Little Miss Malaprop

One of Mark’s friends from his New York days wrote a great book about misheard song lyrics called ‘Scuse Me While I Kiss This Guy. Who can’t love a book like that? It should be required reading in bathrooms across America. And I truly mean that as a compliment.

One of my personal misheard song faves was from my friend Cynthia. She confessed to me in college that she’d long been singing, “I jog in the city! Running wild and looking pretty!”

You’d have to know Cynth to really appreciate how perfectly hilarious that was. Even now it’s a total side-splitter to me.

Not that I’m much better, mind you. No doubt there are myriad song lyrics I belt out daily that are utterly incorrect. One Mark caught me in the act of was from that Billy Joel song “Piano Man.” I thought the guy in the song was “making love to his tiny can gin” instead of his “tonic and gin.”

Not sure what led me to believe gin ever came in cans. Or weirder: tiny cans. It’s one of those things that as you’re singing it doesn’t seem quite right but oh well you’re not the songwriter you’re just driving in your car singing along happily and maybe even thumping the steering wheel when the spirit moves you, so who are you to question what vessel gin traditionally comes in and how big it is. Know what I mean?

Of course when Mark discovered I’d been making this mistake he pounced on it delightedly as only a loving spouse can. In a futile attempt at self defense I think I tried to cover my tracks by explaining I thought he was “making love to his tiny Can Jin.” You know, some diminutive Asian woman. (Yeah, he didn’t buy it either.)

Anyway, yesterday I asked Kate what she wanted to bring into school today since she was the Star of the Day, the school’s one-at-a-time version of Show and Tell. She took the question to heart and started surveying her toy empire intently. At one point she ran up to me with some wooden play dishes and said, “Mama, I want to take these in for Start of the Day.” To which I corrected, “It’s not start, honey, it’s star. Like you’re a shining star!”

Here I am trying to help her out, teach her something, and what I get back is an insistent, “No, Mommy“–the name she reserves for me when she’s being stern–”It’s start.”

There’s just no telling that girl she’s wrong. I wonder where she gets that from.

Turns out Kate’s gotten some other school-related things wrong too. The circle time song she insists goes, “Make a circle. Make a circle. Make it ground! Make it ground!” She sings this song nearly incessantly causing me to mutter between clenched teeth “Round, Kate. Round.”

And they say some non-denominational hippie-type grace before eating at school. I’m not sure exactly what the words to it are, but I’m pretty sure they aren’t, “Thank you, thank you, my hard things! Thank you, thank you for everything.” My guess is it’s a “heart” that “sings.” Though, knowing that school it might also be a harp.

Anyway, one song I’m certain I know the words to–since this Star of the Day thing has had it stuck in my head all day–is the theme song from this low-budg New England talent show called Community Auditions that was on TV when I was a kid. It had a small studio audience comprised of mostly pushy pageant-type
parents, and was on something equivalent to local cable access. (UHF on the dial, yo.)

I was likely one of about seven people bored enough to watch it, but TV producers must be desperate these days because a Google search led me to discover it’s actually been brought back like some bad 70s TV show zombie stalking the airwaves. My God, modern science can resuscitate anything these days, but what are the ethics behind these frightening decisions?

Anyway, back in the old school Community Auditions day their most popular act by far was young girls wearing bad red wigs and warbling out “Tomorrow” from the musical Annie. They also had a preponderance of young dance and gymnastics troupes who’d perform in bright matching costumes covered in those old big round sequins. Lots of kids “Puttin’ on the Ritz” with canes and top hats too. Oy.

I can nearly assure you that none of the acts that appeared on Community Auditions made it big.

So, the show’s theme song (in hopes that typing it will drive it out of my head) went:

Star of the day, who will it be?
Your vote could hold the key!
Is it you? Tell us who
Will be star of the day!

When I picked up Kate from school this afternoon one of her teachers came up to me to report that Kate took her Star of the Day title very seriously. At one point during her my-crap-from-home presentation some kids were talking. The teacher said Kate stopped, glared at them and said, “Please be quiet. It’s my turn to talk.”

Again, where does she get this from?

Ah, little Miss Kate. You are my start to every day and my star of every day. And your Mama loves you so very very much.

What the Cat Dragged In

While our kids were strangling each other on the sidewalk the other day, a neighbor casually mentioned to me that his cat brought a rat into their house the night before.

“A mouse?” I asked weakly, venturing hopefully to correct him.

