The Lovely Miss C

I promised you pictures, and here they are!


Miss Celia, just a few minutes after birth...


Little Miss C, after a feeding yesterday...


Up close and personal!

Sorry to Keep You Waiting

Goldang free Wi-Fi!   I have been Internet-access-free since Wednesday and haven't been able to figure out how to send so much as a text message to the blog. The Wi-Fi at the hospital evidently doesn't work and yet keeps telling me I'm connected. What the bleep??   THE NEWS:  I am thrilled to announce that the latest member of the Blah Blah Tribe has indeed arrived: Celia Lucy came into the world on Wednesday, October 22 at 3:51pm. She weighed 7 lbs, 2 oz and measured 19.25 inches long. All is well now, but it was rough at the beginning. She is, as I write this at 3:07am Saturday morning, still in the Newborn Intensive Care Unit because she had trouble breathing when she first got here. Happily, I have been able to breastfeed her (my milk is coming in with a vengeance!) – she latches on well and seems to have managed to get some colostrum, that really nutrient-rich pre-milk.    I have to say Thursday was the worst day, mainly because I'd been told they'd keep her in the NICU only overnight and then bring her to my room in the morning.  That was a big fat lie. I was awake and waiting for her and unable to get any real information due to a nurse shift change. Sweet Dub was home with Viva because my mother-in-law ended up having to go to work and couldn't stay with her. Viva was distraught because she hadn't been able to see the baby yet, and she has a nasty cough anyway so we knew they wouldn't let her into the ward. I had talked to Viva and she was crying over the phone because she wanted to see C. so badly, which made me feel worse. When I finally got to talk to the doctor in the NICU, she told me that because C. was on oxygen and an IV, they'd have to gradually wean her off of both and she probably wouldn't come out of Intensive Care until Saturday morning. Since at that point I was hostage in my room because I had both a catheter and an IV stuck in me, I did not yet have the option of going up to see her.   I hung up the phone and started bawling. Let me just say that there are few things more painful than crying when you have an abdominal incision, which led to this ridiculous vicious cycle of crying because I couldn't have the baby and then crying because it hurt and then crying some more just on principle.   To add insult to injury, my cell phone battery had died and the charger was at home (!!!). So I spent most of Thursday isolated, watching crappy TV, trying to get on the Internet, reading crappy magazines, and jonesing for my baby. Finally, they unhooked me from everything and I got to go up to see her at around 3:30pm. By that point, Viva and Sweet Dub had arrived and they went up with me. Viva was able to see her through the window of the less intensive area of the NICU – the section where they put the babies who won't be there long. Her face lit up just at the sight of her.   Words are completely inadequate to describe holding a newborn. Celia is so small, and so warm, and so Zen.  It is like holding a hug in your arms, if that makes any sense at all.   By the way, the name? We decided on as we were driving to the hospital Wednesday morning.  So that will evermore be part of family lore, that somewhere between Echo Park Animal Hospital and Jack in the Box on Glendale Blvd., we finally agreed on what to call Miss Thing.   "She looks just like you," Sweet Dub says. But then I must tell you she has dark, very straight hair, and beautiful dark eyes. Right now her skin is very pink. It seems she will be lighter in complexion than Viva, but one never knows with babies of color. Viva started "getting her chocolate" just a few days after her birth, so in the early "home from the hospital" pics, she is already quite brown.  It's hard to tell with Celia. I am fascinated by the recombination of our genes. She resembles Viva but she has her own thing going on. Shorter arms and legs – Viva was very long and leggy (and still is). Noses are similar, as are lips and chin.   I am writing this in the wee hours of Saturday morning to post later today. I've been told we should both be able to be discharged from the hospital today. Update at 8:27am: It appears that I have a few seconds of connectivity and I'm trying to post this. I will post pictures when we get home…

High Alert

I've been having contractions since 5:30 or so this morning. They have been intensifying but are still not at the magic "every 5 minutes, 1 minute in duration" level. Nonetheless, we've kept Viva home from school while we wait to see what happens and we've got all local family members on standby. I am cramping, hips are extra sore, back is killing me. It feels like this is it.

FYI: I'm using contractionmaster.com to time contractions.

Stay tuned...

P.S. If you can believe it, we still have no name for the baby. Trying to decide between two - I guess we'll wait until she gets here!

P.P.S. Cross-posted at Belly Overwhelmed.

Ever So Slightly Busy

I'm on maternity leave and to most people that seems to mean that I must be lying around with my feet up, watching home shows. Perhaps that is what I should be doing, but alas, I am also one of those people who can't sit still when I have a big block of time in front of me and major life changes on the way, to wit: having the baby and moving to a new house one week later.

One week from today, at about this time, I should be in the operating room having a human being removed from my uterus. While it looked like Miss Thing might come early, now I am of the opinion that she was just teasing us, as her sister did five years ago, and she will come exactly on the day she is supposed to. If she does come slightly early, I am hoping for Thursday - which is two days from now, and is my stepfather's birthday. Since he has been having numerous health problems, I think that would be kind of nice.

In the meantime, I've been trying to tie up every loose end possible:

* Viva's Halloween costume is almost done. She will be Barry B. Benson or my name ain't Mama Blah. (Well, technically, it's not. Whatever, you get the gist.)

* I have researched all of our state propositions and figured out how I am going to vote on each one (I vote by mail, so all I have to do now is fill out my ballot).

* I am halfway through online traffic school for that damn "did not come to a complete stop" traffic ticket.

* I've paid all my bills.

* I have completed all maternity leave paperwork.

* I have done an insane amount of laundry (in fact, I have a load in right now).

* I've drafted the birth announcement, created labels and bought stamps for the mailing, and bought the announcement cards to be printed when the baby arrives.

* I've packed almost all the books in our living room.

* I've packed all unnecessary bathroom items. Today I'm moving on to the kitchen (upper cabinets - all the dishes I use for entertaining, mixing bowls, wineglasses, etc).

* I created a "baby countdown" for Viva whereby I bought 7 small gifts for her (squirtgun, Play-Doh, SpongeBob cap, etc.) and placed each in a brightly colored bag, numbered 1 through 7. She gets to open one each night starting tonight and then cross the day off on the calendar. She does not know this yet.

* I finalized my hospital bag items. Bag is packed and waiting. All I have to do is throw my toiletries in and I'm good to go.

* I went back though my emails and finally found pictures of the house for you to enjoy:

Here's the exterior...

...the living room...

...and the patio.

* And now, I think I deserve a pedicure. Quick, to the Blahmobile!

Casita de Blah

I am very pleased to announce that the Blah Blahs have secured a house! We put a deposit down yesterday on a two-story, three-bedroom, two-bath Spanish-style house about five minutes from where we currently live. We will be paying a bit more than we pay now, but we will double our space, and we are two minutes from amenities like the post office, library and a very good public school. I called the school this morning and got all the registration information to get Viva transferred into kindergarten there in December.

We will be moving about a week after the baby is born, and while this sounds hellacious, I don’t even care because at least I will be off and have time to settle in.

Sweet Dub had told Viva he’d take her to the zoo yesterday, and I had told her in the afternoon we’d do arts and craftsy type activities. What happened instead is that we came home from seeing the house again all wired up, we talked a hundred miles a minute, we ate, set Viva up on the computer with a video game, and then we both crashed. We slept for a couple of hours while Viva rotted her brain and ruined her eyes at nickjr.com. This is not, needless to say, something we would normally do.

“Why am I so wiped out?” I said to Sweet Dub.

“You know what it is?” he said. “Relief.”

Yes.

P.S. Viva had the nerve to tell me she would be happy not to be sharing a bathroom with me in the new house because my soaps and things get in the way while she is taking a bath. Like I am thrilled to have to scoop up at least 15 little toys and action figures out of the tub before I take a shower every day. The feeling is mutual, sister!

Which Will Come First?

The house or the baby? Place your bets now!

As I get closer to maybe actually having this baby, you'll find I am posting more over here and less here at Mama Blah, just because I am a wee bit precoccupied.

But let me let you in on the latest with the house search. We have one house semi-finalized -- i.e. the owners have approved our credit and offered us the house, but we haven't signed a lease yet, and the house wouldn't be ready to move in until Nov.5th, after the baby is born, while I'm recovering from a C-section.

Today, Sweet Dub found another house, further away, but for $300 less per month. We are hoping to see it tomorrow afternoon and make a decision about what to do in less than 24 hours. Hopefully you will not have to hear any more about our agonizing over our housing issues for much longer.

The Search Continues…

Regular readers know that our landlord wants, as soon as possible due to his impending divorce, to move back into the house we’ve been renting from him for the last two years. If we have to move, we’d like to move before the baby is born --although that is now in 24 days. So, we’ve been looking at houses and duplexes and apartments and everything. As usual, when home-hunting, I am appalled by how much money people want for some crap. But here’s the latest wrinkle: at a couple of places, the owner wants to leave some of their stuff in the house. Then they don’t understand why that would be a problem.

