Do I feel guilty about this? No I do not. Because my entire freaking family has had the stomach flu.
Pie hardly seems like sufficient compensation.
Good pie, though.
Happy
New Year, peoples! Despite the inauspicious start I'm feeling good
about this coming year. Elliot will be starting preschool, Charlotte
already practically sleeps through the night, and Waxor and I are both
taking more time for ourselves, branching out in new ways, and just in
general enjoying life more. We've got friends
getting married, which makes for good parties; adventures planned, which
makes for good stories; and our house is maintaining its value in the
market, which is totally boring but provides a nice comfortable feeling
of not being totally screwed.
That is, of course, only on the personal level. On
the political scene, both at home and world wide, I am petrified.
Politicians do nothing but lie to us, and everyone seems okay with
that. Not to mention we're losing civil liberties right and left, and
Ron Paul, leader of the crazies, is the only presidential candidate
actually talking about it. What is wrong with this picture? I'm gonna
go with "pretty much everything."
And internationally... holy bejeezum crow. Honduras
is now the murder capital of the world; Iran is going to be bombed by
someone (unfortunately probably us); China is at war with its own
villages; Haiti is still trying to crawl up out of the earthquake two
years later, but everyone's forgotten them; loggers are burning children
to death in the Amazon; and Nigeria's in an uproar. There's more, I
could go on, but you get the point. The world is uneasy. And I am
uneasy about it.
So what am I doing about it? Not a lot, as it turns
out. But I have a plan. Want to hear it? Doesn't matter, I'm'a tell
you anyway.
At first I wanted to run for
congress, but, truthfully, that's a huge job, and I'm not ready for it
yet, the kids are still too young. So, new plan... School Board. I
know, not exciting. Won't help Nigeria. But it's a thing I care about.
I think school funding needs to be addressed in a serious way, which
likely needs to happen on the state level. So, I'm going to try to get
elected to the school board for the next two years, so that I can learn
more and hopefully make some positive changes locally. Then, when
Charlotte is old enough for pre-school, I'm going to run for the MA
General Court.
This, I feel, is worthwhile.
Still won't help Nigeria, though.
***
A long time ago, when ladies wore corsets and men went off by themselves to drink after dinner, married women were cool. I don't mean frigid or reserved, I mean they were the "it" girls, the ones to be seen with, the froods who totally knew where their towel was. This was, of course, because unmarried women had to guard their reputations, which was no fun for anyone, and married women were safe from pretty much any scandal, as long as they kept their copious cavorting on the down low. So they drank and flirted and ran amok, and a good time was had by all. Except for the unmarried girls, who had to wear pastels and stand by the wall while the married ladies wore bright colors and danced with everyone.
Also except for poor people, or married ladies with
awful husbands, but we're not talking about reality, we're talking about
my own personal musings which center on one particular topic, so
please, stop distracting me.
Married women were cool.
WHAT HAPPENED??!!!??!!
I
don't know and I don't care. I'm calling for a cultural revolution.
Down with our worship of fresh faced infants barely out of diapers! I
am a fascinating societal icon, damnit!
This is my bandwagon. I invite you all to board.
***
Let's
start with Charlotte, shall we? The tiny little demon is freaking
adorable and frighteningly similar to myself, personality wise. This
means that you will all love her, and I will go into hiding when she
hits the pre-teen years. Some Charlotte-isms:
"Daddddiiiiiieeeeeee!"
"Where's Daddy going, Chaz?"
"Sawl Mines."
"That's right. He's headed to the salt mines."
"Baih, Daddie, sawl mines!"
"Can you say goodnight, Charlotte?"
"Baih Niagh!"
"Now can we go to sleep?"
"Ahhhhhhh.... nawp."
"Chaz, do you want something to eat?"
"Hawt DAWG"
"You want a hot dog?"
"Yahp."
"Okay. Do you want it hot?"
"Yahp. Halp."
"Okay, you can push the button."
"Buh-uhn. Halp. HAWT DAWG!!!!!!!"
These
are just a few of the conversations that pepper my average day. At
times I wish to just turn on a camcorder and run it all day long,
because I know this will be fleeting, but when I do finally whip out my
phone to try to record something for posterity, it never seems to come
out as cute as she is, right there in person. And I know that, as time
goes on, my memory of it will fade. That's because I look at Elliot
now, and I know that I no longer see him clearly as a two year old, or
even a three year old. All I can see him as is my four year old dude.
Elliot's birthday was sad for me. Not all day long,
just a little, at the end. He's so big now - not even remotely a
toddler anymore. Now he's a little boy, and before I know it he'll be a
big boy. Then he'll be a teenager, and we all know that won't go well.
Currently, though, he's so smart. Charlotte's the
one who's constantly doing new things, so I think sometimes Elliot's
brain gets overlooked, because we fail to realize how cool it is that he
knows so much. Of course, he still thinks babies come from seeds and
grown in a uterine garden, but I think that's more because I failed to
explain properly. Maybe I should give it another go.
A conversation with Elliot:
"Mommy?"
"Yes, Elliot?"
"Mommy?"
"What, Elliot?"
"Uh, Mommy?"
"Elliot. I am listening. Spit it out."
"I love you."
"I love you, too, buddy."
"Can I have some chocolate?"
"Nope."
"But, Mommy, I love you."
"And I love you, my little con artist."
***
Do you have on/off switches in your life?
The kind of thing where you can either ignore something, or care
passionately about it, but you can't just be well informed and
unaffected? This seems to be cropping up a lot for me. I guess the
best example is the news. I am having a really hard time actually
keeping track of what's going on in the world without wanting to run off
and DO something about it.
Speaking of doing something: Anyone who lives
near DC, anyone who can get to DC by Tuesday, anyone who doesn't have
an 18 month old that they REALLY don't want to take out in the January
rain being called for Tuesday in DC; go to Occupy Congress. The only
position you have to agree with is the one that says that laws should be
made with the people's rights in mind, not the corporations profits.
Seriously, aren't we all behind that?
***
I was going to make
this much longer, but it's been a while since my last email and since I
wrote that last segment I should probably send it out before the 17th.
:)
Love you all! Anyone who actually writes me back
gets brownie points. I might even literally bake you brownies and send
them to you. You never know.
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