Resolutions

Hi there blogosphere. Sorry for the prolonged absence. October and November were not a good time for me and I'm afraid the blogging turned into one more thing I was not doing well enough, so I gave up for a while. But amid my resolutions for the New Year 2009 is a promise to blog more often and to not hold myself to such a high standard - think less literature and more cynical bitching and "guess what my kids did today".
For anyone interested, here are all my resolutions so far:

1. I will get on a normal sleep schedule. I have a bad habit of staying up far too late - it is not at all unusual for me to be awake at 2 am, even on weeknights. I'm not doing anything important - piddling on the computer, plucking my eyebrows, reading, folding laundry, watching TV - but somehow I always manage to still be doing it at 1:00, then I have to get ready for the next day and get ready for bed. I also have the very bad habit of getting hungry around 11:30 and eating several hundred calories' worth of complete junk - Coke, chips, chocolate, Cheez-its, you get the picture. I average five hours of sleep a night during the week. For some folks this is enough, but my body really needs seven and eight is better. My thoughtful husband lets me sleep late on weekends to make up - often until lunchtime - but I know this is not beneficial in the long run, as it messes up my internal clock even more and causes me to miss out on weekend activities and church. Also, my husband then expects me to take over kids in the afternoons so he can nap, which is perfectly reasonable, but again prevents many activities and/or excursions. So I am determined to get my sorry ass into bed by 11:30 and turn out the light before midnight, every night, without the late-night calorie dump. That will help immensely with the other resolutions as well as improving my overall well-being and making me less grumpy and less fat, I hope.
2. I will improve my diet. I don't really eat too much food, but I eat way too much junk. I very rarely prepare a meal for myself - lean meat, vegetable, whole grain. My meals tend more toward Sun Chips and Snickers bars - things I can grab out of the pantry and eat right away with no effort and no dishes to wash. I've justified this to myself for years by saying that my overall calorie consumption is not excessive - it's not like I eat a big square meal and then add all this stuff. But I'm forced to confront the fact that I usually feel like crap, I'm ten pounds overweight, and vitamins - even the mega-green kind - are not a substitute for a healthy, balanced diet. So it's time to quite buying and eating packaged junk and start preparing meals - especially at lunchtime. I'm thinking the Healthy Choice and Lean Cuisine meals plus some fresh fruits and veggies are the best plan - I know I won't actually cook anything but I can pop a tray in the microwave . I also need to prepare a healthy dinner for my husband and me instead of getting takeout four nights a week, and I need to have a bowl of cereal instead of a candy bar when I get the hungries.
3. I will take my children to church. This one hit me like a ton of bricks a couple of weeks ago when I realized my four-year-old daughter did not know the words to "Away in a Manger". Since I left home to go to college I have not regularly attended church. I believe in God, our loving Father and omnipotent Creator. I believe in Jesus the Savior, the living Son of God who became a man, died to redeem our sins, and reigns in Heaven, and I have taught these things to my children. We've never attended church with any regularity, though, and since we moved to Katy two years ago we've visited several churches but haven't really found one we liked. Being brutally honest, much of the problem is that church happens on Sunday mornings, a time that I like to spend sleeping and my husband likes to spend tackling his to-do list. Also, the husband and I have divergent views of an ideal church - I like a choir, an organ, and a liturgy, and he likes a casual-dress rock concert. We've attended both kinds here in Katy but not really liked any of them. At any rate - it's time to quit making excuses and get my children some kind of religious instruction on a regular basis, so I'm going to pick a church and attend at least twice a month.
4. I will quit being late all the time. Habitual lateness is a terrible habit that has plagued me since childhood. I end up being barely on time or late almost everywhere I go. Despite careful plans and good intentions, I end up rushing and still not making it on time. I've figured out my problem (besides oversleeping because I stayed up too late): I always plan to be on time, and therefore any delay or snag pushes me into lateness. You'd think by now I'd have figured out that delays and snags are part of life, especially with kids. So here's my plan: I'm going to follow my husband's example and plan on being early. If I build in an extra ten or fifteen minutes I can actually arrive on time. I also will abandon the delusion that I can go from wet hair and no makeup to ready in twenty minutes.
5. I will blog! I'm not giving myself a schedule, but I am going to quit requiring cleverness or weighty subject matter before I'll post anything. Because that did not work out so well.

I'm hoping that making these resolutions a matter of public record will make their implementation more likely and more permanent. So here's hoping 2009 is a better year for everyone than 2008 and that I do better in it.

VP Debate - quick impressions

Here's a quick run-through of my impressions of the Vice-Presidential debate:

• Biden has slogged it out in the Senate for 30 years and come to terms with the fact he'll never be President, so he's running for VP with a man he really doesn't like or respect very much.
• Sarah Palin can somehow be clever and charming yet completely incoherent. She just throws out all the words she can think of and hopes they stick.
• Main theme: Biden - "The Bush administration has been a train wreck and you're no different."
• Main theme: Palin - "I don't know anything about that, let's talk about energy".
• They both bashed the Bush administration, oil companies, and Wall Street.
• They both blamed mortgage lenders for the subprime mortgage crisis. Yeah, we hold guns to people's heads - because we're greedy and corrupt- to get them to buy houses, then we pay mobsters to package mortgage securities. Then we orchestrate a crash in home prices. The Illuminati are in on it too.
• Neither of them actually answered any of the questions posed by the moderator.
• Palin got off some real zingers, which went over well. Had Biden shot back he'd have been a sexist jerk. I could tell he was biting his tongue a lot of the time because he knew he'd look bad if he got at all aggressive or patronizing.
• Biden is smart but not likable, Palin is likable but not smart.
• Major props to whoever prepared their crib notes - they had misleading vote counts and meaningless statistics coming out the wazoo.
• Good job keeping it civil and professional but not smarmy.
• Why is it than in a political debate - about the differences between candidates - most of the talking was about how they believe in and support all the same things?
• They both seemed okay with sending troops to Darfur, a colossally stupid idea. Yes, the situation is desperately sad but there is no external solution. Those people won't stop fighting just because we ask them to. Kinda like Iraq.
• Sarah Palin pronounces nuclear "noo-cue-lur". See, it's not a Texan thing.
• They both love Israel, education, their middle-class backgrounds, and clean coal.
• They both could use a little Botox and/or Restylane. Biden's tie was badly knotted and Palin's skirt was too tight.
• They both oppose gay marriage but support protection of the rights of same-sex couples. Come again?

Sarah Palin tried to establish herself as an able executive because she was mayor of Wasilla. It came off badly - like claiming to be an expert entrepeneur because you had a lemonade stand in third grade. Biden was pretty dry and wooden - I think he's very capable and smart but just has no charisma. He only really came alive when he was bashing Dick Cheney.

My biggest surprise was when Biden teared up talking about his son. For those who don't know, he lost his wife and little girl in a car wreck in which one of his sons was very badly injured right after his first election to the Senate, almost 30 years ago. He was talking about not knowing whether or not your child would make it- in the most literal sense, for him. This guy has a reputation as a hard-nosed brawler and it was very uncharacteristic but actually nice to see - he's not made of iron.

Both of these candidates are good foils for their Presidential candidates - Biden's institutional gravitas to Obama's rock-star charisma, Palin's likability and folksiness to McCain's bad-tempered detachment.

It was a good debate in that it gave us a chance to get to know these candidates and learn about their ticket's stance on some issues. I don't think they changed anybody's mind though.

One last thing - how much better would this debate have been if it had been Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton? That would have been the best debate in the history of politics. Two pushy women who despise one another slogging it out, pulling no punches. Hillary would have wiped the floor with sweet, pretty Sarah but still come out the loser. But man it would have been fun to watch.

Question of the day

So now that it's become painfully apparent that Sarah Palin is a complete moron, what is the GOP going to do?

Survey says...

I saw this series of questions on my friend Lindsay's blog. Here are my answers.
Because everyone wants to know all about me.

1. What time did you get up this morning? 6:47. Almost on time.

2. Diamonds or pearls? Pearls for day, diamonds for evening. Sapphires anytime.

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Star Wars – the Clone Wars. For the 2nd time. Gotta love little boys.

4. What is your favorite TV show? Friday Night Lights and The Closer. I do not like reality shows.

5. What do you usually have for breakfast? Nature Valley oats & honey granola bar and Diet Sunkist

6. What is your middle name? Catherine – 4th generation Catherine in my father’s family. And they’re all bitches.

7. What food do you dislike? Indian. Curry makes me ill.

8. What is your favorite CD at the moment? Disney’s Greatest Hits. Buys me peace in the car.

9. What kind of car do you drive? Dodge Grand Caravan minivan. I always swore I’d never drive a minivan… now I wouldn’t drive anything else. It’s just so easy.

10. Favorite sandwich? Potbelly Sandwich Works roast beef & cheese

11. What characteristic do you despise? Taking oneself too seriously. And bragging.

12. Favorite item of clothing? jeans

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Greek islands

14. Are you an organized person? No I am a complete mess

15. Where would you retire to? Lake Travis. Or the Greek islands

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday? 29th. Had a stomach virus. Lost 8 pounds in 12 hours.

17. What are you going to do when you finish this? Make my daughter take a nap

18. When is your birthday? July 13th

19. Morning person or a night person? Night

20. What is your shoe size? 7.5 - 8

21. Pets? Yes – black Lab named Lucy

22. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with us? The cafeteria and library need more volunteers and my husband is buying a Jeep. Again.

23. What did you want to be when you were little? A Lawyer

24. How are you today? Dragging – long week. And my abs are sore, but that’s good.

25. What is your favorite flower? tulips

26. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? Election day – can’t wait to see what happens

27. What are you listening to right now? Lucy’s collar jingling

28. What was the last thing you ate? Mini Snickers

29. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? Cerulean

30. How is the weather right now? Gorgeous. I think God’s apologizing for the hurricane.

31. Last person you spoke to on the phone? My husband

32. Favorite soft drink? Cherry Coke

33. Favorite restaurant? Fleming’s in The Woodlands, Clear Springs in Nacogdoches

34. Hair color? Today? Golden Cappucino. For real? Gray & brown

35. What was your favorite toy as a child? Barbies

36. Summer or Winter? Winter – more forgiving clothes & don’t have to shave

37. Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate.

38. Coffee or tea? Both. But not at the same time.

39. When was the last time you cried? Watching Army Wives Sunday evening.

40. What is under your bed? Rubbermaid box w/ sheets & blankets

41. What did you do last night? Watched the season premiere of Grey’s Anatomy. The Army medic guy was smokin’.

42. What are you afraid of? Carjackers & armed robbers & child molesters. And snakes.

43. How many keys on your key ring? 3 – house, car, mailbox. And about 12 member tags – Kroger, Randalls, Sephora, PetSmart, etc.

