Friday, March 23, 2012

There's Ranch in my Pants

One of my favorite read-alouds as a kid was "A Light in the Attic," which I remember being quite hilarious for both my mom and us kids. Thankfully my girls love this and other Shel Silverstein volumes, so we've been plowing through them and cracking up together -- nightly. So here is my tribute to Mr. Silverstein: a fun little creation that was inspired by Eve when she wiggled on the couch and said to me, "I think there's ranch in my pants." Enjoy!

There's ranch in my pants,
and beans in my beard,
And ham slices, for worse or for better,
Are dangling like weeds
grown from sunflower seeds
amongst arugula in my argyle sweater.

There's a billion bacon bits
scratching my arm pits,
I've got olives in my front left pocket.
There's asparagus to spare
filling my underwear
and falling out, unless I can stop it.

And then there's the croutons,
the carrots, the cheese,
which squish all around in my socks.
While I haven't checked there
I think there's eggs in my hair,
and somewhere, my celery stalks.

My belt bursts with spinach.
There! I'm finally finished
with this funny, food-stuffed ballad.
My message complete:
You are what you eat.
And sometimes you have to be salad.



Keep Sake

When my first daughter was born, my closest friend stitched her a quilt. It's baby-sized, crisp and white, with little satin pink roses and tiny buttons. Simple, charming, unique.

I treasure that gift -- the homemade-ness of it, the time it must have taken, the details.

But also because that same year my friend and her family moved away, and now we live in different states, and both of us have lives filled with children and schedules and so very much laundry. We hardly find time to talk.

One day my daughter, now three, placed her long-loved blankie in my lap.

"Fix it?" she asked.

At some point during a boisterous game of "house," some of her quilt's pale pink stitching had come undone. A button was missing. And it appeared that for some time, the seams on the corners had been coming loose.

"I'm sorry," I told her. "Mommy doesn't know how to sew."

And it's true, mostly. I don't know how to sew. I could learn, but it's more than that. Sometimes there are things you're too tired to learn, too old to learn, too young to learn, or too busy for. Sometimes there are places you don't venture into because they are too dangerous, or too difficult, or because you're sure they'll break your heart. Sometimes there are problems too big for fixing.

That day I tucked her baby quilt into a keepsake box in my closet. It can't come completely unstitched if it sits in there. It can't lose anymore buttons. But most importantly, I won't have to look at it and remember the truth: that some things are just not forever.

Monday, March 19, 2012

5 pm

5 pm is my least favorite time of day:

Little tummies grumbling,
soup on the stovetop burning,
husband running late,
my own patience running thin.

The clatter of plates carelessly plopped on the table,
the endless search for the good spoons
(the ones I haven't mangled in the garbage disposal),
the sticky steam from the dishwasher when I yank it open,
continuing the search for said spoons.

And the little tummies, still grumbling,
attached to little mouths which repeat,
"I'm hungry!" at ever-growing decibels.

And sometimes:

the realization that the masterpiece I've poured
the last 2 hours of my life into
is NOT resembling the one I saw on the internet.

I suppose it would have looked fabulous and tasted 5 stars
if I had used all those (sketchy) ingredients,
prepared them exactly as labeled,
actually used an instrument marked "1/8 tsp."
But that is just the price I pay for being an artist,
rather than a scientist, in the kitchen.

And so, when I set those steaming bowls of palak paneer or
eggplant curry or chicken with raisins and quinoa
on the table, there is fear and trembling.

From the children, yes, and certainly from the
picky-palate husband, but even more so
from me.

Will they try it? Will they like it? Will they appreciate my time
and work and artistic innovation? Will they know I substituted
milk for cream cheese? Will they taste white vinegar
when they should have tasted cider vinegar? Will they
think I'm a fraud? Will they love me anyway?

And finally:

Will they choose to just eat their food and shutup and be
thankful that someone cooked it for them, for Pete's sake?

But:

There are those magical moments -- oh how they make my soul
sing -- when daughters eat and eat and eat their fill, and
I can see those formerly grumbling tummies
growing under the table. When husband smiles
and says, "mmm... this is good. You made this?"
When there are leftovers I'll be happy to eat
for days.


Wednesday, March 7, 2012

What to Expect When You're Un-Expecting

I didn't see it coming.

I was seven to nine weeks pregnant, wrapped in a hospital gown and positioned rather awkwardly in the ultrasound room. “Hmm...” was the only word the technician seemed to know. I held my breath while he searched with his wand for a baby I was sure was in there.

“Hmm...” he repeated. I squeezed my husband's hand. Took another deep breath. And tried to accept the fact that something could be wrong.

“I'll be right back with the doctor,” the technician finally said, nervously dashing out of the room.

And then it happened: life spontaneously fell off course.

A few days later, as the doctor had warned, my abdomen started to throb and the bleeding began. I crouched in the bathtub with the shower on, and for hours I watched as the remains of my pregnancy literally went down the drain. The questions were endless. Did I cause this? Should I have taken better care of myself? Am I supposed to bleed this much? Will I ever get pregnant again?

There were also questions I didn't allow myself to ask. I blocked them out of my mind, hoping they would fade with time.

It was years later, after my second daughter was born following a healthy, normal pregnancy, that I came to face those thoughts. I'd imagined them lost somewhere deep inside, buried under all the sleepless nights and mental to-do lists that come with being a new parent. And yet, it was at the most unexpected time, at the most incongruent place, amongst the most unlikely company that I came to truly grieve my miscarriage.

Namely, it was after a trip to the zoo, outside a chain sandwich shop, with a middle-aged friend of my husband's who was visiting from out of town.

The girls were busy tossing sizable portions of their supper to the pigeons when my husband's friend commented that his sons used to do the same thing. We were reminiscing: light-hearted talk that most parents engage in without effort.

And then it happened: our small talk spontaneously fell off course.

“Actually, we almost had three children,” our friend confessed. “But my wife had a miscarriage.” He grew quiet. “And I always sort of wondered: would that have been my girl?” He stared at his hands, his dark brown eyes misting up.

I think it was the honesty, the bare-bones transparency of his question that stung at my own soul. Before I knew it, I was wiping at my own tears and offering up my own, long-ignored confession. “I had a miscarriage too, once. And you know, for some reason I've always wondered if that was my boy.”

Somewhere deep inside me, a shift occurred. It took the gentle disclosure of a man twice my age to help me understand that my miscarriage was not just the loss of a child who would never be. It was the loss of knowing, believing, hoping that everything would go just as I expected it to go. It was the loss of planning, controlling, and manipulating the future. It was the loss of feeling like I had it all figured out.

I’d love to say that today I am a whole person, free of doubts and concerns and worries. I’m not. That’s what loss does to you: it forces you to ask the hard questions, and asks you to go on living without any good answers. But there is something to be said for the holy, whole-making act of confession. Of airing out pain and grief, rather than trying to bury it. Of surrounding oneself with people who have experienced similar pain. It certainly won’t provide answers, but in a wonderful, unexpected way, healing begins when we remember we are not alone.