Love You Long Time, Ladies

Last week my kid’s hippie preschool had a “Mothers and Others” breakfast. Because if they didn’t include “others” some crazed PC parent would be enraged and offended and break all the windows and set the garbage cans on fire. Then go live a tree for ten months to protest.

Yawn. Just another day in Berkeley.

The breakfast was lovely actually, and one of the mothers—or maybe she was one of the others—was telling me her four-year-old has been asking a lot of heavy questions lately.

“So the other day she says, ‘What happens to you after you die?’”

“And I tell her, ‘You know, that’s a very good question, Lindsey, but I don’t know really know the answer.”

The mom looks up, “So she says, ‘Well why don’t you just Google it, Mom?’”

Honestly, I was about to give the woman the very same advice. (I always thought that Lindsey seemed like a smart kid.)

Instead I recommended the mom get a tattoo of the exchange. I was willing to get a matching one. I mean, some of these gems you’ve got to write down to remember. Others need commemorating in a more lasting manner.

As mamas I love that we have a front-row seat to all this crap. We work damn hard for the access, but times like those help get you through the day.

Ever since getting my very own C-section scar, I’ve been goony with adoration for mothers. I realize it’s narcissistic that it took me having to become a mom to appreciate all my mother did, but I’d guess I’m not alone.

I’ve learned a shit ton from my friends over the years, but I’ve found the mom-friend provides a unique level of intimacy. Hell, I’ve shared tips for unplugging breast ducts with total strangers in the produce aisle at Safeway. Imagine how I am with mamas I know—and love.

Today I want to honor the moms whose wisdom, talent, humor, and guilt-free ability to drink during playdates has dramatically improved my adventure in motherhood.

Like my friend Mary. Why spend the money on an overpriced plastic Barbie Dream House, when you can make one from a shoe box? It’s brilliant. She’s also happened to take every beautiful photo of my family that I could never take myself. When I’m sitting in a nursing home in my own diaper some day, I’ll be fondly looking at photos Mary took of my family, and blasting Glory Days REALLY LOUD from my clock radio.

And Megan? She taught me about the transformative powers of drinking a cold beer in a hot shower at the end of the day. It’s the modern mother’s Calgon bath. If you’ve never done this, I beg you to try it right now.

My friend Sacha took her kids to museums when they still had their umbilical stumps intact. And I’m not talking about kiddie museums, though she does those too. Those kids know their way around The Asian Art Museum and The De Young like most kids know the playspace at Chuck E Cheese.

I have another friend named Megan, and it’s the weirdest most impressive thing. Every time I’ve seen her daughters outdoors—in photos or in the flesh—they are, get this, wearing HATS. Like, they keep them on their heads. I don’t know what more I can say about that other than, wow. I think Kate wore a hat for 20 seconds once. It was one of those pink and blue striped caps they stick on newborns in the hospital. Even though she couldn’t focus her eyes she clawed that thing off her head nearly instantly. And hasn’t worn a hat since.

My neighbor/friend/walking partner Jen is the cleverist, most creative, all-natural homemade kinda mama I know. Luckily she lives next door and my kids often glom onto her fabulous sewing, rubber stamping, or gardening projects. Her kids come to our house to watch TV.

And Becca—wait, is this starting to sound like that B-52s song 52 Girls? (Don’t worry, it’s not the extended dance mix—it’ll be over soon.) So Becca is a triathlete, ER doc, the first lady of Surly beer, and… I swear there was something else. Oh, right! She has FOUR YOUNG BOYS. Quattro. And a puppy. Becca is my in-the-moment mama role model. Her boys ask her to read Harry Potter, play Candy Land, or build forts ALL DAY LONG—when she’s not at work pulling forks out of people’s eyeballs, that is. Becca always says yes.

If everything goes according to my plans Becca and I will plan a wedding together some day. For our kids, I mean. I’m not professing my love for her here. At least not that kinda love.

My sis-in-law Lori is a military mother o’ two. Her husband’s gone tons, so she cares for their kiddos and cooks like Betty Crocker like it’s no big thing. She’s the master of the early bedtime, which is a brilliant alternative to strangling your children when it’s been a long day.

Lori’s family moves a lot, on accounta the way the military does that to you. That gal can unpack a house and have her kids enrolled in the local school in, like, 20 minutes. It’s really quite impressive.

While we’re at it my neighbor Brooke is a military mama with a deployed son. There are yellow ribbons round her old oak trees, for realz.

My hat goes off to both you mamas.

And here’s to all the moms who I’ve openly—or in a more closeted fashion—adopted since my own mom left the planet. (To be clear, she died. She’s not an astronaut.)

France Demopolus’ kitchen table is where I’ve felt unconditional love since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. If I could make my home this way for even one of my kids’ friends, it’d make up for other things in my life, like not competing in the Olympics or never having gone to summer camp.

And my mother-in-law Peggy has wiped my children’s butts, folded my family’s laundry, and drank white wine with me at the end more days than I can count. She’s also told me more than once, “You’re doing a great job with those girls.” And whether or not she’s been paid to say that, it’s amazingly good to hear.

I’m totally out about my adoration for my friend’s mom Claudia. She’s an elementary school teacher, a reading expert [swoon], and a world-class grandma. And if you ask her how an 8-hour drive was, she lights up like you’re asking about her wedding day and says, “So. Much. Fun.” The woman has a good time getting her teeth cleaned, I swear. I wanna live like her.

Enough of my ramblings. It’s probably time for you to ring the bell for another mimosa or foot rub. Or if you’re a dad, to peel more grapes for your wife. Or pull that B-mer with the big red novelty bow around to the front of the house.

The way I see it, being a mom on Mother’s Day is like getting an Oscar nomination. It makes me want to say what an honor it is to even be in the company of these talented, amazing women. And I’d also like to thank Harvey Weinstein.

Don’t forget your sunscreen today, and grab a light sweater, honey, and I’ll see you back here in a couple days. xoxoxo

Miami Heat

Don’t tell Oakland, but I’ve been cheating on it. With Miami.

And it was a hot, steamy affair.