44. How many years at your current job? 6yrs 2 months as a mom

45. Favorite day of the week? Saturday – sleep late and eat a lot

Palin Part Two

Follow-up: Sarah Palin really knocked it out of the park with her speech at the RNC Wednesday evening. Even the opposition conceded that she came of very well. I liked her joke about the difference between a pit bull and a hockey mom: lipstick. I did not watch the entire speech but have seen some excerpts. She looked great and came off as smart, funny, and tough. The speech was a little mean-spirited at times, but that's kind of the role of the VP candidate - to be the "attack dog" so the presidential candidate can look noble and dignified. But - there's a big difference between giving a speech at the party convention, where one can "get a standing ovation if he got up there and burped the alphabet" (to quote my husband)", and managing the campaign trail, with its minefields of hostile reporters and tough questions. There's so much opportunity to mess up - I think her lack of experience could hurt her there. And I still don't like her willingness to exploit her kids for her image. "I can't wait to send my son off to Iraq to get shot at! Look at my mentally handicapped baby! And here's my husband what's-his-name!"
But my favorite moment was little Piper Palin, who looks about eight, "grooming" her baby brother by licking her hand and smoothing it across his head.

The media has been surprisingly gentle to Bristol and her boyfriend, and I am very pleased by Obama's refusal to capitalize on the situation. He made an offhand comment that his mother had him when she was 18 and he turned out okay.
I have noticed that Barack Obama seems to be a really decent guy. He has consistently refused to sling mud or say nasty things to or about people. When the Reverend Wright thing (nutty preacher claiming the US government created AIDS to "keep down" black people and other absurd things) broke, he said that this guy had been his pastor for many years, had married him and his wife and baptized his children, and he wasn't going to throw him under the bus. Then, unfortunately, the Reverend used his media attention to say a bunch more nutty things and Obama had to cut ties.
I'm really torn about Obama - I don't agree with a lot of his views and I don't trust his background as a "community organizer" and lack of experience in either a "real world" profession or the political arena. I think he's a lot more liberal than he's presented himself to be in this campaign. But I like the guy and I think he's someone around whom America - and the rest of the world - could really come together.
So we'll just see what happens next.

He should have called Elizabeth Dole...

So John McCain has chosen for a running mate one Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska. Here's my theory on how that conversation went:
Senator McCain: "Wow, all those Democrat ladies sure are mad that Hillary's not on the ticket. "
Campaign Guy: "Yep. They wanted to cast a vote for a woman"
SM " (light bulb over his head) SAY! We should put a woman on our ticket!"
CG: "That's a great idea sir! Like who?"
SM: "I dunno - a Republican. Maybe a Senator?"
CG: "Yeah, like Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas?"
SM: "No, she's real smart. You know how I feel about smart women. Pick another one"
CG: "Actually, all the women senators know what a jerk you are, sir. They won't want to sign up"
SM: "Oh yeah... maybe a governor?"
CG: "Are there any lady Republican governors? I'll look it up... here we are! Alaska!"
SM: "Alaska! She won't know me at all! I don't even know her name! Let's call her up."

And so after 36 hours of frantic and obviously incomplete vetting, we have a Republican Vice-Presidential candidate. I had never heard of Sarah Palin before this week and I don't know much about her now. Here's what I've learned so far - all of this from other sources than the lady herself.
- She has been governor of Alaska for two years. Before that she was the mayor of a fairly small town (in all fairness, it's big for Alaska ) of about 6000 people.
- She refers to herself as a "hockey mom" and enjoys the outdoors, hunting, fishing, and that sort of stuff.
- She has five children, the youngest a boy of less than one year - I think he was born in April. So we know she can multi-task.
- Her husband works for an oil company on Alaska's North Shore and is away from home for very long stretches of time. Again with the multi-tasking.
- She understands oil and oil companies. Alaska produces more oil than any state other than The Great State of Texas and exports much of it across the Pacific to Russia, China and Japan.
- She is under investigation by her state's legislature for illegal actions relating to a supposed "private vendetta" against her brother-in-law, a former law enforcement officer (I think Sheriff but don't know for sure). No idea on the details about this - it may be fact-based and it may be political flailing.
- She is a former beauty pageant contestant and news anchor.
- She is extremely conservative socially - pro-life, anti-stem cell research, pro-marriage amendment, etc. etc.
So all of this sounds okay, right? The choice of a woman for VP is pretty clever - there are enough angry bitches out there who will vote for a woman even if her political ideas are diametrically opposed to those of the typical angry-bitch mindset. And she actually sounds like a great story - a mom of five from Nowhere, Alaska ending up as the Vice President (and considering McCain's age and state of health, quite possibly as commander-in-chief someday). Haven't we all been saying for years, "Send a Mom to the White House! She'll have everything fixed in two months". I was kind of excited about it myself, and eager to learn more about this woman.

