today is the fifteenth anniversary of my brother's death. we brought flowers to the cemetery this morning with my mom, but we skipped our usual brunch afterwards because we had to attend a baby shower for cam's cousin. it's not like there's anything special about fifteen, but for some reason i felt bluer than usual today.
i hate to be the living embodiment of a cliche, but i am on the verge of tears because i knocked my milk thermos off my desk. milk everywhere. i stole my assistant's 409 cleaner because my desk, my chair and the floormat are all sticky -- used the dregs. (i will buy him a new bottle.) my pants are sticky and wet, too, but something tells me 409 probably doesn't isn't so useful with cotton and skin. i should have known something was going to happen. about five minutes before i knocked it off the table, i looked at my bag and noticed that the thermos had been leaking. little did i realize it would soon be leaking all over my freaking office.
sigh. sniffle.
i have the unpleasant feeling that i am entirely too selfish for parenthood.
last night my nerves were shot.
paul wouldn't go to sleep. the cat outside the house wouldn't stop crying out. the dishwasher wouldn't work. cam was preoccupied.
i burst into tears trying to read paul to sleep. i gave up and went to my room and let him whine, whine, whine. cam appeared ready to jump in to save paul from me and my cruel heart, but i prevented him.
cam got the dishwasher working and got paul to settle down as i tried to cry myself to sleep. but i wasn't even successful at that, so i sat in my bedroom closet for an hour and cried there, looking for a little corner where at least if nobody liked me, then maybe i could be sad and alone. i got up and went to bed around midnight.
i didn't feel like talking this morning, so cam was mad at me. i wish i could go back to the closet.
because we've all been sick, i feel like i have wasted the weekend. (i don't think cam and paul have wasted the weekend because they don't have the same self-expectations that i do.) sure, we have one day left, but we're not going to suddenly be well and full of energy. today, in an attempt to make up for yesterday's flu-induced sloth, i've organized the kitchen junk drawer, made a shelf from a cardboard box for paul's snack cabinet, scrubbed down the cooktop, put up a decorative tray above the stove and rearranged the cookbook cabinet. can i do enough tomorrow to make myself feel better about all the time i've spent doing not much of anything?
i know you didn't mean any harm, but i think the proper response to "when you wake up [after a nap], you can think about dinner" might be something along the lines of "okay, sure," or "what would you like for dinner?" -- not "i thought i already had it." what about me? have you not noticed i have served and cleaned up after you and paul all day long? did you not even wonder if i've eaten today? i know i'm somewhat overemotional and cloudy of mind because i'm sick and that i need to make similar allowances for you because you're sick, too, but i still think you could have thought about me for a second.
am sick at home today. i could tell i was really not feeling so well when i put up only token resistance to cam's suggestion that i stay home. although i should be glad for the rest, am sad on two counts: 1) i'm lonely, and 2) paul wouldn't hug me goodbye for fear of germs.
i don't know why, but i've been feeling really terrible lately. not sickly, not physically pained (although i am really tired), but just miserable. i just want to cry and cry and cry.
i'm so useless these days.
i can barely keep an eye on paul, and his preference for everyone but me is really blindingly clear. i try not to be hurt by it because i know he's just reacting to my own behavior, but it does still wound me.
my house is a mess. i have so many ideas, but absolutely no follow-through.
i haven't been following my diet the last few days.
i don't feel like i'm ready for another child in my house at all.
some days i get to feeling like i need a break, but honestly, with the little amount of caretaking i'm providing either my husband or my child, i might as well already be on vacation.
i wish i could control this unhappiness. it doesn't hit me at work, so maybe that's key. maybe i need to just keep so busy that i don't have time to dwell. i hate being a whiner.
if there is a situation and nobody thinks there is a problem but me, then perhaps i am the problem.
sometimes i'll just be sitting around -- or washing dishes -- or watching tv -- something mundane -- and i'll get a little choked up and it occurs to me that i'm so lonely i could cry. and then i do.
these sudden fits of the blues always baffle me. first i'd start to feel guilty for feeling so sad. i mean, i'm the antisocial one, the introverted one. i'm admittedly not so good about keeping in touch with people. clearly, i'm happiest by myself or with my immediate family. how dare i feel miserable? but i do, and i can't help it. then i start to think that because maybe i leave such a very small footprint on the world, nobody would notice if i wasn't there anymore.
but this is where things begin to smack so loudly of self-pity that i force myself out of it.
and then i go to bed.
today is the holiday party at paul's preschool. it's a potluck, so i was up late cooking a tomato-sauced pasta (nemo-shaped, even) and tree-shaped chocolate cookies. the sad part is that i don't even get to go -- i'm stuck at work because one of my assistants needed to be out today. oh well. it's not the first time i've missed out on a preschool party.
i took the day off work because i had my big ultrasound scheduled for today.
took advantage of the free morning by attending preschool with paul and cam. preschool was an interesting experience. paul was up-and-down, but i think it was a pretty good day. he did, however, not listen to cam when it was time to return inside after playground time, and that was a little stressful. when the teacher snapped at me for asking paul if he needed help on a ladder, that was also stressful. meh. what did she think i was going to do, grab him off the ladder and spoonfeed him pureed peas? he was stuck. i just asked if he needed help. the "working" parents that day made me feel in the way, so i tried to stick to the wall and be unobtrusive as possible. the children themselves -- when they noticed me -- were a bit more welcoming.
during a playtime, a girl yelled at paul he was playing hopscotch incorrectly. he raised his arm as if to strike her, then hid behind me with his usual, "i don't want ANYTHING."