I was there for the Mom 2.0 Summit, a gathering of mom bloggers, media mavens, and marketers. And mark my words, this was no tragic conference like in that movie Cedar Rapids. No, I went to white parties poolside, a throw-down at the Versace mansion, and spent three gloriously muggy days shashaying around the Key Biscayne Ritz.

If you’ve never stayed at a Ritz Carlton, I assure you it’s got Howard Johnsons beat.

I also stayed at my friend’s parents’ crazy-sick digs for a night. Their backyard is a manicured jungle paradise. An orchid thief’s wet dream. They’ve got a lagoony swimming pool, a waterfall, a dense thatch of palm trees, and the perfect number of tropical flowers so as not to be tacky.

I half-expected Christopher Atkins to swim out from the faux rock formation in an ultra-suede man-thong and crack open a coconut for my drinking pleasure.

Hey, a gal can dream.

There was even gunfire and explosions in the near distance. I thought my hosts just wanted me to feel at home, but it turns out the show Burn Notice was filming in their swank ‘hood. I took the dog for a walk to suss out the scene, but sadly wasn’t discovered by any talent scouts.

But lest you think all this indulgence was for naught, I actually learned something on this trip too.

Like, did you know it smells like poo in the bathroom of the Versace mansion? Yuh-huh it does. I mean, prolly not all the time, but it certainly did when I was in it. They also have a bidet in there, in case you want to hose down the ole undercarriage. So thoughtful.

From chatting with others at the conference I realized I’m missing a child. These days everyone seems to have three. Apparently three kids is the new chai latte. Some overachievers even have SIX. And they’re still stylish, not Basset-Hound droopy with exhaustion, or rocking on the floor of a closet clutching a bottle of bourbon. Go figure. Good for them.

I learned this scary stat: 60% of girls don’t engage in daily activities because they don’t like how they look. SIXTY percent. Terrifying, no? Dove soap is doing extremely cool work about girls and self-esteem that you should check out. And they didn’t even pay me to say that. Hell, I use Ivory for God’s sake.

Another thing I found out—one of the most hilarious bloggers battles crippling depression. Sometimes she can’t even get out of bed for a week at a time. Totally intense hearing the Goddess of Funny talk so candidly about that.

If you enlist a few hundred mamas to break a Twitter record set by Justin Beiber, they will fail. And their friends will all wonder what the bejesus got into them that they were tweeting “I admire you” to everyone they knew for an hour. (The sangria helped.)

Brene Brown is as likeable, warm, and wise in person as she was in her Ted talk. (Okay so I actually haven’t seen her Ted talk yet, but plan too really soon.) Her Mom 2.0 keynote on “The Power to Fail” was dazzling. And, at long last, it justified my Calculus grade in high school.

Didja know every Ritz has a dramatic open staircase? They think women should always be able to make a grand entrance. My friend Meg who usedta work there told me this. It’s good of them to look out for us gals that way. I’ll be sure to pack a ball gown and tiara for my next Ritz vacation.

I found out that maternity fashion diva Liz Lange responds to all her customer service questions HERSELF. And she looks fabulous in turquoise.

And then, get this—at the Ritz there’s a guy who walks around with a wooden xylophone playing a ding-dang-dong tune when a session’s about to start. FOR REAL this is what he does. It’s like when the lights at the library flash when it’s about to close, but it’s a grown man in a uniform ding-dang-donging. I didn’t request any wake-up calls while I was there, but I wouldn’t be surprised if instead of your phone ringing that dude comes into your room and leans over your bed to xylophone you awake.

I’d love to share more about my trip to Miami, but I’m too busy strapping on my stiletto sandals and wiggling into my bikini top for this afternoon’s school pick-up.

See how much I’ve learned?

That hippie preschool in Berkeley has no idea what’s coming.

Mama Needs a New Pair of Boobs

Dear Readers:

Welcome to today’s post, which doesn’t happen to live here. But trust me, it’s so damn good you’ll want to track it down like it’s Osama bin Laden.

I’ll actually tell you where you can find it, but first, here’s the back story: I met a dazzlingly funny and friendly woman named Leslie at that Erma Bombeck workshop I went to and keep yacking about. She writes the fabulous, hilarious blog The Bearded Iris: A Recalcitrant Wife and Mother Tells All, which you probably already read since it seems like EVERYONE does, including The Huffington Post. (Not that I’m bitter.)

Anyway, she and I got to emailing since returning home from the conference, and now it turns out that… We’re getting married!!!

Okay, so not REALLY.

But nearly as intimate as that—at least in the blogosphere—which is to say that she asked if I’d write a guest post for her blog. And I’m the FIRST EVER guest blogger on The Bearded Iris. So I’m incredibly honored. And I’m pretty sure she’s having a commemorative tiara custom-crafted for me right now. Which I will wear to my grave. If it goes with whatever I’m wearing at the time. Hopefully she picks out something I can dress up or dress down…

Anyway, so the post is called Mama Needs a New Pair of Boobs. It’s about some, uh, physical concerns I was wrangling with before leaving for the Mom 2.0 conference in Miami (where I am right now). The post is up on her site today.

So then, please CLICK RIGHT HERE to read it, muse over how delightful it was, comment on it, and share the love.

And I’ll be back with a fresh new *motherload* post when I return from Miami on Monday.

Or Tuesday.

But right now I’ve got to re-apply some lipstick and get back into the mosh pit at the Versace Mansion. This town is wild.

xoxo,
kristen

No Gifts, Please

I had a hangover when Mark asked me out on our first date. To be clear, I didn’t get it as a result of going out with him, but at the time he asked me out I was nauseous. I was headachy. I was leaning against the wall to remain upright. My pallor was a sickly shade of green.

And yet he looked past my bloodshot eyes and potential for rampant alcoholism and found me desirable! What a keeper.

We were at a Christmas party, hosted by dear friends of mine. And even though I’d spent the day in bed, moaning, drinking water, and shying away from bright lights and loud noises, I knew I had to make an appearance at this shindig.

So I moved through Elizabeth Kubler Ross‘ Five Stages of Hangovers:

#1 Guzzle Water

#2 Down Advil

#3 Eat a Greasy Breakfast

#4 Return to Bed

#5 Attempt to Shower and Dress [Note: This should not be done prematurely, or could require that you repeat steps 1-4.]

My plan was to spend 20 minutes at the party. Tops.

Not long after my arrival Mark appeared. Charming and friendly. And although my senses were dulled, I thought I  discerned an air of nervousness about him. In the kitchen we chatted for a bit over the butcher block island, as I rummaged through its drawers for more Advil.

And then as I made my farewell sweep through the living room, he stopped me.

“I um, actually have something for you,” he said. And pulled out of—okay my memory fails me here—his pocket? a man purse? the hands of a bikini-clad assistant who was standing beside him? Anyway, he pulled out of SOMEWHERE an envelope. And handed it to me.

Inside were a bunch of magnets. And I think some stickers too. They all said ChickenCandy.com.

Chicken Candy was this wacky website idea I’d been ranting about when I’d met him once before. It was the Internet Boom, and nearly any URL you could conjure was already taken. And somehow we’d gotten to talking about the idea of candy that was made out of America’s favorite food—chicken!

I know, it’s odd. I don’t really remember how we got on that topic—and I know right now you’re thinking that I seem to have blacked out a lot during this time in my life, and maybe you should be finding my email address to send me a kind but firm message encouraging me to seek treatment for my drinking problem. (Here, let me make it easy on you. It’s kristen at motherloadblog dot com.) But really, I assure you that my poor memory has more to do with—I don’t know, genetics—than it does with

Oh, sorry, where was I? Just had to top off my glass.

Anyway, so here’s Mark handing me these magnets. He’d designed a logo and there was even a little picture of a chicken on them. And it was a really funny and creative thing for him to do. I mean, how often does a guy A) listen to something you said, B) remember it, and C) do something original with it?

Right, not often.

Some time you should have Mark tell you about his internal dialogue as he handed that envelope to me. It went something like, “What the fuck have I done? This is not cool. This is the most insane stalker-ish move I could ever make and she is totally freaked out by me right now.”

I did find it unusual, but in a flattering way. I was generally at a loss for words—for everything that night—but I somehow managed express to him the wonderfully thoughtful and whimsical nature of his gift.

And I did not puke on his shoes.

Later, on my way to the coat closet he sought me out again, and nervously, shyly, asked if he could take me out to dinner.

The rest, as they say, is history.

My birthday was five months after our first date. And, this being The Olden Days before cell phone texting, Mark and I would chat online using AOL Instant Messenger. And sometimes we sent carrier pigeons.

It was almost like Downton Abbey.

In fact, I saved and printed out all our epic IM conversations since they were so damn clever and cute and we were both trying so hard. I knew even then that they were part of some history in the making.

On the morning of my birthday Mark texted me a link that said, “Click here.”

It’s okay, you can go click on that yourself. Check it out, then come back and I’ll be right here.

Okay, did you look? Did you click into the site? Did you read the About Us (I love that part)? And the Gizzard Truffles? Wait, what was your favorite product? You know, I didn’t even know what schmaltz was at the time.

Yes, the gift he gave me was the ChickenCandy.com sticker taken to the Information Superhighway. He made a whole damn website for my pretend Chicken Candy company. And gave it to me for my birthday.

And it was hilarious.

I showed my boss at the agency where I was working and she wanted to hire him on the spot.

Anyway, I’m ten days shy of my next birthday. Twelve years later, that is.

And I actually woke up pretty hung over this past Saturday. I swear this is a very rare occurrence, but I do understand if you still feel the need to contact me directly with your concerns about my drinking. (Again, it’s kristen at motherloadblog dot com.)

For this hangover, Mark let me sleep late. He got up and fed our daughters breakfast and shushed them when they started talking too loudly near our bedroom door. When I finally woke up he brought me a glass of water and an Advil, and asked me what we should do as a family before he went to his 1:30 tee time.

And then the girls ran into the room screaming and fighting and jumping on the bed and handing me pictures they’d drawn and asking if I would read them a book and could they please have some of their Easter candy?

Ah what a difference 12 years makes. And I wouldn’t change a single thing about them. (Except that I should’ve drunk more water—or less wine—on Friday night.)

Thank you, Mark, for being an exceptionally funny, smart, handsome, handy-around-the-house, IT savvy husband. (And no, I’m not going to say “and friend.” Or “and lov-ah.” But hell, now that I mention it, those things too.)

Happy very-soon birthday to me. I am the luckiest gal in the world. You and the girls—and the vast pretend proceeds from Chicken Candy World Enterprises—are all the presents I need.

What Happens in Dayton…

Someone slid me their resume under the door of a bathroom stall once. A stall that I was peeing in.

It was certainly a memorable way for that person to “get her name out there,” but I didn’t end up hiring her. In fact, I had no authority to hire anyone at the time. Too bad she didn’t know that.

This all happened years ago. It was my first-ever professional conference, held by some women in broadcasting group. And I was as nervous and green and wide-eyed as a gal could get. But I was also working for CNN at the time. You may have heard of it. And little did I know the reaction those three letters on my badge would elicit from that mob of viciously competitive, turbo-coiffed, wannabe anchorwomen.

From the moment I slipped that lanyard over my neck I was stalked like a Coach purse at a T.J. Maxx. People applied lip gloss before approaching me, thrust their reels into my bag, and crammed their complete career histories into introductions at the breakfast buffet.

If anything the experience left me doubting whether I wanted to stay in TV news. Those women were not my people.

But last weekend, in Dayton, Ohio of all unlikely places, I had the good fortune of attending a conference with 350 humor writers (mostly women, with a smattering of husband purse-carriers and a gay man or two). And it turns out that those folks are my people.

And true to how I operate—now a jaded veteran of the conference scene—I learned much more outside the sessions than I did from any of the PowerPoint slides.

I mean, I met a totally witty and glamorous woman from Boca who it turns out home schools. I was shocked. She didn’t have stringy brown hair, and wasn’t wearing a poncho she and her five children weaved. She didn’t have a collection of KILL YOUR TV and MY CAR RUNS ON FRENCH FRY GREASE pins on her hemp bag either.

So that’s one thing I learned. Those homeschoolers can be anywhere really. You can’t pick ‘em out of a crowd any more. Which is kinda refreshing, right?

