The New Girl

How She Ended Up On The Living Room Floor, In Her PJ's And Watching TV At Lunch Time.

My girl started preschool.  And so far, the reviews are mixed.  I think she likes it.  She likes everything they do there.  It is an amazing place with an actual curriculum, for pete's sake. There are some farm animals, a little green house, gardens and two play grounds, complete with a water table and a gigantic sandbox. She likes the teacher and the aide.  She goes to the bathroom there, with no issue.  She washes her hands, sits in circle time and has her snack ("Cookies and apples, today!")

The only problem is, I'm not there.

"I want you to staaaaay, Mommy!" She pleads with me every time.

(I find it interesting, her choice of words. She never says, "I don't want to go," she says things like, "I don't want to miss you, Mommy," or "Can you stay with me?")

It's been a tug and pull on my heart, for sure, the moment of weeping before they whisk her out of my car, but perhaps less so than for some.  I signed my girl up for this, not for the educational/academic benefit but mainly because I think she needs the experience of being with adults apart from me, in a setting where her cooperation is expected and required.  She needs to learn and get used to routines outside our own, in close proximity to other kids, whose need for personal space may be, uh, less expansive than her own.

I wish, though, that I could be a fly on the wall.  I wish that I could see how she interacts with the teacher and the other kids when I'm not there to hide behind or cling to, or to remind her to stop chewing on her finger.  But having had loads of experience in school systems and with first time parents' anxieties, I've resisted writing copious notes or lurking outside the door to see how she's doing.  I've used the valet service instead of walking her in and then having to peel her from my legs to say goodbye.  I'm waiting to volunteer in her room until I know she's [not going to stick to me like a burr when it's time to leave] anxiety free about being there.

I'm doing what I can to help ease her transition.  Even though she's only going two days a week, there have been other *behavioral indicators* that she's having a little more anxiety than is usual for her.  She's having trouble falling to sleep again.  She wants only me again (after a blissful but short-lived period of time during which she preferred her father.)  There's also just the joy of being three.  Sassy.  Fresh.  Whining. Whining. WHIIIINING. [Trying to drive her mother to eat chocolate cake at 9:00 AM] Getting 50 time-outs before lunch. Crying when I have to go to work (ONE DAY A WEEK.)

So, today I asked her what she wanted to do. 

And she said, "Nothing." 

I said, "Nothing?  What do you mean? Where do you want to go today?"

She said, "I don't want to go ANYWHERE.  I just want to STAY HOME."

And this is what I heard:

"There's just been a lot, lately.  I'm feeling kind of stressed.  I didn't sleep well last night and I just want to hang out here, with you, and veg on the couch.  I need a Mental Health Day."

And, you know, so do I.

The Glory Of A Boy.

Hey, you know what?

My Boy is ALMOST ONE.  Can you believe that?

I can't.

Really.

Lookit:

 

 

The sparkly little eyes. The little baby mouth. CAN YOU STAND IT?

.

 

Forget the breast pad in the background. Look at the new-awkward-heart rending sibling relationship in the foreground.

.

.

I swear, I think he was watching TV but the wide eyes and the baby hair line? omfg.

.

.

Happy.

.

 

.

Happy. Even at the doctor's office. Ding dong, whaaa?

.

.

I LOVE the look on his face.  It's all, 'OMFG! DO YOU SEE ME?!'

.

.

.

.

Oh, man.

.

.

 Just Crazy Baby.

 

.

.

.

.

.

.

Not so new, less awkward, still heart-rending, and a little more...er...Cage-Matchy?

Unintentional Sabbatical.

I have been on a kind of Unintentional Blogging Sabbatical, I'd say.  For months, now, I've faded into the background, losing touch with my friends in the blogosphere (are we still calling it that?) and watching my own blog slowly exsanguinate readers.  I've had mixed feelings about it.

About three and a half years ago, I started this blog.  I'd been reading my BFF's blog for a while and I literally woke up one morning with an idea for a blog.  The name and the tag line. I started blogging that morning, excited and giddy with the potential of it.  I would be, of course, anonymous--for the sake of any patients (or parents) who might Google my name.  Who wants to know about the friends, extended families, birth stories and broken assholes of their therapists, really? No one, that's who.  And so, I would stay anonymous and blog about my life and my perspective as a mother and a therapist and a human being from there.