me: [yelling girl] is brutal.
cam: paul is a ninny.
as soon as class was over, i headed to the car to drink a quart of water before the appointment.
when paul finally finished his goodbyes, we all went to kaiser for my ultrasound appointment. the lab tech called me in quickly (half an hour prior to my actual appointment!) and told cam and paul that he'd call them in to see pictures after the exam. the exam part took about 15 minutes, mostly spent in silence. then the tech left to bring in cam and paul. after several minutes, he returned alone, saying he was unable to find them. i was really disappointed, but what could i do? he rushed through some shots, then asked me if i wanted to know the sex. i said yes, and he indicated that he was "leaning towards a girl." then it was all over. i asked if i'd get pictures, and he breezily said his printer was broken. there i was, disappointed about cam and paul missing out, disappointed about his lack of certainly re gender and disappointed by the lack of pictures. well. it wasn't that the tech wasn't nice, because he was, but he was awfully cavalier about the whole thing.
as i opened the door to the waiting room, cam and paul walked up. they took one look at me and realized that the appointment was over. cam looked pissed and paul started wailing. they were so clearly upset about missing the ultrasound that i started to cry. i didn't even get to the bathroom, even though i was on the verge of desperation (the bladder of a pregnant woman is no laughing matter). i was too busy apologizing to paul.
but, as usual, out of the wreckage came a few moments of hilarity.
paul: [tearful] but how do they know it's a girl?
cam: they're looking for something.
paul: what?
cam: uh, okay, they're looking for a thing -- like yours.
cam: if they don't find one, then it's a girl.
cam: because little girls don't have one.
paul: but big girls do?
cam: um, no, they don't.
paul: [practically sobbing] but how do they pee?
me: can we please not have this conversation NOW?
we dropped paul off with his grandfather (and i had my much needed bathroom break), then we went home to take a nap. cam explained he wasn't mad at me, but i wasn't really convinced. if i hadn't been lying on a table with gel all over my stomach, i would have told the tech i'd find them myself (they were in the bathroom, by the way).
it was a pretty exhausting day. as nice as it was to take a day off work, enough bummerish things happened to make it less than fully pleasant. i guess i just had idealized visions of how the day was supposed to be.
i would not be entirely truthful if i said that i wasn't bothered by paul's occasional outright rejection. about half an hour ago, i woke up to paul crying out "daddy, daddy" -- i asked cam's sleeping figure if i should go check on him. being asleep, he didn't respond, so i got up.
usually these days when paul calls out for his father in the middle of the night, he doesn't mind when i show up instead. tonight was different.
paul: [screaming] not you!
paul: [takes a swing] where's daddy!?
me: he's asleep.
me: i'll go get him, okay?
paul: [still mad] okay.
so i woke cam up, then had my bedtime snack. not really sleepy, i cleaned up the living room a little and here i am, sitting on the couch and watching the discovery times network. i know i shouldn't let it bother me, but cam was kind of a git before bedtime and i was already feeling sort of sick and hormonal. i'm just... a little tired of it all.
paul had a great time trick-or-treating. of course, sickly, exhausted, self-pitying me missed it because i was at home. i begged out of going to cam's parents' house at the last minute because i wasn't feeling well, plus i didn't think paul would want to go trick-or-treating. foolish me.
cam told me a little about their adventures. i'm glad they had such fun, but i am rather bummed to have missed it.
my mom called me a little while ago to tell me that someone had called from the hospital about my test results. i called back and learned that i have to attend a gestational diabetes class, meet with a nutritionist, have some bloodwork done, start testing my blood sugars and attend a follow-up with a diabetes ob/gyn. all because my fasting blood sugar measured four points higher than they'd like. well. shit.
i am having a hard time dealing with the guilt associated with the fatigue of pregnancy. i am not the kind of preschool mom that i wanted to be. i'm not even the mom i want to be. my house is a shambles. dishes are always in the sink (unless my mom does them). everyone's clothes are all over the place. shoes, too. we're eating crap food because former healthy favorites no longer appeal to me and i'm usually too tired to cook, anyway.
i am constantly ashamed and/or constantly asleep. my family doesn't even know me anymore.
went in for the 3-hour glucose tolerance test today. all i can say is this:
1) glucola is gross.
2) that video of the westminster dog show was not helping.
3) when drawing blood, please don't wiggle the needle.
4) when drawing blood a second time, please don't use the EXACT SAME HOLE IN MY ARM you made the first time around.
5) who knew that lab techs watch medical dramas like "house"? (i know that i refuse to watch lawyer dramas.)
6) who knew that divine worked as a lab tech?
7) who knew that pynchon's newest would be entirely too heavy reading for a lab waiting room? (i would have been better off with an issue of domino or something like that.)
hope i passed.
this morning traffic was really bad, so cam was really late to work -- to make up for it, in the way that people do if they DON'T work in my department, he stayed late. like two hours late. now it's a quarter to six and he just called to tell me that he's looking at 6:30-7 pm before he gets here. i didn't mean to, but i'm just so tired and beat that i started crying. i better close the door to my office before somebody sees me.
i hate to be mopey when we planned this pregnancy, but god, i feel like crap. the sour taste, the overproduction of saliva, the heartburn, the fatigue, the moodiness... eeesh.
some folks here finally pushed a coworker over the edge. i had to step in. not to calm him down, because i don't have a whole lot of faith in my ability to do so, but to remove him from the situation so he could simmer himself down. we went outside and he vented and vented and vented. i felt bad that there wasn't really anything i could say because i don't have a whole lot of influence anywhere. i hate people.
