Two Years

TODAY it is very important that I write. Because TODAY is the second anniversary of our Giving and Receiving Ceremony. TODAY is the second anniversary of the day we went from being a family of three to being a family of four.

A few days ago, I was sorting through Lana's clothes, and bagging up things that were too small. (She has been growing like a weed lately). At the corner of one of her drawers was a wrinkled pair of yellow capri pants with a bad stain over the knee.

She is wearing the pants in this photo.


We bought those pants two years ago tonight, at a shopping center in Da Nang. (We also bought her a yellow sweatshirt with a red tulip on it, and a pair of pink pants and a turtle neck. And crayons and coloring books and boxed milk, and pretty much anything else that she pointed at in the grocery section of the shopping center, because she was so very thin. And she wouldn't eat much, aside from fruit.)

The reason that the pants have a terrible stain on the knee is because she was wearing them when I dropped her. In the road. Yes, in. the. road. In Vietnam. Where traffic is INSANE.

I don't think I blogged about this when it happened.

We were walking in the road near the Somerset Westlake in Hanoi and I was carrying her in my arms, when my shoe caught in something and I tripped...and I dropped Lana in the road and she was almost crushed by a taxi.

When I think about it now, when I think about what might have happened, what could have happened, it makes my heart beat really fast and I feel panicky.

More panicky, in fact, than I felt at the time it happened.

I think I was numb. I think I was in a state of heightened awareness. I think I had reached a level of 'completely-and-utterly-freaked-out' that was previously unknown to me. So dropping my newly adopted child in the road in front of a taxi didn't really register as it probably should have.

And with two years hindsight, all I can say is Thank God, Thank God, Thank God that taxi driver stopped.

This has been quite a journey. We are in such a different place than we were two years ago tonight, when Lana fell asleep watching a Strawberry Shortcake video in a hotel bed in the city where she was born, a city she may never return to.

Tonight we went to dinner as a family, and Lana gleefully ate a cheeseburger and french fries and lettuce and tomatoes. She stole shrimp off my plate.

Afterwards, Lana and went shopping, because Coldwater Creek was having a 70% off sale and Gymboree was having a 60% off sale, and Lana grinned at me and said, "Let's Go SHOPPING MOMMY!"

We are dangerous together, she and I.

I could not bring myself to throw out those yellow pants. They are tucked in the back of her closet, and someday, maybe, I will tell her the story of why there is a stain on the knee, and why, of all of her clothes, I kept that pair of wrinkled pants, even when they no longer fit her.

Lana In The Leaves

My Girlfriend H~ took this picture of Lana playing in the leaves. I just love it.

Six Years

Six years ago, today, Gabriel and I flew from Los Angeles to Detroit, after spending a week in California, visiting family and friends and attending my cousin's wedding.

It was the first time Gabe had ever been on an airplane.

It was otherwise an uneventful day, as far as we knew then.

But...

Six years ago today, in a city on the South China Sea, a woman whose name means "Jade Lotus" gave birth to a baby girl and she gave that baby girl a name that means "Jade Orchid". She stayed with her for one week, before taking her to an orphanage and asking them to care for her, because she did not have the means to do so herself.

I think the fact that she gave her baby a name so close in meaning to her own meant something of tremendous importance to her. I have to believe she chose that name with a great deal of care.

My feelings about this woman, Jade Lotus, have often been conflicted. And I think the reason for my conflict stemmed not from the actions of Jade Lotus, but rather from the difficulty I had in becoming the mother of Jade Orchid.

Becoming the mother of Jade Orchid was not easy for me. It was a road filled with potholes and switchbacks and, many times, as I began walking on that road, I stumbled and I did not think I could get up again and keep walking ~ because it was so hard. And in its difficulty, I did not have kind feelings about Jade Lotus.

But, that bumpy and difficult part of the road is far behind me, I am no longer becoming Jade Orchid's mother. I am her mother. She is no longer becoming my daughter. She is my daughter.

And in the transforming from the becoming to the being, I have come to feel something towards Jade Lotus that is not conflicted, but, merely simple.

I am grateful.

I am grateful for this little girl, who came into our family in such an unusual way, who, by all rights should have joined another family years earlier. I am grateful for this child who smothers me with kisses and sings me songs and tells me funny stories.

I am grateful, that six years ago, Jade Lotus made a choice to bring this child to the world. I am grateful that she gave me the opportunity to become this child's mother.

And if I could say anything to her today, it would be, thank you. Thank you for this beautiful child, and her beautiful name.

Jade Lotus, where ever you are today, I hope you know that Jade Orchid is safe, and loved, and that she is, above all things, joyful.

Happy Birthday to my beautiful, beautiful Lana, who woke up this morning with a smile on her face, and a blissful announcement that "Today is my BIRTHDAY!" It sure is, baby girl, it sure is.

I am not a Llama

Gabe had a friend over yesterday who (either inadvertently or on purpose, I don't know which) called Lana, "Llama".

It's actually not that far a stretch from Lana to Llama. Although many people mispronounce Lana's name like beginning of the word "land" with an "a" on the end, her name is more correctly pronounced like the word "llama," only exchanging the "m" sound for an "n" sound.*

Do you suppose more people would say it right if we changed the spelling to "Llana"? (Or, you know, that might lead to her being called "Yana," which would just be ridiculous.)

At any rate, after several instances of being called, "Llama" by Gabe's friend, Lana had had enough.

Which is when I heard her yell something that I really never expected either of children would have a need to yell across our yard, ever ~ namely,

"LISTEN TO ME!!! I. AM. NOT. A. LLAMA!!"

