But then, everyone has suffered, so we're talking hypotheticals here.

Dana's Apr. 29 blog starts off with a couple of big questions, the first of which is, "Do you think suffering is a necessary part of everyone's life? In other words, do you feel your own experience has made you a 'better' person?"

I was thinking this morning about a book I read many years ago, in which the writer describes his idea of a future utopia. It's a vaguely socialist/communist vision, in which everyone does what they enjoy while a higher authority distributes to everyone what they need to do their job.

In one scene a visitor to this utopia, who is being guided about and shown all the details of this community, sees a man sitting by a pond, pensively feeding swans. The guide explains to the visitor that this man is a great writer, and that he needs these beautiful surroundings for inspiration. They approach the writer and he invites them into his house, which is very grand and filled with great works of art. While there the writer soliliquizes about the past fate of artists, how they were forced to live in squalor, required by circumstance and an unfeeling world to trade off their time between creating art and earning a living. He expresses horror at the barbarity of a society that would require an artist to support himself and marvels that any great art was created under such circumstances.

I've forgotten most of the rest of the book (it was truly bad, bad writing) but that chapter stuck in my head. I can never think about it without feeling torn between wanting to fall down laughing and wanting to grab the writer by the collar so I can slap him several times for his arrogance.

There are so many things wrong with this picture, but I'm not writing this to rant about artists who think talent means the world owes them a living. The fact is, in spite of this author's wish fulfillment fantasizing, the greatest art humanity has created came from people who were often experiencing the worst circumstances. Ludwig van Beethoven, Virginia Woolf, Vincent Van Gogh and on and on, experienced great suffering. I'd argue that it was that suffering that made them such great artists. Their suffering gave them the empathy and insight to create works of art that speak to the rest of us, the inspiration to create the sort of art that resonates in the soul and leaves its audience moved, thoughtful and feeling similarly inspired.

I've never lost a child, experienced racism or had to endure a vicious dictatorship. I've never lived in a war torn country or had to watch my loved ones starving. But I can understand the pain of those who have been through those things. I've known my own suffering, experienced my own pain and grief. I can take my experience and use it to imagine what I would feel in their place. While I may not comprehend exactly what they are feeling, I can understand well enough to weep with them. If I'm a good enough writer I can help my readers understand as well.

Someone who has never suffered is someone who has nothing to say. They can't understand what other people are going through in their lives because they have no place within them from which to draw understanding. Without that empathy, that ability to extrapolate from our experiences, it is impossible to create art or even to live a life that is anything other than superficial and empty. Relationships would be of the shallowest variety, accomplishments would be meaningless, nothing in life would have any savor to it. After all, if you've never tasted anything but sugar, you wouldn't know it was sweet. You have to experience salty, sour and bitter to appreciate and value the sweetness of sugar.

Feeding swans makes a pretty picture, but it doesn't make great art. Experiencing the vicissitudes of life doesn't hamstring our ability to create. On the contrary, every trial, every sorrow gives the artist greater empathy and their work greater depth. Nobody wants to go through trials and difficulties, but they are necessary. Without adversity we remain children, staring with wide-eyed incomprehension at the world around us.

I'm not about to start writing odes in praise of suffering, but I can look back at those times in my life that have been the hardest and value them. Although I railed against my suffering at those times, weeping and begging God to release me from my pain, I can see now what I learned and how I've grown. I wish it would have been possible to have accomplished this more easily; I wish I didn't have to learn the hard way. But I did and I do, and I am in no way unique. It's the way we humans are made. The greater our experience, the stronger the foundation for our imaginations.

In the end, ironically, it's our pain that gives us the strength to fly.

Not weird, not strange, just completely irrelevent search strings

Ever since I mentioned Spymaster in an entry at the beginning of the month I've been getting hits every day on it. And I'm not even in the first couple of pages. No, I'm #81 on Yahoo right now, and on page 12 at Google for the "spymaster tlc" search string. Although, "who were the participants on the 2004 spymaster show on tlc" did bring me up as #1 at Yahoo for some strange reason. And if you search for "narrator spymaster tlc" I'm #2 on Google.