But yesterday a story broke about Bristol Palin, her 17-year-old daughter, who is five months pregnant. I feel awful for this girl, whose private business is now front-page news, especially as I watch her being paraded in front of the camera along with her boyfriend, who wears the dazed expression of a kid who realizes that he prefers the frying pan to the fire after all.
First of all, I have to assume that there is no way that McCain knew about this or he would never have chosen Palin, which really makes me wonder about why and how that decision was made. Was she really the only woman they could think of?
But what I really don't get is Sarah Palin agreeing to be on the ticket, considering her daughter. There are two possible explanations: First - she didn't know her daughter was pregnant, even though she's a skinny teenager in her second trimester. I'm just not sure how that could be if Palin was making any effort at all to pay attention to her daughter. I'm not saying it's not possible but it sure doesn't reflect well on her. But it's certainly preferable to the second possibility: that she knew her daughter was pregnant and decided to go ahead and run, fully aware of the kind of horrible, vituperative things that would be said about her little girl. "Sure, I'll toss my daughter to the wolves, allow her to be branded a slut, make this difficult situation she's in fuel for every talking head on TV, and claim her out-of wedlock teen pregnancy really reflects my "family values" because she didn't have an abortion. I'm willing to put my child through hell for the sake of my political ambitions." I just can't get my brain around that one.

Oh, there she is on TV now, wagging her kids at the camera. I wonder if she will still be on the ticket in two weeks. For her daughter's sake, I hope not.

Politics and Religion. Can't talk about them at parties...

So there's an election coming up. Now, I have a political science degree and consider myself knowledgeable about such things as why we have an electoral college (basically, to keep certain votes from counting as much as others) and the two-part Democratic primary in Texas (Democrats in Texas had no opposition for about a hundred years and got real bored) and whether or not it's racist to expect people to have a photo ID and be able to read in order to vote (answer depends on whether or not you can read and/or have a photo ID).
So as sort of an expert I can comfortably say that there's not much new under the sun when it comes to presidential politics. Generally, carefully groomed and scripted candidates slog it out in the primaries and the guy with the best hair and the richest wife wins, then it's on to the national elections in which the one who can scare voters the most comes away with the victory.
But this election is pretty interesting. Of course much of it is politics as usual - candidates trying to reassure centrists and moderates that they are not wild-eyed radicals, while at the same time assuring their party base (whether that's the Religious Right Against Curing Disease or Gays and Lesbians Against Drilling in ANWR) that they are just wild-eyed and radical enough. The exception here is that the two candidates are guys that I .. actually... like.
I think John McCain is an American hero. Even though he's using it as a shield-all against character questions now, the guy spent five years as a POW in Viet Nam. He was abused and tortured. And he had a chance to get out (his father was an Admiral) and didn't because he wouldn't abandon his comrades. Yeah the guy went nuts when he got home, ran around on his wife, and married a young rich woman. And he has that thing on his neck I can't stop staring at. But the guy has a pair of brass cojones that you have to respect. He knows what's important, he knows what war is about, and he's actually pretty funny - watch him on Letterman, he's on like every week. On the downside, I think he's pigheaded, hot-tempered, and perfectly comfortable with the "Lone Ranger" foreign policy decisions that have been so disastrous for the current administration.
Barack Obama I don't know so well. There's no denying he's handsome, smart, and tremendously charismatic. How else could a one-term senator from Illinois end up as a presidential candidate? I've liked what I've seen and read in interviews - I think he could truly be called a "Man of the World" in that he has lived all over the world, is bi-racial, and understands the cultures and perspectives of many different races and religions. He understands that we will never - NEVER - get the Sunnis and Shiites in Iraq to hold hands and sing Kum Ba Ya and it's stupid to try. He seems to have common sense - a quality that it is impossible to rate too highly - and a willingness to learn and listen. I think the reason that he's the first viable candidate of color is that he's not just a "candidate of color", like Jesse Jackson, for whom everything begins and ends with White People Should Apologize and Give Us Money. He's truly a man for the 21st Century, in which lines of race and color have become so blurred that most intelligent people give them little to no consideration at all. Now for the downside - an almost laughable lack of knowledge or experience of national, much less international, politics.
And - my uncomfortable suspicion that his charisma and likability are about all there is. It's easy to trumpet for change but much harder to make it happen, and he has yet to really enumerate how all this glamorous reform is going to happen.
I am not willing to make an endorsement in this election (sorry, all of y'all who are just waiting for me to tell you what to do). My personal political views are Libertarian - I think the government should stay the hell out of things that are not its business and that people should be able to live their lives as they want as long as they are not hurting anybody, and that people who work hard to earn a living should not have to give part of their incomes to support people who choose not to. I think it is the responsibility of the government to protect citizens from each other, but not from themselves. So to my mind, McCain is way too conservative socially - anti-choice, anti-stem cell research, anti-telling teenagers that condoms will keep them from getting pregnant. And Obama is way too liberal fiscally - every time he opens his mouth I can hear my taxes go up, to finance more help for people who refuse to help themselves. But the truth is that the President does not have all that much influence on government policy - that has a lot more to do with who's the majority in Congress - but there are a few things the president affects directly - military actions and Supreme Court justices.
I have voted a straight Republican ticket in every state and national election since 1996, but this year I am probably going to vote for Obama because of two important issues. One - Iraq. We never should have gone in and we should get out. It turns out that Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator because that was the only way to maintain order in that backwards hellhole, and nobody can drag them out of the Dark Ages before they're ready to go. So unless we're going to carpet bomb the whole miserable country and then take their oil, we should just get out before one more American son dies for no damned reason at all. Two - the Religious Right. We could be looking at as many as four new Supreme Court justices in the next eight years, and I do not want anachronistic fundamentalist judges taking away what's left of our Constitutional freedom of religion - or from religion, in our case. In a perfect world abortion would never happen but in this world it's a sad necessity, especially for rape and incest victims and certain medical cases. It is an absurdity and a crime that in the year 2008 public schools' only approved sex education curriculum is "keep your pants on". And the very idea that public schools have to remind 12th-grade AP Biology students that "evolution is just a theory". The stranglehold that people like James Dobson and Pat Buchanan have on American public policy is absolutely ludicrous, and it's only getting worse and more dangerous. As the world gets smaller and more connected, religious tolerance is more necessary and we must all take our blinders off and realize that being an American means understanding that you can't legislate truth or morality.
So... there's my two cents. I have a lot more to say about religion, prejudice, and why sensible people are so eager to be misled, but it's after midnight and I have to get up early. More soon on vice-presidential selections and whether McCain's desperate bid for "Female-Americans" will work or not.

