Monthly Archives: November 2014

Some things don’t need a sequel…like pregnancy

Posted on November 29, 2014 | 2 comments

I am not pregnant.

I know, I know. You probably don’t care if I am or not. Unless you’re my husband, my traumatized dog or my uterus, you have no stake in my reproductive habits. But let me tell you, typing out those four words is among the top five best feelings in the world.

Not that I’m anti-children or anything. I love children (except for that one kid…he knows what he did). In fact, I have one of my own. And even my black soul is partial to that little bugger. He’s amazing. I love him even more than I love cheese. And I’m someone who has an entire drawer in her fridge dedicated to just cheese (which I’ve creatively dubbed “The Cheese Drawer”).

But he’s also the reason I feel such relief at typing those four words.

See, before I had a baby, I was always terrified of getting pregnant. Or at least I thought I was terrified. Any time my period was even five minutes late, my evil brain tortured me with thoughts such as:

“But I’m not ready to be a mother.”

“But I don’t have the money to raise a kid.”

“But my freedom!”

“But wine!”

“But what if he turns out to be a serial killer? Or worse, an urban kale farmer with a weird mustache?”

Ha! How naïve I was. Because see, now that I’ve actually had a baby, I know the real things to be terrified of. So last week, when I was five days late, I was curled up in the fetal position beside my 9-month-old as the following thoughts raced through my brain:

“But I’m not ready to not poop normally for nine months!”

“But I don’t have the energy to vomit for four months straight and then pee non-stop for the next five months.”

“But wine!”

“But, oh god, the midnight feedings. And the 2:30 a.m. feedings. And the 4 a.m. feedings. And all because of…”

“BREASTFEEDING! I CAN’T GO THROUGH IT AGAIN! I JUST GOT ONE OFF THE SAUCE! I WAS FINALLY FREE! I’D RATHER DIE THAN HAVE ANOTHER NEWBORN HONEY BADGER SHRED MY NIPPLES!”

Just like someone who is finally released from jail and finds themselves in a less than legal situation again while police sirens slowly grow louder, it was like a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from.

I can’t go back to jail, man.

I won’t.

Not that I never will go back. I mean, sure, yeah, my husband and I have talked about having another kid. We both agree it would be nice. To eventually give Riker a sibling. In the future. When we’re both ready again.

Like when he’s getting ready for graduate school.

But we know too much now. It’s all still too fresh. The pain. The exhaustion. The farts.

Oh god, the farts.

Which is why I rejoiced when my menstrual cycle finally did get off its lazy ass and cycled again. I may have been in the electric chair but the governor called in the nick of time.

And it feels good to be free again. Er…well, at least on probation. I still have one kid I need to report to on a daily basis. But I’ll take it.

Because you can still drink wine on probation.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, the warden is demanding a game of peek-a-boo and he gets cranky when I show up late.

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If my blog were a sitcom, this would be the Thanksgiving episode

Posted on November 23, 2014 | Leave a comment

OPENING SCENE: Camera zooms in to clock beside Aprill’s bed. Time reads 4:43 a.m. Sound of baby crying.

APRILL (lying in bed, eyes still closed): “Nope. No way. (Voice gradually getting louder) You wish I loved you enough to wake up this early on a holiday! Go back to sleep, Riker!”

Crying continues.

APRILL (eyes still closed, kicking her husband, Ryan, with her leg): “I’ll give you $50,000 if you go get him right now.”

RYAN (raises head from pillow, his bedhead making him look like a deranged muppet): “Please. I’m still waiting for the $100,000 you promised me when I took the dog out during a blizzard last year. And the $4 million you promised me when I gave you my last mozzarella stick Tuesday.”

Cue laugh track.

Crying gets louder.

APRILL (slowly and dramatically rolling off bed, eyes still closed): “Ugh. He’s so dramatic. I bet when I go in there, he’s not even missing a limb.”

Cue giggle track since the joke is so-so at best.

Camera fades to black and reopens on Riker’s nursery. Aprill is getting ready to change Riker’s diaper.

APRILL: “Well, happy first Thanksgiving, kiddo. (Opens diaper) WHOA! How did all that even fit inside your tiny body? I’m not even mad. I’m impressed. (Note: Check with legal if we can use this and not get sued by Will Ferrell) Guess you’re thankful for having the bowel movements of a Budweiser Clydesdale, huh?”