If only I could have gotten a great combination of words like that when I was getting paid by the page visit for my About site.

There are some serious fans of that show if they're willing to drill through 12 pages of search results to find out everything they can about it. They must be so disappointed to find out I've only written an entry about sleeplessness.

Standing strong, if a little wobbily.

The baby stood alone last night. I was sitting on the floor and she was standing in front of me, supporting herself with a hand on my knee. Suddenly, she removed her hand and straightened to her full height. Wobble, wobble, wobble, aaaand, plop! down she went. But still, her first time standing alone. Wow. I'm grinning goofily even as I write this.

Unfortunately, this means I no longer have a remote.

New adventures with the minivan. I've been using the key that was in the ignition when I picked up the car from the dealership Monday, but last night I thought to myself, "Don't be so silly. You have a remote on the second set of keys, use them instead!" The remote didn't work though. "I need new batteries," I thought, and tried to open the door the old fashioned way.

Not a dead battery, after all. I had the wrong keys. Did they give me the wrong keys? Oh my! They gave me someone else's keys!

Then where is my key?

I called the dealership this morning. They were very happy. It seems these keys belong to a doctor, who is very upset, because they are very important keys. ("I don't know why he left them on the ring," the head mechanic grumbled over the phone to me.) They don't know, however, where my key is. They'll mail it if and when they find it.

You might be thinking, "Why didn't she question there being so many keys?" Well, I just thought that one was the master key, one was the valet key, and the two keys that looked like they went to a bicycle lock, well, maybe there was a locking gas cap? (No, I haven't needed to get gas yet. Whatever the deficiencies of this van, it does get great gas mileage.)

So, here I sit, waiting for someone from the dealership to show up. They sent someone to drive out here (an hour each way, mind you) to pick up those keys. He should be here in 10 minutes.

That must be one extremely unhappy doctor.

The Best Advice My Mother Ever Gave Me

My mother advised me one day when I was young, "Be careful what you let go into your mind. You can wash your body, you can weed out your closet, you can close a book or turn off a television, but what goes into your mind stays there. Be careful not to put anything in there that you don't want to come back to you at your most sacred times, because rest assured, the one thing you don't want to remember is what will pop into your mind just when it's most inconvenient."

Nothing changes but the size (and price) of their toys.

Our new van has cruise control. I like cruise control. It makes it easier to avoid speed creep on the freeway, not to mention giving my foot and leg a break. And, yes, it's kind of cool, too, to be driving with my foot on the floorboard and not on the pedal. What can I say? I really enjoy toys and gadgets. Just call me techno-geek.

Call the husband techno-geek too. His reasons for liking cruise control, though, would be in reverse order from mine. It's fun to use, and hey! it's useful on occasion. It's his toy and driving is only there to provide an excuse to use it.

This attitude causes some problems, because he insists on using cruise control all the time, no matter the circumstances. There we'll be, going down the street in heavy traffic, stop lights before and behind, pedestrians scattered across the intersections like so many video game points and the cruise control set to the exact speed limit. Never mind that the guy in front of us is going five miles under the limit.

Accelerating up inclines and coasting down slight hills, we'll slowly creep closer to his rear bumper, until I'm grasping the armrests in terror, muscles in my forearms rigid as I hold myself suspended slightly above the seat, my right foot pressing convulsively against the floor as if I could somehow control the brakes through sheer willpower.

It is at this point the husband will look at me and say, chidingly, "I'm using the cruise control, dear."

Ah, yes. I feel so much better now.

Fast Food World

They've been talking lately on this one list I'm on about weight and fast food, how much is individual responsibility, how much is evil corporate lures. I have to say that I agree whole-heartedly that fast food is something to be eaten sparingly, if at all. I also admit I tend to rely on it a little too much. For instance, our car is finally done and I can go get it! Yippee! Unfortunately, that's going to mean an hour's drive, each way. Add in the time making payments, signing papers, etc, and I'm going to be coping with two very hungry little girls. Fortunately there's a Sonic right down the block from the dealership. I can feed the toddler and the baby, not to mention myself, in the happy privacy of our car. And I do love their Club Chicken Toaster. Yum, yum, yum.