“No, no. It was a rat alright,” he replied. “It was actually pretty big too.”

It was one of those things someone tells you nonchalantly, and it’s all you can do to repress a full body shudder and exclamation of GAAAHHHH!

Several minutes later, he’d moved onto some other topic or was chatting with the kids or something, as I stood frozen, frantically wondering, “Was it dead? How big was it? Was it half-dead? Eeeeeeeeew!!! What room did it drag it into? Oh God, was it on a carpet? Was there a trail of blood? Did their kid see it? How the hell–and where–did they dispose of the thing?!”

I could barely stand to even think those thoughts, but I also couldn’t stop myself. For the remainder of the evening, back inside having dinner and such, any quiet moment would lead my mind back to thoughts of THE RAT, which as the night progressed grew larger, bloodier, and more diseased in my imagination.

Well, hey. What do they expect having cats. One of the first things I told Kate when we brought her home from the hospital as a newborn was, “We’re dog people.” I mean, it’s important for kids to know what their family stands for right out of the gate.

My disdain for cats started out with allergies as a child, then progressed to more of a fear of them (don’t laugh) after a couple episodes where I’ve been clawed at. (Turns out they don’t like having their stomachs scratched vigorously or being thumped on the back. Who knew?)

But after this rat story I have a whole new reason to hate.

The thing is, I’m starting to see some cat-like qualities in my own offspring. In Kate. No, I’m not allergic to her, and sure she’s scratched me a few times but in minor unintentional scenarios. Thankfully we’re not at the rat stages, but Kate is doing her fair share of taking the outdoors inside.

Today I was reaching blindly for a rattle for Paige in the great toy abyss between her and Kate’s car seats. Instead I withdrew a plum-sized chunk of concrete. Not exactly the German wooden toy that’ll get Paige into Princeton that I was groping for. And clearly Kate’s work. God knows how she manages to reach down and pry off a piece of the sidewalk before we snap her into her car seat.

And that’s just the car. Inside the house, her play kitchen is a shaman’s workbench. The girl has collected acorns, leaves, sticks, fistfuls of grass, dandelions, and other small organic matter. It’s wedged into little containers, mixed in small enamel pots with tiny wooden eggplants. I even found a Tupperware in her bureau alongside her basket of barrettes, filled with a cache some sort of random sidewalk nut.

Needless to say, outside is another story altogether. The bucket in the back of her trike is full to overflowing with pebbles, leaves, dessicated kumquats, pieces of straw, prickly chestnut husks, and a thoughtfully curated collection of twigs. Seed pods are especially prized booty, as she employs the multiplicity of innards for a variety of projects, most often as the key ingredient to her specialité, homemade ‘soups.’

And I should really just write the hipster architects who live on the corner a check for all the polished gray stones Kate’s purloined from their modern front yard-scape. By year’s end she’ll have denuded the place. And from the small crazy-person piles around our yard and spilling forth from her various front porch bowls and baskets, it’s quite clear that she’s the perpetrator.

Of course, aside from being creepily cat-like behavior, this all can’t help but remind me of my mother. Which is to say, what Kate’s got is in the genes. Driving down the road with my mom you’d think she was swerving to avoid an oncoming car, but really she’d careen to the side of the road with break-neck velocity then hop out giddy like a school girl to haul in a branch laden with pine cones. Some women swoon over designer labels, but a piece of driftwood or a fallen bird nest was what’d weaken my mother’s knees.

Her pine cone habit was at times out of control. Look for a clear place to sit in her car and you’d re-enact a scene from The Sound of Music. For as much as she gathered, emptying the car of her earthly treasures was a less immediate compulsion. The back seat was typically off limits it was so overburdened with her finds, along with her stash of old bread, crackers, and cereal she fed to wild ducks. (The woman single-handedly changed the dietary needs of the North American Mallard by causing them to grow dependent on stale Ritz Crackers.)

At least the pine cones, chestnuts, shells, and other natural detritus my mother gathered were the raw materials for some backwoods-type Martha Stewart projects. (Though it should be known she found Martha to be “a puke.”) She’d gild a bale of nut husks and pair them with some holly sprigs, quahog shells, and maybe a pineapple or two. Slap on some peat moss and rig in a few candles and next thing you know we had a centerpiece worthy of a White House state dinner. As wacky as she was, the end products were always impressive.

As far as I know, none of Mom’s roadside finds made their way into her repertoire of soups, though it’s hard to really know for sure. Come winter, she did did make a hearty stew.

Sisters, Sleep, and Yard Sales

At 6:40 on Sunday morning when Paige babbled her wake-up call, Mark and I cracked our eyes open, smacked opened and closed our bone-dry mouths, and softly groaned as we remembered the day that stretched ahead of us. We were having a huge yard sale.

For all we knew, early birds were already prowling around our front porch with the hopes of finding some ignorantly-priced Noritake china. Having to lug everything out of the garage and around to the front yard seemed torture enough, then then Kate’s tiny voice joined the chorus with Paige. “Mama! I woke up!”

My God, we also had children to tend to. And in the wake of a supremely fun party the night before–where Mike and Myra renewed their vows on their 15th anniversary and treated their friends to an exceptionally fabulous throw down–here we were, heads throbbing, lying tangled in our sheets like some suburban American version of Sid and Nancy.

Not pretty.

It’s just more validation that my on-the-fly early morning nanny service would catch on like wildfire. If I could have picked up the phone for urgent back-up, I would’ve paid $100 an hour for childcare. Easily.

Anyway, at least I’d consumed a vat of Don’s superb pinot the night before and had good reason for my state of disarray. Whereas this past Friday, I had no alcohol-related excuse for my behavior.

So Friday. When I arrive at Megan’s house for mother’s group, she’s in her garage bent over two ride-on cars she’s assembling for the twins and she mutters between clenched teeth that she’s been in a fantastically crappy mood. It’s such a gift that Megan A) admits to her foul mood but still throws a yard party worthy of the Smith & Hawken catalog, B) is the kind of friend who doesn’t sugarcoat life when she’s bedraggled, and C) manages to do her hair in cute braids despite it all. Megan is rarely off her game, and with three kids under three, no nanny, and a hubbie with a time-sucking job, I’d be enjoying the creature comforts of a sanatorium if I were her.

Anyway, aside from her admission of it, you’d never know the woman was crabby. But then in some weird transference that we tried to make sense of later, the bad mood somehow leeched over to me. There was either some fierce ‘power of suggestion’ energy out there, or maybe some as-yet-undead part of my childhood Catholicism urged me to take it on like some priest in an exorcism. More likely it was the exhaustion that’d caught up to me from waking-in-the-night children and not sleeping well with Mark out of town.

After lunch, with some help from Mary, who impressively coaxed naked Kate (long story) back into her clothes and even her car seat while I wrangled Paige, I drove home, nearly slumping over the steering wheel, hoping the day’s excitement would warrant Little Miss Never Nap into even the smallest kip. I never sleep when the kids do, but since I caught Megan’s mood like a bad cold and was generally haggard from the night before, I’d have gladly done a swan dive into bed.

No luck. Kate invoked reserve stores of energy and refused to even play quietly in her room. So when I staggered in to feign some active parenting, I was all over her suggestion that “you be the baby and I be the mommy.”  This involved her even tucking me into her bed (bliss!). And the next thing I remember, Officer, I was fluttering my eyes open after having totally conked out. D’oh!

Thankfully the curtains were not on fire, Kate wasn’t out on the sidewalk chatting with strangers, and Paige was still safely snoozing in her crib.

The rush of maternal negligence that surged through me went unnoticed by Kate who was tootling around in her room and came over to me saying, “You woke up now, Baby! You want some milk and a snack, Baby?”

And just as I was settling in to thinking “Okay, I dozed off for a bit here but everything’s okay…” I remembered that I’d taken a sleeping Paige out the car earlier with the thought that I’d come back, grab my bag, and lock up. Which of course, I never did.

“Mommy?” I said to Kate, because God knows when she is Mommy and I am Baby I can never mistakenly call her Kate. (The house could be burning down and if I called her Kate she’d sit on the floor and scream, “My name is not Kate! I’m Snooooow Whiiiiiite!” And refuse to budge.) So I’m all, “Baby forgot something in the car. I’ll be right back, Mommy.”

I’d parked on the street, since our garage might as well be in the next town over. And from the second I set foot on the porch I notice I somehow managed to park with the two right wheels on the sidewalk. My God. Had I been sleep-driving? Then I walk around to the street-side door where Paigey’s car seat is, and of course, it’s open. Not wide open, mind you, but still. And on the front passenger seat? My bag with my wallet, iPhone, yadda yadda yadda. This may be okay in say, Bristol, Rhode Island. But this is Oakland, people. Thankfully–mercifully–it was all still there.

I mean, imagine if I had been drunk how ugly that scene would have been.

Not one to stew silently in my own shame, but to share it (see: this blog) I immediately call my friend Jennifer who lives next door. And she says brightly, “Hey I saw your great parking job!” Oy! Nothing like being beaten to the punch on my own self-flagellation.

But it really was an odd day. Thankfully, no hangover was associated with this not-drunk-but-acting-like it afternoon. I also didn’t don a lampshade, call any old boyfriends, or snarf down a whole sleeve of Chips Ahoy cookies. (Not that I call old boyfriends these days, Mark…) Worst of all, Mary reported late yesterday that the Bad Mood Virus had somehow been passed on to her. I can only hope that its course of destruction ended there.

And thankfully, yesterday when I truly was hungover, my two sisters arrived to valiantly pitch in with the yard sale–merchandising items, setting prices on the fly, convincing people they needed our old crap, and collecting cash with the efficiency and security of a Swiss bank.

At the end of a long and exhausting day I looked at Kate and Paige across the dinner table and smiled thinking that they’ll be there for each other for all the good times, and for all the hung-over yard sales.

About Me

I realized recently that my blog lacks an About Me section.

The problem is, my personal IT support technician/spouse is away on a business trip, so I’m unable to alter the site’s, uh, complex architecture singlehandedly. (Besides, it makes Mark feel so needed when I let him do these things for me.)

While I await his return, here’s my first take on how I might describe myself:

I’m a mother of two from Oakland, CA who hates mushrooms. My ears aren’t pierced. Well, they were once, but those holes closed up decades ago. My mother died of pancreatic cancer. Women who’ve had natural childbirth are my heroes. I’ve never seen Star Wars. I’ve been a VP, toy reviewer, CNN producer, and state park employee. My favorite holiday is July 4th. I love surprises, resist change, and can’t tolerate wimpyness. I adore old women. I’ve had migraines that have put my right eye out of commission for weeks at a time. I once ate a 24-course meal. I’ve never competed in the Olympics. I went to cooking school to become a pastry chef, then decided against it. I’ve chatted with Mick Jagger. I loved high school and was unimpressed with college. My father’s name is Ferdinand. Altogether I’ve taken 13 years of French. I’ve never had a perm. I’ve lived in Rhode Island, Ohio, Massachusetts, D.C., New York, Georgia, California, France, and England. In a life riddled with happiness, motherhood has brought me supreme contentment. Some people think I have nice hands. I once spent a raucous night out with the White House Secret Service. Sometimes I want to eat my children. I don’t know how to follow a football game. My husband spent the better part of his career at Sports Illustrated. If I were President, liking coconut-flavored rum wouldn’t be uncool. I pronounce ‘aunt’ AHHHnt and ‘apricot’ with a short ‘a.’ Cats scare me. I have a terrible memory. The greatest compliment I’ve ever gotten is that my daughter Kate looks like me. I can dish it out but I can’t take it. Math Game Day in fourth grade always gave me a stomachache. My father is afraid of heights and peach fuzz. A psychic once told me I was a famous ballerina in a past life. I skipped having a first marriage and got a brilliant trophy husband at age 37. I’ve never had braces. For a made-for-TV movie I once played a woman who choked while eating in a restaurant. Parades often make me cry with joy. If I had a hammer, I’d hammer in the morning. The love I have for my husband and daughters can best be described as rabid. I’m an obsessive yard saler and recovering packrat. My super powers are the ability to sleep anywhere and parallel parking. I’m the youngest of four girls. I disagree with the way the word ‘segue’ is spelled. I didn’t make a million dollars before turning 30. I look dead in both yellow and light gray. I once stuck a pussy willow up my nose. Seeing a person carrying a box of hot pizza always delights me. I think people who put lines through their sevens are pretentious. If it’s not too much to ask, I’d like a high school marching band to play at my funeral. I know how to say the following things in Polish: ‘underwear,’ ‘Grandma,’ ‘ass,’ and ‘I’m going to throw up.’ I’m a wannabe Jew. If it weren’t for house cleaners, I’d get around to changing my sheets about as often as frat boys do. My best piece of financial advice is to pay for babysitting now instead of marriage counseling later. I’m an avid recycler. My greatest life’s work has been ridding myself of any trace of a Rhode Island accent. It wasn’t until my mother was gone and I had children of my own that I realized I’d inherited her brilliance for tackling tough laundry challenges. I can’t be inside on sunny days. I felt betrayed my senior year of college when the hippies cut their hair short to get jobs at investment banks. I’m not even a little bit country. My last meal would include a Del’s Lemonade.

