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Farewell to the best boy in the world

About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag

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July 26, 2022

Random thoughts on 2022

Where we are in life: Married ten years, two kids, a dog. Mostly still hermiting with the pandemic and not hating the much reduced social life aspect of things even if I hate almost everything else about the pandemic, though we have in person school and camp and may have childcare this year.

I don’t think I’d have predicted any of this back in 2006. Maybe marriage, definitely dogs. Actually, I think PiC was in the picture by then so I think my line of thought was we’d probably get married but I was open to the idea that we might go a different way.

I think about the number of people who made it to the 9-12 year range and divorced recently. I’m glad they could divorce because they were so unhappy in their marriages. People deserve to be respected and loved in their relationships. I am also grateful that we still very much love and respect each other even when we experience friction. When we have conflict, it’s uncomfortable for a while. Usually, we figure it out in some kind of way and move along. Some dear friends are peeking at 20 years just over their horizon and I’m so happy for them too.

I like that we can tease each other mercilessly, but very fondly, about our flaws. It’s good natured, not mean spirited.

We’re deeply imperfect people, and we recognize that, which makes it possible for us to critique the decisions we’ve made, respectively, and talk over what we would do instead in the future so we’re more constructive. Particularly with parenting. We struggle with our flawed parenting but it’s helpful to work through that struggle and self doubt together.

Both of us are established in our careers and are at the same mental place right now: holding steady and keeping on top of our financial goals is good enough. We aren’t feeling any desire to climb ladders and be ambitious. Surely that’s because we’re living the survival lifestyle right now, just making it day to day, but also, maybe that’s where we are with our life priorities and that’s ok too. It would take LOT more money, twice as much as least, to make it worth making our lives any little bit more challenging and even then I’d think twice. Maybe double the money isn’t worth it even if it gets us to any goals faster because money can’t directly buy rest or sanity and that’s all I want right now: my family to be safe from medical long term effects of COVID and for us adults not to go stark raving before things get better.

I’ve done a lot of self reflection with therapy in the last few years. Don’t love what I see, but seeing it is one of the most important reasons I’ve made any progress. Seeing my past for what it was, seeing how “funny” stories actually affected my thinking and my attitudes. I have a ways to go still but this has been good for me in ways I never thought possible.

Living in 2022 feels absolutely surreal most days.

Big picture: We lost Roe v Wade and much of the Democratic leadership has been hair-pulling-out frustrating in response. I see how other rights are under threat and it feels like if things are going to get better, it’ll be a long time coming and a lot of people are going to get hurt along the way.

In big and small ways, the losses from this time of COVID are still reverberating and I can’t understand how so many people are just absolutely impervious to the notion that a million people plus have died whether COVID related or not. Hell, my own circles are now at 10 deaths over 19 months. That’s not normal. That’s so much loss.

So much has changed drastically in a short time and people just want to go back to some normal that was never really good anyway. I wish we had more collective desire to have vision for a better future.

Small picture, well. There’s stress and cracks in the system everywhere. We see it in the daycare center being at 3/4 capacity for many reasons, but most particularly lack of staffing. We see it in the community programs that are so oversubscribed that they won’t even wait-list us. We see it in the inability to buy a car without paying a giant premium we aren’t willing to spend. We see it in the choices we have to make about travel because so many around us only care about themselves and won’t mask or vaccinate. Or our choices to see family, if we see them, because some of them don’t take illness seriously at all and so I guess we just don’t have a whole branch of family until we have enough personal protection in place. It doesn’t matter to them, I guess. I miss my dear friends who have been, in some way, deeply affected by the stressors of these years and have gone offline. I miss feeling like we belonged and feeling connected to people we care about.

The big hurts and the little hurts all add up.

I take comfort in my little family here, my chosen family who remain supportive, but it’s truly a strange time in life right now.

Also? I’m about to have a second grader and I truly can’t comprehend THAT. 👀

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July 25, 2022

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (112)

Year 3 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 3, Day 122: 6 am. BLERGH.

*****

Massively overdid it over the weekend and paying a steep price for it today. Absolutely everything aches and my fingers were swollen sausages all day.

*****

I’m finding it deeply conflicting having a relationship with the conservatives in my family. Hell, it’s difficult just talking to them without holding them personally responsible for their political views that shore up the horrors of gun violence, the horrors of SCOTUS wiping our rights away, the horrors of violence against LGBTQA people, children and adults. Every time we have a conversation, I’m fighting with myself not to lose my head and start screaming. It’s complicated. It’s not how I want to torch our relationship. I only have so much family that’s cared about me and mine. But I’m not wrong about their politics and how harmful they are, either.

