterus adventures.

I know I’m being illogical (ooh, there’s another thing she might have gotten from me!) but it makes me feel guilty (which I had anticipated coming into this whole two-uterus situation) and, less expected, defective. When Lime expresses frustration about Julia’s chatterbox ways, I don’t just feel that she blames me for them but that she also hates my being that way too. So it’s not even that I feel protective of Julia, maligned though she may be by impatience borne of her mama’s under-caffeination and lack of sleep, it’s that I her mommy feel rejected by my wife for who I am. Because I had the nerve to put those parts of me into another human in the world.

Julia really is a wonderful human. We both agree on that. We even agree that there are many admirable qualities about her—including many that her sister does not also have. But somehow the combination of my own flaws (let’s be honest; I don’t actually care for my yelling tendencies either) and inherent 3 and 4 year old ness (yeah, the threenagerness doesn’t magically evaporate on the fourth anniversary of birth) is not great for my self esteem. The things that inspire Lime’s resentment feel like grains of sand–those things about your partner you ignore going into the relationship because you love all the other things about them, the tiny differences you hope won’t become big issues in your marriage–grown into a rather frustrating pearl now that they are magnified by the body and soul that sprung somehow from your ovary, uterus, and/or loins.

I don’t see Julia as an extension of myself (goodness knows I am amazed by her redeeming and resplendent qualities without seeing myself in them!) except when my wife is upset with her. It’s some weird gestational version of “if 99 reviews are positive and 1 is negative, you bet your…donkey…that it’s that last one you’re going to take personally.” But it’s been bothering me lately. Although hopefully less so now that I took the time to write it all out? Thanks for reading, friends! You’re my favorite!

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April 22, 2019 · 10:30 am

Liminal Minds

“Oh she’s almost walking, is she? You’re about to be in for it now!”

A common refrain but not a sentiment I ever shared. That time between crawling and walking is far more stressful than either side of that. Certainly the fleeting period of 5-8 months (or whatever it is) when they can sit up properly and be counted on to stay where you put them is glorious. Crawling was exciting—for better AND for worse—but walking was just liberating. Sure, the go doesn’t always come with a reliable stop, but there’s a lot to be said for not hunching over to stick your fingers between their fingers or making mad dives for whatever piece of unsecured furniture has been chosen to assist in pulling up. Walking was a serious improvement over cruising even if it did mean the baby months were officially over.

Learning to swim is not quite the same thing but it feels rather like deja vu to me. Deja vu with added terror. An even more pressing need to hover and even more dreadful uncertainty as to when the young learner’s newfound skills will suddenly desert her. Falling to the ground is one thing, but the water is something else entirely. I was content to let both my kids bounce off the floor, but large bodies of water are not to be trifled with.

Julia has weekly private lessons (another thing I swore before parenthood I would never do as a parent, but when group lessons utterly fail to teach the first child to swim and you find a local college student to teach her 1:1, you might as well pay them twice as much and give them the younger one as well) and she recently swam halfway across the pool three times in a row. “I knew she could swim!” exclaimed my wife, upon seeing the video, and that may be so, but the feat is yet to be repeated in subsequent lessons. No one can tell if it’s performance anxiety brought on by previous success or an actual lack of endurance, but neither parent is willing to let her flail too far from our arms to find out. Her form is lacking and her confidence is shaky, so by her side we remain with summer fast approaching.

My wife is adamant that she not return to her Puddle Jumper (highly recommend if anyone with a toddler is wondering which flotation device to invest in). It remains to be seen how we will handle watercraft (perhaps it is time to dig out Clementine’s old life jacket) or the ocean (which Julia is loathe to swim in anyway) but I foresee a summer of uncertainty ahead. Clementine was not nearly so uncertain—she didn’t swim and then, suddenly, she did. Or maybe her liminal period was in wintertime so it was less of any issue. Either way, this is all a long way round to say: I am ready for Julia to swim now, thank you very much.

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