this is your brain on toddler
Maybe I could achieve the little tasks I want to get done each morning if indeed, each morning was carefully orchestrated and timed down to the last second, personal assistant style.
but then you get the phone call when you've just put in the load of washing and have settled the boy down with some books and toast and a sippy cup off milk (breakfast of champions!) and the few minutes you've cleared to write all go to shit. So in lieu of the long and detailed entry about thrilling things like, ooh, I don't know, sinus car kits and doorknobs? I bring you a chapter from the Book of SCORE!
God bless the local Salvos store yesterday. Also, the local recycle shop, because yes, my days apparently consist of a lot of shopping, which is ironic because really? I hate to shop.
ANYWAY
The Book Of SCORE! Chapter 1
First, a brand new without tags Victoria's Secret bikini. Which, after cramming my middle aged, post baby squishiness into it, kind of reminds me of those pickled porks you find in the meat section at the supermarket. You know the ones that are kind of wrapped in a mesh suit? Yeah, that's me in this bikini. But it was only $14.95 and I had a twenty dollar store credit at and god help me, this is my last hurrah, bikini style. Except, I really only bought it for the bottoms because a bikini? At aged *mumblemuttermumble? HAHA, too funny. The bottoms only though, well, that makes it sound like I'm planning on prancing around topless which, oh no no no. I have this tankini style top I got a few years back that I've worn with my twenty year old (or more! seriously! I kid thee not!) Brian Rochford bikini bottoms that have the most awesome cut that I'm shedding a tear thinking about how they finally and suddenly crapped out about a year or so ago. Since that tragic day I've not had anything other than my Speedos to go swimming in. Which is what I do in my Speedos. Swim, so I guess we're talking about how if I was invited to lounge around semi naked on some millionaire's yacht, I'd have nothing to wear. And now I do. I have these truss type things with straps around the top of the bottoms (what?) that sound awful but which, on a younger more taut body, would look so sexy you'd change teams. The bra top is pretty sexy too, but will likely not ever get worn. Much like the bottoms, actually, but at least if I was invited, bla bla. The best part of this transaction being, of course, that if I don't wear it, which, duh, as if, I'll sell this bitch on ebay and make my fortune, yes I will.
If that purchase wasn't thrilling enough, I also got this spaghetti strap top that makes me swoon with love at this one. It's probably meant for the evening but since my evening social life consists of spending time with that short dude who thinks nothing of soiling his underwear, I am SO going to wear during the day in some kind of boho vintage chick fashion statement that I have no idea how to pull off. The bodice has sequins (I know!) and it's this dusky purple colour and if it's not arctic tomorrow, I shall wear it so the rest of the world can lust after my sequined boobs too.
and I got some t-shirts for Daniel and bla bla. Thus endeth the reading from the Holy Book. Amen.
Daniel just bit me on the thigh because I'm not entertaining enough so I've fashioned a corner out of three doors and a piece of string, and have plonked him in it after telling him "no biting" and wagging my administrative finger at him.
My thigh hurts.
I also have a bruise on my upper arm where the little rodent bit me yesterday.
He's going to the creche today for an hour or so while I work out, so I may have to put a red collar around his neck, like they used to do with rogue kangaroos at petting zoos and fauna parks. Those were the days, weren't they? When men were men and if you got beaten up by a 'roo, you felt like an idiot for poking a stick at the dude wearing a collar, you hoped no one noticed you looking like a fool, and then you skulked away to tend to your multiple rib fractures and scalp lacerations, and you didn't once, not even for a second, think about suing the establishment who'd conveniently warned you to stay the fuck away from that character who looked like Skippy on 'roids.
Back in those same days, you could ride the train with the doors all the way open. Man, that was such a buzz. Kids these days (she says, sounding like her own grandmother) will never know how it feels to...take responsiblity for your own life and safety, I guess. There are these stupid posters on bus shelters at present, depicting some kid being bowled over by a car. The caption reads "if the car was going 5kmh less, she'd have only jarred her knee" or some shit, when what it should read is "if this stupid pedestrian had stayed where on the sidewalk and had NOT idiotically walked on the road, she wouldn't be dead". Speed limits have been dropped by 10kmh, which is a significant amount, to protect pedestrians. If the powers that be also campaigned that pedestrains should stay the fuck where they belong, that roads are for cars, not people, and to look both ways before you cross one, then I'd accept the reduced speed limit a little more graciously, but they're not. There is absolutely no onus on pedestrains to take responsibility for their own actions. There is none on educating our kids about road safety. it's all about blaming someone else (the driver) if you get mashed on the road the day you walked across it.