You had me at six-pack

I just read a hysterically funny blog called "June Cleaver After A Six-Pack". It's as funny as the name implied. Go check it out.

Apparently I'm a Nog

My dear friend Ariana is in Norway for a year. First off, I miss her terribly and it really sucks that she's gone, especially since her daughter and mine are best buddies and Bailey misses her friend terribly too.
But - silver linings - I am learning about my heritage. I am half Norwegian, from my father. And while the country is beautiful, apparently its people are not so lovely. "Nogs" (a slang term for Norwegians, and I suspect a pejorative one) are reportedly as a whole dour, unfriendly, slightly xenophobic, averse to fun, suspicious of joy, and rather lazy - knocking off work at four every afternoon and taking the entire month of July off.

According to my source, for a Norwegian I am cheerful, accepting and optimistic. (Break while all who know me pee on themselves from laughing so hard). See? My bad attitude is not my fault. It's cultural. Don't discriminate, y'all.

One more thing - all my life I have thought my father was a grouchy, mean-spirited, arrogant, judgemental, pessimistic, Puritanical horse's ass. Turns out he's just Norwegian.

Warrior Princess

We call my daughter Bailey the Warrior Princess. She is the most incredible combination of frilly girly-girl and total badass. She loves dress-up, ballet, singing and dancing to princess movies, tiaras and high heels, lip gloss and nail polish. She dreams about her "marrying day" when she will be the center of attention in a beautiful gown and ride off into the sunset with her handsome prince.

(The fact that after your marrying day you actually have to live with said handsome prince and try to get along is something that slaps all us princesses in the face sooner or later).

But the pink lace covers a will of steel, and an incredible physical strength. And a remarkable ability to get her own way.

Bailey is the most sunny, sweet-natured child I have ever seen. She greets every day with a smile, and every person with a hug and kiss and kind compliment (Oh your hair is so lovely! I like your beautiful shoes! You're so sweet!). I have absolutely no notion of where that came from - I am a grouchy misanthrope, especially in the morning. She is on a constant quest for flowers so she can bring one to me and present it with an exchange of kisses. Everyone loves Bailey, because she loves everyone. She has the most joyous, generous heart.

But my God what a challenge. Everything is a struggle with Bailey - getting her hair washed, her clothes on, her food eaten. She is a climber, a wanderer, a questioner. I swear she is talking and asking questions every single minute she is awake. In restaurants she shouts, wiggles, and refuses to eat. In the grocery store she touches everything and usually knocks it off the shelf. She's a spiller, a destroyer - ruins every new white T-shirt the first time she wears it, loses or breaks her toys as soon as the package is opened, squirts her juice box all over the inside of the car. She questions every statement and looks at instructions as an invitation to negotiate. And Oh the drama. When she is thwarted it's an immense tragedy. When she's been too long without attention she manufactures an injury. And she can't stand for there to be conversation around her that's not about her - she will totally invent a story so she claim a place in the discussion - become the star of the show, as it were. I find myself losing my temper and speaking harshly to her way more often than I would like, especially since she really does have a true desire to be good.

Everyone says that Bailey is just like me. Appearance-wise, that's certainly true - she's mini-me, and it gets more obvious the older she gets. But personality... I disagree. We share some traits - stubbornness and a quick temper come immediately to mind. But she is so much her own person. And I enjoy her so much - except when she's driving me crazy.

Oh, Cooper

Oh, Cooper. I sent you off to your first day of Kindergarten on Monday. You took to it like a champ, as I thought you would. You've been in school for several years now and you were excited and not at all scared. Meet the Teacher night was last Thursday and we met Miss Tharnish, a kind and lovely girl who graduated from Texas A&M three months ago and is determined to excel at teaching. The school is brand new, beautifully appointed, with a principal who is, by all accounts, the best in the business. You love riding the bus home and eating your lunch in the cafeteria. You climb out of the car in the morning and find your classroom without help.

My dear son. When I look at you with your cool new Power Rangers backpack - with attached lunchbox! - and your new shoes and your gap-toothed smile, marching bravely off into not needing me anymore, you look so big to me and yet so very little. I carried you under my heart and fed you from my own body and cherished and loved you more than I every knew it was possible. I am so proud of you, my little man, so strong and independent and determined. But it tears at my heart that you don't really fit in my lap anymore. It's the fundamental contradiction of parenting and it will only get worse - we want them to be their own persons, to manage on their own, to be all right without us. But oh how hard it is to let go. I must learn to live with wanting to follow and keep watch, because I've come to understand that feeling will never go away.

