92 1/2 years.  What a remarkable feat.  The average life expectancy in the United States is 78 years.  When my grandfather was 78, he was still driving his Buick down to Joe’s Variety to pick up his lottery tickets everyday. One of my favorite things I’ve ever heard him say, was this past July when he made the trip to Pennsylvania to stay with my brother in the hills of Greenpoint.  He sat at the breakfast table and motioned to his oatmeal.  With as much emotion as one can muster while talking about their oatmeal he exclaimed to my sister in law, “You think I like eating this shit?”  He was as no nonsense as it gets. I still remember when he stopped dressing up for our family get togethers.  My grandmother would gripe and complain and insist that he change out of his quilted flannel and he would remain poised and unrelenting.  He wasn’t trying to impress one single person.  He had lived too long for any of that.  I can’t wait to finally not care what anyone thinks. To earn my rite to sit at the head of the Thanksgiving table in my 25 year old blue jeans and just take a nap.

As a young girl, trips to visit my grandparents were a sheer delight.  Not only would I be adorned with a fresh school wardrobe, but I had access to all I could eat fruit loops and my absolute favorite, soft fresh loaves of Edy’s Rye bread.  I was devastated the day I came to learn that the old miser in my gramps had finally taken over and he decided that Edy’s rye bread was too expensive, Shop Rite had a better deal.  He had created an addict and to this day I still pick up half a dozen loaves of that rye bread whenever I come to town.

My Gramps was exceedingly generous towards his grand children.  He was constantly looking for reasons to give us money.  I often felt great guilt about the money he would give to me.  I would comb his hair for 10 or 15 minutes while he watched the Price is Right and he would give me 20 bucks!  Thats a lot to me at age 32 and it was grand riches when I was 10 years old.

It wasn’t until I was much older that I realized what it was that my Gramps had done as a career.  My dad would explain to me when I was young that it was Gramps’ responsibility to keep everything going and keep everyone happy at one of the finest restaurants of its time.  I still recall going to eat at Rapp’s Paradise Inn, long after my Grandfather had retired.  I sensed that everything from the table setting to the wait time to the temperature of the lobster tail was under the close scrutiny of his watchful eye, because , of course, nothing would ever be as good as it had been when he ran the place.  A few years ago I stumbled upon a newspaper article in his house wherein he, the maitre d of this popular dining establishment, was being interviewed.  The reporter was asking him about the different types of drinks that people order from the bar and what it said about them.  I wish I still had the article because I found his responses surprisingly entertaining.  My favorite part was when he mentioned that a woman sitting by herself at the bar was always trouble.  Truer words were never spoken.

One of my most treasured memories of my Gramps took place when I was about 11 years old.  I had come to stay with my grandparents for a week over the summer.  I was playmates with the little girl next door, a nice catholic girl…her family kept a pristine sitting room in their house like nothing I had ever seen, coming from my home with five children and no use for such a fancy space.  She told me that we weren’t allowed to go in there because it was for “If the pope ever came to visit.”  We were sitting on her back deck when I must have mentioned something about my father having gone to jail in recent years (allow me to say that in having 5 of my own children, I’ve come to realize that kids need to talk about what’s going on in their personal life as much as anyone else, whether it makes me look good as a parent or not.)  My grandmother had apparently been eaves dropping from the bedroom window of their home.  She immediately called me into the house and made it very clear that there are certain things we don’t need to be so eager to share.  I went to my bedroom in tears.  Now, I can understand.  The family name was at stake.  Her pride in her family was shaken by my candid chit chat with the neighbor girl about the undeniable reality of her sons’ life choices.  While I sat on the edge of my bed, looking out the window, crying the kind of cry that takes over your entire body, I didn’t even hear him come in the room. My Gramps slipped onto the bed beside me and put his arm around me, drew me close.  He didn’t say much, just told me it was alright and held me near. It was, and will remain, the most tender moment I have ever shared with my Grandfather.

