Comfy

On Saturday afternoon I found a great shirt for Twin Boy at the Goodwill.
$1.99 - yeah!

I brought it home just as he was leaving for an overnighter.
Spotting it, he tore off his shirt and put it right on.
It smelled a little like fabric softener so I let it go - hopefully it was clean.

We picked him up in the morning on the way to church,
and he appeared at the truck door in the same shirt, but what can you do.

Right after church we drove to the in-laws for lunch and spent the day loafing there.

I wasn't feeling particularly well, and woke this morning with a terrible cold.
I waited until the last possible moment to get up,
then threw some clothes on and hustled everybody out the door to school.

Just now I looked over and realized that it's the first time I've properly looked at him today.

And yes.

"You're still wearing that shirt?" I asked -
it was one of those questions you already know the answer to but you ask anyway.

"I love this shirt!" he says.


ApparentLY.

*

Keeping An Eye On The Situation

Twin girl got a necklace from Nick the other day.

A gift.

Her friends informed her that
"those diamonds aren't real".


Really now.


Twin boy's take on the subtleties of
courtship:

"If a boy teases you,
that means he likes you.

And if a girl asks you to chase her,
that means she likes you."

This pretty much sums up love in the 5th grade.

And yet apparently Nick seems not so subtle.

hm.

*

Matthew 7:1-5

When Middle Child argued that Twin Girl could NOT be hungry
because she just ate "like a half hour ago",
Twin Girl spun on her heel with her nose in the air and retorted,

"Don't judge my hungerness."

I love that.

And while you're at it,
don't judge my domesticness,
or my hairstyleishness,
or my faithness
or my heartness.

*

Cold Snap

I was trying to think of something good about this weather
and the only think I could think of was:

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't love Springtime so much,
if Winter weren't so long and bitter.

Something New

I started playing with a little jazz group this summer
and last Friday we spent the day in the studio,
making a demo CD.

The recording guy said that a photographer was stopping by
to take pictures for an online magazine that was doing a feature
on his studio and would we mind if he caught us in action?
I said fine but I would have combed my hair and worn something cool had I known.

The singer chick Abigail and our band leader Keith:


Ed the drummer:


Randy on keys and me with apparently no makeup on.


All of us:


Listening to a rough mix in the control room -
You can see my shoes, I'm sitting on the couch exhausted,
eyes closed, with my head back.
This is a typical posture for me. :-)


Home by 5, had my pajamas on by 5:15, in bed by 9 that night.
It felt like a good day's work.

*

Making A Point

I've been getting this simple joy
from picking up everyone's water glasses that they keep leaving around
and emptying them into the Christmas tree stand.

Nobody is noticing
and it's sort of ruining the whole thing for me.

*

It Takes A Village

The husband was quizzing Middle Child for her American History test.

I was only vaguely listening as he hammered away at the questions,
spitting them out in a merciless staccato
while Middle Child murmured her answers with her head down on the table,
tired and bored of memorizing words.

"What was the French and Indian war,
who fought in it,
where did it occur,
who won it,
and was the indian in the Village People an actual native american?"

She sat up and blinked.

He cracks me up.

*

Jessica Watson

This girl inspires me.
I read her blog every day,
and every day it does the same thing to me.

It gives me hope.

She is sixteen years old,
and she is sailing, unassisted,
around the world.

Why would this make me hopeful?

I think that I just need to see her succeed at this.
I think the world really needs it too.

Read about her here.
Her blog is here.

Sail on!!

*

Amazin'

I just love Amazon.com.
It saves me at Christmas.
Free shipping on orders of $25 or less,
and great prices.

It makes me want to buy and buy and buy and buy...

Okay maybe "it saves me at Christmas" is not the right phrase.

But it sure saves me time and gas.

Today just for fun I searched "stocking stuffers".
Not because I'm going to buy any of course,
that's Santa's job.

And the number one item listed?


The Pull-My-Finger Fart Pen, $1.99

Followed by:


Slingshot Flying Chicken with Cockadoodle Scream Sound, $5.10

I especially like the suggestion of:


Meatball Flavored Bubble Gum Balls, $8.95

Yum!

Last but not least?