*****

Another family of my Very Cautious circle are COVID positive/exposed and it’s infuriating all over again that despite all our precautions, it’s gotten more of us. I hate how society and our government have failed us. I hate that we have to rapid test constantly if we want to see people and still can’t feel relaxed about being vaxxed and masked and air purified and outdoors.

Year 3, Day 123: 630 am. PiC is my morning parent saint, he let me get a solid extra hour and that made such a difference in my physical functioning. I still couldn’t make it to 8 pm without intense pain and fatigue but I did have a few decent hours.

*****

This Kyoto band made me wonder how widespread swing dancing was back in the day. Was it an international thing or primarily the US? I should look that up when I have time. Someday.

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I am facing a hard truth: I am an avaricious bag hoarder and it might be a problem. I love functional totes, crossbody, messenger bags of all shapes and sizes. Sometimes backpacks too. We were at Sports Basement the other day and I found myself examining the Fjallraven bags. I thought they were hip packs at first, and my conscious thought was: maybe that’s better for dog walking than my current little crossbody that gets tangled in my coat sometimes. But my subconscious was just: bag! bag! bag! How do I curb my inner bag monster?

One minor consolation, pondering “maybe I can make one?” gave me a quick jolt to the creative brain area at least.

*****

Everything IS terrible.

Year 3, Day 124: 6:50 am.

Smol Acrobat is really full of themselves right now. They are running at a higher gear of mischief and “talking” more. They’re forming audible yeses and nos, and mixing up all their baby signs. It feels like a (temporary) net loss in total communication success as they test a shift to more verbal communication.

*****

I watched a Love it or List it episode, which I usually don’t do because the whole fakery of reality TV is unappealing, and it was actually an interesting one because it addressed accessibility issues. One of the couple is in a wheelchair and they need their current or future home to be more accessible. They kept mentioning “universal design” which I need to look up, but it was striking how many homes are so deeply inaccessible. I see this a lot in the Bay Area as well. What would it be like to have homes designed to be accessible or accessible ready from the start?

*****

Some days I feel like doing nothing but staring into the void. Surely my expression matches that of these owls.

Year 3, Day 125: 7 am.

*****

My aunt called me to ask about the kids and then asked me about whether I’d speak to my bio-dad if I saw him. Um. Why would I see him? It was a very weird conversation. I wonder if she knows something is going on or if she was just testing the waters of our relationship. Even that’s a weird reason. It wouldn’t be out of character coming from anyone else but she’s not generally nosy that way. She’s usually pretty respectful of my boundaries and that’s why we stay in touch. It was a very unsettling conversation and I didn’t like it. Not so coincidentally, with that on my mind, naturally when I read this tweet I thought: BIODAD.

Also, I always feel like there’s another shoe waiting to drop, with him (and my brother who lives with him). The first shoe was my cutting him off and some of his halfhearted attempts to manipulate me through other people. The second is, I’m assuming, what happens when he finally gets sick and needs care. For damn sure my brother won’t provide it. So at that point, I’m going to have to deal with something to do with them and not knowing what I’ll be facing bothers me. It’s absolutely not an option to take him/them in. We don’t have the room but even if we did, I refuse to let him/them into my home near my children. They cannot be trusted. I tell myself not to borrow tomorrow’s troubles, it’s just hard not to want to prepare myself for whatever bad stuff will come down the pike.

Year 3, Day 126: 8 am. They are so unpredictable. Earlier in the week they had a late bedtime and were tired, still woke up in the 6 o’clock range. Same conditions last night? Late sleep in. Weird.

*****

My throat has been hurting all week and I’ve had a persistent dry cough. I’ve tested myself, all of us actually, every day this week and keep concluding it’s not COVID or a cold, because everyone else remains well (thank goodness). This must be my CFS acting up and that may be because I’m staying up entirely too late. This needs to stop. Ouch.

*****

This is mesmerizing. I wonder what AOL did wrong starting in the year 2000 to lose their foothold as an early tech company with massive loads of users. We used them starting around 1996, roughly, and I can’t remember when we stopped using them for dial up. (Remember that eeee eeee eeee eeee squeal of the modem?)