I don’t feel comfortable having your father’s treasured grand piano in a house with two small children. Not only because we're paying for the whole house, including the large area of the living room that the piano occupies, but also because God forbid it should get damaged while we live here with two small children. Note: the response to this was that we could just cover the piano with something. So we should just walk around this hulking covered-up thing in the middle of our living space. By the way, no one in the house plays piano. Sweet Dub took lessons long ago, but you know how that goes…

Last night, we saw a house which was really well-suited to us. The owners want to leave a console table in the entryway, a china cabinet in the dining room (they’d take the china with them), a large Mission-style bookcase in the living room, and a 5-burner gas BBQ on the back patio. Again, we'll be living there with two small kids. I know they’re going to wreck something, and I’d rather it be something we already own so we don’t have to hassle with the landlord over it.

Well, we’re looking at another place tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed.

Wrapping Up Before the Weekend

Hey, guess what?

My bank just got bought out.

John McCain has changed his mind and decided he will debate Barack Obama tonight. Flip-flopper!

The economy is in ruins.

We still have not found a house to move to.

I forgot my lunch.

The baby will be here in just 33 days. While I have a variety of adorable outfits for her, I’m a bit concerned about where she might sleep. Thankfully, we do have a car seat, so if worse comes to worse, we can all sleep in the car! (The rear seats do fold down.)

In more encouraging news:

I have another baby shower this weekend where I will be warmly embraced into the collective bosom of some of my dearest friends.

I am slowly but surely crossing things off my work pre-maternity leave “to do” list.

We found another grant writer and he’s filling out paperwork in the Human Resources office as we speak. He starts in one week – my last week of work.

Viva has decided she wants to be a bee for Halloween. Not just any bee! Barry B. Benson from Bee Movie! Interesting take on the movie here, by the way. [In a related aside, does it bother anyone else when they give animated animal characters blue eyes? Like animals that never in reality have blue eyes, like penguins or horses or bees? What is THAT about?? End tangent.] I have already begun working on creating a costume for her, which thankfully should not be all that difficult this time around.

I found out that one of my work acquaintances, who I really like but don’t see all that often because she works at one of our other sites, lives in the same neighborhood that the Blah Blahs are trying to move to. She is cool – very grounded and sane, and we are already so on the same wavelength – we are both pregnant and due within two days of each other! So we will be on leave at the same time and may even be able to get together and dish during that time. She has a 4-year-old daughter and hopefully Viva would bond with her and pretty much instantly have a friend in the area. (Although actually we already have a few friends in the area – but this one would be within walking distance. Miraculous in Los Angeles!)

My former yoga/dance teacher was recently on the Ellen show. Take a look at the clip and you can see why her class was so much fun!

Funny story about my doctor’s office here.

And, that's a wrap. Have a lovely weekend, all!

Updated two seconds after posting because I forgot to add a link. My bad!

It's a melting pot! No, it's a mosaic! No, it's a rainbow...

Poll: Whites, blacks in U.S. disagree about prejudice

Wow, shocking news. These folks truly have their finger on the pulse.

The highlight of the article for me is:

Kelly Edmondson, 34, of Cincinnati, is a white Democrat enthusiastic about backing Obama. …She cares for her two sets of young twins during the day and teaches college at night; most of her students are black. In the survey, Edmondson said positive words such as "hardworking" and "intelligent" describe most blacks "very well." She said a few negative traits, such as "lazy" and "irresponsible," apply "somewhat well" to most blacks.

In a telephone interview, Edmondson said those attributes apply equally to all races. [emphasis added]

Well, yes. Exactly. I wonder what percentages a different poll would come up with – a poll which asked people their opinions of what traits the general American public shares, particularly if it were one that instead focused on class. I would imagine that there would be a fair proportion of people of all races who would characterize low-income people as "lazy" and "irresponsible." (And I'm not saying that I agree with them, I'm just saying certain leading questions are going to get a pretty predictable response. And often I think that people who do not have much exposure to people of color form their opinions based on what they see in the media - wait, this is a tangent that could comprise a whole separate post, so let me get back on point.)

This ties in, somewhat, with what I've been experiencing in the past couple of months. In our most recent house search, we have pretty much given up on the areas in and around where we live, which is where we have been looking for the past several months. We’ve started looking in a middle- to upper-middle class predominantly African-American neighborhood, even though that would mean a longer commute for both of us, because (1) we’d be closer to certain family members and friends (including Viva’s friends) that we see a lot; (2) quite simply, you get more for your money over there; (3) it’s a nice neighborhood, quiet with lots of trees and close to a major park; and (4) with certain addresses, we can actually get Viva into a decent public school.

I am surprised by the number of people who have said, “Why do you want to move over THERE?” and yet seem to think it is perfectly reasonable to expect us to look into neighborhoods far east of us or deep in the San Fernando Valley, which not only are further away in terms of miles, but also have a very small percentage of African-American residents. I am not surprised, but disappointed, by people who ask me if I’ve considered areas I’ve never heard of and then when I ask, “But are there any black people there?” look crestfallen and say, “Oh, I didn’t even think about that. I guess not.”

The issue is that no one asks "Why do you want to move over THERE?”about any other neighborhood where we've been looking. Hmm...if it only happened once or twice, I wouldn't think anything of it. But most people seem to be surprised that we would consider moving to a mostly black area.

One of the things that attracts me to the neighborhoods where we have been looking up until now is that there is a diversity of people – black, white, Asian, Latino, South Asian, etc. These are mid-city neighborhoods, and since we both work in the mid-city area, it makes sense for us to look there. However, this has not been fruitful, so we had to expand our horizons. One of the things that is crucial for us is to get Viva into a fairly mixed school which will also give her a good education. Fortunately, there is one in the neighborhood we’re looking at that she would be eligible to go to that is pretty balanced between white and black, with both Latino and Asian thrown in for good measure, and it has decent test scores. Neither of us is crazy about sending her to a school that is predominantly anything – whether white, black, Latino, or Asian. That is a major issue for both of us, and one which we have discussed extensively.

On the housing search: we haven’t yet found a place. Yeah. We would like to move during the first weekend of October, since the baby will be here at the end of October and I can’t imagine moving after a C-section, with a newborn. Our landlord has already contacted us about moving some of his stuff into the storage area. He clearly needs to move ASAP, which isn’t helping matters. All I can say is that when we know, you’ll know. I can’t say anymore about it at this point because it just stresses me out. As my boss said, “You’re nesting! And you have nowhere to nest!”

Yeah, it’s like that. Major suckage.

Blog Pondering

Curiouser…

This evening, Viva and I were talking about twin brothers in her class. I mentioned that I hadn’t seen them in a while. “They come to school later than I do,” Viva said. “But you know what I don’t understand about them? I never see their mom.”

“I don’t think they have a mom,” I said, without thinking. Viva gasped.

“Not have a mom? What happened to her?” she cried.

“I don’t know what their situation is,” I said, cursing myself. “But I believe they have two dads.”

“Two DADS?” Viva said. “Does one act like the mom, and one like the dad?”

“I don’t know, sweetie,” I said. “Maybe they just act like two dads.”

I could see her filing this away in her brain. Oh, we will talk about this again, I can feel it. But in the meantime, she got distracted by her Curious George book, and I got distracted by the unbelievable amount of rice under the table. Did any of it make it into her mouth?

…and Curiouser

Yesterday I was at Target and in sort of a hurry (when am I not in a hurry) but trying to mellow out about it because they had only two checkers open. The woman in front of me had two piles of items, which she was paying for separately – one with a gift card and one with a credit card – and I think she was also trying to apply for an adjustable rate mortgage and access all her health records through the little card swipey dealio they had there, because somehow the transaction was much more complicated than it seemed it had to be. At any rate, once the cashier got to the second pile of stuff, I realized it was all underpants, of all different colors and varieties. Briefs, boyshorts, thongs, lacy polyester, cotton, she had it all. In all honesty, it was kind of fascinating to watch. The cashier was exactly the kind of young nerdly type that you might imagine – (I swear I can’t help it) well, you might imagine that this is the only access he ever gets to ladies’ panties, if you know what I mean. He was actually sweating a little bit.

So he rang up this towering pile, and I was watching the total add up with great interest. Because, hello, it was a lot of damn panties. And the total came to $175.12. FOR PANTIES! AT TARGET!!

