Minkgirl Muses

more BODY

1. I love watching people look at themselves in shop windows. The undeniable draw of a vast expanse of reflective glass. The secret hope that the image will be different this time. The shy ones sneak peeks as they pass by, trying to keep their head movements casual, as if they just accidentally happened to come face to face with themselves and aren’t too bothered by it. The sexy ones slow down, prolonging the lusciously narcissistic moment, perhaps inviting others to look as well. With their subtle posture shifts and minor clothing adjustments, these window-watchers reveal the intimate connections they share with their inner most-beautiful selves, and their constant desire for others to see those selves instead of the ones with the sloped shoulders and the droopy buttocks. Where our bodies are concerned, we remain creatures of hope. Perhaps time is not marching forward in one direction. Perhaps the toll taken is still reversible. Perhaps I will look in the mirror today and discover again the 20-year girl – the one I left standing on a pedestal in Trafalgar square, wearing skinny jeans and a billowing electric blue blouse, hair flying in the breeze.

2. I went to the tailor last week and left blushing. My post-partum body, which more closely resembles under-baked bread than supple sinewy flesh, requires clothes. I prefer that these clothes be comfortable, yet not completely matronly. I have two pairs of cute pants I wore in early pregnancy, and I thought with some alteration they might still work. I found the one tailor listed in my town and called to confirm the continued existence of the shop. A man with a lyrical Arabic accent answered and assured me he could take on the work. From the voice, I was picturing the tailor as a kindly Afghani man in his 60’s with twinkling eyes and grizzled hands, who would smile at the baby and treat me like a daughter. But when I stepped out of the blazing sunshine into the tiny shop, the man who greeted me was 25, slender and handsome, with piercing brown eyes. I immediately started to balk at the thought of showing off my mushy midriff to this fellow. I tried to talk my way out of actually trying on the pants, but in the end there was no help for it. He ushered me to an alcove with a curtain and waited for me to emerge. I stood facing the mirror, sucking in my stomach (kind of like trying to hide a watermelon in a change-purse), and standing stock still so that I would not make any more contact with him than was necessary. He stood behind me and carefully placed his hands on my hips, just above the drooping waistband. A whisper of warm skin. Gently he tugged the material this way and that, inserting pins. More touching, down the sides of my legs, the small of my back, my bum. Yikes. He worked slowly, clearly focused on getting it right, but maybe also (am I imagining this?) taking just a little more time than he needed. Either he enjoys the sensual nature of his job, or perhaps he perceived my discomfort and was teasing me a bit. Either way, it was sweet agony. And when at last I burst out of the shop back into the anonymous daylight, I was struck by how easily we are unhinged by the unexpected. The body’s appetites are unconcerned with gender, age, ethnicity or appropriateness. The body does not know that it is considered attractive or not by the culture in which it lives. The body doesn’t care what anyone thinks.

3. Several times a day, I lie belly to belly with my daughter while she feeds. She curls into me and embeds her arms and legs into my flesh. I fold my arms around her and rest my face on top of her fuzzy head. Sometimes we fall asleep together in this embrace. Sometimes my bottom arm goes numb and I get a crick in my neck. Sometimes she wakes me with surprisingly forceful rabbit kicks to the gut. I know from experience that this sweet coupling will be exceptionally brief. In 4 months, 8 months, 12 months, she will be too big and too squirmy to cuddle with like this. In 4 years, 8 years, 12 years, she will be too much her own woman to let her Mama hold her. Time cannot be bargained with.

Be well.


Photo by susiejulie

Labels: body, Mamahood, time

“Once upon a time, a boy named Gman ate oatmeal. The end.”

“Once upon a time, a boy named Gman said ‘No!’ The end.”

“Once upon a time, a boy named Gman got tickled. The end.”

We were all finding this hysterical. Especially Gman, who was giggling so hard he could barely breathe – a sound as pure as water bubbling in a mountain stream at dawn.

This giggle-fest was the climax of a long and funny morning, one which began inauspiciously at 6:30am, when Gman dragged me from my bed with the command “Let’s play!” During the winter months, he took his cue from the sun and stayed in bed until 7:30 or even the occasional blissful 8:00. But now, as the days grow longer, Gman seems to wake a few minutes earlier each day, and I usually find myself grumblingly roused before the sun is fully up.

I’m not very friendly when I’m awakened too early. I find it hard to muster enthusiasm, energy, and patience when I’m bone tired. But somehow today, despite my lethargy and the early hour, Gman and I fell down a rabbit-hole into a land of story-telling and make-believe that made our morning time magical and fun.

It started with wooden spoons. I was standing at the stove blearily stirring oatmeal, when Gabriel demanded to have my wooden spoon.

Gman: “And I need some eyes.”

Me: “Some what?”

Gman: “Eyes. For the spoon.”

Me: “Do you want to decorate it?”

Gman: “And some crayons. For the mouth.”

Me: “But honey, if you decorate it, then I can’t use it to stir the oatmeal.”

Gman: “And feathers.”

Me: “Honey, I can’t give you this spoon right now, I’m using it.”

Gman: “Where’s the glue?”

Me: “How about if we go buy some spoons for you to decorate after school.”

Gman: “No! I want to do it now.”

Me: “Well, sweetheart, I don’t have any other spoons that I’m not using, so why don’t we…”

Gman: “NOW!”

“Oh, here we go!” I thought. It’s going to be one of those mornings, where every little thing becomes a pain in the ass. But as our spoon conversation teetered perilously close to the brink of disaster, suddenly I remembered that Gman has his own little wooden spoon – part of a toddler cooking set. I dug it out and he immediately set to work decorating it. We got star stickers for the eyes, drew on a nose and mouth with crayons and glued feathers to the top for hair. Then I wrapped two pipe-cleaners around the stem for arms and legs. Gman was ecstatic. He spent a few minutes making his spoon (called “Kara”) dance around the table, and then he enthused “I want to make another!”

Oh shit. I started gearing up for a redirection campaign, but he was already rummaging in the utensil drawer. After a moment, he produced another small wooden spoon.