It gave me a giggle.

*we choose to pronounce her name this way because it was the way she, herself, pronounced her Vietnamese name, which was "Lan". We just westernized her name by adding the "a" sound on the end.

Of All the Gin Joints, In All The World, You Had to Walk Into Mine

This evening I was having dinner with my family at a smallish chain restaurant that all four of us like.

Lana surprised me by reaching over to my plate and taking one of my shrimp. (And no, we were not at Red Lobster. Ever since the great Red Lobster Debacle of 1993, David has not set foot in a Red Lobster.)

Where was I?

Oh, Lana reached over and took a shrimp from my plate, put it in her mouth (uh...tail and all) and ate it.

"I like this," she announced.

David and I stared at her, a bit dumbfounded.

Lana loved shrimp when we were with her in Vietnam. And, for a short time afterward. LOVED them.

Then, inexplicably and without warning, she refused to eat them. For a long time she offered no explanation for this. And then, one day, months ago, she said, "I no eat that no more. I ate that when I spoke Vietnam. I no speak Vietnam, I no eat those things."

And while this made me sad, I didn't know what to do. It's not like shrimp is something I feed to my other child, well, ever. So, I stopped putting shrimp on her plate and replaced it with other things - chicken and pork and salmon. She didn't complain.

But today, she put that shrimp in her mouth and ate it happily. And I'm not sure what to make of it.

I watched her, sitting across the table from me, in the booth, leaning into David's arm. She said something very funny (although I cannot recall what it was exactly), we all laughed and she cuddled into him.

For a moment, I was awestruck, looking at this beautiful, beautiful child - this child who once loved shrimp, and then didn't anymore, because it reminded her of a place or a time before, that was too painful or confusing to think about.

To think that we had traveled to the other side of the planet, and arrived at an orphanage on a rainy afternoon, to meet a child we knew almost nothing about...and 20 months later, to find that she fits into our lives, into the crook of my husband's arm, into the spaces of my life that I didn't know were empty...

Truly, what are the odds?

What are the odds that people who are truly meant to be together will find their way to each other? It's almost a little like arranged marriage, isn't it? To be handed a packet of information and a picture and a list of instructions. You will get on a plane. You will meet this stranger. You will love them and live with them forever.

Is the human capacity for love so boundless that we can find love under such a pretense?

I think it might be. And maybe there is something greater going on. Maybe we are drawn to those we are meant to have in our lives by something bigger than ourselves.

For a long time, when I looked at Lana, I knew, somehow, that I loved her, that I was choosing to love her.

Love can be a choice that you make, and I was choosing to love this child.

But, I am not able to remember, at what point, I stopped choosing to love her, and found that I had no more choice in the matter. I love this little girl. It's no longer a choice I am making but simply the be all, end all - I love this little girl. Against all odds, against language and culture and blood ties that do not bind - I love this child.

I could not love her more than if it were my blood pumping in the heart in her chest.

And I am weirdly relieved, that, for whatever reason, she is ready to eat those things again, that remind her of Vietnam, and not feel bad about it.

Gretchen


*Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart), Casablanca, 1942

You Are My Only Mommy

Lately Lana has been extremely, even demandingly, affectionate. I'm not sure how to describe this exactly, except to call it, "attack affection". She lunges herself at Husband and I and wraps herself around our necks or legs or waists or whatever part of us she can get a hold of, and announces, "I LOVE YOU! HOLD ME!"

We try to accommodate this need for affection as well as we can, but, it's difficult to, for example, chop an onion and hold a five-year-old, even a really light one who is hanging on to your body like a monkey. (Believe me, I've tried.)

She is doing well in kindergarten. I spoke with her teacher on Monday for about 15 minutes, about how she was getting along in class. Mrs. K~, Lana's teacher, who appears to be 16-years- old but obviously must be at least 24), said, "Honestly, if you hadn't told me that she had only been speaking English for 18 months I would never have guessed." She said that, from her point of view, Lana understands everything that happens in class, has no trouble with her "skill ring skills"*, and is socializing very nicely with the other kids. Mrs. K~ is not concerned about the trouble Lana has pronouncing consonant blends, because evidently (?) lots of kids who speak English as their native language have trouble with "fricatives and blends" in kindergarten. So, it's a relief to know she is doing just fine at school.

The other thing Lana has been saying, A LOT, is "You are my only mommy" or "You are only my mommy." I think there is a huge difference between those two statements, and I'm not sure if she means both of them.

When she says, "you are only my mommy" she will often add, "not Gabe's mommy" as a clarifier, which makes it pretty obvious what she is trying to insist that she should not have to share me with Gabe. (Sorry, sweetie, but, Gabe is part of the package.)

However, there are times when she says, "you are my only mommy" without insisting that I am NOT Gabe's mommy, and I don't know if she means that she no longer remembers her foster mother or, if she's just being affectionate or what?

I probably should not dig too deeply into this, as it is likely that she is simply marking her territory, so to speak.

Needless to say, the comments from her that I am not Gabe's mommy are going over like a lead balloon with Gabe.

There is some constant bickering and arguing happening between the two of them almost constantly, and, quite frankly, they are making me a little nuts.

This Is How We Spent Labor Day Weekend

It was all too much excitement for my nephew, M.

On Saturday, as we were driving the boat out into the middle of the lake for some tubing-fun, my sister-in-law mentioned how much her (late) mother had enjoyed water-skiing on the lake. Two minutes later this butterfly landed on my sister-in-law. Coincidence? (Am I the only one who has heard that when you are visited by a butterfly, you are being visited by a lost love one?)