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July 19, 2022

My kids and notes: Year 7.6

Learning empathy and how to cope

I didn’t show (feel?) any empathy for my mom when I was growing up. I remember her getting mad at me for not sympathizing about her moments of (physical) pain. I can’t remember FEELING any concern for her when she had minor moments of OUCH. I don’t have any memory of that feeling so assumed that I didn’t though of course memory is imperfect. It’s like how we don’t have an equivalent of “bless you” / “gesundheit” / “salud” for sneezing that I know of in our native language. I just didn’t register an “ouch” as a thing to respond to. I have the same sort of numb non-empathy / impatient reaction to when JB is being super dramatic about relatively small (to me obviously) things like dripping juice on their art and declaring it ruined.

I worry about illness, serious injury, and deep emotional distress, but I don’t over the small things.

I shared this with my therapist in a recent session. I had always assumed it was because I was a uncaring kid and that’s carried over into adulthood. Her theory is a little different. She thinks that I never had a model for being “weak” (having emotions, being vulnerable, needing empathy), so I didn’t know how to respond to it in others. I still don’t, apparently, because I struggle deeply with parenting JB through their moments of small crisis. I get angry first, or I get annoyed. Especially because JB is given to random dramatic declarations to get attention when my reaction isn’t what they want: “You don’t love me” and “Fine, I’ll do (whatever happened to them) to your stuff!”

I hate dramatics, so I get more mad or non-responsive.

Eventually I might find myself remembering that they’re a kid and of course the small things matter deeply to them and that I’m supposed to be showing them empathy but that’s usually a long haul from Point A to Point B.

In that recent juice incident, I had to talk them through the fact that we all make mistakes. We all have the choice to learn from them or not, to ask for help or not, and of course it’s going to be sad, disappointing and frustrating but if our choice is then to tantrum and go on the attack and destroy things, people are much less inclined to offer help. As an example, I shared that I made a mistake on every single one of my sewing projects this year. If I had blamed my sewing sisters like JB blamed me for their drips, they would never have had the opportunity to point out a possible fix that made the projects better than the original plan. I don’t know how much that sank in but I made a suggestion for them to fix their project and they started to sing “I wonder, what if, let’s try” so thanks to Sesame Street for that assist.

Life with Smol Acrobat

That clean up song is like mind control. I was amazed how well it worked on JB in daycare but I assumed the environment, being surrounded by other little kids doing the cleaning too, had more to do with it than the song itself. They’ve only experienced it at home obviously and it still works! Not as well, they need a lot of direction, but it works.

*****

They’ve finally come around on scrambled eggs! A staple in our household they’ve always refused but they have come around!

Fun new thing: if they’re in the mood and you kneel down, and say hug? Smol will run to you fast as they can and throw themselves into your arms.

Their other new thing: playing trust falls with me even if I am nowhere near them. They think the scramble to catch them is HIGH-larious. They think it’s even funnier when they crash and fall to the ground.

*****

They’re a pretty self contained little soul right now but these songs make them boogie a little (which is a lot for them):

Pupdate

Poor Sera experienced an overdose of Smol affection this month and she did not like it. They’ve been wanting to hug, kiss, and nibble on her the way they do to me. I don’t like the nibbles either! I also don’t know why they think it’s so funny, but both my children enjoy/enjoyed biting on me and it’s weird.

Sera is a big target for Smol’s affection because they really like animals and especially their own doggy so we’ve had to be extra vigilant in intervening when they get TOO “loving”.

Sera’s benefiting from Smol’s picky eating, in the meantime. We don’t share people food but fruit doesn’t count and when Smol pulls that really annoying “chew it up and spit it out” thing with their (dog safe) fruit, Sera gets the chunks. She’s very pleased with that.

Precious Moments

JB: If you do rock paper scissors with three people and one does rock and one does paper and one does scissors, does that mean it’s a tie?

…. That’s a good question.

PIC: where’s JB?

Smol points at JB.

Where’s Daddy?

Smol points at PiC.

Where’s Mommy?

Smol pats PiC’s arm.

Where’s JB?

JB walking past a test kit I’d used: can I take a COVID test?

Do you feel sick?

No

Were you around someone who was?

No.

Then why test?

It’s here, why not?

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July 18, 2022

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (111)

Year 3 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 3, Day 115: 610 am. We had some sleep progress over the weekend but it’s going in the wrong direction now. 🤞😬

*****

Monday Morning Musing: why am I such a sucker for Hello Kitty stuff?

*****

Smol thinks it’s HILARIOUS to pretend to fall off a step. Sure, yuk it up, it’s funny ’til you actually DO fall off.