Completely unfathomable. I can see paying that much for panties in a department store. But at Target? Wouldn’t they have to be something along the lines of $4.99 apiece? How many panties do you need? I started to wonder. Maybe she’s going on a long trip around the globe and doesn’t want to do laundry along the way. Maybe it’s something more salacious that I can’t even imagine because I am such a naïf. Maybe she has some sort of chronic uncontrollable bowel disease and it’s easier to just throw her underpants away. Maybe she’s a hoarder or impulse shopper and some switch in her head told her that today was Panty Day. Maybe she’s a good Samaritan and she’s buying underpants to give to a shelter or something. Maybe she’s a set dresser and needed underpants for a shoot.

Everybody’s got their story. What do you think?

P.S. By the by, new post over here.

Moving On…

When we last saw our hero, she was having a bad day and trying to turn it around. In that spirit, she said something along the lines of, “It could always be worse.”

That, my friends, is what we call ironic foreshadowing.

For lo, the next day, did her husband call her at work with the foulest of news. “Beloved Spouse,” he cried, “I have received the most foulest of news, news that will upon its hearing make you faynt and fall twitching into the Slew of Despond.”

Our landlord and his wife of less than a year are separating. He wants to move back into the house where we currently live. I am six weeks away from giving birth, and now we must find a place, pack our stuff, and move before the baby comes.

You know that we have been looking for a new place for months with no luck. Had I written this post yesterday, I thin k it would be filled with a lot more despair, and a lot of cussing.

However, the Blah Blah Family has no time for that. We have already been to look at one house and are setting up appointments for the weekend. I am trying not to focus on it unduly.

“This could all be for the best,” I said to Sweet Dub yesterday evening. Strangely, faced with the prospect of having to move on short notice, with a 5-year-old and an enormously pregnant wife, he was not receptive to such talk. In fact, he seemed a bit stressed.

“You keep saying that about everything,” he said. “Why do you keep saying that, and then nothing good happens?”

My default position, when faced with a crappy situation, generally tends to be immediate anxiety, followed by humor as an attempt to alleviate the situation, and then by an attempt to find something positive about the situation, followed closely by realistic action I can take to try and make the situation better. I am not a Pollyanna, but I do feel it’s a waste of time and energy to focus on the negative and besides, it generally only makes you feel worse.

And who says nothing good happens? As the old saying goes , God may not answer your prayers when you want Him to, but He’s right on time. Something good is coming.

Looks Like Someone Has a Case of the Mondays

Viva has a stye. Her pretty little sparkling eye is swollen and there’s a red lump on the inside of her eyelid.

Someone came into my office today, in a hurry, and after slamming themselves* loudly into a chair, proceeded to cough (without covering their mouth) in the general direction of, and maybe 18 inches away from, my open (half-full!) bottle of vitamin water. The bottle is still sitting there and I still really want to drink it, but I won’t.

Sweet Dub went home for lunch and called to tell me that I just received a $380 ticket in the mail for “failing to stop” in an intersection at 7:58 AM on a Sunday near the drugstore near my house. Since I was turning right on red, and there is no “can’t turn right on red” sign at that intersection, I am completely mystified by this. How can they argue that I didn’t even stop?? I don’t understand how they would judge that. I received a ticket for this many years ago, and I have since been very conscious of making a full stop before moving again. I am really skeptical that this even happened, but this goes down as “yet one more thing I have to appeal,” along with all the ridiculous crap my health insurance company refuses to pay for as part of a normal pregnancy.

Over the weekend, Sweet Dub said, “I can’t wait for this pregnancy to end!” No, he really said that. In the meantime, I have developed a varicose vein in my left leg, my hips are killing me, and the only way for me to sleep is propped up by 6.8 pillows. Please, tell me more about how much this pregnancy is bothering you. Love you, babe!

Oh, and also, my hips? Deserve a separate paragraph, because they really hurt, like on the morning when I woke up 5-plus years ago to pee and said, “Ow, my hips are really killing me” and my water broke two hours later. Yeah, it’s like that, except my water hasn’t broken and I don’t want it to because the baby isn’t ready yet.

Lunch time: I went to the break room and pulled out my frozen spanokopita and lovely green salad. Looked at the directions for the spanokopita: “Do not cook in microwave or toaster oven.” No, yeah. Since those are my only options for cooking my entrée, cursed soundly and then prevailed upon one of my co-workers for part of a Chinese mooncake. Salad and mooncake. Not quite gonna do it. Baby’s reaction seems to be, “Yeah, right.”

I always have to ask myself on days like this, “What was the bright spot in this day?” And when I can’t think of anything else, I know that at the very least, it could be worse. So much worse. I have a lot to be thankful for. Like, for instance, the fact that I can afford to buy vitamin water and spanakopita. And stye medicine. For the moment, anyway.

* Sorry, trying to be gender-neutral.

With Apologies to Dan Fogelberg

Earlier in the week, I wrote a really long post about the government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and how it is ridiculous that no one bats an eye over the government assuming control of these private financial institutions but that the minute you point out that the government should step in and do something about healthcare – like, oh, I don’t know, maybe some sort of healthcare reform? Create a national, single-payer system like many other countries in the civilized world? – people start shrieking about socialism.

I feel that we are in a healthcare crisis just as much as we are in a housing crisis, and I want somebody to do something about it. So I wrote this long post and then it just seemed to me, on reading it over, that there was a bit too much ranting in it. Yeah, I’m angry about it, and that translated into me not writing very well. I ventured over into Indignance, and I couldn’t find my way back.

So. I’m not expecting you to tune in here expecting sunshine and rainbows, but I also don’t want to raise your blood pressure. I could write a follow-up about work, but I’m trying not to raise my own blood pressure (right now, a healthy 90/62). I could write about my pregnancy, but that’s what this is for. What to do, what to do?

Ah, well, I give you this:

Viva: I had the funniest dream last night.

Mama: Oh yeah? What was it about?

Viva: We were having a marching band parade! [following me around the kitchen as I am trying to pull together both lunch and breakfast] Me? And my cousins? We were all in a marching band!

Mama: Wow, that does sound pretty funny.

Viva: Yeah! M was playing the trombone, and T was playing the drums! And – what else do you play in a marching band?

Mama: Um, there are lots of horns, like – the tuba? And cymbals, and different kinds of drums...

Viva: What about the flute?

Mama: Yeah, yeah, you’re right, they do have flutes.

Viva: Well, I was playing the flute. And Auntie Lola was there! And Grandma too! She was in the parade? And you know what she said?

Mama: What, sweetie?

Viva: She said, “I never got to be the leader of the band.” So I said, “Grandma, you can be the leader of the band!”

Mama [laughing snidely]: Oh my God, that totally sounds like something Grandma would say. It’s like a metaphor for her life.

Viva: And I made her the leader of the band! And she even had the swirly stick! What is that swirly stick called?

Mama: The baton.

Viva: Why is it called that?

Mama: I don’t know. I think it’s French. French for stick.

And, end scene. I’m just a living legacy to the leader of the band.


P.S. And can I also say how much I love this? I want to eat Marge’s hair. It looks like it must be made out of something yummy.

Laughter and Tears! The Yin! The Yang!

Bright Spot of the Day

On our way to school this morning, Viva says, “Did you know we have secret signs at school?”

I immediately think of kindergarteners either throwing gang signs (East-SIIIIDE!) or dressed in softly gleaming white robes, performing by candlelight scary occult rituals for which there are secret signs. Guardedly, I say, “No, I didn’t know that. What are these secret signs? Are they so secret you can’t tell me?”

“No. What you do is you hold up your fingers to tell the teacher.”

“Okay, and what does that tell her?”

“If you hold up three fingers, it means you need a drink of water.”

“Oh,” I say, relieved. “I get it now.”

“If you hold up one finger, it means you have to go to the bathroom.”

“I see,” I say. “What does it mean if you hold up two fingers?”

“PEACE,” Viva says with a heavy sigh, and then gets pissed off because I can’t stop laughing.

Shitty Spot of the Day

A new director has joined our department and today is her first day. Since I was one of only a few people here when she arrived, somehow it falls to me to get her acclimated. Eventually we are joined by one of my other co-workers, who shows this new person that she’ll be sitting (for the moment) in a cubicle. (Note: We are notoriously short on space over here; it took me six months to get an office when I started.) So my co-worker assures this new person that the cubicle is only temporary.

The new person, L., says confidently, “Oh, I know.” And turning to me she says, “How do you feel about having to move out of your office?”

“I wasn’t aware that that was a done deal,” I say. My boss had recently floated the idea that I might have to move to an as-yet nonexistent office, which I would have to share with someone else, and I had already firmly stated my opposition to that idea. It now becomes clear that this has been presented to this new person as something that is going to happen pretty much as soon as I go out on maternity leave. She realizes she has said something she shouldn’t and starts backpedaling. “Woops, don’t get mad at me, I’m new,” she says.

