Post Election Blues

Last week we were on the way to swim class and we passed a large group of people chanting and waving YES on 8 signs. "What are they doing, Mama?" Stella asked from her car seat. "Well..." I thought about how to explain the California proposition to change the constitution.

Me: "You know that Papai and I are married, right?"
Stella: "Right."
Me: "Do you think that's OK?"
Stella (a little confused): "Yeah."
Me: "And you know Mark and Lina's Daddy and Poppy are married, right?"
Stella: "Yeah."
Me: "Do you think that's OK?"
Stella: "Yeah."
Me: "And do you think two girls could get married?"
Stella (thinking this is silly): "Yeah."
Me: "I think so too, but those people with the signs think that only a boy and a girl should be able to get married."
Stella: "WHAT?!" (as if I told her there was no more color blue)

Today I am elated with Obama's victory.

I need to let that statement stand alone. But (WHY does there need to be a "but"?), I am sad too. Living in the Bay Area bubble, I really thought Prop 8 wouldn't pass. I shared my little legislative lesson in hate with Mark and Lina's Poppy and he said, "We lost the battle, but we won the war."

True.

There is hope for the next generation.

Mr. Disney was Inspired by Oakland's Fairyland

 

 

 

 

We aren't a Disney Family, like many we saw last week. We don't have the pin collection, we didn't go in the minute the park opened, and we did not pay $150 to make Stella into Cinderella- although it was tempting, I admit. Now if they could have guaranteed a princess who does housework and has good manners... But we did have 6 hours of fun in Fantasyland, Toontown, and the Princess Faire. Augusto had a conference, so I took the kids down for 2 nights.

What We Learned at Disney:

1. The Disneyland Hotel kiddie pool slide is really fun. There is no admission fee (other than a night at the hotel).

2. It is possible to get out of a 30 minute line 20 minutes into it for "I changed my mind" and a pee break. You just hop the barriers. And remember not to wear a skirt next time.

3. The $2.99 Toddler Meal is reasonable price- for 1/4 of a child. Try to look like a bratwurst-buying family and sneak snacks past the guards.

4. The Royal Coronation Ceremony is awesome, complete with a maypole. Waiting for a princess behind a wall isn't necessary for a 3 year old.

5. Disney does not acknowledge Oakland's Fairyland. They claim to be America's first theme park. Humpf.

6. Everyone told us to get out, nap and go back. They were right. It also works to skip going back in.

7. Wait 5 years before going again. Both kids will be tall and adventurous enough to go on the rides we're also into.

What I Learned While Flying Outnumbered by Children:

1. Give up all hope of staying clean and unsticky.

2. All people stare. Some get out of the way. Some offer to help. It is advisable to make the most of either.

3. The carry-on is only for kid stuff. Time to read? Don't make me laugh or I'll spill another liquid on my pants.

4. A day is only a day. How long was labor? I survived.

We got a pin after all (for our collection?). Stella calls it our Disney Remembership Pin. "It's to remember all you saw there."

"Now that's something."

His voice, round and cheery, is over my shoulder this morning. And I think it too when I stand on the Transbay bus to get a gander of the new bridge. It looks ready, complete with speed limit signs and benches, but ends abruptly 1/4 mile from Treasure Island.

San Francisco is glowing at 7:42. "That's a beautiful city. Just beautiful."

 

My grandfather visited twice in my 13 years here. Once we toured the wharf and then jetted off to Alaska- just the 2 of us. Once we met at SFO. He and his 86 year old bride were on a layover. They were heading home from a Hawaii honeymoon. Melvin had a way of getting around. He was an elevator repairman who knew how to save. We talked weekly until he died. But he is still everywhere.

This week I watched a young woman and an old man sorting out details after a fender bender. She was on her cell phone while he waited at the hood of his car. He had his manual open, registration and insurance card at the ready. My guess was it was her first accident, and his first in many, many years. I wanted to go to the double yellow line, ask if they needed any help, but I was stuck on the curb with both kids and a doll's stroller. The kids and I were walking to school. We had paused at the FedEx and UPS drop off boxes, and they were opening and closing the slots. I was about to stop them when I was overcome. That was Melvin there, prepared for anything at 93. Most likely a reassuring presence for the young gal (although in private, he would complain about her ruining his paint, how she didn't know how to drive). It was the way he just waited, rested his hand on the hood. I waited for Stella to ask why I was crying, prepared myself for her little voice, "Old Pop Pop died." But the kids kept on opening and closing the mail flaps, and I stood in his presence, sad and content until the moment passed.

***

Between work, food prep, exercise, and games of chase, there isn't much space left for memory that stops me in my tracks. The joy and stress of daily life are so noisy. Often I can't hear my feelings. A day or week even, can pass so quickly I don't realize what I've missed. Paying a parking ticket. Scheduling a sitter. A page of emails. My grandmother's birthday. This week was one of my busiest in months. In addition to the usual, I went to Vallejo for half a day and SF for a 3 day conference on antepartum and intrapartum management. But in the journeys (walking, riding the bus), there was enough quiet to receive the visits from the man I miss so very much.

 

Make a Wish and Blow

**** October 12

** 9 am

The effects of the accident wash through our family. Others have become sick from stress and all are feeling a loss. My nephew has been amazing. His father is the man whose head needs to be supported when he is propped up. He said, “Papai, don’t think of what you can’t do, think of what you CAN do.” This from a 15 year old when he saw his father for the first time after the accident. I didn’t even try to keep it together over that very long distance call. The boy is a marvel.

I spend a lot of time trying to focus on each moment. Motherhood and loved ones with cancer and even my own near drowning are the stuff that inspire a good look at life. They are the stuff that, if we are lucky, make us pause and take it all in.

I am working too many hours each week covering shifts for a doc who is out. Stella is in school full time- other than when I pull her out for a zoo trip (or today’s ghost making party that starts in an hour). Otto keeps me present and charmed by his giggles and broad leaps growing up. But I constantly butt heads with Stella.


** 5 pm What a day.

After I dropped of Stella at school, I went home and took a nap upstairs with Otto. It was pouring glorious tent-in-the-rain-sounds. I heard a noise that woke me. It was a boom, then walking. I relaxed when I thought it was only my neighbor bringing in her garbage bins. I dozed off. About 30 minutes later, I was in bed nursing Otto when I heard what sounded like Augusto's footsteps on the stairs. It was 2:45. He had a meeting at 4. It didn't make sense. Then I heard 2 male voices approaching the bedroom door. I hopefully (?) cautiously called out "Augusto?" and the door opened to two men in black clothes and black watch caps. A million awful scenarios went through my head, and then the guy who opened the door said "Oh shit!" and they both ran back down the stairs. I grabbed the phone and dialed 911 then took Otto into the bathroom and locked us in.

The guys (we think there were more than 2) tried to interrupt my 911 call (so were possibly thinking of coming back upstairs?). The police surrounded the house within 4 minutes with the dog and guns and warning shouts. When they determined the place was clear, they let me out.

They messed up our AV equipment, took pictures off the walls (looking for a safe), took about $600 of electronics, and made a general mess. They pried open the french doors with a screwdriver.

I can't get that image of them out of my head. I'm so glad Stella was at school. I know we were really lucky.


**** October 23

How do I pause and take it all in? How do I slow down the pace?

Fingerprinting. Visitors. Hypervigilant nights. A birthday party. Mounds of mail- growing. Home form work at 10 pm. Up at midnight with a puking baby. Out of your pajamas before oatmeal at 7:30. I won’t wind the jewelry box until you brush your teeth. Two kids, a lunch bag, one very important bunny, a car seat, keys, wallet, shoes, don’t forget to set the alarm. Thirteen stairs. School drop off. Nurse in car. Sleeping baby up to the crib. Move load from washer to drier. Wash breast pump, bottles, breakfast bowls. Take out trash and compost.

Each moment rushes into the next and before I can wrap my brain around a spinal cord injury, a robbery, or an unsafe furnace report, Otto has five teeth, Stella says “I’m already three,” and the amount of free space on my desk shrinks to twelve square inches. Do I hide my overwhelm (ha, ha, good kidding myself on that one) or just make sure everybody survives? Stella had a great dance party. We did the limbo with a broomstick and my dad wore the crab hat and set up a tattoo station. Pizza. Ice cream cake. It really was a good time.

 

Diving In

You know how it is to go from alarm clock to cereal to locking the door to crossing the street to putting one foot in front of the other… all the while numb and bursting with emotion at the same time? This week a relation, the father of a teen very, very dear to me, had an accident. He survived, but he lost complete use of his body. I am sick with sadness imagining how every person he loves/ loves him is suffering now. Sick to numbness beyond imagination. How it would be to know I could never tickle my squealing children again? And he is stuck in Croatia, a world away from his family in Brazil, a world away from us. Our grief spans three continents, not solving one thing.

