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Although I'm home, my feet keep trying to dig their way into the softest sand that has ever be-speckled my toes despite the fact that I'm now bundled in a hoodie and 17 pairs of pants. And as I’m browsing through my photos, I keep double checking that I didn’t take home the wrong camera because I do not even recognize the colour of my non-white skin.
I have much to write about, but for the moment, I need to be 100% enamoured with my son while I try and figure out how he went from a barely two-year-old toddler to a sentence-speaking teenager in one week.
B, I love you to pieces. Thank you for taking the keys to my humble little home here in this small corner of the Internet while I was away. If there is one motto that I have in life, it is that ideas are up for debate, but people are not. And that is all I will say about that for now.
Also? Friends? Mark and I totally went to a disco and did the Blue Clues mixer dance on a completely empty dance floor because we are classy crazy drunks. I don't remember.Labels: Vacation |
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| Ocean |
Dear Karla
I hope you and Mark had a wonderful time down south. I can almost feel the intense Caribbean sun shining down on my pale northern Canadian face.
I can hear the beach, the waves coming in from thousands of miles away, large and fierce, but sometimes soft and barely there at all. There is something about the ocean that lifts my spirits. I haven't seen the light blue waters of the Caribbean for a number of years, but try to make it to an ocean once a year.
The endless expanse of water. I love the feeling of looking out and not seeing anything but horizon. I love how the wind tastes and smells standing on a beach.
The last time I saw the ocean was a cold winter morning of 2007. Hubby had to help me down the rocky slope so I could get as close to the water as possible, my belly was already throwing my balance. The sky was a deep blue, the wind was too strong for clouds. We navigated the red sandstone shoreline, tracing out the quartzite nodules with our boots. The wind brought tears to our eyes. We walked until the ocean slammed directly into the cliffs we were scaling.
A somewhat different ocean experience then what you had I imagine!
Somehow I think lawn chairs and cabanas wouldn't quite work on the north shore of Prince Edward Island....
It was great fun staying in your corner of the interweb. Thank you for asking me to guest post.
I hope you have a safe return.
and, bring some of that sun with you...ok?
- B |
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| Sickness and the Pseudo-Single Parent |
It is the calm part of the day. First thing in the morning, Jr's top priority is to sit and talk to his toys. He's good for at least half an hour. Picking up pieces of fluff off the carpet and holding them up to show me. Sitting with his ankles crossed happily talking to his sunglasses.
Yesterday was a hard day. Hubby has been away all week and I came down with some kind of illness. I spent most of the afternoon and evening curled up on the floor beside Jr trying to stay awake. Slipping off briefly to wake up in a minor panic to find him chewing on a wrench he found god-knows-where. Moving hurt, all noise shook through me like icy daggers. I was wearing two sets of sweat pants and sweat shirts and still blew hot air into my hands. Thankfully Jr went to bed at 7:30 and I was able to sleep soon after.
Being a pseudo-single parent is not easy. I have a husband, I see him on weekends, he makes money so I don't have to work. It is the arrangement that works best for us. Though all situations come with sacrifice. Like last night, when having another parent home would have made my life easier. Most weeks he is gone Monday to Friday. I get through the week waiting for the glorious weekends when he takes the morning shift and allows me to sleep in (once I even saw 8:30!!!). Hats off to real single parents, the ones who don't get a break on weekends, or ever. The ones who have to work and look after kids, be it sick or well.
Unfortunately this weekend he works, his job makes me like I never win. His schedule is random, and changes often. I've gotten used to it, but being sick makes it shitty. He is hundreds of miles away, unable to do much more than listen.
I feel a bit better now, the handfuls of Tylenol are making a difference, one layer of sweat pants was able to come off.
Has it been a half hour already? I should get back to being a Mom. Thanks for stopping by while Karla has been away, you have all been so nice.
Bye for now - BLabels: It's All About Me |
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| Be Gentle, it's a guest post. |
Karla has asked me to guest post while she is off sipping cocktails and building sandcastles. Her hand trembled slightly as she handed over the keys to her blog-baby. Like an overprotective mother her only request was "Be gentle to my blog dude".
I have never guest posted before, so I should start by introducing myself. I am the friend from this post. The girlfriend who lives too far away but has managed stay close over the last 10 years via email and instant messaging.
I am most comfortable talking to people through a computer, I find it easier to be honest when the words appear in front of you instead of spilling from your mouth. That being said, I love the ability to write out a thought, then quickly backspace backspace backspace and think "I am sure glad I didn't send that one"
One of the topics that Karla and I have talked about more frequently in the past couple months is the "When are you going to have another baby?" the question that pours out of grandparents, friends, strangers lips when they see you with a small bundle of joy. The amniotic fluid isn't even dry and they are pressuring you to have another child.