Other things: Since I got back I started journaling for ten minutes every morning. It took two writing teachers and a speaker at this conference urging me to do this before I finally drank the Kool-Aid. (Apparently I’m highly suspicious of smart people trying to teach me something.)

But here’s the thing. It turns out that dumping your early morning thoughts onto paper (yes, NOT your laptop) is wonderfully cleansing. It’s like the feel-good hit you get from clearing out your closet, but with your brain. And instead of “wasting” my words, as I feared I might do, I’ve found it actually warms me up to do even more writing.

So I learned that too.

And the keynote speakers were all so dazzling I sprang from my seat for standing ovations—either dabbing my eyes with my napkin, or waving it in big churning circles over my head howling, “HOOOOO-eeee!!!”

But after each speech I still wanted more more more.

Like, I want to be Connie Schultz‘s best friend.

I want Ilene Beckerman to adopt me. (She wrote her first book at age 60. Sixty!!)

I want to go back to college to have Gina Barreca as a professor. Or hire her to do stand-up at my next book club/wedding/kid’s birthday party/bris.

I want to get to the bottom of Alan Zweibel‘s relationship with Gilda Radner. Did they do it or didn’t they? I’m just saying, it’s human nature to wonder. Like how you want to know whether or not figure skating couples are schtupping.

I want to swap Italian-girl stories and meatball recipes with Adriana Trigiani.

And I want to have even one-eighteenth of the success that any of these writers have had. And for a math-phobic like me, that’s saying a lot. Or at least, I think it is.

Finally, a word about the Bombeck family. They were all there, and at our meals each one read their favorite column of Erma’s. (Cue more tears into my napkin—many from laughing.)

I’m no event planner but if you ask me this conference has legs. In the alternating years when it’s not being held, I think Bill Bombeck (Erma’s widower) should lead a workshop on spousal adoration. All I can say is, my husband does a damn good job of this himself but he’s not carrying around my autograph book from elementary school and reading from it lovingly. There’s always room to up your game, and I think the husbands of America can learn as much from Bill as us wives have from Erma.

I humbly clutch my housecoat for a deep curtsy to the attendees, speakers, and organizers of the Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop. Thanks for the laughs, the insights, and the three pounds I gained from all those Midwestern desserts.

And thanks too, ladies, for only passing me toilet paper under the door of my bathroom stall.

Becoming One with Erma

Every once in a while a friend will introduce me saying, “This is Kristen—the funny one I was telling you about.” The new person then turns to me wide-eyed, as if they’re expecting a monkey to jump on my shoulder playing maracas, and for me to launch into celebrity imitations and a slew of hilarious one-liners.

Oh, there’s always a two-drink minimum when I’m around!

I’m rarely at a loss for words, but that introduction—which I realize is meant to be a compliment—tends to leave me dumb and drooling.

I wish I could hear the conversations those people have as they walk away from me. “Is she feeling alight?” “So, wait, THAT was the Kristen you were telling me about?” “Do you think she’s maybe having a petit mal?”

Speaking of mal, I’m awake at a blisteringly painful hour, awaiting lift-off for a flight that will take me to the bright lights and glamor of Ohio. Yes, I’m goin’ “back to Ohio,” land of my alma mater, for a weekend writing workshop. It’s as if all those times I drunkenly sang that Pretenders song at Kenyon frat parties were somehow truly prophetic.

I wonder if that means there’s a Funky Cold Medina in my future too.

Anyway, I managed to get off the waiting list for this humor writing workshop that happens every other year, and sells out nearly instantly. A friend—the sassy and hi-larious Nancy of Midlife Mixtape (read her blog IMMEDIATELY if you never have) told me about it. When I asked to be put on the waiting list months after registration closed, the conference coordinator sent me the kindliest Midwestern email, essentially saying I had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting in, but he’d be happy to add me to the list.

But then a couple weeks ago a woman emails me outta the blue and says she can’t make it and would I like to take her spot. And thanks to The Husband’s preponderance of frequent flyer miles, here I sit watching the worst-ever American Airlines safety video. It is truly truly atrocious and I’m not sure why it’s pissing me off as much as it is.

At any rate, the conference is called The Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop. Yeah, yeah, she’s the bowl full of cherries greener over the septic tank writer your mother loved so much. Several people have asked me if she’s still alive, and sadly she’s not, but I’m nearly certain we’ll have a seance to make contact with her at some point in the weekend. I mean, what else would you expect of a Marriott full of 350 kidless-for-the-weekend women? Think of it as an immense slumber party of hundreds of thirty- and forty-something women. We’ll all be globbing on eye cream and padding around in our slippers in the hallways raiding each others’ mini bars.

I know, I know. You want to come now too, don’t you?

Of course, when I first got the email about getting in I ran through my Mental Check List of Unworthiness. Aside from it being last-minute and utterly unplanned for, I wondered whether I really belonged in the company of those funny, successful women writers.

I also wondered:

Will the other kids like me?

Will I make any friends?

Should I spend the money to do this so soon after sending that large monetary gift to Uncle Sam?

Will I suffer some of the same dorkish alone-in-a-crowd feeling I sometimes had in the swarming throng at BlogHer?

What does one WEAR in Dayton in the springtime?

Not to mention all the practical issues, like childcare while I’m gone and the fact that the hotel hosting the event was sold out. Staying a mile down the road was sure to solidify my deeply internalized outsider status.

But then the woman whose spot I took said she knew of someone who didn’t need their hotel room. A pants-pissingly funny blogger who I heard read once, and had the entire room in eye-wiping hysterics. I sheepishly emailed her and within minutes she very graciously (and helpfully) outlined what I should do to transfer her room to my name, insisting I wasn’t at all the “stranger” I’d labeled myself as when I contacted her.

Awww…

Call me a late bloomer, but I’m getting a hit of that down-homey comfort of an online community.

Maybe, just maybe, there’s hope for me in this group of gals yet.

So then, here I am. Horrifically early. (Did it mention that?) Ohio-bound. Awash in first-day jitters—though that may just be my body’s reaction to the 3:45 wake-up call.