I am PISSED. Really pissed. I’m not pissed at her – what sense would that make – and I say so. I also say my understanding was that this whole discussion is premature, and we don’t know where I’ll end up. I then reassure her she shouldn’t worry about it. We move on getting her oriented and after a few minutes I excuse myself.

I go down to the parking garage and sit in my car and call Sweet Dub, and as soon as he answers the phone I start crying. (Lucky, lucky him.) I just think it’s pretty shitty to plan to move someone into my office while I’m off having a baby. I mean, shit, I’m seven months pregnant and trying to keep all the aspects of my life under control and I have really tried to not let this pregnancy interfere with my work life, and I feel under the circumstances I have handled it well up to this point. This is just what people do, right? But my feelings are hurt and right now I just want to throw my hands up in the air and go home.

Since Sweet Dub’s job is imploding (they had some kind of disaster yesterday which he is in the middle of running damage control on), I let him off the phone after a few minutes. Blow my nose. Drink some water and take a few deep breaths. Send good vibes to the baby, get out of the car, and go back upstairs.

As the morning progresses, people ambush me in my office and I end up having to rehash this incident three times. First with my boss, then with the co-worker who was present when it happened, and then with my boss’ boss, who swears he was the one who told me they were going to give away my office while I’m gone. As in, yes, that IS going to happen. The alleged plan is to build out a conference room while I’m away – cut it in half and put up a wall and a second door.

I am thoroughly sick of it. At this point, I have closed my door and every time I get down to work, someone else comes by and knocks and asks about some other fucking thing. So since I’m not getting anything done, I had to vent. And here we are.

Peace (that’s two fingers).

On Being Fearless

A recent post of Mango Mama’s about her daughter Olivia got me thinking again about Viva and her confidence. I’d had this post floating around in my head for a few days, but it hadn’t yet gelled (my brain is not as perky as it used to be). But what it boils down to is that while Viva has increasingly become more physically confident – plunging into the water without a second thought when swimming, shaking off bumps and falls when playing soccer, clearly feeling her power during kung fu – socially, she is still a bit timid.

I blame myself, of course. One thing about Sweet Dub is he is never timid about anything, so I know she ain’t gettin’ it from him. Dub has pretty much taken charge of Viva’s physical education lately, taking her bike riding, signing her up for kung fu (which is the cutest damn thing you have ever seen), and the like. When she sits with me to read a book together, or to write a note to someone, she is cautious. If she starts reading a word and mispronounces it, and realizes she is reading it wrong, she will look at me anxiously. “I can’t do it,” she’ll say.

“Of course you can,” I say. “You’re such a good reader. Sound it out. You almost had it, just start the word over from the beginning.” Then she will start over and read it correctly, I’ll praise her for getting it right, and nonetheless she may stumble over the next couple of words. I don’t know where this is coming from, but I’m thinking that (and I don’t want to blame the baby for everything, BUT) she is regressing a bit because if she’s having trouble with something, I’ll give her extra attention. Since she craves being with me or her dad or both constantly lately, this makes sense, but it’s frustrating.

Tomorrow is School Picture Day. (Oh yes, kindergarten started THREE WEEKS AGO, did I not mention it? So much for summer vacation.) This morning she said, “I’m not sure what to do for School Picture Day.”

“Sweetie, all you have to do is smile,” I said.

“But what if you don’t like the picture?” she said.

“How could I not like a picture of you? I love every picture of you I have ever seen,” I said.

“So no matter what it looks like, you’ll like it?” she said.

“Of course,” I said. “I really don’t want you to worry about it, babes.”

I started out this post thinking in my self-absorbed fashion that I had passed my tendencies toward a lack of self-confidence* on to my child – and indeed, maybe I have on some level. I should say that, having wrestled with esteem issues through adolescence and my early 20s, for the most part I think I am The Shizznit, though like all of us I have moments of self-doubt. But as I started typing, I realized what is truly going on here. (You see, the usefulness of blogging? Gives you time for a little evaluation, reflection and awareness and all that, if you only make time for it.)

I think the impending arrival of Rosie**, as Viva calls her, is making my little crumb cake feel a bit insecure***. And this is totally normal. And her constant wrestling with her daddy, and her constant testing of limits, is all about that. And now I just want to go pick her up from school and smother her with kisses and tell her I know she is scared that we won’t love her as much when the baby comes, but nothing could be further from the truth. Poor little thing and her fragile psyche. I don’t know how she could imagine her parents don’t completely adore her and would gladly throw ourselves under a train to spare her any hurt, but I guess that hasn’t fully come across.

Here’s to being bold, and to the confidence that comes from knowing that folks have your back. Here’s to making mistakes and having the courage to try again. Here’s to believing the positive about yourself.

* I know, hard to believe. My sister once told me, “You think you’re better than everyone else,” to which I snidely replied that her statement said more about her than about me. “Don’t hang your insecure bullshit on me,” I said. I love my sister, but you know how siblings can push each other’s buttons like no one else can? Yeah, it’s like that.

** Not her real name.

*** This weekend, I had to sing Viva an old Sesame Street song because she was making a card for a friend and she mis-spelled something and started freaking out about having to start over. Do you remember this song (sung by Big Bird)?

Oh, everyone makes mistakes, oh yes they do
Your sister and your brother and your dad and mother too
Big people, small people
Matter of fact, all people
Everyone makes mistakes so why can’t you?
If everyone in the whole wide world makes mistakes
Then WHYYYYY CAAAAAN’T YOOOOOUUU??

A Different Kind of Black List

Ooooh, I just found out about this today: THE BLACK LIST: VOLUME ONE.

In a new kind of living portraiture, a remarkable group of African-American notables share candid stories and revealing insights into the struggles, triumphs and joys of black life in the U.S. when THE BLACK LIST: VOLUME ONE debuts MONDAY, AUG. 25 (9p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.

I'm totally setting my DVR since Lord knows, I may be passed out on the couch by 9 p.m. But I'm hoping it's better than that recent series on CNN which, or so I've heard, pretty much focused on everything that's wrong in Black America. I realize the media feeds on and thus propagates fear, but was it too much to ask for a nuanced picture? Now, I am not sure why THE BLACK LIST chose to interview only "notables" in this, its first volume -- seems to me they could intersperse celebrity segments with other folks -- but hopefully they will remedy that with subsequent volumes. I'm interested to hear what they have to say.

And no, it hasn't escaped me that they're airing this on the first night of the Democratic National Convention, when for the first time ever a person of African descent is being nominated by his party to represent said party as their candidate for President of these United States. By the way, Michelle Obama will be speaking at probably about the same time that THE BLACK LIST is airing. Hmmm. I wonder if she'll set her DVR?

Updated to add: Oh, yeah, and a few new posts up over here.

Incoherent as I Want to Be

Have you ever read any tips on how to increase blog traffic? Perhaps the most oft-cited rule is to update your blog frequently to build your audience and to increase the number of chances for your blog's content to be noticed by search engines. Following close behind that is to respond to comments promptly.

Yeah, I'm kind of a sucky blogger these days. Sorry about that. And now, despite saying that, I have to log off because it appears that even though I was already late for work today, I left my child's homework in the car, and if she doesn't hand it in every day she won't get a sticker and because it is my fault (I jammed it under my tote bag and lunch box and jacket and all the other crap in the front seat because she had too many other things to carry), I will never hear the end of it. So I must leave work (for which - did I mention? - I was already late) and drive back to school so my child does not lose faith in me forever and evermore, Amen.

How's your day going?

P.S. Haven't been able to do anything about the house offer because my work friend's daughter went into labor off and on for 5 days and finally, finally had the baby Monday, a week past her due date. Hence and therefore, my work friend hasn't been at work.

Getting Housed

So a work friend of mine has had her family home on the market since sometime last year. It’s a gorgeous, huge house in an upper middle class, predominantly African-American neighborhood. The friend in question, B, owns her own home and is not interested in moving into the family home. She and her siblings have remodeled it and are trying to sell it for over a million clams. Nobody’s biting. They’re taking it off the market.

She called me Friday to ask if we’d be interested in renting it. It’s vacant, and she and her siblings would like someone living there who would take good care of it. It is much farther from work for me and Dub, but near a really good public school (thus we would save money on school tuition, but pay more in gas*). Her brother is handling the finances so she has no idea how much he would want in rent. Did I mention that while we live in an 864-sqaure-foot bungalow, this is about 3,500 square feet?

Sweet Dub is skeptical. I admit I am a bit too. Some issues:

+ How much will it cost to heat and cool a house that big?
+ Will my mother-in-law assume she can just move in?
+ How much are they going to want in rent?
+ If we live in a million-dollar house, won’t we be spoiled for living in a regular house when we eventually buy?

I don’t know. I guess it can’t hurt to talk to the guy. What do you think?