Lana and my niece Jo-Jo (her nickname, not her real name)

Lana, always wanting to "go faster"
Lana and Dave

David and I (keep in mind I had very recently been dunked in the lake. Several times. And it was very, very cold water!)

David and Gabe

First Day of Kindergarten

Harold and Kumar May Have Gone To White Castle but Gabe and Lana Went to Arkansas

No alligators (or Lanas) were harmed in this photo session.

Anyone who told me girls are easier than boys was totally lying!

Oh the drama! The epic emotion! The tyranny of the mood-swings of an almost-six-year-old girl!

Seriously, in my experience, a boy child is a WALK IN THE PARK by comparison.

Perhaps it is just MY boy child?

Gabriel started 3rd grade today. Kindergarten, despite being in the same school building, doesn't start until next Tuesday.

Suffice it to say that Lana is P*SSED.

We had a mini meltdown last night, that nobody likes her, she doesn't have any friends, she doesn't know anybody in her kindergarten, why does Gabe get to start school today if she doesn't, and, the topper, "EVERYONE" thinks she is "STUPID". (I'm ticked because I think a little girl in the neighborhood called her "stupid" because she didn't understand something. I have no idea how to deal with that, and it's ridiculous. Lana is, categorically, not stupid.)

She also demanded to know why she couldn't go to kindergarten with one of her friends from her pre-school. When I said, "she's going to Hebrew school and we aren't Jewish" - Lana insisted she could be Jewish if she wanted to be. (Then she demanded to know what Jewish was.)

Anyway, there have been tantrums and tears and gnashing of teeth and high-pitched screaming, and crying that no one likes her and everyone is mean to her.

I am really hoping kindergarten goes well next week. I want her to meet some new friends, I want her to have the kind of friendships she had at pre-school. (I think she has really been missing her pre-school buddies this summer.)

I just hope I can get through this weekend without throttling someone. Or myself.

I am terrified of what "12" is going to look like if "almost 6" is making an emotional wreck of both of us!

When did I do THAT?

My babies are back.

They got home yesterday afternoon after a whirlwind visit to Nashville, Memphis, and various parts of Arkansas, and attending a 100th birthday party for their great-great-grandma. They had a good time but were happy to come home.

A funny anecdote from Lana's first meeting with my great-grandma.

(Scene - great-grandma's kitchen)

Lana and Gabriel and their cousin T~ run into the house.

Great-grandma says, "Hey, I know you all! I gotta picture of you all right here on my fridge! Here's my Yankee great-great-grandbabies!"

Gabe and Lana and T~ are playing in Great-Grandma's family room for about 10 minutes. Great-grandma leans into my mother and whispers, conspiratorially, "Do you think her daddy mighta been an Oriental man?"

My mother looks at her in surprise and says, "Yes, Grandma, I'm sure her daddy was an Asian man."

Great-grandma says, "Uh-huh."

Forty-five minutes pass, during which my great-grandma visits with my mom and brother and watches the kids playing.

Out of the blue, great-grandma whispers, conspiratorially, again, to my mother and brother "I just don't see Wart (her unlovely nickname for me since I was a very skinny, sickly looking baby) in that child at'all. I just don't see a lick of Wart in that girl."

My mother looks at her in shock and says, "Grandma! She's adopted! They went to Vietnam last year to bring her home!"

Great-grandma nods with sudden comprehension. "Oh! Well! That'll do it. That'll do it."

From this exchange, I can only conclude that my great-grandma has spent the last 18 months looking at pictures of Gabe and Lana and believing I had a tawdry affair with an Asian man....

Lighter Notes

Our receptionist buzzes my office. There is a light giggle in her tone, odd for our office these past few days.

"Line one is for you," [snicker].

"G~W~," I say in my best, 'I am a professional ball-buster' voice.

"Hi Mama!" Lana squeals. "Is Lana!"

"Hi sweetheart," I say, surprised she is calling me, all by herself. "Are you okay? Where's daddy?"

"Yeah, mom, I okay. Daddy just starting his run on treadmill. But, I need to cancel our appointment today." [This comes out sounding like "I neeta canshel ow appertnent tuhday" but, I know what she's trying to say." (She has a speech impediment, but her vocabulary is impressive.)

"You need to cancel our appointment?" I ask, incredulously.

"Yeah, I just gonna stay home and swim in the pool with Daddy and Gabe? Kay? So, cancel our appointment."

Evidently, I was suppose to pencil in a meeting with my five-year-old, but, she's cancelled it, due to the fact that she'd rather swim. Go figure. What impresses me most is that she was able to find the listing for "mom's office" in the call log of our phone, and dial it. She's a pretty savvy cookie, that one.

_____________________________

It's come to this. I am taking hula-hoop tips from an 8-year-old girl. My latest obsession is my new weighted hula-hoop, which I can now keep going for 3 and half minutes straight. (I find that the song "Animals" by Nickelback is particularly good for background hula-hoop music. The beat is just right, or something.) Anyway, Lexi, our 8 year old neighbor, is the reigning hula-hoop queen of the neighborhood. Two nights ago, she walked the entire rectangle around our pool, including stepping up on to the diving board and jumping down, while keeping her hula hoop in motion around her waist. And she did it without breaking a sweat and with barely appearing to move her tiny body. I was so fascinated I thought about taking notes.

It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen. Her advice is not particularly helpful, though. "I just do it," she answers, when I ask her how she is doing it. Kids.

the heart has no bones you say so it won’t break, but the purpose of loving is the pounding it takes*

Lana has had a rough time of it the past week.

There have been two significant tantrums, and some smaller fits.

