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Today The Middle turned six. He has been both a joy and a pain in the ass since the day he decided to enter my world. And, of course, I say that with love.
He made his appearance three weeks ahead of schedule. It was a Monday. The Hubbin’ had gotten up at 3:00 in the morning and driven over four hours to work. He had just pulled onto the job site and parked his truck when I called him with the news that I was in labor. “Dude,” he told the guy who had ridden with him that week, “wake up, you gotta get out of the truck.” He then made a four-hour drive back home.
The labor was so much easier than it had been with The Oldest. I was sent away from the hospital once. Told to “go walk around”. I took the opportunity to exchange some of the baby shower gifts that I had gotten double of, bought a watch with a seconds hand so I could time my contractions and glided around on a shopping cart for about 40 seconds every two minutes while my miserable ass was seized with the agony of contractions.
Upon my return to the hospital I told the lady at admitting, “I’m back and I’m ready for my epidural.” She giggled. “No. Really.” Something in my eyes told her that I didn’t want to hear any shit about the checkmark on my birth plan next to the box that read “Natural Childbirth”.
Six hours after I went into labor, I held in my arms an amazing little baby who had been almost wiped clean by the nurses (and let me go off on a tangent here, I mean really, they hand you a little baby, still somewhat covered in that white, smudgy stuff, and then every gathers around, their eyes filled with expectation, silently encouraging you to kiss the baby, and therefore the slime—ick!).
The six years since then have been the sweetest, most amazing and utterly aggravating times I can remember. He is at once the biggest cuddler, the sweetest, most considerate, gentle and humorous little boy. That shell also encases the loudest, rudest, most obnoxious, abstinent person. He is a little boy who loves superheroes and still sleeps with the Winnie-the-Pooh that he’s had since he was a baby, and my heart melts. He is also a little boy who loves to use the word “penis” in as many variations as he can during a conversation and yells across the crowded playground at his brother, the “fucking jackass”, and my heart sinks. And, no matter what he’s done, at the end of the day, he snakes his arm around my neck, tells me that he loves me, and I melt.
And, yes, I gave him the damn gift.
In 4 years that Pooh Bear will still be snuggled up to that sweet, curse-word spewing mouth
Yes, son. You do have a lot of balls. Some things haven't changed in the past 3 years.
Happy Birthday, my sweet Muffin!!
I have found myself in quite a quandary. Do I relent and take the “boys-will-be-boys” approach and fail to follow through on a threat that I made? Or, do I prove what a cold, callous bitch I can be? Tough call!
This whole dilemma came about because of a very big event that has been brewing in our family. It is something that has been talked about and planned for the past year. This monumental event will be taking place tomorrow. It will be the sixth annual celebration of The Middle’s birth. That’s right, it is a little boy’s birthday and there is drama in the air.
Now, I have to tell you that for the past several weeks said child has been pretty full of himself. You see, he’s going to be six now. That means that he is nearly a man. And, as a man it is his duty to assert himself, speak his mind, claim his territory—oh, and leave his fucking underwear on the floor. This man has failed to remember that he’s had a birthday approaching and that I am the one person who is solely responsible for how glorious– or miserable– that celebration is. (And, yes I have The Hubbin’ who I always confer with, but let’s be honest, I ask his opinion in a way that is more a statement of how things will be with a complimentary question mark at the end)
As the compassionate and loving mommy I am (yeah, I know, I could barely type that without laughing myself) I pay very close attention, throughout the year to the things that my children are excited about and have added to their “I Want It” list. After I discard all of the items, which I deem to be crap, I file the appropriate gift ideas away in my little mental mommy file, to be recalled at the next gift-giving holiday. Let me assure you, I have some great ideas in that file and sadly, many of them are nowhere near being earned by my heathen offspring. This year, I chose some items, which I knew, were both perfect for the interests of my darling son and congruent with his behavior over the past year. OK, that’s bullshit; I just bought him the shit I knew would rock his world!
This afternoon, in the car, The Middle tells The Oldest, “I’m gonna go home and find my birthday presents.” At that point I was both panicked and pissed. Panicked because I have this pattern: I buy the presents in advance and hide them really well; then I bring them in the house and hide them in my bedroom closet until I get around to wrapping them (always at the last minute!). I was pissed because I’ve outdone myself this year. These gifts are the shit and this cockey little asshole can’t even wait 15 hours until his birthday and he’s gonna ruin my glory? “If you do go looking for them,” I told him (and here’s where the Ultimatum comes into play…) “ I will take them back to the store and you won’t get them.” The conversation ended there and was forgotten by all. Or so I thought.
I arrived home exhausted, hungry and carrying a baby in a crap-loaded diaper into the house. While I was in pig wrestling The Baby to get him cleaned and re-diapered, The Middle apparently let himself into my bedroom, and the closet, dug through the “camouflage” pile of clothes, opened the bag and saw his present. He then made a very serious mistake. He ran straight into the dining room and told his brother, the town crier, what he was getting for his birthday. Such a rookie move! Within 25 seconds I knew what happened. And, as I looked into the eyes of that devious spawn from my loins, he gave me a very confidant, and smug sneer (and, that would be the Challenge!). It was then that I knew I had to crush him.