My son is 8.5 months old. Born on a sunny Tuesday in May, he changed my life (as babies often do) and my opinion of babies and children alike. When I found out I was pregnant (a story that will have to wait for another time) I knew I would want more than one. Hubby felt the same way, he was raised an only child and I had siblings. We both agreed having a brother or sister was important.
So if Mommy and Daddy are both wanting another baby, when you start trying for another baby?
I got kind of freaked out when the clock struck midnight and I realized that I would be 29 in a few short months. That means that in a few short months and a year I would be thirty. My silly internal timetable said "no babies after 30" just like it said "you must be married before 25". That doesn't leave me much time to have any remaining children.
The part of me with the giant clock around her neck says "Don't be a pussy, have another baby NOW. You know what it's like to have a newborn, you can totally have a newborn and a toddler, and do it on your own five days a week while hubby is away at work, you are an amazing woman and mother" but then the rational part of me says "Are you fucking insane?"
I know I want more kids, should I just suck it up and have a few insane baby/diaper/sleepless years now? Or wait until Jr is older, and have another baby when hes like say married?Labels: Friends, Pregnancy |
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| Intensity |
I just got home from the most treacherous ride of my life. And I am not exaggerating in the slightest. This morning Nate and I headed out under sunny skies to make the two hour drive North where he will be staying with his Grandparents for the next ten nights and I swear, as soon I was out of the city limits, the sky turned ominous and dark and all of a sudden all I could see was white, everywhere, and oh my god, where is the road?
While navigating the slippery slope of snow-coated roads, I kept remembering this horrible accident that I read about. Or maybe I saw a tribute on You Tube, I can’t remember for sure, but the life of a mother and father where shattered when a transport truck, unable to stop in time, rammed into their van from behind instantly killing their three children.
That story just haunts me to the depth of my core and knowing that I was carrying precious human cargo in the back while inching through the white-out of a blustery snowstorm made me feel so, so, intense about it all. I mean, man oh man, could I survive the death of another child? I’m not certain my heart is capable of that.
At one point when visibility was minimal, at best, I noticed there were no cars in the southbound lanes and after several minutes of driving I saw the police cars and ambulances and fire trucks blocking the road from any oncoming traffic. There was a horrible accident. I gripped the steering wheel tighter and dared not even take my eyes off the road for one second to steal a glance back at my sleeping toddler.
And almost just like that, we were out of the storm, and when I pulled over to call my Father-in-Law, I realized that my entire body was trembling and even though I shouldn’t have, I crawled in the back and gently stroked Nate’s cheek until he woke up and I told him that mommy really needed a hug and a kiss.
And then all was fine with the world again.Labels: Motherhood, Nate |
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| Equatorial sun |
Things are quiet around this little corner of the Internet lately because, well, sometimes life can be complicated, and complicated means boundaries, which then turns into writer’s block interlaced with a hefty dose of much needed introspection.
I’m just ready to curl up beneath a glinted gold equatorial sun promising sun-kissed skin and romance from midnight to eternity; a place where the most mundane decisions that I’ll have to make are whether to sit by a pool or inhale the sweet scent of an ocean breeze and what colour of eye shadow to wear to dinner.Labels: Vacation |
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| Old Man Winter |
Dear Winter,
How do I hate thee? Oh, I am so going to count the ways. And when this dissertation is done, assume I could add like, one thousand more reasons if I wasn’t on a schedule that involves a toddler who will not nap and will probably wake up in 4.3 minutes.
1: You’re cold! That really sucks because my body likes heat and sunshine and balmy summer gusts twisting through my hair while I rest my head against a salmon-pink sunset.
2: Also? For the life of me, I cannot get my son to wear mittens or a scarf. Do you not think you could heat things up, just a touch? Because to be totally candid, I find it unreasonable that you’re so unforgiving when it comes to toddlers that are like, pretty much always completely irrational with BECAUSE I SAID SO, even it means enduring the torture of mittens.
3: Every time I forget to park the van in the garage a sudden mountain of snow lands on my car. Vans are ginormous, Winter! And they take an eternity and a day to clear the snow from.
4: We do not have a driveway wide enough to park two cars beside each other and it just so happens that on the days Mark has a ride to the train station it also happens to be the days that I forgot to park the van in the garage. So then I end up having to clear a mountain of snow off of TWO cars and then scrape the ice off of 14 windows just to get Mark’s car out of the driveway so I can leave the house with an already cranky toddler who will do nothing but scream at me for milk the entire time anyway, which is usually only tolerable in one hour increments, which is also why I am a house hermit and my kid is a milkaholic.