Bacon Bandages, $3.50

Ho Ho Ho!!

*

Day

2am-8am - be awake
8am - get children to school
8-ish to noon - learn music
noon-1 - attend rehearsal for concert
1-2 - rest head
2-3 - transport child to community college, back to pick up the rest.
3:30-6:30 - students
7pm - concert

That's how my day looked yesterday,
and things were going well until I went out to start the car
at 11:55am,
because of course I left myself only 5 minutes to get to the rehearsal.

Battery dead.

I pulled a stocking cap down over my ears and zipped my coat up to my neck.
I balanced my notebook of music on the handlebars of my bike
and rode it through the winter cold,
with tires slightly flat,
up to the school.

Breathless, I pedaled up to the back door where a custodian was unloading chairs
in preparation for the concert.

"Can I leave my bike out here? Do you think anyone will steal it?" I asked him.

I should say that my bike is a beauty to behold.
It is huge, and red, and completely rusted by being left out in the rain too often.
It is a Pee-wee Herman style one-speed bike,
with wide handle bars and big round tires and a big, big comfy seat.

The custodian looked over and sort of laughed,
"No, I don't think so."

After the rehearsal, I came outside and sure enough, it had not been stolen.
The fifth graders were lining up outside the building and one called out to me,

"Sweet ride, Mrs. K," in a dead-pan voice.

I saluted her and pedaled off to the wonder of my own two fifth graders,
who didn't have the information about the car,
and just took it in stride that on that freezing day their mother decided to ride
her bike to school.

On the way home after school, in a car the husband had jumped back to life,
I found out that girl twin won the Student Council election,
and boy twin had been given the threat, "You're dead meat" on the playground,
53 times by the same kid, because he counted.

In response to my questions regarding this information,
they pummeled each other in the backseat yelling, "Slug bug! No slug bug back!" over and over,
while middle child sighed in the front and rolled her eyes.

I drove home with a steady hand,
checked off the remaining items on the list for the day,
and marveled at the end of it
that everything turned out okay.

*

Sleepless

It happens sometimes.

Went to bed at 10, woke up at 2 this morning, with a gasp,
remembering a particularly painful moment from yesterday.

In the middle of the night it's hard to let it go, you know?

Had a first gig with a new little band and for the most part it went well.
If I can look at the overall picture, it was a good first time.

But there were a few train wreck moments courtesy of me,
and in the middle of the night, the big picture fades away,
the spotlight zooms in,
and my heart starts banging around.

Today will be particularly challenging.

A rehearsal at noon, a piano gig tonight.

In between those, there is a child transportation issue,
and several students.

I've been taking things one day at a time,
and it has been working,
but the sleepless night means that one day
is sort of
bleeding into the next.

You know?

*

Out of Sync

*Twin girl ate a bowl of the froot loops we were saving for making gingerbread houses tomorrow before anyone could stop her.

*Roger the 7 year old piano student asked to use my bathroom yesterday (upstairs) and only later did I find that the sink had a pair of underwear soaking in it.

*I can't find my calendar, and I have that dreaded suspicion that I have double booked a gig and a family outing.

It feels like my timing is all off.

Sort of like when the dog starts to do his business and right then a car drives by.

*

Ugly Shoes

Middle Child has a savvy fashion sense
and I do not.

Today while shoe-browsing after her orthodontic appointment
I asked,

"Hey do you think these are cute?"

She looked at them,

"For me or for you?"

Okay nevermind.

*

Fire Starter

Got a letter in the mail asking us to participate in a
twins study at the University, so I filled out the on-line survey.

I had to ask the twins if they minded and they both said no,
and Twin Girl said,

"I like it when people study me."

Then I asked Twin Boy if he remembered who was born first, he or his sister and he said,

"MOM!!! I'm your SON!!!"

Yes, but it was ten years ago, dear.

The survey was a series of yes or no questions
that I had to answer for the "First-born Twin", the "Second-born Twin",
the "Biological Mother of the Twins" and the "Biological Father of the Twins."

There were health questions and behavior questions,
but the best part was a series of four questions at the end:

1. Smoker?
2. Ever convicted of a felony?
3. Participated in dance, cheer or gymnastics for at least one year?
4. Starts fires?