A lot has changed in a little over three years.  Three years is, how long in internet time, do you think? (Remember memes?  Blog awards? Half-Nekkid Thursdays? Blogrolls?)

I swear, when I started, there were lots of other anonymous bloggers. LOTS!  Most of them have come out of the closet, I think.  There used to be debate about ads. ADS! And now, for many, blogging has become a business.  Or a launch pad.  Or a marketing tool.

Not that I mind.  I really don't.  I'm not Making a Statement or Giving Critique to the business of blogging.  None of it matters or influences the reason I write a blog or read blogs.  For me, it always, always comes down to content.  If I can relate to the content, if I am amused or moved or inspired by the content, then I read it.

But who cares about any of that, really?

The point is that I have slowly been Ebbing more than Flowing in the content department here at The New Girl.  I'm not sure why that is, really, given that I have lots to talk about and am never at a loss for words.  As I've written before, I think it might be time-energy related.  Having an almost walking, cute-as-hell-but-curious-as-in-into-every-fucking-thing baby puts a damper on my creativity.  I have some time when the kids nap but I find myself kicking back to read or scrambling around the house to get it [just passable] neat enough. 

So, instead of telling you about how my almost one-year-old's first word was, so help me, CHEESE, or how my big girl started preschool, or how my dad is settled in and doing better than I am, I just...don't.  I've dropped out, into the background, taken up my long-lost penchant to lurk.  I've become a mute observer. 

And, while I don't have the urge/compulsion to write to keep me sane, I have to say that I notice its absence.  Even though I wonder, sometimes, what this blogging is, I've never wanted to quit.  Even in these quiet times, I miss the connection, the opportunity to stretch the muscles required to write a post that has legs.  I miss the exercise itself. 

I miss you guys.

 

 

 

Either/Or.

It seems, these days, that it's either read or write.  It's either go out and do an activity with the kids or clean the house.  It's either grocery shop and return the library books or get the laundry started (it's never, ever, finished, am I right?)  Eat pudding out of the carton and watch an episode of The Wire or work out. Return phone calls and emails or spend 10 minutes on Twitter.  Chase my kids around or run the vacuum.  You get it, I'm sure.

Life these days is a never-ending string of reminders that my time and patience are finite and my skills at multi-tasking are abysmal.  I've got so much to do and yet so much of it seems...what's the word?  Repetitive.  Endless.  Ongoing and ongoing. Putting the toys away and vacuuming up the gross bits of rawhide today, only to have to do it again [whenever I can get to it again] tomorrow.  Washing. Drying. Folding. Washing. Drying. Folding. Washing and forgetting it's in the washer because omfg HOW CAN THERE BE MORE LAUNDRY?!  Scrubbing the toilet but foregoing the sink and tub because here comes the baby with an eye for the spray nozzle.

And so, when I look around, I see failure.  It's never as clean as it could be--or feels like it should be after working on it.  I'm losing tons of readers because I don't post regularly (and, then, you know--post THIS kind of crap.)  My car is a mess, my house is a mess, my bills are disorganized and I am still sporting extra poundage.

I'm caught up on The Wire, though, and in case you were wondering: It's Kick-Fucking-Ass.

We all have choices, this I know. I'm up to my ass in teaching this very thing to my now-preschooler.  Any dissatisfaction I have with the way things are is a direct result of my own decisions, and maybe even more so, my allowing my focus to fall where it does.  How I am perceiving things right this minute.  Seeing the fail, instead of seeing the progress.  Peering too long into negative spaces isn't healthy for me.

That's an Either/Or, too.

Right?

The other day, I painted my little girl's fingernails and toenails with a bright pink nail polish that she got me for my birthday.  I painted my toenails the same color, at her request. I am acutely aware those days are so very, very fleeting.  I already see in her face the shadow of a first-grader.  A middle schooler.  A pre-teen.  I see the long limbs and the training bras and the rolling eyes that are sooner rather than later headed my way. 

So, it might do to try and wrench my gaze from the negative space and focus on what's actually in the picture.  Toys on the floor, for sure.  Gross bits of rawhide, too.

But, man, those little pink fingernails could kill you from the cute.  And who's looking at my carpets anyway?