Aspirations

I grew up hating country music. HATE. I’m not sure why except that hating country music was the cool thing to do and since I was not cool, I spent a lot of time doing the things that would supposedly transform me into that enviable chilly state.

No one probably cared that I didn’t listen to country music but I knew that if I was ever shoved into a junior high locker and forced to admit ever listening to the detestable stuff, I could answer “NO! Take off, eh?” with a clear conscience.

When I moved from Canada to Houston my junior year of High School, I was slowly exposed to country music by friends and more importantly boys. I liked boys who liked country music, who went to rodeos for more than the funnel cake, who knew what FFA stood for. I needed to speak their language and during that time became familiar and somewhat in like with a few big country artists.

When I left Texas, my interest dwindled and I’ve become indifferent to the twangular style of music. Lately I’ve been trying to expose the kids to a bunch of different musical styles. Laylee still loves Bob Marley but I’ve been having trouble finding something that really moves Magoo. He will not dance. This week I was playing the second movement of Verdi’s Requiem when Magoo started going nuts, rocking out, bopping and laughing hysterically. There’s nothing like Funeral music for dead poets to encourage this younger generation to get their freak on.

Anywho, it’s a bit disturbing. I don’t think it should take tympanis and operatic solos in a minor key to get Magoo dancing. So today I played some Garth Brooks and he appeared to like that too, if cautiously.

I’m ready to get my feet wet again in the world of country. What should I start with? What are the must have artists and songs to bring a recovering Backstreet Boys and Tchaikovsky fan into the world of belt buckles the size of your mamma?

Today is Blog for Choice Day and posts are popping up everywhere in support of Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose.

The labels that fly around show the biases of those who wield them. I could be called “pro-life”, “anti-abortion”, “anti-choice”, “crazy conservative religious wacko” or any number of names due to the fact that with the ability to choose, I believe there comes a moral responsibility.

I believe that one of the greatest gifts we have in this life is the agency to choose our own actions. Before we choose, we need to think about the natural consequences our actions will have on us and those around us.

At a pretty early age, I learned what happens when a man and woman engage in sexual intimacy. At a slightly older age, the mysteries of birth control were explained to me, along with their effectiveness rates at inhibiting pregnancy and STDs.

It is every woman’s choice what she does with her own body. If she chooses to overeat, smoke 10 paks a day, run a marathon, or have sex with another person, then she has the right to make that choice and deal with the consequences.

When her choices put her in a position to have a dramatic influence over another person’s life or death, she suddenly needs to act more responsibly. If her husband quits his job and lays around all day expecting to be supported, does she have the right to cap him off so that he’ll no longer be a drain on her finances? If her 18-month-old turns out to be a destructo and a nuisance and she can no longer go out clubbing every night, can she toss him down the garbage chute and move on with her life?

Technically, a woman does not have the legal right to choose either of these things. What if the baby was only 3 months old and had colic? Still not legal. What if he was in utero and just starting to suck his thumb? Many people would like this to be legal and at times it has been. What if his little heart and brain were still developing at an amazing rate and he was completely defenseless? Bing! At this point, our country considers it okay to terminate the baby’s life so that the mother can move on with hers.

What if the woman didn’t make the choice to have sex, such as in cases of rape or incest? Of course she should be given the choice to recover her choice that was taken away by force. What if the pregnancy puts the mother’s life at risk? Of course she should have the option of terminating her pregnancy in self-defense. Either of these circumstances would be agonizing but the mother should have the option to save her life or reclaim her body after it was taken over by violence.

Having carried 2 children to term, I cannot imagine thinking its okay to kill a child of any age simply as a form of belated birth control, because the timing just isn’t right or to avoid putting a crimp in my lifestyle.

I think of wonderful people like my sister who anxiously wait to adopt a child when millions are snuffed in a quick and easy procedure each year. The idea that the only alternative to abortion for the accidentally pregnant is a lifetime of unwanted motherhood is absurd. There are so many choices available.

Personally, I choose to be responsible for my own actions and accept the consequences that they produce. I choose to love and protect the most innocent and defenseless among us rather than subjugating their rights because they’re too little to organize a protest rally.

Being shot down by a three year old who’s almost 4 but still 3 but almost 4 but still wears pull-ups to bed so I’ll call her 3 is too funny to be painful.