Aprill carries Riker into the kitchen, which is pristine and huge and has a funky vintage fridge just like all sitcom kitchens, even if the people in the sitcom are poor and live in a ridiculously expensive city.

APRILL: “Well, since we’re up, we might as well get a jump on Thanksgiving dinner.”

Aprill opens funky vintage fridge, which is full of colorful fruits and vegetables and POM drinks, and not leftover Chinese food and Kraft singles and a carrot that committed suicide in 2011.

APRILL: “Shit!” (if this airs on late-night cable) “Darn it!” (if this airs on network TV) “Babe! I forgot to defrost the turkey!”

Stumbling noises heard off-camera. Ryan enters the kitchen, bedhead now making him look like the love child of Nick Nolte and Justin Bieber.

RYAN: “Huh. Well, that sounds like a pretty big problem for Future Ryan to deal with. But right now, Current Ryan is going back to bed.”

Two hours later…

Ryan wakes up to a loud noise. He walks into the kitchen.

RYAN: “Uh…whatcha doin’?”

APRILL: “Blow-drying the turkey, obviously. Added bonus, I occasionally blow it directly in Riker’s face and it makes him giggle. And his hair is now super shiny.”

RYAN: “Aw…that’s my delicate little flower.”

Cue laugh track.

APRILL: “By the way, how long does a turkey take to cook?”

RYAN: “I don’t know. I have to Google it every year. Why don’t you know? You’ve made the turkey before.”

APRILL: “And how did that work out?”

RYAN: “Yeah, but after the food poisoning symptoms passed, remember how happy you were you lost five pounds?”

APRILL: “I finally fit in my skinny sweatpants.”

Cue pity laugh track.

Four hours later…

Aprill, Ryan, Riker and the dog are all on the back porch as smoke billows out of the windows of their house. Sirens can be heard in the background.

APRILL: “Who knew potatoes could explode like that?”

RYAN: “Two people who have a small infant they are in charge of keeping alive probably should.”

APRILL: “This day is a disaster. Do we have any wine?”

RYAN: “No. But we have some cooking sherry that’s probably tainted considering I think I bought it back in the 90s. That ought to do the trick.”

APRILL: “I’ll get the sherry, you call China Garden.”

RYAN: “I think that makes four years in a row. Pretty sure it’s now officially a Thanksgiving tradition.”

APRILL: “It’s just not the holidays without crab rangoon and the smell of burning arm hair.”

Ryan kisses Aprill.

Cue “Ooooooo” kissy-face track.

RYAN: “Insert some cheesy line here.”

Cue applause track.

Fade to credits.

 

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Posted in Food, Holidays, Marriage, Parenting

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How was your day, honey?

Posted on November 19, 2014 | 3 comments

My husband asked me how my day was. So I drew him this…

how was your day 1

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You have to crawl before you can raid and pillage

Posted on November 15, 2014 | 7 comments

For only being 9-months-old, my son has a lot of interests. I mean, a LOT of interests. All day long, he’s just interested in everything.

For example, here’s a list of things my son is interested in:

Pulling off his left sock.

Dropping heavy, loud things on the floor.

Shaking his head no. At everything.

Licking the couch.

Licking the dog.

Licking my cellphone.

Obviously eating the left sock he pulled off because I can’t find that damn thing anywhere.

Biting my collarbone.

This mug full of super-hot coffee in my hands.

crawl 1

And here is a list of things my son is not interested in:

Learning how to crawl.

Yes, my son, while a master at the art of sitting, has absolutely no interest in taking that skill to the next level. And it’s not just that he’s not interested in learning how to crawl. It’s as though he actively loathes even the mere thought of transporting his tiny body in such a crude manner. I’m talking put that kid on his stomach and he either:

  1. Lies face down, arms and legs splayed straight out, while crying pathetically. Or…
  2. Turns round and round on his stomach like a clock (while crying pathetically), just biding his time until I finally give up on the whole charade, pick him up and let him get back to his very important job of licking the couch.

Now, in general, this does not bother me. One, because I know all babies start crawling in their own good time. I mean, sure, I have irrational concerns my baby is not developing normally, just like everyone else in America. But it’s fine. Because just like everyone else in America, I assume I will be rich someday and as such can always hire someone to carry him from class to class when he’s enrolled in Harvard.

