the tender youth

one day my daughter will not pull a child-sized chair up to the window to blow kisses to me when i drop her off at school. one day i won't be able to cuddle her whole body in my embrace. one day charlie might not say to me, "i just need some love..." and then cozy up to me one the couch for animal-style affection, rubbing foreheads and cheeks together, making cooing sounds and me repeating "so much love..." i see that parenting small children is such a brief moment in the scope of a lifetime and that in the midst of daily mini-crises, children fighting and crying and demanding, it's so easy to forget to appreciate the miracle of their innocence, their openness and unfiltered joy. sometimes i'm so caught up in my own internal drama to notice hazel spying on butterflies and charlie making leaps and bounds in learning. he can already spell 'sleeping!' and he writes his whole name on paper and rides his bike without training wheels! with tears of gratitude for my children...

our daily bread

it should be no surprise that C's first culinary accomplishment is making toast. he is the grandson of a Pioneer bread man, who daily delivered fresh bread to his children, which was usually prepared as toast. now this was no ordinary affair. firstly, the toast was considered raw until at least 1/3 was blackened, and the toast-maker could be found staring intently into the toaster's orange glowing holiness. Indeed there were two holy figures in the Lennon family -- the Virgin Mary and the toaster.
When i married into the Lennon family, their clan obsession with bread amused me. now i confess that i have become one of their proselytes. when children say they're hungry, i offer toast without a second thought. i stand before the toaster in patient reverence or listen for the expectant spring of toast popping, then hurriedly, in a state of complete focus, i smear thin slabs of butter on my piece of perfection--a black/brown crust fading into golden oblivion. no edge forgotten, no surface overlooked as my butter knife works confidently beneath the subtle sizzle of butter on hot toast.
needless to say, eating the toast is a matter of sacredness. if the bread can make it from toast to mouth in under 4 minutes (depending on toaster of course), the toast-maker has earned a medal of excellence and the silent approval of the Lennon's who have been buttering toast since they were toddlers -- about C's age, to be exact. So, Mr. Cbear, welcome to the rank of third generation proselyte of The Lennon Toast Affair. you're on your way to excellence.

wean

i weaned hazel on tuesday, february 23rd. it came like a mysterious wind that signals the arrival of change, so i was gifted the confidence to make this significant transition. i didn't know i would feel all the ways i've been feeling in the last four days since i stopped nursing. i had been waiting for that very wind to blow and relieve me from the obligation nursing had become to me. ultimately i continued nursing because i believe in the lasting benefits of such a strong mother bond, but at some point it felt like i was giving that nourishment grudgingly, and this is no way to give to anybody.
on the first day, with my breasts engorged like they hadn't been since after labor, i felt such a tremendous sense of gratitude for the earth, our mother, for giving to us so tirelessly, without question or condition. i crossed my arms over my chest and, like a ceremony marking the closing of a womb, i thanked my body for giving to our children for the last 4 1/2 years of uninterrupted pregnancy and nursing. but i wept in secret as my daughter became aware that our relationship was changing. she asked to nurse again and again, as if hoping to awaken from a sad dream. maybe i'm just interpreting her experience, or maybe some cellular part of me understands. so i quickly direct her to the sky and the birds and ask 'where did nursing go?' -- a limitless question with any number of answers. i remembered when i weaned C and the process of reinforcing our connectedness by quiet times of reading; or swooping him up in my arms and dancing with him, whispering that 'mama still holds you soooo close...' and so it goes again with miss louise, my little gumdrop girl.

my daughter

H stays with me in the bathroom when i shower and mimics my beauty routine. brush my teeth -- and she clumsily brushes hers; apply lotion to body and face -- she holds out her tiny hand, and i give her a tiny squirt of lotion, which she then spreads on her legs and arms; put on my makeup -- if i don't give her something from my makeup bag, she erupts into a true female fit, face pinched, reflecting the pathetic truth of how i feel without my blessed beauty secrets; apply chapstick -- she puckers her cutest-baby-mouth and i give her a dab of burt's bees.