So not only is the toddler eating, in essence, junk food, she's not running around and playing hard like she normally would. Bad combination. It's not going to get any easier, either, with the teen here. I'm going to have to do more and more running him around. Even after we're all together again, the husband's new job is shaping to require many more hours than we had realized. The answer, as I see it, is to work even harder to make sure everything I make is healthy and to make sure they get as much activity as they can stand. And try really, really hard to avoid spending long hours in the car.

Dealing with the teen is another issue entirely. The husband did comment Saturday that he seems to have lost weight, which was a happy thing. We've made a change in our eating habits that the teen is very unhappy about, though. No more table sugar for our cereal. See, Friday I went to get the sugar out, so I could make the pie and the brownies. Only it was almost gone. By emptying the sugar canister, emptying the sugar bowl, and skimping heavily I was able to make what I needed. But we had no white sugar left in the house.

Now, since I bought a five pound bag of sugar only a couple of weeks ago we should have had around three quarters left. I made one batch of cookies and Friday's cooking. I really don't think the teen is eating sugar straight, no matter what his sweet tooth is, so after some thought it seemed most likely that it was all going into breakfast cereal.

Sooooo. We've switched to Splenda, and I won't be buying white sugar anymore unless I have a specific need for it. We're not going entirely sugar-free, just making this one small change. Little steps. He's freaked enough about this. This morning was the first morning with the Splenda and he complained bitterly about the after-taste. He used 5 packets on his cornflakes. Hmmm. Might there be a connection? (He's much more given to emotional than logical thinking right now!) Since I never use sweetening on my cereal I don't know how it tastes, but the husband said it tasted just fine to him.

The teen has also started walking his dog around the block every afternoon before doing his homework or getting on the computer. I didn't even have to suggest that; he just decided to start doing it. This is good. I am feeling very hopeful right now.

Learning to Walk

So, the baby is doing her best to blow through crawling and go straight to walking, the little stinker. If she keeps this up, she's going to be walking before she has teeth!

She started walking around while holding onto things Friday night after we got home from the auction (we brought home a Twinkie Cake, which is a horrifyingly yummy trifle-like concoction, made with - you guessed it - Twinkies instead of ladyfingers. I do not want to think about how many thousand calories are in each bite.) She rapidly tired of that and spent most of Saturday and today putting a great deal of effort and concentration into learning how to stand unsupported. She's really working on it, too. You can practically see her little mind working as she focuses, then lets go, wavers for a microsecond, then either falls down or grabs hold again. She'll also get up on her feet and hands, then wave one arm in the air behind her, trying to figure out to get up all the way.

The good news is, she's really wearing herself out with all this hard work. She's really happy and excited about all this, too, practically hooting when she gets especially close to success.

So what am I going to call her on here when she starts walking? Toddler #2?

So, I'll never win the Pillsbury Bake-Off. My life still has meaning, really, it does!

Our congregation is having a dinner and bake sale/auction tonight. It's an annual event, one of those looked-forward-to-all-year kind of things. The dinner is usually lackluster, which is being kind (the Scout troop puts it together and they're not exactly good cooks.) The auction, however, is a blast, the most fun we have together all year. (The money raised goes toward paying for the Scout's camp expenses, hence our enduring their cooking.) Everyone who has any baking skill brings their best dishes, and there are a few cooks, mostly older women, who are so talented that the bidding for their pies and cakes can rapidly get out of hand. It's worth going even if you aren't planning on buying anything just to watch the bidding wars that are sure to happen.

It's kind of sad the husband can't be here. He's coming home right after work, but it's such a long trip that he won't be home until around midnight probably. It will rest on my shoulders to try to get Peggy's pecan pie, and I fear I am not up to the challenge.

I'll be bringing Cherry-Blueberry Pie and Turtle Brownies (just regular fudge brownies made with pecans and with ice cream topping caramel in the middle.) My last year and my best effort yet to try to get some recognition as a cook. Yes, I'm competitive. Yes, I'm proud of my cooking. Unfortunately I'm trying to compete against people who have been cooking for 40 or 60 years. No wonder I can't bring in the big bucks. Well, after they taste my Cherry-Blueberry pie they'll be sorry! (Because I'm not coming back, not because I, like, spiked it or anything.)

Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies.

Only now you have permission to ask me any three questions you like! I'll answer them in the blog. In return you have to post the same offer on your blog.

Any questions?

Senile, or just the parent of a teen?

Sometimes the teen just flat out cracks me up. He does something or says something, and I am vividly reminded of doing the exact same thing when I was his age.

Tonight, just before bedtime, he tells me, "Oh, I forgot to say, you didn't give me the money for the play."

When I didn't answer quickly enough he went on, "You know, the two dollars?"

I remembered. His English class is going to Fiddler on the Roof tomorrow. So, this morning I very carefully gave him the permission slip, the money for the play, two midterm grade reports that needed a parent's signature, and the money and form for his school photos.

Obviously the money got lost in all that stuff, probably on a floor or sidewalk somewhere. Oh well. Stuff happens. Not a happy thing but definitely not the end of the world. Next time I will know to try to avoid that kind of confusion.

But I wasn't thinking about that right then. Instead I responded, "Yeah, I did. This morning? Remember? It was on top of those papers I gave back to you?"

He gave me a look so full of doubt and disbelief that it was nearly an accusation. "Weeeellll," he said, "I'll look again tomorrow."

His voice trailed off in a tangle of innuendo. I was either crazy or a liar, the tone said, but either way he was only humoring me. The money wasn't there, ergo, I hadn't given it to him.

I refrained from rolling my eyes as I gave him the money again. After all, I can remember thinking exactly the same thing about my parents.

Make mountains from molehills! Grow your own real estate, overnight!

It is becoming more and more apparent that if this dog is going to be properly house broken, it's going to be up to me to do it. The teen makes promises, only to immediately forget them. "Look! There's something new!" Animals and kids, not an ounce of attention span amongst the world-wide lot of them.

I keep reading about a technique where you take advantage of a dog's instinct to keep its nest clean by keeping it in a crate most of the time, just letting it out to relieve itself and to play (with maximum supervision.) I'm thinking that's what I'll do, but it just seems so mean.

See, this is exactly the sort of situation where I go all girly and let my emotions override my common sense. "Poor puppy! Look he's whining. We need to let him out so he can run wild and ruin all our carpets."

Spent all evening helping the teen write a three page paper contrasting and comparing Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story. He'd write for about three seconds, then, "Look! There's something new!" Whereupon I would put on my best evil stepmother face and ask, "Where are you on that paper?" He would complain that it wasn't fair that they were only given one night to write such a long paper, and I would remind him that life isn't fair. Yes, I'm turning into my parents. Frightening, isn't it?

At one point, after he announced that he was going to do a lousy job in protest at the injustice of it all, I even told him he was "cutting off his nose to spite his face." Could I sound anymore like my father? The only thing worse would be my mother's line. "You're making a mountain out of a molehill." If I ever use that line, could someone please pour chocolate down my throat until I come to my senses again?

Thoughts inspired by Brown v Board of Education.

I finally had a chance to read Sunday's Parade magazine. As you might already know, the cover story this week was about the upcoming 50 year anniversary of Brown v Board of Education. The writer, David Halberstam, talked about some of his experiences observing segregation and racism back then, one incident in particular involving Louis Armstrong. "... what I remember clearly all these years later," he wrote, "was his bus having to stop along the side of the road so that this proud and joyous man could slip into the bushes to answer the call of nature. In that America he was not allowed to use a gas-station toilet."

Several years ago a dear friend of ours was visiting one evening. He is retired military, like the husband, and perhaps inevitably they drifted into reminiscing about their active-duty days. Jim is of an earlier military generation than the husband, though, and so the husband listened more than talked, fascinated by Jim's stories of that previous era.

One of the stories was this: Early in his military career, Jim was transferred to an Air Force base on the west coast. For those of you not familiar with the military, when you are given orders to a new location it is up to you to make your own way there (unless for some reason it would be impossible to do so.) They'll cover the cost, but you generally either drive or use civilian transportation. After all, there are better uses for military planes.