*Although we did manage to get the “Let’s Refuel America” deal with the $2.99/gallon gas for three years when we bought the new car last month, so it’s not as expensive as it could be.

Who's the Bomb?

My darling Sweet Dub, that's who.

In anticipation of my birthday, which is this coming Monday, he arranged to have his sister, Diva, take Viva along on a camping trip for the whole weekend. Merely having a Viva-free weekend would be a huge gift, as anyone who has children knows. You love them, but every now and then you need a break -- especially when you are pregnant and all wore out and broke down.

But lo, Sweet Dub not only arranged a child-free weekend. No, my friends, he also booked us a Club-level, ocean-view room at the Ritz-Carlton. The Club level features dedicated concierge staff and a private lounge with four "food presentations" daily. So all we have to do is walk out of our room, mosey into the lounge, pick up our free food, and go back to the room. It sounds like heaven. I wonder if the concierge will peel and feed me grapes?

I'll report back.

Earthquakin'

In the aftermath of the moderate earthquake that jolted us Angelenos earlier this week, I’ve received a lot of earthquake preparedness emails and the like. One in particular grabbed my attention because it stated that the standard advice to stand in a doorway or get under a desk or table might actually kill you in an earthquake. Being in a major earthquake would be bad enough – without a doubt I would need clean underwear afterward. But I would like to know enough to actually survive the earthquake rather than being crushed to a paste under the desk I crawled under.

A group called the American Rescue Team advocates what they call the “triangle of life” to survive a disaster:

It is not the earthquake which kills you. Getting crushed under a squashed desk or table kills you.

Misinformation from bureaucrats or phony experts who have never crawled into a collapsed building kills you.

All rescuers agree: You can survive by fleeing the building if you can get out the ground floor or getting into a survivable void, next to a large, bulky object.

And Ten Tips:

1) Everyone who simply "ducks and covers" WHEN BUILDINGS COLLAPSE is crushed to death -- Every time, without exception. People who get under objects, like desks or cars, are always crushed.

2) Cats, dogs and babies all naturally often curl up in the fetal position. You should too in an earthquake. It is a natural safety/survival instinct. You can survive in a smaller void. Get next to an object, next to a sofa, next to a large bulky object that will compress slightly but leave a void next to it.

3) Wooden buildings are the safest type of construction to be in during an earthquake. The reason is simple: the wood is flexible and moves with the force of the earthquake. If the wooden building does collapse, large survival voids are created. Also, the wooden building has less concentrated, crushing weight. Brick buildings will break into individual bricks. Bricks will cause many injuries but less squashed bodies than concrete slabs.

4) If you are in bed during the night and an earthquake occurs, simply roll off the bed. A safe void will exist around the bed.

5) If an earthquake happens while you are watching television and you cannot easily escape by getting out the door or window, then lie down and curl up in the fetal position next to a sofa, or large chair.

6) Everybody who gets under a doorway when buildings collapse is killed. How? If you stand under a doorway and the door jam falls forward or backward you will be crushed by the ceiling above. If the door jam falls sideways you will be cut in half by the doorway. In either case, you will be killed!

7) Never go to the stairs. The stairs have a different "moment of frequency" (they swing separately from the main part of the building). The stairs and remainder of the building continuously bump into each other until structural failure of the stairs takes place. The people who get on stairs before they fail are chopped up by the stair treads - horribly mutilated. Even if the building doesn't collapse, stay away from the stairs. The stairs are a likely part of the building to be damaged. Even if the stairs are not collapsed by the earthquake, they may collapse later when overloaded by fleeing people. They should always be checked for safety, even when the rest of the building is not damaged.

8) Get Near the Outer Walls Of Buildings Or Outside Of Them If Possible. It is much better to be near the outside of the building rather than the interior. The farther inside you are from the outside perimeter of the building the greater the probability that your escape route will be blocked.

9) People inside of their vehicles are crushed when the road above falls in an earthquake and crushes their vehicles; which is exactly what happened with the slabs between the decks of the Nimitz Freeway. The victims of the San Francisco earthquake all stayed inside of their vehicles. They were all killed. They could have easily survived by getting out and sitting or lying next to their vehicles, says the author. Everyone killed would have survived if they had been able to get out of their cars and sit or lie next to them. All the crushed cars had voids 3 feet high next to them, except for the cars that had columns fall directly across them.

10) Rescuers have discovered, while crawling inside of collapsed newspaper offices and other offices with a lot of paper, that paper does not compact. Large voids are found surrounding stacks of paper.

I am not an expert, nor do I play one on TV. But this makes sense to me so I thought I would pass it along.

P.S. Still posting over here.

FivePointFour

Yesterday at 11:42 AM, I was on the phone with the VP of my department, whose office is just down the hall (we were preparing for a conference call). If you had been a fly on the wall (ick), you would have heard me say, “Hey, wait a minute. That’s not – hey, is this an earthquake? Oh my God, I think it’s an earthquake. Yup, we’re having an earthquake. Um, hello?”

At that point he stuck his head in my office and said, “Are you okay?”

What? Was there some sort of tectonic disturbance yesterday?

We are all okay over here, although it took a few minutes for the rubbery feeling in my legs to go away and then all the phone lines were jammed so no one could get in touch with anyone else. My sister-in-law, who is always on top of these things, had developed an emergency plan for our family years ago. In the event of a terrorist attack or natural disaster, we are all supposed to call Sweet Dub’s Aunt D in Texas. She will then be able to tell us all where everyone is and if everyone is okay. The problem is that in the intervening years, there’s been a rift in the family and Sweet Dub refuses to speak to that side anymore. Since I think the rift (which involves allegations of elder abuse*) is legit, I don’t want to call them either. So instead we were all emailing each other and trying the landlines every 10 minutes.

Here’s some fascinating footage of the quake, if you haven’t seen it already.

Evidently, instinctively, I did the right thing as the quake was happening, which was to not get under my desk and to stay away from the front wall of my office, which is made of glass. I just got down low on the floor next to the desk , because (a) I’m big and pregnant and all and I can’t move that fast, and (2) What if it WAS the Big One? I’d be crushed underneath the desk.

Ah, California. Endlessly entertaining.

* Oh man, the stories I could tell you, which I don’t out of respect for the family. This blog would be about 500 times more interesting. Yeah, sorry about that.

The Other Side of the Story

"Children's mouths speak the truth."
- Chinese proverb

"You can't handle the truth!"
- Jack Nicholson as Col. Jessep in A Few Good Men

Well, as I've learned more about "the incident" that occurred over a week ago, I'm reminded once again of how important it is not to pass judgment before you get the whole story. And particularly of how, when you know your child is generally well-behaved and truthful, you need to take what others say with a grain of salt.

Here's my recap of how the incident was originally relayed to me:

The kids went on a field trip on Friday and were waiting in line to get on a merry-go-round. There was the usual pushing and shoving, and apparently some child pushed Viva, so Viva punched her. Then one of the moms who was helping to chaperone said, “No, no, no – Viva, no hitting!” To which my child (yes, mine)replied: “What do you care? You’re not my mother!”

Two points here: Viva did not punch the other child, as I found out later - she merely pushed her back. (I'm not excusing this, but I do think pushing is much less harmful than punching, as I was originally told.) Also, there was a crucial omission in this story, which is that the mom in question did not see the child, A, push Viva in the first place. When Viva protested that A had pushed her first, the mom flat out said, "No, she didn't." I know my child and while she can sometimes be "spirited," I know that she will not ever hit, or behave aggressively, unless she is hit first.* So it appears that not only was she wronged first, but then she was (in her mind) called a liar on top of it.

This pretty much changes the whole tone of the incident for me. I said to Viva, "Okay, I understand that you were really angry and hurt. It sounds like K's mom took sides without knowing the whole story and that was unfair. But you know you are still not supposed to talk to grown-ups like that."

"I'm sorry!" Viva wailed. She had already had to talk it out with Daddy, with much crying and unhappiness, and then I came home to find her lying in a somber little puddle on Daddy's chest on the couch and had her rehash it with me. "Can we just stop talking about it? It just makes me sad!"

"You understand that you are not to talk back to grown-ups like that?" I said. Viva nodded miserably. "Okay, then. I can tell you are sorry and you already feel bad enough, so yes, we can stop talking about it. Can you come over here so I can give you a hug?"

Privately, Sweet Dub and I conferred and agreed she should not be subject to any kind of further punishment. It is a hard road to walk, this parenting thing. You just kind of make it up as you go.

* This is a policy of last resort, since when Viva started school, she was so non-confrontational that she was getting bullied by another kid every day. Finally, against my protests** (and since "telling the teacher" was not preventing her getting pushed, kicked, scratched and even spit on every day), Sweet Dub taught her how to throw a punch in self-defense. This was preceded by a simple lecture, the refrain of which was how she was only to do this as a last resort to make this child stop picking on her. Indeed, not only did the bullying stop, but they became best friends.