When I say “tantrum”, I’m not quite sure if this fully describes her behavior. When she is in the midst of one of these episodes, she is screaming and kicking (although, admittedly, she does not kick at PEOPLE. She will kick the floor, but, she doesn’t kick people. She also doesn’t bite, which I have read about other children doing during this kind of thing, so, thank God for small favors). Her body becomes very, very rigid, she curls in on herself, and eventually will begin to hyperventilate, at which point whatever she has been crying/screaming about becomes, “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe” or sometimes, ‘I need Daddy, I can’t breathe, I need Daddy, I can’t breathe.”

She has not, ever, called for me during one of these episodes. Her anger may be directed (and in fact often IS directed) at David, because he is the one who has punished her by denying her something she wants or sending her to her room, but, he is the one she wants to come to her when she is upset like that.

This is unfortunate because I am much more capable of sitting next to her and waiting for her rage to pass than Dave is. (I am not good at having the rage directed AT me, but, I will sit quietly next to her and wait.) I employed this “sit quietly and try to hold child” method on the rare occasions in Gabe’s toddler hood that he would throw an epic tantrum. Even now, if Gabriel is angry (Lana being the person most likely to make him angry), if I follow him to his room and rub his back and talk to him quietly, he can be brought back from his anger fairly quickly.

This technique does NOT work with my daughter. When I try it, she curls further into herself, becomes more upset, and chants, “please leave, please leave, please leave, leave leave leave leave leave” until I worry she will start with the hyperventilating, so, I leave.

At a certain point her raging becomes something…else, something sadder and less angry, more woeful, I guess. At that point, if David goes near her, rather than kicking the floor and screeching at him, she will fling herself at him and cling to him, and he tells her “breathe, breathe” and then she desperately needs affection from him.

The extremely unfortunate part about these tantrums in the past week is that they have been witnessed by Keiko, who is an exchange teacher from Japan who is staying with us for 3 weeks.

(I actually wonder if the presence of Keiko in our house, and the disruption of her routine, may be responsible for her heightened tantrums this week. She was quiet and clingy at the airport when we went to get Keiko, and she overheard someone ask Keiko if she (Lana) was her (Keiko’s) daughter, which prompted Lana to climb up my body and into my arms (not necessarily odd behavior, but, the timing seemed telling.)

Keiko is far too polite to comment on the tantrums, but, I have to think she found the behavior disturbing to witness.

After the second tantrum this week, I took Lana into my bedroom to read some books and to cuddle in our big bed. We read about four books and then we were just lying there, and I was rubbing at my ear.

“Why you rub your ear?” Lana asked.

“Because it hurts right now,” I said.

“Maybe you gotta go see the doctor?” she inquired.

“Maybe.” I said. (I think it is just sinuses, but, it’s been hurting for about a week, so, maybe I should go.)

Lana suddenly says, “I don’t never wanna get another shot from the doctor.”

“Sometimes you have to get a shot at the doctor, to keep you healthy.” (I think she might actually need one more shot this summer before she starts kindergarten, so, this conversation is making me nervous.)

“I no like shots. I cry,” she says.

“They hurt, but, sometimes you have to have one to stay healthy. Daddy had to have a lot of shots when he was so sick last month.”

“Babies get lots of shots,” she comments.

“Yes, I guess they do.” I say, wondering where she is going with this.

“Who went with me? Who went with me to get my shots when I was baby?” she asks.

“Um…” I say.

“You go with me, when I was baby, I cried for shots?” she asks.

“No, honey. I think, maybe the mom you had before me, your mommy before me, maybe she went with you.”

She is lying with her back to me, her tiny backside curled against my stomach, the back of her head nestled against my throat. She says nothing for a few minutes.

“I had two moms, before. One of them was hooker.”

“What???” I say, too loudly.

“No, no, that’s wrong….” She corrects herself, “One of them was COOKER. She was all the time cooking. She was COOKER.”
(I try very hard not to laugh at this point. She certainly wouldn’t understand the humor in her alphabetical mistake.)

“You had two moms and one of them cooked all the time?” I ask.

“Yeah, one of them was cooker,” she repeats, as if I am not getting her point.

I wonder if she thinking of her foster grandmother, who, in the four photographs we have of her, is wearing an apron. Maybe she cooked a lot?

Lana rolls over to face me, and wraps her arms around me very tightly.

“I give you a squishy hug, mama,” she says. “I love you very, very,” (on her fingers she carefully counts “very” 10 times) “much,” she finishes.

“And I love you very, very” (and I use her fingers to count “very” 10 times) “much, too.”

I’m just relieved to know that she knows I love her, and that, of her life before, she remembers someone who came with her when she had to get her shots, and someone else, who was a COOKER, and not a HOOKER.

Some days I feel like mothering this child takes me from the depths of despair and frustration to the heights of hilarity. It’s quite a roller coaster, but, I think the high points are outweighing the low ones.

Gretchen

* Josh Ritter, You Don't Make it Easy, Babe

Things My Children Have Accused Me Of Today

1. Forcing them to eat foods they hate.
G.W. pleads....not guilty. As hard as I try, I cannot "force" them to eat things. I keep putting various things in front of them, and pleading, and cajoling, and begging and bargaining, but, FORCING, per se...not so. It's not true! It's not like I'm prying their jaws open and sliding the food in! I swear. Despite the cajoling and bargaining, their diets are fairly limited to: fruit (all kinds), cheese (all kinds), milk, eggs, bread, noodles, plain chicken, plain pork, mac n' cheese, french fries, and broccoli. And tomatoes (for Lana) and cauliflower (for Gabe.)

2. Not being fair.
G.W. pleads..............not guilty. I try really, really hard to be fair. The fact remains that life isn't fair, but, I feel like I bend over backwards to make things fair. Today, they said it "wasn't fair" that I refused to buy popcorn when we went to see Wall*E. But, I didn't buy popcorn for ME, or THEM, so, it was FAIR. It just wasn't the outcome they wanted.

3. Eating all the cherry flavored skittles out of the dish of skittles in our kitchen.
G.W. pleads............well, GUILTY. Yes, I am totally guilty of that last one. It was me, I cannot lie. (Come on, the red ones are the BEST, everyone knows that.)

I don't want a pickle, Just Want to Ride on my Motorcycle*

Lana came in the house yesterday after jogging at the park with David.

(For Lana, jogging at the park involves sitting in the babyjogger and yelling, "go faster, Daddy, go faster" while Husband runs, pushing the babyjogger in front of him. David indicates that other joggers find this hilarious.) (I tend to think that David WOULD find it hilarious, except that it is also very hard work to run and push a babyjogger faster and faster. So I'm told. I wouldn't know.)

As they walked in the house, David asked me, "Is today the 1st of June?" (This was apropos of, what? I don't know, because we never got any further into that conversation.)

Lana piped up, "In June, I'm gettin' a MOTORCYCLE!"

Dave and I, together, "What?"

"In June, I'm gettin' a MOTORCYCLE. Gonna go FAST."

Yeah, hold the phone and put on the brakes, baby girl. Not. Gonna. Happen.

"Where are you getting the motorcycle from?" I ask her, curious.

"Don't know," she said happily. "Just gonna get one."

I am in so. much. trouble.

LM

*Arlo Guthrie, "The Motorcycle Song", from the album Alice's Restaurant

And it's Poetry In Motion

As I was picking up our standard Friday night sushi-takeout order (because evidently I have an addiction to California rolls that must be fed at least once a week), David called to say that he and Gabe had lucked into a pair of tickets to this evening's baseball game. Lana was with me in the car when he called, and heard me say, "oh, that's fine, Lana and I will just have a 'girl's night in'."

When we arrived home, my girlfriend Heather called to ask how we were getting along with a problem we had been having with our pool filter*, Lana clamored to talk to her. (Lana loves Heather unabashadly, and loves talking on the phone.) "We havin' a girl's night!" she exclaimed. "We gonna paint our toes, and watch a movie and take a bath!"

She chattered some more on the phone, and when she hung up, she started up the stairs, swinging her hips and singing "girls night, we havin' girls night" to herself. Shortly thereafter, we heard her door shut and CD player start up, loudly, blasting The Indigo Girls. Because, evidently, Closer to Fine is the appropriate soundtrack for Girls Night In.

So, the boys went to the ballgame, and Lana and I painted our toes and took a bath and watched Tom & Jerry, and also went out for ice-cream, and I cannot imagine a more perfect 'girls night in' for Lana and I.

Sometimes Lana takes my breath away with the sheer joy she finds in the simplest pleasures. She was bubbling over with happiness this evening. It was contagious.

LM

*(Heather works human resources for a large pool and spa company, she was my go-to person when my filter wouldn't work yesterday. Specifically, it was blowing, but, not sucking, and with pool filters (as with so many other things in life), when there is blowing without sucking, nothing good can come of it.)

She's Got High In the Sky Apple Pie Hopes

Driving home from work and school today, Lana says to me,

"Mommy, turn the radio down for a minute."

I turn off Rihanna singing "Take a Bow". (I cannot decide if I love Rihanna or if I hate Rihanna - I kind of like this song, though, but, not so much I mind turning it off.) (Note that we are not listening to NPR on the way home because they made me cry hysterically while driving last week TWICE*, so, I consider the news too dangerous to listen to while driving at the moment.)

"You know what I'm gonna learn, mom?" Lana asks.

"What are you going to learn, Lana?" I respond.

"I am going to learn how to fart REALLY REALLY LOUD. Super loud. I am."

Dream big, baby girl. Dream big.

To Light Up The Darkness and Show Us the Way

I bring you the distraction of an amusing story about my funny little man....

I believe I have mentioned before that my Gabriel is something of an old soul. He also, not surprisingly, loves music.

(His love for music is not surprising because everyone in my mother's family, save for me, is very musically talented. I, myself, CAN carry a tune in a bucket, but, much to my family's dismay, just barely.)

Gabriel likes many, many kinds of music - he even will listen to freeform jazz. (I have always WANTED to like jazz, but, the truth is that, mostly, I don't.)

His favorite albums are (and have been for the last 5 years) the "O Brother Where Art Thou" soundtrack, and "Down From the Mountain" (which is more music from the artists on O Brother). He listens to the 'O Brother' soundtrack on repeat at night, all night long. (It is for this reason that Gabe's room is on the opposite side of the house from our room, because David has trouble sleeping with Ralph Stanley singing "O Death" in his ears. (Go figure.))

But, back to Gabriel - he is not at all hemmed in by his bluegrass roots. Yesterday, for example, he was listening to Queen's "Fat Bottom Girls" on Husband's ipod...he has broad musical interests.

A few months ago, Gabe came home from school and asked if we had any John Denver CDs. He said that they had heard some John Denver songs in music class that day and he had liked them and wanted to hear them again.

And because Husband and I are both children of the 70's, and nostalgic, I said, "of COURSE we have a John Denver CD" and pulled out John Denver's Greatest Hits from our CD shelf, and Gabe took it to his room and he listened to it for a while. He came back down and said that he really liked "Sunshine on my Shoulders", but he was upset the album didn't have "Calypso" on it. And I said, "what song?" and he burst into song, singing (loudly) "AYE CALYPSO WE SING TO YOUR SPIRIT"..."but I can't remember the rest of the words".

