Lucky

Oh March, you emotional bastard, you.

Tomorrow I will celebrate my mom on the two year anniversary of her death. The very next day I will celebrate my son as he turns nine.

Two years.

Time moves faster now. I laugh more, I laugh harder. I save less for rainy days, I eat way too much dessert. I am quieter, a better listener. I internalize more, I am less argumentative, and I do not want to talk politics with you. I try not to say "I don't know how you do it" because I know you don't know either.

I love more.

Most days I know I'm lucky to have had my mom as long as I did.

Because on Monday, a friend who'd already lost her mom to cancer, lost her dad, too.

Because two weeks ago marked the 4 year anniversary of my former brother-in-law taking his own life, leaving behind my then 8 year old nephew.

Because another of my son's friends, 8 years old with a 6 year old brother, just lost his dad to kidney failure, joining three more of his peers and their siblings who already lost their dads to cancer, all in the very small circle of people we know.

I am grateful for the thirty-two years we had.

On the hard days I look at my two youngest and I am ungraciously jealous.

There's the enchantingly feisty granddaughter she so badly wanted and didn't really get to know, who has doubled in age and has hair on her head and opinions and says something brilliant every day; my little girl, who dreams out loud about how wonderful it would be to have a grandma, just like Max & Ruby on tv. The baby, and oh did she looove babies, especially mine, who uses his security blanket and smiling eyes to drag random strangers in games of peek-a-boo from 25 feet away, who is so charmingly himself that admitted non-baby-loving people are constantly stopping to tell us that for him they'd convert. And for my almost nine year old, who told me again recently that he can no longer remember her voice, but remembers how she made him feel.


I am so very lucky for all that I have, but tonight my heart wants more.

First Words

Last week it was "up," which I pretended was my mind playing tricks on me, screw the witnesses. Yesterday it was very clearly "ballballball!"

Ten and a half months has gone so fast...

First Year Bellylaughs

In the sandbox:

Whiplash recoil. What the?!
Tilt head, raise eyebrow.
A moment to ponder.
One finger test.
Sit back, think.
Light touch, five finger test.
Reflect.
Again. And again.
Threat assessment complete.
Lightbulb!
Hysterical, maniacal laughter and squealing.

Looking to me and his brother,
OMG YOU GUYS! Did you know that our sandbox has...wait for it...a bottom?

Like Grandmother, Like Granddaughter

Sometimes, when her hair is down, a little of her curl lost at preschool, the profile of her cheeks, her nose... Just for a split second, from the side, she is my mom.

Olive, 3, and the Overturn of Prop 8

"Boys can marry boys, but you can't marry chocolate cake. Or noodles."

Thank you, Betty Bunny.

Heavy Hearts

(Part One)

The verdict is in, and I believe it is right.

Lessons in Olive

At Olive's glowing parent teacher conference last week we were told, "She can read," and we were all, "Yeah, she has a lot of sight words," and they were like, "That's not what we mean." Apparently she has also already reached many end-of-the-year goals for the pre-kindergarten program she will attend next school year. (They are NAEYC accredited.) This, they emphasized, is especially mind-blowing since she only goes two mornings a week and has missed more than two months of school due to illness and her mother being a mysophobe. They asked us for goals, and we were like, "Can you make her scream at us less? Be a little more reasonable about, say, everything?" And, of course, they were like, "Whaaa? She's a delight! We've never seen her cry! Or have a tantrum!" She also doesn't swear, or yell "Don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining!" Oh, I see, she's not comfortable there yet. No problem, we'll stick our apologies back into our pockets and save them for next time.


Tonight Jason pulled out a book she'd never seen before, buried deep from her brother's learning to read days. She read the first 4-word sentence with 100% accuracy, and then the 5-word sentence that followed, and so on, until she realized Jason and I were making holy shitballs our 3 year old can read faces at each other.

She immediately threw the book aside and bellowed, "I don't know how to read!"

It sure was fun while it lasted.

Burn Notice

Olive has a doll that we are to refer to as her baby. It goes everywhere, except school.

"I was talking with your teacher today. I told her about your baby..."
Horrified whining. "MOOOOOOOMMM!"
"Wha?"
"SHE'S A SECRET AGENT!!!"