How much room do they give you in those blog templates for the About Me section anyway?

Well, this will have to do for starters.

The Remote Control of Life

Am I the only one who wishes real life was like Tivo?

I mean, sometimes I feel like if I could just hit Pause for a few minutes (or hours)–freezing the rest of the world, not me–it’d give me a chance to run around like a madwoman and get my shit together, even slap on some lip gloss and smooth down my clothes before taking a deep cleansing breath through the nostrils, smiling serenely, then hitting Resume.

Wouldn’t that just rock?

Yesterday I totally needed Tivo Life functionality. We were at our local kiddie digs, Frog Park, and I was chatting with an extremely super duper pregnant woman. Kate ran up to us and asked her, “Do you have a baby in your belly?” to which she laughed and said “Yes! I do!” (I think she was in that nearly almost overdue get-this-thing-out-of-me phase. The Fourth Trimester, as it were.)

Anyway, then Kate looked up at me with a quizzical head tilt and asked, “How do they put babies in the belly, Mama?”

At which point I nearly swooned and needed to hold onto Huge Preg-o for support. Nearly.

Instead, several possible and seemingly inappropriate answers raced through my head, along with the thought “Why don’t I have a canned response ready? Why the hell am I so unprepared for this?” And also the thought, “She’s not even three, for God’s sake! Isn’t it a bit early for this question?!”

Thankfully, Large Pregster had waddled off to help her ecto-child who was experiencing some sort of monkey bar issue. So at least my stuttering, blathering answer would take place in relative privacy. But still. I needed that Tivo Pause button.

But then, in the next split second–since this dense stream of neurotic thoughts managed to whirl through my noggin at a furious pace–Kate squealed and pointed across the playground. “Look at that little dog!!” And like a blur she ran off to inspect a wee decrepit Chihuahua who was tied up to the fence, her question to me nearly instantly forgotten.

Uh, phew!

Having had some time to reflect upon this, I’m still utterly at a loss for how I’d answer her in an age-appropriate way. I’m hoping that the Friday Mama Posse will have some brilliance and insight to send my way. So cross your fingers that the question doesn’t resurface before then.

In the meantime, I think the obvious solution is to get a dog.

Mars and Venus

This weekend when I was chatting on the phone with my friend Mary, Kate asked if she could talk to her son, Will.

After their conversation, Kate handed the phone back to me and said disappointedly, “I wanted him to say more.”

On her end, Mary reported that Will said, “I told Kate all about my life.”

Typical, huh? Here’s the guy feeling like he’s bared his soul, and the girl just wishes he could open up to her a bit more.

Ah well, they’re three. They have plenty of time to work this stuff out.

Christmas Comes Early ‘Round Here

Would you be disgusted with the rabid state of consumerism in America if I were to tell you that a store I went to this weekend was already totally decked out for Christmas–trimmed trees, stocking stuffer point-of-sale bins, and carols blaring in the elevators? In September?!

Well, thankfully, I didn’t enter any such store. That would have just been ridiculous.(Though I’m sure there are some teddy bear laden trees already lurking in the basement at Macy’s.)

For an untimely hit of holiday spirit, I actually had to go no further than, well, my own house. And despite myself, I think I’m the one who brought it on.

You see, whenever we manage to find a children’s book author whose stories when read hundreds upon hundreds of times over don’t make Mark and I want to go on a wild book-burning spree,
I go onto Amazon and buy out everything that author has written. I mean, if one of his or her books has managed to totally unsuck, my assumption is the others may have their merits too.

We’re on an Arnold Loebel kick right now. He wrote these Frog and Toad books in the 70s, which aren’t much in terms of illustrative eye candy, but are sweet stories written in a quirky enough manner to entertain Mark and I. (The one about them not being able to stop eating cookies just slays us. As does Toad’s frequent depressive exclamation, “Blah.”)

The other children’s book rut we’re currently in is the Olivia books–introduced to us this summer by Daryl and Christian’s kids.

So on Saturday, along with a couple other things, Olivia Helps with Christmas arrived in the mail. Telling Kate we were going to put it away until a more seasonally appropriate time would have been like making her a huge hot fudge sundae, setting it on the table, then saying, “Oh, this isn’t to eat now.”

At this point, the entire family has nearly committed the book to memory.