Me: “Oh! I forgot we had another one of those.”

Gman: “This one can be the Mama spoon!”

So, we decorated a second spoon (in between bites of oatmeal), who we named “Mama Spumoni Spoon,” and then we told a story about how she and her assistant “Kara” became tailors for the world’s tallest giraffe and fashioned him a special pair of yellow pants to wear to Bear’s birthday party. It was great.

And I found, suddenly, that I was using the best parts of myself (funny voices, knowledge of dramatic structure) to parent him through the morning tasks of eating, dressing and washing, instead of the worst parts (mean voices, knowledge of what makes a three-year old apoplectic.) It was all easy and effortless and good good fun. I don’t think we’ve ever enjoyed tooth-brushing or sock selection so much.

How did this happen? And why can’t it happen everyday? Why is it that some days all I can manage is to speak and act like a drone, while other days I actually relish pinning Gman under my booted heel as I force him to bend to my maternal will?

Laughter is like a miracle drug. It un-cramps the heart, de-fogs the brain, and dissolves conflict on contact. It delivers more sensorial satisfaction than any other substance on the market. And it’s free.

Now I am not a naturally funny person. In fact, some people might even call me a serious person. But I think it’s time to lighten up. I think I should start watching Comedy Central and reading comic books. I should learn some jokes. Because without a hefty dose of laughter in the mix, parenting is one long sorry slog through alligator-infested swampland. It’s Sartre’s No Exit on repeat play. It’s an endless turn at the rigged carnival basketball toss, where you miss again and again and again.

So my mantra for today is “Keep laughing!”

It’s much better than crying, arguing, begging, whining, ignoring, yelling, cajoling, banishing, berating, threatening, bartering, or beating!

Be well.

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood

Labels: Faith, Family Life, Mamahood

DRAMA

1) Picture This...

a Woman, a Boy, and a Baby get off a bus and go into a shop. The Woman doesn’t normally take the Boy into shops. She knows about his penchant for hiding in stockrooms, stripping cans and packets off shelves, and performing various other inventive acts of mischief. She knows that he does things in shops he does nowhere else - embarrassing things, things that make other parents roll their eyes and shake their heads, things that make store-keepers tremble. The Boy seems to believe that because the Woman has engaged in the careless and cruel act of taking the Boy shopping in the first place, all terms of the Mother-Son contract are temporarily invalid, those terms being chiefly that given appropriate levels of glaring, squeezing, and scolding, the Son will more or less conform to accepted standards of moderately annoying behavior (such as, but not limited to, whining, poking, fidgeting, and suggestions for sugar-based bribery.)

Not this Boy. This Boy waits until the 4 or 5 critical foodstuffs have been deposited on the counter (via an elaborate and laborious “Can you find Mama the eggs? What a helpful Boy!” game), and the Woman has just handed over her credit card to the Clerk, and then he suddenly dashes out of the shop and runs up the street at a dead-sprint. “Has he gone far?” the Woman asks the Clerk, who has a better vantage point through the plate glass window. “Oh yeah. He’s going for it,” the Clerk replies. The Woman snatches her card and her foodstuffs (sans sack) and runs higgledy-piggeldy after the Boy, eggs clutched between elbow and Baby Bjorn, milk jug dangling precariously from one finger, trying desperately to keep her eyes trained on the Boy (who is now a good 100 yards ahead of her) without dropping anything or knocking anyone over on the crowded side-walk.

With a quick glance over his shoulder, the Boy veers sharply to the left and ducks into a Chinese Restaurant. “Perfect!” thinks the Woman. “He’s cornered and at least not going to run into traffic.” She decides that she’ll play it cool, saunter right by the restaurant (which also has a plate-glass window), and let him see that she’s continuing on her way, unruffled by his absence. But as she passes the window, she sees a Cook with his hand on the Boy’s shoulder, clearly quizzing him about his solo status, and the Boy smugly pointing out the window at her. The Cook brings the Boy out onto the street with a “Be careful! Stay close to your Mama!” and returns to the restaurant. The Boy waits until the door has closed and then turns around and takes off at a run again – this time in the opposite direction.

“I’m going home!” the Woman shouts at the Boy’s retreating back. “See ya later!” And making good on her bluff, she turns her back on the Boy and begins to walk in the direction of home. Curious, he follows, eventually catching up with her and giving her that “Are you mad yet?” side-ways smile he’s perfected so well in recent weeks. The Woman walks in silence for a moment, and then offers (with utter calm) “You won’t be watching any television when we get home.” The Boy blanches. What?! No wind-down pre-dinner television hour? “No way!” shouts the Boy. “I’m sorry,” explains the Woman with polite magnaminity, “but you know you are not allowed to run away from me in stores. That’s very dangerous for you and very scary for me. You could get lost and I wouldn’t know where you were.” “But what about my warning?” asks the Boy, referring to the standard practice of offering a “If you do that again, then I’m going to…” before meting out punishments. “Nope,” replies the Woman blithely, “No TV. You know you aren’t allowed to hide from me. No TV will help you remember that next time.”

And cue….Hysteria…on the 12 minute walk home, the Boy gushes an ocean of crocodile tears, complete with melodramatic sobbing. His performance is so over-the-top, the Woman is just dying to run into a friend on the road or meet someone come out of their house to see what all the fuss is about, so she can share the joke. It is all the Woman can do to make it back to her house without completely splitting a gut and laughing in the Boy’s face. He keeps up his dramatic tantrum all the way up to the door of their 3rd floor flat, through the process of removing coat and shoes, and into the living room, whereupon he spots an abandoned sheet of bubble-wrap and immediately drops his act like a cheap clown-nose in favor of popping bubbles. Television is not referred to again for the rest of the evening, and the Boy and the Woman spend a pleasant hour before dinner playing with toy cars on the carpet.

Score one for Mama!


2) On Wednesday morning at 9am...