So, Jim took the train from North Carolina to California, and as the trip went along, the train began to get crowded, especially in the black cars. Jim might have been serving his country, but his uniform didn't mean as much as the color of his skin. He rode with the other blacks in their carefully segregated passenger cars, which only kept filling up. Eventually, somewhere in the Midwest, Jim gave his seat to an older woman and stood in the aisle for the rest of the trip to California.

Now, Jim told this as an amusing story about crossing the country standing up. The segregation he mentioned only in passing, something thrown out as an incidental detail almost not worth mentioning. It hit the husband and myself, though, with greater impact than anything else he said that night.

My parents were young hippies in the 60s. They lived for a brief time in the South, when I was a baby, and were horrified by the racism they saw. It wasn't long before they fled back to the Pacific Northwest where they raised my brother and myself on stories of how horrible the South was. Being too young to remember anything about the civil rights struggle, and growing up in a (at that time) remarkably white area of the country, all I knew of racism was those stories. I grew up thinking of discrimination as a freakish and bizarre evil, something that used to exist in the olden days in places strange and twisted, but thankfully now mostly eradicated.

Of course I know better now, but those teachings lingered in my mind, forming a foundation for my perceptions of the world - until that night. I had never consciously realized that this man I loved, respected and admired, who I hoped would act as a surrogate grandfather to the children I looked to someday have, had been the target of that kind of ugliness. Reality broke over me like a wave with his story, leaving me breathless with horror. It made me sick to come face to face for the first time with the fact that there really were people in the world who just wouldn't ever see anything about him but his skin tones, who would never allow themselves to see his generosity, his great heart, his kind spirit.

I wish I had something pithy to say, something profound to wrap all this up, but I don't. Anything I write seems trite and foolish. Jim still has to deal with racism every day; I still feel sick at the thought. I'll never really understand what he's been through and I can't fix it for him, but I grieve anyway. And there we sit.

Training Dogs and Children

Well, the husband started the new job this morning. He was pretty tired when he called tonight, so he didn't give me many details about how our life will be changing. I think I'll have to wait until he's home this weekend to look over the paperwork and find out about insurance, etc. He did say he doesn't think there'll be dental. I have to look up if we get to keep our COBRA coverage if that's the case.

After figuring out how to crawl just a few days ago, the baby has started pulling herself up today. Yet another "laugh with delight, moan with despair" mommy moment. She obviously intends to blow through crawling and go to walking as soon as she can. Not that she's been crawling all that much. She figured out how to straighten her legs and "crawl" in a fashion on just her hands and feet, no knees involved. Did you ever see the animated Jungle Book movie by Disney? Remember Mowgli walking around like an elephant (I think it was)? That's exactly what she looks like!

We are all surviving without the husband, though sad without him. I just keep reminding myself that he will be back in only a couple more days. This short work week could be very nice! Besides, without him sitting around the house, playing on the computer and making messes he seems incapable of cleaning up, I'm getting a lot done. I may yet get this place cleaned up again.

Have I mentioned the teen's puppy, a mini dachshund? He's a cutie pie, but not as well trained as I was promised. I keep stepping in messes. Shudder, shudder, shudder. That is truly one of the nastiest sensations. I've been online researching housebreaking and while much of the information is contradictory there are a few consistencies. I think the teen and I are going to have to sit down and talk tomorrow night about how to do this. I refuse to live in fear of what I might step in. Not to mention fear of what the baby might put in her mouth!

Quick Note

I've updated my blog links to the right. New addresses/titles for a couple and added Think Pink.

The teen and the husband have gone off to watch Hellboy. I'm claiming the opportunity to go see Ella Enchanted tonight, by myself. I can't wait. I haven't been to a movie in, I think, something over a year. I've been wanting to read the book for awhile, but I don't mind seeing the movie first.

So, the boys are gone and the girls are both asleep. I have time to myself, blessed, blessed free and solitary time.

"Normal" is just a meaningless word, anyway.

Growing up with a crazy father who abuses you isn't a good way to get a grasp on typical male behavior. Most of the time I'm convinced I'm just married to the single best guy in the world, but I have a hunch that's only because I'm so suspicious of all other men. Every so often, though, something will happen that jolts me into wondering which direction reality is.