it's all these things that make me feel so blessed to have a daughter. it's just plain fun!! she naturally wants to smell flowers without my beckoning. she somehow already knows how to play games, and i don't mean childish ones (or maybe mine are!) -- if she's not given what she wants, she knows how to withdraw her love and affection. then she lavishes me with her tiny kisses when i don't ask for them. she's already a "Rule's Girl" at 1 1/2!

i can already see us as friends as she becomes an adult. i look to my relationship with my mom and think how amazing it is to have generations of women, with a friendship so unspeakably close.

siblings are overrated

siblings are overrated. this coming from an only child, mind you. i wasn't one of those only children that felt some deep longing for a brother or sister. i never knew the difference; i was comfortable with adults. my dad likes to tell the story of when i was a child, maybe 4 years old. apparently i would look people square in the face and ask them how they were doing. "it would freak people out!" my dad would say with a chuckle. "you used to talk to people like you were an adult, really scared people."

it has been fascinating to watch my two children as siblings. i'm in awe of their natural connectedness, having grown in the same womb and nursed from the same breast. when they get into a groove and start playing together, i have such gratitude that they have each other and will be friends for life.

but it's the fighting that makes me say (with a just a touch of sarcasm) that siblings are overrated. the screaming from my little girl over every minor infraction, every bump from her older brother. the possessive nature of my little boy with each and every toy at any and all times. sometimes i don't interfere just to see if they resolve it on their own. they usually don't and from the next room i hear the most cacophonous screams -- i half expect to see a bloody murder scene when rush in to play referee. 'what is it with you guys?!' i hear myself saying daily. they seem innately bent on torturing each other most of the time, so what's so great about having siblings? as an only child, you get all the toys to yourself all the time; you get your parents' undivided attention; and have the added perk of being their only benefactor (jk -- totally morose, i know :).

then again, as an adult you have to adjust to being only a star amonst stars, instead of the ruling sun in your parents' world. this is something i'm still getting used to. sometimes i think some of my most severe woes stem from only child syndrome.

once upon a time, there was a little boy who loved to chase the chickens. he would sneak up on them at their midday shade and gallivant around with a stick, prodding with little feathers flying about. the chickens didn't like it, needless to say.
so one day, they got together to talk about it.
"i don't like it, i don't like it one bit," said blacky.
"nope, not me neither," said another and they went around like that saying how they didn't like the little boy to chase them.
they made a plan to get the little boy back for scaring them all those times and this is what they did:

the next morning when the little boy went out to the coup to let the chickens out, they all huddled together and when the latch was opened, they flew out one by one, landing on the little boy's head, until all five chickens were perched on the little boy while he scrambled and clucked. "yeelp! yeow!!"

then on the chickens whispered "one, two THREE!" and with that they all pooped on the boy's head! now was he mad or what? the chickens hid in their boxes and rejoiced.

the little boy went inside and told his mom what happened and she said,
"i guess you won't be chasing the chickens anymore--you scared the poop out of them!"

i didn't know i'd do the whole santa routine...but i really quite enjoyed it. i like the moral manipulation of 'you better watch out, you better not cry'. it was actually effective a few times in calming C from a few point-of-no-return fits.
"oh, charlie? you know, santa needs you to be good so you can get presents? uh, uh uh, no crying--you better not cry!"
mark that up on my list of things i never thought i'd do as a parent. the list is becoming an epic novel. but there are some redeeming qualities about the santa claus myth:
1) although slightly twisted, it does demand a certain level of decency from children.
2) children love ritual. i felt like i was making an offering to a hindu god when C and I set the cookies and milk out for santa to eat.
3) it develops a sense of faith and deepens imagination. we don't really get to see santa in the flesh. we just have to belief that he's there and knows our whereabouts and whatabouts at all times.
so when C fumbled through his expanding vocabulary to describe to my mom on the phone the whole santa scenario, i didn't feel one ounce of remorse for having lied to my kid about where his presents come from. i love the sense of wonder bubbling in his voice when he imagines santa squeezing down the chimney and his sincere concern that santa doesn't get his bum bum burned by the fire.
i've even thought about the moment of truth and how i'll handle the accusation that i have indeed lied to C about santa. but it's late now and my mind is doing that tapioca end-of-the-day failure. to be continued...