Every night at bedtime she gets to pick 2 songs for Dan and me to sing. Sometimes they’re church songs. Sometimes she chooses something peppy. Frequently she requests
“the song about what’s in the nightlight? It’s people and things and combs and stuff that don’t belong in there.” Dan always begins these improvised songs with the line, “I was walkin’ down the street…” (And he wonders why he’s never won a rap battle around here!)

Lately she usually asks for songs from Disney movies. When she asks for the Snow White song, we take parts. I am the warbly young princess “standing by a wishing well” and Dan is the equally warbly and high-pitched echo.

Last night she asked for the Cinderella song. So I began “Sing Sweet Nightingale.” I was tired. I started low. Maybe I started a bit scratchy. Sue me.

Me: Sing sweet nightingale. Sing sweet nightin-
Laylee: NO! Not the one the stepsisters sing. Cinderella sings that song too.

So after stumbling around her room, gathering my splattered pride, I cleared my throat and began in a higher key for the future Simon Cowell to critique. Apparently it met her approval and I was moved on to the next round. What song would she chose?

She asked me to please close the closet so she could decide. Wha??? Surveying the princess stickers on the sliding doors, she settled on the Belle song. Luckily Angela Lansbury has no ugly stepsister that I’m aware of so “Beauty and the Beast” went off without a hitch… besides the fact that I made up the words as I went along.

Ever as before, ever as before, as the sun will rise.
Tale as old as time, tale as old as song
Ever just and same, finding I’m your mom
Beauty and the Beast.

the reasons: microwave popcorn, Dan’s freshly shaven face, ELECTRICITY.

Last night Magoo’s month-long-already-been-to-the-doctor-and-she-says-it’s-nothing cough turned nasty, he sprouted a decent fever and some pretty sweet green elevens. All night long he coughed and hacked and yelled, “Mo-mmy! OWW-EEE!” He slept best when sitting upright on my lap so you can imagine how much sleep I got.

This was complicated by the fact that we thought we’d take one more whack at getting Laylee to stay dry through the night. We’ve tried pretty much everything. She just really likes peeing in her pull-up. You think I jest, but oh no, I do not. She will wake up, walk into my room, get this spaced out look on her face while I’m talking to her and then announce that she just had a “pee-splosion”. Sometimes she refuses to use the potty before bed but then goes in the pull-up 3 seconds later while I’m reading her story.

So we thought maybe switching her back to diapers at night would make her want to stay dry. Not so, my friends. Switching back to diapers is the funnest thing EVER. Switching back to diapers at night means you can talk baby talk and stick your butt up in the air, commentating on the entire process as your mom wipes you down.

Last night I decided that enough was enough and she would simply have to stay dry through the night. At about 2 am, I was leaving Magoo’s room and I found her in a pee-soaked shirt, new underwear, no pants, sleeping in a sleeping-bag on the floor next to her saturated bed.

All day today I walked around in my pajamas, smelling pee in every room. What did she do, take a pee tour of the entire estate? It was driving me nuts. About 4:30 this afternoon I bent over to pick something up and realized that the smell was coming from my t-shirt. When I picked her up last night, I guess she had rubbed off on me. Blick! I’m considering beginning a strict regimen of personal hygiene the next time I get more than 3 straight hours of sleep. This will involve showering daily and possibly wearing new clothes each day, particularly when the ones I have on are drenched with dried human waste.

But the day was not without humor. Laylee has started a new style of joke.

Laylee: Ding ding. Now you say “Who is it?”
Me: Who is it?
Laylee: Awaura.
Me: Awaura who?
Laylee: What?

During dinner she asked to play outside and I told her to pretend she was outside.
Laylee: I want to go to real outside.
Me: It’s too dark and wet and cold. Why don’t you just pretend?
Laylee: I hate pretend. I can never never pretend.
Me: Okay. Why don’t you just stare at the wall?
Laylee (settling herself in a corner with a huff): Okay.

All through dinner the little coughing melon-head cried his brains out. We did everything we could think of to make him more comfortable. Juice? Loosen your high-chair straps? Tylenol and cough syrup spritzer? Hot stone massage?

Nothing helped. We decided bed was the answer. As I picked him up, Dan noticed the giant splotches of ooze, spilling over the bottom half of his gingerbread PJs. The one thing we hadn’t thought of! All he needed was a new bum. Now he’d been sitting in killer sandy acid pear poop for half an hour. OH, the humanity!