If this workshop were a yoga class I’d have to set an intention for, it would be to try to learn as much as I can. And to put myself out there and meet lotsa people. And to not worry about being funny, because I’m clearly so very out-ranked there that I’m just thrilled to tag along. (When I make my Oscar speech some day I’ll really mean it when I say I’m honored to be in the company of the other candidates. I won’t mean it when I thank my agent. And I will mean it when I say that Mr. Harris was my favorite teacher in high school. Okay so he was really from Lower School, but do people ever thank elementary school teachers? Is that even done? I think that the high school white lie is the way to go.)

So wish me luck! And send some good vibes to The Husband who is gallantly wrangling the kids solo all weekend to make this happen. I told him that the kitchen is the room with the refrigerator in it, so he should be fine.

Actually, the man hardly needs domestic guidance (thank GOD), but that line just felt so Erma.

I’m already letting the channeling begin.

Light as a feather… Stiff as a board…

Happy Easter-Passover Hybrid

I heard the most EXCELLENT thing this week. I was chatting with a mom from Kate’s school, and her cell phone buzzed with a text. She leaned over to look at it, and slowly said aloud as she typed, “Yes, we’re still on for Saturday night.”

Then she looked at me. “We’re hosting a Seder this weekend—not because we’re Jewish or anything—but Dustin,” she nodded in the direction of her son, “wants to be half-Jewish.”

“Wait—” I said, confused, “Dustin’s half-Jewish?”

“No, no,” she explained laughing. “Not Jewish at all. But he wants to be half-Jewish.”

Okay, so how rad is THAT?

As a fervid, shameless wanna-be Jew (and the mother of one as well), this news shook me to my goy core. I’d never pondered the concept of half-Jewdom, and it struck me as sheer genius.

I mean, as a half-Jew you can just pick and choose what you want to get out of the either scene, right? Not into gefilte fish? Why should you be? That’s your WASP genes talking. Don’t want to sit through synagogue? Wear a yarmulke? Or miss out on Santa Claus, Christmas trees, or sneaking spiked egg nog? No problemo! That’s your other half talkin’. Take what you want. Leave the rest behind.

On the other hand, you’ve also got free reign to stuff yourself sick with latkes, call your grandparents Bubbe and Zeyde, feel a deep dramatic connection with Fiddler on the Roof, and have a blow-out bat mitzvah that’d make a Kardashian wedding look like a low-budg gig at a VFW hall.

Man, I’m all hopped up on the brilliant potential of it all.

Needless to say, I wanna be half-Jewish now too. DESPERATELY. And I no doubt freaked out that poor kid the other day when I got all in-his-face freaky fired up. “Dustin! I LOVE that!” I bellowed. “I wanna to be half-Jewish too!”

He was all wide-eyed backing towards his mother’s car, like, “Okay, Kate’s-weirdo-mom… whatEV.” But of course, he was too polite to say that.

Alas, until the time I’m fully indoctrinated in half-Judaism (in a ceremony I’ve yet to concept but will certainly relay the details of here), I’m staring down the barrel of a full-on Easter-only celebration this weekend. Somehow we’ve fallen off the guest list of our friends’ Seder, no doubt because I over enthusiastically made all manner of faux-pas in past years, tapping bitter herbs behind my ears like perfume and feigning gagging noises when Uncle Myron poured me a glass of Manischewitz.

Or maybe it’s just that they’re out of town this weekend.

Anyway, our Easter plan is brunch and and an egg hunt with our turbo-creative neighbors. Their yard is a gorgeous overgrown garden paradise that makes you feel like you’re in some Tuscan village not a suburban North Oakland double lot. Mark’s baking cinnamon buns and will no doubt bust out some highbrow mimosa-like drink.

There will be plenty of other folks and food there too, but there’s part of me that still needs a ham-and-scalloped-potato dinner later in the day as well. Oh, and green beans. Might as well go full-bore traditional.

So I’ll be the last-minute loser at Honey Baked tomorrow being told there’s only a 65-pound 280-dollar ham available that’ll feed 30-40 buffet style or 80-100 for apps. And because I’ll feel like a failure making pasta for dinner on Easter, I’ll buy the damn thing and we’ll be eating ham ’til Fourth of July.

But really, really what I want more than anything is a ham made by my Aunt Jennie. The woman is truly a wizard with a ham. I mean, grown men have wept eating her ham. It’s like some crazy gift, her and the hams.

When my mother was sick Aunt Jennie came to visit with my cousin Sue. They live a couple hours away. The day before, Mom was having a bad day and didn’t get out of bed. But at one of the times when she woke up she told me, “Call Aunt Jennie and tell her when she comes tomorrow not to bring a damn ham.” (Mark still cannot say the word ham without using the adjective “damn.”)

Of course, it’s not like Aunt Jennie had even said she was bringing one. But in one of those ways that you know your siblings inside and out, my mother just knew Jennie, and that Jennie would think a ham was in order.

That’s how Jennie rolls. With a large home-baked ham in tow.

So I called her. “You guys still planning to come?”

“Oooh yuh, yuh,” she clucked.

“Okay, so Mom said for you not to worry about bringing a ham,” I said. Then thinking better of it I added, “I mean, really? She said not to being a damn ham.”

Aunt Jennie just said, “I’m bringing a ham. See you tomorrow.”

And really, when I hung up the phone my sisters and I were relieved that Mom’s request carried no weight. Why would you EVER want to dissuade that woman from working her magic?

My Aunt Jennie is a world-class crack-up. She’s always been my favorite aunt—and my mom’s from a family with eight kids, so that’s actually saying a lot. Jennie has chutzpah like nobody’s business. She’s in her eighties and still works taking care of “old people” (as she puts it). She’s a first-rate grandmother, buying her grandchildren laptops, watching broods of kids after school, and cooking massive Sunday dinners. You can’t leave her house without a plate of something “to have later” and money she managed to stick in your bag “for something for the kids.”

And she will make you piss your pants laughing, in the most dry, innocent-about-her-humor way. Get her talking about the geezers she’s cared for who’ve hit on her. (Scary proof that even decrepit and in oxygen tents all men ever think about is sex.) You’ll nearly pull a Mama Cass on the ham you’re horkin’ down you’ll be howling so loud.

