In praise of the disclaimer

A while ago I read a blogger's comment regarding Linda Hirshman's book "Get To Work" (an argument against women leaving the workforce to raise their children); she (the blogger) wrote, in part: ". . . it is kind of nice to read someone with actual opinions instead of the wimpy "whatever is right for your family" standard disclaimer".

Yeah, that whole business about not judging other people's lifestyles is totally WIMPY, isn't it? It's just so much easier not to criticize families who make choices you wouldn't make for yourself, right? Oh wait.

I have no opinion on the book itself since I haven't read it, but when someone (a whip-smart, uber-educated working mother, by the way) finds it banal, so tragically unhip and tiresome, that many of us evoke the same sentiment—that whatever is right for your family is whatever is right for your family, so mote it be—when we try and discuss parenting issues without passing judgement or starting flame wars it seems, I don't know . . . kind of like the attitude a surly teenager takes when their intent is to seem thrillingly controversial and cool, when in reality they're just being small-mindedly obnoxious.

We all have opinions, we've all made our choices to stay home or work or do a mix of both based on our individual situations and preferences and any number of outside factors. Why not respect the fact that there is going to be diversity in our choices? Because it's wimpy? Give me a break.

Beth wrote, ". . . while I may not totally understand them, I don't question your decisions either." Word to that.

Death by leftovers

I've been noticing that despite my efforts to develop healthier eating habits, I'm stuck in a loop of self-sabotage because of my picky-ass son. Whatever Riley doesn't eat, I tend to pop in my own mouth, telling myself it's no big deal because it's a small amount of food and I wouldn't want it to go to waste. Basically I have appointed myself as human garbage disposal, eating crusts of peanut butter sandwiches, spoonfuls of that creamily fattening YoBaby yogurt, the bottom half of muffins. Foods I wouldn't make for myself as a meal, since I'm "dieting".

Well, the first step is admitting you have a problem, and if happily eating a piece of waffle left on the filth-encrusted seat of a highchair doesn't indicate a problem, I don't know what does. From now on, his leftovers are going in Tupperware or the dog's willing maw.

Well, unless it's macaroni and cheese. I do have my limits.

SwistleWatch 2007

One of my favorite web-writers, Swistle, is having a baby TOMORROW, and she's predictably cracking me up as she waits out the final hours:

"I want time to go over my hospital bag list twenty extra times to make sure I'm not forgetting anything that will make me unable to have the baby after all, and I want to re-read the hospital pamphlet so I won't forget not to get up at 3:00 a.m. and eat a steak. Oh my god, what if I lose my mind and accidentally eat BREAKFAST in the morning?"

Hee. Oh, I can't wait to hear about this new baby's arrival, which I fervently hope is as tolerable as a C-section can be (mmmm, delicious painkillers . . . ). Fill up her comments section with some good wishes, will you?

New stages

A run-down of some current toddler behavior in our household:

MINE!
"Mine!" he says, clutching his stuffed bear as though I had attempted to rip it from his grasp in order to perform an Unnatural Act with a Starbucks-branded "Bearista". "MIIIINE." MY cup, MY blankie, MY cheese, mine, mine, MINE! Everything is his, including objects that are gently explained as belonging to Mama or Daddy. "MIIIIIIIIINE!" he howls, in desolation.

The Constant Naming of Things
"Cheh," he says, pointing to his chair, and he waits, his round eyes fixed on your face. For you must acknowledge the naming of the thing, and respond in kind— "Yes, that's right! Your chair!"—before he is satisfied enough to move on to the next thing. "Book," he says, pointing to a tossed-aside copy of "Where Are Baby's Hands?", and welcome to your afternoon.

The Obnoxiousness
Where did this new scream come from? Jesus, it sounds like some sort of jungle bird being ground through the jet engine of a 747. And what's with the nonstop testing of boundaries, like when you say "NO HITTING" and he sort of casually smacks at a different object, all the while staring at you to see your reaction? AARGH.

The Extra Serving of Charming
"My. Noo. Shoo," says Riley, because he has new shoes. By god, that's a whole sentence, right there. "MOOOOON!" he crows, as you walk past the Port-a-Potty with the cartoon crescent moon printed on the door. He blows staccato, spluttering raspberries and shrieks with laughter at his own hilarity. He takes a bite of macaroni and cheese and loudly says "MMMMMMMM", in perfect imitation of his ridiculous, hovering parents.

Dating, parenting-style

Nearly every Wednesday, Riley and I head out for a playdate at my friend Ashley's house. Riley teams up with Ashley's toddler, Owen, and they charge around like drunken rhinoceroses for a couple hours until somebody (usually, ahem, MY son) cascades—shrieking and snotting—into Nap-Related Meltdown Mode. Meanwhile, Ashley and I sit around and bullshit and occasionally dole out snacks or snag a child mid-gallop to slather on more sunscreen.

A good playdate is a greatly satisfying activity, because everybody wins. The kids are happily distracted with fighting over toys and chasing each other, while the adults can indulge in a conversation featuring both personal pronouns and a refreshing absence of Blue's Clues references.

