October « 2005 « Sharp Corners

The obligatory Halloween post

October 31, 2005

Has it escaped your notice that it’s Halloween? This is a revered holy day for my boys so they’ve been staring at the calender, waiting for October 31st, for around 2 and a half weeks now.

Forward thinker that I am, I’d already purchased the boys’ costumes a few weeks ago. I was feeling great about being so organized until I was on the phone with the mother of one of my son’s neighborhood friends. "Oh, so glad you called," she chirped. "I’m sewing up the last piece of my daughter’s costume and my fingers could use a break." Sewing? Thanks. I dress my kids via debit card and she sews. The woman probably makes her chocolate chip cookies from scratch too. Hell, she probably grinds her own flour. I hate her.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, I promised my middle child that I’d attend his class party. The first graders do it all up fancy but the second graders (my oldest son’s class) do nothing. No party, no costumes, no treats. Zip. But a small classroom party for the first graders? How bad could it be?

Oh. My. God.

First of all, this was no ordinary party. I figured we’d eat a few cookies, play Pin the Nose on the Pumpkin and get to leave before the automatic timer switched off on the coffee pot at home. No such luck. All four first grade classrooms got in on the action. First the was the parade through the whole freakin’ school so everyone could see the kids’ costumes (like the fourth graders gave a rat’s ear that 67 Spidermans were in attendance today). Then back to room 301 for Goodie Bag Decorating! Then over to room 302 for cookie decorating!! Then room 303 for Pin the Eyes on the Pumpkin (an interesting but slightly ghoulish variation)!!! Then out to the playground for some spoon-holding-candy-run-but-don’t-drop-it game!!!! Then to the other end of the school for the candy toss (don’t forget to stand behind the white line…can you toss it in the giant pumpkin?)!!!!!

After two (2, dos, deux, twee, due,
日本語, TWO) hours of this I was ready to borrow young Jeremy’s fake Ninja sword and commit hara-kiri in the Principal’s office. Okay, now if you’re with me so far, you’ve gathered I wasn’t really enjoying the party but I plodded on for my son’s sake (with my four year old Batman in tow). It wasn’t really the chaos and noise that was bothering me but you wouldn’t know that because I’ve left out one crucial detail…

Read the rest of this entry »

5 Comments | Me. ME! | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Who’s got your back?

October 28, 2005

I read something over at Mir’s today and the first thing I thought was "Wow, I can relate." Then I thought, "I’m going to leave her a comment." After that I thought, "Better yet, I’m going to blog about it." Finally I thought, "I wonder if these jeans make my ass look like the back end of a crosstown bus."

Where was I? Oh yeah, Mir. So, apparently she had to cancel her plans the other evening when her babysitter bailed. She called her ex-husband to see if he could take the kids but he had other plans. Mir goes on to say:

…I’m furious with my ex, for having the freedom to go and do pretty much
whatever he wants to do, whenever he wants to do it. He plays in
several sports leagues, goes out with friends, and is almost wholly
unfettered by our kids.

Yeah, I can relate to that. My issue isn’t so much that Wanker can come and go as he pleases, equally as unfettered as Mir’s ex. Near as I can tell, Wanker’s life is so far in the toilet that being able to go bar hopping when the mood strikes is probably one of the only things he has going for him. No, my frustration is comes from a different angle.

I’ve mentioned here before (but I’m too lazy to find and link to the post) that the magnitude of assuming full responsibility for everything in my boys lives has been pretty intense over the past year or so. I’ve had to confront and deal with a lot of things that would have been much easier if I was co-parenting with the sperm donor but he’s not real big on participation and problem solving so I’ve handled everything on my own (to my own betterment, as it turns out).

Like Mir, my ex is "almost wholly unfettered by our kids" too. I’ve asked him to take the kids to their yearly dentist appointment or feed them dinner before bringing them home but he’s not interested in the minutiae of raising children. I guess it’s just not "fun" enough. So, as Mir (and some of her commenters) says, "mom takes the hit" when something needs to be done. That’s what frustrates me. Who gives mom a break? Who’s mom’s back up plan? One could argue that it’s my "fault" for finding myself in this situation since I chose to end my marriage. Wanker would argue that he would participate more if he lived nearby. Both theories are patently false for more reasons than I care to go into at this moment.

