One of Those Baby Updates
I figured since I am being labelled a Mommy Blogger (or so I've noticed in a few places) I should maybe, you know, blog about the babies.
The babies are 7 months old, or almost 32 weeks old. I'm not sure why I still bother about that weeks business. I suppose it's because it ties in with them being weighed, but I'm a negligent absent-minded stubborn mother and haven't had them weighed in a while. I can safely say that they're still gaining weight. Or, rather, my biceps can state that they're gaining weight because I'm going to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger's slightly less brawny little sister with the size of the muscles I'm getting from carting babies around.
The twins presented me with two red geraniums for the kitchen on Mother's Day, courtesy of my stepmom who sent them money to make sure they bought me something (which was so nice I didn't even get angry that the babies not only stole the car without asking but drooled all over the keys). Did you know that infants can wake up on the wrong side of the crib and make your day a living hell? No? Well they can. On Mother's Day in celebration of the woman who gave birth to them they also gifted me with fierce moods that continued throughout the day, leading me to assume that I didn't so much give birth to them as simply be there when they were spawned.
The babies are moving on, and it's honestly great fun most of the time. Nick and Nora have liked being read to for some time but now they don't mind reading on their own.
Oh wait. Did I say reading? I meant bashing.
Nick, in stereotypical boy style, has learned that bashing things with his fist is big, big fun. That photo was him mid-bash. Nick the Destructor - aka Nick the Bruiser or Nick the Thug - has discovered that anything is subject to bashing - books, his stomach (which makes him laugh), and particularly Sophie. Sophie was a teething suggestion from Statia when I told her I was at the end of my tether, as neither baby will touch cold things, teething rings, or fruit to ease their aching gums. Statia suggested Sophie. I bought one. The twins initially were of the mindset Are you serious, Mom? You expect me to chew on that? See how that thing is shaped? Yeah. Guess where you can stick her. Now, though, both babies love her so much that I've had to buy another one because sharing is a pretty foreign concept to 7 month olds. Nick particularly loves Sophie so much he sleeps with her. What Statia had failed to mention was that Sophie squeaks, so we know when Nick wakes up based on the melodious sound of *bash*squeak*bash*squeak*bash coming from his cot.
Nora is also into reading (even if the book is upside down), but Nora is more into contorting her body into various poses. She's twigged she has feet, and twigged it a week before Nick did. Now all she does is ride her legs high in the air.
Constantly.
Any chance she gets, including in the Fisher-Price Kickin' Bobbin' Gym, which I got at a bargain price brand new off of Ebay.
Also a recommendation from Statia, at first the babies were unimpressed. Now they both love it to bits. However Statia once again failed to mention to me the seriously annoying noises this toy makes.
This year for Christmas Auntie Helen is going to send Statia's Mini all the annoyingly noisy toys she can find. She's come across a ball that, when you roll it, shouts random phrases in French as it hurtles across the room. That's looking pretty good to Auntie Helen.
The twins still sit together and hold hands a lot. Nora spends a lot of time watching Nick. Nick spends a lot of time watching lights. So many parallels between their relationship and Angus' and my relationship.
Put them down for a nap together, though, and you always find them invading each others' personal space.
And once they wake up, you'll always find Nick stealing Sophie from Nora.
She pays him back by eating him.
Both babies are heavy onto the solid foods now. They're pretty bored with millk and get a bit shouty if that's all they have to eat. Nick in particular loves food (thereby taking after both Angus and I). He eats huge portions of food and screams when feeding time is over, even when you're sure he's not hungry. He stops pouting after awhile, so thank God for babies having 7 second long attention spans. They're allowed cheese and eggs now, but while I haven't tried the eggs we did test drive the cheese. I'm pleased to report that they both love cheese, which is a good thing as if they didn't like cheese we may have to exchange the babies for cheese-lovers because not liking cheese is, in this household, a crime akin to drowning kittens.
I know that they're still small for their age (he's in size 6-9m, and although she looks bigger she's actually much smaller than him, and only just heading out of the 3-6m clothes) they're getting baby chub, which I'm delighted by.
The baby chub will act as an energy booster for when they start walking. Realistically, we know they won't be walking by their first birthday. We'll be lucky if they're crawling. They both still can't roll over, and they can't sit unaided. Nick in particular still has a wobbly neck. I'm not too worried about it, as selfishly it's a good thing they can't be mobile right now - the house is in such a state it might actually be dangerous for them to do so.
Nick has a case of cradle cap that we're fighting. Both babies have two teeth, both in their bottom jaws. Nora has no problem while teething, just some diaper rash and drooling. Nick, on the other hand, huuuuuuuurts. He huuuuuuuurts and you must all huuuuuuuurt too.
They have startling personalities now. Nora is sunshine and light. She loves to be held, and only wants to not be held when it's time to go to sleep. She laughs easily, smiles constantly, and is generally very easygoing.
Nick, once the easygoing baby, is now Personality Central. He has quick mood changes where he's happy, he's happy, he's happy, he's angry RIGHT NOW. He sometimes just has had enough of people and so we put him in his crib and he talks to himself for ages, completely happy. He's a funny kid though, and prone to watching the world. Lights are his thing, as is any toy that makes noise. When he smiles his whole face lights up, which is a good thing as it makes you forget all those times when he's being such a miserable sod that you understand why animals eat their young.
Finally (since I'm probably boring you to tears) they both like being outside.
I love them. I do sometimes want to leave them on a hill and give the changeling babies back. Instead, in my little personal battle for revenge for their occasionally foul moods, I just create lots of pictures that I hope will someday humiliate the hell out of them.
I think I'm ahead on that score.
-H.
PS-hey, a variant of this photo is going to be printed in a paper over here. No I'm not telling which one because then you will know their non-superhero aliases.