And by the time I got up from my weekend-day-to-sleep-in on Sunday, Kate had apparently done some dumpster-diving in my orange childhood toy box. That’s where we keep toys we’ve gotten as gifts that scare Kate (or us), like the animatronic Tickle Me Elmo, unwieldy games we don’t need in constant rotation, and out-of-season holiday-themed books.

So, groggy from the decadence of what might actually have been too much sleep, I stumbled over that scratch and sniff book about Bear’s smelly Christmas on the floor of the white bathroom. We’ve since read, scratched, and sniffed it several dozen times. 

And late Sunday afternoon I walked by the living room to see Mark reading an enraptured Kate The Night Before Christmas. It was very sweet, but at some point soon I’m hoping I can sneak all the Santa stuff away for a while.

I don’t want to be a buzzkill about it. I mean, I like seeing a kid in his Spiderman costume in April as much as the next guy. I’m just not sure we can maintain the magic of Christmas around here for the next few months. And it would be such a shame to lose momentum around about mid-December.

Halloween’s in the Bag

Halloween is like black licorice–you either love it or hate it. I personally loathe black licorice but I ADORE Halloween.

What can I say? It’s a legitimate day upon which my inner showman can shine. If you’ve known me for more than say, three minutes, this I’m sure surprises you not in the least.

Hey, materialists get Christmas, romantics get Valentine’s Day, and folks like me get Halloween.

I don’t consider myself terribly competitive, but on Halloween no last-minute Walgreens caliber witch costume will suffice. In fact, if it ever got to me going that sad route, I’d rather just not participate. And unlike some folks who specialize in the gory, scary, or sexy, I don’t like to limit myself. I’ve dappled some in the scary realm, and intentionally steered clear of the costume-as-excuse-to-show-leg. I mean, anyone with a nice pair of stems and a little imagination can find a way to expose their assets. But the sexy pirate, the tavern wench, the 80′s slut, or the naughty devil get-ups not only offend me with their lack imagination–they’re just plain tacky.

Though bad taste comes in many forms. And some would argue that in my career of crafting costumes I’ve teetered on the brink of it myself. But as my old friend Andy Robinson says, “I’m not for everyone.”

If there’s any one theme, I’d say my costumes are most often reflective of the times. Like in 2004, I couldn’t resist a snarky ‘tribute’ to The Gipper. Wearing a sensible dark wool dress, a scalloped gold necklace and brooch, and a fluffy brunette wig in an effort to make my head appear as large as humanly possible, I was a mourning Nancy. I walked through the streets of the Castro—San Francisco’s dearly-departed Halloween epicenter—clutching a tri-folded American flag, sobbing into a hankie and crying out occasionally for “My Ronny.” Those gay boys who hated Reagan loved it.

My engineering masterpiece wasn’t a terribly original costume, Janet Leigh showering in Psycho. Its merits revolved around its construction. I rigged a piece of PVC pipe in a halo high above my head, from which I hung a plastic shower curtain and a large dummy arm clutching a bloody knife that swung at me. Mark–a non-lover of Halloween who graciously endures my antics—made a soundtrack loop of the famous “WAAH WAAH WAAH” sound effect and secured a micro cassette and little speakers somewhere along my back. Try listening to that for more than  five minutes without wanting to stab yourself. But, hey, that’s the kind of commitment I’m willing to make for a costume.

Which is to say I’ve also suffered my fair share of physical pain. Sure as kids we all had that annoying condensation build-up inside our plastic masks, or costumes that made sitting and certainly peeing an impossibility. But try lugging a hand-crafted sandwich board-sized Wheaties box with a oval cut out for your face to an evening of hi-jinx and debauchery (while trying to look cute and meet men). This I endured for my Olympic gymnast Kerri Strug costume, complete with the bandaged injured ankle she still vaulted her way to gold medal glory with. (Am I dating myself here? She made all the news back in ’96, trust me. Michael Phelps may we remember you 12 years from now…)

Anyway, all I can say is that costume delivered a facial ring of fire the likes of which I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. I also did a decent job of whacking people with the side of the box whenever I’d turn even slightly. Though my friend Kevin, dressed in a hastily-made but hilarious Bela Karolyi costume—which he perfected by sadistically barking heavily-accented gymnastic directives at me—did his best to guide me through crowds to avoid injuring innocent bystanders.