I had just climbed back into my cozy bed to nurse Miss V (after making oatmeal, dressing Mr. G, dispensing vitamins, enforcing peeing and toothbrushing, packing the spare “just-in-case” clothes and the after-school snack into the back-pack, and putting on his shoes and coat), when Lord Limescale asked me “Where’s the scooter?”

Gman has one of the Mini-Micro scooters (the toddler version of the Razer) that are ubiquitous on the cheery streets of Chiswick. You really never meet a child over 2-1/2 in the outdoor world anymore who isn’t attached to one of these 3-wheeled wonders. They stream-line and fun-ify the process of getting from here to there for kids who are post-stroller but not quite up to walking long distances. The scooter was the “big present” of birthday #3, and it is one of Gman’s prize possessions.

So Lord Limescale’s question elicited an instant jolt of adrenaline, because I had absolutely no idea where the scooter was. My mind was a total blank. I remembered leaving school with it the day before, and then…and then…had I left it on the bus?! The sidewalk?! In a shop?! Where was the @%&! scooter? I wracked my brains for several minutes until I remembered that Gman had led me on a merry chase out of a shop and up the high street the day before, and I realized that I must have abandoned the scooter somewhere along the way in order to pursue him.

And cue…Cursing…I jumped out of bed and proceeded to speed through the morning routine so I could drag my butt (and Miss V’s) back up to the high street in search of the scooter. I found the damn thing (thank my lucky stars). But despite my successful recovery mission, I was left with an uneasy feeling for the rest of the day. Because this memory lapse is not my first. Lately I have been simply unable to retain data in the normal way. People phone at an inconvenient moment, and I say I’ll phone right back. I usually remember to do this 3 or 4 days later. I find myself entering rooms and wondering what I’ve come for, leaving, only to remember, and then returning, only to forget again. I’ve missed doctor’s appointments, stood up friends for coffee, failed to pay really overdue bills, and left key items such as “milk and bread” off the shopping list.

I know what my problem is. It’s simple. I’m feeding another human being, and my brain has shut down all non-essential decks (ala Star Trek) in order to conserve energy for the supremely important task of feeding Miss V’s chub (you should see her thighs, they’re really getting Sumo-like). But because I don’t have the kind of sleep deprivation I did the first time around, I keep forgetting that I can’t function like a normal person. During the first few months of Gman’s life, I felt like crap all the time, so I wasn’t surprised when I screwed up ordinary tasks. But I feel pretty okay this time around, so I keep being caught-off guard by my swiss-cheese brain. I think I should make my own warning label:



3) After nearly a year...

of stressing and strategizing, wishing and worrying, and then finally giving up, I’m back in the saddle again – I’m directing a play. It’s a one-act with one actor to be performed for one night only at the theatre at the end of my road, but nonetheless, it is a bonafide piece of art and I’m gonna make it. I had auditions this week (in my living room with a baby in my lap), and it was lovely to be in a room with actors again. Yes, I know that I bad-mouthed actors in one of my recent posts, but actually I kind of like them. They care so much. They try so hard. They really want to be good.

Like most other things, directing is like riding a bicycle. You think you'll forget how to do it, but you don't. Like a few things, not doing it for awhile actually makes you better at it. At least I think it does. We'll see what I think when rehearsals start and the drama in my life is taking place in a theatre rather than in the small bodies around me.

Be well.

Labels: Creative Process, Directing, Drama, Mamahood

SHABBY CHIC

Last week on the District Line, I saw my fantasy family - a family that oozed harmony and creativity - a family that seemed to be living more vibrantly and more joyfully than everyone else around them.

There were 4 adults and 6 children, representing (I think) 3 different families. But so relaxed and seamless were the parent-kid interactions, it felt like one big family. Also, they were dressed alike. Not in the "creepy cult" sense, but rather in the "birds of a feather flock together" sense. You know how you always see pairs or trios of friends walking down the street wearing the same kind of outfit? Either they shopped for them together, or they recognized each other as kindred spirits via their fashion choices.

This family I saw on the tube was the epitome of "shabby chic." Everyone was wearing vintage and/or handmade clothing. There was a ton of color, lots of layers of different kinds of patterns, crocheted hats, chenille coats with applique - you get the picture - the kind of clothes you might see on any stylish thrift-store maven in San Francisco. Also, they were all a little unkempt - in the "I've been too busy painting murals or writing my novel to get a proper haircut" sense. The 6-year old was wearing summer shoes with no socks. The 10-year old was dressed entirely in orange. The Dad was dispensing snacks from a small backpack which the kids shared with democratic fervor, and I got the sense that the parents expected the kids to mostly to take care of themselves and each other without too much parental intervention. The adults weren't about to get bent out of shape over a failure to wear socks or eat nothing but shrimp-flavored crisps all day. In fact, it seemed as though eating and dressing might be considered creative acts by this clan - opportunities for the kids to practice creative self-expression. These parents were clearly in it for the joy, not for the nag, and the children seemed incredibly happy, well-adjusted and open to the world.

That's it. That's what I want for me and my family. I want us always dressed in a riot of color. I want to have a wall in our house that we repaint 100 times a year, whenever the mood strikes us, with fabulous murals and pithy sayings. I want the word "Mama" to conjure up images of surprise, adventure, pleasure and fun, rather than duty and organization and rules. I want "No!", "Don't!", "Stop!", and "Be careful!" to be replaced by "Why not?", "Check it out!", "Let's do it!" and "What do you think?" I want to laugh more than I worry, and play more than I work.

But I think I might need a tutor. I was never the bold one in either my fashion choices or my ability to buck the system and my ideas about what I "should" be doing. I had a friend in junior high school who had a cool Flock of Seagulls haircut (long on one side, short on the other), and pure United Colors of Benetton style. She would layer a purple spotted short-sleeve top over an orange and green striped long-sleeve top paired with a rainbow knitted scarf and a jaunty little hat. She was cool. Meanwhile, I was wearing tailored lavender courdoroys with a matching wool sweater that my grandmother picked out. I was not cool. And 25 years later, I still haven't gained much purchase on the fashion front. It doesn't occur to me to "mix 'n match" and I'm generally too obsessed with being tidy to let myself (or my kids) have as much fun as we could.