And that's my political statement for today.
Daniel has now taken the local paper out of its protective biodegradable wrap and is tearing it up and strewing the pieces all over the floor, demonstrating my earleir comment that the morning needs to be carefully orchestrated to the second in order to actually stuff. This paper shredding? Should needs to have been scheduled if I want to get to the gym on time.
Last night was the night Daniel's father and sister sat with him while I took the world's most boring aqua class. It was awful, and by that I mean the leaving of my son with his father, even though the lack lustre, group of five I taught last night could also be described thusly.
I hate giving up my child, I hate that it feels like that. It doesn't feel like I'm giving him a family, because the truth is I feel like ultimately, Daniel will love him more. Yes, esteem issues. Major ones. I KNOW. I'm also pathetic, but there it is, that's how it feels. So I do the right thing and give him something that I know (which is how it feels) will ultimately take him away from me. Already I'm picturing myself as this little old lady alone on Christmas day while my adult son and his family go and spend the entire time with his father's side of the family because there's me: the one person, versus them: the big ass, extended Italian family. It's obvious which side is going to the attractive one for the rest of his life.
Despite my pain though, woe is me, I act the part and enthusiastically do the family thing and god help me, I even offered to and took a truckload of photos of them together, photos of my son with the family that will eventually have all of him, and you know what? I think it's killing me because in the last week, I've had more heart attacks than I've had in the last four, post panic attack years. My left arm that keeps feeling..."funny", so of course it's an infarct.
I was telling my psychiatrist about this babysitting HELL after I'd arranged it the other week and - wait for it because I'm this amount of crazy - mid telling of story, I had to get up, bolt out the door, run down the hall, past the secretary and into the bathroom to fortunately not expel the contents of my stomach (coffee! and air!) But I felt like I had to. It was muay embarrassing, and I'm not certain my shrink didn't get out her red pen while I was gone and, in big bold letters, scrawl the world "certifiable" across the top of my notes.
On a cheerier note:
My son, demonstrating his ancestral ties with me. The look on his face more than anything reminds me of me when I was....not as uptight and fucked up as I am now. Of course, I was a screwy and anxious child too, so I have no idea when I looked so pensive and serene. Maybe when I was drunk or high?
It's taken about an hour and a half to actually get this out between clearing up messes and cramming food into scream holes and yes, the occasional time outs because look at the bruise on my arm. I bet there's one on my thigh now too. And in re the time out: it's a recent tool in the bee household because putting him down and firmly telling him "no biting" obviously works for shit.
but then you get the phone call when you've just put in the load of washing and have settled the boy down with some books and toast and a sippy cup off milk (breakfast of champions!) and the few minutes you've cleared to write all go to shit. So in lieu of the long and detailed entry about thrilling things like, ooh, I don't know, sinus car kits and doorknobs? I bring you a chapter from the Book of SCORE!
God bless the local Salvos store yesterday. Also, the local recycle shop, because yes, my days apparently consist of a lot of shopping, which is ironic because really? I hate to shop.
ANYWAY
The Book Of SCORE! Chapter 1
First, a brand new without tags Victoria's Secret bikini. Which, after cramming my middle aged, post baby squishiness into it, kind of reminds me of those pickled porks you find in the meat section at the supermarket. You know the ones that are kind of wrapped in a mesh suit? Yeah, that's me in this bikini. But it was only $14.95 and I had a twenty dollar store credit at and god help me, this is my last hurrah, bikini style. Except, I really only bought it for the bottoms because a bikini? At aged *mumblemuttermumble? HAHA, too funny. The bottoms only though, well, that makes it sound like I'm planning on prancing around topless which, oh no no no. I have this tankini style top I got a few years back that I've worn with my twenty year old (or more! seriously! I kid thee not!) Brian Rochford bikini bottoms that have the most awesome cut that I'm shedding a tear thinking about how they finally and suddenly crapped out about a year or so ago. Since that tragic day I've not had anything other than my Speedos to go swimming in. Which is what I do in my Speedos. Swim, so I guess we're talking about how if I was invited to lounge around semi naked on some millionaire's yacht, I'd have nothing to wear. And now I do. I have these truss type things with straps around the top of the bottoms (what?) that sound awful but which, on a younger more taut body, would look so sexy you'd change teams. The bra top is pretty sexy too, but will likely not ever get worn. Much like the bottoms, actually, but at least if I was invited, bla bla. The best part of this transaction being, of course, that if I don't wear it, which, duh, as if, I'll sell this bitch on ebay and make my fortune, yes I will.
