Bippity Boppity BOO !

Once upon a time there was a fairy princess...

I don't know why, but lately I've been getting a big kick out of these old pictures of me. Maybe I'm a little homesick. Maybe I am just envious of the innocence I see.

The gown was a pink flannel nightgown, with silver paper doilies sewn on, and the crown and wand were covered with foil. I thought it was awesome! I guess shoes weren't in the budget...

just a light in the darkness..

For sometime now the living room has been empty. It was painted and all the old furniture moved to for the ultimate makeover. The Christmas fever descended on my youngest the day after Thanksgiving and I found myself dragging three boxes of Christmas decorations down to the empty treeless room. Within an hour it and her face were transformed by the soft glow of hundreds of lights winding in loopy trails all around the floor. She sat in the midst of it, smiling at me--illuminated, luminous. So magical and beautiful.
I am thankful for that face and the wisdom of it. Joy is really a simple thing. Hang around a kid long enough and they'll remind you.

The pox on it

K1 is doing a report on disease in the 17th and 18th century. We were just talking about small pox. It was not long ago in my line of work there were meetings and training and signup sheets for volunteers willing to recieve the first immunizations and participate in the mass vaccinations of population that would follow. We were shown photos, thankfully old ones since small pox has been allegedly erradicated. I thought of my professional exposure and my children. For a moment or two I glimpsed a panic of self preservation that can make the best organization unravel. And then I was again safe in my present. My well fed and healthy present. We are bessed, lucky and spoiled. So when our turn comes, we should not complain.

Sock conspiracy

One closet down, five to go. What is it about spring and fall that make me want to turn everything upside down and rebuild it? I always have the fantasy of finding the mates to all the lost socks. Never happens. I bet as soon as I give up on an orphan and chuck it, the mate turns up and I hold onto it thinking "I've just seen it somewhere". Maybe I should date stamp them or something. Each orphan is allowed 30 days in the sock basket, before it shall be vanquished (I've been watching alot of Charmed lately).

So that is about as profound as I feel like getting today. I am off to the upstairs realm to further rummage, sort and chuck.

The dangers of dinner time

Last night at the dinner table I was accosted by the pigtail gang. It wasn't pretty believe me... I gave them the slip at homework time and made my escape.

Thank god for homework.

Everyone has a unique perspective.

Must've done something right!

Yesterday there was no school and after the kids did the homework they had shunned the night before we went to... The Mall. Yes, that beehive of consumerism. I suppose I do the bees an injustice since they are not flying into the hive with little credit cards to buy honey with money(a poet!) they don't have. Well, anyway, you get the picture. I hate the mall because, like tabloid news of Britney Spears, it fascinates and disgusts me at the same time. I feel that inner whinny child awaken in me to scream "I want! I want!". Yet the genes I carry from my immigrant parents are appalled at the prices so brazenly asked for such shoddy goods, and the marketing machine that assumes you believe you are getting a bargain. I think the scariest thing for me is to watch the kids in the mall. The little buyers.

Little K2, with all of 8 years of shopping experience( if you include stroller time), entered Claire's on a mission to buy something with the remains of her birthday money. She circled and circled glittering pink garden of lipgloss eden. Finally I suggested a wallet that I knew she could not resist. Pink metallic pretend-leather with huge gem stones glued on it. I just wanted to get done in the store. I did not intend the lesson that unfolded. K2 was thrilled, she dug out her dollars and we counted pennies. She had barely enough. Then I dropped the bomb. You can buy the wallet, but you will only have a few pennies of all this money left to put in it. Is it worth it? Or would you rather keep the money and find some wallet or ziplock back or altoids tin at home to keep it in? She put the wallet back and marched out of the store, a little frustrated, but unscathed.
Mom -1 Mall- 0

The best was in abercrombie, whose marketing strategy seems to be to confront you with the super-sized bare chested male model that you will neither be or see in real life (not to be confused with reality tv) and then pound your brain with some nondescript dance music until you submit to buying their tissue paper T-shirt for an arm and both legs. I often refuse to walk on that side of the mall, much less go in there, but alas, K1 had several gift cards burning a hole in her purse. K2, bless her, is as sensitive to loud noise as I am, so she walked around with her hands over her ears. Several well outfitted twiggy teens were sifting through the clothing, looking like a scene from Laguna Beach or the Hills. Occasionally you'd see a suburban mom-in-waiting trailing along while her bright faced daughter darted eagerly from rack to rack. Finally K2 and I retreated to the bench outside and let K1 browse.