So here's a prayer to the gods of color, composition, and chaos:

Please spring me from my middle-class suburban strait-jacket and embolden me to unleash the creative mama within. Give me the courage to let my children make messes - even when they aren't going to come out of the carpet. Keep sending me signs that the world needs us to express ourselves more than it needs tidy sock drawers and clean kitchen counters. And send me back to the land of thrift store magic and multi-cultural magnificence, where I might have a fighting chance of making these dreams reality.

Be well.

Labels: Creative Process, Mamahood

OATMEAL

I’m sitting in front of my favorite window this morning, enjoying the play of winter sunlight on the whitewashed house across the street and eating a bowl of oatmeal. Oatmeal is the breakfast of choice for British women (of course, they call it porridge, a word I’ve never been able to embrace, because it conjures up creepy images of soot-smudged Dickensian orphans for me.) Oatmeal is quick and easy to make for the kids and mums like to eat it too, mainly because it satisfies the four F’s: it’s filling, full of fiber, not fattening, and free! Okay, it’s not actually free, but a box of Quaker oats costs about £1.09 here – the equivalent of $2.25 – and you can get about 20 bowls of oatmeal out of it for an average cost of 10 cents a bowl. I usually doctor mine with some raisins, brown sugar and chopped apple, so throw in another 75 cents for the fancy extras, and you’ve still got a meal that comes in under a buck. But I think mainly women eat it because it helps them lose weight – all the mums I know do anyway. With a glop of oatmeal in your belly, you can go hours and hours without eating again, plus eating something that looks as yucky as oatmeal makes you feel gastronomically virtuous – it’s essentially the opposite of a chocolate bar.

Women’s bodies are such tricky things. It seems that we’re always trying to grow and shrink them according to various alchemical formulas in order to turn ourselves into pure gold. Like Rapunzel, we wake up each day full of hope that we can accomplish this obscenely impossible task, if we’re just a little more diligent, a little more faithful, a little more willing to believe that the perfect body will bring us perfect happiness.

My body has never been more imperfect, but I’ve never been more satisfied with it. First of all, I am THRILLED not to be pregnant anymore. Lord Limescale asked me recently if I feel kind of smug when I pass pregnant women on the street. The answer is “Absolutely!” I want to dance a nasty little jig in front of them while yodeling “Haha chubbo! My baby’s out and I can see my toes again!” And G-d willing, that’s it for me now – any future belly I grow will be of my own and not Nature’s making.

But I think the main source of my satisfaction is that I feel immensely PROUD of my body for what it has accomplished. It grew, carried and birthed a really healthy (and really heavy) baby for a very long time. It produced all the hormones, natural painkillers and other metabolic wonder drugs I needed to make it through these radical transformations, and it now creates and dispenses the perfect food to nourish and grow this baby into a stronger and more capable human. My body did all of this despite the fact that I regularly ate crisps, occasionally drank wine, and often forgot to take my prenatal vitamins during my pregnancy. It did all of this whether or not I got exercise or enough sleep, whether or not I was feeling upbeat and positive or exhausted and depressed. It did all of this because that’s what bodies do, that’s what they’re made for – not modeling Minolo shoes or looking good on elliptical machines. They’re made for life – living it, creating it, enjoying it.

Now lucky for me, I happen to LIKE oatmeal. I didn’t always, but somehow I’ve come around to the pleasure of a warm bowl of organic oats infused with honey, pecans and sultanas (golden raisins) eaten on a cold morning. I eat it because it tastes good to me and it makes me feel good – happily it will also keep my insides healthy and maybe make me a little svelter. As I eat my oatmeal this morning, I salute British women everywhere who are forgoing rashers of streaky bacon (the national food I think) in favor of bowls of steaming porridge. I salute women whose bodies are the very bricks and mortar of the civilization thriving around us – women who wake up each day prepared to give themselves completely to whatever task lies ahead, whether it involves poop or politics – women whose belly skin sags and shifts into mystical formations of wrinkles as they burp and cuddle their babies, women who are packing extra pounds from eating comfort food after a day spent delivering comfort to others, women whose feet are sore from kicking ass in the corporate jungle. I salute you and wish you all the kind of cozy pleasure my oatmeal has brought me this morning.

Be well.

Labels: Community Muses, Mamahood, My Favorite Things

Gman went back to school yesterday, after nearly a week at home due to chicken pox. Since he’s been immunized (unlike British kids), he had an extremely mild case with only a dozen spots and absolutely no other symptoms. Nonetheless, civic protocol required me to keep him home for a week, so it was 5 long days of double-mama duty, my first experience of this delight. But while I initially dreaded my plunge into the parental cold-pool, honestly, I enjoyed our week together. Like all new things, it was scary at first: “How will I keep him from jumping on Miss V and covering her with pox-infested kisses?”, “How will I keep from killing him if he spends all day throwing attitude at me like he’s been doing lately.” But despite my worries, I figured it out and managed (mostly) to keep my temper. There were massive play sessions involving all the pillows and balls in the house. Chaos was created and cleaned up hourly. There were lots of snacks and lots of tv. We did leave the house a couple of times to go to the park – outdoors being the only safe place for a kid with the pox – but even on the days we stayed inside, we somehow found a way to pass the time.

And I discovered, as I often do when I am most at odds with Gman, that the more time I spend with him, the more quickly I find solutions to mend what ails us. Enforced togetherness forces me to really listen to him and be more creative in my parenting. And having some fun together doesn’t hurt either. It’s odd, but I often find that my worst parenting days are followed by my best parenting days – like I’m attached to some kind of cosmic bungee-cord, ricocheting between the depths and the heights of the parental plane. Smack your kid on Saturday and by Tuesday you may have discovered a new and fun way to get him to eat his vegetables, while simultaneously developing his pre-literacy skills and building his self-confidence. Bizarre. So I guess the pox, like so many unexpected events, was a blessing in disguise.

