Raw Drip

Dick and I have noticed that our 2-year old, Tabitha, is making huge strides in her ability to communicate with us.  No longer are her thoughts expressed in bits and pieces – a few words strewn about.  Now her thoughts are connected with a delicate little narrative for her parents to cling to when deciphering requests.   Still, while she communicates her desires more clearly, many of our conversations are of the circular, unproductive variety usually reserved for weekly one-on-one chats with one’s micro-manager.   These conversations are exhausting, leaving me and Tabitha emotionally spent and Dick and Adam utterly confused.  Take, for example, last night’s conversation with Tabitha at the dinner table…

Me: “Do you want some peas for dinner?”

Tabitha (suddenly bursting into tears): “I don’t want peas!”

Me: “Whoa, honey! Okay, okay, no peas.  How about some chicken?”

Tabitha (sobbing uncontrollably): “I don’t want chicken.”

Me: “What would you like, then?”

Tabitha (still sobbing): “I want…I want…I want peas.”

Me (spooning peas onto her dinner plate): “Okay, calm down – have some peas.”

Tabitha (tearfully staring at her dinner plate): “Mommy, I don’t want peas on my plate.”

Me: “Well, where do you want them, dear?”

Tabitha: “In a bowl.”

Me (moving peas from her plate into a bowl): “No problem, sweetie here you go – peas in a bowl.”

Tabitha (bursting into tears again): “No. No. I want chicken!!!”

Me: “Why are you crying, again?”

Tabitha (sobs): “Because I’m crying…” 

Me: “Well, uh, you don’t want peas – only chicken, right? Do you want your chicken in a bowl or on your plate?”

Tabitha (still crying, looking hopeless): “I don’t want chicken.  I want a banana.”

Me (handing her a banana): “Alright. Do you want me to help you peel it?”

Tabitha (pouting): “I don’t want you to do it. I want Daddy to do it.”

Dick (whispering to me, as he peels the banana): “What’s wrong with her?”

Me (to Dick): “I don’t know, but I’m pretty you must have done something to upset her.” 

Dick seems fairly mystified by Tabitha’s constant mood swings.  I’ve tried explaining to him how sometimes we women just want everyone to shut up and listen – to be with us as we’re sad and miserable – and not rush in to rescue us with silly things like logic or reason.  Besides, this is the easy part, I tell him.  Tabitha’s teen mood swings will pale in comparison to this stuff.  Consider these moments the rumblings of an awakening volcano.   

So dear Tabitha, let me assure you, it may not seem like it, but Mommy has spent years prepping Daddy for you with my own share of spontaneous emotional outbursts.  He’s still confused by it all – definitely a work in progress - so be patient with him and know that you always have a special place in Daddy’s heart, even if Daddy’s brain can’t figure out what’s going on with you.

We’ve been sick for the last 18 months.  This is not an exaggeration.  When we moved to New Jersey in the fall of ‘06 we were all coming down with something.  And soon, we’ll be moving back to Florida and I’m certain we’ll be sick for that, too.  When we first arrived, I explained our constant state of illness using the perfect storm metaphor – 2 kids in daycare + 2 full-time working parents (with new jobs, stress, & expenses) + more drastic northeastern climate = sick.  That explains the first few months – maybe even a year, right?  So, what’s up with STILL being sick? 

Now, before you read on, let me just say – we’ve tried them.  We’ve tried using hand sanitizers and following OCD-inspired hand washing rituals.  We’ve popped Airborne, Zycam, Vitamin C, Echinacea, zinc, and scary gray colored immunity boosting substances from Whole Foods.  We eat a healthy diet of fruits, veg, & lean meats and try to get as much as rest as possible.  Obviously, none of those things has worked for us, because I’m sick – again.

So as I recover from my latest illness and lacking inspiration for writing any better Raw Drip material, here are my two favorite sick moments from our time in New Jersey:

What are sick children like?

Any working parent will appreciate this situation.  I’m new on the job and I had to call in sick for the 6th time in 6 weeks.  Bad, right?  But what choice do I have with both children home sick with 104 degree fevers and Dick unable to take another vacation day?  Hoping for some flexibility and armed with my company-issued laptop, I called my young, single boss to ask if I could work from home that day.  With annoyance in her voice, she asked how seriously I took my job at Soulless-Blood-Sucking-Privately-Owned-Company, Inc.  From my response, she must’ve been concerned about appearing insensitive, because her tone changed from one of anger to one of engagement.  With misguided zeal she engaged me in an impromptu “brainstorming session” to help me find solutions to my childcare dilemmas that would make “everyone happy & productive” (Read:”…so, I can continue to micromanage you as you look after your meddling kids.”). 

That’s when she kicked off the brainstorming with the now infamous question,  ”So, what are sick children like?”. 

“Are you seriously asking me this?”, I said. 

“Yes.  Rather than you working from home, I was thinking maybe your kids could come with you to the office and use the loaner laptop to watch DVDs while you work,” she said.

“Think for a moment how awful you feel when you’re really sick.  Now imagine you don’t possess the sophistication to understand why you’re so miserable or the communication skills to whine about how miserable you are.  That’s what it’s like.” 

I think that statement as well as my observation that it might be bad to introduce MORE illness and misery into the workplace pretty much stopped that brainstorming session in its tracks.

Christmas Barforama

‘Twas the night before Christmas

And all through the house,

Every stomach was stirring

We were all gonna ralph

The upchuck was flying

All through the air

With moans of, “Oh God, get me some air!”

To say that night was hell doesn’t even scratch the surface.  In hell I think they allow you to choose between having diarrhea and vomiting…

*****

Maybe it’s toxic mold in the house we’re renting, or maybe it’s the shiftier climate that plays with our immune systems?  I don’t know.  I’m sick of thinking about it.  The important thing is that we’re heading back to warmer climes and, hopefully, healthier times where illnesses can be treated with plenty of sunshine and redneck jokes.

A few weeks ago we decided to eat dinner at our favorite neighborhood Italian restaurant with Adam & Tabitha in tow.   The restaurant is popular so, to get a table for four in under an hour we arrived with the 5 o’clock dinner crowd, made up mostly of retirees.   As the hostess led us to our table – Adam and Tabitha, despite their parent’s coaching to the contrary, obliviously barrelled past people with walkers and spoke in their “outside voices”. 

Watching my children bounce by, about half the oldies smiled sweetly; the other half rolled their eyes in disgust.  I’ve found that overt disgust at my family’s invasion of any quiet restaurant is typical New Jersey old person behavior, so I tend to brush it off knowing that, at 36 I’m already pretty crotchety, and without their good excuse of a lifetime spent living in the punchline to every petrochemical waste joke. 

Seated at our table at the back of the restaurant (no accident, I’m sure) we were around the corner from a door that the busboys use to move waste to the back alley.  At some point during the day, two or three small moths must have found their way through the open door and into the restaurant.  The moths loitered around the light cast up by the nearby wall sconce – their frantic flapping wings begging for a child’s attention.  

Adam didn’t disappoint.  In our favorite restaurant, nearly silent except for the sounds of dentures biting into al dente pasta, our boy yelled at the top of his voice, “Wow! Mommy, daddy, look at the big bugs all over this place!  Eeeew. Gross!”  

Ahhh…children. 

You wait so long to hear them speak their first word.  You wait for months, or even years to carry on a simple conversation with them.  Then, one day, just as you begin to see their little personality emerge through their speech…

…they single-handedly summon the Health Department to your favorite dining establishment over a few errant moths.  

Thanks for making all the waiting worthwhile, kiddos!

As for dining out that evening, Adam’s observation elicited angry stares from the village elders (and I suspect lit torches were in the ready), so we beat a hasty retreat to the mini-van, our meals in to-go containers.  I think take-out is still probably the way to go - at least for the next five or ten years.