I realized something about the husband the other day that really shocked me - and then I was surprised that I was shocked. The husband has never deliberately frightened one of the children. He doesn't scare them, he doesn't threaten them for the fun of it or lie to them for the pleasure of confusing them. He has never made them scream in fear or even cry. He is unfailingly nurturing, kind and loving.

You know, I thought being mean was just what guys did? Isn't that how men are supposed to interact with kids? Don't all fathers find it amusing to torture their small children? Isn't all father/child interaction supposed to be at least mildly sadistic?

The husband can remember being held over Hoover Dam by his father while he cried and screamed, terrified his dad was going to drop him. Is that why he never deliberately frightens our children? Or are his father and mine the unusual ones?

Neither has the husband ever done any of a number of other things I have always thought of as typically male. For instance, he's never played any strength games with me - you know, the sort of thing where your boyfriend uses his strength against you in a playful way? Maybe he'll hold you back when you want to walk forward, squeeze you in a bearhug until you can't breathe, or just grab your hand and not let go until he's demonstrated that you can't get free unless he lets you go. Not the husband though. I really have no idea of how strong he is, because he's never used his strength against me, even playfully.

Is it age that makes him like this? Is continually testing your strength something young men are prone to do? Or is it a result of being very confident in his masculinity? After all, this is a man who spent 20 years doing things that even such icons of macho as John Wayne and Schwarzenegger only ever pretended to do.

My husband and my father couldn't be more different and I can't help wondering which of them is the more typical example of the human male. Or have I managed to have the two most important men in my life represent the two extremes?

I started thinking about this because the teen got frustrated over something last night and started getting worked up into a tantrum. Not a comforting thing to see from someone as big as he is. The husband dealt with it so deftly, though, using a mixture of humor and a very small amount of subtle intimidation to calm his son down and get him smiling again. He's got such fantastic parenting skills. I hope I can learn to be as good as he is when the girls are teens. I hope I can learn quickly enough from him to do a half way decent job of handling the teen over the next year or two.

Whine, Whinge, Moan and Complain

I never realized before just how many times a day the baby hits me in the face with her head. My jaw hurts worse this morning than it did when I woke up yesterday. I actually started bleeding again last night from getting bumped so much by her.

Whine, whine. My face hurts and I can't take anything stronger than ibuprofen because I'm nursing. Woe is me.

I'm going to go pout for a while now.

A discussion of teeth and candy, for unrelated reasons.

It should be interested to re-read this in a day or two. I might not be too coherent, or at any rate, more incoherent than usual. I just got home from having the remains of my broken tooth removed. It's a good thing the husband has that new job, because oral surgery is expensive. I was given something to knock me out, which I muchly appreciated. I do hate getting my mouth worked on. I'm a little sore as the numbing wears off, but nothing like I will be, unfortunately. No prescription, just the advice to use cold compresses on my face for the pain and swelling. I don't know if that's because I'm nursing, or because the oral surgeon just didn't think I'd need more than acetaminophen. It'll only hurt a couple of days, though, and after all, I always have childbirth to compare it too and put everything into perspective! Labor - my gold standard. I am glad to got to experience that as much as I hated it at the time. It's very useful to know how much worse things could be.

Easter went very well. The toddler was very excited about her basket (which she got after church. We told her the Easter Bunny came while she was at church and left it on her bed.) The lamb is now called a lion (what the heck, there's a certain balance there if you think about it) because it's very, very furry. We thought that was the end of it, until yesterday, when we got a package in the mail from the teen's mother. She had very generously and kindly sent a few toys for the girls for Easter, but the package was delayed. So, I gave the toddler her stuffed toy and told her it was from the Easter Bunny. She was very excited and made a break for our bedroom closet. Turned out she wanted to play with the Easter Bunny and has decided (after Saturday's discovery) that he must live there.

We got another box, before Easter, for the teen from his mom. This one was all for him, stuff for his basket. It was rather a large box, about 3 feet long by 2 feet high, full of bags of Easter candy. There must have been $30 or $40 worth of candy in there. We confiscated it. He got the solid chocolate bunny, one egg containing a Nerd-like candy, and a toy we provided. We will be doling out the rest of the candy as we see fit. I think I'm beginning to see where the weight problem is coming from. The husband is going to wait a couple of weeks and then have a gentle discussion with her about not sending anymore stuff like that.

Time to go lay down. I'm so glad to have gotten this tooth out, and I'm so glad I didn't have to be awake for it.

On Her Way

Two breakthroughs for the baby today! She crawled for the first time, and seconds later, sat up all by herself. She had her first solids (rice cereal) Friday night at dinner, too. A big week all around for my little sweetie-pie. She's so happy and pleased with herself, and we're happy for her, too. It's always amuses me how I can rejoice with them over their progress while simultaneously mourning the ending of a stage. It's enough to make me question my stability.

We mailed off our taxes Friday, only to realize when we got home that we'd left the W-2 form out. Not sure what to do now, besides laugh at ourselves.

Looking forward to Easter. We dyed eggs with the toddler today, her first time participating in this tradition. She had a blast and cried when we had to end it. "Colors!" she protested. "Want colors!" But then we got to put stickers on the eggs, which somewhat soothed her. She also got into Mommy and Daddy's closet when we weren't paying attention. I caught her happily trotting out, clutching a stuffed lamb to her chest, liberated from the Easter basket of course. She sobbed when I took it away from her. At least I know she'll really enjoy it tomorrow.

Time to break out the insect repellent

The flowers have all fallen off the Bradford Pear tree (the toddler was very upset when she realized this. "Oh, nooo," she told me, shaking her head sadly) and it has fully leafed out. I came in scratching my arms and legs after playing with the girls on the lawn this afternoon, which means the insects in the grass have woken up. The air conditioner has been running for the last two days, though more to counteract the mugginess than the heat.

Everywhere else it's springtime, but here summer is gearing up.

A Job, Definitely

The husband called today and accepted the job. We had a long talk this morning and figured out some possible solutions to my concerns. I'm still not wildly happy, but, he's the one who's going to actually be going to that workplace every day, sooo ...

Anytime life is going fantastically well you know it's only temporary, anyway. I figure we're doing well if less than half of everything is bad, and if we can get 75% or better, whoo-hoo!

So the next few weeks are going to be mayhem and madness of packing and getting ready to go. And I just got called up for jury duty today. And the baby is sick. And I'm waiting to get in to see the oral surgeon about the hole in my jaw (turns out my bridge was loose because one of the anchor teeth broke below the gumline, so now I have to get the roots dug out.) And we don't have the right video card for the teen's favorite game, so he's very depressed and sulking all over the place, sure that no-one has ever suffered as much as he has.

In other words, if my blogging gets erratic, you have been warned!

But we have a job! And we will not be homeless or starving any time in the near future, and we will have benefits so that I can maybe think about getting my broken tooth replaced. (I told my husband I am a walking stereotype right now - fat and frumpy, with bad hair and missing teeth. He looked depressed, so I shut up.) I'm even thinking about getting my hair done and spending 100 bucks on some new clothes. I haven't had anything new since before I got pregnant, so I think I'm due.

Yippee!

A Job, Maybe

Well, we have a job, but I'm not too happy about it. The husband hasn't accepted it yet, and I'm not to sure if I want him to. The more I think about it, the more unhappy I am.

In most ways, this is a good job. There's job security, a good chance of moving around in the organization to a better job if he wants, pretty good benefits, and we'll be living near his family which will give the children a chance to get to know their grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. We'll be making a little less than we were here, once you take cost of living changes into account, but that's OK, we can make it work. The husband would be in an area he is familiar with and really enjoys. He would find the job fulfilling and would feel like he is doing something worth spending his time on. We'd also be living in an area where we could take advantage of his military benefits, which would help stretch his paycheck.

The deal breaker is this: The husband would be expected to work 12 hour shifts, one month days, the next month nights.

Now, he worked nights before. It was not good for him. To a certain extent, he's never really recovered from it. We also didn't have children at that time, so it was easy for me to switch over to his schedule. Our life was rather unusual, but it was easy to work out, except for the damage to his health.