Someday my son will be taller than me. He will get in his car and drive away and not look back. He will make all his own decisions and order his own life. Someday he will have a wife, a woman he loves more than he loves me, and I will be a place to visit instead of home. But then he will smile and I will see in his face the moment he was born, when he was so completely mine, my whole world swaddled in a blanket, his tiny hand wrapped around my finger.

Sort of his first day of school

My son Cooper is starting kindergarten in less than two weeks. It's a big day, right? He seems kind of underwhelmed. He gets that it's a new school (as it happens, it's a brand-new school building) with a different group of kids, and that he'll be staying all day, but he's not worked up about it at all. I'm glad that he's not scared or anxious but I regret that he's not more excited.
Maybe that has to do with the fact that he's been going to some sort of school since before he turned two. He doesn't ever remember not being in school and he doesn't like vacations. He likes the routine and seeing his friends and having his brain stimulated.
My first day of kindergarten was my first day of school EVER. I had no idea how to manage myself away from my mom and brother. The whole "sharing, listening, taking turns" thing was definitely not a skill I had cultivated previously and it was rather a rocky time for me.
So is it better for Cooper to not be scared even though he's losing a little of the excitement? I think so.

I'm a Slacker

Yes I am still alive. July has been a crazy month and I've been lacking the time to write good posts instead of churning out inanity. I promise to get my shit together next week when the children are back in school and post something witty and profound.

It's the Hormones

Conversation with my husband:

Chris - Why do you have to go to the doctor?
Rebecca - They want to do a blood test to check my hormone levels - they were out of whack. That's why I went back on the Pill, to regulate the levels.
C - What was wrong?
R - I had too much testosterone.
C - I guess the testosterone's a bad thing for women.
R - Yeah, it makes us stupid. We can't listen or follow directions or finish anything we start.
C - Oh, okay... Hey!

How I got from there to here

As a teenager and young woman, I did not like kids. I babysat occasionally and hated it. Children were loud, disorderly, demanding, messy, rude and unreasonable. I never dreamed of having babies, never saw myself as a mother. My plan was to get my law degree and make a nice living doing other people's dirty work while living a glamorous metropolitan life. My mother stayed home and so did most all the mothers I knew, and they never seemed to want or need anything else. I thought it was a terrible, unnecessary sacrifice. I was determined to break the mold, to be my own woman and to get what I wanted and never let my own desires take a backseat to anyone else's.

I don't know exactly what happened. I met my future husband and discovered that I wanted to be with him more than I wanted to have my own way all the time. By the time I got my Bachelor's degree I was sick of school and wanted to get out in the world. Then I went to work - standard entry-level secretarial stuff, what else can you do with a political science degree? - and discovered that it was neither glamorous nor fun but an ego-crushing, unsatisfying means to an end. When I married I knew that my husband wanted to have children and I discovered that I was not as opposed to the idea as I had been, but I was aware of my nature and I really feared that I would not be a good mother. I still did not like kids and did not like the idea of abandoning my education and potential in order to be "just a housewife" as my mother had done.

I went off the Pill in March of 2001, thinking "we'll just see what happens" and got pregnant right away. I was excited but scared. Then I had a miscarriage, then another, both so early on it did not really seem like a loss. The doctor told me to wait a few months and try again. But I wasn't sure it was what I wanted to do - it seemed God knew better than I did and was trying to tell me something.

A woman at my work had a baby, loved and wanted and prayed for, and came back to work six weeks later. She was a complete mess - cried all day, felt horribly guilty and bereft, pumped breastmilk in a hastily converted broom closet, couldn't concentrate. I watched her and realized that women are not engineered to leave our infants for hours at a time. That is not a judgement - for many it is an absolute necessity, either for financial reasons or sanity's sake, and we all just do our best. But it was so incredibly difficult for her. I knew then that if and when my baby came I would be staying home, and it was best to not do it at all if I couldn't freely commit to that.

In November I learned that I was pregnant again. From six weeks on I was so violently ill that there was no doubt the baby was healthy. In another instance of God telling me something, I got fired. It was, in retrospect, deserved - the bad mood and habitual tardiness engendered by my morning sickness were the icing on the cake of a very poor relationship with my arrogant, pompous, egomaniacal boss. (Side note: calling your boss an asshole at the office is not a good idea even if he is not actually in the room.) Even though my morning sickness improved at fourteen weeks, it seemed silly to go to the time and trouble to find a job I would leave after five months. Besides, I was starting to show and figured no one would hire a pregnant lady and I would have to spend all my income on maternity work clothes anyway. I was and still am quite the master at rationalization. So I stayed home, watching TV, napping, eating, shopping. I put together a beautiful nursery, got a very ugly haircut, and admired my skin, clear and glowing for the first time since I was 11 years old. I went to the doctor, took walks with my husband, and read What To Expect When You're Expecting. Then I threw it away, ate some chocolate, drank some Coke, and read Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy and Childbirth. We took a mini-vacation to Galveston and got rained out. We chose a name, got lots of presents, and thought we knew what we were getting into.