The First of Many Rides
I'll never forget the day he showed up outside the house. Cocky, self-assured, a swagger that only Pony Boy could compete with. He took up as much space as he could get his hands on. If he could've had a bell-bottomed pure polyester zoot suit and sunglasses the size of Kansas City he would've. He didn't take shit from anyone, and had no problem throwing his toys out of the pram if you pissed him off. He would enrage me, but I spent many a day outside with him, caressing and soothing him.
If you guessed he was a car, you would be wrong.
He wasn't a car. He was a fucking tank.
He was my first car, obtained just after my 16th birthday. My dream car was this or this, but no. I got the Disco Boy with a 'tude.
He was a 1978 Buick Electra. 4-doors, the color of "the puppy ate something that didn't agree with him" brown, and the vinyl on the roof had peeled off, leaving behind a strange black foam. The seats were big enough to fit an entire basketball team and still have room for the cooler, and the trunk was made for hitmen to hide their targets. I don't know for sure, but I personally would swear that the Buick Electra was the biggest 4-door ever made. That car didn't so much drive down the road as simply take it over.
I absolutely hated that car.
With no power steering or power brakes, I would have to launch myself off the seat with all my might to stop the car, and turning a sharp corner meant I would be screaming with the effort of trying to turn the car. The car had no AC, which in Texas is always a negative. Under the hood it had what looked like the accordian shaped dryer duct holding bits together. I would have to dump a bottle of coolant into the damn engine on a regular basis, as the engine would simply eat coolant like it was candy. If you wanted the radio to work, you had to hit the dashboard in a certain location, and the buttons to change the station were still proper buttons, silver things with an impression for the finger.
When I was rear-ended a mile from the house by a woman who'd had a few too many, the frame of the car started to fold. I didn't for a moment regret seeing the back of that damn car. The Buick Electra has left me with a permanent pathological hatred of large cars for one simple reason - I just can't park them. To this day I panic when I have to park a larger car.
My next lover was a smaller, more manageable car. I left Detroit and went Asian, and I didn't regret it. I got a 1982 Honda Accord. Also 4-doors, it was silver with what once had been grey interior, but time had taken its toll on the interior and the seats were shredded. I had to pour a bottle of power steering fluid in it almost every time I drove it, and one hot Texas day the driver's-side window fell. It just fell, right into the bottom of the door, as the plastic clasp that held it in place corroded. You couldn't get a spare part for it so we super-glued the window up in place, which made going through the Drive-Thru to be a real hassle.
I finally got rid of that car and got a series of very good, very reliable, very boring cars. I had a red 3-door Honda Civic that I loved a lot. I lost him in my first divorce, but a 4-door white Toyota Tercel saw me through college and the first few years of work. Completely reliable, both cars, especially since as a student I wasn't the best at keeping them up with service.
My true love, though, as this little gem, as I moved from Asia and found love with a German. Dark green with a black top and a real glass rear window. Tan leather seats (a mistake in Texas and, later, North Carolina). Heated seats, 6 CD-changer, it was a dream car. A dream car for a chick, anyway, it felt like a lesbian fling which finally allowed me to relish being a woman. I loved that car so completely, but taking it to Sweden was impractical so I sold it. I miss it greatly. I wish I still had it, but I know it would be beyond impractical now.
And now we have two thoroughly practical cars.
I have never been that bothered about cars, possibly because I only ever had one that I really liked. Angus is lucky - he was a gearhead for a while, but only because he really had his dream car (and then went on to have his other dream car). He's not a gearhead anymore, but maybe that's because he had his chance to own the cars he's always wanted. Maybe if I'd had one of the cars I'd lusted after, I would care. But in general if you ask either of us what car we'd buy if we had a million pounds, we'd shrug. Dunno. Don't care.
Still.
Such a huge leap from Disco Boy.
Tell me about your first, or at least your most memorable - I could use a grin today.
-H.
Falling in Love With Others
"It's not that I don't care about you anymore, because I really do," Angus says, his head down. "I'm sorry about this." He sighs and runs a hand through his hair. "It's just temporary, it's not that I'm tired of you, I just feel we need a break."
His shoulders drooping, he looks at me.
I shake my head.
"What are you on about?" I ask.
"I just can't bear any pain between us," he replies.
"They're just lights, Angus." I say.
"Shhh! Don't say that, they'll hear you and you'll hurt their feelings!" Angus admonishes, and then continues talking to his beloved lights - an experiment he did to prove that fluorescent lights can be dimmed - as he takes them down from the wall.
This weekend we hope to progress the kitchen, especially as we will be losing our piece of shit temporary kitchen sometime soon. We've chosen the tiles for the new floor (grey slate) and chosen flooring for the dining room and living room (oak floorboards) and have finally decided the layout of the kicthen. The cupboards will be purchased shortly, and the granite work surface still needs to be ordered.
The sink arrived earlier today (we didn't buy it from B&Q and we didn't pay that price. We're relentless about hunting down the lowest price and we have done so with every single thing we've bought so far.) The sink isn't to everyone's taste, but we both liked the look of it. It's different and it won't stain like our stainless steel one has, courtesy of coffee grounds and squash, the same squash which stains the babies' bums yellow. I do worry it's a bit Disco Stu though, and that people will expect lots of bachelor pad black leather furniture, chrome, and neon sculptures on the wall when they see the sink.
The sink was delivered by a courier company, the driver of which decided to strike up a conversation with me.
"You from the States?" he asked.
"Yes I am," I reply, moving shoes out of the way so he can move our sink inside.
"I want to go to the States but I can't get a visa," he says sadly.
"You don't need a visa if you have a UK passport," I say, rising from my shoe shuffling.
"I do though. I was convicted of a firearms offense."
Oh. My. God.