And then for four days, he walked around the house singing those same ten notes over and over and over and over and OVER AND OVER again, until I was forced to obtain a copy of the album Windsong from the library, so that he could at least learn the rest of the chorus so I would not be forced to strangle him.

So, "Calypso" became a favorite song of his to listen to, or just sing to himself. He is a BIG FAN of the song. (What I find adorable about 8-year-old-boys is that they really have no clue about what is "cool" or "not cool" - so, that at this age, Gabe is free to like or not like whatever music he wants. He has felt the peer pressure a bit with games/toys/TV Shows, but, so far, he is uninfluenced by his peers as far as music goes. I like this and I hope he continues to buck his peers and listen to music he really enjoys just because he enjoys it and not because it's what everyone else is listening to.)

At any rate, Gabriel loves the song Calypso with all the passion that an 8-year-old-boy can muster.

SO, with all that in mind...............rewind to the end of our vacation in Jamaica last month.

As we were sitting outside our hotel in Negril, waiting for an awfully long time for the bus to leave to take us to the airport in Montego Bay - the driver got on the bus and said it was going to be a few more minutes before we could leave for the airport, and everyone on the bus groaned audibly. The bus driver says, "Shall I entertain you with a bit of Caribbean music while we wait? I could play some reggae?" The driver was smiling and some of us smiled a bit (but mostly we were still annoyed by the wait.)

"What? No fans of reggae? How 'bout I play some Calypso, then?"

And my earnest, happy, little boy jumped up from his seat on the bus, jumped up and down clapped his hands and (loudly) said, 'OH! YES! YES! Play CALYPSO! I LOVE CALYPSO!"

Everyone on the bus laughed. (Presumably because they thought it was hysterical that such a small child had such a huge preference for a particular type of Caribbean music. I didn't feel the need to clarify that my kid was actually hungering for a John Denver song.)

The bus driver looked at Gabe and said, "I'm sorry little man, I can't actually play any music."

And Gabe pouted in an adorable kind of way and said, "I guess I'll just listen to it on my mp3 player" and he put on his headphones, where he proceeded, presumably, to listen to John Denver, while the rest of the bus, no doubt, thought he was soaking up the sounds of the Caribbean.

What Not To Do In A Jacuzzi Tub

This is possibly the stupidest thing I have ever done as a parent.

Gabe and Lana were both taking a bath in the jacuzzi tub in Dave and my bathroom.

The like to use the jacuzzi tub because it is larger and deeper than the tub in their bathroom.

I went to pull Lana out of the tub and I noticed that I wasn't feeling like her hair was rinsed very well, but, I was tired and not feeling great and I contemplated letting it go. (Yes, bad bad mommy.)

But, when I got her fully out of the tub, I saw it was still FULL of bubbles in the back, so, I said, "Lana, just jump back in for two seconds and stick your head under the water and shake it around." (Yes, I was being lazy. I am a horrible person.)

Unfortunately, I had pulled up the plug and the water was draining.

We live in a new house (four years old) and the drains and the plumbing still work very efficiently.

So, when Lana jumped into the tub and laid down to rinse her hair....

THE DRAIN SUCKED HER LONG HAIR DOWN THE DRAIN AND PULLED LANA'S HEAD TO THE FLOOR OF THE TUB.

Now, fortunately, the tub was draining very quickly, and I grabbed Lana's head to keep it above the water as it was draining, but, SHE WAS STUCK. Her hair was being pulled down the drain by the water rushing out of the drain, and then it got tangled in the plug mechanism, and I was screaming for Gabe to go get Husband from downstairs, and Lana was just screaming (because she was terrified and because it hurt!)

Dave came running upstairs and jumped in the tub fully clothed and began pulling Lana's hair out of the drain strand by strand while I held her head and pulled it forward.

It was NOT a fun time.

And believe me, her hair was a MESS of tangles when we finally got it out of the drain. (And, a mess, in general.)

After another washing, and soothing of tears (Lana's and mine) - all of us were in our jammies and curled up in bed together in the guest room watching Tom and Jerry. Gabriel turned to Lana and said, with a very very serious look on his face,

"Lana. That was really scary when you're hair went down the drain."

And Lana said, "It was Gabe. It was."

Truer words have not been spoken.

Moral of the story - DO NOT LET your long haired daughter lay down in the tub to rinse her hair if the drain is open.

The Incident of the Strawberry Pop-Tart

This is how my morning went:

Gabriel woke up at the insanely early hour of 6:15 AM. He got up and went downstairs where David was eating breakfast, and it was determined that there were no Cheerios in the house.

Gabriel, distraught, ultimately consented to eat a strawberry pop-tart. (Actually, it was an organic dye-free strawberry toaster pastry from Costco, but, as far as my kids are concerned, a pop-tart.)

It was...(cue dark foreshadowing music here) THE LAST STRAWBERRY POP-TART.

I came downstairs at 7:15, ate my breakfast, and then went upstairs to retrieve Sleeping Beauty from her bed. (I've been trying to let her sleep until 8:50, but, this morning is my early court morning, so, it wasn't an option.)

There was angry growling as I pulled her from bed and took her to the potty.

She was asleep on my shoulder when I opened the car door to strap her into her seat, followed by crying that she was "too cold, too hot, too tired". I asked her what she wanted for breakfast and, eyes still closed, sleepily she said, "a strawberry pop-tart."