For a long time, I lived in perpetual fear of getting so much as the flu, wondering how I’d care for the kids and myself at the same time. I don’t have to wonder anymore: when I broke my hand a couple months ago, I actually accumulated a few other injuries at the same time. Functioning on auto-pilot, I spent an hour driving the kids to their schools and then another half an hour getting to the ER where, upon crossing the threshold of the automatic door, I promptly blacked out. If anything good came from that day, it was that I understood I can do what I must do. And, unfortunately, a lot of the time I must do what I don’t want to do (get up at 5:00 every morning, blech).

Mir wants time for herself now and, believe me, I understand. She also says she feels like a martyr for saying so but she’s dead wrong about that. She is not a martyr for wanting time to rejuvenate herself, for god’s sake. Everybody needs down time. Unfortunately, sometimes that’s just not possible. Hell yes, it sucks sometimes to have all the responsibility and none of the fun. But, boy are there benefits. I’ve got love notes on my desk from the boys, I get to be with them during important things that happen in their lives (for me, it’s school dances, for Mir it was owl poop….you’ll have to ask her). One of Mir’s commenters suggested just being patient during this phase of her life because it will soon pass. I guess, Mir, if you’re listening, that’s the best advice I can offer too. There’s no doubt about it, there are parts of single parenting that suck big, huge, slimy, smelly eggs. When I can’t remember what I like about it, I come find blogs like yours that remind me why we do this. I’m sorry you missed choir practice but when you wrote about how frustrated it made you, you made me feel that my frustrations weren’t that out of line after all.

I thank you for that.

3 Comments | So there | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Sharp Kids: Unplugged

October 28, 2005

True story: I was in the post office the other day when a woman came in with a child in tow. The boy, who looked to be about four, immediately began messing with everything in a fifteen foot radius while the mother did absolutely nothing to control her kid. After waiting in line about three minutes the boy started whining about how bored he was. The mother looked at him and said, "Well, why didn’t you bring in your DVD player like I told you to so you could watch a movie?"

WHAT?!? A four year old with a portable DVD player? Worse yet, a four year old that has to have a portable DVD player to be able to stand in line for five minutes? I simply cannot grasp that concept. Sadly, though, it’s not the first time I’ve seen stuff like that.

Once, while waiting at a pediatrician’s office filled with toys, I watched a mom walk in the door, put her two adolescent boys into seats, and haul out – take a guess – a DVD player, two bottles of Coke and two bags of chips. Just to wait the ten minutes to be seen by the doctor. In an office. Filled. With. Toys.

I used to know a woman who’s son took a class with my oldest boy. Her other four children would get wiggly while we waited for class to end and she’d always threaten to "take them out to the van to study their French" if they didn’t settle down (she homeschooled). More often than not, she’d hustle them out to the vehicle five minutes later. I seemed to be the only one who noticed that once they were in the van, the built-in DVD player was immediately turned on and I never did notice a workbook anywhere.

Just how prevalent electronics are in our young children’s lives was made abundantly clear to me on my son’s birthday. Among the gifts he received was a Star Wars video game for a Sony Playstation 2. Not that he has a Playstation, mind you. Apparently though, we live in a world where the presumption is that children begin to acquire electronics within the first few days of life and slowly build up their collection until, by age eight, they have enough of them to put NASA to shame.

I imagine my kids will get a Playstation fairly soon but not because it’s what’s expected. I’ve had my reasons for waiting. A portable DVD player? HA! Not until they’ve mowed my lawn 600 times. A Zen Micro or iPod. Let’s not even go there.