Nothing on earth can prepare you for the moment you first see your child's face. I couldn't believe that life was going on around me as usual because everything was so profoundly and permanently changed. All my fears flew out the window - I had never known such joy, such contentment. My parents were transcendent with happiness - their first grandchild. I felt great - the OxyContin probably helped. Cooper took to nursing right away with no problems. We took him home on a wave of joy and promise. I could no more have left him and gone back to work than I could have flown to the moon.

Compared to most, I had a pretty easy time when Cooper was a baby. Of course I was tired - he was not a good sleeper - and there were days I did nothing but nurse, change diapers, do laundry, and cry for how badly I wanted to take a shower and sleep for six hours in a row. But I never felt like I couldn't do it, and we had a lot of fun once he got past "the larval stage" as my husband so poetically describes birth to three months: "you know, they're still all red and wrinkly - they look like angry little old men". We visited Nanny and Grandpa a lot, had a wonderful Christmas, bought a new house and moved to The Woodlands, and settled into a nice group of friends who also had babies or were expecting them. I was absolutely infatuated with Cooper - I had never known such love, such fulfillment. I was a good mother - Cooper was happy and healthy, everything went just as it was supposed to. We even talked about having another baby and agreed that once Cooper was 18 months or so we might start trying - he wasn't even weaned yet. I had just gotten back into my old jeans.

July 13th, 2003 was my 27th birthday. Cooper was three weeks shy of a year old and I was planning his first birthday party. He was crawling, trying to walk, pulling up and getting into everything and keeping me running all the time. I had noticed that my milk supply seemed low - I just wasn't "filling up" (nursing mothers understand and everyone else shouldn't think about it). I called the OB's office and the nurse asked "Could you be pregnant?"

Surely not. I had only had one period since Cooper's birth and it had been a couple of months ago and we had only had sex one time in the past two months and Oh Shit You Have Got To Be Kidding Me. I still had a pregnancy test left over from two years before - it was expired but that little plus sign popped up right away. And so did the next one, and the next.

We told everyone at Cooper's party. They all smiled and said congratulations and I politely thanked them and made little jokes about surprises and plans. At least that's what the video shows - I honestly do not remember it. I was quietly going to pieces, thinking about being pregnant and having a toddler, then about having an infant and a toddler. I didn't have the luxury of ignorance - I knew that the baby would keep me up all night and then Cooper would wake up at 7:30 ready to party. I knew how huge and exhausted I would be, nine months pregnant, only I would be caring for an active 18-month-old, lugging him up and down the stairs and chasing him around.

This sounds weird but I ignored the pregnancy for the first trimester. I wasn't sick, in contrast to the constant queasiness I'd had the first time. I just tried not to think about it. I was getting used to the idea. We did the ultrasound at 20 weeks and learned it was a girl. This freaked me out more. I had such a weird, backwards relationship with my own mother that I feared I wouldn't be able to relate to or nurture a girl, and surely I could never love anyone else as much as I loved Cooper. I was going through the motions, living underwater it seemed, along for the ride. I started to show, made plans, but still felt this horrible heavy sucking nameless dread. I felt wrenching guilt for my lack of joy or even expectation. I only prayed I would get through it somehow.

It was my OB's nurse - a wonderful woman named Pam, I owe her a great deal - who named the elephant and told me in no uncertain terms that I was suffering from depression and needed help. She bullied my doctor - a no-nonsense, suck-it-up type - into putting me on antidepressants. I think she may have saved my life.

The transformation was not immediate, nor were the drugs a complete fix, but it was like a door opened and I could feel the sun on my face again. Looking back, I was in a truly terrible place and I hope to never go back. The doctor blamed it on the haywire hormones resulting from going straight from breastfeeding to carrying a girl baby. Whatever it was, I just thank God my memories of that time are so spotty - I don't remember that Thanksgiving or Christmas except for a few snapshot-like images in my mind.

Bailey's birth was an adventure - it's a story for another post as this one is so long already. She was from the start a sunny, placid baby - slept and nursed on a schedule right from the start, smiled and cooed, hardly ever fussed. I was still taking the Wellbutrin so I guess she was getting some too - we would laugh and say "it must be the drugs!" Being a "veteran" made infancy much easier - I knew what to expect, didn't freak out over everything. I let her "cry it out" much sooner, didn't hold her every minute, didn't time each boob when I nursed her, and never kept a written record of the times and characteristics of her poops. Having two such small children at the same time was hard but we managed. I let others help me and I learned to let go of things that did not matter. When she was six weeks old I started working out and lost thirty pounds in five months and suddenly felt good about myself - a sensation I had lost to the depression.

While Bailey was a baby I would sometimes think of how I used to feel about children vs. career and how funny it was that the girl I used to be turned into a stay-at-home mom of two children under two. Sometimes I felt loss and even grief - I barely recognized myself anymore. Sometimes I felt satisfaction that I had grown up and figured out what was really important. Giving up myself - that's what you do when you stay home with children, you stop being your own person and turn your life over to others - was a decision I made, not an accident or a coincidence. I didn't love it all the time - I still don't - but it is what I chose.

I have made a deal with myself. When Cooper and Bailey are both in elementary school, I will try again to have a life of my own. They won't stop needing me but they will certainly demand less time and attention - they're already so much easier than they were three years or even six months ago. What I really want to do is get a nursing degree and become an RN. I think that's my true vocation and I just didn't discover it until later in life. In the meantime, I'm continuing to let my own life go, rather than struggling to manage too much and feeling resentful or bitter when I can't make it work. I'm at peace with that decision precisely because it is that: my decision.