this afternoon my assistant was telling me about some family drama (his term: "nigger mess"). when he finally paused, i nodded and made "go on" faces, but i inwardly said, "you know what? how's this for drama? today my brother would have turned 36."
i don't remember what you sound like. i don't have a good internal picture of you. but every september 7, when i think "paul," it means you, not my son.
i wasted a lot of brain power today over misleadingly simple directions. i should be mad at the giver of the directions (who, to his credit, did apologize), but instead i just feel stupid and blue.
a lot of random crap has happened over the last several months. not all of it to me, you understand, but (obviously) all of it involving me in some fashion.
as a result, i sort of lost the will to write. i would start posts most half-heartedly, then save them after completing a line or sometimes even half a line. in some cases, i'd get as far as a title and a word.
some people have been unusually cruel. some have been mind-bogglingly stupid. at least one appears to have lost her mind. honestly.
to get away from this crap, i have sought my solace in television. it's kind of embarrassing how much i've sunk my soul into tv. csi: miami reruns, in particular. but now that it seems that we have caught up on all of the eps a&e has to offer, i'm feeling a little lost. i've been reading twop recaps for shows i don't even watch. i've been rewatching scenes of tivo'd shows i've already seen countless times. thank goodness we've got that new jeffrey donovan show coming up.
life has been exhausting lately. work is stressful enough as it is, but my assistant's life has become very complicated. very, very complicated. not to be a me-me-me kind of person, but his need to be out of the office to take care of certain issues is wearing me down. i don't begrudge him the time -- he certainly should deal with his personal problems. speaking as a friend, hell yeah, he should take off all the time he needs. but admittedly, as his boss, it's a little hard on me to have to work two jobs. i feel like a bitch for even wanting him to be in the office when there's so much going on in his life. in fact, i feel like a traitor for even writing it down. it's an uncomfortable fence to straddle.
i've been shopping for a dress to wear to cam's boss' wedding for a while now. i ordered a really pretty dress from garnet hill, but it looked awful on me. i've looked and looked and looked online and actually ventured into some stores, but nothing is appealing to me, on me.
the truth is that i've been an awful eater for the last few months. i haven't done anything remotely resembling exercise. i'm drink nothing but coffee and alcohol. i'm smoking. i'm working long hours and combing my hair less than usual. i look, quite frankly, like shit.
how on earth am i going to clean up nicely in time for a wedding in mid-july?
so. it's a friday night. cam is asleep. paul is asleep. i'm working. that's what i do.
this is absolutely stupidly petty, so i'm writing it down so that i can forget about it.
this morning i got a vm from the wife of a friend about a potential health problem that my friend might be having. it was very direct and businesslike. i called her back and we talked about my friend for a bit. then i tried to inject a tiny note of levity by mildly teasing her for such an all-business vm.
her: i don't show much emotion when dealing with people i'm not close to.
me: um, yes, of course.
now, i never claimed to be close to my friend's wife. (if i was, then she'd be my friend and not just my friend's wife.) i know she's terrified about this potential medical issue and that is making her a bit more clipped than usual, but i'll be damned if i wasn't a little stung by that comment.
okay, it's out. now i can proceed with my day in peace.
if overtime pay was still a part of my life, i'd be happy to be doing research in the middle of the night. since it isn't, well, this sucks. i have a headache. i'm going to bed.
was in the shower this morning when i heard the doorknob rattle. thinking cam wanted to put his toothbrush back or something, i stuck my arm out of the shower and unlocked the door.
much to my surprise, a small hand pushed the door open. i peeked out and saw paul standing there most solemnly.
paul: what are you doing?
me: i'm taking a shower.
paul: but what are you going to do?
me: i'm taking a shower because i've got to get ready for work.
paul: waaaaaahhhhhhhhh!
poor baby. how tempted i was to just turn off the water and stay home. but instead i called for cam to look after him so i could continue to be the good little worker bee i've always been. jesus. even though i know the tears stop as soon as we turn the corner and stop waving from the car, it's still wrenching.
sometimes at work i feel so lonely i start conversations with a known womanizer just because i know he'll talk to me.
i am feeling very low, very self-pitying right now. i am just not fitting into the world today.
my brother has been dead for 14 years now.
it's hard to fathom sometimes, you know? 14 years. i was a child then... of course, according to most of the world i was an adult. 18 years, two months, eight days. i had reached the age of majority. i could buy lotto tickets. i could vote. i could sign my own absence notes from school. but i was still a child -- and child or adult or whatever, i was completely unprepared for his death.
14 years later, i still feel unprepared.
i was unprepared for the way a person -- a living, breathing college student with a fondness for computers and tomato sauce -- became a footnote.
i'm unprepared for the way it still stings when i tell strangers i'm an only child because i don't want to explain how i had a brother and he died, and oh my god, isn't it so painfully sad but it was so long ago so we're all properly adjusted now, thanks.
i will always be unprepared for that bittersweet tinge when i say the name paul and i mean my brother instead of my child.
i was sick all weekend. i'm still sick. i would have been pretty much okay by saturday night (i speculate) if i hadn't taken some [insert name of otc medication] on saturday morning.
at around a quarter to 11, i took a dose. i woke up cam at 11 (he had a rough night with paul), then collapsed into bed. at about 11:40, i suddenly woke up in a panic, unable to breathe. i rolled back and forth for a moment, trying to figure out if i could breathe if i only hit the right position. starting to hyperventilate a little, i called for cam. he didn't come. i tried again and he showed up.