5: Which brings up an interesting point, Mr. Winter. For all of the advances in medicine that humanity has accomplished, why is no one is researching the art of human hibernation?
6: Also? I must admit, all of this perpetual darkness is so depressing.
7: So are these perpetually gray skies.
8: And the bone chilling dampness that hovers in the air from the Great Lakes makes me feel like I am 95 years old and crippled with Arthritis.
9: Oh! Hai! Did I mention you are are effing cold? MOFO! Brrr!
10: And that I hate the need for bulky clothing and fingers perpetually encased in stiff-gloved leather?
11: Or that I miss the gilded blush of sun-kissed skin?
12: And that I hate chapped lips? Last Saturday I indulged in a bottle of Australian Shiraz with a friend and on Monday the icky dry patches on my lips were still tainted purple.
13: It’s also very unpleasant to forget what your toes feel like. I have warm boots, I do, but I’m a glutton for self punishment and wanted to wear my heels with a perfectly hemmed pair of boot cut jeans today, so sue me, Winter!
14. Just not over the fact that my puffy red winter coat makes me look like an inflatable air mattress.
15: Oh man, and your cold-induced runny noses can suck it. Both mine and my kid’s. Especially when he wipes his nose on my shirt.
16: And finally, dear Winter, it’s days like today where I’m alternating between holding hands with a snail-paced toddler wading through slush-laden parking lots and perching his body in the cove of my maternal hip that I end up with dirty snow stains right near my vagina because that just so happens to be where his boots land, and walking around with a dirty vagina is not the image I would like the world to see Old Man Winter you filthy pervert you!
Love,
Karla
xoLabels: Soapbox |
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| Unexpected |
I didn’t ask for anything for Christmas this year because Mark and I are planning to move in a few months and, well, a home is expensive. This house of ours, although cozy and humble and filled with so much happiness, is also filled with tremendous sadness. So much sadness. This is the house we moved into only a few short weeks into my pregnancy with Ava, hopeful and giddy about starting a family, and this is the house we returned to, arms empty, crushed and altered after she died. This is the place, day in and day out, I walk the same halls where I used to scream until I collapsed under the weight of an unfathomable truth. This house, well, it’s just never really felt like home since.
And so, we’ve been saving our pennies and waiting and waiting and obsessively checking MLS for like, oh, YEARS and we are finally thisclose to being ready to buy another house. But despite all of our penny pinching and a fridge full of no name condiments, Santa kept relentlessly insisting that I need to sit on his lap and tell him what I wanted for Christmas. And by Santa, I mean Mark. And although I think dude was just looking for some action, I guess he thought I was a very good girl last year because he brought me a plane ticket to another part of the world that is sunny and warm and covered with endless white sand beaches.
And we leave, like, soon.
To say I am excited to bask in the warmth of a soft Caribbean breeze and sip, oh man, who are we kidding, gluttonously indulge in the free-flowing girly drinks topped with cute little umbrellas is a bit of an understatement.
So, in two weeks, if anyone happens to be in Punta Cana, come over and say Hi! I’m the one with the sunburn sporting the body of a 12 year old boy with a beer gut.Labels: Vacation |
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| He'll either become a carpenter or surgeon. |
Wow. Where have I been lately and where the heck did 2008 go? As a matter of fact, where did 2007 and 2006 and 2005 go? Also? When did it become the year that I will be turning 30? I swear all you have to do is blink and life will pass you by. That’s why posting has been so light lately. Mark’s been on holidays for the past couple of weeks, and we’ve just been enjoying our time together, with Nate, as a family. Sometimes the most soul-quenching thing to do is just be and live in the moment, even if that moment starts sometime after I wake up at around 10:00 am.
Although we had a very quiet Christmas, Nate was still spoiled rotten by his Grandparents. So rotten, in fact, that I was pretty certain it wouldn’t be humanly possible to squeeze all his new toys into our already toy-cluttered basement. But, as it turns out there’s always room for more as long as you’re willing to get rid of a beloved piece of furniture and turn your bar into a play area. Classy, I know. As my child ventures through these formative years his memories of building lego castles will include overhead shelves of Mom’s wine and martini glass collection.
One of the gifts that we bought Nate was a Home Depot work bench complete with every imaginable tool that makes noise. His favourite tool is whatever one that will make enough noise to give me a headache, which is usually the drill. Man oh man that kid likes to drill things. So far, he has used it to terrorize the cats, give his teddy a lobotomy and Samson a new asshole.
Oh good times. Also, can we just pretend that you can’t see we let our kid eat smarties for breakfast?Labels: All in the Family, Nate |
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