I often wonder how it would have turned out if I had followed the path I chose at 18 - a high-powered career, the corner office, the brass ring. I think of that girl I used to be and I miss her confidence, her certainty that she could do and be and have anything she wanted, that she would make her dreams come true. But I am not even a little sorry that my life turned out differently, because what I have is more precious than I ever imagined anything could be.

Explaining some things

I'm calling my blog These Are Days in testament to something I have noticed about being a housemommy.

Sidebar: I use housemommy instead of stay-at-home-mom because it's not so difficult to type and it's much more melodious.

As a housemommy with small children, life is a series of days. Some days are better than others. Some are really great, and some are really not. But there is a sameness and monotony to it. For the most part, every day you do the same things - feed the kids, wash the dishes, do the laundry, straighten the house, and on and on... Your plans are made, and changed, day-to-day, depending on the health and attitude of your children. You get through a day, then you get through another one.

In the working world there are usually projects and processes that happen over a course of weeks or months and then are finished. You work on something until it is finished and then put it away. Projects are completed, presentations made, goals met. Of course there are daily tasks and responsibilities, but there is a sense of accomplishment from completing something that is the culmination of many days' or weeks' worth of effort.

As a housemommy, nothing is ever really finished - all your tasks are ongoing. They were done yesterday and will have to be done tomorrow. However hard you roll that rock up that hill, it will be at the bottom again in the morning. There's a lot of frustration in that. You can't ever point to anything and say, "I did that. Now it's finished." The things that you do are not worthless or unnecessary, but neither are they big achievements. They're never really finished at all. I think that absence of accomplishment is what leads a lot of housemommies to that sense of a lost identity.

I am not unhappy or bitter about not working - I think it's what's best for our family, and I'm lucky that we can afford it (thanks honey!). But I do find that I am living life day-to-day, with little thought beyond that days' tasks and schedule. I no longer wonder about or plan for the future, with an eye on where my learning and accomplishments can take me and a plan for progress and/or advancement. There's a relief in that, but there's also a loss of hope and possibility.

On the other hand, there is opportunity for much joy. I get to watch my kids play and learn and grow every day. I have been there for everything: every first, every achievement, every skinned knee, every bad dream. Even on the long hard days, my husband and children know that they are my first priority, the top of my agenda. I don't struggle with guilt or feel stretched beyond breaking. I'm able to be spontaneous - to take ten extra minutes to watch the rain with my son, because there's nowhere else I have to be.

My kids are already so big. These endless, monotonous days have flown by with breathtaking speed. Soon my kids won't need me or even want me around and I know it will break my heart.

So - These Are Days. Long and tiring and beautiful and precious and maddening and exhilarating and much the same and always different. I'm trying to learn to appreciate the beauty and simplicity of these days, because I will never get them back and I will miss them when they're gone.

Adventures in blogging

I am an avid blog reader. I read blogs by strangers and by friends, by people whom I will never meet and by people I see almost every day. There are a few things I've noticed about good blogs and these are the rules I will take on for myself. Along with some necessary boundaries.
1. I will tell the truth. I think that many of life's sorrows result from deceiving ourselves - seeing things as we wish they were instead of as they are. We paint a rosy picture on top of a horrible situation to keep from facing the truth, or, conversely, dig up dissatisfaction where it is not justified. That's why people who are always happy - or always mad - are so difficult to deal with. They do not deal in reality. More discussion on this subject at a later date.
2. I will not be falsely cheery, as many "family" blogs are. "I am just so blessed and lucky and my wonderful kids and my fabulous husband and I'm happy all the time and my life is so satisfying and I just want to share my joy...". Gag,Vomit. If I ever sound like a holiday newsletter I hope someone has the decency to drive to my house and bitch slap me. Self-congratulation is just bad manners.
3. I will not be sentimental. Emotional, probably, but never sentimental. I'm just not a goopy person and I despise sentimentality - it is usually a disguise for manipulation.
4. I will not name names. I will often discuss people - friends, family, the checkout girl at HEB, even authors, celebrities, saints and historical figures. When necessary I will assign code names - "Thelma" and "Chad" come to mind - so as to avoid getting in (as much) trouble if I am being uncomplimentary toward someone who may be hurt by it.
5. I will not discuss my husband. He and our relationship are off limits. This rule is for my own benefit, in order to keep from damaging my marriage beyond repair in a fit of pique just because he moved my shoes. He will show up peripherally, of course, but I will respect his privacy.
6. I will frankly discuss my children and hope fervently that they never read this.
7. I will use correct grammar and spelling. I am a grammar Nazi and I am peeved beyond all reason at the way educated people butcher our language. There is just no excuse for choosing incorrectly from among "their, they're, there" or "you're, your" or "it's, its" or "except, accept" or for pluralizing with an apostrophe S if you completed the fourth grade. I'll allow some latitude for "stationary/stationery" because it's confusing and pretty esoteric. And I will always cringe at comma splices.
8. I will often be profane, raunchy, explicit, or just plain gross, but never in a gratuitous way.

This is a beginning, at least. I am doing this for myself but I really hope that I develop a readership because it would make me feel very cool.