I'm really worried about what this could do to him. We'll have two very active, noisy little ones running about, shrieking when Daddy is trying to sleep. Just when he adjusts to one schedule, he'll be required to switch to another one.

I think if we take this job there's a good possibility we're heading for a train wreck.

On the other hand, it's not like employers are beating down our door and that does tend to trump any objections. The husband is positive he can handle it (overly optimistic, him? Oh no, he's not too optimistic! He's just got this incredible ability for living in la-la land, that's all), and that he can move over to another position if he can't.

So far, he has my tentative agreement, but I haven't made up my mind completely. The way we work major decisions like this is that either of us has veto power. In other words, we must both agree on the suggested change to our lives or we maintain the status quo and don't do anything at all. I can't think of a time either of us has ever vetoed the other. We've always been able to work out a compromise, but I don't think a compromise is possible on this. It's too much of a binary decision. Yes or no, take the job or not. No third possibilities anywhere in sight.

We have to give them an answer soon, and I'm agonizing over my decision. Sacrifice my husband's health or trust his positive outlook?

Have I ever mentioned what a cynical pessimist I am?

Real Women Don't Need Sleep

The baby slept through the night last night. Seven full hours, 1:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. Even better, the toddler (who managed to put off actually falling asleep for three hours after being put to bed) slept in. So, even though I woke up at 5:00 a.m. and slept like a paranoid bunny in wolf country for the next three hours (I will not check on her, I will not check on her, is that a cry? please don't be a cry) I actually can say I got a full night's sleep last night! Close enough at any rate.

The husband was watching some new reality show on TLC the other night, called Spymaster. At one point, the participants were being woken at some terribly early hour to go do reality show type stuff. I wasn't paying much attention until I heard the narrator announce, in hushed and horrified tones, that "... they've only had four hours of sleep!"

Whereupon I broke into manic, sleep-deprived laughter, which really annoyed the husband who did not appreciate my not taking the show seriously.

"They had four whole hours of unbroken sleep? What are they complaining about?" I asked him. "Let's see them getting four hours a night for months on end. There's something to complain about! Better yet, let's see them sleeping four hours and waking up two or three times every night!"

The husband pretended he didn't hear me.

Buncha wimps. Pbbtttt.

Time keeps on slippin' ...

Went through the baby's clothes again yesterday and put away a whole bunch of cute little things. I really hate putting away the ones she never got to wear for one reason or another.

Lately, every time I nurse her I can't help thinking that I won't have this much longer. She's going to be starting on solids in a few weeks. From there on it's all downhill in a frantic dash to the cup, to weaning and an end to breastfeeding. And, since there is an excellent possibility that this is my last, I'll probably never get to experience nursing again.

I love nursing. I've always found it a very positive experience (thanks to the oxytocin rush!) As soon as she latches on I lose my breath for just a few moments. Then euphoria bubbles up from behind my breastbone, and if I give in to it I'll start to giggle or even laugh out loud. A millisecond later I want to pull the baby away from her meal, cuddle her tightly and kiss her all over her sweet, fuzzy little head. This all flashes by in, probably, less than a second, leaving me with a lingering feeling of love and adoration of this suckling infant. I spend the rest of our time in wonder and amazement, contemplating how beautiful she is and how lucky I am to be her mother.

If I could sit in the center of a filled champagne flute, the bubbles rising all about me, it would remind me of that half a second let down rush. Not a bad reaction to have at 4 a.m. when the baby has just woken me for the third time since I went to bed.

But that's not the only reason I'll miss nursing. I'll miss having a little one cuddled up to me, getting to coo over those rounded cheeks, closed eyes and dark eyelashes. You know, the stuff we all enjoy, regardless of how the baby is fed. I'll even miss the playful times, when I can't get her settled down long enough to get full because she's too busy pulling away to grin at me.

Oh heck, I'll just miss having a baby around.

Update

I'm still alive. Just exhausted. I'm hoping to get some sleep sometime tomorrow. If not, maybe next week.

Someday at any rate.