92 1/2 years.  I have to imagine that my Gramps had experienced emotions during those years that there are not yet names for.  The feeling of being one of the last of all your friends to be breathing.  The feeling of outliving your sons and your wife.  The feeling of losing track of all the grand babies and great grand babies you have. During the years that my dad lived with Gramps and helped care for him, he told me that he had observed that as a person ages, it is as if they become like a child again.  While many of us want to imagine ourselves living to a ripe old age, no-one wants to picture themselves being hoisted into their bed with a lift or not being able to make it to the bathroom or living in a cloud of confusion and frustration.  A complete loss of the dignity that we believed at some point was our right.  My Grandfather had done it all.  He felt the sea breeze on his face while cruising in the North Pacific Ocean during his time in the navy. He beheld the beauty of the Aleutian Islands and spoke of them as if he had just returned.  He built his home from the ground up with his bare hands.  He won the lottery more times than I’ll ever know, in more than one way. He lived through wars and depressions and unspeakable grief. My memories of my grandfather will always be of his strength and his wisdom and the brightness of his eyes while he watched his grandchildren playing at our family gatherings.

One of my children was disappointed to have to miss a spring concert today that they had been preparing for and working hard for months to present with their schoolmates. Sensing the disappointment, I explained that no-one ever WANTS to go to a funeral. It’s never ideal. It never seems to happen at a good time.  But when it does, when someone you love and respect has completed their mission on this plane of existence, it is time to reflect upon them and to honor them. I informed my child that if it weren’t for their great grandfather, they would not be here. We are who we are because of who he was. He has left his imprint on every person here. We will forever be better, stronger, wiser, more generous and loving people because in his 92 1/2 years…his life happened to touch our own. Gramps. We honor you. We thank you.

Thursday, April 28th…I pick the kids up from school and Iris has tears in her eyes.  She claims she has had a stomach ache ALL DAY.  She mentions that at one point she was on the floor, resting her head on the seat of her chair.  I asked why the school nurse didn’t contact me?  She insists that the nurse touched her head with “a thing” and told her there was nothing wrong with her.  This was a bit disheartening simply because Iris loves school and she isn’t a huge faker…and I wondered how the nurse and teacher aren’t also aware of this.  We went home and she missed her piano practice and passed out on the couch.

Friday, April 29th…4AM…I am awakened by Max, screaming through the upstairs.  I go to him, bring him back to bed and nurse him.  Within 10 minutes he is back in his crib.  I lay down on my pillow, that I thought was my friend.  My eyes are closed when I hear Owen ask if he can climb in bed with us.  Chris is extremely talented at NOT LETTING OWEN IN OUR BED.  I, however…am not.  I imagine, like our 3 older children…soon enough he will not be interested in crawling in our warm blankets and finding comfort from the long night.  He is permitted.

Friday, April 29th…6AM…Iris has entered the room and walked to Chris’ side of the bed to audibly cry that her belly hurts.  I am uncomfortably positioned as close to the edge of the bed as I can be while still remaining in the bed.  I attempt to sit up to assist the crying child, but it feels as though my neck just might be broken.  Pain.  Pain in the neck…literally.  I cannot sit up.  This is a familiar pain that has plagued me a few other times in my life.  Most likely my pillow was not supporting my neck properly for those last two hours of slumber…and now I’m experiencing a pinched nerve or something.  With my head still laying on the pillow like a pile of bricks, I turn the rest of my body and pseudo spin off the bed and I am then able to drag my head, while it is fully bent forward (the only position that doesn’t hurt) and I rise to my feet.  I alert Chris that we have a code red and that he needs to get up…immediately.  Iris climbs into our bed and now two people who are not the owners of our bed…are sleeping in our bed.  I barely muscle to my phone to call my chiropractor…out of the office till Monday.  The last time this happened, it was so tense the first day of the injury that he couldn’t help anyway.  A day of belly aches and ADVIL and icy hot were in my future.  Iris slept most of the morning and watched an old 80″s movie (per Chris’ suggestion) the rest of the day.

Saturday, April 30th…Chris is home in the morning but will be leaving shortly to go bid 3 drywall jobs.  He is scouting out the bacon and I must be understanding, for I too like bacon and he happens to be better at finding it than me.  I am not, however, excited to be navigating the unnavigatable ship that holds 5 of the most unruly shipmates one could ask for.  Our friends who own a piece of recreational camp land are hosting a “work day at camp”.  Even with my immobile neck, I am aware that if I simply make it to camp…my kids will find tasks and adventures to keep them busy.  While cleaning up flood debris and “camping out” under a bridge, Iris steps on a rusty nail.

Perfect.  No we don’t have Tetanus shots, because I’m one of those idiots who imagines their babies eyes rolling back in their head while their body seizes and frankly the cocktail of Diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus all swirled together makes me a little nervous. AND Chris had a bad reaction to the shot when he was young so I was basically waiting for something like this to happen that would force me into getting the shot for the kids.   Naturally, because Iris has never received a shot before, she immediately starts softly crying to herself while she eavesdrops on my conversation with her dad on the phone.  In all my reading, I learned that its usually within 3-20 days after the infection that Tetanus sets in.  Since the family doc was closed for the weekend we monitored the wound closely.