At home our world is busy with work and eating and dancing and bedtimes. Augusto and I are dealing in our own ways. He is ever the optimist, hoping for a treatment or act of God, holding on to his fears- and tears. I am the salty spring for us all- eyelids swollen daily as I can’t shake it. Don’t want to shake it, really, because even as it kills me to hold the image of this man’s elegant olive wrists gesturing in a story, this tangible memory makes him complete. And the beauty of the motion, now forever in the past, makes me believe we will all survive his accident, each holding on to some piece of him, carrying him. Carrying on.

WhyMommy

I’ve been stewing a post in my head about nose picking and educating our children. But I’ll need to come back to it, because all I keep doing is checking WhyMommy’s posts on breast cancer. I am nursing as I type, enjoying it before Otto gets too distracted by the click of the keys. And there is a mother in DC weaning her son. She has a serious cancer (I guess that means we’re making progress if “serious cancer” isn’t actually redundant anymore) and cancer treatments aren’t good for breast milk. Her baby is three days older than mine. And she is strong now. Asking Demanding that her readers’ comments be positive. Typing her truth. Not changing her name, her tune to WhyMe.

Another mother in DC just beat colon cancer. She shared her journey through mass emails. The same emails that a two years ago were updates on her daughter’s running and music achievements. Quick notes about a new job, a move, other people’s health. I was with this woman nine years ago, steadying her as she signed the papers for the Chinese adoption, as she pulled the first picture of her daughter from the cardboard envelope. We were coworkers, and I was a new midwife. She was too moved, to already in love, to drive to the post office alone. She calls me her midwife. For years after she moved East, I didn’t read all of her emails in detail. Other than the updates, we lost touch. But then one day she found out she had cancer, and all I could think about was that lunchtime trip. Her dreams coming true.

We imagine our lives. We see the splendor of it rolled out ahead. Parties. Graduation. Celebration. We piece together “normal” in relation to others. How much sleep do you get? How often do you fight with your husband? We read the paper and swallow hard at kidnappings, kids caught in gunfire, fathers killed in a convenience store. But life as a parent is mostly just day to day. What’s for dinner? Is the dishwasher empty? No, you can’t stand on that chair. I can’t figure out how one becomes the person in the news with the sad, sad story. No. I know how these things happen. What I can’t wrap my head around is how you live with them. How you live.

The year my mother had breast cancer and my uncle had brain cancer is the year we lost our first son. It’s not so clear to me now how we lived. I remember crying on the couch an awful lot. I remember my milk darkening circles on my shirt. I remember believing I had the worst luck on the planet. But then the days moved one by one along the squares in the kitchen calendar. My mom came and went from the community chemo room. She mailed pictures of her bald head. We threw ashes into the Pacific. Hours became weeks became years. And now we are parents of two. My mother and uncle survived. And I sit here now thinking how lucky we are to have more than just a “normal” life: health, and wealth, and love. How lucky I am to feed my son and dream of his first day of school… that quintessential vision of the backpack, the glance backover his shoulder. How easily it all can change.

What does WhyMommy think of now in those moments when she's not strong? What is normal in her house? I swallow hard now and hold a future for her in my swelling heart.

The Brazilians have arrived!!

After 30 hours of travel, my in-laws are here. Most of my friends think I’m crazy or lying when I say I have been eagerly awaiting their arrival. They will live with us for the next three months. Three whole months. In this time I will return to work, Stella will learn more Portuguese, Augusto and I will have weekly date nights and a night away, and we will coexist in the kitchen, living room, and daily stuff of our lives.

I get along with my in-laws. Well. I always have. The initial language barrier probably smoothed the way. It’s hard to argue when the English conversation is limited to food and sights. We have since switched to Portuguese, which actually makes us have accidental debates which spin off of a minor misunderstanding. Augusto and Auri are gracious people. They don’t occupy much space. They clean up after themselves (and us). They LOVE their grandchildren. They can play with them for hours, listen to any pitch or volume of screaming, and hold them for an hour forgoing a potty break. There are the expected debates over sweets and bedtimes and the daily “No, I’ll do it.” But it is overwhelmingly good.

I do speak from experience. When Stella was 2 months, they lived with us for 8 weeks. When we hugged goodbye at the airport, I sobbed huge, attention grabbing tears second only to the crying many years ago when I had to leave my sick grandmother in Baltimore and I couldn’t convince anyone at the airport to give me a change of ticket for less than $1000. So this time I suggested they stay longer.

The fridge is a little more packed than I like it and I’ve already said no to half a dozen grandmother-suggested sweets in less than 48 hours, but I am NOT complaining. We are so grateful they are here.