Two, his semi-immobility does make my job exceedingly easier. Which, as an inherently lazy mom, I really appreciate. I know I can set that kid down in the middle of the kitchen and leave the room and when I get back he will still be in that exact same spot. Or spinning in a circle crying pathetically, but still relatively in the same spot.

And three, I’m pretty sure he’s just biding his time until he can jump straight to walking. Because just like a dog who doesn’t realize he’s a dog but thinks he’s human (and yes, yes I am comparing my baby to a dog again), my baby doesn’t realize he’s a baby and thinks he’s a 35-year-old Viking. A 35-year-old Viking that must yell his barbaric yawp and savagely pillage the toy basket on a regular basis.

And Vikings don’t crawl, thankyouverymuch.

crawl 3

What does bother me, however, is the constant stream of “Is he crawling yet?” I get from other parents. There is a dark, dark underbelly to the parenting world and it is composed of people who constantly want to play the game “Let’s Compare Babies!” Which is less a game and more just a way for them to tell you all the ways their baby is better than your baby. It usually goes something like this:

Other Parent: “Is he crawling yet?”

Me: “No.”

Other Parent: “Oh. How old is he again?”

Me: “Almost 9-months.”

Other Parent: “Oooh. Nine months and not crawling yet. Hmm. Well, Sabrina was crawling when she was 7-days-old. But the doctor said that’s exceedingly rare. All babies crawl in their own time, you know.”

Me (to the waiter): “I need a cocktail.”

Other Parent: “It’s 9:30 in the morning.”

Me (to the waiter again): “Make it three.”

Yes, no one wins at “Let’s Compare Babies!” Because if you’re a parent like me, you end up feeling like crap and spending the rest of the day Googling “crawling specialists.”

And if you’re the Other Parent, you end up getting hit by a bus, like in my fantasies.

crawl 2

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How I feel when people start celebrating Christmas too early

Posted on November 8, 2014 | 3 comments

earlyxmas1 earlyxmas2 earlyxmas3 earlyxmas4 earlyxmas5 earlyxmas6 earlyxmas7

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Ever get that feeling you’re being watched?

Posted on November 6, 2014 | Leave a comment

My son’s current favorite toy is a stuffed dog. A stuffed dog that talks. And sings. And lights up. And requests in a bit too perky of a voice that you hug it. A lot. Like, a lot a lot.

And I’m pretty sure it’s trying to kill me.

creepy dog

Oh sure, maybe you could chalk up my paranoia to watching one too many demented child’s toy-themed horror movies or too many late nights falling asleep to “The Twilight Zone” reruns (yes, I’m old, shut up). But the evidence is mounting.

And I’m pretty sure it’s only a matter of time now.

It started out innocently enough. Riker would be playing with Creepy Dog (as I’ve taken to calling it) and when he was done, I’d push the button on its foot that turned it off. Three minutes later, there was Creepy Dog, sitting beside us on the couch, perkily telling us “IT’S LEARNING TIME!” and then requesting that we hug it.

It must have accidentally turned on when I adjusted my legs on the couch, I pathetically told myself.

Things were fine for awhile (like they are in every single horror movie I’ve ever seen). And then Creepy Dog turned on by itself again. Only this time, no one had been playing with it for hours and it was lying (creepily) by itself on the coffee table. “I love you!” it said. “Can you and I be friends?” it said. And then it firmly told us that we should hug it.

OK, OK, sure. Maybe those two incidences can be explained by faulty manufacturing or science or whatever. But before you cart me off to the looney bin, just read what happened next.

A few days later, I was in the bedroom, rocking my baby to sleep. He had just drifted off when suddenly I hear “IT’S LEARNING TIME!” followed by a stupid song about colors, followed by “I love you!” followed by another stupid song about shapes or some junk, followed by a DEMAND that we hug it. And worst of all…

…it was coming from INSIDE THE HOUSE!

Well, obviously. But more importantly, it was coming from inside the living room.

And we were in the bedroom. Me. The baby. The dog. All piled on the bed together. Even that goddamn fly that has been living in our house the past five months that I can never seem to squish was chilling on the bedroom wall.

And if none of that is enough to convince you, the above Creepy Dog monologue/karaoke show was followed by the phrase “PEEKABOO! I SEE YOU!”, repeated no less than seven times in a row.