"Firearms are hard to come by in this country," I smile nervously.
"I know. That's why the U.S. won't let me in," he replies.
Look at the time! I want to shout. I have to go now, thanks so much for dropping off the sink and help yourself to any valuables you want in our home on your way out!
Naturally I don't say any of this. It's strange that a total stranger confesses this to me, but at the same time we all make mistakes, my mistakes generally being about relationships but hey - I guess firearms play different roles for different folks.
People with a criminal past don't stress me out too much, really. Two of our builders are on driving bans for drinking and driving offences. At least one of our builders has spent time "at her Majesty's pleasure", and he is one who honestly is keen to walk the straight and narrow. We all fuck up. Maybe I should make a deal with them, I'll promise not to marry the wrong guy again if they'll promise not to drink and drive.
We have, however, installed a lock on the study door, where we keep all of our valuables. It's not that we don't trust the builders because we do, and the Cowboy would kill any of his team who got caught stealing. I'm not kidding. The Cowboy takes his company's reputation very seriously, he would never stand for theft. But he has to use various sub-contractors that we don't know, and for that reason (and because our extra house key which we foolishly forgot in a flowerpot outside disappeared) we changed the locks on the house and installed a lock on the study. Never hurts, and might as well remove the temptation.
Anyway.
The drains are being installed in the kitchen so that we can shortly hook up the new sink, washing machine, and dishwasher. I have missed the dishwasher more than words can say. Reuniting with it will be like going to bed with the best lover in the world and making him sleep on the wet spot. I also miss the washing machine actually working - we have to stand by with an empty formula can in order to bail out the pipes when the washing machine is on spin cycle.
Admit it. You're so envious.
This afternoon I have to go pick up the cooker hood (aka the vent). We were completely out of ideas - having budgeted little for the hood we were shocked to find out how bloody expensive they really are. We couldn't find anything we liked for a decent price, so we decided to go to a posh showroom to simply figure out what styles we liked. Once there, we zeroed in on one we both loved. The vent, however, retails for £1500.
Oh how we laughed.
£1500 for a vent isn't even up for debate in this house.
The good news was the posh showroom wanted to display some new stock and told us we could have the display model for £400, which is cheaper than most of the cheapest, nastiest vents on the market today. Let's see now - uber cool and expensive vent for a ridiculously low price? Lemme' think about it.
We thought for about 0.5 seconds.
I go to pick up the hood today (Angus is in London).
And finally, I had to come clean to Angus. It was hard for me, but it had to be done. My feelings have been changing, and it has gotten to a point that I could no longer ignore.
I have actually fallen passionately in love with someone else.
And yes, I love him so much I do want to marry him.
His name is Steve.
He moved in with me last Sunday, and I can never love another again.
-H.
PS-to anyone coming in from that website that is dumping traffic here - I don't know why you're here. Apparently it's from a link that includes the words "black chicks love white people's cocks", so lemme' 'splain: I am not black, first of all (not that there's anything wrong with that, I just hate to disappoint when you see my face, the color of which is akin to rice powder). Seondly, I never use the word cock because it's just a word I don't like. I prefer dick. Penis is ok. If you want, you can even call it a wee willy winkie, I don't care. And third, why is it "white people's cocks"? Shouldn't it be "white men", or are white women armed with special parts that I don't have? Whatever the answer, if you came here from that site just move along, pod people. Move along.
PPS-if you have an account on Flickr, comment here, and aren't linked to me and my baby photos, let me know. I think I missed a few names several months ago when the whole brewhaha went down (I've been dying to say that for days - brewhaha. So pointless and yet so good.)
Healing
Many years ago I was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. When I finally got the diagnosis the relief was instant, like a wave that pushed me under to a place where I no longer had to panic and struggle, I could simply drown amongst the answers. Extreme sufferers of BPD also have dissociation, which I had for so many years that it has changed all of my memories, thoughts and feelings on levels I can't even being to unpick.
I started therapy after my third suicide attempt. My last therapist here in London was the best. Calmly but emotively we worked through so much that cataloguing it all would take years to get out. He told me that in his many years of being a psychotherapist, my background was by far the most unstable that he'd ever encountered, that I would no doubt have wound up a statistic, a name in the obituaries of a crumpled up morning newspaper, had I not sought help. I would have spiralled and split so completely that I could never have been whole, because in the end I was not only dissociating when bad things happened, I was dissociating when anything happened which triggered an emotional reaction. BPD sufferers are described as people who are the emotional equivalent of a third degree burn. It's the most perfect description ever.
In my therapy sessions I started to learn about myself and about what my condition had done to my way of thinking. The biggest issue was the dissociation. Even though I no longer dissociate anymore, I just couldn't get past it taking over my past and my memories. I called it "watching myself in a movie", because that's how it appeared. The worst of it was my entire childhood played out in a film before me. My memories were filled of watching another child grow up. My nightmares at night were about the adult me trying to rescue children, and failing every time. My therapist told me that was the adult me trying to save the little me, that I had to reach out and rescue the child in order to rescue myself, and I laughed and told him I didn't buy that shit, to go sell crunchy granola to someone else.
Then the Child Me started to make herself known. In a therapy session I would see myself as a child, standing against the wall in the room. The young me would be sat on the stairs, watching me. The goal was always to get the Child Me to disappear inside of me, to connect the two. We never succeeded though, and the closest we ever got was the Child Me curled underneath the sofa I sat on, her face even with the treads of my shoes on the floorboards.
I know this sounds crazy. I know it sounds like I should be locked up and the key thrown away. But this is how profoundly screwed up I was - when I talked about my childhood, the Child Me was there, in the room, the actor in the movies of my life. Some of my memories are completely lost, but at least we figured out where I started to break, where it began to go wrong. And I learned that even though I was broken, it didn't mean I was a write-off.