Sunday, May 1st…we go to church, then to our favorite Indian food buffet and then home, to putz around and hold my neck very still.  I am looking forward to going to my chiropractor as soon as the sun comes up on Monday morning.

Monday May 2nd…I drop the children off at school and drive around with Max in his carseat until he falls asleep and I head to my chiropractor’s office for a 9:30 appointment.  I lug the gigantic forward facing carseat into the waiting room with me in an attempt to keep Max asleep.  Unfortunately, two extremely enthusiastic grandparents were shout-talking and sharing pictures of their grandchildren.  I felt half tempted to ask if they would like an extra grandchild to care for while I had may neck adjusted, for it was only moments later that Max woke up.  I kept him detained while my neck was placed back where it belonged.  He sat like an angel, a gift that I am exceedingly thankful for, as I have trouble having my neck cracked while someone in the room is screaming.  That tiny 20 minute nap just so happened to mess up the rest of the day for Max and I.  If you have a 14 month old or have ever had one, you know that the nap schedule can be very delicate.  He only went to sleep at 1 that afternoon and when 3:15 rolled around, I found myself standing on the sidewalk, looking in all directions for a warm body to stand guard at my home while I picked up the other 4 kids from school.  No dice.  Neighbors weren’t home and it felt too “bad parenty” to ask the person sitting in their parked car to “watch my house” while I picked up my other kids.  So I woke him up and he wasn’t happy and he was even less happy at Flynn’s baseball game that evening.  I didn’t imagine that my family could get on people’s nerves at a baseball game, where you assume its ok to take kids, but we were successful at receiving more than 2 or 3 nasty glares from people who just didn’t want to listen to our toddler cry or our 7 year old son and his 10 year old sister wrestle on a blanket and they definitely weren’t crazy about the fort our five year old was building on the bleachers…all while the parents tried to be interested in their OTHER son’s baseball game.  Extra circular activities don’t feel meant for large families.  Homeward bound…and exhausted as hell.

Tuesday May 3rd…the tiny puncture where the nail went into Iris’ foot is looking red.  I waste no time, we are scheduled for 11:30 Mother/Daughter Tetanus Shots!  She was so terrified that I told her I would go first (I haven’t had one since college, so why not?!)  Of course when we arrive the receptionist tells me there is something wrong with some words printed on our insurance cards.  They insist that unless their practice is listed as the Primary Care Physician…they can’t see us.  This was a mistake, we had just received new insurance cards and they chose our PCP for us and I didn’t even notice.  I insisted that we have never gone to any other doctor’s office EVER and I wasn’t sure how this happened.  I proceed to call our insurance and wait while they change the information in their system and then hand my phone to the receptionist so they can be like “BLAH BLAH BLAH”…”OK…BLAH BLAH BLAH.”  We are taken into the exam room, where they begin prepping Iris for her “VACCINATION!!!”

I mention, “Actually, I was going to get mine first, just so she could see that it isn’t a big deal..”  The nurse responds, “Oh, didn’t they tell you…yours was cancelled.  You can’t just ‘get a tetanus shot’…I mean, when was your last one?”  I’m confused…how else do you get a Tetanus shot than to “just get one”.  “My last one was in college, maybe 12 years ago…”   She goes on, “Well I’ll ask, but I don’t think it will be approved.”  WHATEVER.  The nurse returns a few moments later and says the Nurse Practitioner is running behind and they are going to go ahead and give us our shots.  Maybe that’s how you “just get a Tetanus shot”…come when they’re running behind schedule and they’ll just DO IT!  Iris watched while I held Max with one arm and they stabbed me in the other.  I didn’t even feel it.  Her turn.  She turns her head away from the prepared needle and dramatically places her hand over her eyes to hide her tears.  By the time she was done with this swift, expressive motion, so also was the shot.  She couldn’t believe it.  We were outta there and eating some horrible Wendy’s fries in no time.

Wednesday May 4th…Nothing considerable to report on, aside from endlessly dismal weather.  The kind of weather that you don’t even think is bothering you until your five year old says, “I miss the sun.”  So did I.  Where did the sun go?  The largest positive to the horrible weather was that baseball practices and games kept being cancelled, taking otherwise stressful evenings of trying to feed people by 5 O’clock and bundle up for long evenings outdoors and instead placed us all inside, to draw and play games and ALMOST MURDER ONE ANOTHER!  The winter was too long.  We all want to be outside.