I craned my head around the bedroom door and damn if I didn’t see Creepy Dog staring right back at me, sitting up (creepily) on a chair in the living room. A chair I don’t remember leaving him in.

Granted, my memory isn’t the most reliable these days (I lost my house keys for eight months and found them two weeks ago in, get this, my purse…I may also leave a disproportionate amount of Riker toys in the fridge and leftover chili in the toy basket, but whatever). Still, there’s a good 14 percent chance I did not leave Creepy Dog in that chair (now if I found him in the fridge, that would be a different story).

Anyway, the moral of the story is that if I’m ever murdered, Creepy Dog did it.

creepy dog 2

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The “Mom Haircut” & other parental sacrifices

Posted on November 2, 2014 | Leave a comment

I fought it for as long as I could. Because I was the cool mom. The edgy mom. The mom with the perfectly messy Botticelli-esque curls cascading halfway down my back like one of those vacant-eyed models randomly jumping in a field of wildflowers in an Urban Outfitters catalog.

mom hair 1

Except in reality, my long, wavy hair was always tied up in a school marm bun because my 8-month-old son has made it his personal mission to pull out each and every strand of it. And those few times when it wasn’t tied up, it tangled so quickly that one would think it would take more effort than a slight breeze (such as making out with a weedwhacker) to get that unique Bride of Frankenstein look I so often sported. Seriously, if I stepped outside, neighborhood birds started nesting there (although you can hardly blame them, what with the nice buffet of pureed peas, scrambled eggs and pancake crumbs my son had thoughtfully left for them between the strands and all).

mom hair 2

But then came the last straw (a straw very much like the texture of my tortured hair): A windy Halloween day, me outside for most of it with my hair down and getting whipped around relentlessly while I toted my costumed baby around to run errands. A last stop to get coffee before heading home and then THIS conversation:

Barista: “What a cute baby chicken costume! And what are you supposed to be, mom?”

(Note to reader: I wasn’t wearing a costume.)

Me: “Tired Mom Whose Clothes Don’t Match.”

Barista: …(confused look)…

Me: (looking at my reflection in the baked goods glass and taking stock of my combat boots, stained cargo pants, hastily applied black eyeliner, dark rings under my eyes and tangled hair that had grown to three times its original size) “Amy Winehouse. …(sigh)…I’m Amy Winehouse.”

Barista: …(flicker of recognition)… “Oh! I love it.”

And so it was with a heavy heart that I walked into the hair salon yesterday. We had had a good five-year run, my long hair and me. But the party was over. It was time to grow up. Time to look like I didn’t spend my weekends going to music festivals and eating maple bacon kimchi cupcakes from a food truck.

Time to tell the world that what I really did was watch “Gilmore Girls” on Netflix while pulling my newly mobile baby out from under the coffee table every three minutes.

On the plus side, my hair stylist was a veteran mom herself and understood my plight.

Stylist: “So, what are we wanting to do today?”

Me: “Chop it off. Chop it all off.”

Stylist: “Um…OK. Into any particular style?”

Me: “I have a baby. But I want a hairstyle that says I don’t.”

Stylist: “So no ‘Mom Bob’ then?”

Me: “Exactly. I love my baby almost more than anything. And that one anything is a mom haircut.”

So how did it turn out, you ask? Great! I think. I mean, it’s shorter now. And stuff.

Truth be told, as soon as I left the salon, I walked home in the rain and wind, ruining the gorgeous professional styling, and then immediately tied what was left of my hair back into a teensy ponytail so I could relieve my husband of baby duty. And then I spent the rest of the afternoon playing with my son and his creepy bear that creepily says “Peek-a-boo! I see you!” when you hug it. And then this morning I immediately threw on a hat over my unwashed/unbrushed hair to walk to a coffeehouse to spend the very few free moments I have to write this.

And I realized that any hairstyle I get from now on will be a mom cut. Because I’m a mom now. A mom who, just like generations of moms before her, will choose function over style almost every time when it comes down it. Because vanity is a luxury we can no longer afford. Or even really want to afford anymore. Not when what has taken the place of that vanity is a tiny drooling person who giggles every time Mommy tickles him with her hair, no matter the length or style.

Yes, as it turns out, I do love that little stinker more than anything. Period.

 

 

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