Some time in that same late 90′s era, horrified Noe Valley mothers pulled their children close to them on the sidewalk when they realized my blonde wig, pink satin dress, lace ankle socks, and Little Miss Denver sash was an overgrown imitation of recently-deceased pageant-rific JonBenet Ramsey. Young girls walked up to me cooing about princesses and their mother’s smiled, then blanched, and steered their innocents clear of me. And I don’t even think they noticed my excellent strangulation-bruising make-up job.

Ah JonBenet. That one was a classic. Those patent leather Mary Janes are still around in a box somewhere.

But really, the costumes over the years are like one’s children. How could you ever say you love one more than another?

Last year, more than 7 months preggy with Paigey, the timing was perfect for me to become one with Buddha. (Ask me if I’m still bitter that it didn’t garner a prize at the company party.) Needless to say, my rotund midsection fit the Buddha bill to perfection, but despite my best efforts at Ace-bandage bondage, I think I was a bit more buxom than would have been ideal.

So often it’s the timing that makes the difference between a good costume and a really offensive great one. Which is why while watching Kate and Paige playing from across the room yesterday I nearly squealed with excitement at the thought of two costumes that were spot-on for them.

All it’ll take is a brown dress, a little black hair dye on Kate, and maybe a bit of a trim–otherwise she’s ready to roll as a perfect Piper Palin. Of course, she’ll be cradling Miss Paige, playing Trig, and I’ll coach her to do that little spit on the fingers and hair-smoothing maneuver we saw at the RNC.

It’s perfect, right? I mean, how many people have kids the right age for this? Not to mention a mother with the utterly unflinching poor taste to pull such a thing off.

Of course, I wouldn’t ever really do this. For the costume to be truly authentic I’d need to surround the girls with a convention center’s worth of 9,000 or so utterly deranged mis-informed and asinine Republicans. And thankfully I couldn’t find that may conservatives in Northern California, even if for the sake of a damn good costume I wanted to.

What the 3-Year-Old Buddha Said

Yesterday upon hearing we were leaving a supremely fun birthday party, an overtired sugar-fed Kate began shrieking, “I want everything that I want!! I WANT EVERYTHING THAT I WANT!!”

If it weren’t for the fact that the host, our dear friend Megan, found it so hilarious, or that I was the one carrying the howling kicking terror, I’d have looked to the person next to me and asked, “Whose child is that?”

I am not my mother… I am not my mother…

For a while now Kate’s been all hopped up on hearing me tell stories about when I was a little girl. I’ve told her about vacations we took, playing in snowstorms, my sailing lessons, and the day we went to see the dog, Tramp, we ended up adopting. But by far of all the stories I’ve conjured from my past, the one Kate requests the most is the one about when my mother forgot to pick me up from school.

You see, my elementary school was across the street from my house. But my mother would still take me there–help me cross the street in the morning and fetch me at the end of the day because, of course, YOU NEVER CROSS THE STREET WITHOUT HOLDING MOMMY’S HAND. Right?

So, one day my mommy didn’t come to get me. All the other mommy’s and daddy’s came to pick up their kids. (I always include daddies when I tell Kate this story, but really, hell if a single dad performed this duty back then.) So, bereft that my mother had potentially left me and taken off on the Green Tortoise bus to California, or some such, I stood in the corner of the school yard and cried and cried and cried.

(She was likely on the order of four minutes late. But you know, kids and time and all that.)

So here I am crying.

“Then who came, Mommy? Then who came and saw you?”

Then, as I was standing there, a police man pulled up.

“In a police car, Mom?”

Yes, in a police car. And he said, “What’s wrong little girl.” And I told him about how my mother always picks me up from school but today she didn’t come get me. So, the nice police man asked me if I knew where I lived, and if I wanted him to give me a ride home.

“In the POLICE CAR, Mama?”

Yes, in the police car. Of course I felt super cool. So I get into the police car and I’m checking it all out and the police man asked me where I lived. And I pointed to the yellow house right across the street.

“Hahaha [fake laughter], that’s funny, Mama, right?” Kate says, not entirely understanding why it’s funny but knowing it’s supposed to be.

Yes, that is funny, Kate. But the police man didn’t laugh. He just asked me if I thought we should just drive around the block a couple times before he took me home. (No, he didn’t offer to put on the siren. But I took what I could get.)

Anyway, when we get to my house the police man rings the bell and through the window I saw my mother at the kitchen sink. She sees me and the police man, opens her mouth, looks at the clock over the stove, and runs to open the door while she’s drying her hands. She explains with immense embarrassment (as I stand smugly holding the policeman’s hand) that she had totally lost track of time and thank you SO MUCH officer, and of course that will never happen again.