If that purchase wasn't thrilling enough, I also got this spaghetti strap top that makes me swoon with love at this one. It's probably meant for the evening but since my evening social life consists of spending time with that short dude who thinks nothing of soiling his underwear, I am SO going to wear during the day in some kind of boho vintage chick fashion statement that I have no idea how to pull off. The bodice has sequins (I know!) and it's this dusky purple colour and if it's not arctic tomorrow, I shall wear it so the rest of the world can lust after my sequined boobs too.
and I got some t-shirts for Daniel and bla bla. Thus endeth the reading from the Holy Book. Amen.
Daniel just bit me on the thigh because I'm not entertaining enough so I've fashioned a corner out of three doors and a piece of string, and have plonked him in it after telling him "no biting" and wagging my administrative finger at him.
My thigh hurts.
I also have a bruise on my upper arm where the little rodent bit me yesterday.
He's going to the creche today for an hour or so while I work out, so I may have to put a red collar around his neck, like they used to do with rogue kangaroos at petting zoos and fauna parks. Those were the days, weren't they? When men were men and if you got beaten up by a 'roo, you felt like an idiot for poking a stick at the dude wearing a collar, you hoped no one noticed you looking like a fool, and then you skulked away to tend to your multiple rib fractures and scalp lacerations, and you didn't once, not even for a second, think about suing the establishment who'd conveniently warned you to stay the fuck away from that character who looked like Skippy on 'roids.
Back in those same days, you could ride the train with the doors all the way open. Man, that was such a buzz. Kids these days (she says, sounding like her own grandmother) will never know how it feels to...take responsiblity for your own life and safety, I guess. There are these stupid posters on bus shelters at present, depicting some kid being bowled over by a car. The caption reads "if the car was going 5kmh less, she'd have only jarred her knee" or some shit, when what it should read is "if this stupid pedestrian had stayed where on the sidewalk and had NOT idiotically walked on the road, she wouldn't be dead". Speed limits have been dropped by 10kmh, which is a significant amount, to protect pedestrians. If the powers that be also campaigned that pedestrains should stay the fuck where they belong, that roads are for cars, not people, and to look both ways before you cross one, then I'd accept the reduced speed limit a little more graciously, but they're not. There is absolutely no onus on pedestrains to take responsibility for their own actions. There is none on educating our kids about road safety. it's all about blaming someone else (the driver) if you get mashed on the road the day you walked across it.
And that's my political statement for today.
Daniel has now taken the local paper out of its protective biodegradable wrap and is tearing it up and strewing the pieces all over the floor, demonstrating my earleir comment that the morning needs to be carefully orchestrated to the second in order to actually stuff. This paper shredding? Should needs to have been scheduled if I want to get to the gym on time.
Last night was the night Daniel's father and sister sat with him while I took the world's most boring aqua class. It was awful, and by that I mean the leaving of my son with his father, even though the lack lustre, group of five I taught last night could also be described thusly.
I hate giving up my child, I hate that it feels like that. It doesn't feel like I'm giving him a family, because the truth is I feel like ultimately, Daniel will love him more. Yes, esteem issues. Major ones. I KNOW. I'm also pathetic, but there it is, that's how it feels. So I do the right thing and give him something that I know (which is how it feels) will ultimately take him away from me. Already I'm picturing myself as this little old lady alone on Christmas day while my adult son and his family go and spend the entire time with his father's side of the family because there's me: the one person, versus them: the big ass, extended Italian family. It's obvious which side is going to the attractive one for the rest of his life.
Despite my pain though, woe is me, I act the part and enthusiastically do the family thing and god help me, I even offered to and took a truckload of photos of them together, photos of my son with the family that will eventually have all of him, and you know what? I think it's killing me because in the last week, I've had more heart attacks than I've had in the last four, post panic attack years. My left arm that keeps feeling..."funny", so of course it's an infarct.
I was telling my psychiatrist about this babysitting HELL after I'd arranged it the other week and - wait for it because I'm this amount of crazy - mid telling of story, I had to get up, bolt out the door, run down the hall, past the secretary and into the bathroom to fortunately not expel the contents of my stomach (coffee! and air!) But I felt like I had to. It was muay embarrassing, and I'm not certain my shrink didn't get out her red pen while I was gone and, in big bold letters, scrawl the world "certifiable" across the top of my notes.
On a cheerier note:
It's taken about an hour and a half to actually get this out between clearing up messes and cramming food into scream holes and yes, the occasional time outs because look at the bruise on my arm. I bet there's one on my thigh now too. And in re the time out: it's a recent tool in the bee household because putting him down and firmly telling him "no biting" obviously works for shit.
posted by aibee at 15:35
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