We are all connected

I have to insert this into my own blog instead of doing a blog-hop every time I want to listen to it. At first it was just making me feel a little better in my grief. But I guess... I guess I'm still grieving pretty hard.



The cosmos is also within us. We are made of star stuff.

(I'm sure right now somebody is thinking, "Ohh, there she goes again, being all weird!" But you know, most people take comfort in the thought of something larger. For some, it's Heaven. For me, it's the heavens. Plus, Richard Feynman is playing the djembe. It's like the video was made especially for me.)

Grieving on Thanksgiving

It was a good Thanksgiving. AwesomeCloud met his great-aunt and great-uncle, and his second cousin, and had a grand old time shoveling mashed potatoes into his mouth. The food was delicious and the company was pleasant.

But I miss my Chica Chica. She died far too young. 7 years wasn't nearly enough. There's a profoundly empty cat-sized space in my heart.

I'm thankful this season, but I'm also sorry. I'm sorry AwesomeCloud won't get to know Trixie as he grows. I'm sorry she didn't have a chance to form a real relationship with him. I'm sorry she felt too ill to be properly catlike with him, and to show him how a cat and toddler should interact together.

I'm sorry I was unable to let her curl up for hours on my lap and be comforted. The baby kept me too busy. I'm sorry I couldn't come to her everytime she called out in the darkness of her brand new blindness. It must have been terrifying for her.

But I gave her a quick scritch whenever I could, and I got down on the floor when she couldn't jump, and I fed her extra soft food when she asked for it. I didn't do badly. I just feel guilty because I can't touch her at all anymore.

I'm sorry you were in pain, Trixie, and I couldn't do any more to alleviate it. I'm sorry I didn't slow down and give you more reasons to purr.

A lot of people may think it's a bit silly to go on and on like this about a cat. But she was a life here on earth, and I was responsible for her. She wasn't just an ornament and she didn't go with the furniture. She was.... she was herself. And she was very special.

We all lost a special family member. AwesomeCloud did too, even if he'll never grasp the depth of that loss. Even if the disappearance of that little furry face in his personal space barely registers.

I wish there were something else I could've done. I feel so helpless.

Zai jian, Trixie.

Trixie passed away this evening. She probably had cancer after all.

She was... what can I say about her? She was a superlative cat. She was gorgeous, gentle, high-strung, affectionate, and her ordeals were bigger than most cats' ordeals. She was an odds-beater. She took the long odds life gave her and beat them to a bloody pulp over and over. She worked hard at learning how to be a pet. She struggled to accept loving as well as she gave it. She gracefully adjusted to several major life changes, and she miraculously survived being lost for five weeks, three years ago this month.

She and I bonded hard, and I miss her terribly already. The last thing she did in life was curl up in my lap and purr.

The MRI people are going to wonder why I'm so teary-eyed tomorrow.

It's going to be a tough couple of weeks

I wish the Cloud weren't in such a foul mood today. Tomorrow we have to get up at 5-ish for an 8 AM appointment at the hospital, and then Wednesday he has an MRI, for which he needs to be sedated, for which he needs an empty stomach.

Then on 12/3 he gets an actual hospital stay, and all the other lovely things that go with surgery. There are lots of frustrating, silly, poignant, disgusting, and exhausting moments within his medical adventures, but I'm not writing about them here for reasons of privacy. I hope you all understand.

So. 5:00 AM! Are we ready?!?

(Uhhh.... no. We're a couple of grouches here. Grr.)

Lucky LOLcat

I wish I had something in particular to disapprove of today, but I don't. I just thought this picture I took was cute, so I made a LOLcat out of it.

Who has something worth disapproving of today? You can borrow my LOLcat if you like.

A new African store

AwesomeCloud and I did some mallwalking this morning. We discovered a brand new African store that opened just two days ago.

I loved the African store in Jersey City, and this one is just as fun. Unfortunately it doesn't carry books. But they have a selection of djembes - not that we need djembes! We have three already, and three family members, but I must have a compulsion to collect djembes or something.

They also carry shea butter. The last time I bought shea butter, it ended up being my favorite cosmetic in the whole linen closet. It is apparently good for rashes, too.

I didn't buy anything today, but I hope the African store can stay in business, because it's the kind of place where I will occasionally spend my money, yes, even with my tightwad tendencies. I'll be pleasantly surprised if the Cape can support such a store. Ethnic specialty shops tend to struggle here. It's a shame.

Commenting for charity

Hey. Go leave a comment for Amy over at her blog, Lots'o'Kids. Tell her one thing you're thankful for. She'll donate one dollar to a charity to help Chinese orphans for each comment she gets.

She also links some worthwhile charities on her blog, in case you're interested in donating yourself.

In other news, AwesomeCloud can now pretend to read his books.

Right now he's boogying down to a little techno music. This kid can really shake his thang.

Thud!

Children's Hospital today.

Also, Children's Hospital on Friday and again on Saturday.

Everything is good and the process is moving right along, but oh man, all this traveling is kicking my butt.

My son the earthworm

AwesomeCloud has started to eat dirt off the floor.

It started with a stray Cheerio. A stray, soggy Cheerio that had fallen off his high chair tray this morning. Later, I saw him pick a mote of dirt off the floor and put it in his mouth. "Haha, that'll teach you," I said, and fed him some real food to get the yucky taste out of his mouth.

Next time he was on the floor, I saw him grab for a leaf fragment. In it went. "Ack," I said, but it was gone too quickly for me to do anything about it. Besides, it was just a tiny leaf. It's... um... fiber. Yeah.

I scooted him into the living room, which I'd already swept, but he was sly and managed to find a bit of bark. I was able to dig that one out of his mouth. "No, don't eat that," I scolded him. "Yucky. Don't eat things off the floor." (Not that he has nearly enough English/cognitive skills to have a clue what I said. I'm sure tone of voice was the only thing that affected him.)

His face scrunched up and he began to cry, but I ignored him. I was too busy frantically sweep sweep sweeping every square centimeter of floor space I could find.

Please tell me this phase will be short. I'd like to skip ahead to the part where we laugh about it and are grateful it's over.

In other news, I'm really pushing AwesomeCloud's sippy cup skills and walking skills. He is humorously bad at both, but we keep trying. Fortunately, he's interested in both.

I confess I made an error last night. We recently bought a child development book recommended by our pediatrician, and last night I read all the 1-2 year milestones. OMG I'm such a bad mother. A terrible, horrible, neglectful baaaaad mother.

Didn't I swear off books? I'll swear them off again. No more books! The baby will grow and learn in his own way, and he has the parents he has, and if we're doing anything spectacularly wrong, we'll figure it out in due time. A parent who is fraught with guilt and self-loathing is worse than a parent who is blissfully unaware of what the experts say.

No more books. I am only allowing myself to read non-child-related books from now on. Like, there's one on the shelf that's been catching my eye called "Physics Demystified." That is a good choice. I bet "Physics Demystified" hardly mentions child development at all.

Heavy baby! I want a toddler.

AwesomeCloud is breaking my back. I hope he learns to walk soon. He's certainly big enough for it. Then I can get away with only carrying him some of the time, and some of the time giving my back a rest.

He did come down with the cold, and it wasn't too bad. His nose is still runny but otherwise he's almost over it now.

So, yeah, our first sick baby experience. May subsequent illnesses be as mild.

We went to baby storytime yesterday and it was quite nice. There were other babies there. There were some toddlers his age, too, but he's more like the one-year-olds at the moment. He's catching up.

Today we're going shopping at the discount shops to get Christmas decorations cheap. We're sticking to a tight budget this year. It's been a year of massive expenses, and our bank accounts need a break. Food, family, and church! That's what Christmas should be limited to every year, not this big sprawling spendfest that starts before Halloween. And the political issues should be resolved - no decorations on public property, ever, and all the talk show hosts and commentators should just shut up.

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year. We show up, eat, and leave. Christmas should be like that too. Maybe we can give each other oranges like my grandmother's generation did when they were little. That would be perfect. Merry Christmas! Light a candle. Here's your orange.

A parent's big ambitions for her child

An older parent has some certain advantageous life perspectives. She has more experience, and more years' worth of each type of experience. She can look back on her life so far - and the act of doing so is quite useful to her! She thinks, If I'd only done X in college, the next 10 years of my life would have gone in a better direction. She has had time to reflect on whether listening to heavy metal throughout middle and high school had any long-lasting damage, and, determining it has not, resolves to go easy on her child when he develops his own musical tastes. Hey, she'll even buy him a copy of the CD "$&#@in' my @#!%" by Phat Gangsta George if that's what he really wants. But he's going to learn to play an instrument, and play it right, and not waste 2 years of organ lessons like she did when she was a kid.

You see, older parents are probably as guilty of permissive parenting as the books say. But we are also very, very much into success for our child.

It doesn't have to be material success. I would like AwesomeCloud to grow up to be a scientist or a doctor or a senator. I want him to marry a wonderful woman and have healthy kids and never lose his job or get divorced. I don't really want him to own a yacht or nine homes, because that would be a conflict of interest. I want him to be comfortable and happy. But if he's comfortable and happy living in a yurt raising llamas and making jewelry out of milkweed pods... okay! I can live with that! In fact I am exceptionally equipped to live with that.

I just don't want him to major in natural jewelry-making only to discover he can't make any money from it and has to abandon that path and get a real job. That was what his Mama did. I guess I was too difficult to offer real guidance to, so I didn't get much worthwhile guidance. I'm going to do things a little differently with him.

As an older parent, I really am thinking about his major in college. I don't have to wait until he's 9 and embarrassing the rest of the class with his mad multiplication skillz. If he does become a prodigy in something, I won't downplay it - I'll tell him, "You're the best. Run with it! Be the VERY best!"

If he's average in every way, I have a plan for that too. I'll tell him to work hard so he may rise above mediocrity with sheer determination. "If you find a way to make it fun, then you'll WANT to get things done."

I spend a lot of time each day exposing him to little things - a toy that spins, keys that jingle, food that squishes, water that's wet. I cheer when he tries to say a word that has a meaning, no matter how incomprehensible his attempt is. I dance with him. His daddy gives him playing cards and d20 dice to discover.

I wonder why parents don't continue this kind of intimate, hands-on learning in later years. Learning gets relegated to school. Why? Boys, especially, have trouble with book learning for the first several school years. Maybe if their parents gave them activity-based learning experiences when they're ten, same as we do when they' re one, they wouldn't get so frustrated in school. Maybe learning math at the gas station and ecology on the nature trail is just the antidote to male classroom restlessness. (Female too.) Right now I can play "how many different objects can you kick in the back yard" with the Cloud. Maybe in ten years we'll be playing, "how many different types of plants can you ID in the back yard."

I can't leave it to school to teach him everything he needs to know for life and career. Look how badly that approach worked on me. There's a reason why Harvard University admissions officers look as hard at an applicant's extracurricular activities as at his or her GPA.

Not that I'm expecting the Cloud to get into Harvard... but... I'm not ruling it out either. Just saying.

Cornell would be nice. Their ornithology and marine bio programs have strong reputations. The University of Rhode Island is also a center for studies in field biology. Many of the coastal studies and programs dealing with invasive species come from there.

If he decides to go to MA College of Art... well... we'll cross that bridge if we come to it.

As an older parent, I find this line of thinking normal and natural. Instead of devouring parenting books and looking over the shoulders of my fellow parents to see what they're doing right, I make up my own version of what's right. Conformity never led me to greatness. Even finding a different drummer to march to doesn't quite cut it. At my age, I believe it's best to make your own dang drum, and learn how to play it really well, and that's what I'm going to pass on to my kid. It also helps that I only have one child to focus on. If I had 4 or 5 or 7, I could spread out my ambitions for them amongst them all, and celebrate how unique and individual each of them all are. But with one child, my attentions are funneled. That can end up being a whole lot of pressure resting on his shoulders. But part of my lesson for him is to please himself, not other people. Not even Mama. The path to rising above mediocrity is to leave Mama behind in the dust. Don't worry about me, kiddo! Go chase your dreams! And choose your own music!