And now, one blessing has yielded another. Having lost my solitude for a week, I am doubly grateful to have it again. Lord Limescale is still working part-time for the next few days and generously taking Gman to school and picking him up, which means that I have nearly SEVEN UNINTERRUPTED HOURS OF SOLITUDE each day. Those of you with children will appreciate how remarkable this gift is. It is great great great to have so much QUIET – kind of like Body Butter for the soul – it lubes up all my creative parts and creates a deep and gentle sense of satisfaction. Just being in my house, getting to putter and do all my homegirl activities, getting to stare out the window at the shadows shifting on the house opposite ours, getting to stare at my baby, getting to nap – all these simple pleasures are so much sweeter because they were denied me last week.

One of Gman’s favorite games lately is to make my voice “disappear.” He’ll say “Abracadabra!” and I’ll move my mouth without sound, pretending that I have no voice. Then he’ll repeat the magic words and my voice will return. He usually likes to play when he’s in need of a power boost, and I don’t mind, because he giggles a lot in a really cute way while he does it. But it reminds me that sometimes I wish I could make his voice disappear! He talks more and more each day – clearly he is carrying on the legacy of verbosity that derives from my mother and myself – each day questions, stories, ideas, narrations, and all manner of mumbling, whining and other patter erupts from him in ever growing torrents. He is, in fact, almost never silent – just like he is almost never still. I remember one of the phrases that stood out when I read The Mommy Myth a few years back was that in addition to all the good stuff, raising children also entails a lot of mundane, boring, and just plain annoying parts, one of which is the “enervating noise.” That certainly rings true for me. The best part about the solitude my special post-partum period affords me is a chance to escape that noise for a little while, so I can hear the sound of my own thoughts again, and the quiet rhythmic hum of my own trusty soul.

Be well.

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood

UNTIL NOW...

I was sitting on the couch this morning, holding the warm, cuddly bundle that is Miss V, and thinking about time. Well, actually, I was spacing out, but occasionally a thought would drift through my head like the tail smoke of a jet blazing across a cloudless sky. It sounded something like this…”Breathe in. Breathe out. Warm. Steam on windows. Heater blowing. What was I doing last year at this time? Breathe in. Breathe out. Rustle. Gurgle. Burp. My foot hurts. I wonder why? Breathe in. Breathe out. A year ago, Miss V didn’t exist.”

So, I pulled out my 2006 journal and settled back on the couch for my annual ritual of re-reading last year’s inner thoughts. As is often the case, a lot has changed in a year. And also, things are exactly the same. Apparently on November 22^nd of 2006 – the page to which the journal cracked open and also the last pre-London entry – I was thinking about how to lighten up and appreciate the good stuff. Work I am actively pursuing this week as well. The backstory on this entry (which I have excerpted below), is that my good friend Aphrodite - who is not only the most passionate woman I know, but also a genuine goddess in her quest for truth and wisdom, who I have known for (gasp!) nearly 20 years, and who has also given me the great gift of being my personal coach for the past few years – once shared with me a core concept from her coaching model: the phrase until now…I see this phrase as a literal get-out-jail-free card, as in “Until now…I have allowed other people’s expectations to shape my choices, but I will now trust my own desires.” Or, “Until now…I have devoured potato chips mindlessly, but I will now fill my body with better fuel.” You should try it – it’s better than dark chocolate and twice as addictive. C’mon, think of something you catch yourself doing over and over again that pains you in some way and let this magic phrase peal from your lips…

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

I’ve been thinking about A’s phrase until now…and the freedom it offers of just being able to walk away from old behaviors that you don’t want to engage in anymore. I’d like to walk away from the self I’ve been for the last 4 months, maybe even for the last 2 years. The fearful, cramped, anxious-about-her-career, exhausted, beleaguered, whining, complaining Minkgirl. I’d like to give her a vacation – maybe Tahiti or the South of France. I’d like to see her come back with long hair and a tan, wearing a sari and barefoot. I’d like to see her cock her head to the side while chewing on a blade of grass and say “Man…I like that.”

While she’s gone, a new Minkgirl could move into her house and spruce up the place – roll up the window shades and open all the doors – air the place out. Put fresh bunches of wildflowers all around and silly figurines in unexpected places. Erect permanent (or rather impermanent) monuments to pleasure throughout the house – a pile of laundry to jump in like new fallen leaves, a treasure hunt of books leading from one room to the next, beautiful pictures and words cut from magazines pasted all over the walls. There will always be music playing and something sweet baking in the oven. When you ring the bell, this Minkgirl will answer the door laughing about something Gman has said, and she will invite you to come and sit on the kitchen floor with her and watch the light fade from the sky while you sing songs about love.

A nice vision – this alternative self who knows how to appreciate simple pleasures. I picked up Mommy Mantras again this weekend, a sweet and sensible little book that I was also reading around this time last year, when the nights were oh-so-long and Gman was punishing us in every conceivable way for rocking his world by moving to London. Here’s the phrase that caught my attention both then and now:

It's not about what we do wrong, but rather about what we do next.

Another way of saying until now…It’s not about falling off the horse – there is absolutely no way to avoid that, no matter how long or how skillfully we ride – it’s about how quickly you can recover and get back in the saddle. That idea does a lot to chase away negative self-esteem when I make mistakes.

The human brain is so complicated – we have to build such elaborate mental castles to trick ourselves into seeing what’s already there – how good and beautiful life is. I seem to live perpetually in need of an attitude adjustment. Maybe everyone does. A positive attitude, like any other good thing in one’s life – an intimate relationship, a vocation – requires daily recommitment. What I’m looking for is a few more tools to help me and the others in my family remember to make that commitment. We have our Friday night Shabbat ritual, and that really helps, and sometimes (if I can remember) I do yoga or a little meditation, but we need even more tools to help us remember to look on the bright side. Like a warm and totally trusting body lying in one’s arms reminding us to stop, breathe, and just be.

Be well.

