MY BOGGY BLOG: find your way through the murk

One of My Loves

I know DH doesn't mind at all when I say I'm in love with T. Berry Brazelton-- he's a pediatrician in his 80's who has studied and worked with children for over half a century, and he is one of the gentlest and wisest men I've had the pleasure to meet. I first heard about him in the months before I had my twins-- he had a cable show called "what every baby knows," and his way of dealing with children and parents was so amazingly understanding, kind of like Mr. Rogers, M.D.

Anyway, I got to hear Dr. B on the radio this morning, when he was a phone-guest on FM 107 talking about the case of the 5 year old girl in Floriday who had a fit in school and the police came and hand-cuffed her. Dr. B was adamant that this situation was handled poorly all around, and that the girl's behavior was a cry for help, and that she really neede someone to love her and be with her. I wanted to cry, listening to his voice of acceptance and empathy, wishing I had had a voice like that to be there for me when I was growing up.

I was googling him this morning and came up with this link to an interview with Dr. B. I just love what he says about our country's health care situation. So here's the voice of one of my loves:

http://www.well.com/user/bbear/brazelton.html

Crappy Cars

Our van has been at the body shop for over a week now, getting a bumper fixed and a door scrape. These seemed like pretty minor problems and I'd hoped to have the van back last Friday. I just called the shop and they are still *painting* it, and hope to get it back to me later today.

%$&*)@#!! (I'm just a bit grumpy.)

For the last week, I've been driving around a Nissan Sentra from the rental company, luckily paid for by the accident-causer's insurance company. Unluckily, it is a piece of crap car. Sure, it looks nice with its shiny taupe exterior, and I've had moments of pleasure using the keychain remote and CD player (don't have either one of those in our cars). But otherwise, I find it to be uncomfortable and lacking in quality. It's just a lot of little things, like the car only having speakers in the back and a poor sound system, so the kids in the back seat complain about the music being loud while I'm trying to just hear it in the front seat.

So hopefully just a few more hours left of this car. I appreciate my comfy van so much now. But maybe I will get a CD player in there. The remote control I can do without.

My Baby!

I was helping 10 year old DS out in the shower the other day (just washed his back and made sure he got the shampoo all through his hair) and then I saw it-- fine little hairs sprouting from his arm pits. I couldn't believe it--my baby is growing up! My baby is entering puberty! My baby is not a baby! He even has a pimple on his nose this morning.

My sister L. and I were moaning about our babies growing up just the other day on the phone-- her 2 year old is now saying understandable words, not just babbling inchoherently, and I was telling her that youngest DS still likes to climb on my lap and cuddle (he always was a snuggler), but now his feet hang to the floor. I know my days of these cuddle times are numbered, too. If he's like his older brother, 13, he will get all stiff and awkward when I try to hug him, look like he'd rather be somewhere else. (Though out of the blue, very occasionally, he'll come over and give me his own stiff little hug and melt my heart.)

It's hard watching the kids grow-- exciting to watch the changes that happen, interesting to see how they react to things, but we leave behind the little kid world I lived in for so long. There is sweetness in that world, and also exhaustion and frustration. And the teen world has its own charms and frustrations. Charms: their developing senses of humor, conversations with them on many topics, their ability to do more chores around the house, and being able to go out and not have to get a babysitter. And frustrations-- need I say what these are? Teens are challenging, as much so as toddler.

So I stand here with joy and sadness that my baby is getting older. It's hard to have your job always changing as a mom, and knowing that someday they'll be off living their own lives and I won't be so much a part of it. Sigh. As younger DS said, when I was squealing about his underarm hairs: "Me growing underarm hair is going to be the least of your worries, Mom!"

I'm here!

I've been in a kind of blog-block lately, haven't known what to write. But I'm pushing myself out of it, trying to get back. So bear with me (if you will).

Just a short one for today, since I have a book due TODAY and still plenty of work to do on it. Gulp. It's one of my children's nonfiction books I've been hired to write. It's on the topic of Vietnam, so my brain has been swimming with all the research. I've been learning a lot about Vietnam and yearning for pho, the Vietnamese noodle soup. Have you had this? You must! It's wonderful!

Last week was spring break, and DH took the week off, which was nice. We ended up going to Duluth for 2 nights, stayed at the Radisson with the revolving restaurant, visited the aquarium and the omnimax theatre, hung out by canal park, walked around the Glensheen Mansion grounds (it was closed), ate chocolate from a shop owned by DH's old high school friend, and drove around a lot. Our 10 year old is at the stage where he l-o-v-e-s hotels, and for him, the best part of the trip is the hotel. He loves the room, the cable TV, the movies you can rent, the pool and the pitiful little room of video games. Whenever we would leave the hotel, he would start asking when we could go back to the hotel.

We were home by Friday, and then DH and I were invited by friends (I won't mention names since I'm "not blogging this!" ;-) in Rochester to go out with them and attend a Rochester drag queen show. It was a blast, a fun gender-bending night. I would look at the people-- both men and women-- who would go up to tip the "dancing queen," give a dollar and often get a little peck on the cheek, and I'd wonder-- "are they attracted to the queen? are they tipping just because they like the dancing? think they're talented? who, what, where?" Like I said, gender-bending, but I've never minded gender-bending. It makes for interesting speculations.

And I found out about Drag Kings, too, which somehow I've managed to never hear about before. Women who dress up like men-- and these four black women dressed up like rappers and performed, and I honestly was stunned to think they were not men-- they looked the part so well! And all their moves, too. Wow!

And that's it for now. Must get to work... Vietnam.