Thursday May 5th…Aside from the bum out forecasts, another thing that had been deeply effecting my mood was the consistent smell of heating oil in our home.  Since last fall when our rusty heating oil tank decided to finally fail us and leak fuel all over the basement floor, we have been dealing with a light aroma of the fowl stench here and there as Chris would have to transfer some into the tank, only up to the rusted point, to keep the hot water flowing.  This week he decided to unhook all the fittings in preparation to hook up the new tank.  The smell gave me this depressed feeling about cleaning my house.  Why bother cleaning a house that stinks like heating oil?  It made me want to evacuate with Max everyday.  I mentioned a few times how much the smell bothered me, and that maybe it was even giving me a headache but I’ve found that sometimes the people in my life need me to get out “My Megaphone”…or else I’m just not taken seriously.  Chris set up a vent fan to draw some of the smell out of the basement until he could get around to closing everything back up. That was nice.  I expressed my appreciation.

Friday May 6th…My sister in law is an exceedingly talented massage therapist and she had caught wind of my recent neck injury and she sent me a text wherein she offered to help me out in the stiff neck department.  I responded to her that she was welcome to stop by, but that I really needed to stay home and get some stuff done.  I had been away from the house everyday that week, messing up Max’s delicate nap schedule and I was suffering the repercussions.  Around lunch time, I got a call from the school nurse that Iris had fallen on the roller skating field trip and she thought that her wrist needed to be looked at by a doctor.  (So much for spending a day at home.)  Chris was working locally so he picked her up while I called the family doctor.  A 1:30 appointment.  I couldn’t imagine that her wrist was broken because she was handling it like a champ, and she could move her fingers pretty well.  I asked if there was anyway Chris could stay home while Max napped and then possibly pick the other kids up if this took a long time.  “Sorry hun, I just can’t.”  Join the club.  This is where I will briefly mention that being a mother can feel quite lonely at times.  You have created a person or GROUP of people and at times all their needs run together.  Meeting their needs is a job that I only feel comfortable asking my husband and maybe a relative or two to help with.  Call it a defect of mine, but it is just how I am.  This is going to change soon.  Soon I will be posting a Facebook announcement about how badly I would like to go on a date with my husband for his birthday and I will be asking for any and all qualified babysitters to come out of the woodwork.  This is what normal people do, I think.  So Iris and Max and I head for the doctor’s office.  “WE’RE BACK!” I jovially exclaim as the same nurse practitioner who saw us on Tuesday steps into the room.

 We are sent for X-Rays across the hall and then given a disc with her images on it.  I have come to realize that when you are “given the disc” it is because something is wrong and you shall take that disc with you on your future medical journeys.  We are taken back into the original exam room where we are told the wrist is broken.  I was incredibly surprised, as I looked at Iris, balancing the wrist on an old tablet from her dad’s work truck.  They were out of slings so we were sent away with the same grubby tablet we came with, holding the hand steady upon it.  I was asked to sit down with the referral department, but unfortunately the other 3 kids needed picked up very shortly and there just wasn’t time.  They told me they would call me.  (Insert down pouring rain while I attempt to get the freshly maimed Iris and her baby brother into the vehicle…the normal things I rely on Iris for, buckling herself, closing her door, she cannot perform.  I finish running all around the vehicle, securing everyone and turn to load the stroller…it has blown to the end of the parking lot in the downpour.  Insert also, me not loving any of this.) Around five that evening I am told to take Iris to an urgent care facility to have the wrist splinted for the weekend until we can have it casted on Monday. That night we ordered pizza and listened to our kids complain that they would have rather had Chinese.

Saturday May 7th…I get up and make waffles and Chris leaves to complete a few hours of local work.  I take the kids to the park where we bask in the partly cloudy skies, teasing us with the occasional ray of sunshine.

When Chris returns I take 2 of the boys to the thrift store to get some bike helmets.  Flynn finds a pair of those God forsaken sneakers with wheels in the heels that are basically another broken wrist waiting to happen.  We spend the afternoon in the parking lot…that we live in…on our bicycles and end the night with Uncle Ben and Aunt Mare roasting hotdogs in the back yard.  The neighbor girl sleeps over and aside from a super messy house, I feel thankful at the end of the day.