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood, mantras, time

SLAP

One of the most common questions people have been asking us about life on Planet New Baby is “How is Gman handling having a new sister?” For the first 10 days, I had the pleasure of replying “Oh, he’s doing great! He’s so excited about Miss V, and he’s being so loving and helpful.” But sometime last week Angel Honeychild Gman was replaced by his evil twin Push Mommy’s Buttons Until She Screams Gman. I’ve been screaming a lot lately, as my son has begun refusing to do all rudimentary tasks (ie. get dressed, eat food, brush teeth) and generally responds to any request I make of him with an adolescent-style sneer and a loud and obnoxious “Mama, NO WAY!” Add to this the fact that he is systematically testing every limit we’ve ever set¸ and the fact that he’s been physically and verbally aggressive with both his father and me (thank god none of it has been directed toward Miss V…yet), and you have a sense of the seething context in which my all-time worst parenting moment occurred this past Saturday.

Do I feel you leaning in?…Ready for a good glimpse of some stinky dirty laundry?...A story that will be you feel better about any sub-standard parenting you’ve done this week? On Saturday, I slapped my son across the face. In a really public place. He shrieked and cried like I’d lit him on fire and wouldn’t stop, and so, we had to carry him kicking and screaming (sans shoes, sans coat) from the building out into the cold, and find a public bench on which to collapse, recover, and lick our wounds.

Now as much as I know this will shock my readers, I cannot claim that I’ve never raised a hand to my little bundle of joy before. In fact, there was a dark time during the first few months after we moved to London when it was a good day if I only spanked him once. Although personally, I think anything that we do to our children between the ages of 2 and 3 should be automatically expunged from our permanent parenting record, because let’s face it…they probably deserved it. But I draw the line right above the bum. Hitting a kid in the face…well, that’s pretty fucking low. Talk about conditional love. Displease mom and she’ll give you a good taste of her right hook. Never mind that he hit me first, also in the face, as hard as he could. Never mind that we were completely at our wits’ end after trying for 15 minutes to get him to exit an indoor play area – the kind with a 4-story cage in which a small child could disappear and join a band of Lost Boys, because the apertures of the various slides and inner sanctums are too small for ordinary grown-ups to squeeze through and catch the little buggers. Never mind that we know Gman is experiencing deep emotions about the sea change his family has undergone and that he has no ability to express this except through tantrums and other histrionic displays. It all happened so fast – he hit me, I hit him – and then we were standing in a bog of our own making while literally hundreds of other parents and children looked on. Talk about humiliation.

It took me the rest of the night to recover. We managed to straggle home and feed ourselves. And then I called my friend Dee, who has been riding on the Double-Decker Mama bus for nearly a year now. Besides being a kick-ass parent, Dee has a Ph.D. in Education, and a great sense of humor. She assured me that my slap hadn’t left any permanent scars and that even though it will probably take us months to sort out how to negotiate Gman’s insecurities and anxieties with any grace and how to operate effectively as a family of 4, we are not going to break our children before we get there. David and I were gloating the other night how much easier it is to deal with an infant the second time – you already know how to care for them, I can breast-feed without using 6 pillows, both hands and a special footstool, we’re not so terrified every 10 minutes that we’ve inadvertently killed our baby. But I can now see that compared to people who’ve had multiples for more than 3 weeks, I am a total fucking neophyte. It’s like I’ve been cruising along for ages on level 7 of my favorite video-game, feeling all stud-like ‘cause of how well I can avoid the space invaders and beasties, and suddenly I got bumped up to level 42, where I’m getting blown up or having my spine sucked out my nostrils every few seconds.

I woke up on Sunday and thought “OK, Game on dude!” I think this parenting thing is going to get a lot harder for awhile. And so I need to work out, eat my Wheaties, take my vitamins and be prepared each day for a whole new level of mental, physical and spiritual engagement. I remember during the first year of Gman’s life, I often thought that parenting was a kind of visceral form of Buddhism, because the daily lessons of living with an infant usually encompassed that religion’s core concepts: Live in the moment, Don’t make assumptions, Practice detachment from your own ego and agenda, Everything and Everyone is interconnected. And like so much of life, I find myself back on a familiar street again – Parenting as Buddhist Practice Part 2. I think I’ve still got the course books hidden somewhere in the back of a closet. And I’m pretty sure my Humility Robe still fits. Ah universe, you are wily and cunning in your unwillingness to let us forget what we have learned. I hope I’ll remember a little longer this time.

Be well.

Photo by J Belluch.

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood

WATERS

When I was younger, whenever I felt a little crazy, I would hop in my car and drive to the beach. I favored hard-to-get-to spots such as one of the Marin Headlands beaches that can only be reached via a crumbly hillside trail that is clearly marked "Closed" (a warning that never seems to deter local residents - there were always loads of people on this particular beach). Upon arrival, I would lie directly on the sand - no mitigating towel or blanket - digging myself ever so slightly down into the earth - and let the heat of the sand and the sound of the waves slowly pulse the craziness out of me. I did this a lot in my 20's. The sound of all that water rushing up to meet the land and dashing away again is the most comforting sound I know - it mirrors the pitch and pace of our own breaths and heartbeats - it is the sound of life itself. It is a sound I could trust, even when I didn't trust myself.

And now in my 30's, it seems that I have become the ocean, and my children are the ones lying half-buried in the sand, calmed and caressed by the tidal sounds emanating from my body. When my son is feverish or wakened by nightmares, I lie on the floor next to his bed with a hand on his body making slow, rhythmic, tones with my voice - not music, just sound, in waves - and it calms him until he can finally let himself relax into sleep again. When Miss V cries, my husband and I pick her up and make load whoosing sounds into her ear (recommended by the Baby Whisperer I think!), and she immediately quiets, lulled by the same sort of consistent noise she experienced in the womb as my blood rushed to and fro.

In pregnancy, one's body becomes an entire tidal ecosystem, as is evidenced by the rising fluid levels in all parts of the body. One of the many strange features of the post-partum period is how much you have to pee, as all this extra fluid, no longer needed to buoy and sustain the baby, is released. I wonder if the fact that we all begin life as aquatic creatures explains our deep fascination with the sea, as though we understand that this breathing of air is a new and temporary thing, not our original source of sustenance.

...to be continued...

Labels: birth, Mamahood

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood, time

Labels: Family Life, Mamahood

One of my favorite intellectual indulgences is engaging in long-winded theological conversations. My good friend J and I use to stay up till all hours in college debating the nature of divinity and the various laws and practices humans have devised to explain and express their connection to it. For my own part, I believe in a kind of universal consciousness and creative force that I call G-d, for want of a better word to describe the expressible. But I've never believed this power was personal: I don't think G-d takes notice of me or the specific circumstances of my life. I think that I hold about the same position in G-d's consciousness as any other living thing: one drop in a really big bucket.

And yet...how to explain the miracle of my daughter's heart. Yes, Baby Pickle has revealed herself to us. We recently had the 2nd ultrasound - the big picture show - and because we had the good fortune of getting a technician-in-training, the test took about an hour (rather than 10 minutes), and we got to see everything. First, as I predicted, Baby Pickle is most likely a girl. I am enormously pleased by this discovery, not only because I felt she was a girl and love having my maternal intuition validated, but because I am really looking forward to having the experience of parenting children of both genders. I am also hoping that Pickle and Gman will find it easier to enjoy and tolerate each other if they are a bit different.

But by far the most amazing part of the ultrasound was the chance to see Pickle's heart. There are several measurements of the heart ultrasound technicians must take to ensure that there are no significant defects, and because ours was a novice, he was having trouble getting his shots. His teacher, a nurse who appeared to be running the whole department, patiently instructed him how to move the ultrasound wand until finally, the entire pulsing organ came into view. It was such an amazingly clear picture, everyone wanted to linger over it. We could see all four ventricles, the arteries leading into and away from the heart, and the pulsating flush of light representing the flow of blood through the heart. "Nice heart," the nurse said after a minute. And I felt a flood of pride: "I made that heart!" And then another flood of wonder: "How is this possible?" How is it possible that one human being can create another inside of them? How is it possible that information encoded on a microscopic scroll could cause the creation of such a complicated, delicate, and beautiful organ. Looking at my daughter's heart, I immediately understood why the organ has become the symbolic seat of the emotions and even the soul in human consciousness. It is the very embodiment of the universal life force that moves through all things with a steady thumping beat. You can live without a brain. You can live without your kidneys. You cannot live without your heart. And looking at this heart, I could suddenly imagine that maybe G-d does take notice of each creature created on her blue globe. I imagined the heart as G-d's pied-a-terre, the place she fills when she comes to visit her creatures in their earthly incarnation.

Now on to the 2nd Miracle. The day after this ultrasound appointment, I got a phone call out of the blue. "Hello, my name is Jeanette. I'm a one-to-one midwife. Can I stop by and see you today?" I've got to give you some backstory so you can fully appreciate the waves of ecstasy that rolled through me when I heard those words. Early in my pregnancy, I became convinced that I wanted to try for a homebirth this time around. I've had several people encouraging me toward this choice - my exceptional midwife L who graciously "specialed" me with my first pregnancy (meaning that she was the only person I saw for my prenatal care and she committed to being at my delivery), my amazing doula R (who I credit with getting me through transition quickly and in a relaxed enough state that I was able to go the distance without the drugs), and my new friend A (who is training to be an antenatal teacher here in the UK). A gave me a fabulous book called "Homebirth" by UK author and midwife Nicky Wesson, and after reading it, I was pretty sure I wanted to try it. However, the book cautioned that while 75 years ago 90% of births were done at home, today the rate is less than 2%! Thus, you can expect to find a lot of ignorance and resistance to homebirth in the mainstream medical establishment.

Flash forward to my first prenatal appointment at around 14 weeks. I saw a woman who it turns out was a midwife (although she never introduced herself to me, nor did she do much beyond taking my blood pressure and asking 3 or 4 banal questions), and I told her that I wanted to have a homebirth. She basically said "Oh, you can't. We don't do that anymore, we don't have the staffing. We used to have this thing called the one-to-one midwife scheme, but it's only available to disadvantaged mothers now." In other words, if I was young, addicted or crazy I could have the blissful experience of seeing the same midwife throughout my pregnancy, and in my own home no less, but since I'm healthy, wealthy and middle-aged, no dice. Now to be fair, the National Health System is extremely strapped at the moment. Later I learned that it was decided at some point to save one-to-one midwifery time for people who otherwise might not receive any prenatal care. This seems like a smart idea. But still, I was flummoxed by the "we don't do that" approach to homebirth. Because not only are the outcomes better in homebirth, it's actually a hell of a lot cheaper for the state than a hospital birth. I mentioned several times during my visit that I would really like to have a homebirth. "I'll put in a request" she said in a bored tone, "but I wouldn't count on it." I figured that was a euphemism for "fuck off," and didn't expect it to go any further.

At my next appointment, at around 16 weeks, I saw the head honcho OB doctor, because I have this little genetic disposition toward developing blood clots, and I needed to check out the implications for the pregnancy. Turns out there are none for the baby (yeah!), although I could potentially croak from a post-partum deep vein thrombosis that develops into a pulmonary embolism (boo!), but the chances of that are very unlikely and it wouldn't develop quickly so there would be time to take some measures to contain it. I asked this Dr. M (a white, middle-aged, ultra-English male) if my condition precluded me having a homebirth. He said no, "but I would advise against a homebirth anyway." Why? Because my first baby was "big" at 9 pounds, 9 ounces, and 2nd babies tend to get even bigger. "We'd worry about shoulder dystocia," (fancy term for baby getting stuck on the way out). Oh, is that all. I laughed it off, because honestly, if you've seen my hips, you know I ain't gonna have no trouble birthin' no big babies.

Turns out, this conservative dude is actually the gatekeeper of my prenatal care. Because at my 3rd appointment (the one where I had the ultrasound), a much friendlier and more informative midwife said "Oh yes, we do do homebirths and we're always looking for candidates," (yeah!) "but Dr. M has said you shouldn't have one, so you'll have to convince him," (boo!) When I asked when and how I could achieve this, she told me I could see him again at 36 weeks. "Isn't that leaving things a bit late," I asked. "Oh no," she chirped, "if he says it's okay then, we can still schedule you for a homebirth." At this point I was 22 weeks (out of 40 total), and I didn't relish the thought of spending 14 weeks worrying about a big showdown with the doctor that would either result in me getting the chance to birth the way I want or in getting forced into doing it their way. Didn't seem like a good plan. But I left the hospital with the grateful knowledge that Baby Pickle is healthy so far and decided that I would hold the intention of a "homebirth" and hope that the universe or G-d was tuning in enough to pick up my broadcast.

The very next day, I got the call from Jeanette, the one-to-one midwife. I waited all day for her to turn up (she was squeezing me in), and when she finally arrived, we spent a relaxed hour together chatting over tea. She took my blood pressure again and measured my belly on the couch, while Gman played happily in his room. She explained that in fact, one-to-one midwifery care is still available for anyone who wants to have a homebirth. And it turns out the first midwife I saw - the surly one who I thought was blowing me off, actually did put in my request, and finally it had been approved, and I was in like Flynn.

I cannot describe the joy I felt that day, and the wonder that after expecting the worst, suddenly the best had become possible. It just goes to show...well, I don't really know what it shows. Except that I am considering it a Miracle - Miracle #2 (the first being Pickle's heart) - and I am so so grateful. "Hold the intention" is becoming a new mantra - a kissing cousin with "Do your part and the universe will do the rest." There are still lots of reasons why I could wind up delivering in the hospital, but I feel like I have done everything I could to create the optimal conditions for this baby to land in the world, and that is a very very good feeling.

May you experience a Miracle in your own life sometime soon. And may you be wise enough to recognize it when it comes.

Be well.

Labels: birth, Faith, Mamahood

OH BABY

Time to let the cat out of the bag. Well, okay, I'm actually hoping to keep the cat...er...baby in the bag awhile yet. But I've had visual confirmation via a scan that this baby exists and at 15 weeks I'm out of the danger zone, so I finally feel free to write about the experience of double-dipping into the Mamahood jar.

First of all, let me just say - those condoms really do work. I know this because apparently I got pregnant about 12 seconds after we decided to stop using condoms even though we weren't quite ready to conceive yet ('cause hey, it took 8 months the first time, so we figured we had a little leeway.) But being pregnant seems to be like riding a bicycle - once your body has done it, there is no prep time required to do it again.

Like much else in life, the second time around isn't quite the thrill ride that the first was. It's also not as scary. While I did still entertain a persistent first trimester dread that the zygote wouldn't stick around to develop into a charmingly little long-tailed lizard, in most other regards it was fine and totally manageable. Sure, I was exhausted and a little queasy and emotionally volatile and exceptionally stupid for about 3 months, but other than that the first phase was no big deal. Also, since I am now living in the land of socialized medicine, I didn't even see a doctor for the first time until last week - so in a sense my pregnancy has been off the radar up until now.

But now I am on the radar, and now begins the struggle and scrape to choose when and how I will perform the big push. I've been fairly interested in having a homebirth, given that a) I had a great birth the first time around and b) I've heard lots of unpleasant stories from local mums about their experiences in NHS hospitals. But apparently if I go this route, the state has no obligation to provide me with a midwife to assist me. They might send somebody if they feel like it on the big day, but then again they might be too busy. This apparent indifference to my birthing preference appears to be largely economically motivated. In the hospital, one midwife can attend up to 5 women at a given time. At home, two midwives are required to be present and they must stay with the woman for the entire duration of her labor. So, obviously, you can pump out a lot more bambinos a lot quicker in a hospital setting. Which is my big problem with hospitals in the first place - the time pressure. Clock watching tends to lead to icky interventions like forcepts and vacuum extraction and caesareans. Apparently 100 years ago, 90% of women gave birth at home in this country. Now it is less than 2%. Amazing how times change. If I was poor, teenaged, or crazy, I would have a better shot at being assigned a homebirth midwife team. But since I am healthy and middle-class, my desires about how my health is managed are of little interest to NHS. I could hire an independent midwife to assist me with the birthing process - apparently they are terrific and even better trained than the NHS midwives - but it would cost us about $6,000 out of pocket. This option is a) financially impossible for us and b) kind of absurd in a country where allegedly the healthcare is free.

So, I'm trying to be patient - a good practice given that I am still less than halfway through my pregnancy. Being pregnant provides the ultimate opportunity to get comfortable with waiting - which is I think one of the secrets to being a happy and fulfilled person. We are so used to being in control, to exerting our agency and influence - it is quite a shock to discover that in some circumstances the best and only thing that can be done is to wait. And I still remember a key lesson I learned in my first pregnancy - the reason it takes 10 months to grow a baby is that it takes the baby's parents that long to really believe in the baby - as a fully fleshed individual entity, not just an idea or a lifestyle prop. It is starting to dawn on me in small ways that another human being is coming to live in our house and that everything we have chosen or planned for our lives is about to change. We don't know if this person will be male or female. We don't know if s/he will be mellow or intense. We don't know if s/he will be sick or healthy. And all those unknowns stir up flocks of other unknowns - where will we be living in 6 months (our lease is technically up December 6th), when will I work again, what will life be like in 5 years (with a 4 year old and a 7 year old), in 10 years (with a 9 year old and a 12 year old), in 20?

Accepting the impermanence of life - that is one of the central goals of Buddhism. Well, I think having babies is one of the most tangible expressions of Buddhism there is - it's all about the unknown and lifes' cycle of constant change. It's all about giving up your ego and acknowledging that you have no control over anything. It's all about the present moment - which today - at this moment - is very good: the sun is shining (after 14 straight days of rain), I went for a power-walk this morning (I finally feel well enough to exercise), and I've had enough time alone to both read and write this blog. I hope the moment is good for you too.

Be well.

Labels: birth, Faith, Mamahood