Fruit in my dessert

weekend haiku

nice to be with friends
with babies and without too
plans, schemes, dreams, chatter

Strike a chord

What do you do all day?

I've heard some version of this question quite a bit in the last 15 months and have never really been able to answer it very well. And because I haven't been able to answer it well, I have often questioned myself in a similar tone to the question asker featured here...what DO I do all day? I mean, seriously. I used to be paid to make people and things and processes more efficient. Why, then, have I done crazy things like missed not one, but several bill payments in the last year, effectively, in my mind, destroying much more than my credit rating with the credit card companies? Or not responded to actual important emails from people who are doing things to help me out? Or (nearly? I can't remember) missed appointments because I didn't know what day it was? Or, or...

Carolyn Hax, Style Columnist for the Washington Post answered this question for her Tell Me About It column all the way back in 2007 for the unnamed questioner from Tacoma, Washington. I think she answered it for everyone else too, even the stay-at-home-moms in question. And, well, she answered it with style. I'm less concerned with the "snit" parts and more with the actual list of stuff. It's a good reminder and yes, of course, validating too. And, I know this isn't my friend asking, because I'm the person who does call my friends ALL the time, the ones with kids, without kids, kids themselves. I like to talk. Have I mentioned that? Maybe that's why the bills aren't getting paid. But I digress. The question:

Best friend has child. Her: exhausted, busy, no time for self, no time for me, etc. Me (no kids): Wow. Sorry. What'd you do today? Her: Park, play group . . .

Okay. I've done Internet searches, I've talked to parents. I don't get it. What do stay-at-home moms do all day? Please no lists of library, grocery store, dry cleaners . . . I do all those things, too, and I don't do them EVERY DAY. I guess what I'm asking is: What is a typical day and why don't moms have time for a call or e-mail? I work and am away from home nine hours a day (plus a few late work events) and I manage to get it all done. I'm feeling like the kid is an excuse to relax and enjoy -- not a bad thing at all -- but if so, why won't my friend tell me the truth? Is this a peeing contest ("My life is so much harder than yours")? What's the deal? I've got friends with and without kids and all us child-free folks get the same story and have the same questions.

Carolyn's answer:

Relax and enjoy. You're funny.

Or you're lying about having friends with kids.

Or you're taking them at their word that they actually have kids, because you haven't personally been in the same room with them.

Internet searches?

I keep wavering between giving you a straight answer and giving my forehead some keyboard. To claim you want to understand, while in the same breath implying that the only logical conclusions are that your mom-friends are either lying or competing with you, is disingenuous indeed.

So, since it's validation you seem to want, the real answer is what you get. In list form. When you have young kids, your typical day is: constant attention, from getting them out of bed, fed, clean, dressed; to keeping them out of harm's way; to answering their coos, cries, questions; to having two arms and carrying one kid, one set of car keys, and supplies for even the quickest trips, including the latest-to-be-declared-essential piece of molded plastic gear; to keeping them from unshelving books at the library; to enforcing rest times; to staying one step ahead of them lest they get too hungry, tired or bored, any one of which produces the kind of checkout-line screaming that gets the checkout line shaking its head.

It's needing 45 minutes to do what takes others 15.

It's constant vigilance, constant touch, constant use of your voice, constant relegation of your needs to the second tier.

It's constant scrutiny and second-guessing from family and friends, well-meaning and otherwise. It's resisting constant temptation to seek short-term relief at everyone's long-term expense.

It's doing all this while concurrently teaching virtually everything -- language, manners, safety, resourcefulness, discipline, curiosity, creativity. Empathy. Everything.

It's also a choice, yes. And a joy. But if you spent all day, every day, with this brand of joy, and then, when you got your first 10 minutes to yourself, wanted to be alone with your thoughts instead of calling a good friend, a good friend wouldn't judge you, complain about you to mutual friends, or marvel how much more productively she uses her time. Either make a sincere effort to understand or keep your snit to yourself.

Thanks and credit to my friend KD for alerting me to this column by posting it on Facebook.

Busy Body

Watch this awesome time lapsed photography "video" of a baby playing with his toys. Four hours of play in just over two minutes:

The music, Ensemble, by Coeur de Pirate, is also delicious.

focus

I have a list of blog posts that i want to write. I usually come up with them laying in bed at night and roll over to write them down on BH's Michigan post-it pad that has mysteriously ended up on my nightstand. I write things like:

• I read InStyle but I don't live/dress InStyle
• Cookies
• Chief performance officer

and more detailed ones too, like:

• Raising baby simultaneously euphoric and wondering what to do next
• Logistics of doing things when you think of them
• Were these obsessions (e.g. parabens) invented for SAHMs or people with too much time to focus on the wrong things - busy, doing what? Not what I want. Analogous to kids with after school activities doing better than kids without? More to manage, focus on the important stuff.