Fortunately for me, they don't make cutting-edge music these days like they did when I was a kid. There's nothing being produced today that will shock and disturb the parents, because the parents grew up listening to worse. The most angst-ridden high schoolers are now wearing Pink Floyd and Nirvana t-shirts - two of my favorite bands from my generation. (Pink Floyd (pure Pink Floyd, that is, with Roger Waters heading the band) actually predated me by a few years.) My generation invented punk rock, rap, and death metal! Nothing has come out since then that tops death metal. Maybe Finnish death metal, but those guys are all my age too.

I can at least draw from personal experience and advise the kiddo to be a gentleman at concerts: protect his girlfriend by standing between her and the mosh pit. But do they even have mosh pits anymore?

Alas, I fear my son's musical tastes will either be very, very retro or very, very tame. He'll be blaring a riff from "Smoke on the Water" on his @$$-kicking new electric guitar and his Mama will start singing along. Oh, how times have changed. Youth is no longer a key ingredient of 'cool'.

My generation's life experiences are hard to top, too. We can honestly say, "I've known people who lost their lives to AIDS or ruined their lives with drug addiction." Some of us can even say, "I saw my friends sliding downhill with their drug use, and it only strengthened my resolve not to make the same mistake." And we're not 'uphill both ways barefoot in the snow' kinds of people, spouting misfortunes that our kids fail to relate to. We grew up in prosperous times, when sexism and racism were at an all-time low. Aside from cell phones and the internet, our culture has not progressed in 3o years.

That's actually kind of scary - we're older parents, and yet we're NOT culturally obsolete. My mother was 23 when she had me, and she was most certainly culturally obsolete. Here I am, a parent for the first time at age thirty-never-you-mind, and I know my stuff. I've been there, done that, don't suggest you try it too kiddo. I know my way around the internet like a teenager, probably better - and I take the time to spell my words out, too.

I still refuse to get a cell phone, though. Every time I blink, new cell phones are old already. Cell phone generations come and go so quickly, the term 'cell' is inadvertently appropos.

Will any of this change in the next 15 years? Will culture jump-start forward again? Will some mass phenomenon come along that leaves us fogies scratching our heads? I don't think so. Not until we're too tired to keep learning and too old to care.

Trixie update

Good news! The vet feels that Trixie's lump is an infection rather than a tumor. After a week of me administering medicated eardrops twice a day, her condition has improved and her ear is clearing up.

However, it seems she has no eardrum in her left ear. Strange. How does an indoor cat with a low-risk lifestyle lose an eardrum?

Then again, how does she go blind suddenly without any head trauma? A tumor might explain that. She is a cat of many mysteries.

Thus, I apparently have a visually impaired cat who is deaf in one ear and has arthritis. And I haven't been so relieved since I learned that AwesomeCloud's delays were not innate.

Speaking of AwesomeCloud, the kiddo is walking like crazy - with assistance, but it's only a matter of time before he takes his first independent steps. He's babbling like it means something; he says "Goo" with a sincerity that belies its silliness. Also, "Doit doit doit." Serious stuff.

And he pretends to eat. He eats invisible morsels off my wrist, off box tops, off the edge of his stroller. Make-believe! My kid is doing make-believe! Whoa, awesome!

He likes Fatboy Slim and his eyes light up when I play it. Now he also likes Tommy Dorsey and Count Basie. He is a kid of diverse musical tastes. (Coincidentally, they match Mama's musical tastes.) We have yet to find out if he's a big Springsteen fan like his daddy.

He also eats more foods, and he's more eager to feed himself by hand. Last night he had Thai food at the mall. He enjoys shoveling the pad Thai noodles into his mouth. (Disclosure: they're not spicy. Thai food at the food court is like macaroni at Sbarro - it's not real ethnic.)