things got all wonky from that moment on. breathing got harder and my arms and legs went all tingly numb. i was crying and cam was getting upset and threatening to call the hospital. we ended up in the living room and he wanted me to drink some juice. he had to hold the glass because my hands weren't working. eventually things settled down and feeling returned to my limbs.
the rest of the weekend i slept as much as i could to recover from that freakish moment. today i'm still suffering from nausea and a foul taste in my mouth, two things i didn't have going into the weekend. at least the headache is more or less gone, and the tingliness hasn't come back. (it was a little scary.)
my assistant scolded me, of course. "just great," he scowled at me. "my boss almost kicked the bucket." it's always nice to know you care, sweetie.
i'm hoping the lingering effects of whatever this is will be gone by the end of the week. it just will not do to have this ruin another weekend, even if i am getting more sleep than i have since before paul was born.
after years surviving relatively unassisted through familial unhappiness and death and stress and self-image problems and self-destructive behavior, i do believe that work -- WORK -- has finally put the final nail in the coffin. i think i will finally be seeking professional help.
cam: wow, you have an archnemesis.
cam: congratulations.
it has come to my attention recently that someone really hates my guts. i knew she disliked me and has for years, but i had thought that perhaps time had mellowed the animosity so that she could at least function around me. as far as i knew, we had finally reached the point of civility and so that was that.
guess i was wrong. huh.
it's a very creepy thing to know that someone hates you enough that they are willing to blame you for things that are obviously in no way your fault -- indeed, even going so far as to blame you for things that haven't happened (can't even say "yet" because there's no way of knowing that these things ever will happen until, you know, they happen). if she had had some distant relatives on the hindenburg or the titanic, i guess it wouldn't surprise me to find out that she blamed me for that, too.
i don't care if she likes me. i don't. i have been on this freaking merry-go-round for too fucking long ("we had a conversation today! maybe she likes me now?") to care. i know i've been stewing about this, but it's not because my feelings are hurt -- rather, it's because i am just so utterly astonished by the sheer violence that she must have in her heart that she feels the need to vent to MY allies -- as if, by the mere expression of that violence, she could convert them to her side. but the thing is that i don't want sides. i just want to coexist. if not peacefully, then at least without overt ugliness.
yesterday we discovered that paul can't play with play-doh because it contains wheat. not being a big proponent of play-doh (or any clay, for that matter), i am not really that disappointed, but... come on, play-doh! it's part of the tradition of the american childhood, isn't it?
i am having a very bad day. i would like to take my accumulated benefit time (13.4 weeks) and use it all at once -- starting now.
i am officially sick. damn.
i was trying to write a letter to a mommy friend and failing miserably. could barely get past the "how were your holidays?" before just trailing off and letting myself get distracted by stuff... like keyboard lint.
it's not that i don't like writing to my friend. it's just that she wants paul updates (she doesn't even know about this blog -- if she does, she's not sayin') and the competitive little bitch in me is all, "riiiight, so you can compare my little stinker against your perfect little one and then feel like you're winning the mommy stakes" -- which is totally unfair because she has never been like that, but other moms just bring out the sad and angry in me.
i told cam today that although sometimes i feel like of lonely, i'm mostly glad to not have other moms and kids around because i can forget about the milestones that paul is missing. there are yardsticks i can ignore. i can concentrate on stuff like paul's burgeoning lexiconnoisseurness --
paul: look at this syringe. [pointing at imaginary needles on the floor -- gah, what an image]
paul: there are two of them.
paul: i built this trebuchet all by myself.
cam: paul, you have the most amazing vocabulary.
cam: i don't even know how old i was when i learned words like "syringe" and "trebuchet."
me: i think i just learned "trebuchet" last year.
no, paul does not dress himself. no, paul does not pick up after himself. yes, he still fights the toothbrushing. yes, he drinks far too much milk. no, he doesn't like to draw. no, he is not potty-trained. no, he's not reading words yet. no, he's afraid of other children.
when distilling the life and progress of a child down to a single page of single-spaced 10-pt arial, we grasp at the obvious. is he developing the way that he should? based on charts and studies and books and experts, is he doing all the things a three-year-old should be doing? i get insecure. i make jokes. i paint less-than-flattering pictures. i don't want to be the gushy mommy, talking about my son's latest habit of drawing on the wall and isn't that cute, he's a pint-sized picasso. huh. i veer to the other side. (leave the heavy praise to my mom -- it's her right as a grandmother.) i mock my mothering skills. if he's not hitting those high notes, it's because i've failed him.
he's a normal kid, i say. he runs, he jumps, he scores! he whines, he fights bedtime, he throws tinkertoys!
yes, i know your tot has been helping you put away the silverware since he was a year and a half. yes, i know that my son's inability to understand what goes where in the kitchen reflects poorly on me. give me a break.
talking to another friend, the dejection sets in. "i have a really great core relationship with my kids, so i'm not worried about what they'll be like when they're teenagers," she chirps. can i hang up on you now? this doesn't make me want to talk to other parents (aside from cam, of course).
i will just have to try again next week. maybe something will happen over the weekend to put me in the communicating mood.
went through two cabinets (two short billy bookcases with doors) in the library today to see if i could clear up some space to store toys. yeah, i know. don't say it. paul has enough toys to keep an entire third-world country entertained. yeah.
