My Writing Adventure

Writing is something I have always loved. There is a box in our basement filled with folders of poetry and old journals that chronicle my life from elementary school through college and slightly beyond. I've affectionately labeled it "Pandora's Box" because whenever I open it I get sucked into reading overly-dramatic drivel for hours. The husband has been instructed to burn Pandora's Box when I die. It's that bad. But lately I have been trying to refine my talents, fueled by the success of my adoption article and the encouragement of family and friends. I have been entering writing contests and working on a YA novel. Things are slowly falling into place and some days I think it may actually be possible to become a successful writer! Then I start cruising the Internet and become completely overwhelmed. Writing is no longer about sitting in a secluded cabin by the sea typing away and then stuffing your manuscript into a manila envelope and hoping for the best. It's about getting yourself out there on social media and promoting your work and the work of others in your field. Once an introvert's dream job, a career in writing now seems more about who you know and how you can use your social skills to get published. That truly frightens this little introvert, who prefers to spend her days holed up away from society where I can remain equally fascinated and disgusted by the human race but take as little part in it as possible. But I want to be a successful writer, and that means stepping out of my comfortable imaginary cabin by the sea and interacting. Thankfully, I have started to make some new friends in the writing world who are not only providing motivation to keep working on my projects but also some much needed guidance. I am learning how to use Twitter (follow me!), write more efficiently with cool software, and query agents (must finish something first of course). It is downright scary, but it feels like the right path. Who knows, maybe people out there in the literary world want to hear what I have to say. Which would totally rock my world.

Why oh Why...

...is my four and a half year old peeing the bed almost every night? We did not go through this with our oldest. When he was four I took him for his annual physical and when the nurse asked if he was potty-trained I proudly said yes. Through the night? she queried. Well, no he still wears a pull-up. Not fully potty-trained she logged into the laptop. Ugh. We went home and created a sticker calendar to keep track of dry days. If he could make it to ten days in a row I would buy him the pack of water guns he so desperately coveted. It was a painful few months of near accomplishment (seven days! eight days!! nine days!!! oops), but by early summer he was fully trained. And has not had an accident since. We tried a similar approach with John when he turned four. His reward of choice was a new Spiderman bike helmet. It took a bit longer, but he was finally able to make it ten days in a row and was rewarded with his new helmet. And then, the setbacks began. He would be dry for a few nights, then wake up completely drenched in pee. I was up changing his pajamas and sheets at all hours of the night, wondering how one little body could produce so much waste. We tried limiting his fluids after school - half glass of milk with dinner and only a mouthful of water with teeth brushing. That has reduced the quantity a little but hasn't stopped the bed wetting. We tried waking him up before we went to sleep and bringing him into the bathroom for a sleep-walking toilet visit. That also helped a little, but sometimes he would pee before we got there, especially if we were up late. The weird thing about all of this is that he gets out of bed during the night - sometimes two to three times - to use the bathroom by himself. I know this because he turns on the light, which shines through our bedroom door directly into my face. At 2 am. And then neglects to turn it off. (We have to keep the door open for the cat who will scratch relentlessly if she cannot go in and out freely.) The worst part of the whole bed-wetting process is that his laundry consistently smells like pee. He pulls off the wet pajamas and stuffs them inside out into his laundry basket. In the morning he proudly announces that he is dry and little do I know he has only been dry since 4 am when he changed his clothes. When I go to do laundry I find wet underwear balled up inside wet pajamas, and EVERYTHING STINKS! When I try to talk to him about it, he grins at me and laughs. LAUGHS! Huh?? Is that some sort of defense mechanism? Why do you think this is funny? I ask. Do you like the smell of pee? No. Do you want to go back to wearing diapers at night? No. Then please please stop peeing the bed. Help!

Settling In

In the early part of my adulthood, time was measured by duty stations. We never stayed anywhere for very long, and my memories involve temporary jobs, unfamiliar towns and strange weather. Now that I have been a mom for seven years (as of tomorrow), time is measured by milestones and holidays. The family is setting down roots in a place I never expected: our hometown. And my memories involve birthday cakes and Halloween costumes. I'm not going to lie - I miss that nomadic lifestyle, a lifestyle that involved throwing out whatever didn't fit in the moving van, discovering new neighborhoods and reinventing myself every few months. But we are here now, and we are settled. The husband started a new job, the boys are happy at school and have tons of friends and we have family right around the corner. Every year we bust out the Halloween decorations and devise new ways to scare the neighborhood kids. Every winter we head to the park in our neighborhood to sled down the hill. Every birthday is celebrated with a crazy cake and the grandparents are there to watch my boys blow out their candles. Life has become traditions and settling in. It's an odd mix of comfort and anxiety. Is this what the next 15+ years will be? The same thing year after year with slightly taller children? Is that really so bad?

My Boy is a Doughnut Eating Champ!!

The Bus Ride

Last Friday I went with John's preschool class to a local farm for their annual fall field trip. Paul took a similar trip when he was four to a different farm. I was home with John at the time and was able to attend with him in tow. John and I drove separately while Paul enjoyed his first ride on a bus. The weather was miserable, but everyone had a ton of fun. When it was John's turn to go on the field trip as a big, bad preschooler, he was beyond excited about the bus ride. Despite having previous experiences of riding a city bus (through the Bronx no less) and multiple airport shuttles, he was convinced that riding a school bus was magical. That he would step on it and be transformed into a KINDERGARTNER. Nope, I would reply, calming squashing his dreams, you'll still be in preschool. Nevertheless, he remained excited and hopeful as we waited for the bus on Friday morning. When it arrived, the children and a few parent chaperones foolish enough not to drive their own cars boarded the bus with a buzz of anticipation. Video cameras were rolling, camera phones clicking; you'd think it was high school graduation or something. (For proof that I am not exaggerating my point here, see photo below.)

As the bus pulled out of the parking lot, the children began to squeal with an excitement generally reserved for Santa Claus. Every bump we hit, every turn we made, every light we came to was accompanied by similar noises of delight. Well, except for when one of the little girls in the back whacked her head on the seat in front of her when the bus stopped suddenly. Then there were sobs. Unfortunately, our bus driver got lost on the way to the farm and a 40 minute trip took us over an hour, but we made it there in one piece and had a marvelous time in the mud. Thankfully the rain held off until the ride home, which is more than I can say for Paul's trip. Here he is, three years ago, happy as a clam with his preschool buddies.

The next day, John accepted the fact that he was not yet in Kindergarten and seems content to watch his brother board the bus every morning. For now anyway.

The Deep, and the not so Deep

Paul and I have struck up some interesting conversations lately. His brain is a fascinating piece of machinery that I don't think I will ever truly figure out. His questions often lead to deep religious discussions that I hope open his mind a bit to the world outside of our little suburban universe, and then... the conversation ends faster than it began. For example: Yesterday he asked me what gelatin was. I asked why he wanted to know and he said that some of the kids in his class aren't allowed to have it. For the third year in a row he is in a classroom with students who have extreme nut allergies. I am a lactose sensitive vegetarian and he has recently been diagnosed with lactose intolerance. Conversations about food restrictions are not new. But I had a feeling the gelatin one was more related to religious practices, so I began explaining first what it was and then why some families choose not to ingest it. He seemed intrigued and we continued to talk about different religious practices and what, in a nutshell, each of the major religions believed. Our community is relatively diverse and I was able to use different families for examples. I wanted to make sure he understood the concept of freedom of religion and that he was free to choose something other than what we currently practice. All in all, I felt pretty good about our conversation. A few weeks back he had asked about the devil and I worried that what I had said then may have scared, confused or bewildered him. It is hard to tell with Paul. You give him an answer and he thinks it over, then asks if he can have a snack, go to a friends', practice his math facts on my tablet. I try to reengage but when he says the conversation is over, it's over. The gelatin discussion was no exception. After my explanation about who believes Jesus was the savior and who doesn't and why some people don't eat certain animal products or walk to worship and how he is free to visit any church at any time, he looked at me and said, "Your vocal cords move up and down when you talk." Hmm. Guess that was the end of that conversation.

Leaving Home So Soon?

My oldest son no longer wants to spend any time with me. I didn't think this was going to happen until he was at least 10, or maybe even 12. But nope, at seven he's decided that I am no longer cool. There is a group of kids up the street who are all his age or one year older, and they are way more fun than mom and little brother. His disappearance down the street started with his kindergarten girlfriend. ("Maa-ummm," I can hear him say, "she's just my friend now.") He begged me to let him go to her house and I finally relented, opening up a pandora's box of sorts. We live on a court that is on one end of a long street containing several other courts. Because the other courts are only on one side and the feeder street comes to a dead end, you can bike along the sidewalk for several "blocks" without ever having to cross a street. Remember as a kid when mom said, "Go as far as you can before you get to the corner"? Well, that takes a while in our neighborhood. And I figured what the heck, he should be okay as long as he doesn't have to cross the street. So I let him go. And he discovered that the boy next door to his "girlfriend" was pretty cool. As was the boy next to him. And the boy next to him. And the boy two houses in the other direction. Now he never wants to stay home. There are kids down in our court, but he doesn't like them nearly as much. (And there is some drama there that I won't get into on my blog.) So off he goes, riding his bike into the sunset at every possible opportunity. Occasionally the boys will make their way back to our house and look for frogs in the backyard, but it is much cooler to hang out at the other end of the street. To be honest, I am a little jealous. The parents down there seem like a lot of fun, but it's not like I can just ride my bike down there, ring the doorbell and say, "Hey, you wanna play?" Life is much simpler when you're seven. And you have an outgoing personality like my son and not a hermit-like personality. Like me.