1 Comment | Monkey boys | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Overjoyed for Joy

October 26, 2005

One of my favorite commenters (not that I don’t love each and every one of you enough to rub up my head up against your hand and scent you like a territorial puppy), Joy Des Jardins has been interviewed over at Lipsticking. If you’ve never read Joy’s blog then you really must do so. Once you’ve added her to your blogroll, then race immediately over to her daughter Jory’s blog (unless you’ve already visited her from my blogroll in which case you get a cookie).

On a side note, I emailed Joy not too long ago asking if she was related to Jory (not too much of a leap in logic but one that took me, sadly, about four weeks to make). In true Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, Jory is featured in a new book along with someone I’m about to start a project with (don’t give me a hard time about the grammatically incorrect sentence structure, just go with it, mmmkay?). I was surprised to see the two of them in the book together since I’ve been planning on writing about Jory as part of my project with this other fellow. Did you follow all that or did I just give you a headache?

I had too much coffee today. Can you tell? CAN YOU? Ihavetogonow…
butI’msureI’llbebacklater…
whenthecaffeine…
w-e-a-r-s o-f-f.

5 Comments | People say, people do | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Cool under pressure, I tell you. Cooool.

October 25, 2005

I’m guessing this won’t garner a lot of sympathy but – I’m freezing. It’s 67 degrees but it might as well be 4 below zero because I do not handle this kind of cold well. I’m currently wearing a turtleneck, a sweatshirt, a jacket, jeans and :::gasp::: socks! Yet my fingers are turning blue.

I guess I’m better off than many other Floridians at the moment so I won’t complain about the weather a minute longer. While my neighbors to the south didn’t fare so well, we only had to deal with a rockin’ Tropical Storm in my area. The biggest news event around here was one tree that fell on one car but, of course, the media acted as if an entire city block had been leveled. Oh, please.

As you know, I was prepared for the end of the world early last week so by Sunday there was nothing to do but wait to see what the storm would do. My god, it was worse than waiting for labor to begin when you’re nine days overdue (and I know how that is). Since J won’t let me buy an anemometer, I had to make do with licking my finger and holding it above my head to judge if the wind speeds were beginning to pick up. J, ever cool as a cucumber, watched me pace nervously in front of the windows for about four hours that evening before finally making me watch a movie to take my mind off things. When it was over, oh, maybe around 10 o’clock or so, I said that I simply had to get to bed since I was going to have to start Storm Patrol in a few hours. If he smirked and rolled his eyes, I didn’t see it.

I wanted to lay fully dressed atop the covers but I didn’t want to call attention to my nervousness (because J might not yet have figured out that I’m, you know, a bit high strung about these things) so I reluctantly crawled under the covers. But not before setting up my weather radio, turning up the volume on my cell phone so I wouldn’t miss incoming news alerts, laying out my robe within easy reach, and placing flashlights right where I might need them. Once I was all set, I fell into a deep and peaceful slumber.

Yeah, right.

Actually, I think I slept more soundly when my first son was a day old and I was in that new mother panic that each breath might be his last. At one point, J rolled over in bed and I think I shot straight up saying, "What? WHAT? Did you hear something?!" I tried not to fidget as the wind got stronger and stronger. Though the power had flickered a couple of times, it was still on at 4:30 a.m. when J got up to have a look around. "Finally!" I thought and jumped right out of bed. I bounded out to the living room, flipped on the Weather Channel and ran straight for the computer in my office (which has huge windows taking up two entire walls). I think I was sitting there for all of six seconds when a huge gust of wind rattled the glass. I shot out of my chair and practically jumped into J’s lap as he sat on the couch coolly watching news coverage. I nuzzled his neck and told him I’d missed him so maybe he wouldn’t wonder why I’d run into the room as if I was on fire (I’m sure he bought it).

After reassuring myself that the storm wasn’t changing direction and heading for my driveway, I went back to bed and ~~pretended to sleep~~ slept for a couple more hours while the wind howled and my stomach lurched. I’m positive that if I had hoisted a couple of sails on the roof, the whole house would have moved right down the street and out into the bay; The S.S. Sharp, as it were. It was just so not fun for me.