was able to ditch a some catalogs and assorted magazines, but the greatest amount of space came from the disposal of grad school paperwork. as i enter my last year of repayment for my student loan, it seemed like maybe it was time to admit that i would never ever reread my old papers because, well, let's face it, i wasn't the greatest student. my grades were good, but it was all diligence, not brilliance. the comments on my papers would bear me out -- "you write very well, but..." all style, all earnestness -- flimsy theses, simplistic arguments. i knew this about myself back then and i know it now... never claimed to be particularly deep or even particularly bright. still, it does sort of sting. i knew i wasn't cut out for the academic life, but seeing those old notations don't exactly make me want to say, "yep, so true, so true!"
i ended up keeping just a few mementos from the past -- jr./high school journalism records (my mom made me keep a notebook of everything i published back then), a reader for tagalog class, notes from an intensive beginning spanish course at cal state dominguez (i needed a language course for grad school, and i wasn't about to pay for a class at any other of the claremont colleges), some high school creative writing papers kept solely for amusement value at the extravagance of praise, and some aphio stuff i should probably toss (including my pledge notebook).
almost got rid of a pile of 2003 better homes & gardens, but i was weak and they looked so pretty.
in the end, i managed to clear up two and a half shelves. it's so nice to be able to put some of paul's toys out of sight. with luck, he'll forget about them and i'll be able to sneak them out the door...
the other day i fulfilled my goal of making a pizza for paul.
i had a brand new box of wheat-free pizza crust mix, so i used that. don't know what happened, but after adding the liquid, the dough turned out far wetter than it should have been. it wasn't a familiar brand, so it felt a little strange to my hands. they recommended adding their own branded rice flour to bulk it up if the dough was sticky, but i just used some all-purpose wheat-free flour that i had on hand. turned out all right, but i wasn't very happy with it.
cooked up some tomato sauce, grated some casein-free cheese, added some mushrooms and tossed the whole thing in the oven for maybe 20 minutes. moved it up to the broiler so the cheese would melt. when it was done, it actually looked and smelled pretty nice. tasted all right, too. BUT... paul would not eat it. he ran away. i was ready to cry. cam and i ended up eating half and putting the rest in the fridge.
i used the remaining dough to make soft breadsticks, which he did eat (sliced in half lengthwise with jelly), so the work wasn't a complete waste, but... it was pretty heartbreaking to have my efforts rejected like that.
i tried really hard to figure out what to get my assistant's wife and eventually gave up -- now i feel bad because she's been shopping for paul AND cam. good lord, such generosity.
a while ago i resuscitated my old handspring visor with the intent of being a more organized human being. cam downloaded the newest software and i was on my way.
it was going pretty well, even though my purse looked pretty stuffed with a big wallet, a blackberry, a cell phone, a card case and my visor. oh well, all the more reason to buy a bigger purse. i had all kinds of info stored in the visor, not the least of which was my very neat and tidy christmas gift list.
i let far too long go between hotsync sessions. in fact, i only did it once. the second time i tried it, my computer acted like i had never done it before, so i filed that away in my head and planned to have cam look into it before because i clearly must have messed something up the first time.
the other day i reached into my bag and pulled out my visor. it wouldn't turn on. i don't remember how i got it to turn on, but it finally did -- and all my info was gone, gone, gone. i was practically in tears.
but i managed to get by without it until last night when i realized i had several tiny boxes of candy and no idea who my intended recipients might be. almost in tears yet again. i had been thinking that i was just going to change the batteries and hotsync every night, but i just decided that i no longer trust the visor. it's silly to take out my frustrations on a tiny electronic thing, but i never claimed to be wholly rational.
yesterday a secretary friend i see about once or twice a year visited me in my office. she came bearing gifts and a quizzical expression.
her: have you gained weight?
me: [stunned silence]
her: [nervous chuckle] you look bigger than the last time i saw you!
me: oh yeah, sure, i'm always gaining weight [nonchalant hand gesture].
i could have cried. my coworkers were disappointed that i didn't smack her for her rudeness.
am working on christmas cards, reading a dick francis novel, drinking cold tea, listening to cam snore -- and am feeling absolutely wretched. maybe it's the cheese overindulgence, maybe it's the tedium of christmas cards, maybe it's the onset of pms. whatever it is, it sucks.
last night i was rereading l.m. montgomery's a tangled web when i came across a passage that positively struck me in the face.
and grace penhallow cried, which was so unusual that her husband whispered testily, "what are you crying for? you always hated her."
"that's why i'm crying," said grace drearily. she could not explain how futile the old hate seemed to her now, and its futility made her feel sad and temporarily bereft of all things.
at my brother's wake, my aunt said the same thing to me (more or less) and i was so shocked i could not speak. i was 18. my brother had been 21. it wasn't like we were middle-aged and had ceased talking for the last twenty years. i know what kind of family she grew up in so it was absolute BULLSHIT that she couldn't comprehend sibling rivalry and sibling discontent. but, as always, we just sort of shrug off her barbed comments and sigh as if to say, "well, that's just her."
truth be told, though, i carried for years the unsettled feeling that maybe i did hate him and that maybe my behavior did warrant such a comment at a wake. looking at the above lines, i felt like i knew what that felt like -- the futility of an old hate. when it's over, it's over and what do you have left? so many times since he died i looked back and i did not know what claim to a relationship i ever had with him. the last thing i said to him was, "can i use your computer?" he said yes and went to his room. never saw him alive again. did i ever say i loved him? i don't remember. ask anyone, we just didn't travel in the same circles. apathy or argument. i have let that overshadow any good memories we may have had together.