Something about that list just strikes me as odd.

*

Crazy

A band I play in does covers of some cool tunes
and this is the latest one.

Been listening a lot - a little bit to learn the song,
but mostly because I like it:

Wild Thing

So last night I was out walking in the dark,
in the warm, wet night,
and I was feeling soooo sad about nothing in particular.

Maybe I was feeling sorry for myself
because the wind was whipping my hair everywhere,
and the rain was falling on my face
and I was all alone.

Who knows where these mysterious moods originate?
Usually a nice long walk zaps them.
But this time, the more I walked,
the worse I felt.

Coming back home,
seeing the house all lit up,
I didn't want to go back in,
and that is a very, very bad sign.

Emergency measures must be taken
when one is reluctant to go back home.

Three children inside,
in their jammies,
late getting to bed
because mama is walking way too long...

So I opened the front door and hollered.

"Get your shoes on!"

The older one recognized the drill and
helped monitor the confusion of the twins,
who were concerned with unimportant details
like whether they had to wear a jacket,
change into real clothes
or whether slippers counted as shoes (they do).

Once they appeared - more or less clothed -
I said, "Ready-set-go!" faster than they could process
and dashed toward the backyard.
They tailed me, not wanting to get left behind
in the creepy pre-Halloween black of night.

We tore for the back field and cut through
Gillespie's backyard for the subdivision.

We ran down the road with our arms held straight up in the air
for absolutely positively no reason except that
we were wearing pajamas and slippers in October
at 10pm and it seemed like a crazy thing to do.

Then we came back and played Popowitch in the yard,
hiding behind trees and screaming.

The warm wind was glorious,
the rain and the dark felt dangerous
and when we fell in the front door laughing,
it felt so good to be home.

*

Cupcakes

Last night on an emergency run to the grocery store,
I walked by the display of Halloween cupcakes from the bakery.

Then I walked back to them.

I looked at the cool green witch's finger on the top of each one.

I looked in my cart
at the cake mix,
the frosting,
the baking cups,
the decorations.

I did math in my head.

And I realized with sudden clarity
that $15 for 36 cupcakes,
the night before the school Halloween party
is really money well-spent.


*

Laughter

Uncontrollable laughter...
the kind where you can feel it coming, and you know it's going to be bad.
The kind where at some point you might worry that you are going to pee your pants.
The kind where you make loud noises and tears come to your eyes, and you know you're embarassing yourself, but it's just out of your control.

It started last night at the choir concert when Twin Boy fell asleep.
It just struck me as so funny, because he is SUCH an animated being, and seconds before he was asking to go run around with his friends, talking a mile a minute.
One slow song in and he was OUT.

I looked over and it was a sudden burst of hilarity.
I felt it coming, I was shaking, trying not to snort,
doing the silent laugh that hurts your stomach.
I could feel the people behind me wondering. It was just not THAT funny.
But looking over at him, with his head lolled to the side and his mouth open, just - boom - asleep. It just flipped a switch in me.

That's the way it is with that kind of funny moment. It doesn't really make sense.
It triggers some nonsensical part of you that nobody else understands, and that's part of what makes it so funny.
To you.

Maybe it's hormonal.
I remember attending my first Lamaze class, and going through the motions of breathing.
I looked around and all of the couples were so SO serious.
It just struck me that we were all sitting there pretending to have a baby.

Like, acting it out.

I don't know why, but it just threw me and I started giggling.
At the first glance toward me from some dour serious parent-to-be, I knew it was over.
The look that said, "Rude. You are rude to laugh." It put me over the edge. I snorted.
I tried to stop. The husband shushed me and smiled apologetically to the others.
By then I was in full out laughter - loud, long, gasping for breath and what made it even more funny is that the whole class was silent, continuing on with their exercises,
completely ignoring the maniacal laughter from the one lady who was now lying prone on the floor, hiccuping and not even trying to stop anymore.

I mean, wouldn't you stop, sit back on your heels and try to catch the joke?
Nope. They wrote me off. And I laughed all the harder.

So twice now the Teenager has joined me in an "episode".
The first was when he had to get pictures taken of his mouth just before getting braces.
We had no idea what was going to happen.