Fuck invisible friends. We've got spies, y'all.

That's My Daughter

So I'm getting out of the shower and over the baby monitor I hear 3 year old Olive raging @ "Gwam":

"YOU'RE A BABY! AND YOU'RE A DUMB-ASS! YOU'RE A BABY DUMB-ASS!!!"

Forget my strict no name-calling policy. Way to raise the insult bar and rip him a new one, dear.

Disclaimer:
I say a lot of things, but she didn't get this one from me.
(I think.)
And my 3rd grader thinks "darn" and "heck" are punishable by death naughty.
(He doesn't swear at all. For reals.)
Just finds ways to casually mention that he has a penis.
(All the time.)
(Like his father.)

My hands are full.

(Jason, not with penis, but I thank you in advance for the offer that I know is coming.)
(I know...hehe...coming.)

Fin.

My Little Licker

Know what else she licked that week? Bugs, off the front grille of my dirty minivan.

Finally one of my children gives a frick about penmanship.

And so declares Olive "I am going to practice my s's!"
"Knock yourself out."

Blessed quiet for 3 whole minutes, suddenly interrupted with mad scribbling.
"What happened?"
"I don't like this one! It looks like a dumb 5!!!"

Tears. The end.

I'm 34 now. Send crutches. And condoms.

You missed it? No worries, it just happened like an hour ago.

So on the eve of my 34th I sat down, knee fine, stood up, knee not fine = fell down, in a most ungracious manner. Now I can't walk. What a great reminder that I'm getting older. Did I mention that the sitting down/standing up/falling down thing happened on the toilet? With a sober stomach? Cause yeah, that makes me feel so much not better.

My dear husband assures me it's a late onset injury from last night's sexcapades, because we found a new style of condoms at Target last night, weeeeeeeeee, and because our over-sized garden tub has not grown with us. And all that last chance sex with one of us not being a mid-30-something.

Sad.
Really.

Us: "Ooh! Look at those! Jinx! Get those! Jinx!"
Third grader, again: "What are condoms?"
Me: "So there's like...30 in a box. One or two?"
Him: "Duh. Two."
Me: "It is a great value, but really?"
Him: "30...that's like two weeks worth, and they expire in...2014."
Me: "But we come to Target every day..."

More wine, please. And condoms. Because we're down to 56. And it's not even bedtime yet.

Watch Your Tone, Mister

An Olive storm blows in from the other side of the house and makes a screaching halt right in front of my dad and me. Arms outstretched by her sides, elbows bent, palms up, she emphasizes her point with exaggerated up and down action.

"Momma! Gwam is talking to me like he's a dult. But he's not a dult, he's a kid like me!" (Shaking little fists of fury.) "ARGH!"

A Sorta Epilogue

When I look back at my life over the last year all I can say is "Wow, I didn't see that coming."

In September 2010 I was preparing to mark six months since my mom's death. Slowly I was shedding all the stress and tension that came along with cancer, the stuff that had changed me into a person that I didn't recognize or like. Have you ever been 100% conscience of your bad behavior but unable or unwilling to stop yourself? That was me. And while the journey back continues to be longer than I ever would have expected, one year ago I was on the road and headed in the right direction. Approaching six months down without her I patted myself on the back for a job well done. That was until I realized that all the big firsts, like her birthday, my birthday, my dad's birthday, their wedding anniversary, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, blah blah blah were all going to be back-loaded into the second six months. Fuck.

So I started getting myself all worked up, because of all the firsts that had not yet passed. I was back to counting exactly how long it had been, though honestly, I'd never really stopped.

The plan was to give myself a year to grieve and breathe and recover, to find a new normal before plunging back into fertility treatments. I did not want to jeopardize a pregnancy with fresh grief -- I knew it would be hard enough to have a baby my mom would never hold.

And then one year ago today, the day before the six month anniversary of my mom's death, I found myself pregnant by surprise, from baby-making the good old fashioned way. It wasn't that getting pregnant on our own was impossible, just not very likely. Thirteen married years without birth control + an active sex life + lots of figurative standing on our heads trying to make a baby and here I was with an unplanned pregnancy. It was as funny as it was welcome.