so -- was i crying because i cry at funerals (although i couldn't know that back then), was i crying because i was shaken by the ugly presence of death or was i crying because i suddenly saw the emptiness and wrongness in the way i treated my own flesh and blood for the last 15 years?
am i grace penhallow? maybe i am.
this morning paul asked cam if he would carry him.
paul: i keep slipping off mommy's shoulder.
cam blamed my winter coat and scarf, but i know the truth: i'm just not built for carrying a big toddler. how much longer before paul won't want me to hold him at all?
i swear i saw my brother at the auto show on wednesday.
well, okay, maybe not my brother, but somebody who looked an awful lot like him the way i remembered him. god help me if i didn't tear up to the point of almost not being able to watch him walk away.
i have been following the story of james kim and his family with great interest and eventually with great sorrow. my condolences to their families and friends -- and especially to kati kim and her daughters -- on their loss.
we are very sad that greg is leaving the wiggles. a friend is lamenting the fact that her daughter will never see the original yellow wiggle in concert.
her: [semi-accusingly] at least your son got to actually see him.
sigh.
it's stupid, but even though we managed to put in a lawn, i still feel underaccomplished for the weekend because the backyard wasn't my project. terrible, huh?
there were all kinds of things that i wanted to do that i didn't do -- because paul wanted attention, because my jigsaw puzzle kept distracting me (a most embarrassing reason), because i was doing laundry, etc. etc. etc.
i guess i can try to get to some of this stuff this weekend, but it's doubtful because at least part of what i wanted to accomplish rests on cam's shoulders and i don't really want to bring him down yet from his post-project high. oh well.
just wrote the check for our property taxes. ouch. combined with christmas shopping, random upkeep, etc. etc. etc. -- i need a second job.
working from home tomorrow afternoon because we have a funeral to attend in the morning. there have been far too many funerals lately.
my very first assistant came to visit me a few minutes ago. she's an attorney now. egads, i feel like a wretched underachieving old woman right now.
funerals for babies are just so... heartbreaking.
this has been a hellish weekend. absolutely hellish. i have no more enthusiasm for the weekend -- i want to go back to work, sort of. friday was miserably busy, but at least it was stuff that i could control (more or less... i did feel like crying a few times). my assistant was out because he had to take his wife to the hospital -- i certainly couldn't begrudge him that!
on saturday my father's sister and her husband came to visit my mom. i have not been looking forward to this weekend. i say this openly (as openly as one can on a blog like this). our relationship -- at least from my perspective -- has not been pleasant. she has ALWAYS rubbed me the wrong way. when they showed up, paul was on the verge of napping. my mother made sheepish sorry faces at cam as she ushered them in. they brought with them a big noisy plastic firetruck. the noise didn't stop all weekend. they were loud. they were shrieky. i was cringing.
on saturday night, my uncle got word of the death of a family friend and had to schedule a flight up north. his wife was less than pleased. ime, got word of a tragedy in my assistant's family. my aunt wouldn't stop griping about my uncle. i just wanted to crawl under my bed or hide in the closet.
sunday morning, my mom and my aunt drove my uncle to the airport. sunday afternoon, my mom, cam and i went to a funeral. (more on that later.) sunday night, my mom and aunt showed up with my uncle's sister. they promptly made me feel guilty for paul not being home (cam had just left to pick him up from his parents' house). luckily, they showed up not long afterwards, so my uncle's sister was able to see paul before she left. then my mom and my aunt went to the airport to pick up my uncle.
i ought to go to bed, but i'm so wound up. so so so wound up.
i managed to tweak my back yesterday while working in the backyard. don't know if it was from the digging of trenches for the sprinkler system or the moving of broken concrete/pebble slabs from disarray to a grace-defined standard of tidiness. my guess it would be the latter. cam's back hurts again, too -- mere days after he cheerfully declared that it was so amazing, this life without pain. we're quite a pair.
we went to the cemetery this morning because my brother's birthday was on thursday and my dad's death anniversary was today.
it was a little startling to realize we hadn't been there in ages. in fact, we had been away for so long that the grass had grown in over the in-ground vases. while cam and my mom valiantly dug around for them, paul and i went for a walk to look for what he called "secret drains" (i guess you could say that those vases -- when not in use, they fit upside down into tubes in the ground -- look kind of like drains, but the idea is rather gruesome to contemplate).
when we returned, they were were still hard at work unearthing those vases. locating them was only half the battle. the tubes had filled with mud (and worms!) that served to lock those damned vases in place. cam bent a hammer trying to pull one out. they ended up only digging up three of the four (my brother had two on his grave at his grandmother's request) because it was just too much work. at least each of the graves would have flowers. nobody would be left out.
we put the flowers together in a hurry. it was already so hot ("i was hoping the sun wouldn't come out," said my mom) and paul was bored (bored enough to want to walk into the street). then we went to breakfast at a hof's hut in cerritos. paul flirted madly with the waitress. i rolled my eyes.
it's interesting to see what distance does... a day formerly wrought with such sorrow eventually becomes just slightly greater than commonplace. in the earlyearly hours of september 10, 1998, i had a father who breathed. snap your fingers and i didn't. crossing the chilly parking lot to the garish warmth of a local hospital it took me years afterwards to look at squarely -- seeing a shell of a man with tubes poking through here and there -- being asked if we wanted those tubes removed -- saying no -- changing our minds -- having our request refused because the proper authorities! needed to see them because he hadn't been in the hospital 24 hours before dying.
how is it that something so heartwrenching is now "celebrated" with pancakes and hasty flower arranging? i miss my dad.