That last one is my problem. I'm not focusing on the important stuff. I have so much I want to write about, so much I want to do, but the days go by and somehow I manage not to do the things I want to get done, not to make the most of EVERY possible moment, and of course, not to let it go. Then the night comes, and I log on to check and maybe even respond to email, and I get lost in the tangled Web that others have weaved to trap me here. I read and sob about the death of someone else's child because I am so afraid that it could happen to my child. I read friends' blogs and "friends'" blogs, and strangers' blogs, and twitter, and facebook.

I help other people think about their passions, their projects. I get inspired. And then I get blurry. I can't think of what to write, what to do, what is actually the important stuff. 

And then I climb into bed and read books like Unconditional Parenting or Be Perfect Without Being Happy Happy Without Being Perfect and fiction alongside them for good balance. I stay up too late, which makes getting up energized and motivated more difficult.

Part of the reason I became a stay-at-home-mom (a term I am still not happy with), aside from wanting to spend exorbitant amounts of time with my son, was to give myself some time and space to try new things, things I've always wanted to try, for fun and for serious. And, in the last 15 months, I've dabbled, but not jumped in all the way to anything, and I'm getting impatient. I'm ready for all of that passion I have bottled up inside me to be put to good use (I think my husband is too - wink, wink). Use, use, what is the good use!?!?!?

I think this is what some people may call a rut. But I don't want to say that I'm in a rut because that says something about me. And I don't think I like what it says. I am happy, d***it, most of the time. I just feel very unFOCUSED of late. And, I've been talking a lot to other stay at home moms (it's what I do) and they feel this way a lot too. We're focusing on the wrong things, obsessing about decisions and parabens and schedules and all sorts of things that I wish I wasn't. It's time to DO something that MEANS something to ME. But how? But when? I really think I just need to start doing and the "thing" that I'm supposed to do will come. I don't think I can take it as far as a vision board, but maybe I will.

WWOD? (What Would Oprah* Do?) I think we both know she wouldn't be wasting her time writing a blog post about it, would she? In fact, if Oprah weren't Oprah, would she even watch Oprah? Man, I've got a lot of work to do.

*I do realize that including Oprah in my post may make some of you think less of me, and worse, less of the post. Sometimes, including Oprah in my thoughts makes me think less of me too. But I can't help it. It is what it is. In the future, I'll try to warn you if she's going to be in the post, so as not to jerk you out of your reading pleasure or thoughts.

stuff (or Pdiddy, octuplets, toddlers, and marriage)

I just asked BH if he is going to tape P diddy on CSI: Miami. Yes, now that I mention it, good idea. We both love when our favorite things (full disclosure: I am not a fan of CSI - particularly the Miami version, but will watch it with BH, who is a big fan. But Las Vegas is "our" favorite) come together in one place.

Will people please stop judging other people? Is there a pill for this? Inspired by all the nonsense being said about the woman who just had the octuplets. In particular, woman on woman hate really makes me angry. Please, just let it go. We don't all make the same choices. We never will. It's what separates us from other animals (for the most part).

Cut HD's hair tonight. Kind of cute. True test tomorrow upon wake-up. Mullet-be-gone.

Been going through a rough sleep/ear infection/molars phase with HD. Some of it has filled me with rage...which part you say? The lack of control part of course. Starting to see the light at the end of this particular tunnel. So glad that BH is my partner.

Sometimes I make it really hard to be my partner. Sometimes (but way less than me) he makes it a bit challenging to be his partner too. Which, after the dust settles, brings us closer together.

Marriage after baby is very challenging sometimes...just like they said it would be. But, of course, when they said that, like the whole, "you'll be more tired than you've ever been before," I thought we would be somewhat exempt because we knew what hard work was already. Silly girl.

HD looked at my cell phone today and saw the picture of BH and said, "daddy!" with a big smile on his face. Not his first daddy by far, but definitely his cutest, most excited by far. Loving the anticipation of a word explosion.

P diddy awaits.

If Only It Were This Easy...

Since before HD was born, I have continuously obsessed about which diapers would be best to use. You'd think that now that he's 14 months I would have stopped obsessing, but, in reality, I'm still deciding. Our primary diaper is Pampers Cruisers, well, because they're easiest to use, especially on the go, which we often are, and because BH prefers the disposable option. When I know I'm going to be home for several hours, I use the G Diaper whenever I can. I learned the hard way that the flushing option doesn't work at our house, but they do break down quickly in the trash, and will break down even faster when we start composting this spring. We've also tried Seventh Generation and have heard good things about the similar Nature Babycare. I originally wanted to try cloth, but decided, for a variety of reasons, that we were not to be a cloth family. I tell myself (and people who ask) that it's because you have to wash them twice in really hot water, which is not good for the environment anyway, but it's definitely partially an excuse, one to which my friends who use cloth might say pish posh. To make myself feel better about the Pampers choice, I don't change HD very often, so I wind up using fewer diapers altogether. Some people might call that neglect of some kind, but HD and his heiny don't seem to mind, and it helps me sleep a little bit better at night. Plus, I'm potty training him next week, so this will all be moot then.

The intro to this SNL video was supposed to be one line, but I got carried away. Like I said at the top, if only it were this easy: