Tagged: mommy blogs

Parental Bliss

Your 4 year old is eating a watermelon wedge.

She loves it.

And you love watching her bite diligently closer and closer to the rind.

You turn away to talk to your spouse.

You turn back and there is no more watermelon. No red part. No rind.

Behind the empty plate on the table is nothing but your little girl wearing the satisfied expression that only comes from a job well done.

That is bliss.

A Downright Mean (But Not Mean-Spirited) Observation

It occurs to me near constantly, when it comes to relationship problems, “I am so right!” Nearly every marital issue could be solved by implementing some kind of “rule” or process. Get it? The disagreements all stem from each of us wanting our own way. (This is a given.) But the very idea (only ever presented by yours truly) that we compromise and/or put a “rule” or “plan” into place is so foreign to my non-Western wife that all I can do is assert the following observation:

If my non-Western (code for African) wife ever were to triply 1. See the value of “rules” or “plans” 2. Implement them and 3. Execute them, then all war (civil and otherwise) currently spanning the globe would end in the same instant—the two events are inextricably linked.

But it ain’t never happening.

It is still to be determined whether the hangup—be it blindness, stubbornness, or laziness—is genetic (some level of biology) or vindictive (“What does (s)he want?” “Revenge.” “For what?” “For being born.”) or proverbial (“can’t teach an old dog new tricks”). For what it’s worth, my money is on “all of the above”.

We will see.

Why I Want the Department of Education Gone

I want the government to dismantle the Department of Education because I love debating “happiness” or “flourishing” or “eudaimonia”.

There is a thing called “learning”. There is a status called “educated”. Most of the literate people (and some illiterate people) of the planet believe learning and education promote this happiness in the fullness of the word.

But the question remains.

Does education lead to happiness?

So dismantle the Department of Education. I’d even go so far as to support the end of formal schooling for a year or two.

What would “we” do? No school? Ahhh! How would life go on? Our precious daycares! Who would watch the kids screw around all day? Who would not teach them? Where would they eat? What would they wear?

Big questions, folks. And I don’t think for a second that any of them are anywhere near settled. So, Federal Government, proceed, sir!

Feels Like I’m Just Losing When It Comes To Cars

Financing used cars is the only way to go right now. But when any mechanical issues appear, the monthly payment skyrockets. Add Colorado insurance prices—and the raison d’etre—and driving a car at all becomes obscenely expensive.

I’m just coming off a false alarm “you need a new engine” on one vehicle, and a totaled-out second vehicle. This wreck was fortunate in a way because it was a high-mileage rust bucket. We got more from the kid’s insurance than we ever would have even as a trade. Yet, the plan was to keep it until the step-son needed wheels, at which point he gets the old car and, well you know the story. Now who knows when he’ll start driving.

Now this newer (still a 2017) used car seems to have a leak. Maybe it’s a fluke. I’ll find out soon enough. But it puts me in a foul mood.

I just want to read, you know? The toddlers are in bed. I just want some reading time.

Too tired for Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time.” Not even in the mood for an early X-Men comic. There’s always a Jack London freezing Alaska tale, but not tonight.

Anyhow, I have my stupid rule about reading at least a chapter from the Bible before anything else. Hmm. I’m in Two Chronicles (ha). It’s actually not terrible because of its summarizing. It is kinda nice to breeze through the history so quickly, from such a high-level, AND know that it’s still the Word of God.

I feel better already. Probably gonna hit the next chapter on that and then see about Hawking.

Oh well. Going snowshoeing with the toddlers tomorrow.

One day at a time.

“Decide”, A Review of Mothers’ Instinct by Benoit Delhomme

If you’ve somehow hesitated on this one, rest assured that it is worth watching. It isn’t perfect. But compared to all the other trash that is being proffered as “movies” these days, it is a return to the classic definition. (You don’t even want to know what my co-workers were about to watch when I came to the rescue.)

The tone was perfectly subdued, precisely unpronounced. No one holds your hand and points out what to notice. You either get it (and are disturbed in the titillating manner you found appealing) or you probably are bored and never really wanted to watch it.

As far as the leading ladies, Hathaway performs her role better than Chastain. But she also has the easier task.

The best part of the film is how the immediate fallout from the boy’s death is so natural. By way of comparison, consider the tragic mid-air. People’s reactions have centered on personal responsibility (pilot error) vs. systemic failure (FAA/ATC). And that debate is crazy to me. It’s actually why I choose to fly. I have ultimate authority for the safety of the flight. Not many jobs offer that.

As a recap, the helicopter pilot said, “Traffic in sight.” And then we all learned that he did not have the traffic in sight.

In this movie, the tragic death is more purely accidental. The trick, or hinge, to it is that one mother happened to see it coming but couldn’t get there in time, and the other mother should have been watching. But, different than the pilot, the boy never said, “I know I might die if I am wrong, but I am not wrong.”

I say all this to bring to the forefront that the post-tragedy questions “how to respond” and “how to interpret with and deal with others’ responses” are totally distinct from the mid-air’s “how to prevent this from ever happening again” question.

Moreover, the truly fascinating aspect of the plot is how powerfully the story debunks utopian notions of how good life could become if only. Life is great, people. But death is a part of life.

Death is a part of life. You don’t want life to be worse because of death. So talk about it. Think about it. Prepare for it. As a topic, death should be no different than meals or clothes or relationships.

Ultimately, I want to say this. If you feel death approaching, say, at the hands of an unstable woman, flee! It’s best not to hesitate on that one.

Quit Complaining About the Eggs

Quit complaining about the price of eggs.