There's a side benefit, too: being around other parents always gives me more ideas for how to take care of Riley. Even if it's as simple as learning about some food product I'd never heard of (Stonyfield portable yogurt tubes!), or seeing what kinds of toys Riley gravitates towards that he doesn't have at home (sidewalk chalk!). In fact, thanks to last week's playdate, this weekend was handily full of backyard chalk-scribblings and snacktime on-the-run yogurt injections.

Plus, there's nothing like a friend who is also a parent to commiserate with. Like for instance when your discussion is interrupted for the 295726th time by a wailing child.

Does your week typically include a playdate? Where do you go/what do you do?

The thing I can't stop laughing about this morning

Don't bother visiting if you're easily offended, but for the rest of you: behold the magic.

"Sly Little Bear Undresses You With His Eyes" may have actually caused me some permanent internal damage.

The future's so bright

Someday Riley will learn that he participated in video calls with his grandparents when he was just a little boy, and he will be BLOWN AWAY by the archaic technology that was being used. "Was that when dinosaurs were still alive?" he'll ask, and JB and I will cackle appreciatively from our aluminum walkers.

Highs and lows

It's been a rough week or so with Riley. We had the Biting Incident (my arm is still ugly and mottled from having a tiny bear-trap crunch into it; I suppose I should be glad he didn't break the skin but DAMN), we had some ongoing Fractious Behavior, we had night after night of 2 AM Awakenings, and yesterday evening he pitched a tantrum of such epic proportions I actually wondered if he was going to 1) pass out, 2) explode into millions of razor-edged chunks of toddler shrapnel, or 3) trigger a series of 911 calls from our entire neighborhood, reporting on the abused child whose toenails were clearly being removed with a pair of rusty pliers.

He was not only losing his mind completely and making the kind of noises you'd expect to hear from a goat being sawed in half, he was doing the "DADDYYY, DAAADDYYY" thing and absolutely refusing to even be touched by me. He recoiled from my touch and screamed at the top of his lungs, while reaching pitifully for his father.

Nice, kid. Thanks for that. Yeah, the bruise wasn't quite painful enough on its own.

After we put him to bed and I swore once and for all that this was it, we were never going to have another baby because holy christ on a cracker, I cannot deal with one more of these (I have made this promise before, by the way, and I always seem to change my mind, which seems like the very definition of insanity), in fact I cannot deal with the one we have. I went for a run and strongly considered abandoning my normal loop in favor of just . . . heading in one direction, far from home.

(Never mind that I can't jog more than half an hour without dying. I would have been half an hour from home, which is far enough not to hear him scream. I think.)

Then he slept all night without a peep and when I went into his room this morning he greeted me with a giant smile and joyously hopped up and down in his crib. He ate an enormous breakfast without one screaming fit over the diameter of his banana slices and then he ran around the living room giggling. He watched Blue's Clues while talking to himself ("A coo. A coo.") and he came up out of nowhere and hugged my legs. He threw his hands over his head and shouted "Dobbybadada!" (Abracadabra), and he handed his cup to me and gravely thanked me for taking it ("Tan too"). He's got on his Old Navy pajamas with the bugs printed all over them and he looks spectacularly dorky and and unbelievably cute. He kissed me earlier, all slobber and the faint whiff of applejuice and the sleepy sweet smell of just-awoken toddler.

What can I say? What is there to say. Parenthood is crazy, that's all there is to it.

Weathering the storm

Sometimes I wish some Child Development Expert would come watch my son when he's in the throes of an extreme tantrum, just to reassure me that Riley doesn't have emotional problems.

Because SERIOUSLY. We have reached DEFCON 1 over here, people.

Assault on the ears

There have been no further biting incidents in our household, thank god, but the boy was, frankly, a royal pain in the ass all weekend. He felt kind of hot and he seemed even droolier than normal, so I assumed his cantankerous behavior was due to yet another (!) tooth coming in. To validate my suspicions, I actually pinned him on his back during one tantrum (figuring hey, he's already pissed off) and aimed a flashlight down his angry little scream-hole, peering around for the culprit—surely a massive, serrated tusk was painfully erupting from the roof of his mouth—but I couldn't tell what I was looking at. Were those irritated gums? How long had that tooth been there? Was that . . . a forked tongue? Retreat! Retreat!

I realize that at 21 months, Riley has many, many more tantrums in his future, but I find myself feeling officially Tired of All the Crying. Must there always be so much crying? Milk not delivered in .000372 seconds? CRY. A toy briefly stuck under the couch? SCREAM. Air filled with molecules? TEARS.

Second only to a cat throwing up at 3:30 AM, tantrumy crying is the most annoying noise in the universe. From the whining "Eh-heh. Eh-heh. Eh-heh. Heehhhhhhh . . ." sounds to the full-fledged glass-shattering arias, one small child can produce more aural pollution than a Boeing 747. I was thinking, I've been exposed to crying on a daily basis for nearly two years now. I somehow missed the chapter of What to Expect When You're Expecting that told me I was going to experience the equivalent of listening to someone scrape their fingernails down a blackboard/eech a fork across styrofoam/hork up a hairball EVERY SINGLE DAY.