And in the moments that followed the stick screaming pregnant I heard my mom saying she'd given me my silly six months and enough already! You want something to count? I'll give you something to count! Count how pregnant you are, and then when that's done, count how old he is.


This is Callum. Today he is 4 months, 2 weeks, and 5 days old.



He has blue eyes that everyone agrees look like the kind that will stay blue, the blue eyes that my mom always teased about.

"Why don't my grandchildren have blue eyes? Our family all has blue eyes!"

"I married a redhead! Okay, a redhead with brown eyes, but still...what do you want me to do? He's English, he's Irish, maybe even Scottish. Hell, we're practically inbreeding here."

Fourteen pounds of delicious blue-eyed baby love. Funny how you make plans only to have them tossed right out the window, and the life you didn't orchestrate turns out so much better.


For those of you trying to figure out the math he was born straddling the prematurity line amidst mucho drama. But that's a story for another day.

As My Husband Always Says

she's gonna be a hit in college.

Let's Play "I Spy"

I spy sperm. You?

(I am so glad I ordered two pairs.)

Too Much Chicken Run

Loading up in the Target parking lot

"That" she says, pointing to oil on the pavement in the empty parking space next to us, "is the stain from when we killed the chicken."

Look to husband. Did she just say...? Husband nods. Yes she did.

"It's okay Mommy. We made him into a pie."

Oh. Well then.

PC Olive

"Gwam, it's kinda funny, but it's NOT cool!"

Hey Asshole, Get Over Yourself

"Half the bloody world is going through a divorce, more than that are having children. All of us have parents who are dying, or have died. It's just the life cycle."

-- Sarah McLachlan in the L.A. Times

I recently learned that the parent of a friend has been diagnosed with early-onset dementia. My friend packed up her husband and kids, sold her house, left a job she loves in her chosen field, and moved 2,000+ miles back into her childhood home.

Brain cancer and dementia are two very different diagnoses, but they have a lot in common, among them loss of function, personality changes, and having to take the car keys away from a parent against their will. And death. Almost like brain cancer, but without the radiation and chemo.

...

I spent a long time trying to wrap my head around the fact that my grandmother, my mom's mom, had died at the very early age of 74, but my mom? 59 at diagnosis. If 74 was young, what the hell was 60 or 61? Here I was in my very early 30s and my friends were now losing their grandparents. What the fuck?

And then I read the above excerpt and it hit me. My college roommate lost her dad from a sudden heart attack our freshman year. At least four girlfriends, all a few years older than me, lost their moms to breast cancer a few years back. Plus my old Jazzercise instructor, and another woman from our class, who is now losing her dad, too.

I wasn't that young, and neither was my mom. I was not alone, just temporarily blinded by grief.

...

I can look back now at the seventeen months on that damn emotional roller coaster knowing that the hard part is over. With the stress of my mom's illness gone only the sadness remains. I cannot begin to put into words how much easier and uncomplicated my life is now vs. a year ago.

I think of my friend. Her mom's expected life expectancy? Six to ten years. Forget the uncertainty of will it be six years, or ten, or maybe just four? How much time will they have? My friend has an average of six to ten years of slow moving hell in front of her. All of it, for years, and the majority of her children's childhood.

As it turns out we got off easy. Who knew?

Lives, Lost

We met in a college French class, and during my 5 years in Colorado she was my best friend. To this day she remains the kindest, most gentle person I have ever met. I don't know how to put it into words, except to say that even in a place as granola as Boulder, she was the embodiment of Mother Earth.

I have a million wonderful smiling pictures of her, but this one of her and my son has always been my favorite.


She was so excited when I became pregnant with that little guy that she came to visit us in Phoenix just so she could put her hands on my 4 months pregnant belly. When he was 3 months old I brought him up to her. All I remember from that trip is laying on a bed, the two of us spending hours pouring over his little body and soaking up his babyness.


I hadn't seen her face to face in two years, but in our short exchanges through email and facebook I sensed she was having a hard time adjusting to motherhood. Caught up in my own family drama, I didn't reach out the way I should have, despite the fact that she had reached out to support me when my mom was dying. Even though I had yet to meet him, I loved her son fiercely through his pictures. His round little face and perfect boy hair reminded me so much of my own son as a baby.