bought my first pair of mom-ish jeans. i'm rather sad about it, but man, are they ever comfortable.
to be honest, i think what disturbs me most is the size. i'm destined to be chunky forever.
i totally wanted to love the oxiclean detergent ball-thing. i saw it on tv and was intrigued, so when cam came across a display at target, i just went for it. been using oxiclean for years, so wasn't concerned that it would thrash my stuff.
i used it and it was cool. it was a little strange having a scented laundry again, but it wasn't obnoxious. the rubber ball was pleasing. so what was the problem? it had no staying power. it was supposed to be good for at least 25 loads, but after a paltry weekend's use (maybe 6 loads), i already needed a refill. don't think i'll be buying one unless i see them on clearance. alas. i know that my little danby's wash times are quite long, but it's not like the ball is fully submerged for over an hour at a time. a pity. it was an interesting idea.
of course, i think if i used the detergent ball all the time, paul would think something was missing from the wash.
paul: vinegar?
paul: did you put in the vinegar yet?
we take our laundry very seriously in this house.
i hate it when an idea is so abruptly dashed by practical concerns.
on saturday night in ikea's as-is section i saw it and laughed so loud an entire family looked at me in alarm. a little red playhouse store display, the kind scattered around carson ikea with various child-friendly activities tucked within. it was less than $40. i nearly wept with delight. what an opportunity!
the next morning we returned with cam's parents' creaky old van. because we didn't bother to check the night before, we were stunned to discover that the thing was heavy. really heavy. there's no way we'd be able to get it up the stairs. in fact, i doubt we could even get it to the van. i blinked back disappointed tears.
although it wasn't ideal playhouse material (where would i have put it?), it was just so... iconically carson ikea -- paul's favorite store in the world -- that if i only had been a little bit bigger, i would have strapped it to my back and hauled it home on foot.
my department is very noisy sometimes. today they all came back from lunch together, laughing loud enough to wake the dead. it's a small department, and we've seen so many people come and go -- i think this may be one of the few combinations in place with a mimimum of outsiders. i'm an outsider, sure, but i'm a supervisor -- i expect it. just a price one has to pay for the title, the responsibility and the gobs of cash i'm sure the others aren't making.
riiiight.
it would be nice to be included every once in a while, but it's no big deal. i was a little bummed, however, on wednesday when my boss brought in a carrot cake for the departments to share. death in iced and sliced form. i hid in my office until my eyes returned to normal, maybe two hours. there was also a chocolate cake that looked innocuous enough, but only one knife to cut both. the first person to use the knife on the carrot cake apologized after the fact -- "sorry i forgot, just wasn't on my radar" -- and i bear her no grudge, but it did sadden me that my boss didn't remember, either.
skinned my knee on saturday morning -- i was trying to get out of bed quickly because a boy was crying. instead i ended up crying, too, bawling like somebody died. and dammit, now i can't wear knee-length skirts until it heals. very inconvenient.
i just realized a few minutes ago that my site has been... um, on the fritz because i apparently have no eye for detail. funny how a thing like a single omission of a slash can do that. apologies.
it's rough covering for two people while still doing my own job. thank goodness my assistant was only out for a day. i'd go mad.
i said something to my friend susan last week that has been sort of haunting me for a few days now -- something about my need to be productive. if i don't get a lot accomplished, i don't consider my weekends to be successful.
it's not that i didn't know this to be true, but there's something about vocalizing a fact like that to make a girl feel like one big fucking control freak.
i get moody when i don't do everything -- or at least a great part of what -- i meant to do. (at least once a month i can blame pms.) i don't mean to be a jerk. it just happens. often i can suppress the outward signs, or, as i told susan, i can break my desired goals into smaller components so i can pretend to myself that i've done more than i've actually done.
really, i wish i weren't so driven about something as ridiculous as whether or not i finished organizing paul's collection of trains. it's kind of embarrassing how worked up i can get. you know, it's actually more than kind of embarrassing, it IS embarrassing.
and it's positively painful how a simple monday morning query like, "hey, how was your weekend?" can put me in the dumps.
i hate it when i have time to write and the words don't come. i've been thinking and thinking about stuff i've been wanting to put down here and... i don't know where it went. feh!
it's a long weekend and i am already beat.
friday kicked my ass. work started out really slow, but then the afternoon just exploded. it wasn't like that for everybody else, though, aside from my assistant. in fact, we had two people out and two left early. poor damon and i were stalwart workhorses... until 4:30 when he left. from 4:30 to 5, i just cleaned up. my boss came to my office to say goodbye (he left for china last night. three weeks.) and was very amused to discover that we were the only ones left.
i've been looking forward to this long weekend, but now that it's here i don't feel as happy as i thought i would. maybe it's the lack of sleep, maybe it's paul's heat rash (my poor bumpy baby), maybe it's the prospect of working outdoors in the blistering sun. i'm hoping my spirits pick up soon. (maybe with the help of coffee?) this is not the best way to start off this endeavor.
between the sunburn and the aching muscles, i think i am ready to die. good god, i hurt.
last night the coffeemaker broke, so i am coffee-free thus far today. my head aches and the day is dragging, dragging, dragged. i feel so pathetic.
i think it's a combination of pms, work stress, home-improvement stress and family stress -- i've been a basket case for over a week now. i am sad, freaked out, angry. i get tied up over little things much more easily than usual.
just yesterday i was trying to tell cam a story in the car on the way home. he interrupted, innocently guessing at the reason why i was telling him the story. for some reason, i just got really upset. i told him not to talk to me because i was so angry i was about to cry. my insides were tangled.