We had a looooong stretch of time before their nap today. I think we’re on day 5 of shifting them to one nap a day and this was the first day of those that I was solo with them. We did ALL THE THINGS. Backyard time, digging weeds time, trying on water wings, bouncing the basketball, bouncy ball, and soccer ball. Even tried on a baseball glove but they were iffy about that one.

They’ve been “talking” up a storm since the weekend, forming near words and even managed “mum/mom”. They were mostly talking to PiC but today they patted me very hard from chest to head establishing I also get to be mum mum mum mom mom mom. We also suddenly have a more clear “no” (but for nose, not negative) and “yep/yip” for yes. It’s a little disconcerting to have a handful of words when they didn’t have any a few days ago but also a relief. The unfortunate bit that goes with these three words is that they now mostly refuse to sign. Instead they insist that we go through intricate charades to figure out what they want. CHILDREN.

Year 3, Day 116: 4:45 am. BAH HUMBUG. I thought we were starting to make progress after three post 6 am wake ups in a row. That seemed so promising. This was a big step backwards as were the micro catnaps they kept taking in the car when running short errands instead of waiting to get home for a real longer nap. They finally took a whopper of a nap mid afternoon. 🤞 for tonight’s sleep.

*****

My pain has been out of control the past few days and therefore unbearable at night. At best I can get 3-4 hours out of 8 hours of laying down because it just hurts too much to fall asleep or stay asleep.

I’m need pain relief to sleep but I can only take so much heat and nothing else does much. I just have to wait it out.

*****

I asked Twitter and now I’m asking you: Is (was) there anything about your job you think is fun?

Year 3, Day 117: So many wake ups. I lost count after five. I was so tired. I am so tired. I’m so tired today that all I want is to curl up and cry for several hours and hibernate for week.

Alas. It is not meant to be. It’s so frustrating that when I’m most tired is when my pain will skyrocket. Can I please take them one at a time please??

Can Smol please start sleeping in a decent routine please please please??

(So far, the answer is no.)

*****

As the end of our summer nears, JB is increasingly stricken with grief that they’re heading back to school soon. We made a tactical error sending them to a summer camp that was Too Much Fun. They never want the fun to stop and they’ve been trying to negotiate more camp and less school. They even tried to get me to agree to homeschool them. Hah. Hah. Hah. They won’t even do their chores without attitude and whining, there’s no way I, with my absolute lack of any teaching skill or aptitude, would take on that task without a massive life change first. No no and no. I have been tempted in principle because sending my kids to school where they run the risk of being murdered, because it truly can happen anywhere, is one of my many parenting nightmares, but in reality, I think we’d both be scarred for life.

*****

Such tired. Help.

Year 3, Day 118: 5 am? 6 am? So tired I couldn’t tell but thankfully PiC was able to field them today.

So tired today that my brain continued to spin like a whirligig when I finally laid down in bed. Ouch and ouch.

*****

Struggling with massive disappointment today. We thought we’d get to see a family member who we’ve been missing deeply next week. After 2+ years of being super careful, we got our hopes up. Then COVID got them. I am still steeped in denial that they will be well enough (aka test negative) in time for a visit but I may need to start making my peace with yet another disappointment and a refresh of my fury over how people not giving a damn about this pandemic has deprived us YET AGAIN of the company of a loved one.

*****

My brain is the tiger:

Year 3, Day 119: We had a lot going on yesterday and Smol didn’t get to sleep until very very late. I was sure this would lead to a disastrous sleep but they were out cold until 8 am. Yay!

*****

I’ve been struggling with sewing. After making several zipper pouches in various sizes that I really like, I’ve hit a wall. I suspect my creative engine went on hiatus and writing this is my way of actively making myself be ok with the pause. It’s ok to wait until my brain and body are in sync and ready to take on the learning process for another set of projects.

When I have a longer stretch of time between looming deadlines, I’d like to make a set of packing cubes using the fabrics that I have on hand. I know mesh tops would be useful but I’m inclined to fiddle with (and yell at) mesh yet. I’m thinking of making each of us a large cube with a different cotton fabric top “lid” piece for each person. We are all sharing one packing cube set now and we’re going to outgrow that really soon. I’m studying these two tutorials in hopes that the process will start making more sense before I get started. If you have a good tutorial, I’d love to see it!

*****

There’s some irony in the fact that I recognized Andrea Bocelli’s “Time to say Goodbye” on Sesame Street from another room because my mom really liked his music. Sending her to his concert was one of the few gifts I was ever able to give her as an adult.

Is it irony? Or is it just a heart twinge?

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