Needless to say, my mother would have to endure several lifetimes before I’d ever let her live that one down. 

Anyway, I’ve managed to pass that old yarn down through a generation. And, like any kid, I could come up with a few other stories of minor maternal slip-ups. None of them truly damaging, neglectful, or malicious, but certainly things that collectively informed some of my “I’ll never do that” attitudes about my own mothering.

Like when my friend Steve told me he and his wife were expecting their first child. Nearly immediately after announcing the news he vowed he’d never do that spit on your thumb and clean your kid’s face move. So, you know, we all have our issues.

For me the “I won’t do thats” are more along the lines of forgotten field trip permission slips. My mother seemed to lack the gene for ever remember getting those in on time, leaving me to hold up more than a few field trips when a teacher flipping through a pile of papers at the front of the bus would mutter in dismay, “Oh wait… We don’t have one for Kristen Bruno. Again.”

Mom also thought nothing of leaving a sink full of dishes when we’d go see my grandmother for a few days. As for me, I can’t go to the bathroom with a dirty dish in the sink.

The other big thing I vowed to never fall prey to was lateness. Four girls, one mother, and one shower–and our collective estrogen level–made it understandably difficult getting out of the house en masse. Late, loud and clumsy arrivals tended to be a Bruno family hallmark. They gave grumpy Father Coffey a legitimate reason to leer over his pulpit, and me a legitimate reason to swear that my own family would assuredly be different some day.

Today, with Grandma Peggy here providing two extra hands, Googled driving directions, and a departure time mapped out that’d give Kate plenty of time to suss out the scene and fluff up her tutu before her first dance class–we set out. Well, I didn’t actually print out the directions, just skimmed them. I did write down the address. But before long it was apparent that I had no idea where I was going.

An exit off the highway dumped me into an unfamiliar neighborhood (stress spike), though I managed to quickly get back on in the other direction (manic upswing), to quickly realize it was the totally wrong highway altogether (flop sweat). I fumbled around in the backseat with one hand trying to wrench my phone out of the diaper bag. I considered calling the dance studio for directions, then Mark (for directions and sympathy), then just trying to figure it out on my own.

The clock ticked away minutes closer and closer to the class’ 9AM start time. I did a lot of muttering under my breath and a couple seemingly safe u-turns, though my mother-in-law  was gripping the side of the car door white-knuckled. She politely kept offering to “do whatever she could to help”–no doubt ending that sentence in her mind with “just get me there alive.”

All the while I lambasted myself over how Kate would miss getting a good start to her new class. Meeting the teacher, hearing the rules, getting oriented with the other kids. Was I remembering all the first classes I got to late? You bet your ass I was.

Did I think about the first bat mitzvah I was invited to? Where my mother drove me to the one synagogue she ever remembered seeing in Providence, where I threw open the doors to an empty temple, then returned to the car–which was of course devoid of the invitation–where we continued to drive around the city asking pedestrians if they knew of any synagogues nearby, until finally, after a teeth-grinding grand tour of no less than five synagogues we found Cheryl’s family and friends pouring out onto the sidewalk at the end of her ceremony? (Don’t worry, I didn’t miss the Blue Jeans Disco Dance at the Marriott after.)

Anyway, as I was driving around hell and gone Oakland with my mother-in-law, and baby, and three-year-old who was asking “Where’s my dance class, Mama?” yes, yes, yes, I was thinking about all that.

Eventually my own Guardian Angel Direction-Dispensing Pedestrian pointed us in the direction of MacArthur Boulevard. And despite a long series of palm-sweating steering wheel squeezing red lights, we slowly made progress in the right direction.

Blah blah blah. We eventually got there ten minutes late. Surprisingly, I hadn’t blown a neck artery, and Peggy hadn’t peed her pants from fear of my driving or my rabid must-get-there-on-time wild-eyed determination.

Peggy pumped money into the meter, holding Paige on one hip, and I grabbed Kate and ran down the sidewalk into the dance studio. When we regrouped after Kate joined the class Peggy kindly made a “we’re a little late but no harm done” remark.

Indeed, it didn’t appear that Kate’s lateness affected her
in any long term psyche-scarring way. Though I guess it’s too soon to
tell. It’ll take a few more times of us skidding in after the bell before she makes her own resolve to never do all the things that I do when she has her own family some day.