Anyway, God bless my most excellent, one-in-a-million Aunt Jennie. She recently had a mild stroke. Word is it wasn’t so bad, and I truly hope that’s true. If I know her she’s bounced back, poo-pooed anyone who so much as asked after her health, and is planning to serve up a meal this Sunday that’d make Jesus rise from the dead with a napkin tucked under his chin.

If I weren’t 3,000 damn miles away I’d be pulling up a seat myself to that table, as excited about the company as I’d be about the food.

Anyway, as you’re tucking into your holiday meal this weekend—whether it includes matzoh crackers or a green bean casserole, I’d sure appreciate it if you sent a little healing thought my Aunt Jennie’s way. Think of it as paying homage to the High Priestess of Ham.

And if that doesn’t feel quite right to you because you keep kosher or are somehow not a fan of pig meat, no worries. Feel free to consider yourself half-Gentile, if only for the moment.

My Jewish Mother

Did I ever tell you how I stalked a woman once?

It was back when Mark and I were looking for schools for Kate. And a school we applied to was hosting a conference where authors, experts, and teachers were lecturing and running workshops. It was all about parenting.

The event fell on a Saturday, a few weeks before we’d be finding out whether or not Kate got into the school. Even though anyone could attend the day’s program—and hundreds of amped up, achievement-hungry Bay Area parents did—Mark and I set out all spiffed up and eager to make a good impression if, by chance, we’d have the good fortune of bumping into the Admissions Director at the continental breakfast buffet.

But minutes into the keynote, given by the handsome, cleft-chinned author of Nurture Shock, we were fully engrossed in the topic at hand. Our ulterior motive of showcasing what great members of the school community we’d make had all but melted away. (Though God knows I could have summoned it back in a snap had I bumped into the school’s French teacher in the bathroom.)

We attended a tepidly interesting session on teaching your kids to read, wandered through the Redwood-tree-lined playground, and made our way into a workshop on temperament being given by a nurse-turned-radio-show-host. It was five minutes into her presentation (I’d admittedly lingered at the coffee urn, scanning for school officials), but we slid into two seats at the back of the room.

The woman at the podium, Nurse Rona as she called herself, was talking about temperament. That some people are “intense” by nature, and some less so. Fairly basic stuff we’re all aware of, but she was talking about family dynamics and how our individual temperaments play a role in how we operate as families.

We got hand-outs that listed a long series of scenarios and gave some kind of 1-through-10  reaction rating for each one.

The good nurse asked us to think of one of our children, and fill out the worksheet based on how he or she would react to the different situations. Mark and I did this together, circling something with a number 10 answer for Kate, then circling a number 3 for Mark. We went through each question and answered for ourselves and the girls, even though Paige was only two at the time.

What was amazing was how easy it was to do. We were having a little laugh as we’d whisper “Paige” and then both be pointing frantically with our pencils to the same answer on the spectrum.  Other things Mark would circle about five times while mouthing “you” at me. It was really simple—and actually quite fun—to map our little family all out.

And at the end of the exercise a distinct pattern arose. It was clear that Kate and I have, well… intense personalities. (Duh.) Mark and Paige? They’re on the more mellow side.

This is not rocket science, people. I mean, I guess we’d both realized this on some level, but we hadn’t really thought much about it, ya know? We’d just been so busy with the day-to-day grind of parenting, that we’d never really stepped back to take note of this now-fairly-obvious thing. And now that this came into focus, the nurse was giving us all this smart advice about how we could handle various situations in our family life based on this information.

It was a huge aha moment. It made me realize why, when given a chance to divide the kids up to run errands, Mark gravitated towards taking Kate, and I did the same with Paige. Call it opposites attracting, or personality load-balancing, but there’s just a reason why those groupings tended to form naturally. Even long after the time when I needed to be with Paige for breastfeeding purposes.

I was fascinated. This revealed so much about my growing-up family too. I finally understood why people said one of my sisters and my mom were so much alike—a comment that always confused me since the two of them seemed to clash more often than get along.

So later, in line at the salad bar when I saw Nurse Rona, I made my move.

“Amazing workshop,” I gushed, throwing some mixed greens on my plate I had no intention of eating.  And I went on to overshare all my take-aways from her workshop. It was like I was wedging in a free quick therapy session while blindly piling croutons onto my plate.

Anyway, after that weekend I couldn’t help thinking about that woman and her work. She was a nurse who’d spent decades in hospitals and taught various kinds of parenting courses. I tuned into her radio show the next Sunday morning. I went to her website. And then one day while the girls were napping, I decided to send her an email.

I told her I loved her presentation. Reminded her we chatted at the salad and cold-cuts buffet. Told her all about my media background and recent foray into little more than “nose and butt wiping” for my kids. But that her work was so compelling I was wondering—Did she need a research assistant? A ghost writer? Someone to bring her coffee during her radio show?

I hit send and figured I’d never hear back. Or that she’d think I was mad.

I was deep deep into my stay-at-home mom life. This email was liking tossing a crumpled note over a tall stone wall into the world of the working set. A world that had once been incredibly familiar, but had grown distant and even a bit mysterious. I had dim flickering memories of the place, but could only imagine how vastly it had changed since I’d been there. And it seemed absurd to imagine that someone on that side would want to communicate with someone on my side.

I didn’t expect to hear back from her. But it was thrilling nonetheless attempting to make contact. In fact, after so much at-home childcare time, it was exciting to even feel a rumbling of professional curiosity still lurking in my bones.

I was passionate about motherhood, and had lost interest in my former career. But maybe I could do work that was related to parenting. Chocolate and peanut butter together!

Anyway, it turns out I did hear back from Nurse Rona. The same day even. A lovely and encouraging note, along with an invitation to lunch. “Do you have childcare?” she asked. “If not, I can come to you and talk around the kids.”

Wow.

Lunch-time Rona was just as fascinating as lecturing Rona. We talked all about her work and my pre-mama career. I heard about her kids and grandchildren and I gushed about Kate and Paige. She told me about the constant funding struggles with her non-profit and keeping Childhood Matters, her radio show, on the air. She promised to read my blog.

There wasn’t any immediate need for my help, but she was at the beginning of a book project and various other endeavors. Who knew what we might be able to collaborate on?