FRAP.

Of course she wants a strawberry pop-tart. How the hell does she KNOW that her brother has eaten the last one? HOW? HOW????

I go into the house. We have blueberry organic dye-free toaster pastries that are the same color as the strawberry ones, so, I grab one of those. I run to the car and hand it to Lana, run back in the house, shoo Gabriel out the door, grab my purse and my coat and my lunch, and run back to the car, where Lana is crying hysterically.

What's the matter? I ask.

"I WANT A STRAWBERRY POP TART. THIS NOT STRAWBERRY." Lana is wailing. She is beside herself.

"Lana, we don't have strawberry. We have blueberry and we have cherry."

(Now, my kids have only disdain for the Cherry Pop tart (which we have in actual Kellogg's Pop-Tart form, and which is, in MY opinion, a superior tart to all other flavors of tart. The cherry pop-tart is da bomb (verily, da cherry bomb) but my children normally disagree with me on this fine culinary point. They shun the Cherry Pop-Tart. The Cherry Pop-Tart is tarta non grata to Gabriel and Lana.)

"I want STRAWBERRY" she wails again.

At this point I am in the car with the key in the ignition. "Do you want a cherry pop-tart instead?" I ask her as I turn the car on.

"I want STRAWBERRY!!"

Seriously, I have no idea how she knows the tart in her hand is blueberry, because these organic dye free toaster pastries all have the same color frosting - vaguely graham-cracker-colored. If "graham-cracker-color" is a color. They all look the same.

I pull out of the garage and hit the garage door remote and the door closes and we are driving down the street and she starts to scream, 'I want cherry! I want the cherry one!!"
And I am ticked because she is pulling this crap a lot lately - waiting to ask for something until it is incredibly inconvenient for us to get her what she wants - I swear she wants to see if we will run in circles for her. (She doesn't have to pee until there is no bathroom anywhere near her, she's not hungry until there is NO FOOD anywhere, she wants a particular toy when it is at the very bottom of the carry-on luggage, etc.)

I had to be in court by 9:15, it was already 8:07, and I needed to get both of them to different schools.

So, I kept driving, and I said, "I'm sorry, you should have told me that when I offered it to you, you're going to have to eat the blueberry one."

"I WILL NOT EAT IT. I WILL NOT." There is screaming and crying and gnashing of teeth.

"Well, then you'll eat it for a snack on the way home from school then, cause we don't waste food."

"I WILL SMASH IT IN YOUR CAR!! I WILL MAKE A MESS WITH IT ON THE SEAT!!" she threatens.

I about lost it with that one. Gabe was crying cause he said her crying made his head hurt. I told her if she smashed it on purpose she was going to eat it ANYWAY. (She hates to eat things that are broken or smushed.)

I let Gabe off at the elementary school and she continued to cry and scream and tell me I was a "mean, mean mommy" for another 15 minutes, during which I kept saying, "if you're hungry, eat the pop tart" every minute or so, until she finally ate the damn thing.

When we got to her pre-school, her face was a mess of tears, snot and blueberry pop tart remains. She looked pathetic and wretched. "You are mean to me" she cried some more.

I picked her up and took her into class and she stopped crying and laid in my lap in a lump in a chair in her classroom.

I tried to hand her to her teacher S~ and she said, "I want to go to work with you" and S~ convinced her that mommy's work was boring and that they were going to play beauty shop and do jewelry making today, and Lana agreed that sounded like more fun...

And when I got into my car, thinking, well, at least I can turn on NPR and have a few minutes of CALM, I remembered it was *&%$#!@# pledge week and I had to turn the radio off. I hate NPR pledge week. (We pay our pledge every year, we do. I just hate to hear them beg other people to do it. Mostly because I've already paid. Ugh.)

So, that was MY morning...

 

Gretchen

Stick your heart inside of my chest, Keep it warm here while we rest*

This morning as Gabe, Lana and I got in the car, I put Tegan & Sara's So Jealous album in the CD player.

As soon as Lana heard the beginning of the first song she said, "Mommy! Play the sticky hands song!"

"Sticky hands song?" I asked, confused.

Lana started to sing, "Sticky hands inside of my pockets, keep them warm while I'm outside".

I thought for a second and realized she was singing the chorus to another song on the album (I know I know I know), which goes

"Stick your hands inside of my pockets, Keep them warm while I'm still here."

At any rate, that was my giggle for this morning. I wonder if I should send the sticky hands song lyric to this guy, who writes whole books about misunderstood song lyrics?

Forgotton Pictures from last Summer

Lana and Gabe creating some masterpieces at the kitchen table
Lana and Taylor and Gabe at the Zoo

Things Lana Said This Week That Made Me Laugh

Lana: I don't talk regular

Husband: It's okay, you're getting better every day

Lana: I knows

Lana: I only like really CRUNCHY salad, mommy, like REALLY REALLY CRUNCHY, like, you bite it and it says CRUNCH-CRUNCH. This salad [she picks up a leaf of spinach from a strawberry spinach salad] is not so CRUNCHY. Not so crunchy, I not eat it, okay?

Lana: We goin' on VAY!CATION! We goin' on VAY! CATION! All four of us go on vay! CATION! All four of us guys [she gestures to our immediate family unit] goin' on vay!cation! on a airplane! Last time, I go on airplane, I go [Lana makes a vomiting noise]. I did that [vomiting noise] last time on the airplane. But, not this time! I don't know how to say that [vomiting noise again] but, I no do it on VAY!CATION! (Let's hope she's right about that one!)

 

Is It Really 8 Years?