Sunday May 8th…Mother’s Day.  I’ve started telling people that I don’t recognize the holiday.  It is fully man made, like most (ALL) holidays and I used to feel entitled to some type of honor or homage and then Chris said to me, “You aren’t my mother…”  True.  And my relationship with my own mother has proven to be quite rocky over the past few Mother’s Days.  So I’ve found that expecting nothing is a much better approach to these types of things.  I much prefer to act as if it isn’t even happening.  My kids definitely pull through in the hand made cards and pictures department EVERYDAY OF THE YEAR, so if nothing is produced on Mother’s Day, its never been a big deal.  Iris did make me a super sloppy drawing of a heart that read “Sorry, I’m right handed”

 That really made my day.  I will say though, that I like to use this made up holiday as an excuse to not change a diaper occasionally.  So I wake up like any other day, cuddle Max, holler at people to get ready for church.  I sat at my little desk in our room to jot something down when Chris presented me with a small envelope.  I am astonished.  I open it.  A gift card for a massage and facial at a local Brazilian Spa.  WHAT?!  It says “From Max”…I knew that fat little baby would be my PAYDAY!

This is quite pleasing, especially because I expected nothing…I’m telling you, its the way to GO!  We go to church, go eat Indian food (I know, we have to skip a week or they are going to ask us to stop coming) and then we went to a Lancaster Barnstormers game with the kids + a friend of Iris’ (what’s one more?)  Chris and I took turns sitting with Flynn near the first base line while he desperately waited to catch a foul ball

and manning the other 5 at the play area that is a blessing to any parent who has ever tried to take little children to a baseball game.  The sun was so sunny and the breeze was so refreshing.  This was a perfect day.  If I did celebrate Mother’s Day, this was a good one.  We were about to leave the ball field when I received word that my 92 1/2 year old grandfather had died…on this, the Mother’s Day that I don’t even celebrate.  It was his time, he had lived a long life…but more than the actual passing of the old man, it stirs up so much emotion about how things change.  They never stop changing.  I spent my life going to visit he and my Grandmother in Connecticut, several times a year.  We would roughhouse in his carpeted basement until someone surely got hurt and I combed his hair for money and he let us eat colorful cereal that we never saw any other time. In November we went to visit for Thanksgiving.  He spoke with my kids about his time serving in the navy and shared pictures with us and it felt really special.

I sensed that we might not ever see him again.  My own father died in my Grampa’s basement, tragically and much too young…three years ago at the age of 60.  My Grandfather has buried almost ever person near to him, his two sons and his wife, survived now by his daughter, my aunt and his grandkids (8) and his great grandkids (14).  His passing will be the end of an integral part of who I am.  Another piece of my life, my childhood, my foundation…gone forever…left with only bits to tell stories of and photos to share.  Nothing can stay as it is.  Nature will not have it, and so we must not be foolish and take for granted what we have right before us…for someday it will be as distant as the sun.

Hindsight being 20/20, I can honestly say that my last week felt a lot like a shitty diaper.  Some diapers that you change are surprisingly pleasant, a nice solid bowel movement with very little clean up.  And some are what I like to call “Up the back, down the legs” kinda diapers.  This week was an  “Up the back, down the legs”.  You know there are things to be thankful for, like “At least I’m not wearing white pants.” Or “I’m so glad my baby’s systems are all functioning.” And you know that you will get things cleaned up, even if it takes rubber gloves and a power washer and a box of OxyClean.  Things are going to be OK.  They have to be.  But sometimes it’s nice to write a lengthy blog post about how shitty life can feel.

And thankfully, broken bones heal.

Owen is breathing softly beside my bed, in the darkness at 4 AM.  Little does he know, I was just awake with the baby…so I was laying there waiting for it…”Mom…can I sleep in your bed?”  Lately I can’t ever find a reason to say no…not initially…not since Max is sleeping thru the night more often.  The swiftness of Max’s maturity has reminded me of how quickly these years go.  It makes me think that maybe Owen got the shaft.

He was the last of a line of four kids.  By the time he came along I had twin 4 year olds and a 2 year old sapping all that I had to give.  My stress-o-meter was reading somewhere around “MAX CAPACITY”.  Looking back…I can’t believe I got thru it.  It was no award winning performance…but I’ve lived to tell of it.  I remember crying on the edge of the bed a lot.  Those days are a little more distant feeling now.  Things are still hard, but its a different kind of hard.  I can handle this hard.  This hard is the consistent position of reasoning with the unreasonable and walking beside them while they try out all their own terrible ideas…and maybe keeping a first aid kit on my person at all times.  This hard doesn’t feel as one sided.  Hard with babies is a helpless kind of hard.  If you can’t make them stop crying then you CANT MAKE THEM STOP CRYING…what can you really do?  I’ve learned to lay that baby down and walk away…feeling helpless but OK.  Low and behold, they went to sleep…they just wanted you to leave them alone.  This knowledge only comes with experience, which is why Max has felt like my favorite baby.  Not because of Max, but because of me.  I know me better.  I know what I can and can’t handle.  Forcing myself to hold the screaming baby while 3 other kids need my help didn’t do any of us any good.  I can read a baby better now than I could 5 years ago.  I’ve gotten a chance to get far enough away from something to have some perspective and then I’ve gotten a chance to try it again.  It’s really a treat.

Naturally there is some remorse for being impatient and snappy with my other children when they were younger, and they know that I’m always looking for new ways to manage the stress that 5 kids can help manifest (yoga, mindfulness exercises, mommy timeouts, taking 10 slow deep breaths, sitting with a blanket over my head, eat.)  It’s important for me to have honest communication with my kids.  I try not to make it that they feel responsible for the way that i’m feeling.  Sometimes I say things like, “All four of you guys are telling me things at the same time and I can’t hear even one of you clearly and it is making my head feel explodey.”  What they do with that information is up to them, but at least i’ve said my part.  So sometimes I feel that Owen got me during the height of my “STRESSD OUT YEARS”.  Poor guy.

SO there is Owen, in the darkness.  I tell him he can hop in.  He moves 1000 times more than is necessary in order to get himself situated.  My eyes are closed.  Silence.  30 seconds of silence.  I am dozing off, after my half hour intermission with Max and the bathroom.

“Mom, can we make gluten free pancakes in the morning and can I help you make them?” His soft whisper shows me that he’s trying to be considerate of his sleeping parents…but not considerate enough to just go to sleep.

Imagining that a speedy answer could bring my slumber back, “Sure.  But only if we get up early enough.”

I’m reminded of how big he is getting when I feel his toes all the way down at my shin.  I turn toward him and put an arm around him.

“Mom, I still gotta do my homework.” He comes home with roughly 2 minutes of homework per evening and we usually get it done right away…yesterday we took Iris to piano lessons and then went to the Farmers market and then back to pick Iris up and then to the grocery store and then to the park and then we had supper and then the neighbor boys came over for treehouse/campfire action and those 2  homework minutes slipped through the cracks.

“It’s ok.  We’ll have time in the morning.” I whisper back.

Silence.  My eyes are heavy.

“Mom, do you know I know how to spell NAIL?”

I turn away from him.  May it discourage any further communication.  “Yes.”

“No mom, ask me how to spell NAIL…” still whispering.  So considerate.

“Hey buddy, if you want me to get up to make pancakes and help you with homework then we need to go to sleep…or you can go back to your bed.”

“Oh. Okay.” It’s official.  We go to sleep.

Lately he has been walking around the house singing “I LIKE BIG BUTTS AND I CANNO LIE!”  He only knows that one line of the song, THANK GOD.  I believe he told me he heard it on some cartoon movie.  It’s not a big deal, except that I would rather hear him sing something else.  It’s a catchy tune to I tried to help a modified phrase naturally make its way into that little brain.  On my first try, coming up with something that rhymed with “BUTTS” I went with “PEANUTS”.

“Hey Owen, how about ‘I LIKE PEA-NUTS AND I CANNOT LIE!”  He seemed cool with it…until it fully backfired on me.  It didn’t feel natural to leave out the word “BIG” so now it just sounds like he’s singing “I LIKE BIG PENIS AND I CANNOT LIE!”

Well, that worked out.  Im realizing that a lot of times, my over involvement tends to make things worse.

Last Saturday we were entertaining four good friends, and the boys had a friend sleeping over while Iris was away for the weekend.  I could tell that Owen was fading as 10 o clock approached.  I intercepted his sleepy gaze and asked if he’d like to go read a book and get in bed (when older kids are hanging out I find I have to treat it like a cool, fun thing to go to bed when NOONE else is going yet…a book and a brief cuddle help ease the transition.)  We went to the bathroom so that he could brush his teeth.  Fully adorned in his Spider-Man underwear, he marches over to sink and steps up on the stool…leans as close as he can to the mirror.  Adjusting head in the light, looking closely from different angles.