cam is on edge, too. we just got into a not-quite-argument that we managed to sigh off.
paul has been quite good -- he has slept without calls for diaper changes and milk for the last two and a half nights. but he has also been his share of trouble, too. no parent of a toddler ever lives a completely stress-free life.
we need a vacation.
yesterday i went home early with a migraine. to give you an idea of how bad it was -- i didn't check my email between the hours of 1:45 pm and 6:50 am. unreal. i had cam set up (and take down) my out-of-office message. i never even recorded a vm version.
i awoke from a nap to the sounds of struggle. i went to paul's room to discover that he had a splinter in his finger and was fighting to keep cam from touching it. between the two of us, we were able to remove the splinter before he even realized it was gone. the fuss stopped instantly. (this brought to mind paul's tantrum the day before when cam wanted to bandage his knee. once it was over, paul admitted to cam that it was now, in fact, better. "thank you, daddy," he said, "for cleaning my leg.")
cam then brought paul over to his parents so we could have a peaceful meal.
when cam returned with paul, he brought with him the bad news that paul had an allergic reaction to some cow's milk that he had accidentally drank -- apparently it was in a cup that looked like his. he drank it, he got scared, he threw up. cam's dad drove them home. my poor boy was drooly and sad and swollen. he ate ice and clung to me until he felt a little better. the visible effects of the reaction had faded by the time he went to bed, but he was so worn out that he slept without incident all night long.
my head is better today, and i haven't heard anything from my mom, so paul is most likely symptom-free. what a yucky yesterday we had. glad that day is over.
this morning i felt worn out, even though i had gone to sleep fairly early last night. (the heat is kicking my ass. exhausting. i haven't stayed up past 11 all weekend.) part of the reason for my malaise was that paul had slept poorly yet rejected me at every turn. "no, go 'way! daddy! me want daddy!" it's stressful. even though i should be glad he was demanding cam's attention instead of mine -- so that i could sleep -- i still have this idea that i'm responsible for his nighttime care. i guess it's tied to our breastfeeding days.
when i got up this morning, paul was rolling around and whimpering. i picked him up and he smacked me in the head. "go 'way! go 'way! no! daddy!" so i put him down and went to the bathroom. when i came back, he decided he wanted to go with me. it was a very difficult hour. he didn't want to do anything i wanted to do -- he didn't even really want to do much other than be carried around and complain. twice i felt so awful i broke down.
me: i feel terrible. i want to cry.
paul: no!
me: [crying]
paul: sorry! sorry! sorry!
me: [crying]
paul: sorry! [rubbing my face vigorously] wiping stuff off your face.
me: okay, thank you.
it's only about 8. i hope the rest of the day isn't going to be like this.
even though i slept long and decently well, i still feel like hell. i hope i'm not coming down with something.
i don't think i'm a very good daughter-in-law. i try, but perhaps i'm too meek to really fit very well.
why am i so sleepy? my coworker has a three-month-old baby girl and i think i look more haggard than she does.
cr-v troubles again. oh joy.
my headaches are sometimes worrisome. i think i would have spent this entire past weekend sleeping if i could have.
it's been a very long and very short couple of days. i can't believe that in a few hours day four of my mini-vacation will be over. one left. i better make the most of it.
having such easy access to childcare (hello, grandparents!) really does make me feel like a terrible parent sometimes. it's not like we drop paul and run all the time, but having someone else watch him on weekends (even for just an hour or two) sometimes gives me guilt like you wouldn't believe. if i were a stay-at-home parent, sure, no prob, but working fulltime AND not spending every waking weekend minute with him... sometimes i think of myself as akin to unfit.
i am trying not to be bummed that the test flashed "not pregnant" before i was even done washing my hands. i think i prefer the old(er) fashioned tests that just had you stare at lines. then there was ambiguity, possibility. then there was hope and the desire to take more than one test. none of this newfangled in-your-faceness.
whenever i go into paul's closet, it makes me a little sad. not because i see all of his tiny outgrown clothes (because i don't -- most of them aren't stored there), but because i see how we have less than two-and-a-half boxes left of costco's old kirkland wipes. once they're gone, i don't know what i'll do.
sometime last year i got wind of the fact that costco was changing the supplier for their store-brand baby wipes. because we absolutely loved their wipes and had been using them since paul was born, this was devastating news. my mom started buying an extra box every single time she stopped by there, which was at least twice a month. soon we had a nice little stash built up of those weird pastelly rainbow boxes. when we showed up at costco one day and saw unfamilar boxes, we scoffed in the face of disasters foretold and confidently walked past them without a second look.
as the stash dwindles, i know i should start thinking about a new brand. i hate huggies wipes, even though we love their diapers. i liked pampers wipes for washing my face (i used to buy those from the grocery store for years prior to having a child because i just liked the convenience of them), but thought they might be too rough for their actual intended use. yes, i have a rough tough weatherbeaten old face. i liked the lansinoh wipes included as samples in the big boxes of breast pads, but because i have never bought a full-size box i don't know if they made any changes between beta and production. those might be worth a shot, but the idea of buying wipes in such small quantities makes me very nervous. i've read that the new costco wipes aren't as bad as they could be (considering huggies makes them), but buying them in such large quantities without getting to try them first also makes me very nervous.
i've got some time left before these run out, but i guess i should start shopping around. even though paul is doing pretty well with the potty-training and i almost need more clorox wipes than baby wipes, i have a feeling our need for these is far from over.
i need to find a wallpaper for my office. momentum is slipping away.