The calendar tells me that it really is February 21, 2008, and I'm having one of those "where has the time gone" cliche moments of motherhood.

It was eight years ago this morning that we first met our little man Gabriel, who came to us scrunch-faced at exactly 10:00 AM, weighing in at 7 lbs, 7 oz.

I had a moment of angst the other day, when, having purchased him some new long sleeve shirts (size 10! Good grief his arms are getting long), David came into our room and said, "his new shirts don't fit on his hangers."

This seems like such a little thing, but, it means THAT HE NEEDS GROWN UP SIZE HANGERS. No more baby hangers. BIG REGULAR SIZE HANGERS for my baby's clothes.

Is it pathetic that this bothers me?

Last night I was telling Gabe the story of his birth (the highly sanitized version which is minus the blood and the screaming and the swearing like a sailor at the unknown doctor who was grabbed out of the hallway to come in and deliver him), and I had gotten to a key point in the story, the point at which my then-five-year-old-niece Jordan laid her head against my gi~normous belly and started whispering, her mouth flush against my sweater. And when I asked her what she was saying, she looked up at me and said, "Aunt Gretchen, I am telling that baby it is time to come out now!"

(After which, she also looked from me to her own mother, my sister, who was pregnant as well and said, "is my mom's belly going to get as huge as yours?" (No, I am not making that up, not even a little.) And considering the fact that my sister is an adorably petite 5-ft-tall tiny person, and I am a 5'7" Viking-lady, I assured her that it was impossibly unlikely that her mother's belly would get as huge as mine. And it didn't. Not once. Even though she's had FIVE babies.)

Anyway, I had gotten to the part where I went into labor only 4 hours after my niece Jordan had whispered into my stomach that it was time to come out, when Lana piped up,

"What about me, mommy? What about ME!!??!!"

Oh, the crushing and irrational guilt that consumed me! I have no story to tell her about the night she was born. I cannot even tell her if it was night or day or raining or windy or gloomy or sun-shiny. Nothing. Nada. I got zip. Zero. Zilch. No information.

I have told the story of Gabe so many times that it is like second nature to me - and the little details are important (David had a fever of 103, I went to the grocery in a snow storm, the bit about my niece, and how we were watching an episode of The X-Files when we left for the hospital and how it's the only episode of the X-Files we have never seen all the way through*), but, even though I have been telling all of YOU the story of Lana for the last two years, I have not been telling it to HER.

And, well, let's face it, the past year has been a lot about getting to know each other, and her learning English, we haven't exactly had a ton of time to build our shared history, the story of 'us'.

I have yet to tell Lana the story of how, on the day we learned she was our daughter, we were swimming in the backyard when the phone rang, and a woman named Abbie, on the other side of the country, told us "Congratulations!" I have not told her of how I took the tracings of her feet with me to Frankenmuth, Michigan at Thanksgiving in order to buy her the perfect pair of shoes, and how I got excited to buy lace trimmed anklet socks to go with them. I have not told her of how her grandmother and I packed and repacked her suitcase 3 times on the night before David and I left for Vietnam, or how the lady at the Northwest counter in Detroit wished us "good luck with your daughter" when we checked in for our flight. I have not told her that I was nervous to meet her, or what I was thinking when I first saw her.

I have a good story, a compelling story, (really, it is a good story) to tell Lana. I need to work out the details, to get them right, to perfect the story of 'us'.

It may not ultimately be the story she is craving, it may not be the story that she wants. The time may come when she decides she needs to know the rest of her story, and I worry that she may never be able to find it. I worry about this, that no matter how compelling and interesting and humourously told, the story I have to tell her...may not be the story that she NEEDS. But, I will do my best, to craft a story for her, as carefully as I have woven the story of her brother, and I will weave those stories together, and I will hope for the best...

Gretchen


*It was episode 7.12, an episode entitled "X-Cops", and Mulder and Scully were followed around by the film crew of a "Cops" style show - I honestly think that episode only aired that one time, because I have NEVER seen it advertised, anywhere, as a re-run.

 

Navel-gazing

My children have both hit me with some stunning questions this week.

Gabriel: Why doesn't the President like Barack Obama?
Me: Wow, Gabe, that's a big question...

(Anybody care to craft an answer to that in terms an 8-year-old can wrap his head around?)

Lana: Who made all this snow?
Me: God.
Lana: How did God make snow, mommy? How?
Me: (Absolute silence as I search my head for information on precipitation long buried since 8th grade Earth Science)
Me: (finally) Ask your father (I should get some mileage from being married to a guy who TEACHES earth science, right?)

Gabe: Why isn't the Feast of the Epiphany* (this is the day which Roman Catholics and Episcopalians (and a few other Protestant sects) recognize as the day the The Three Wise Men arrived to meet Jesus. Gabe is strangely intrigued with this concept - possibly because I told him that in France it involves CAKE) always on Wednesday?
Me: It's always on January 6, Gabe. Why would that always be a Wednesday?
Gabe: I think Wednesday would be the best day to meet Jesus, that's all.
Me: Hmmm....

* Gabe pronounces this more like "the feast of Fanny" which cracks me up a little bit

Lana: Mommy? You have belly-button?
Me: Yes, I have a belly-button?
Lana: I have a belly-button!
Me: Yes, you have a belly-button, too.
Lana: All people got belly-button?
Me: Yes, all people have belly-buttons.
Lana: Mommy? How come cat got no belly button?
Me: (long silence) Ask your father.

And now I'm left wondering...all mammals MUST have belly buttons, right? Or at least a spot where the umbilical cord was attached. So, dear readers...WHERE IS a cat's belly button???