I'm reading Nabukov, Invitation to a Beheading, which is probably not what I need to be reading. I already feel like the world is contrived and artificial, I don't need help from him.

Like I went to a baby shower yesterday, which seem about as staged as a Catholic mass. Everyone enters, pregnant mom arrives, everyone yells surprise. Greetings continue, then the organized, slightly frantic friend will make various announcements: time to eat, time to play a shower game, time to open presents. Then cake. That was the best part, I think.

It was lovely, really. And kudos to the mom-to-be, who gets to go home with a lot of schwag. (Most of which I think is unnecessary to raising of young, I mean Diaper Genie-whatever). Maybe I'm just jealous that they are doing it "the right way." Get engaged, get married, work and save, buy a modest house and raise your kids, send them to college, retire and die. Which wouldn't even be such a prison sentence if you could at least enjoy it. Mom-to-be is going back to her low paying job almost immediately. But it doesn't matter-lawyers and doctors, cashiers and waitresses, even Anjelina Jolie I suspect, are all on this treadmill going nowhere. So how am I expected to enjoy a baby shower when I can't even find a Meaning For It All.

So, this morning, full of ennui and self loathing, I went to church. I didn't want to. And the service was pretty tame-regular pastors were not in attendance, student preacher preaching. Lackluster song choices, if I may say so, and one that was so hard to sing that we all just mumbled through it. Bitchy of me, I know, but I was in a critical mood. But I did see one old friend who I gravitated toward and she gave me a big hug and I told her I woke up on the wrong side of bed and she said that that's ok, just straighten it out now. And I got a few more hugs from people who genuinely like me. And I saw that the lady I helped last week when she almost passed out from the heat was back in her pew. They didn't have to admit her after all, just gave her a tune up and sent her home. And another parishioner who I saw in the ER this week was ok. And the wife of another good old guy I took care of a few weeks ago told me that he's going home, there's nothing more to be done and he wants to spend his last days sitting in his chair and looking out his window and that it's ok. And it was ok. Because sometimes ok is enough.

So, I got hugs and a reminder that I am both liked and useful, which is not too shabby for a Sunday morning. I like church. I'm still not sure who I'm praying to or what all the details are, but it is a tonic for those things that can't be fixed by either logic or therapy.

I got back home, still a little irritable (really, now, STILL?), wanting to write and getting interrupted a dozen times with "Mommy, can I...?" Just when I thought I would lose my stack, and S could tell, she went and brought me a sticker. Of a dragonfly, because she knows they are a special to me. And we stuck it on my phone so I can have a substantial reminder that I can't always get what I want, but sometimes I get a gentle and loving reminder not to be such a poop head.

Cake Happiness

Yuuuup. I'm retarded.

I can bake a cake, but can I upload the photo correctly? No. I cannot.

Anyhoo, after only minor drama, which involved screaming at my family and a mushroom cloud of powder sugar hovering over my mixer, the cake was made. I wish I was exaggerating. Somehow, to no one's surprise but mine, we made it to mom's surprise birthday party with 2 cakes and all family members accounted for. And she was surprised, which is hard to do with my mother.

Dad and Mom enjoy the cakes

My niece MADE these yummy donuts. Which I also can't load right. CRAP. 

Also fruit salad and G's back up Wesley Fudge Cake. 

Seriously, what is wrong with me?

Wrapping up the school year

10 people read my blog...isn't that neat. I know 3 or 4 of them, I think. And I don't even pay them. Interestingly, 1 is from Canadia, 1 from Pakistan and 1 from Indonesia! Welcome, ya'all.

We have been lazily finishing up first grade at home. I finally found a homeschool group, now that they are also finishing up the school year, but they have some activities over the summer, so it'll be nice to get to know them. We went to a play group last week and I really like them. G says I should, cause they're flaky. Whatever.

S and I did some projects. Last week with Venus in transit, which we did not see a. cause it was cloudy and b. cause we didn't send away for special viewing glasses, gave us a reason to talk about how the earth goes around the sun, etc. From a neat book that Aunt Chris gave us, that's ancient (from the 80's), we learned how to make sun dials, so we made two:

the top one is your classic, horizontal dial and the bottom is the same concept, but with a little, bitty bead that casts a shadow.

Here is a neat page about sundials, from down under New Zealand, keep in mind when following the instructions.

S and her dad also started a garden. Our church's community garden had some room, so we took them up on their offer to use the space. They are keeping a journal of their activities. S worked hard, including turning the earth and staking our squares and deciding what was going to go where.

done tilling and weeding

boundary is marked off. with tiki torches, cause we're awesome!

someone has a bucket of tadpoles, so we took a picture. 

 S also finished up with her singing and dance classes AND there was Ag field day AND we took trips to the museum AND....we've been busy. More pics to come.

AND we won tix to see Cirque du Soleil in NYC! So we got dressed up all fancy and went to see a show in the big, big city like we are fancy people. Cause we are. 

Let them eat cake! (and fruit salad)

Next week is our Matriarch's 75th birthday. So we're having a surprise birthday party for my mom at my sister's house today (shhh, don't tell. Actually, this page would take 75 years to load on her computer).

I agreed to make a cake. A rainbow cake! Before he brings it up in the comments, rainbow cake was my husband's idea. I was gonna go with chocolate. Since I agreed to rainbow, he's going to make a chocolate backup in case the rainbow cake fails. Cause that's how he rolls. Also, cause he's nuts.

Now, there's two kinds of rainbow cake circulating the webs. The hippy, dippy, tie-dye version:

whoa, man, it's like cake

Or the more OCD, Martha Stewart approved version:

It is cake. Ja. 

I went with version deux. Cause that's how I roll, yo'. 

The first part is basically make some cake. I suppose you could use cake mix, but our house does. not. Then you have to divide 5 1/2 cups of cake mix into 6 parts. Like I can do maths and stuff. That's why we have programmable IV pumps, but I digress. After that, it's easy-peasy, just color them six rainbow colors, remembering ROY G BIV : red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. Crap, that's 7. But if you notice, even Martha Stewart combines indigo and violet to make purple. And if it's good enough for Martha, etc. 

Then S starts singing the Cat in the Hat rainbow song. "red, orange, yellow. green, followed by blue! Indigo and violet, that's a rainbow song for you!" Listen, I say, we're combining indigo and violet. We're just making purple. "But mom! The song!"

Shut up, cat. 

Anyhoo. Here's some cake....

first 4 layers, check. Now I just need blue, indigo and violet-DOH!

For those not eating cake (?!), there's fruit salad, a la Alton, who is a minor deity in our house. 

I know they sell those little grasper thingies to take the core out of the strawberry. I do not have one. So it's either cut straight across or make a fancy, V-incision. Don't judge me.

fruit labels. The bane of my existence.

Lots of cut up fruit on the right, lots of compost on the left and that weird thing in the middle is a mango slicer, much more useful than you'd think and since it works on peaches, nectarines, et al, NOT a uni-tasker. 

Gotta go make frosting. More pics to follow. 

S is independently reading! For the past week she's been sitting in bed (or on the potty) and reading Dr. Seusses to herself. Last night she read "Are you my mother?" and I almost cried when she wasn't looking. Later, I told her how proud I was of her and how her hard work had paid off, all those worksheets of phonics and consonants and sounding out words and word-of-the-day.

Then, yesterday, her and G were working on an Egyptian project. He found this thing at a thrift store for $5-it comes with a pyramid encased in "sand" and you have to chisel it out. By translating the hieroglyphics on the side, you find out what door to open and then you use your tools to open the lock. Inside is more sand and more digging out until you find the sarcophagus and the canopic jars and stuff. Anyway, G said that she remembered some of the hieroglyphics and could decipher it on her own. I'm so happy-she remembers stuff that we teach her! I mean, obviously she has learned a lot in the past year, but it's still gratifying and she really enjoys learning that stuff.

Now I just have to come up with a plan for today....

Misunderstood


My husband and I had an argument today. Argument #3,186. Really, though, there are only 2 arguments: you won’t do what I say and... I forget the other one. I can’t say that we fight often but when we do they can be doozies. We have never raised our hands to each other. We have, however, raised our hands to several unfortunate, inanimate objects around the house. Today nothing was thrown in anger. Instead, my depression kicked in.

I have suffered from depression since I was 12. It is suffering. It’s hard to describe the bleakness that makes it seem like someone pulled the plug on every good thing you ever had. It’s a withering feeling-that this world would be better off without me in it, that nothing good ever happens, that nothing will ever change. “Why is this still happening to me?” I cry. I spent years, my whole 3rd decade practically, in therapy, so that I wouldn’t be 42 and sitting on the floor crying.

Because that’s where I am: sitting on the hall floor, crying hysterically, while my husband is trying to be mad at me. Moments like this, he doesn’t quite know what to do with me. A minute ago we were having a heated debate, now I am a soppy, pathetic mess.  He tries logic: “My children don’t love me.” I wail. “Yes, they do. Look how happy they are to see you when you come home.” He tries honesty: “You must be thinking, ‘Oh, here we go again.’” “Yes, that is what I’m thinking right now.” It seems so trite to put it on paper. I’d shame us both if I told you some of the thoughts that I think are true when I’m depressed. At 17 I broke up with a perfectly nice guy because I was convinced that being around me would contaminate him. I thought I was broken. Occasionally, I still do.

It’s hard to convey this to anyone. It’s especially hard to convey it to my husband, my best friend, when I would REALLY like for him to understand what is happening to me and if at all possible not act like an ass or do anything that might set me off, which is really unfair because criticizing my inability to handle criticism will usually make me laugh, 99% of the time, except for when it makes me curl up in the fetal position and question my right to exist. “You don’t understand what this is like!” I yell.
So my husband gets down on the floor next to me and doesn’t do anything. I relax enough that I can start to talk about the things that haunt me, things no one else knows about me but him. Although he doesn’t get depressed, he’s had his own dark thoughts, his pervasive worries. In 12 years neither of us has been scared away, neither has said, “What the hell are you talking about?” Once or twice we may have come close, but he didn’t and I didn’t and here we are. When my little one asks about our wedding rings, I tell her they are a symbol of a promise we made to each other, to never leave.

So I like to think that love, as I understand it, as I first understood it when my husband sat down on the floor with me, that love is an action word. Funny, I’ve had other relationships where we never fought. We were happy right up until we broke up. I really thought I loved some of those people. I certainly said I love you. Some of them even “understood” me better than my husband, but they’re not here and he is.

I think I’ve finally started to know love as a woman, not as a wounded child. Love isn’t something you want, it’s something you do. It’s why my dad, who never said he loved me, showed up for every play, every junior varsity game, every swim meet. It’s why I let the girls sleep with me when they are sick, even thought it guarantees I’ll be next. Because love is about being there, even when you don’t want to, even when you think you can’t. Now I understand that love is about not walking out: not on my husband, not on my kids, not on myself.

“All right,” I say to him, “I’m done crying.”

“For good?” He asks hopefully.

“For now.” He sighs, but hey, it’s a start.

Ooh, look. It's been so long since I blogged that blogger done up and changed their whole format. Took me 10 minutes to figure out how to write a new post.

In weekly news, I've been working many days in a row after spending 5 glorious days at home, including Mother's Day, in which wonderful husband cooked an amazing dish of Salmon with Provencal Sauce over parmesan rice with home made rosemary focaccia. Dessert was cake from Tous Les Jours and ambrosia. Did I mention he cooked for us, my parents AND my sister and her boyfriend. He's too good, but he's upped the ante for Father's Day. Dang.

So, G has done most if not all of the homeschooling for the past week or so. Since taking her out of school last October, S has learned double digit addition and subtraction, lots about the Egyptians and Mesopotamians, and now the Mayans and Aztecs, is independently reading and knows what cells do.

Happy Biodiversity Day! Or Happy Rainforest Day! We spent about 30 minutes this morning learning about the rainforest, which is how I found a great site called Brain Pop, which is not free, but not terribly expensive. For $85/year we can get Pop Jr, for $170 we can get Brain Pop, Pop Jr and Senor Pop(It's not called that, but you get the idea). Right now I'm doing a 5 day trial to see if we like it. So far, Pop Jr seems a little too basic for S but the regular Pop seems too hard, but more to her interests.

So, now, before I go back to work tomorrow I must: send Marilyn my George St. Coop article, exercise, clean the house, finish S's lessons and maybe make a delicious but low carb lunch. I need some more tea.