Oh, and did I mention the rain? That started in the early afternoon and lasted about 3,982 hours. At one point during the night there was some god awful clattering on the roof and I jumped a country mile. "What was that?!?!" I asked J, certain that the roof was going to drop on my head shingle by shingle. He informed me it was "just the rain going sideways" complete with hand motions that sliced the air. He said this as casually as if he was describing how to slice an apple. Going sideways? Oh. my. god. Get me out of here! No, wait! Don’t make me go out there! Ummm….should I get under the bed? Wait in the bathtub? Run around in circles until someone slapped me? So many choices. I went with "D – none of the above" and just said "Oh" while knowing that my ashen face was giving away my true ~~fear~~ feelings. Have I told you that this was just so not fun?

Eventually the rain stopped and the wind died down. By noon people were outside raking up twigs and leaves. By 2 p.m. it was business as usual on our street. And the kids? They slept through the whole thing. Too bad they didn’t get a chance to see their mother in action. SuperMom: cool under pressure, unflappable in the face of bad weather.

You can stop laughing anytime now.

2 Comments | Brain lint | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

And not one kid threw up either

October 22, 2005

Yesterday my son turned eight and, being the fantastic mother that I am, I threw him a party. Okay, actually did it because I remember reading somewhere that children who grow up without birthday parties develop a stunted ability to appreciate the aging process and an creepy fascination with clowns. Or maybe I hypothesized that on my own. Whatever.

I considered hosting the party and my house and then I slapped myself upside the head with a wooden spoon. Did I really want several eight year old boys running willy AND nilly through my house? No, Hurricane Wilma was presenting enough of a threat to the sanctity of my home, who needed Hurricane Hyper as well? I took the easy way out and called Chuck E. Cheese. Yeah, I know…eight year olds are really on the cusp of being "too old" for The Big Rat but it was nearby and the behind-the-scenes tour of Earl’s House of Erotica and Panties was booked.

Me being, well, me I arrived a half hour early at the place and must have had some sort of wide-eyed horrified look on my face ("Oh god, what have I done? Get me earplugs! Now!") because the manager immediately placated me with a free cupful of tokens for the video games. I think he was a minute away from patting me on the head and saying, "There, there. It will be okay." I sent the boys off to play and chewed my last nail down to the quick worrying if people would show up, if the cake would taste good, if any of the guests would kick the man wearing the giant mouse outfit. You know, the basic things any of us would worry about, right?

As it happened, I had nothing to fear. The guests showed, the cake was fine and the kid that kicked Chuck in the nads wasn’t with our group. A couple of the moms stayed during the party which gave me the opportunity to learn that my children are not the only quirky, silly, strange, noisy, fidgety, defiant weirdos in the galaxy. In fact, according to their stories my kids are pretty…wait for it…normal. Can you believe that?

At the end of the day, my son proclaimed this was the best birthday of his life, in fact, the best day of his life and went to bed so happy my heart nearly burst. Of course that couldn’t really happen, you know, my heart bursting and all. I was simply too tired for my blood to even keep pumping that fast. The energy of the day, the excitement of the kids, the noise level of the restaurant; it sucked the life out of me and I think every major function of my body shut down by 8 p.m. I vaguely remember drifting to the couch, I think the television was on and I believe there was a gorgeous bearded man somewhere in my vicinity. I have no idea because I was immobile from exhaustion. When I finally crawled into bed, I immediately slipped into a coma only to be awoken at an ungodly hour by the noise from one of my son’s new toys. Yes, it went fine, it was fun and…oh…oh, crap…I get to do it again for my youngest son in about nine weeks for his birthday. yay

***
On a slightly related note, I have something to get off my chest: normally the things Wanker does are about as noticeable to me as the buzzing of a gnat four towns away. Sometimes, though, there are things he does that even Helen Keller couldn’t miss. Like totally ignoring my son when he had surgery over the summer…you know, that kind of thing. So tell me, why am I surprised that Wanker couldn’t be bothered to call my son on his birthday? Oh, wait, I take that back. He did call. At 9 o’clock last night. Apparently drunk. This from a guy who repeatedly tells me I am such a horrible parent that my children will "grow up to despise me."

