All the freaky people make the beauty of the world

Do you know Michael Franti? I do. He doesn’t know me back but his music and lyrics are a very good thing in the life o’ me. Says he: every soul is a poem that’s written on the back of god’s hand. I’m not much for a god but I do like that lots.

Some good stuff is coming up around here, namely: the Book Fair, the World Naked Bike Ride, the Dyke March, and Pride.  I’m only doing the book fair this year. None of the Beavers are available for the other events (they are international jetsetters sans child, you see) and I just don’t feel quite ready to ask any of my mom friends to go. Solo is alright, but I did a recent war protest that way and it left me feeling a little exposed. Of course, my sign was rather inflammatory haaaaaaaaaa. Lots of people took pictures of me and it. I was glad to be so popular but a little nervous to be alone at the time. I’ll get there with the moms eventually, where I can go to events that represent more parts of me. Who knows, though, mebbe never, and that’s alright. I value their friendship for what it is. It has gotten me through some seriously difficult shit. We disagree on quite alot but we do so respectfully and with the shared knowledge that we are all coming from different places and doing the very best we can for our individual children.

The book fair will be grand as always, I’m gonna get some old printing press letters and hang them on some walls around my place, all willy-nilly. Little pieces of hard-worked history. Have I mentioned lately how much I love my place? Crumbling brick, special assessments, non-stop construction and all. I have lived through the growing pains of this area. I’ve earned this place, warts and whatnot, day by day over the last 2.5 years. My binoculars show me worlds across the way: nude models, art hung, um, artfully on blood orange walls, indoor hanging gardens, stairs where there should be none, people laughing loudly while drinking terrifically good beer, middle eastern theatre groups, people smoking on fire escapes, and lots of golden, yes it is quite golden, light pouring in for my fledgling indoor garden. Yay for this place, yay for this time, yay for us for finding our way here and sticking it out no matter what. We’re staying. Huz says so. The fella doesn’t say much, and usually I control all things, but he never was overly enthused about the prospect of Philly, and I now have to say he was right. Philly is not an emotionally healthy place for us to be at this time. Maybe it will be at another. I hope so. Until then, I will regard our time here as precious, as I should, as it has been all along, despite its very real difficulties.

So how many posts am I going to write about the personal peace I am finding? How boring, right? Ha!

P.S. My girl M.I.A. is still bringing it in a major way. I want you to dance your ass off every time you hear her and please do think of me. I would go see her in concert but I might die of exertion. I’m gettin’ a little old, you know :) I’ve picked out my jazz lounge, and before I know it, it’ll be time to find a farm.

P.P.S. Besides her deeply socially relevant messages about violence, disenfranchisment, global responsibilty, etc, one of my favorite lyrics by M.I.A. is “I’ll let you be superior”. You could easily miss it if you weren’t paying attention, but to me, this is a message to an attractive man that says “you are not superior to me, but I know you feel pressure to be, and I will indulge that need in you for now, as it serves my needs”. Interesting shit for such a young woman. Catchy as hell, too.

Happy stuff I am doing for myself

Growing an indoor herb garden - hullo, Yum, so good to meet you. The dried stuff is an expensive insult to my tongue in comparison.

tmi: Making sex dates with Huz. No, not regularly scheduled “it’s business time” stuff; we have to ask ahead and plan just as if we would if we had never been together and were trying to seduce each other, albeit quickly, for the first time. It’s the hotness.

Decorating, decorating, decorating, (does that sound too Martha? should I say beautifying? art-ifying? whatevs, you get me) with both found and self-created objects. A living environment is an evolving organism as far as I am concerned. I adjust it accordingly, in small ways, as needed depending on my mood.

Daily dance parties with Bean. The kid is a nut for “party favorites” on our cable music thingermawhatsit. His moves absolutely KILL me.

Doing the T-Tapp Basic Workout (the production is cheesy, but dammit, it works) and using About.com’s Calorie Counter (it’s free and way better than WW) so I can get a handle on my recent post-weaning weight gain. Now listen, skinny is not the goal. Skinny is NEVER the goal. I eat, baby. I am married to a classically trained chef. Fat is flavor, salt is life!!! Voluptuousness, sway, and zaftig-iosity are what I am all about. Besides, serious curves throw the very best shadows on the walls in candlelight. Sure, my boobs fell down a bit with pregnancy and my stomach pooches out more than ever, but to a good man like Huz, that just means I housed and fed his beautiful baby. I do like to look and feel healthy, though (which to me is roughly 20-30 lbs heavier than what a typical magazine tells me I should be) and I haven’t since Bean weaned 6 weeks ago. T-Tapp and CC are just helping me keep me looking like ME.

Taking care of a crazy ass fish named Fred who is only a “simple, great first fish” in opposite world. He is a loony mofo. He’s my kind of feesh.

Reading/watching art, craft and travel books/shows at every single opportunity. World and your wonky, curious inhabitants, I love you lots.

Staying informed of rampant injustice. It hurts to do so, and yep I am merely a drop in the bucket but together, baby, we can create a downpour. Signing petitions, writing letters, marching and yelling is what I was born to do. I used to feel pressure to shush, to be less angry, less loud. I don’t acknowledge that pressure anymore.

Re-reading my acoa stuff and joining a virtual support group for it because dammit, you just cannot run away from that shit, no matter how far you go or how many fathers you stop having contact with. 

Actively declining offers of high-paid work that takes place in an office cubicle. I know from experience that it sucks my soul dry and I am now just saying no, no matter what the pay. I will find work elsewhere (elsehow?). I realize this choice is a major luxury even with the discomfort it causes us financially. I am grateful daily.

Going to the park with Bean and talking to strangers even when I don’t feel like it, which I usually don’t. I have met some truly kind and funny people. I love the humbling, unifying moments of parenthood they help me stumble upon. They are gorgeous: the moments and the people.

Enjoying the hell out of the view from my windows.

And finally…oversharing about my life with you all. Ha!

I hope you are doing many good things for yourselves, peeps.

 

Why is it

that I have a deep well of compassion to draw from when it comes to absolute and near strangers, yet I can hardly muster up a drop for people in my own family?

I’ll tell you why: personal history. Strangers can be total assholes for all I know. They usually haven’t harmed me in any direct or intentional fashion, so they get a free pass to my understanding and kindness, even when displaying puzzling and/or awful behaviors. But members of my own family (outside of Huz and Bean and my Sis-in-Law)? Nah. As a matter of fact, I don’t even usually have it for myself.

I’ve ought to try harder with the whole enlightenment thing. I’ve definitely got some kinks to work out.

There are certain small events

that feel like major milestones to me. Events that have made me go, yep, I’m a mom.

I guess the first one was slinging Bean without dropping him while I was standing up and then nursing him in public, staring down questioning gazes and smiling at understanding ones.

Wanting to have sex again was a big one, too. No, my child was not actually involved. It was just remarkable to feel calm and comfortable in my body again, to assimilate my new mothering self with my individual physical self after riding out the storm.

Painting and dancing at 6 months postpartum were huge. Wanting to do these things showed me that I was getting back to me after a while away. The mental and physical cracks were healing and Bean loved being integrated into these activities.

The next standout was flying with Bean and dealing with airplane fussiness and all that. I had to do everything but stand on my head to avoid a screamfest that first time, but we did it. Not only did we get there and back, we got through security and a maze of airport tunnels in order to find stroller-accessible elevators, and we only lost one or two items along the way.

Recently, there was this:

Huz thought it was hilarious that I took a picture. It felt momentous. Still does.

Readiness to go back to work feels like something momentous, too. I am finally able to say, oh yeah, we’ve got a good sleeping/eating/playing routine going, I’m no longer depressed and freaking out (much), I can handle the bullshit that goes along with work again and I think I finally may be able to trust someone to look after Bean here and there.

I guess I can also consider my recent dressing down as a mother to be a milestone as well. When women gang up on another woman, it’s certainly not pretty, but when the picked upon one can keep her chin up during and after the experience and maintain her own identity throughout, that is very important stuff to me.

And now, the latest mothering milestone in my mind is drumroooooooollllllll pleeeeeeeese:

choosing my child’s first pet. Behold, Fred:

(a.ka. Frederic Thelonius Amadeus E. Feesh)

He’s beautiful and strange and we talk to him alot. Fish in bowls always hold a certain sadness for me, but Fred seems to like it just fine. He’s an aggressive little bugger, a loner through and through. Bean thinks he is extraordinary. I can see his point.

First a fabulous new jazz club

opened up the street, then we got the news that we can’t sell our place for at least a year and expect to break even, then there was the damn near miraculous recovery of our shady mortgage situation in a sea of foreclosures under similar circumstances, then I became great pals with E. and her boys and therefore finally have a nearby mom-friend for last minute, casual outings and in-ings, then the commercial laundry people who have made my life very difficult these last 2 years (by covertly taking over my condo building’s laundry facilities daily) got served and booted so I can finally. do. laundry. during waking hours, then we had the surprisingly unproductive trip to do some neighbohood shopping in PA, and now I just found out that IL is going to offer free pre-school for all 3 & 4 year olds by 2011 and that our area will likely have it by 2010 in time for Bean to go. The lack of affordability of pre-school in Chicago was one of our majors drivers for moving, you see. Sure, I am doing unschooling stuff, too, but I did want Bean to have the socialization part-time preschool would provide and was very bummed that we couldn’t give that experience to him. Poof. Problem solved.

The universe is saying stay put, I tell you, she is telling me to chill the farg out and stay put for a while.

Okay, Uni. I will.

I hate to be so self-referential

but Blue Milk got me gabbing about myself again because she poses such thought-provoking posts, questions and commentary. If you haven’t checked her out yet you’re missing out big time. Anywho, the self-referential part is where I am going to now repost a comment I made in response to her latest post about who we all want to be as individual parents and that is this right here:

I am pulled in two directions, depending on where I am located geographically and generationally on any given day. I’m not one for much scheduling of structured activities (he’s only a year and a half old!) and that makes me the odd woman out in my community. I am definitely the laid back one around here, but I also have a background in constructivist/social education so I tend to lay off a good bit compared to them. When I visit family, though, they act like I am an overprotective semi-psychotic who is absolutely ruining my child because I breastfed until 18 months, prefer co-sleeping, make him wash his hands before he eats mostly organic food, require a fairly regulated sleep schedule, and won’t leave him with a stranger so I can go out. I just see us all as more educated to the benefits of such things than our parents were, and my partner is often in his own little world, so yeah, that has made me hyper-vigilant. I felt pretty neglected as a kid and there was quite a lot of fallout from that, so it is hard to trust the judgment of older family members who are now telling me I am hyper-parenting.

yadda yadda yadda

Does that make me a hyper-parent, or just conscientious?

I know the answer: it makes me conscientious. I just wanted to point you over to blue’s post and also reiterate my response here at b.b. because it was all so damn timely for me. I have just come back from yet another family visit where I caused so much eye rolling and tsking due to my parenting choices that it is a wonder there weren’t eyes and tongues falling right out of people’s heads and goo-ing up my shoes. It seems that very basic baby-proofing (ex: if it is valuable or dangerous, put it up high) is an affront to certain people in my family, my own mother included, as is my preference for mostly organic food, even though I shop and pay for it myself. Encouraging co-sleeping? Worrying about my child while someone is babysitting him? Getting annoyed when I find that Huz, who was supposed to be watching Bean, “forgot” and so I came out of the bathroom to find that my baby had crawled up a very tall flight of stairs and was standing solo on the top step? How dare I? What an asshole I am. I am ridiculous about my child, whatever that means, or so I am told. Funny thing is, I am actually quite fond of the approach described here (many thanks to I forget whom for the original linkage) but to some members of my family, I am a total loon.

So how do you all who are near family members deal with this sort of thing, this lack of respect for your parenting choices? Is this common? I’ve been pining for family for a year and a half, but do I really want to move to any area where the decisions I make as a parent are so openly criticized? Maybe it was just taken so hard because we were staying at someone else’s home and could not escape the disapproval…still, am I expected to entrust Bean with certain relatives who think so differently than me and Huz, in some cases dangerously so? Or should we stay put and remain surrounded by friends who trust us to make decisions for our own kid but are more hands-off?

I know, I know. I’m once again using geography as a buffer instead of resolving things with people.

Pickle.

Update:

One major reason I love my neighborhood: we are a microcosm of world culture. It keeps me fom getting too far into my own head. I met a mom in the park today who gets a ration of shit for NOT co-sleeping, babywearing, etc from her tradition-focused Pakistani in-laws. She has to wear traditional clothes when they visit, worry about their strict expectations for her daughter once she reaches puberty, etc etc. It put the requirements and disapproval experienced during my weekend in Philly in perspective. It certainly does seem that while becoming the mothers we want to be, we’re all damned if we do, damned if we don’t :) All the more reason to do what feels right to each of us.

An important public service announcement

from the WNBR:

We are just two and a half weeks away from the beginning of the World Naked Bike Ride. The time has come to dust off your wings, wigs, feathers and crazy flying dangly things. The dress code of the event is bare as you dare. Nudity is not enforced.

A common question that we are getting is “Will the police throw my naked ass in prison” The answer is “they might”. It is indeed very rare that the police interfere with this event but it has happened a few times in the past.

If you are worried about the police, here are a few tips that might help:
1) You do not really need all that much strategically placed fabric to technically not be naked.
2) Even though the media can be somewhat annoying they are really good at getting the police to behave. The last thing the police want to be seen doing is arresting happy, peaceful naked people on the six o-clock news. It makes them look incredibly silly. So invite the media; they are just a press release away.

A last word of colourful wisdom:

WNBR is about having fun and unleashing a streak of creativity upon our cities. Music, songs, colourful bikes and silly things are all part of this great flood of creative merry-making. WNBR belongs to its participants so feel free to allow your creativity to take ownership.

For more info, please visit
http://www.worldnakedbikeride.org

I wonder what the shelf-life of my liquid latex is?

Promise me

that the next time you are kind enough to have out-of-town guests stay at your home, you start each day with the following questions:

1. Did you sleep alright?
2. Would you like something to eat?
3. Is there anything in particular you would you like to do today?

The absence of these questions will almost certainly lead to environmental chaos and hurt feelings all around.

And of course, parenting choices that you may witness are nobody’s business but the parents. Unless a child is being harmed, mind yo’ own. We talk about that sort of thing all the time in our bloggity-blogs but it needs to be said aloud often. Evidently, it needs to be said very loudly and very often in certain homes within the Philadelphia suburbs.

You may have guessed that the Philly trip should have gone far better than it did. On the upside: I met my stunning niece, spent time with my bee-yoo-tiful sis-in-law and her fella, and Bean had a blast.

P.S. Philly is no Chicago. You all already knew it. You were just patiently waiting for me to arrive at this on my own. Thank you.

P.P.S. My upcoming circumstantially “stuck” year now feels a whole lot less sticky.

P.P.P.S. I am going to stop bitching about having a kid in a condo. We live near four, no five, terrific parks that we frequent and we also walk to stores, coffee shops, everything. While we were in a house with a yard in a leafy Philly suburb these last few days, we walked and played outside far less than we do here in the city. Yes, it rained alot there, but still. I have been feeling stir-crazy in our condo all this time and very guilty about our lack of ease in getting outside. I need to stop that.

Hope

Let’s do this thing, people.

I am not holding out for but am also not against a “dream ticket”. I think it would be simultaneously hilarious and deeply genius. It’s not likely to happen but if it did, babycakes, we would have some stories to tell our grandchildren.

What was the point

in getting us all used to Bean being in a crib and doing a set routine so he would go down/stay down for the night? It has all gone to crap now that he is in a toddler bed.

I always planned to co-sleep. We didn’t buy a crib for Bean before he was born. He had other ideas, though. When he outgrew his little co-sleeper bassinett thingy, he started spending the beginning of each night in his pack and play, alone in his room. Gradually, he stayed put for the night. I didn’t really want it that way, but he slept best alone in his room starting at 10 months old. It freaked me out, to be honest; to me, it is more natural for a family to sleep together for at least part of the night. I spent many nights sleeping on a futon in there with him. When I finally felt reaaaaally certain that this was the way he preferred to sleep and that he would be just fine alone, we got him a convertible crib/toddler bed. It was kind of high up for my taste, but they all were, so we went with the lowest-to-the-floor model we could find. He seemed to love it. We enjoyed the next few months of sleeping in peace. It was a miracle considering how the first 10 months had gone. 

Recently, he started using his crib bumper as a step to try to flip over the rail. I would go in to check on him and find him standing on tiptoe with his head and arms completely hooked over the railing, as though he were just waiting to grow a leeetle bit more he he could flip himself out and wind up in the ER. I took the bumper out and hoped he’d stop. Instead, he started getting his arms and legs stuck in the slats. He would wake howling as he tried to wrench them out. Did I mention I never wanted him alone in a crib? I wanted him alone in a toddler bed even less. He’s only 19 months old. Still, I took the rail out and converted it to a daybed. I re-toddler-proofed his bedroom. We babygated the hallway at night so if he did get up, he could only go into our room and not roam the rest of the place. Fine.

The first days and nights were amazing. Same ole, same ole. Bean stayed in bed and slept and so did we. It took about 3 days for him to realize that he could get out of bed of his own volition. Then he did, lots. I am not a close-the-door and cry-it-out kind of person (other than for maybe 10 minutes, tops, to let him get the crabbies out every now and again). I am, however, a behavior modification type of person, so I strictly enforced our rule that pacis are only for sleeping times. When he popped out of bed, I took the paci. When he got back in, I gave it back. Worked like a charm for two days then stopped. And so…

what do I do now? He’s up, he’s down, he’s up he’s down, on and on and on. Last night we woke to him standing by our bed at 4AM. Even though the house is babyproofed and he is corraled in a limited part of it, it freaks me out to have a 19 month old wandering around in the near-dark.  We would be happy to have him sleep with us, we even lowered our bed for that purpose ages ago, but he doesn’t seem to be able to. Tosses and turns and fusses all night, unable to settle down (I now believe that much of our sleep issues in those first 10 months stemmed from my insistence that he be in the room with us). We pulled him in with us anyway and he rolled around for an hour or so. I finally gave up and carried him into his room, put him in his bed, and fell asleep on the futon in there, only to be woken minutes later with him crawling on me. That is how he slept for the next two hours: on me. Not next to, on. Cried every time I tried to put him back in his bed. We are somehow back to how things were at 3 months old. Damn crib. Damn toddler bed. Damn fatigue.

My independent sleeper, whom I reluctantly accepted as such, seems to be gone. In his place I now have a dependent sleeper, but one who does not want to be in bed with Huz and me, he wants only me, and only in his room. It would be flattering if it weren’t so tiring.

For nap today, he just stopped crying after what felt like forever because he was unable to sleep without me having a hand on his back. I stopped touching him after 20 minutes of a very uncomfortable position and my pins-and-needles feet drove me from the room. He woke. I left anyway to see what he would do, closing the door behind me, hoping he would just fuss a minute and crash back out. He cried, lots. Made me feel terrible. Sure, he eventually crawled back into bed and crashed out, but it made me feel like a jerk to do things this way.

Wait, he just woke up again, and is now crying because I’m not there. My poor Bean. Is this just standard separation anxiety brought on by a cognitive leap? Who knows. I’m going back in now. I’ll probably be back on the futon tonight.

Sleep, I hardly knew ye.

Update:

Huz is in with him now for bedtime. Bean just seems to want someone to sit in there until he falls asleep. Makes the nightwaking tough. He’s also asking for a ton of hugs which is not typical but very, very sweet. Maybe it’s just a combo of his bed looking a little different (which it took him days to notice, if that’s the case), separation anxiety and the neverending molar teething and this thing called sleep regression my dear Ask Moxie talks about. All of this right before our trip to Philly, yee-haw. Should make for an interesting trip :)