As I was soaking him in a warm bathtub, Laylee and I had this conversation:
Laylee: Magoo was so sad at dinner. It makes my heart hurt.
Me: Oohhh. Me too.
Laylee: Why was he so sad?
Me: He had ouchy poop and it was burning his bum-bum.
Laylee [eyes widen. A minute goes by.]: Can I see the light?
Me: What light?
Laylee [peering sideways over the side of the tub]: The fire light.
Me: What fire light?
Laylee: The fire light that was shining out his bum when it got burned.

Now you want to know if I let her see it, huh? I would tell you but I’ve got to go change my shirt and teach Magoo that he’s pronouncing one of his favorite words incorrectly. There is no “H” in “sit”.

This year instead of resolutions, I’ve written up a few family commandments. If these really take off, I may consider licensing them to other families. Stay tuned.

1. No Comparisons Shall Be Made:

Walking through Costco yesterday, my children were staring into space immobilized, momentarily mesmerized by a stack of bargain-priced designer jeans. At that moment, a woman came around the corner with her daughter squeaking softly and straining at her lap belt.

The woman pointed to Laylee and Magoo and said to her daughter, “Look at those kids. They’re not screaming and trying to get out of the cart.”

“Catch us in five minutes,” I laughed, earning a glare from the “comparison shopper”.

Seriously, I say down with comparisons. There will be no comparing myself to the woman with 8 kids who still wears a size I haven’t been acquainted with since second grade, no comparing Laylee’s fits of personal expression with Magoo’s sleeping form, no comparing my salary with Dan’s (Honestly how can he possibly compete with what I make teaching one piano student and blogging? It’s just demoralizing.)

2. All Children Must Needs Nappeth — Laylee made the mistake of asking for a nap yesterday and then… actually sleeping. It’s all over now. Last week I would have said, “My daughter stopped napping over a year ago.” Next week I’ll be saying something much more witty and fabulous because I’ll have an hour every day to LET MY BRAIN RELAX. (Of course you know now that I’ve typed this, she will never sleep again, day or night.)

3. When Thou Cuttest the Hairs of Thy Head, the Shortest Layers Shall Not Be in Length Smaller Than One Half the Length of the Longest Layers, Resultething in a Mullet or Anything Like Unto It.

This does not mean necessarily that I’m cutting off Magoo’s curls. I think a bushy mullet is an acceptable mullet, at least for 2007.

4. I Shalt Not Zone Out

If I think of any more, I’ll let you know.

Well, I’m usually clean. The good news is, my kitchen has been clean for over 24 hours.

I decided yesterday that since I could not, in fact, keep my house clean as long as Laylee and Magoo were still residing in it, I could pick the one room I can control and set it up as a fortress of clean.

When we use a dish, it goes straight in the dishwasher. When we make a crumb, we wipe it up. When Magoo finishes a meal in a fantastic display of doneness by sweeping the contents of his tray onto the floor, I wipe the floor before declaring breakfast finished.

The strangest thing has happened. When the kitchen and dining room are clean, the rest of the house sort of maintains itself at a low-boil of play-time catastrophe. Dan reminded me that the kids are old enough to help and I’ve brought mean motherhood to a new level by having them clean with me several times a day before they move onto the next activity.

Magoo likes it so much that he’s been dumping out baskets, saying “Uh-Oh” and cleaning them up just for fun.

The freeze has subsided. Dan is back at work. The Christmas decorations are up and I want a dumbwaiter. Seriously. Do you remember the dumbwaiter they had on Webster? I want one in the worst way. I’ve even figured out a place where it would fit. We just need to annex the coat closet downstairs and the linen closet upstairs. They’re directly in line with each other as though the builder was leaving space for an optional pulley system.

I am also looking to hire someone to stand at the top of the stairs, unload the dumbwaiter and put all of the things away. Send references to kathryn@daringyoungmom.com.

This afternoon Dan and I will be taking Laylee to see the Pacific Northwest Ballet production of the Nutcracker. Heads will explode. I won’t be surprised if she shrieks in ecstacy at inappropriate places. I will cry. I always cry. When I hear good live music, I cry. Dave Matthews, Dave Brubeck, the Broadway Beauty and the Beast. They all made me cry. The Backstreet Boys also made me cry but for a different reason.