She invited me to an event at her non-profit. I called into her show a few times. I’d see her at farmer’s markets, or we’d grab a cup of tea. She ran a workshop out of my living room. Her daughter started babysitting for my children. In short, over the course of the past couple years we became friends.

I’ve even appeared on her show as a guest a couple times. Once with the author of a book about the importance of family dinners, and once with a family therapist talking about babyproofing your marriage.

And she may not know it—or maybe it’s blatantly plain to see—but she’s become one of the mothers I’ve adopted. You know, I do this now since my mom is gone. “Borrow” other peoples’ mamas for practical or emotional purposes, or just for fun. It’s like I’m hand-picking the village that it takes to raise me, still at age 44.

Rona is so warm and wise, and with a great California sensibility that’s enlightened but not too far out hippie-dippy. Who wouldn’t want her as a mama?

Last Sunday, after more than nine years of bringing great thought-provoking information to parents, Rona’s excellent radio show Childhood Matters went off the air. They finally lost their perpetual funding tug o’ war, and decided to put their remaining resources into their Spanish-language parenting show Nuestros Ninos.

It’s bittersweet for sure, but this change hardly leaves Rona sitting around eating bon bons. She’s got her book project underway, podcasts with Christine Carter (author of my new favorite book, Raising Happiness), workshops, coaching—you name it. You just can’t keep this woman away from work that helps families.

After more than nine years of waking up at the crack of dawn to get to the recording studio, this Sunday Rona will get to sleep in. I hope, for her sake, it’s delicious.

And the way I see it, she needs all the rest she can get. I’m not the only mama out there who’s  eager for whatever wisdom she’ll continue to share, be it by radio, book, or lecture. I’m just lucky to be one of the few who’s also got her cell phone number.

Paige’s Birthday Interview: Age 4

We recently had an all-girl bring-a-doll tea party for Paige’s fourth birthday. We set a long kid-sized table with nice linens, plates with doilies, and a remarkably-nice-from-the-grocery-store bouquet of roses. We cut PB&Js into animal shapes and grilled cheese into little squares, and stuck toothpicks with pink ruffly tops into pieces of fruit. We arranged everything on cake pedestals and fancy platters.

But the best part? Mark wore his tux and served the girls. He poured dramatic high streams of cocoa from a silver teapot into teensy china cups. He bent crisply at the waist to take in whiny requests like, “I want MORE mini marshmallows!” He returned folded napkins to girls when they came back from “the potty.”

It was a hoot.

Especially since Paige’s homies aren’t exactly the Fancy Nancy set. They enjoyed themselves, but were hardly holding their pinkies up or sending mini bagels back to the kitchen for more cream cheese. They were more like a soup kitchen crew, muttering incoherently at times, grabbing food off each others’ plates, and occasionally burping and scratching their crotches.

Good times.

Anyway, after Mark’s stellar performance I thought of a new standard us gals should set for selecting a male to breed with. Will the guy be game for catering to the needs of a gaggle of four-year-old girls with the grace and proficiency of Carson from Downton Abbey? If so, ladies, grab that man and drag him down the aisle.

Kate reminded me this morning that I haven’t interviewed Paige for her birthday yet. It’s so helpful having her around as a second-tier mother.

So this morning, in keeping with my better-late-than never approach to birthday interviews, I sat down with Paige and asked her a few questions.

Me: If a genie could grant you one wish, what would it be?
Paige: Flying.

Me: What do you want to be when you grow up?
Paige: A mermaid. [Pauses, thinking.] I need a tail.

Me: What kind of job do you want when you grow up?
Paige: Be a nurse.

Me: What do nurses do?
Paige: Give shots.

Me: Where do you want to live when you grow up?
Paige: Penn-siv-vania.

Me: Do you think you’ll have any animals?
Paige: YEAH!

Me: What kind?
Paige: Camel.

Me: Do you want to get married when you grow up?
Paige: No.

Me: Why not?
Paige: Because I’m going to be a mermaid.

Me: Do you want to have children?
Paige: Yeah.

Me: How many.
Paige: Seven. That’s a lot of kids.

Me: Do you feel different now that you are four?
Paige: Way older. Way way way way.

Me: How so?
Paige: Because I’m almost 8!

Me: What is your favorite color and why?
Paige: Turquoise, pink, and purple, and violet. Because one is that turquoise is the color of the sea, and one is that pink is the color of the sunset. And purple when you mix it up with pink it makes violet.

Me: Who is your best friend and why do you like them?
Paige: Penny. [A girl who used to go to her preschool who she hasn't seen--or mentioned--in months.]

Me: Why?
Paige: Cute.

Me: Now that you are four, do you think you’ll have a boyfriend?
Paige: Yes. [Giggles.]

Me: What do you think about world peace?
Paige: World peace? I love you! [Laughs.] I said I love you. I love world peace.

Me: Do you know what it is?
Paige: No. That’s why I said I love you!

Me: What is your favorite TV show?
Paige: What is that polar bear movie?
Kate: Knut.
Paige: I love Knut. And Sponge Bob Square Pants.
Me: Huh. I’m pretty sure you’ve never seen Sponge Bob.

Me: What’s your favorite thing to do that’s not TV?
Paige: Have candy. And do cartwheels.

Me: What’s your favorite activity that’s not about candy?
Paige: Painting and drawing. And getting candy.

Me: What do you like most about school?
Paige: Learning about dinosaurs.

Me: What have you learned about dinosaurs?
Paige: The way how they roar.

Me: What do you like to do in your free time?
Paige: Play mermaids. [Really? I have never witnessed this. If we were on The Newlywed Game my answer to this question would be "look at books." And we'd get in a fight later back stage that she came up with "play mermaids" totally out of the blue, leaving that other couple to win the new bedroom set.]

Me: What is your favorite thing about yourself?
Paige: [Incredibly long pause to think] I like peacocks.

Me: What is your favorite song?
Paige: [Thinly singing] Ba ba black sheep do you have any wool? Tell me, tell me… Wait. [Walks out of room.]

Me: Where are you going?
Paige: To get a songbook. [Returns with a binder of her preschool artwork.]