“It’s an awesome present isn’t it?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said nodding enthusiastically.
“It’s too bad I have to take it back to the store.”
And…cue the crying.
So, now I’m conflicted. Asshole or Princess? Which do I want to be remembered as? Which suits me best?
It’s a tough call.
A Tough Decision.
As I mentioned before (see the death of rule #178) i used to have lofty thougths of what my life as a parent would be like. My YCS (younger, cooler self) was an idealistic girl who thought she would always be in control. She believed that all it would take to achieve excellence would be to set goals and be consistent in her expectations and behavior. The thing is, that silly little bitch poorly informed young idealist, never considered that the time would come along when she would grow tired. Very, very tired. And that those rules that she envisioned herself upholding, even in the face of monumental opposition, would someday be rationalized away as having been poorly planned in the first place. And so, I give to you…
The Death of Rule #37- I will never put a leash on my toddler
I have to say, for those of you who’ve done it, I’ve always looked at you with contempt. I always thought that to see a toddler in a leash was the absolute in dehumaizing. In my mind the choke chain and quick tug on the leash weren’t far behind (although I do advocate them for teenagers and husbands. Just saying).
Recently we took a family trip to Denver. After being in the car for a few hours, and ending up in a hotel where I strategically rearranged the furniture to prevent his access to certain areas of the room, we strapped that 18-month old back into the car seat and drove to the Downtown Aquarium, took him out of the car seat and strapped him directly into the stroller. Two hours later, I strapped him into the car seat and we drove to a resteraunt, strapped him into a high chair, ate, back to the car, back to the hotel with limited free space to run. And run he did. He must have covered the few square feet he had available to him a hundred times before I placed him in his next area of confinement, the Pack and Play crib.
The next morning went something like this: strapped into the car, the highchair at the restauraunt, the car, the stroller…and as we walked up to the zoo I realized this poor kid has had NO chance to run (but being that the number of carnivorous animals on the property exceeded the number of fleet-footed parents, it wasn’t really an option to just let the little heathen run wild). We set him free a few times (near the slow moving, vegetarian animals), and each time he tried to escape.
I realized that the poor kid needs some independance and that he would have gotten more out of the outing if he had been allowed more exercise. I also realize (yes, it’s selfish, but I never claimed I was otherwise) that he would have been WAY more tired and slept MUCH better if he had had the opportunity to walk the entire way (and maybe I would have gotten lucky in that hotel room–it’s really been a while since a hotel has paid out for me!).
So, I am now keeping an eye out for one of those toddler leashes, the one that looks like an animal backpack with a tail for the leash (that’s right, it’ll look like an animal is humping my toddler and I’m pulling it off by the tail!).
Oh, and while I’ve re-evaluated my stance on keeping a toddler on a leash at zoos and amusement parks, etc. I do still think that if you can’t carry your toddler through a store or mall, your just being a lazy-ass!
I came down with an outrageous cold the other day. My sinuses full, my throat scratchy, my head pounding and my eye watering. That’s right. Just the one eye. That should have been a clue.
By the end of that miserable day my sinuses felt like they were clearing but the fluid in my eye was steadily increasing and thickening (you didn’t just eat did you?). I woke up in the morning with this…
Don't look at the wrinkles...just the color of the eye!
What the hell? Am I nine? I get pink eye?
So now I’m on isolation precautions (Let’s face it, I look hideous and I just shouldn’t be seen in public).
Even more troubling…where the hell did those wrinkles come from around my eyes? The crappy skin tone I’ll blame on the early hour, bathroom lighting and poor quality of the cell phone picture. But those wrinkles? When the hell did that happen?
That’s right. 30 seconds. Because that is about all the time I have before my damn computer shuts down. It has been doing that randomly. I tried to be optimistic. “It’s just the power cord. It doesn’t seem to be connecting properly. If I just prop it up with a Snickers bar ,a remote control and some tape it’ll stay in place. See, it’s working just..what the f*@! kind of a piece of crap is this. I just hit the damn “Save” button right as this absolute piece of f*@!ing sh*@ shut down again. Oh, son. I didn’t see you standing there. Yes, Mommy was using her naughty words. Yes, I know I just grounded you for that.”
So, yes. I am a computer neuter. (Makes me regret what I did to that dog a month ago!)
I thought I would be fine. I could just use the Hubbin’s computer. Here’s the problem with that philosophy: His computer bites ass is a bit on the obsolete side. It literally takes 17 minutes from the time I hit the Power button until it’s fully operational. Every time I click on a link, it takes a minimum of 53 seconds for the page to load. That thing has been debugged and defrag’ed so many times it barely remembers that it’s a computer and capable of being a highly advanced method of information sharing and retrieval. At this point, I could send the dog after the proper encyclopedic volume and have the information within a comparable time frame. And, while the computer itself doesn’t randomly shut down (it takes 4 minutes and 49 seconds for it to take that leap!) I have found that the word processing program does and so, before I lose my rant, and am forced to polish off that bottle of Vanilla Absolut (well, I say forced, but we all know I’m looking for an excuse, and it is the first Thursday of the only month that ends with the letter “l”, which is a perfectly good reason to have a cocktail!), I will bid you all, adieu!
Stumble It!
Stumble It!