K1 came out with a very large bag with that naked man on it, and a very small little shirt in it. She did not look satisfied. She complained that the prices where too high, and the people that work there weren't really nice. I asked why and she mimicked quite satisfactorily the huge pec man who complained he'd worked all day and had to go to the gym, and very tan girl who couldn't wait to get done to go home and tan. She used the words "phony", "not real" and "get a life."

I was so proud.

Coming soon...

The splendidly mundane adventures of ..

HARD ROCK MAN

TGI Monday

I'm not sure what happened this weekend. I feel hung over and didn't even drink. Maybe I should have. K1 is better though I took her to the doc for a check over and she has a walking pneumonia, which so explains the lingering fatgue. Another Z pak ought to fix it. I should get me some of that... Any way she is now teaching K2 a cheerleading routine and they are getting along fightening well. Nothing like a little illness to make everyone enjoy each other more. SHHH... (knock on wood)

If everyone goes to school this week, I may regain my balance.

K2 is doing a research project on a rebel and she chose Katharine Hepburn. I went to the library to pull some books for her while she was home sick, and, of course, came home with one or two on the subject that I wanted to read myself. The story begins with her grandparents and describes the suicides of her grand father and uncle, and the precarious position the women where left in financially and socially. The utter dependence on men which drove her grandmother to push KH's mother and aunts into college even though educated women where undesirable. KH's mother fought for women's suffrage and birth control. Her aunt went through medical school and was appalled by the treatment of venereal disease. At a time when there was no treatment yet for gonorrhea or syphilis, women were infected, and hysterectomies performed if they did not die from it. Often the men divorced them for infertility or adultery,using the disease they infected their wife with as proof. When young brides died it was called "honeymoon appendicitis" and routinely covered up, even to the patient. It was a truly appalling time. I read it out loud with my 13 year old daughter next to me, and she was amazed. Study hard, never give up your independence I said, never let that happen again. Was there ever a time, in any cultures history, that women perpetrated such a thing on men? How does this happen?

What, it's over already???

How typical of holidays. The enormous anticipation. The flurry of frantic preparation-- and then, it's over, done, finito. There's that morning after of decorations around the house. I just put them up, should I take them down already? Seems like a lot of wasted effort. And then there's Christmas... I was in the stores on the Saturday before Halloween and all the costumes were gone and the shelves were stocked with Christmas stuff. Reminds me of one blizzardy March when I lost one of my winter gloves and searched through a department store full of shorts and bathing suits.

K2 went trick or treating, all glittered again, and K1 stayed home with me to watch Charmed and not (!) eat the 5 lbs of candy I got for the trick or treaters that never came (we have a long driveway, but I like to be prepared). At least I'm stocked up for every possible mood swing until April. Somehow the candy always disappears. I think the little gremlins come in at night and eat them because I am always finding the wrappers behind the couch. They sometimes smear some chocolate on K2's cheeks, too, probably hoping I'll blame her.

K1 finally made it through a whole day of school, and I was so happy to hear her back to the chatter box she usually is. Some virus. She is still tired, but at least not to tears anymore.

K2 is standing next to me singing a song from Spirit(the horse movie, not deity) at the top of her lungs, thumbing through a toy catalog with kid-size Cadillac Escalades in it. She points out a big doll house identical to the one she had two or three years ago, which collected dust, then clutter and now resides at the dump. And so the next season begins. When I worked in the hospital a young nurse I trained would sing a happy song when the stress became extreme, just to break the tension. Sort of like the insane giggle but more socially acceptable. That song was jingle bells. It worked.
So as the new season begins, I sing jingle bells -- but for me it has a slightly different meaning...