“Whatcha doin?

“I’m just checkin to see if I have any hair on my face.  There is a boy in my class who has a mustache…I wanted to see if I have one.”

I couldn’t contain the smile on my face.  I took the mental picture of all mental pictures.  My five year old, straining to locate a hope, a shred, a glimmer of peach fuzz on his upper lip.  He nodded off before we were half way thru the first book, because…thankfully…he isn’t as big as he thinks he is.

A few years ago I wrote “a children’s book” using Owen as the star.  I wanted Chris to illustrate it, because while I’m great at folk arty-vintagey-70’s inspired furniture art, Chris is an amazing fine artist.  I pictured it being done in water color.  He loved the idea and that morning before he left for work he said “Sure, you write it and I’ll illustrate.”  I called him at 11 o’ clock and told him I had written it.  He didn’t like that.  He attempted to begin illustrations that evening and quickly lost patience.  I would have also.  Especially when you are used to being paid for your time and when you aren’t, you’re surrounded by little kids who mostly want to get physical with you.  But I would love to share this little tribute i wrote to The O Man.

Quit Growin’ Owen!

I know a little boy named Owen.  He is just small, but everyday he is growin.

He used to stand wide eyed and watch his brothers ride bike, but you could sense there was something about this that he just didn’t like.

As soon as he learned about training wheels, all you could hear were his tires squeal.

His hair was once short but soon it grew and it curled. As he sped through the streets his mane whipped and it whirled.

Every day theres a tune he would carry.  While it always sounded the same, the lyrics would vary.

Somedays he would sing about grandmas and flowers, other days about brothers with super powers.

At dinner each night, between his “Nom-Nom”, he would turn and politely say “Thanks for making this yummy food, Mom.”

When he began to grow tired and the world seemed less grand, he had a favorite treat…the middle two fingers on his left hand.

No matter the day or the house or the town…one thing was for certain…this boy wasn’t slowing down.

So at night before bed, his mama would beg..

As she squished him and squashed him to slow down the pace, of his wild growth that felt like a race.

What more could she do to get this thing slowin?! Nothing but beg, “QUIT GROWIN OWEN!”

He is like no one I’ve ever met.  I feel so blessed to have been a partial vehicle in his creation.  You are loved and adored Owen.  Thanks for being mine.

It’s 8:43PM.  The kids are catching onto the well lit world around them that lasts well into the 7th and even the 8th hour of the evening.  Its getting harder to get an 8 o clock bedtime to happen as the summer months quickly approach.  Once we finally get all 5 locked and loaded, Chris sets up a study station at the kitchen table.  I come down for my nightly (NOT EVERY NIGHT!!) bowl of ice cream and I see him there.  WOMP WOMP WOMP.  No House Of Cards for us.  It’s nearing the end of the semester and he is busting his hump to keep his 4.0 to place favorably for clinicals as his nursing school endeavor continues.  Sometimes I just wonder at him.  He forces me to ask myself if I could ever do it.  Could I go back to school to make a better life for us…could I do years and years of hard work to change our life forever?  If you are lucky enough to be with a partner who prompts you to ask yourself hard questions…just because of who they are…then you know what a bitch it can be.  Lets say you just want to curl up in bed and be your usual lazy slob self with your bowl of ice cream, but they say to you…”Hey, I gotta do at least two hours here…you wanna sit here with me?  Maybe you could write while I do this?”  Awe F@#$.  I guess I’ll pound his bowl of ice cream and harness the energy from the sugar while The Strokes blast in my ear buds and I’ll write about absolutely nothing…nothing that is our life…nothing that is our sacred essence…nothing that is the complete perfect beauty of what we have been creating together since we were 15 years old.  I won’t mention that we listed our house for sale last week and then this week after realizing how stressful it would be to be parenting 5 kids and doing college and running a drywall business and potentially selling a house…we immediately unlisted it.  I won’t mention that we are both as fickle as the weather and the only thing that we have ever been truly sure of is our love for one another.  I won’t mention that at least once a week for the past 3 weeks he has called me in the middle of his work day and asked me to tell him that everything will be “OK”.  I won’t let on that it was hard for me to tell him that everything WILL be “OK”.  We both know it will be fine, good, great, OK.  It doesn’t always feel that way.  It doesn’t feel like we’ll ever get out of this city, where our kids are growing up in a parking lot and occasionally scratching cars with their bike handles.  It doesn’t feel like we’ll ever get the break we are wishing would come.  It feels like we’ll be in our starter home forever…but I’m here to tell ME something.  And that something is SHUT UP.  SHUT UP YOU SELFISH, SMALL MINDED DUMBY.  You have more than most people and your tiny home is regularly filled with not only the 6 people you love most, but lots of others too!  Aside from an obvious gluten allergy and maybe a lazy eye, we are all healthy and prospering.  WE ARE THE AMERICAN DREAM!  We have a future and a hope and lots to look forward to, and we are doing the hard work to ensure that eventually it will happen.  Here I sit, keeping the company of the man who has more energy and drive and ambition and heart than I do…and it is a privilege.  Aside from filling a crock pot and doing the laundry and lactating when its needed, I don’t feel I bring a lot to the table, but thankfully Chris doesn’t seem to be keeping track.  But if he needs me to, I’ll eat another bowl of ice cream and use that energy to write another long winded paragraph, documenting the mishmash of our everyday.  Mr. Krouse, you are my king.