I was sitting supportively opposite him.
I was smiling encouragingly as the technician fitted his mouth with.....a medieval torture device.
When she backed away, I was staring at my poor son, who was looking at me questioningly, his lips peeled back away from his teeth with some sort of metal clamping gear - top and bottom.

It was the most hideous grimace I had ever seen. And I just burst out laughing.
Then he did too, and we both went through the whole gamut - the tears, the loss of breath, the guffaws.

The technician just stood there, kind of taken aback.
The more I laughed the more he laughed, and the funnier he looked and the more he drooled.
He had tears streaming down his face - his little Joker face - and I....could....not....stop....

Fast forward to today.
This is SO not that funny.
I hadn't eaten yet and was on my third cup of coffee and I could feel the tremors beginning.
The inner quivering of my stomach. The woozy head. It was coming.

We were sitting in the oral surgeon's office, waiting for the doctor to come in and consult about his wayward wisdom teeth. I told the Teenager of how my brother had posted a question on Facebook: Which would you rather have, a head twice its normal size, or half its normal size?

It set us both off, and we could barely talk, laughing at the question and then laughing at the other person laughing, egging each other on, topping each other with just one more layer of stupidity, just one more silly "what if"....

We were crying by the time I said,
"When that doctor walks in, all I'm going to be able to see is whether his head is proportionate to his body."
Again with the gasping, the falling out of the chair, the wiping of the eyes.

Then he walked in and he was so normal looking it was a let down.

All this to say....

I have no idea why I said all of this.

It's just....sometimes, it feels really really good to laugh.
I highly recommend just letting go. Letting it rip.
Life is funny.
There is laughter to be had.

*

Math Balloon

After an hour of stressful mathematics,
tears,
depression,
feelings of failure,
twin girl disappeared upstairs.

She came back down and stood half behind a door
to tell me she was making something.

"It's to help with my math facts,"
she said with a grin.

"Show me!" I said.

She pulled out a balloon from the Teenager's
birthday celebration this afternoon,
and said that while she is lying in bed,
she can toss it up in the air.

When she catches it, she looks at whatever fact
is facing her,
and she says it aloud three times.

Then she throws it up again.

Unconventional.

We may not be good at math in this house,
but we are good at shaking off the bad stuff
and trying to make it into something happy.

*

Life is Short, Wear the Dress

This summer I bought a dress on impulse.
It was completely unrealistic.
But I came out of the dressing room with it over my arm,
and I marched up to the register.
My girlfriends raised their eyebrows with pleasure.

I said,
"I know. I'm never going to wear this.
Never.
But I'm going to buy it.
Because it makes me feel like a Princess when I put it on."

It hung in my closet for months.

Then early this month I had a wedding to attend.
Sadly, the husband had to back out.
Work.
I was depressed about attending alone.

I was standing in my closet in my underwear,
getting even more depressed because I couldn't find anything to wear,
and it was getting late.

Middle child walked in and innocently fingered the Princess Dress.
"Why don't you wear this?"

I explained to her that it was October,
and that dress was too skimpy,
and I'd have to wear sandals with it,
and it was just not the right dress for an October wedding.

The pile of castoff outfits on the bed started to grow.
I kept looking at the clock and getting more manic in my search
for something right.
I was growing more and more depressed about going to the wedding alone.
I got that familiar weepy feeling, sort of a
"boo-hoo I don't have anything to wear" thing
that only girls understand.

Middle child came in again and it felt like she was the grown-up.

"Mom, please, why don't you just wear the dress?"

I stopped and looked at the dress.
I thought about how I bought it
knowing I'd never have any reason to wear it.
I thought about how it felt when I put it on,
the soft fabric, the slinky feel of the skirt.

Something in me just kind of relaxed in one second.
I grabbed the dress and I put it on.
I strapped on the sandals.
I draped a black cover-up over my shoulders.

Middle child oohed and ahhed, and grinned at me.

The thought that had gone through my head,
is one that keeps returning to me since that night
when I swirled into the wedding, late,
slipped into the back row and crossed my legs.

Life is short,
Wear the dress.


*