Nick and Nora give me so much in life. I am not trying tu gush about my children or idolize them, because trust me - we have our bad days. Nick helps me in so many ways, with his large eyes and even larger personality. My son gives me so much.
But it's Nora that's bringing me together.
Nora, the child with the colicky past. Nora, the one that no one could bear for so long. Nora, the one who I can point to the moment where I bonded with her. It wasn't when she was born, for although I was crazy in love with her from the beginning, she was a foreign little creature to me. No, it was on the plane on the way back from the States in January that we hit that patch of time that parents call bonding. Curled on my lap, spread-eagled and asleep, she snuggled into me during the entire flight from Amsterdam to London. We snoozed together, each of us taking turns sighing, and it was from that moment that I took her into places of my heart that hadn't seen light for many, many years. I just knew.
A completely stupid thing to say, but I just knew.
This is not to say that Nick hasn't wandered into his own abandoned corridors in my heart, because he has, and there is no comparison between my children as I love them equally.
This is just to say that there's something about Nora that is bringing me back together again.
There's something about her happiness and welcome that makes me feel like I am healing. The Child Me, the one under the couch - sometimes I can touch her. Sometimes I feel her. Flashes, really - suddenly I am her, making myself walk down the sidewalk in a way to make my ponytail swing. My shins vibrate with the feel of metal roller skate wheels on the bumpy driveway. My knees tighten under the mask of scabs from falling down. Sunlight hits the back of my neck.
These are things the Child Me had.
And for moments - just moments only - I am Child Me.
I can't explain why, but there's something about my daughter that is fixing me. My son, he's helping other parts of me, but my daughter has this in the palm of her tiny hands. When Nora's eyes light up at seeing me, I feel the Child Me just behind me, her breath on my neck. When Nora babbles and growls and gigles, I smell candy necklaces and banana scratch 'n sniff stickers. When Nora nestles her head on me and falls asleep, I look through my mind and see memories that come from me, not from me watching me.
The burden to be a whole person is on myself, not on my children. I am broken but I do not expect them to fix me, I know that only I can do that. I would never impose that responsibility on them because I want only hope, light, and stability for them.
But my daughter is helping me heal.
I knew that having children would teach me to be a mother.
I never knew that having them would teach me how to be the child I was, too.
-H.
PS-I've signed up for this Twitter business, although I have no idea what I'm supposed to do (suggestions welcome). You can find me here.
Safety First, Children!
We were watching a news clip this morning about how much neighborhoods have changed here in the past 50 years. They showed children skipping rope, playing games, throwing a ball around in the street while mothers chatted and rocked baby prams from side to side.
"Wow," I said, shifting Nick to the other side of my lap. "Things sure have changed."
"How's that?" Angus asked.
"The kids are skipping rope in the street. That'd never be ok. A child could die of strangulation."
"And there's a kid sitting on the garden fence there. He'd not be allowed to sit on that in case he fell."
"There would be no throwing the ball around, either. Could hit someone in the head. Not to mention that ball games where you choose teams are exclusionary and damaging to children's self-confidence."
Things used to be much simpler. OK, we never would've been allowed to play in a bomb site, but still. Kids would entertain themselves with whatever they had to hand. And if they had nothing around to mess with, they'd make do with using each other as platforms in which to launch themselves of. This is what kids used to do - they'd dick around. Someone might get hurt, but then we'd learn not to do that kind of thing again.
I remember summers when I'd roll out of bed, throw on clothes, gulp down a bowl of cereal and then hurtle outside. I'd drag myself home around lunchtime, and then again for dinner, but in general I was out and about on my bike. What the hell I did during those days, I have no idea, but I remember being reasonably entertained.
I remember sitting in the car, waiting for my mother while she ran errands. Hell, Angus remembers he and his brother sitting in the back of the car, armed with two Cokes and a packet of crisps, while his folks went to the pub, which he said based on the number of kids in the backs of other cars meant it was pretty normal in the 60's. These days you can get arrested if you leave your sleeping child in your line of sight and step out of the car for two minutes. Leave a child in the car, even if you're only yards away and it's not boiling hot outside? Better have bail money ready.
I remember rolling around on the backseat without a seat belt. While I do advocate everyone in a car wearing a seat belt these days, I think it's wrong to dictate that children up to the age of 12 must be in a car seat, as is the new law here. Gives a whole new meaning to that "Mom, don't let my friends see me strapped into my car seat!" embarrassment.
It's all gone a bit mad. One of my co-workers attended his daughter's school pageant last year. She was in Snow White and the Seven Defenders of the Forest, because "dwarves" was ruled poticially incorrect. The nursery rhyme "Baa Baa Black Sheep" in banned here, you get "Baa Baa Rainbow Sheep", which makes no sense as black sheep are real - they do exist! Why not talk about them? They even get three bags of wool, why not include them?
I get it that nursery rhymes are a bit much, but that's just it - they're nursery rhymes. They're old fashioned but pretty much not nightmare inducing. Why change the endings, then, as is happening everywhere? Shall Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf sit down and talk animal conservation and how the Wolf might profit from a vegan diet? Shall Sleeping Beauty be changed to handle a sensitive portrayal of a woman with narcolepsy and a high IQ, as beauty is more than skin deep? Will Rapunzel not let down her golden hair in case it is viewed as objectification and, potentially, abuse of women?
I think back to being a kid, and I never viewed the nursery rhymes as being anything other than they were - fantasy. Beans don't grow into stalks that lead to giants and talking harps. Rapunzel wasn't objectified or abused by the chap who climbed her hair, she was just a dumb whore in need of a haircut, maybe some layers added to give it some movement. Women don't get identified based on shoes they left behind (unless they're like me, in which case they're shod in shoes the sizes of life rafts and can easily be picked out of a line-up of cuter, smaller sizes). The tales just were. Sure, some of them are definitely inappropriate (Little Black Sambo comes to mind, and some of the Uncle Remus tales maybe need to be explained to children carefully), but in general I don't think having those stories read to me colored my perception of people. Rabbits are silly, bears get stuck, and children the world over make mistakes.
I know a lot's changed in life. I know times are more dangerous, that more can go wrong. I know that handling children needs to be far more sensitive than people used to think it was, that damage can be done without the slightest provocation. Believe me - if anyone knows that you can fuck up your kids easily, it's me.
But at the same time, I guess I'm sad that we're losing the capacity to pick teams for dodgeball. Yes, it sucked to get picked last. Yes, it sucked to get pegged in the head. But it was also childhood, and let's be honest - for one gym class it felt kinda' nice to aim a ball at someone and not get in trouble for it.
I'm not sure I'm angry that we've become so sensitive and paranoid, or angry because so much has happened that we had to become so.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go see how much of Aesop's Fables are inappropriate, see how much blacklisting is being done there.
-H.
The Money Pit
Anyone else seen it, or is it only saddos like myself? A young couple (played by Shelley Long before she started taking herself too seriously, and Tom Hanks before he became, well, serious) buy a dilapidated house and try to rebuild it. Their contractor promises it'll be done in two weeks. Naturally it takes a lot longer than that because otherwise it wouldn't be much of a film - Two weeks? Rebuild? You got it! Everything that can go wrong does. It's a comedy of errors in pretty much every sense of the word.
A clip:
I always feel like we're seconds away from that happening to us.
The Cowboy and Angus conferred and remember that whole ripping off the ceiling in the soon-to-be kitchen escapade last weekend? Yeah. Turns out we weren't done. In conferring and looking at plans, it appeared the ceiling was still not right.
So Angus and I got up on ladders, armed ourselves with crowbars and goggles, and went to check it out.
That's not a blurry photo. That's dust. 100 years of dust to be exact. The babies were safely cocooned in another room, entertained by bouncy chairs, and Angus and I went to town.
It sucked big, gaping donkey balls. And the mess - dear God, the MESS.
We took the ceiling off completely, right back to the original joists. The ceiling was indeed too low, and now when the new ceiling goes on it'll be to regulation, which is 5cm (2in) from the joists. So we now have a great big high ceiling in the now-empty living room.
And quite a view from above, too.
I keed. The real view is this:
That would be light coming in from the floorboards from under my freakishly long toes. You can look right up into our bedroom from the spaces between the boards.
Our new temporary living room is the artist formerly known as the guest room.
That'd be the babies checking out the TV in preparation for In the Night Garden. The living room has everything we need - babies, TV, iDeck, couch, and mattresses lining the walls in case we feel we need a good bouncing.
The work never stops. We ripped out the ceilings on Saturday. On Sunday Angus drove 300 miles to pick up our new stove as we got a great deal on it if we were willing to drive to Nottingham (save £1000? Yes please.) While he was spending 7 hours on the road I watched the kids, did the grocery shopping, cleaned, and painted the garage. We were exhausted. And then yesterday - because it was a bank holiday - I continued my War on Carpets and ripped out the carpet on the landing with assistance from my apprentice Maggie.
Maybe it's because I fear I'll fall through a hole in the floor and be stuck in carpet for 24 hours.
Know what I found? Floorboards. Lovely ones. They were tarred at one stage, which is what people did when they had limited incomes - you had a rug on the floor and tarred around it to give the illusion of floor covering.
I didn't take the carpeting off the stairs, as they'll be too slippery and the entire staircase is going anyway, but I took the carpet off one stair and found gorgeous wooden stairs just aching to be stripped of carpet and provided with a loving coat of paint. Sadly, we can't reuse the stairs.
While I ripped out carpet Angus channeled holes in the walls of the to-be kitchen for the cabling which of course meant more brick dust because you just can't get enough brick dust, it's such a great thing, the way it covers everything and clogs the vacuum cleaner.
It's all exhausting. Really exhausting. We're covered in cuts and scrapes and bruises. Our bruises have bruises. Those bruises have moved in and adopted pets. I have a feeling that we'll be blowing our nose and brick dust will be coming out in our snot for the rest of our lives. When we finally showered late Saturday, after a day of ripping out ceilings, I had to wash my hair multiple times just to get all the dust out. The babies are always completely safe, they don't get exposed to the dust, but Angus and I are often one giant ball of grey.
But it's coming along.
No really. It is.
That's me standing on the first floor of what will be the new nursery.
I know that it won't always be like this, and we're only 5 weeks into a 16 week build. This week the tarps should go and the roof starts to go on. We get windows installed. Lots of things happening. Considering the fact that we're living in half a house, it's a constant fight with dust, we only have half a roof, the drains in our temporary kitchen are giving out, the grass in our garden is dead and whole sections are giant mud pits, and we're spending a fortune on what looks like tarp and duct tape, we're both actually pretty upbeat and still raring to go.
Which is a good thing, considering the sheer mountain of work we have ahead of us.
-H.
Seven
Late last night April and Patrick met their gorgeous son. I've known April for a while now, and am very happy for her and her family. She's been so ready for so long now, and I know that feeling of "Please take this child out of me, I'll even whiz by KFC to get you a spork to take it out with!" that she's had.
It's a strange feeling - I've thought a lot about her in the past 36 hours, thoughts of a mixture of hope, understanding, smiles, and - believe it or not - envy. I'm actually slightly envious. She's at the beginning of it all now, and when I look back on my own beginning on the 3rd of October 2007 I see so many things I would do differently. I spent most of that afternoon and evening passing in and out, unable to confidently hold the babies. I don't remember that much of the delivery. It seemed to have taken 5 minutes, when I know it was over an hour.
I remember some bits so clearly, and others are a haze. It's a haze, and it was so important. I wish I could remember better, remember more. I wish I could lock up every memory and hold it inside of me, to warm me on the colder nights.
There are so many things I would do differently, and so many moments that I would lock inside of my mind. I can never go back again and I know that, but the majority of my early days with my children reign high in beautiful moments for me. I guess it's true - I've become one of those who sit here and write about her preshus babeez. And my babies, they are precious. They're also little hellions on occasion, so don't get me wrong, my kids aren't preparing for sainthood.
Nick and Nora turn 7 months old tomorrow. 7 months. It seems like yesterday, and it seems like 7 years ago. I am enjoying them more and more as time passes. They're brilliant fun and have real personalities now, and even better they light up now when they see me. At almost 7 months old we're still way behind - size-wise we're now in size 6 months, and the babies cannot roll over and cannot sit up unaided. I don't worry about it all that much, they'll do it when they're ready, and at least my babies have truly been babies longer than most.
I read that at some point their little bodies will no longer mold against mine, will no longer curl into my shape. Sometime soon they'll be independent, they won't need me. I think of moms with their new bundles of warmth and I worry that the day is coming sooner than I can handle it, that day of independence.
So I guess what I'm looking for is reassurance that kids need cuddles well into childhood, that they need me and will light up when they see me for a while to come. These are the only children I will ever have and this is the only time they will be one day shy of 6 months old. I can handle them growing up, but growing away hurts a lot. If I can just know that it doesn't all end tomorrow or on that day their bodies no longer mold to mine when we sit, I think I'll feel that much better.
-H.
Childhood Literature
Recently I've begun packing up the nursery, getting it ready to be moved. The first things to be moved were the babies' books, which now rest in the study. With huge, huge thanks to people who sent us books, my folks, an ebay compulsion, and The Book People (I think their books fall off the back of trucks which my morals are flexibile enough to be ok with), the babies' reading material has been really beefed up.
The books are currently not arranged or alphabetized. Do you have any idea how twitchy that makes me?
Anyway, both Nick and Nora like to be read to. They like book after book after book, although their threshold for books has no leeway - they're on your lap being read to, they're happy, they're happy, they're happy, STOP READING IMMEDIATELY. My children - already masters of what they tolerate and don't tolerate.
The thing you don't realize about children's books until you start reading them - this because your memories of your childhood books are wonderful treasured things coated with sticky strawberry jam and Pixie Stix dust - is just how fucked up some of these books really are.
No really.
Occasionally I'll be reading one of these and thinking: What the hell is this all about? And what profound psychological impacts will this have on the kids? To which the babies rubbish me and say "Seriously, Mom, you're way overthinking again. Now turn the page before I get screamy."
I'll give you some examples.
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I love aliens. I love underpants. It stands to reason that this book would be right up my alley, so I bought this one. It has cheerful, bright illustrations. The aliens are all friends. The aliens are all happy.
The aliens also come to Earth and steal our foundation garments. The bad news is grandmas are apparently stuck back in the 1920's, and their bloomers are considered big fun for those aliens with slightly transvestite preferences. The other bad news is apparently "Mummies wear pink frilly things", so I need to hide my period-time granny panties from the babies as they grow up, so as not to disabuse them of the notion that mummies spend their time prancing around in peachy underthings.
The aliens take our knickers off the washing line and prance around in them at night before hanging them back up on the line in the morning. Let's hope they don't leave skidmarks.
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Maybe they don't, but fish sure as shit are cannibals.
Those would be fish enjoying a little lox on their bagels while wearing the very same fishing hats they wore while reeling in their Cousin Bob.
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This one - sent by the lovely Aunties CTG and ZTZCheese, is a classic. Seriously. Sendak need not bow to anyone. But I do have a hard time reading this page and keeping a straight face:
It must be because I can't get past the milk jug on the kid's head.
Yeah, that's it.
I hope Nick doesn't get a complex from looking at this page and sizing up his own milk jug.
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Varmints is an amazing book. The illustrations are stunning, the message incredible, and I want absolutely every book that this author and the illustrator collaborate on. But I do wonder a bit if this book is aimed more for adults than kids.
Those two pages read: "It touched and warmed the hearts of those few who paused and cared to listen..../Then one day OTHERS came, and the sound of bees was lost."
The OTHERS? Ben, is that you?
Then you come to these pages:
Those white dots on the left hand page? Those would be the creepy faces of the OTHERS. I can see this is one book the babies may read when they're older, lest I have to bunk down on the floor with them and assure them that the OTHERS are not, in actuality, under the bed waiting for the babeis to fall asleep so they can steal their souls and trade them for some red crayolas.
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A classic. Absolute classic. A beautiful, tear-inducing book that makes me choke up every damn time I read it. I love it, it's a book about a mother who says the same poem again and again to her son as he grows up (and naturally I've plagiarized the poem and say it to my son).
What I don't love is this:
The mother takes a bus across town, lets herself into her adult son's house, and whispers the poem into his ear before leaving again.
What. The. Fuck.
"Hey, kids! We love having you, and when you grow up someday we'll stalk you to constantly remind you of how much we love you! Better not bring home the ladies and try for some action, m'kay? Wouldn't want to blow your dear old mom's ticker out, would we?"
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Finally, there's this one:
My folks brought it over as part of a lot of 75 Dr. Seuss books they won on Craigslist for me. I love all the books, and I especially love that the books are old and well-used, because to me that makes them more special. But I don't love this one. Why? Well, since it was written in 1959 it pretty much takes all the major political incorrect issues, urinates on them, sticks a funny hat on them, and buys them all a pint.
I give you the middle of the book:
Why yes, that does say "There are many Indiands here. One of the Indians looks after the plane." Presumably thie author intended the Indian to take care of the White Man's plane after the Indian was done hunting heap big buffalo and smoking peace pipe with Runs Like the Wind. Perhaps the author felt the need to call him an Indian and dress him up in the latest of Wild West schmaltz to make a point, although what that point is I cannot possibly imagine. I've been around a lot of Native Americans in my archaeology days, but not once were any of them dressed like that. I have however encountered a number of stupid white people who dressed like that in some nonsensical attempt to impersonate a Native American, so maybe the author meant to say "substitute Indian".
My real issue with Ann Can Fly though comes from the part where Ann squeals and hopes other girls can see her and maybe they'll be in an airplane someday, too! Isn't that exciting! People with vaginas are allowed up in the air! Ann can fly even though she's a girl! I mean, you couldn't have a book called Dan Can Fly because Dan is a Man. Man Dan can fly already. Man Dan uses his huge stonking penis to control the throttle, propping up his giant tree trunk man thighs on the dashboard while making jokes about the stock market and reading a map without having to land at a gas station and ask directions. But Ann, well, Ann's a little useless. Ann's just a girl. Flying is hard, Barbie.
If I read this one to the babies I'm going to explain that Ann's stupidity was due to her being dropped on her head as a baby and not due to her having two X chromosomes. Girl's can not only fly, but we'd never bump the plane while parking it.
-H.
PS-Lily, are you here? How do you pronounce that word "pech" that you and Clancy mentioned yesterday? That's my new word.
When Schadenfreude Backfires
Schadenfreude.
A German term, it means taking pleasure from someone else’s misery.
It’s something our karma-bent souls try to not partake in, but occasionally we slip and fall. It’s not nice to smirk when someone is having a problem. It’s naughty to laugh when we see someone trip and fall. It’s mean-spirited to punch the air when we know life has gotten one over on someone that we think had it coming.
Schadenfreude is rejoicing when your nemesis tumbles off that pedestal they’ve put themselves on. It’s being glad that the supermodel trips and falls on her killer 5-inch heels. It’s smiling that the beauty queen has a zit on her chin the day you’re having a good hair day. It’s knowing deep down inside that someone has something coming to them, and when that something comes you’re glad to see the wind fall out of their sails just that little bit. It's taking comfort that someone else is as fallible as you are, as human, as likely to have to fight and struggle.
I’m not immune. At work I’ll hunker down and wait until someone has got what’s coming to them, that the “what” is often a spectacular downfall. I may not be there to see it, I just take comfort in knowing that everyone falls, and their fall may be what evens the karmic score I’ve been tallying in my head. I’m not Buddha, but I’ll go ahead and referee for him until he gets here.
I have it in my personal life too, although to a lesser extent than in my professional life. There are a few people in particular that get me to air punching, a move which is simultaneously wholly immature and blissfully rewarding. I confess there are those whose misery I don’t necessarily enjoy, but I won’t look away while it’s going on, either.
I tell myself that as long as I don’t hand life a bat, I’m not to blame when it administers a beating to someone.
I’m pretty sure Buddha wouldn’t agree with that.
He should maybe come here, stand by the pitcher’s mound then.
It’s not as though I’m a moral compass myself. I don’t decide things, I don’t get to always be in the right. It’s just I have so often been in the wrong, and god knows I’ve tried to claw my way out of that. When life seems like a skating rink to others, when it seems that they’ve never known what it feels like to shake the muck water out of their eyes, when they’ve never stared into the mirror and wondered who they were, when they’ve never had to work hard at anything when you’ve spent your life working like a demon, well, it’s a balm to a troubled soul when you see someone tumble down to your level.
But the thing with Schadenfreude is that it isn’t free. It comes at a price. You may take pleasure in someone else’s misery, but chances are that at least once they’ve taken pleasure in watching you fall, too. The worst comes when you draw in your breath to unleash a hyena laugh at someone’s downfall, only with that intake of air comes the understanding that the situation has changed, and it isn’t the other person who’s miserable, it’s you.
And then you want to kick the Buddha’s ass.
-H.
Oh God, They've Come In Now
Le Building Nightmare 2008 continues. There are a lot of things that they don't tell you about what building work does to your life. I vacuum every 20 seconds or so to keep the dust under control. It's a constant battle in the kitchen - once you disturb the earth around the house, as we did when foundations were laid, the ants come in and they bring all their friends for a keg party at Casa de Helen. There's zero privacy as every room has a window that the builders can see in thanks to all the scaffolding, so Angus and I have had to resort to a quickie on the landing of the stairs as that was the only place we couldn't be seen. He and I have both flashed the builders more than once trying to get dressed, but we're now beyond the point of caring. One of these days I'll step out of the shower and get handed a towel by a builder cheerfully whistling Quando Quando Quando.
Four days ago the temporary kitchen we created showed us a slightly different perspective.
That's daylight behind the dustcloth.
The kitchen ceiling is gone, as is half of the roof.
This was once the kitchen ceiling. The window at the top of the picture is the nursery, which will become a family bathroom and an en-suite bathroom. The entire back of the house is covered with tarps, so when you get a wind going you feel like the house may just sail away.
Angus and I spent the weekend working ourselves to death doing DIY. While the builders are doing the big work, Angus and I are doing little bits in order to save money - painting, tiling, floorboards, two bathrooms and the kitchen. You know. Little things.
Because the weather was so amazing the whole family was outside, including the babies, who slept in their bouncy chairs underneath the shade of a giant umbrella. Angus and I tooled around in shorts (OK, he wore shorts. I couldn't find my shorts so I ran around in boxer shorts. Same difference, right?) Surprisingly, both of us got sunburned, which is stupid of us because we're so naive about the weather in this country after last year's miserable summer that we didn't even think about the sun.