** "My child is not going to be a punching bag!" was Sweet Dub's response.

Scenes From a Marriage

Sunday morning. I am eating a blueberry muffin and enjoying the fresh medley of fruit I have prepared (peaches, strawberries and blueberries). My husband wanders by.

Sweet Dub: So what's the plan for today? We need to clean this house.

Mama Blah [deliberately screechy]: When are you going to put my pictures up on the wall? When are you going to fix the yard? I thought you were going to --

Sweet Dub leaves the room. Five minutes later, he pokes his head into the dining area.

Sweet Dub: Do you want to go to the zoo or clean the house?

Mama Blah: I don't want to do either of those things.

Not that it matters, because Sweet Dub has already walked out the back door without waiting for my response. Ah, love.

Updated to add: We ended up going to the hardware/garden center en famille rather than the zoo. Once we got back home, it was too blindingly hot to stand in the patio area where we were planning on doing the work, so I took a nap while Sweet Dub and Viva played with Legos. But we did end up getting half the project finished in the early evening -- pavers have been placed, and tonight we will add seed. Sweet!

Hush Your Mouth!

I am having issues with Viva’s school – more on that later – and I have been trying to get in touch with their principal to address them. She returned my call today and said, “I assume you’re calling about the incident on Friday?”

To which I responded, “What incident on Friday?”

Oh, Lord. The kids went on a field trip on Friday and were waiting in line to get on a merry-go-round. There was the usual pushing and shoving, and apparently some child pushed Viva, so Viva punched her. Then one of the moms who was helping to chaperone said, “No, no, no – Viva, no hitting!”

To which my child (yes, mine) replied: “What do you care? You’re not my mother!”

Wow. I was floored. We have been having some trouble with Viva over the past few weeks because she has become very mouthy. In fact, right now she is on punishment for a week because she mouthed off to her daddy over the weekend. Clearly, whatever we have been telling her about her mouth and having respect for other people is not working.

Man, if I ever said something like that and the principal called my mom to talk about it? Whew! Shit. I would rather not go home. Life would be very unpleasant.

I responded that this is a new thing, very uncharacteristic of Viva (to which the principal agreed, as Viva is most often the kid who gets stickers and treats for being so well-behaved, such a good listener, etc.). I have never had a bad report about her – usually if the school calls me, it’s because she is either sick or some other kid hit/bit/kicked her or something. I asked for the child’s name so I could make sure Viva apologized to her, and for the mom’s name, so Viva and I could apologize to her together.

I also told the principal that while I am not trying to make excuses for Viva, she has been very unhappy with the school’s camp program this year. She has had a different teacher virtually every week, and no one has communicated with us about this at all. The woman who was supposed to be her teacher, who Viva loved and whose class she wanted to be in, quit unexpectedly because the other kindergarten teacher gave notice and the school administration expected her to teach two classrooms’ worth of kids. The only reason I know this is because one of the other parents called me at work and told me. No one at the school communicated to me at all.

So Viva was already heartbroken that she lost one teacher, but she quickly regrouped when Mrs. H. began teaching the summer program. Mrs. H. is a fourth-grade teacher who was supposed to substitute for the whole summer. Viva told me she liked her and was now happy with school. So we had Mrs. H. for two weeks and then we went on vacation. When we returned, Mrs. H. was gone on vacation and Mrs. R, the Spanish teacher, was filling in. Viva was glum.

“She is not a good teacher,” she said. “She thinks we’re babies. She makes us sing Barney songs!” I told her to grit her teeth and be patient, that Mrs. H. would be back next week. This would be fine, except that I was wrong. Mrs. H. was not back. She was moved to another class and an 80-year-old teacher’s aide is now in charge of the class. Viva is now really unhappy and confused, and I’m really ticked off.

“Well, we hired a new teacher, Miss W. She’ll be starting Monday, and she’ll be Viva’s teacher for the whole school year,” the principal said.

Great, so now she has to adjust to yet another teacher. It occurs to me that when it appears that the grownups don’t know what’s going on, and the whole routine is off-kilter, it makes the kids feel really insecure. Viva misses her Pre-K teacher, so she’s already unhappy about that, and now after three teachers in four weeks, she is going to get a new teacher again. How this new person is going to get any respect from these kids is beyond me. I can see why Viva might be acting out a bit. (Not that I am making excuses.)

But moreover, getting back to “the incident” at the merry-go-round, I am really pissed off that this happened on Friday and I’m just hearing about it today. Had I known about it the day it happened, I could have addressed it then and our weekend would have been very different (Viva had her cousins over for a camp-out and a sleepover, with all the attendant treats and privileges). It’s well after the fact now, and it’s not fresh.

So it was especially timely that I came across this entry from CityMama:
'Ohana means family (and sometimes you learn that the hard way)

It made me nostalgic for my mom’s old neighborhood, where if you did something bad up the block, your mama knew about it before you even walked home (and you got a talking-to from every other grownup on the street on your way home) . I feel the parents in Viva’s class are a pretty tight-knit group and we can pretty much correct each other’s kids with impunity, so I am doubly appalled that Viva would respond this way to someone’s mom.

And I already ratted her out to Sweet Dub. She is in for one hell of a talking-to on the way home. Further bulletins as events unfold.

Forty (Not the Song by U2)

My birthday is on its way (August 11th), and it’s the big one this year. I’m turning 40. Sweet Dub says I shouldn’t tell people that, but you know what? I don’t really have a problem with it. If other people do, that’s their issue. I’m not going to get all hung up about it.

Since this is a “milestone” birthday, it gives me pause and makes me a bit reflective. Here are some reasons why I feel blessed to have lived through nearly 40 years on this planet:

* I honestly do not give a rat’s ass about what other people think about how I live my life.

* I still get carded when I buy alcoholic beverages (good genes haven’t let me down yet).

* I don’t have to be trendy.

* I am more comfortable with myself than when I turned 30, and much more so than when I turned 20. This makes me look forward to the years to come.

* I have finally learned how to say no.

* While I do like to look good, I realize that (to quote India.Arie), “I am not my hair, I am not my skin…” Who I am is not just what I look like.

* On a related note, and this is not a contradiction of my previous point: regular application of moisturizer and sunscreen are critically important.

* Finding the right life partner makes a huge difference in how you live your life as you age. Find someone who makes you laugh, who makes you think, and who has his/her head on straight. It will save you a lot of grief.

* Good friends are a great gift.

* Sometimes it’s easier to let the small things go. And there are a lot more small things than you might think.

* Certain things you can’t go cheap on. Wine, bras, and shoes come to mind. Oh, and garbage bags. Don’t go with the cheap garbage bags.

This is what comes to mind this minute. I am sure I will amend later. What would you add? Even if you haven’t yet reached 40, what are some important life lessons you’ve learned?

P.S. New post up at Belly Overwhelmed, too.

Anti-Social

So, last week the Blah Blah Family was on vacation, or as we like to call it, "staycation." I intentionally did not read email or blogs or for that matter, return phone calls if I didn't feel like it. And it was glorious. During this time, I: had my sister and her family over twice, including a sleepover on the 4th of July; went to the supermarket approximately 43 times; had a mani/pedi; bought a new car; went to the beach; saw a Sparks game in the skybox at Staples Center;

went to a pool party; read two books in their entirety; lounged around in the backyard drinking lemonade and eating Popsicles and watching Viva splash about in the pool; and I don't remember what all. The days just kind of blended together and that was just fine with me. I got to nap!

Okay, I admit it. With this pregnancy, I just can't be bothered with people. I get easily tired and thus easily irritated, and when people want to do things that aren't easy for me, I have actually begun to say no. I think the last straw was a few weeks ago, when I had agreed to a playdate with one of Viva's classmates. Her mom is sweet but a bit high maintenance, as in, she will call me every couple of days normally, but when we are having a playdate she will literally call me every five minutes before we get there. But first, she will call me the day before the playdate to confirm, then call the morning of the playdate to confirm again, then ask me to call her when I am leaving the house. This is not because I have ever been late to a playdate. I understand how kids are, and mine is just as hyper about getting to play with your kid as your kid is about getting to play with mine, so I am pretty much out the door when I say I'm going to be.

The problem with this mom is that I agreed I would meet her at an indoor playground in an area of Los Angeles County which is inland, and extremely hot. I actually live closer to this area than she does, but I left the house earlier than she did, because, as I explained to her, I needed to get gas and then pick up a gift for my grandmother's birthday at the same mall where the playground is. "You're leaving NOW?" she said.