How, you ask? Easy. Eat steak.

Now that the prices are comparable, I have been eating 1/2 petite sirloin steaks—perfecting a cast iron pan fry—for breakfast as the rest of the country questions themselves into lunacy.

And I like it! Who wants eggs, when you can eat steak?

Goldilocks and the Three Americans

Once upon a time, there was a family of the smallest of sizes, but perfectly intentioned, who lived in a neighborhood-

“That’s not how it goes, Dad!”

“I’m not telling the story we read, A-; I am answering your question about the noises the cameras make.”

“Oh.”

-Whenever these smallest of sizes, but perfectly intentioned, families went out from their house—whether to school or stores or restaurants—they worried about yellow-haired girls who they had heard about when they were children-

“Goldilocks has yellow hair!”

“That’s right, A-. That’s who the noises are supposed to scare aware. You see, Goldilocks is supposed to think, ‘I don’t want to deal with whatever those bears are up to. So I’ll find a house without cameras.’”

“This house doesn’t have cameras!”

“Good eyes, A-. That’s right. If I were Goldilocks, I’d try that house first.”

“You’re not Goldilocks!”

“I know. I’m just answering your question.”

“Oh.”

“You know, A-. I don’t mind sharing with you that besides adding talking cameras to the cornucopian display of my opulent wealth, that story is why I don’t trust any Yellow-Haired women.”

“Look, Daddy!”

“Okay! What? I see a truck.”

“Goldilocks is in that truck!”

“That’s right. I didn’t finish the story.”

-And no one ever saw Goldilocks ever again. But sometimes, when the light is just right, you can see Yellow-Haired women driving white trucks. So if ever on your camera screen you see a white truck in your driveway…hide your porridge!

The Right Kind of Start to the Day

Santa brought my daughter a prism for Christmas this year. Where’d he get the idea, I wonder?

If you guessed, “Who is Isaac Newton?”, then you guessed right! Of course, it wasn’t the legendary Isaac Newton who noticed apples, but the historical person Isaac Newton who recorded his thoughts and experiments for posterity, who painstakingly measured the wavelengths of colors with a prism and analogized gravity to a slingshot.

This morning my four year old daughter, A-, ran from the sunny window of my bedroom and promptly returned with the prism to try to make rainbows.

Naturally, no one needs to make rainbows with a prism anymore. This is because (despite morons abounding) to all important parties, color measurements—and even light measurements—are as solved as shoe sizes.

But the ability to see? That is truly rare. But my daughter has it. And who gave it to her? That’s right. Her very own Santa Claus, otherwise known as Dad.

It was the right kind of start to the day.

****

Oh, and I finished that other EPIC COLLECTION(!!!) of X-Men I mentioned.

For posterity, one effect that occurred while reading these 450+ pages of comics was the ability to see the rather finite amount of “types” these stories can have. IE, after you exhaust good vs evil in the plain sense, you have to move on to plot devices like making a good guy character seem evil, but lo and behold it wasn’t really the good guy, but the bad guy all along through some obvious and ingenious use of their powers! And then they also introduced the concept of using an entire comic(!) for a character in the story to tell a (in this case bedtime) tale involving slightly altered characters etc. Is that called meta, but inward; instead of breaking the fourth wall? In any case, time for a break from the Uncanny X-Men! (Don’t worry, Strangest Super Heroes of All, I still love you guys.)

Sleep, Sleeper

If I could change one aspect of modernity, it would be to un-invent the clock. I know, I know, it wouldn’t work. Modernity needs the clock like fish need water. But living by a clock has always felt unnatural to me. Most unnatural is the idea of waking up because of “what time” it is. Sleep, I say.

Running right alongside my fantasy is that I hate waking people up, no matter what time the clock says it is. I feel that I have done my small part in increasing happiness for my fellow man if I help keep people asleep. Specifically, I do everything in my power to keep babies, toddlers, and children asleep. This sleep benevolence of mine extends also to spouses and family members and house guests in general. If I am at work and someone is sleeping, I tip-toe away and do whatever is in my power to not wake them.

I cannot recall the last time I caused or allowed (or let pass without strong rebuke, for that matter) a sharp noise to be sounded while someone was sleeping.

I do confess there are moments where my posture towards sleep is more difficult, perhaps impossible, to maintain. When H- was small, we went to the symphony together and she would fall asleep despite the racket. At the end, I couldn’t just close the place down as she slept. So I woke her.

On Sundays, the black baptists run long as a rule. J- often finds the padded pew similar enough to a bed. I cannot just allow him to sleep as they come to the conclusion of the whole matter. Life must go on.

But I ask you, dear reader, what about when I show up to H-’s orchestra concert only to be carefully ignored by her? What if H- plans a trip to visit my parents and siblings (her grandparents and aunts and uncles) and is sure to confirm that I do not have a coordinated surprise visit in mind before boarding?

What then? Should I let H- sleep? Should my family let H- sleep?

H- is told the worst kind of lies by her mom, her mom’s parents, her step-dad, and his parents, and my parents, my siblings, and—unless I miss my mark—the entire fucking population of this great country have decided to let her sleep.

H- is living a lie.

She doesn’t know it, but she has been kidnapped.

She doesn’t know it, but her dad is robbed monthly and has been for 12+ years.

She doesn’t know it, but she would not have a roof over her head, food in her belly, or a pot to piss in, if it wasn’t for me.

She doesn’t know it, because she sleeps.

Should I wake her?

Nahhh. Let her sleep.

Sleep, Sleeper.