We started with painting the garage doors. We've had new barn doors installed on both sides of the newly roofed garage, and we painted them.
The garage is currently brick, but because the bricks on the garage and, sadly, the house are in such a shit state, they're going to have to be covered. We consulted with some experts to see if there's anything we could do to keep the brick as the outer fascia, but even with lots of pointing there's no hope. In some places, like this photo of the fireplace off the study, the horrible white pebble dash rendering was the only thing holding the bricks in place.
We're ripping off the white pebble dash and are going to have to plaster over the bricks. Short of tearing down and re-bricking every wall there's nothing else we could do to save the bricks. The plaster we'll be painting something along the lines of a cappuccino color (as will the garage), with white trim windows and a front door painted to match the garage doors.
The former kitchen ceiling is gone, but what's in place now are the studs that form part of our new master bedroom.
The back of the house is getting there, anyway. The back wall will all be brick (we're not plastering over that wall, as it'll be a feature wall seen only from the back of the house). Doors and windows have been ordered. We're in only half a house right now, but we like to pretend we can see the finished product.
We're absolutely covered with bumps, bruises and cuts. This, because this past weekend we demolished most of the living room ourselves. I'd already started on the living room a few days ago by tearing out the horrible living room carpet, underliner, and those wood strips you nail carpet too. It was a travesty - the original wood floors in the living room had been covered over by concrete, so they're lost forever.
Angus and I went for a walk with the babies, got in an argument, and came home and beat the stuffing out of the living room, thereby dispensing the argument in a giant puff of dust.
The fireplace in the living room had to go. It wasn't the original fireplace anyway, it was rebuilt in the 1980's and we were never that keen on it. The new range cooker has to go in that space, with the hood venting out the chimney, so we knew it had to be ripped out.
So I got a crowbar and went to town. Angus joined in. It was brilliant fun.
This is what the fireplace looked like decorated for Christmas, 2006 (I didn't really decorate last year. I didn't have the energy or, frankly, the inclination).
So we beat the stuffing out of the fireplace and removed the front and you know what we found?
Another fucking fireplace.
It was the original fireplace, put in when the house was built. When the fireplace was re-done in the 1980's, they simply bricked in front of the old fireplace, they didn't actually remove it.
So we stripped down the brick to the original fireplace, which we're keeping and will use as a surround around our new range.
Angus and I stripped off the rails, coving, and all other bits and pieces. Then Angus got that look on his face as he studied the ceiling. You know "that look", it's the one that tells you you're further away from a shower and a glass of wine than you thought you'd be. Angus had long held the belief that there was something under the ceiling, that the levels of the floors above and the ceiling on the ground floor didn't align. So he decided to punch a hole in the living room ceiling and find out. You know - as you do.
He was right - there was something amiss. At some point in the past, someone had lowered the ceiling about 8 inches.
We're fans of high ceilings.
So we ripped out the entire living room ceiling.
And now the living room - which will become a kitchen in the next few weeks - looks like this:
In other words, it's still a disaster, but we're working on it.
I'm betting we'll have a relaxing weekend in about 2010 or so. Any takers?
-H.
Le Snippets
There are about one million things going on, not least the fact that I'm in London tomorrow, the skin is sloughing off my hands thanks to all the building work we did today, and the delivery guy bringing our curry will be here any minute now, and my God the priority he's been given is amazing. So I bring you snippets again, because I'm a lazy bitch that way, but also because that's how my mind is working right now.
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Pushing Daisies. Why - WHY - has no one mentioned this program to me before? What, I look after you by telling you my deepest darkest secrets and feelings (and Mooncup incidents) but you can't tell me about this little gem?
Pushing Daisies rocks my world more than macaroni and cheese and white wine and footsy pajamas served up on a naked John Cusack bar. It has gotten me passed my deep and unending mourning for the cancellation of Dead Like Me. My life can now go on.
And I want every single one of Anna Friel's dresses on that show, and I plan on holding my breath until I get them because rumor has it that little ploy works.
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My grandma is back home and healing. Melissa is doing well and healing. One of Vicki's sons has been released from the hospital and is busily trying to gain weight. Her other little boy, unfortunately, has gone a slightly longer route to going home - his heart surgery was cancelled as he developed a bleed on the brain. The family was taken via air ambulance to another hospital, where the little guy had a shunt inserted to help drain the bleed. He's in NICU healing and still needs heart surgery, and Vicki still needs all the support she can get.
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I noticed the calendar tonight.
"Oh no!" I cry. "We missed Arbor Day!"
"What's that?" Angus asks, puzzled.
"It's...Arbor Day."
"And what do you do?"
"You...you arbor."
"Right. Shame we missed it then."
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If I see one more US online news page whine about gas prices, I'm going to get stabby.
Yes, gas costs a lot (for the purposes of this one, let's call it gas. Yes, it's petrol here. I'd like to move past that one for the moment). Gas costs more than it ever has. Gas is expensive. A recent online article had a woman in (Detroit? Tampa? Butte? Whatever.) some location complain that gas was now $3.90 a gallon. Gas has been going up in price over there. But gas has been going up in price here too.
Let's analyze, yes?
$3.90 a gallon. OK. Sure, that's a lot. Now want a peek at our life?
Gas here is £1.10. That's $2.20. But that's not per gallon, that's per litre. There are 3.5 imperial litres per gallon. So we would pay £3.85 per gallon, or $7.90.
You pay $3.90.
We pay $7.90.
See? Stabby.
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I'm keen on getting another tattoo, something small and out of the way, to celebrate the babies. Angus has suggested a small tattoo of Eros (the god of fertility). That's a leading contender, any other suggestions?
-H.