Me: If you could have any super power what would it be?
Paige: Being a super girl.

Me: What can a super girl do?
Paige: Have power. And have a cape.

Me: What is your very favorite thing to do?
Paige: Make a cake.

Me: What are you most afraid of?
Paige: Bumble bees.

Me: What about them?
Paige: They have stingers.

Me: What is your favorite thing about me?
Paige: I love you. I love when you read.

Me: What is your favorite thing about Daddy?
Paige: I love you.

Me: Okay, but what is your favorite thing about Daddy?
Paige: He can read.

Me: What is your favorite thing about Kate?
Paige: She can read.

Me: What’s cool about her?
Paige: I like her.

Me: Why?
Paige: Because she can read!

Paige: I don’t want to do this any more. Can you just read?

I finally did relent and read to the gal. Even I can take a hint.

Happy birthday, dear Paigey. I love you more than you’ll ever know.

I Can Walk Under Ladders

My college roommate tortured me. Not by bringing home an endless stream of guys. Not by being a huge slob, or selling drugs from our cinder-block dorm room Shangri-La. It was a CD. A Joan Armatrading CD that she listened to NON STOP.

Which is to say, when she was happy. When she was depressed. When she had a paper to write, or to celebrate having just handed one in. And when she didn’t know what else to listen to.

I loved her dearly. She was one of my closest friends. But God. Help. Me. It was A LOT of Joan Armatrading.

In fact, at one point the frat we lived next to was hazing their initiates. For a week they blasted some horrible 80s rap song—the same damn song—over and over and over again. And frankly hearing that was a cake walk compared to my own private musical hell. I could have gotten into that frat no problem-o considering what I’d endured for months. I mean, if I’d also had a penis, was willing to drink non-stop, chug gold fish, and sex up goats.

Though to be fair the them, the goat thing is just conjecture. For all I know they were having sex with cows. (It was, after all, rural Ohio.)

Anyway, one of the songs in my private musical hell went, “I’m lucky. I’m lucky. I’m lucky. I can walk under ladders.”

And right now? Well right now, decades later, I am SO down with that song. I am truly feelin’ lucky.

Because last week, while grabbing a random laptop bag that was wedged alongside my desk, I found a long-lost library book. It was Big Dog, Little Dog by Tolstoy. Or maybe it was P.D. Eastman. Anyway, one of them.

I’d already bought a replacement of the book for the library. But finding it was still a thrilling validation that I’m not the world’s worst housewife. That my house didn’t swallow that book up like a hairball, and refuse to cough it up. Plus the discovery eradicated that bad lost-something feeling that can lurk in one’s soul. That crappy feeling of irresponsibility that can only be removed by finding what it was you foolishly let slip away.

Of course, it being Monday and Oakland suffering from gargantuan budget cuts, the library was closed. So I was unable to swagger in waving the book around and bellowing, “Eureka!” Instead I stuck a neon yellow Post-It note on it. “Found this!” I proclaimed. “Already replaced it, but that’s okay.” I left off the “love, Kristen,” but I think it was implied.

Then I stuck the book in the drop box.

Heck, I already got you a new one, Library, but take this one TOO. I’m feelin’ that generous.

The thing is, I lost that book the same fall weekend in Seattle when I lost my diamond pendant necklace. The special one Mark gave me on our first wedding anniversary. And I don’t know about you, but my jewelry box isn’t exactly overflowing with diamond necklaces.

Anyway, finding the book made me tear through all the little zippered sections and pen nooks in the bag I found the book in, wildly hoping that my necklace would also magically appear. I thought I could, like, double down on my finding luck.

But no dice.

Mark was traveling for work, at the yearly CES geek-fest in Vegas. And on Wednesday night while he dined on steak, drank expensive wine, and spent a rollicking evening gambling, boozing, and maybe even chomping a cigar, I sat in our living room surrounded by four (count ‘em, FOUR) laundry baskets full of clean clothing. And I folded. And folded. And folded.

Because I know how to have a good time.

For some reason when I was putting stuff away I was overcome with the OCD urge to sort through my sock and underwear drawer. This is the sort of strange organizational compulsion that overtakes a gal like me at 9:30 at night when all the laundry is folded but you want more hot crazy domestic action. Oh yes, I was unhinged.

I happily re-united socks that had been living apart from each other just inches away—unworn for months! I wadded together a bolus of brown and black tights larger than a watermelon. I even decided to THROW AWAY some underwear that dated back to the first Bush administration. I mean, I was making all kinds of world-rocking changes and life-enriching decisions. I don’t want to brag or anything, but I’m even planning to wear a matching bra and underwear set some time soon.

I know… cuh-razy, right?

Anyway, as I dug down towards a strapless bra I may have bought for my prom dress, past some random business cards I stowed with my undies years back for safe-keeping, somewhere amidst all that and a weird Russian watch I have, I found my diamond necklace. Just sitting there. Looking so oddly there, that I couldn’t believe it was it.

It’s not like the sound track to this discovery—had this taken place in my movie memoir—would’ve been a sudden clap of of upbeat, celebratory music. Or even an angelic chorus mounting in pitch. Instead there was a weird kinda pins and needles sound in my brain. I’ve wanted to find this necklace for so long, but finally looking at it, I somehow couldn’t grasp what I saw. It’s like I was stuttering in my mind, “No. No. Naw…” until it finally clicked.”Wait. Really? Oh my God—YES!”

This is why my life story can’t be a documentary. It has to be acted out by someone else. I’m just so bad at acting out the most exciting parts. If you don’t believe me, ask Mark how dopey I was when he asked me to marry him.

Anyway, what was so funny about that damn Joan Armatrading CD Leah used to listen to was that I’d bemoan it constantly to her face, but eventually I kinda started getting into it. Not that I ever admitted that to her, mind you. It was like some kinda musical Stockholm Syndrome. I think I sometimes even maybe played the CD when she wasn’t around.

Eventually, after college I ended up buying myself a copy.

After finding that damn beloved necklace I never thought I’d see again I wanted to blast the song I’m Lucky louder than a frat house. That is, if I were willing to stop admiring it around my neck for long enough to dig up the CD.

P.S. Check out this incredible story my friend Lauren sent me about another great find.