"Yeah," I said. "I just have to do these two things and then if we get there before you, that's fine. We'll just meet you there." I was leaving about 10 minutes before she was, and she lives about 15 minutes further away. She proceeded to call me when she left, again when she got on the freeway (at which point, on hearing I was already in the parking lot, she screeched, "You're already THERE?"), and then every two minutes thereafter to determine where exactly we were. At one point, I had just hung up the phone with her and it rang again before I even put it down. What?? I almost threw the phone out the window. It was 98 degrees and I could not find a parking space and I was muttering not very nice stuff under my breath and Viva kept asking me what I was saying and I wanted to run someone over.

I just have no patience for stuff like this. I realize this is her issue, her anxiety, whatever, but it makes me not want to deal with her at all. She called me again while I was on vacation (despite the fact that we'd just seen her at a pool party three days earlier) and left a message wanting to get together. I haven't yet called her back. (I know, I know, I'll call her today.)

It's not that I don't like her. When we finally get together, I have a good time. But seriously, this woman calls me more often than my own sister does. (And I actually like to talk to my sister!) But I had other friends before I met her, friends who I love dearly who I don't get to talk with as much as I'd like. If I'm going to be talking to anyone, I'd rather be talking to them. (Note to friends: this doesn't mean that I'm actually going to call you, although you know I love you and think about you constantly. Kiss kiss!)

Sweet Dub said to me this weekend, "You are really anti-social these days. We both are."

"Viva doesn't want to go anywhere," I said. This is true. We had tried to lure her out of the backyard with promises of the park, the zoo, even heroin, but she just wanted to lie in the shade and paint watercolors with her dad and then splash around in the pool.

"But I wonder if she's getting that from us," he said. "We need to schedule some more playdates so she's not just around us all the time."

I glared at him.

"It doesn't have to be with just [Constant-Phoning Mom's kid]," he said. "Do she and Viva really get along THAT well?"

"They play together fine," I said. "But Viva never mentions her or asks to go play with her. She asks about [kid whose parents we like] and [other kid whose parents we like] a lot more often, so I've talked with them about doing a kind of a regular thing. We just haven't gotten it together."

"Well, get it together," he said, making a face at me.

"Whatever, get it together yourself," I said.

God! Why must I be so put upon? Me and my petty little problems.

So anyway, I am going to attempt to be more sociable. Wish me luck. Oh, and look upon me in all my anti-social hugeness:

P.S. Also, very short new post up at Belly Overwhelmed. Because I'm back from vacation, but why work? (ha ha, heh heh, that was a joke, I've been very busy today, really)

Imaginings

Viva, as her alter-ago “Michael,” has asked me to go on a date with her. I have accepted, and we have both gotten dressed up. The outfit “Michael” wears on our date is comprised of the following: knit winter cap, pulled on haphazardly over Viva’s mini-locs,* a white “wife-beater” tank top with colorful designs painted onto it with tempera paint, a pink madras belt used as a tie over the wife-beater, and navy blue bike shorts with sparkly rhinestones down each side. (I am wearing a white eyelet dress with a green wrap, dangly earrings and a straw hat.) We drive on our ottoman to a lovely restaurant. When we arrive, “Michael” asks if I would like to sit inside or out. I decide on out, so we head out to the backyard, where “Michael” serves me a lovely dinner of plastic food – tacos and something called “soup sorbet” – on a tray, on a blanket on the grass. It is all very romantic, and at one point “Michael” lies back on the blanket and invites me to look at the sky, which is beautifully blue and clear. I lie down for two seconds before I can feel my pregnant stomach overtaking my lungs. Because breathing is important to me, I sit back up. “Michael” looks at me lovingly and tells me I am beautiful. I thank him and tell him he is beautiful, too. And then the following exchange takes place:

Viva/Michael: Do you wanna have dinner and then sleep together?

Mama B: Sleep together?!

V/M [encouragingly]: I have a REALLY nice bed.

Mama B: That sounds nice, but I think I need to get to know you better before we have a sleepover.

V/M [disgustedly]: Agh.

Mama B: Y’know, this has really been great. I’ve had a really good time on our date. You seem like a nice guy. But I need to get back home to cook dinner for my family.

V/M: Yeah, um – me too. I need to get home to see my little brother, Gee-Woo**. He wants me to play videogames with him.

Mama B: That’s sweet of you. Well, thanks for the date and all.

V/M: Yeah, um – I’ll see you tomorrow? We can go to the movies!

Mama B: Sounds good.

V/M: Okay, see you in the morning. [runs inside] Dad! DAD! You wanna play with me? Let’s wrestle!

* I twisted Viva’s hair last Sunday and then took the twists out on Saturday and just left her hair like that, all curly and wild. Completely adorable.

** New kid in summer camp. He speaks very little English, mainly Korean, but apparently they speak some kind of universal play language, because Viva is all up in his business and he’s all I hear about lately.

Can I Get an Amen?

Today, I was browsing through the rental listings for Craigslist, when I happened across this headline:

$3000 / 3br - Rental listings over $2000 on Craigslist (Pipe Dream USA)

Well, I had to click on it. Wouldn't you? And here is the ad (I am quoting the entire thing because it is just too beautiful):

Would all the people trying to rent houses that they can not afford the mortgages on, please REALIZE that this is a free listing service. We, the readers of craigslist.org, hereby say to you, we can't afford your inflated house either!

Give it up. Walk away. You're underwater and noONE wants to rent your 'fabulous' house for more than 25% of their earnings. You really want to rent your property? Try setting a realistic rental price that someone making an average income in LA can keep up with (48K in 2005). Otherwise, list it somewhere else.

Thanks.

And to you, Anonymous Craigslist poster, sir or ma'am, I say preach on! I think I love you. You win Cranky Crackpot of the Week, and a year's supply of toilet paper!

TV Has Sunk to a New Low

"Baby Borrowers" message to teens: Don't get pregnant

NBC and The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy are educating teens about unplanned pregnancy while enchanting them with "The Baby Borrowers," the network's upcoming new reality show featuring five 18-to-20-year-old couples tasked with taking care of tots, toddlers, tweens, teens and elderly folks on camera.

Are you kidding me? What parent in their right mind would hand their children, especially very young children under 3, over to a complete stranger for three days?

After NBC announced it was producing an American version of "The Baby Borrowers," Natural Child Project director Jan Hunt posted an open letter on the organization's site, lashing out against the network "for the present and future emotional health of the babies and young children whose lives will be so strongly affected."

"Sudden removal from their parents and placement with strangers for long periods of time is from a baby's point of view no different than a kidnapping," wrote Hunt. "It has been well-established that babies who suddenly lose their primary caregiver can quickly go into mourning and emotional depression."

When my dad died unexpectedly almost 5 years ago, Viva was only eight months old. I was her primary caregiver, although we did have a babysitter coming in a couple of days a week to watch her for a few hours at a time (for situations like when it took me over three hours to vote in the presidential election). It was December. My dad's funeral was taking place in Boston, more than 2,600 miles away. There was a nationwide flu epidemic and while we did have warm clothes for Viva, having a baby prepared for winter in Los Angeles is a very different proposition from having a baby prepared for winter in Boston. My husband had just started a new job the previous week; fortunately they were sympathetic and gave him a couple of days off. I had to make a decision quickly, and I decided to leave the baby at home with her Daddy. I left on a Saturday night on a red-eye flight, caught up with family Sunday, went to the funeral Monday, and flew back Tuesday morning.

It was one of the hardest things I've ever done. Walking out the door with my suitcase, knowing she couldn't understand that I wouldn't be back in ten minutes, was awful. At that point in Viva's life, we had never been separated for more than two or three hours. I cried most of the way to the airport. When I spoke to Sweet Dub over the next three days, he said she was pretty much inconsolable at night and although he could play with her during the day, he could tell she was looking for me. She would occasionally just rest her head on his shoulder, looking completely dspressed and heartbroken. When I returned on Tuesday, she was sitting in the babysitter's lap on the couch. When she caught sight of me, her face lit up, and then she burst into tears. She cried for a long time. It was utterly horrible.

Now, I know my experience is just anecdotal, but it reinforces all the reading I have since done on early childhood development. Viva seems to be pretty well-adjusted and attached to me to a fairly normal degree (whatever that is), but I wonder sometimes if this impacted her more than I know. When she was a toddler -- not that long in her lifetime from when we were first separated -- she wouldn't leave my side when we went to the playground. I would try to show her how to play with other kids, offer them sand toys, the usual, and she would have none of it. She only wanted to play with me. I was amazed to see children younger than she was who would just crawl or toddle away from their parents, completely confident and independent. Admittedly, this clinginess may just have been part of Viva's temperament. Or it may have been rooted in that separation. It's hard to know.