I found this draft buried a few pages deep under other drafts and I loved it enough to share it…Enjoy.

December 2014

Sunday morning.  Chris at the kitchen sink, washing the pots and pans, loading the dishwasher.  I’m preparing frozen hash browns to go  in the preheated oven.  The stone pan I need is beneath the stove, a kitchen accessory location I’ve had to reconsider since the third trimester and the return of that old familiar “I’m an orbiting planet” feeling.  There isn’t much space between the stove and the kitchen table…especially with four kids having their way around the place. Now add me hovering in a struggling (that stoneware is some heavy sh*#) bent forward position.  I’m asking for it every time I invert the upper portion of my top heavy body at this point.  And once I end up on the floor, I might stay down a while…scrub a cupboard stain or collect some stray cheerios.  Needless to say, once I’m bent over, I’m going to stay that way until I’ve accomplished whatever it is I’ve set out to do, down there, below my waist.  So basically it can be a real set back…the stoneware location. While bent forward, wrestling pans and maneuvering around my drastically pronounced front bump, I hardly budge as I feel Chris urgently trying to squeeze between 3 and half feet of pregnant, contorted road block and the big old harvest table.  I’m naturally knocked forward a bit as he makes a way for himself to get to the trashcan directly on the other side of me.  It was gentle enough.  If I had to choose a way to be knocked headfirst into my kitchen oven, it would be that way.  Urgently and abrupt while still seeming like it could have been a lot worse.  I get the baking pan loose and he reaches the garbage can and the world is upright again and the thick, bacon scented air of the kitchen fills with the sound of Chris’ voice, apologizing for nearly knocking his bent over, pregnant wife down in her own kitchen.  “Sorry about that.  I had a handful of crap from the sink drain in my hand and it was dripping and I was trying to get to the garbage can.”  He didn’t need to explain.  Anyone like us, who is primitive enough to NOT have a garbage disposal in their kitchen sink knows well what that handful of wet noodles and oats and meat bits and ricecrispies and diced tomatoes and bag twisties feels like.  Perhaps you understand the feeling of a soggy cheerio attempting escape through your thumb and index finger.  There is a sense of urgency to complete this specific kitchen chore with finesse and efficiancy and accuracy.  I tell him not to worry about it.  I know what that’s about. You don’t want that handful longer than you have to have it.  You won’t answer the door holding that stuff, or even take one more breath while holding it.  Its an urgent matter.  He receives my complete understanding.  I get back to the hashbrown task.  Precise placement…one hash brown after another.  And then comes one of those moments of contemplative silence that has come to be one of the defining qualities of our marriage.  It is the moment right before someone is about to be honest.  They have thought about what the outcome of their candid confession may be, they have calculated any cost and have made their decision.  He is facing out the window, still diligently scouring pots.  “It actually dripped all over your back.”  A moment…  “Oh.” I say.  “Good.”  Another moment…  And then the refreshing wind of laughter that has surprised us more times than we can count.  After ten years, I’m proud to say that this too is another defining characteristic of our marriage.  Through my two shirts and my cardigan I never felt the grotesque moisture and I never asked if it looked like I needed to change my sweater.  We fed the masses and hurried off to church and there we sat, his arm around me…resting in the runoff from the bottom of our kitchen drain.  And I’d never loved him more.  Together we have created a life that results in a drain full of food slime and hair and garbage…and sometimes, one of us is going to wear some of it on our back.  True love.  Sigh.