According to the media the fact that she was suffering from post partum depression wasn't a secret -- her family knew, medical professionals knew, her neighbors even knew. And she was trying to find help.

I know I'm angry and hurt and devastated and irrational, but really, it never should have happened, not in a million years.


RIP sweet baby.

According to Olive

"Bunyees go RAWR!"

Two Weeks

Two weeks to the day after losing my Mom we spent the night at the vet, very unexpectedly putting our cat to sleep.

Back to raw.


Rest in peace, Belle. You were a little shit from day one, but in a super cool kind of way. You and your naughty antics will be missed.

(Tinker)Belle, 2001-2010

Day One: Trying to Use My Words

What I really wanted and needed today was have some quiet time to myself. Quiet time, by myself, uninterrupted.

Strike one, husband had to work. Strike two, my little guy's birthday. Strike three, stay at home mom of an easily angered 23.5 month old. Strike four, I don't want to turn off my phone because there are people I want to be able to reach me: my kid's school, my husband, and my dad.

First thing first, after being told explicitly by her brother last night that I wanted a day without phones, and then reading on Facebook this morning that I wanted to have a day without phones, my sister-in-law, who last year didn't call, didn't send a present, or even a frickin card for either of my kid's birthdays, sends me a Facebook message wanting to know if it's okay for her to call. Right, because when your brother said, "The one and only thing you can do for Heidi right now is NOT CALL" he totally didn't mean it. It's opposite day, y'all!

In the 35 minutes that I was in the Cracker's classroom this afternoon I received 7 unsolicited text messages. The kids actually stopped singing happy birthday to my child to yell out "YOUR PHONE IS BEEPING AGAIN!" I don't have a text plan because I am a stay at home mom. If I can't talk then I can't text either. Seriously, if it isn't need-to-know-right-now-or-the-universe-explodes information fucking e-mail it to me. I promise I will enjoy your non-time-sensitive messages a few minutes (or, gasp, hours!) later when they don't cost me a quarter each. Really, seven BEEP!BEEP!BEEP! texts during a 35 minute party? No, not disruptive at all.

BUT HERE'S THE CAKE!

Scene: The Cracker's classroom. Enter Carmen's mom.

"How is your mom?"
Whispering. "She's gone. (Gulp.) But I'm here to celebrate the Cracker's birthday and he doesn't know."
"HIS ACTUAL BIRTHDAY IS TODAY?"
"It is."
"When?"
"What?"
"When did she die?"
"Yesterday. But the Cracker doesn't know. I can't talk about it right now." And the kid is 5 feet away. Pretty sure this was the point at which I put my sunglasses on, cause you know, welling up now.
"When yesterday?"
Lady, I don't even know your first name. Fuck, I don't even know your your last name.
"Early afternoon. Excuse me, I need to go set up."
She follows. The Cracker comes over and attaches himself to my leg.
"Oh I think he knows. He was so sad yesterday. When are you going home?"
"We're not."
"Is she being cremated?"

What the fuck is wrong with people?! I am using my big girl words. Why can't they listen?

Rest In Peace

1948-2010

The End of the End

When we first had to tell my son that his beloved grandmother was dying he was 5 and a half years old. The only way I could think of to express maybe months, maybe a year, was to tell him that while she would probably live to see him be 6, we didn't have much hope that she'd make it to see him turn 7.

When Christmas 2009 passed March 30th became her new goal.

We never told my mom about what we'd told him, though I suspected she knew. More than once he broke down and tried to get her to promise that she'd come to his 7th birthday party. It was obviously more to him than regular birthday milestone.

After she made it past the hurdles of mid-February, the days where we thought she wouldn't make it through the night, I found myself worrying about the worst case scenario.

Please not near his birthday. A two week cushion, minimum, is not too much to ask for, right?

On Saturday the hospice nurses volunteered that my mom has taken a final turn, one that suggests she has reached her final 48-72 hours.

On Tuesday my little boy turns 7.

Please let them be wrong.