When I left Viva for three days, I left her in the loving care of her dad, with her loving grandparents right down the hall, and her loving babysitter for one of the days I was gone. I did not leave her with a complete stranger. It was nonetheless clearly traumatic for her. (It certainly was traumatic for me. And knowing what I know now, I am inclined to think that if I had it to do over again, I would take her with me.) This new show, based on a British show of the same name, seems cruel to me. What do you think?

P.S. Here are statements from two groups concerned with child welfare, Natural Child Project and Zero to Three. Both condemn the show, with good reason. Read if you want more info.

P.P.S. I'll have a new post up at Belly Overwhelmed later today if you are inclined to read it. No pressure!

Color Confusion

Hold on to your hats:

In South Africa, Chinese is the New Black

A high court in South Africa ruled on Wednesday that Chinese-South Africans will be reclassified as “black,” a term that includes black Africans, Indians and others who were subject to discrimination under apartheid. As a result of this ruling, ethnically Chinese citizens will be able to benefit from government affirmative action policies aimed at undoing the effects of apartheid.

You know, I've said it before and I'll say it again: race is just a social construct. As a woman of color, I embrace my new "black" brethren (and sistren, O yes). If anything, this ruling just underscores the inherent ridiculousness of the whole apartheid system and makes the whole concept look even more ass-backwards, if that were possible.

(Is it possible I haven't posted in ten days? Insanely busy with a 500-person event last week at work, just trying to get caught up. My apologies!)

Dreaming my Dreams

I had the weirdest dream last night/this morning. I was watching an old movie from the '70s, and the plot seemed to involve a group of about ten young men who were very tan in that weird kind of orangey Technicolor way of the 70s, and they were all running around naked through the streets of the San Fernando Valley. They were all high, so they were just laughing and goofing around and running from this barrage of police cars that were trying to cut them off. As they were running they were cupping their hands over their naughty bits, but sometimes they would have to jump, say, across a ditch or something, and there would be this whole nads-swinging-in-the-air thing going on. At one point one of them turned to another and said, "This is the best Googlewatch ever!" Which even in my dream I thought was kind of incongruous. I mean, Google? In the 70s? And in my dream I got distracted from the movie and started to deconstruct the word "Google," making the connection between "go ogle" and "watch." But then I was drawn back to the movie because one of the young men had fallen and was lying down and there was a close-up of him and I said, "Oh my God, is that a young Ted Danson?" and it was.

The end.

The Results are In!

But you're gonna have to read them over at Belly Overwhelmed. (Aw, come on, it's just one click away!)

Education Deprivation

A new report from the United Way of Greater Los Angeles finds that too often when we talk about education reform, we focus on early education (the primary years) and high school (preparing kids for college), while ignoring the middle school years, which are critical. Kids who struggle in middle school tend to drop out once they hit high school, or even before. Statistically, these kids are more likely to continue struggling throughout their lives, since without an education they are much less likely to make a living wage. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger* is proposing to cut LAUSD funding by $350 million, due to the state budget deficit. Talk about kicking you when you’re down. Check out these statistics:

100% of L.A. County middle schools spend less on each student than the national average.

At least 20% of teachers in L.A. County middle schools lack full teaching credentials.

Half of middle schools in L.A. County meet the state’s definition of an overcrowded school, and within the LAUSD this proportion jumps to 75%.

70% of schools that serve high levels of low-income students are categorized as Program Improvement schools – meaning they have not improved their academic outcomes for two years in a row. Half of these have seen no improvement for 4 or 5 consecutive years.

If you feel up to it, the Summary Report and the Full Report are available for free download at United Way Los Angeles.


* By the way, the Schwarzenegger household will be unaffected by the budget cuts. I hear that his children attend a private school that charges over $25,000 a year in tuition.

Fashion Crisis

Oh Lord. I have to go to a cocktail event tomorrow night and I don't know what I'm going to wear. I have two maternity dresses but they are very much more business-y than dressy. Since I left this until the last minute, I can't order anything online and I fear I'm going to end up spending an outrageous amount of money for something I'll wear only a couple of times. Crap.

I really dislike myself sometimes.

Updated to add: Okay, so I ended up looking pulled together, if not glam. I bought this quite non-dressy dress at GapMaternity:



And I spruced it up with a pretty sheer apple green wrap, some dangly multi-colored chandelier earrings, a couple of green and gold bangles, and these A. Marinelli peep-toe pumps:



I also wore my hair down and finger-curled little ringlets into it. Since I didn't take a picture, you're going to have to take my word for it, but I think I cleaned up pretty good.

What the...?

So for those who have been following along at home, you know that the Blah Blahs have been trying to find a larger place to live. We don't have to vacate our current digs at any particular date, but we do need more space for when Fetal Blah arrives in late October, with all the attendant baby gizmos and gear. We'd like to move this summer at the latest so I don't have to deal with packing and settling in while being gargantuan.

A couple of nights ago, we went to check out a place that was nice but too pricey for what it was and where it was. I have also been having an ongoing email conversation with someone who listed a house for rent, then when contacted told me the house wasn't ready to show*. We exchanged emails for a week or so, and then she asked me to give her a couple more weeks to get repairs made. I contacted her today to ask if the house was ready, and this is the response I got:

"At this point we have two very interested couples. Thanks, [insert name here]"

What the hell? Clearly this was not meant to be, but I'm discouraged and (I'll admit) a little ticked off.

As my friend Sploo would say, "That is some foolywang**."

So I'm a little bummed out on the house front, which means that this weekend will no doubt turn into an episode of The Blah Blahs Mix It Up, also known as To Make Themselves Feel Better, The Blah Blahs Redecorate. Tune in, while we:

• debate the merits of blank, pretty sunshine-yellow walls vs. actually hanging artwork in the living/dining area, the walls of which consist of some impossible, impassable substance which you can hammer into forever and still not get the smallest hole to stick a nail or picture hanger;
• dig up the flower bed and relocate the lantana;
• find some pavers and put them in the flower bed, which is located very inconveniently in a strip running right through the middle of the patio (aesthetically pleasing, but when you have kids running through it, not so much);
• gripe about the housing market;
• buy new bedding for the master bedroom because it is no longer sexy in there;
• lie around on the couch exhausted from our labors;
• lie around on the couch having not done any of the above;
• instead of doing any of the above, make movies in the backyard, with Viva as the star;
• instead of doing any of the above, create an art project with Viva;
• watch the NBA playoffs, which will apparently Never END (no, seriously - whose idea was it to stretch the playoff semifinals to "best of seven" instead of "best of five"? Because I like basketball, but I'm done already, and we haven't even gotten through the Eastern and Western Conference finals. Can't we just fast-forward?);
• debate going to the beach/the in-laws' (on either side)/another kid's birthday party/on vacation;
• create a simple yet stylish filing solution for the gobs of paper threatening to swallow our house;
• rag on each other for our choices of baby names;
• create a dazzling sculptural masterpiece out of all the shoes Viva has outgrown in the past couple of weeks.

Stay tuned for the soundtrack! Coming soon!

* Which should have raised a red flag anyway, since why list the house if it's not ready to show?

** Foolywang is my new favorite word. I am adding it to my list of potential baby names.

Spleen, Venting Of

This morning, while I was waiting An Eternity for Viva to get out of the bathroom, I turned on the TV to find a decent kids’ show that I had recorded (for some reason, at the time when I am usually in the shower and Viva is eating breakfast, there is a dearth of shows which catch her interest or are age-appropriate – she is in this weird netherworld where the preschool shows are too babyish, but the shows she would love to make me let her watch are too old for her. I end up taping a conglomeration of shows at various times when we are not home so I have something to keep her from standing outside the shower and screaming the same made-up song at me thirty times in a row). At this time of day, Good Morning America was on, and George Stephanopoulos was pontificating about the West Virginia primary.

Ordinarily I have no issue with George Stephanopoulos – I mean, he is so cute, you could just put him in your pocket and button it up if you didn’t want to listen to him. But GMA host Robin Roberts asked him what stood out in this primary and he responded, “Race has played more of a factor in West Virginia than in any other contest we’ve seen so far.”

He then cited the following numbers from an exit poll of “white voters” in the West VA primary:

2 out of 10 said race was a factor in how they voted
8 out of 10 voted for Hillary Clinton
3 out of 10 would support Obama vs. McCain

“This shows a real problem for Barack Obama,” he said.

“This shows a real problem for AMERICA!” I shouted at the television. Prejudice is alive and well, and we can point it out, but let’s not address it head-on – why no, let’s just keep it moving. “God, I can’t stand it,” I said, and added some choice words.

Of course, that made Viva come out of the bathroom. If Mama asks you to wrap it up and eat your breakfast, no. But if you hear Mama swearing under her breath, by all means, come on out!

P.S. New post up at Belly Overwhelmed. I'm not making any promises that it's better than this one.