For those of you who had any lingering questions about why I divorced this slimebag, is it starting to make sense now? You know, I love to make fun of him because he makes it so easy. Occasionally though, like anyone else who doesn’t treat my children well, I lose the ability to joke around and end up struggling to keep down the bile. The one thing that takes the edge off the whole matter is that yesterday afternoon, sensing Wanker would do something like this, I offered my son the phone and asked if he wanted to call his father to tell him about the party. He looked at me completely bewildered for about 20 seconds and then said, "Uh, no. Why would I?" I had no answer for him.

4 Comments | Monkey boys | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Wilma likes my son

October 21, 2005

Today my oldest son turns eight. For a few days, I’ve been wondering if by now I’d be en route to Ocala to get out of the way of Wilma. Now it seems that we’re out of harm’s way so we’re staying put (but I’m keeping those hotel reservations until, like, next Friday just to be sure). Thank you, Wilma, for not interfering with my kid’s birthday.

His party is this afternoon. After keeping company with a few 7 and 8 year old boys for three hours, I’ll probably be wishing I’d gone to Ocala anyway. Oh well, I guess it won’t be that bad. And besides, it’s blog fodder, right?

Wish me luck.

2 Comments | Monkey boys | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

I’m so long winded when I get nervous

October 19, 2005

Brace yourself, I have some news about myself that will shock you.

I am highly neurotic.

I know what you’re thinking: "Oh, Lisa, don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re always so calm, so level-headed, always reasonable, and never freakout-able."

Oh, cut the crap. You and I both know (and you’ll only admit it because I can’t reach you to punch you) that I’m a complete and total spaz (that term is so politically incorrect I almost winced). It’s not exactly a state secret that I worry and fret over things like greenhouse gas and what the price of tea in China really happens to be.

I can commonly be found obsessing over things like: Is that cloud in the shape of an elephant or does it more closely resemble Hillary Clinton french-kissing a wombat while reading a copy of Ulysses? And if I choose elephant, what does it "mean"?

Or sometimes I can’t decide whether to choose peas or carrots for dinner because, you know, one is higher in riboflavin than the other and perhaps I should stop on the way home from school and have the kids get a quick blood test to see what their levels are…

Get the idea? Oh, don’t pretend you’re surprised. This is something you knew about me when we met. So know that and knowing that I live in the Tampa area…

WHAT DO YOU THINK HURRICANE WILMA IS DOING TO ME RIGHT NOW?!?!?!?!?

Would you like to know?

Read the rest of this entry »

6 Comments | Brain lint | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

Currently the devil on the left shoulder is winning

October 18, 2005

I received an email from Typepad today (my blogging platform) that read:

Change
is good.
Put a TipJar
on your blog.

At first I thought this was the most repulsive thing I’d seen them do yet (and you longtime readers will know what a :::choke::: "fan" I am of Typepad’s ideas). I was about to delete the email until I saw the last line:

If ads aren’t your thing,
then let your readers say "thanks" by giving you a tip. Add a Pay-Pal
powered donation button to your blog and use the
funds to pay for your TypePad subscription, or for that new iPod Nano you’ve
been coveting.

Now I guess I have to thank Mena for learning of my heartache and creating an entire software plug-in just for me.

Don’t worry, folks. I won’t actually put a tip jar on my blog. Or will I?

2 Comments | Brain lint | Permalink
Posted by Lisa Hoover

That’s what friends are for

October 16, 2005

Someone, and I’m not naming names, needs to learn about what true friendship means. My best friend reads this site regularly and if she has been diagnosed with a brain wasting disease that causes her to forget things, she certainly ought to let me know. Even my most casual readers won’t have to think that far back to remember this post. So riddle me this, Batman: how do you explain the email I got from her this morning that said: