For Mimi...

My mom was a single parent, essentially, living 4 hours from my father. I spent a considerable amount of time in day care, with babysitters, some family, for most of my early childhood. I remember very fondly the sweet Montessori school she sent me to when I was 3 & 4, run by the Dominican Sisters & a bit of a drive for her. I remember learning how the calendar worked in 1978, when I was four, & the feeling of pride I got from understanding. I remember generally gazing over the classroom & being proud of the sense of order that there was, with everything having a place, & knowing there were still discoveries for me to make. I felt comfortable with my teachers as well as my peers; I had a sense of community. This was a primary reason in me wanting to send MiniMe to Montessori, & I know she found her experience to be as satisfying as mine.

When we moved into the City, 3 blocks from the very house my mom grew up in, I was to go to the same elementary school as she did. On the first day of kindergarten I had an awful experience I remember very vividly almost 30 years later. The teacher was going over the alphabet, probably to get a sense of where we, the students, were in our understanding. I was bored. I reached over another student to grab a Little Golden Book, opened it, & read quietly to myself. The teacher scolded me for not participating with the group. I told her, "I already know that, though. I've never read this book before." She mocked me. She ended up bringing me up to the front of the class, where she was standing & all the other students were sitting in front of her on the floor. She didn't believe that I could read, so she literally dared me to read the book aloud. I knew that she expected me to fail, which was something I hadn't really experienced before. I read, slowly, but certainly. The kids in the class didn't seem to understand that what I was doing was a positive thing. All they understood was that the teacher was mocking me. The fact that I could read was irrelevant. I was disobedient. I did not conform. I was to be punished. I was to be mocked. 

I went home that day & cried more than I had when my Brittany, Missy, had run away. I was beside myself. I didn't understand. Thankfully, my mother understood exactly. In fact, she had even endured the cruelty of the same kindergarten teacher herself as a child. She made an appointment with the principal of the school & I did not go back until after we met with Mr. Castle. 

When we met with him I remember he & my mom explained to me that I would be given some questions on paper & I was to just do as best as I could. There was no right or wrong answers, they just wanted to see how much I understood. I remember rows & columns of words that were somehow related. I had to circle some things, or underline them, or simply read them aloud. I was comfortable. I didn't feel like I had on that first day of kindergarten & was relieved.

The decision was made to just put me in first grade at 5 years old. I remember my teacher, Ms. Shirley, who used phonics before they were very popular. She used to put words on stars around the ceiling & we would take turns reading them aloud as she pointed to them with her pointer. I was not afraid to succeed or be proud. 

I remember in 2nd grade I left the rest of my regular class for a few hours a week & went to the library with other kids from other classrooms. We did special projects where we got new markers, new books, & it was there that I first heard that I was gifted. In the 4th grade, my best friend, Rachel Hernandez, & I were moved out of the same class as our other friend, Ramona Castro. Ramona's mom tried to get her moved into our class, but they wouldn't let her. I remember how mad Ramona was at us, but we didn't understand why the grown ups did what they did. Rachel & I were put into a 'split' classroom, where there were about another 8 students our age, 4th graders, but the rest of the class were 5th graders. My mom made the decision to put me in private school before I got to junior high because she was a juvenile social worker, she knew too much, & she didn't want me to be 10 years old going to school with pregnant girls.

When I was older & we moved out of the City into a more affluent suburb, I had a hard time. I was the girl from a broken home with the wrong clothes. I had a hard time adjusting socially & because of that my grades suffered initially. Eventually, I grew into high school, but while I did have a few close friends, I was behind socially. When my classmates turned 16 & got cars, my parents tried to compensate by buying me a moped. I didn't turn 16 until the summer before my senior year. I started college when I was just 17, and I wasn't very street smart. I had a hard time in college because I didn't know what to do with myself. For the first time in my life, I had to study, & I didn't know how. 

I have been thinking about this a lot because MiniMe is going to four in a few short weeks & she is eligible for the Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten program, which covers a big portion of the cost of her to be in certain pre-school settings starting in the fall. (You know, the fall, when I'm due to have another rugrat to suck up my time as well as my breastmilk) She is desperately in need of being with some sort of a peer group, as we live in a seriously unbalanced population. She was used to being in group care from 9 weeks old until just last summer, so she is incredibly social. But the choices for schools here are, well, let's just say that the state of Florida is currently ranked #49 in the country for quality of education. 

In raising MiniMe thus far, we have cultivated a love of learning in her that is nearly unquenchable. She is caught between wanting to be an astronaut, a violinist, a veterinarian, a scientist, and a dancer. The library is like a fantasy to her, where any question she has can be explored. She has asked for Gray's Anatomy (the book) for her birthday because she is fascinated with what is going on in there. I love to hear her questions, as they are already so thoughtful, it is possible to have an intelligent conversation with her. I am afraid, however. 

I feel as if there is a choice where you have to cross a boundary, & I feel I am upon its' precipice. As we have let MiniMe's desires lead her, she knows all of the planets in the solar system, but does not recognize each letter of the alphabet. She can tell you what a gardenia, bougainvillea, hibiscus, plumbago, & bromeliad are, how banyan trees grow from the top down, but she cannot grasp why twenty-ten is not a number. 

We have chosen to send her to the local Catholic school because, well, we are, & this is the first year they are participating in the VPK program. Another part of my rationale is that if we are still here (God forbid) for the following school year & cannot get her into the arts magnet elementary, at least we would have the option of keeping her at the Catholic school as it goes through 8th grade, & we would be able to provide her some sort of continuity. I am worried, however, that they will squelch our passionate girl. 

I remember, sitting in Calculus class, & being irate with the teacher. I could not grasp the concept & was trying to get him to help me visualize what the concept was. He lost patience with me & told me to just follow the directions. It was the first class I ever failed. This rutabaga cannot just follow processes very well without understanding how the process related to something tangible. I learned math in Montessori, which uses a series of manipulative beads to illustrate the concepts. I realized that while I was given a firm foundation of loving to learn, a gift of having things taught to me in a way that I fully understood them, I never learned to just memorize for the sake of memorization. What a waste, I thought, of my time & my thoughts. 

The Catholic school expects MiniMe to be able to write her name when she starts in August, & I am expected to teach her this. I'm annoyed. This is yet another fine example of where No Child Left Behind has gotten us; children must learn how to test well. We both have such better things to do with our time. When she decides she wants or needs to know this, she will, & it will take her all of a half hour at most. But to force her to sit, at not quite 4 years old, & learn this thing that someone else has decided she needs to know, I don't know if I can do it. Part of the reason I think the Catholic school would be good for her is because I don't want her to be in Calculus class one day & be in that place that I was. I want her to know how to study. But at the same time, I hear Yeats, whom I share a birthday with saying, "Education is not a filling of a bucket, but the lighting of a fire."

I know she is smart. I don't care if someone thinks she's gifted; in fact, I hope no one ever labels her as such. It's an awful kind of pressure. I'm more worried about squelching that little flame. It is so beautiful, it lights up my days. 

raising my hackles

I was thinking about one of my favorite houses in Detroit that was on the market last year for a very reasonable price. It is known by some as the Mary Chase Stratton house, who was the founder of Pewabic Pottery. I lived right down the street from Pewabic for a while & I use to go there just to look & touch the magnificent tiles that they make. I went to the Pewabic website to revisit some of those tactile memories & I got a chill. 

Mrs. Stratton was an amazing woman. She grew up in the Upper Pennisula of Michigan,in what is called Copper Country because of the copper mines. Mrs. Stratton named the company after a river where she grew up near Hancock. Pewabic is an Ojibawa word used to describe copper, or the sheen of copper, which Mrs. Stratton replicated in her beautiful glazes. 

As I was reading about all of this, I felt a breeze on the nape of my neck, though no windows were open. I was thinking about my family that comes from the same place; my father's family. I felt, very strongly, the presence of my father. I could even smell the Swisher Sweets.

I don't like to say I believe in ghosts. I want & need to believe the loved ones that I have lost are away from this world, its' pain, & in a better place. All of them were lost to cancer. But when I put my hand to my belly, my heart sends out tentacles to wherever that place is. I cannot fathom that I will be having a child that my father will never know. When I heard these words in my head, I cried, but almost immediately, I felt comfort. I felt the comfort that my father, even though he is gone, believes in me. 

I am afraid to think about the things that I want too much because I am afraid of failing. I am afraid to miss home too much because I may not be able to return. My mother reminds me often that you can't go back home. But in that fear, I look up to see MiniMe at her easel. I hear my dad's giggle. I remember him telling me that it is okay to fail, but not okay to give up. 

So I will push forward with my plans for a business that will help us to be able to go wherever we want to go, regardless of the local economy. Biggie is taking us to Michigan for my birthday & I am giddy to get there. I can't hope too hard that he will find a way to want to go back. I have to keep reminding myself that MiniMe's birthday is right after we come back so I don't forget to plan it & send out invitations. This trip is eclipsing so many exciting things, even my first ultrasound, that it is speaking volumes to me about how much I miss Detroit. I can't wait to take pictures of the places I miss & share them with you.

Taking Me back to Dionne Warwick & Stevie Wonder

I think Kristine was in my car for all of 30 seconds before I had told her I was pregnant. We hadn't been in the same room together since 2003, but I couldn't tell. We were right back at it, finishing each other's sentences, swapping stories, just as we always have. It was so nice, to not have pretense, not that I normally do, but it's different with certain people.

Morgan, or Momo, her daughter, is a doll. I think she may be the most mellow baby I have ever spent time with. The kid cried maybe twice that I noticed in four days she was here, furthering what I have always said; if we have another girl we might as well name her Scarlett, because that would be more honest. I loved following her chirpy little butt around, introducing her to the chalkboard easel, the ball tracker. So easily entertained. With none of the dramatic sighs & "Well, you know..."s that are MiniMe. But then again, MiniMe is also so affectionate, not that Momo isn't, but I like me some hugs. & I got them, from Kristine, in spades.

Whenever we have company Biggie is always trying to get them to the beach. I know people like the beach, but I don't. Especially since I've become a mother. The sunscreen slathered everywhere, the squinting, the covering of the fat rolls, the greasy food, the sand in every crevice & throughout the car for months, it's just not worth it to me. God Bless Kristine. She was content with the few sporadic plans I had made; open gymnastics, lunch, the fabric store, the Italian market, walking in our woods were enough. She came to see us, not the place. 

I had forgotten how fun Kristine is & how much she likes me. I was remembering being on the phone with a resident when we worked together, Kristine was sitting across my desk, drawing crazy stick figure drawings. I was being given a verbal finger-shaking from the person on the phone, but my voice was smiling, because Kristine was bored. She would come out to sit with me when I took a cigarette break, even though she didn't smoke. When she was here, Biggie did something, maybe it was my hormones being insensitive to him or my hormones making me overly sensitive to him, that hurt me. I didn't have to say a thing. I got one of those sobbing, can barely get the words out talks that we all need to have with a girlfriend every once & while. Other company that we have had has stressed me out, making me worry about the dishes, the towels, the dog hair. Kristine is the kind-of friend that loads the dishwasher, finds the coziest way to sit on the sofa, & is like she lives down the street.

MiniMe has this ritual thing that I have always done to calm her down before she goes to sleep called ticklies. It involves feathery stroking of her limbs, torso, wherever her bossy self can think of. When MiniMe wanted Kristine to read her a bedtime story instead of Mom, I didn't have to explain what ticklies are. Kristine already knew. Even better, on Sunday, while we were laying around before we had to go to the airport, Kristine gave me some ticklies. Now THAT'S a friend. 

So, Kristine. Thank you for coming to visit me. It meant more to me than I can explain. I so hope I can find a way to come visit you. Bless your sweet girl. Thank Brad for letting his girls go for a few days. My only regret is that we didn't get a picture of us together. But, we will.

Our Little Pilgrim

So, I'm pregnant.

I'm due two days before Biggie's birthday, (Nov. 20th), which is funny because MiniMe was born to days before my birthday, (June 13th). Not that I put much stock in due dates. MiniMe's was June 27th. My mom's due date for me was May 22nd. So in other words, we're not a timely bunch in these parts.

Be glad that I decided to not blog about this in my first trimester. About 2 days after I figured out that I really didn't need to rush out for tampons, Kristine decided she was going to come visit so I decided to wait to tell her face to face. I also considered the fact that things happen & I didn't want to force a bunch of people that have never laid actual eyes on my person feel sorry for me if something went wrong. But let's just say that being pregnant at 34 is a lot different than it was at 29. No, I haven't had morning sickness; I've had evening sickness. It starts right around the time I'm supposed to go in the kitchen & mess around with raw meat, stinky cheese, other generally smelly things. The actual first red flag that I might be pregnant was when I was cooking sausages with cheese & parsley for the fam, lifted the lid to turn them over, & promptly did an about face to vomit into the sink. The only thing that has sounded appetizing to 'me' (I am temporarily hijacked & my taste buds are not to be trusted), is turkey, mashed potatoes, dressing, with gravy & cranberries. Poor Biggie. There is a Bob Evans on his way home that we have developed a first name relationship with. I think it's waning, though. I actually managed to eat a chicken burrito last night, so let's hope I can move on to other foods soon. 

I think I just have an aversion to food I cook, because nothing I can think of cooking for dinner sounds good. Well, maybe some grilled cheese & tomato soup?

The week, a summary

I hate sippy cups. MiniMe has been able to drink out of a regular, open-topped cup since she was a year old. When we go to restaurants we always ask them to bring her a regular glass of water, just like the rest of us. Sometimes I'll get crazy descriptive & ask for a juice glass. Is that unclear? Because, a lot of the time they go ahead & bring the damned plastic cup with the lid & the straw that we know is just going in the damned landfill as soon as we leave if we don't take it home & recycle it. So, then if they bring it to the table & we send it back, we know it just goes in the damn trash. I hate these people that make our carbon footprint bigger because they are too lazy to listen. Dammit.

I am MiniMe's friend. She has been ultra affectionate with me this week. I am a great mom, she tells me. This has nothing to do with homemade chocolate chip cookies, four trips to the park this week, one spur-of-the-moment playdate with one of her favorite girlfriends, or Bubblefest '09. 

I have BIG news. BIG. I just can't tell y'all yet, because it's not ready to be unveiled yet. But please come back soon, because I NEED INPUT! 

Biggie rocks. He has sold 24 cars this month. Craziness. Some whole dealerships don't sell that many cars in a month. Not our Biggie. Oh, & he took today OFF because he sold 4 cars alone yesterday. He may not help me much around the house, may be a little too much a smart-as morning person, but hey, he sells the cars. 

Kristine coming Thursday. Much cleaning, sprucing, checklist making between now & then. Plus, MiniMe has her fricken VPK interview. I'm thinking that the interviewers better have their game faces on because she wants some answers on why, exactly, they are going to make her wear plain white leather tennis shoes. She thinks they are ugly. 

Warning: If this doesn't make you tear up you have no heart

On Easter we went to Mass, came home, I made cinnamon rolls & chicken sausages. MiniMe found her eggs & basket. She proceeded to hatch & heal the plastic eggs all day long. She completely reinforced the idea that we need to obtain a living situation where we can have a couple of chickens. She loves them.

My mom came over & we all sort of tag teamed dinner. It was rich & we all ended up splayed over our sofa. After growling over the car shows that Biggie chose to subject us to all day, I insisted on watching The Sound of Music. He groaned. It was 4 hours long, due to the fact that it was on ABC Family & had commercials. He said he has seen it before, but I don't think that was a true statement. I think a true statement would be that he has been in the room before when it was on, but I'll elaborate on this further later.

I am ever-so-glad I insisted on watching this movie. I love Rodgers & Hammerstein. My Gram was one of those women who would chirp about the kitchen, humming these old classics, & was famous for making up her own lyrics when she couldn't remember the actual words. I can't listen to Blue Indigo without tearing up, remembering how she changed the lyrics to be about how sad she was without me around. My friend Kristi & I used to play a travel game where we would sing snippets from show tunes & the others in the car had to guess the show. But in the Hierarchy of Show Tunes, anything once sung by Julie Andrews is known backwards, forwards, sideways, in reverse ala Black Sabbath. I have VIVID memories of The Sound Music viewings with my Gram. I knew that MiniMe was finally old enough to at least stop & stare a few times at the screen. She exceeded my expectations.

First of all, through the viewing of the Good Night Song, MiniMe has perfected her curtsy. She has requested a "twirly" dress every day since then, so as to have sufficient skirt to hold to the sides of her body n the event she stumbles upon what she believes is an appropriate time to curtsy. Say, to Farmer Red, the farmer we buy our greens from at the Farmer's Market. 

She chirps around the house, I am certain in her head she is flanked by matching siblings, prancing around Salzburg. She has requested a white dress with a blue sash. She has consulted with many people she thinks are smart to attempt to come to a solution on the problem of Maria.

By the last scenes of the movie, when the von Trapps are attempting to escape the Nazis, my mom had gone home, & MiniMe was snuggled in between Biggie & I on the sofa. I explained that the men in the matching suits were trying to make The Captain leave Maria & the children to fight in a war he didn't believe in. Biggie made me absolutely speechless, saying that he didn't think it was fair to the family to leave the lavish existence behind, that he would have just gone along. Apparently he didn't pay much attention in history class about the Nazi's. I explained that there was no way they would have let Maria, a Catholic, stay in that house with the children. They surely would have taken it for some senior officer. As far as The Captain, there isn't even any certainty that they would have even put him in command of anything, given his outspoken disagreement with the Third Reich; they may have just taken him away & killed him to prevent him from lending his support to The Allies. I told Biggie, in no uncertain terms, would he ever have left us to fight a war none of us supported, and that we would all be better together than separate with more material wealth. His life is priceless to us.

At this point, MiniMe looked up at him and said, "Daddy, I'd die for you."

Heart. Shattered. I couldn't speak, I just hugged her. I looked over her head at him with tears in my eyes & told him she had heard Father David during the homily talking about how few of us realise we have people in our lives that would give their lives for ours. I make no attempts to force our religious beliefs on anyone, I am just relaying the concept. But, still. She loves. 

The one thing that I've always said is the most important value for me to teach to my children, she's got it. At 3 years old. I will hold this memory up for those times when she is screaming at me to stop, even when she's a teenager telling me she hates me. 

She Used To Be My Girl

When I was in college I got sick of waitressing & did a stint at a copy store. While working there, I noticed another girl that worked there with dyed black hair, wearing Doc Martens. She was snarky enough that I noticed, & when I overheard her talking about going to see The Cure on a cigarette break, we became friends. Her name is Natalie, she used to be one of my best friends, but she isn't anymore.

When I was still in school she lived in a house right across the street from campus & I lived 20 minutes away, so I would hang out at her house between classes. We'd go through pots of coffee, packs of cigarettes, & watch Buffy The Vampire Slayer instead of studying. I don't know when she stopped taking classes, but she sort of just gave up on graduating, it seemed. After I graduated, she became a manager at the copy shop. She moved on to other retail jobs. She had crappy boyfriends & so did I. But we talked almost everyday & shared a lot of formative experiences through our twenties.

She dug my Artsy-Fartsy genes & we would hold "NBA nights" (No Boys Allowed) where we would make 5 course meals, make frozen girly drinks, do bong tokes, and make crazy things. We would take things to the pawn shop so we'd have enough money to go to the bar. One summer night she had a BBQ at her house & I had helped her get ready all day, but had to work some stupid 6-8pm shift at the copy store. She told me to just leave my sweet dog, my beloved Casey Jones, at her house while I worked. "He'd be fine." Well, when I got back to her house, Casey was missing. After a frantic hour of searching for all seven pounds of him, someone showed up with him. I ended up having to take him to the emergency vet clinic because someone had given him beer. Should have taken it as a sign.

After I graduated we still kept in touch. My first job out of school was for a non-profit, so I was actually making less than I did waiting tables. When I did start making money though, I was excited to be able to buy Natalie some nice Christmas & birthday presents. She had lived in Paris one summer & I was so proud & she so happy when I bought her this 3-foot wire sculpture of the Eiffel Tower from Pottery Barn that I knew she had wanted. I bought her a huge glicee of a Mucha print, had it matted & framed & sent it to her. I liked to do things like that for her. She appreciated it. 

When I met Biggie, Natalie was the first of all my friends to meet him. She was skeptical until she saw his hair. Good hair genes are hard to pass up. Of all of my friends, she was the only one who actually came to visit me when I moved in with him. She & Biggie got along famously. When he decided he was going to propose, it was Natalie whom he consulted with on my ring. When I moved out of my house, she helped me pack a little. I still have a box of my Keith Haring prints & personal photos that she boxed up. On the top she wrote, "Pictures of You (I Miss You)". 

During the planning of our wedding, Natalie was pretty broke. Had she not inherited most of my furniture when we moved to Florida she wouldn't have had much in the way to sit on. I paid for her bridesmaids dress. I didn't care. She did things like take care of me the morning after my bachelorette party when we had to be out our hotel at 11am & I still needed to sleep, but lived 1200 miles away. 

The winter after I had MiniMe, Natalie lost her job, they didn't give her her last paycheck, & she had little hopes of finding a new job. She was going to get evicted. We had just bought our house which had a huge bedroom & bathroom off the garage. I bought Natalie a plane ticket to Florida. Biggie had her come to work with him. She drove our "Home Depot Mobile", a 1995 Cherokee that ran well but needed a paint job. When they came home from the dealership, she would help me, a new mother that worked full time, by cleaning the kitchen after dinner so I could get MiniMe to bed. She also helped me with the mopping, vacuuming from time to time. We charged her no rent & let her drive the car for free. She lived with us from December to August. 

We had told her we needed her to find a place to live because we were putting our house up for sale & trying to move out of state. Things had gradually degenerated at that point to the extent that she didn't really eat dinner with us anymore. I rarely saw her at all. I'm sure it was hard for her pride, living in our house, going to work with Biggie everyday. I had tried to talk to her, but honestly, some things she said did piss me off. She had managed to find the money to fly home for Mother's Day, for example. I didn't try to pry into the situation of her finances, but considering I didn't have the cash to buy plane tickets, I did speak up on that one. We had asked her to water our plants & walk our dogs when we went to North Carolina for a week. We came home to dead tomato plants & dog shit all over the floor. Biggie had bought a used car that a customer had traded in for her to drive pretty quickly after she had moved in. She never had it plated or insured until the week she moved out, & even then, he really had to give her an ultimatum. I was embarrassed. I didn't understand why she was doing this.

After she moved out, we had made plans to meet for lunch. I was going to go pick up some sandwiches for us & meet her up at the dealership. Biggie had moved on to another dealership at this time, so he wasn't working with her anymore. When I called to ask her what kind of sandwich she wanted, they told me she had called in sick that day. When I called her cell phone she didn't answer. She did call me back a few days later, apologizing to my voice mail, calling when she knew I wouldn't answer. I was hurt. I waited a few days & called her back. I got her voice mail. Weeks became months & she still hadn't called. When we were coming upon her birthday in November, I told Biggie I was going to call her. He told me not to. When I asked why, Biggie told me that he didn't think Natalie cared as much about me as I did about her. He told me mean things she had said to him about me. Stories about things I did in college that husbands don't really want to know about their wives. Stories that were elaborated & embellished to be specifically awful. She told him she & her boyfriend use to snicker about my relationship with my dog & how I was just a little too attached to him, insinuating something out of middle school urban legends. It hurt to hear him say these things, but I could hear her voice in my head saying them. I knew it hurt him to hear them. I felt betrayed in a way I never had before. I felt taken advantage of.

I hadn't thought about Natalie for months until we moved & I saw her writing on a box of "Maturnity Clothes". At first I wanted to go find a sharpie & fix the misspelling. Then I was annoyed that her writing was on my box of precious things. Then I wondered where she is now. If she still has the nice gifts that I bought for her, driving the car we bought for her, if she thinks of us at all. I remembered that she is in the home movies from MiniMe's first Christmas, her christening, her first birthday. What will I say to her about this person? Then I thought about how surely one day someone will hurt MiniMe the way this friend hurt me, & there is nothing I can or will be able to do to stop it. I'll have to teach her that it's okay, I've decided. Because in the end, I did what my heart told me to. I helped someone whom I thought was my friend, not out of guilt or for gratitude, but out of love, & there is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of in that.