Life Is Too Short For Boring Summers

The older I get, the busier summers seem to get.  By June 21, my calendar is jammed with activities and obligations.  While this supplies me with a bevy of post ideas, it leaves me with little time to actually write these posts.

For example, here is what I have done with my summer so far:

• I went to the zoo twice AND angered a host of ancient spirits.  Multi-tasking is essential if you are to have a good summer.
• I DIDN'T take my kids to the beach. Apparently I also angered the ancient rain and sun gods.  I'm nothing if not consistent.
• I took my kids to a free splash pad (i.e. park with a bunch of sprinklers), and due to the fact that I wore regular clothes instead of a swimsuit, I got soaked chasing Toddler around.  On the other hand, no one had to see me in a swimsuit, which is really a favor for every one involved. YOU'RE WELCOME.
• I worked on some long overdue cleaning projects.  The top of our buffet is sort of a landing place for any sort of junk.  So I cleaned it off.  Then I loaded it up with more junk.  Then I cleaned it off again.  Now I have loaded it up with even more junk, so take a wild guess as to what I'll be doing tomorrow.
• I weaned my Toddler off the pacifier.  And by weaned I mean NOT weaned.  One cry and I fold like a deck of cards.  At this rate she'll be taking that thing to college.

And here's what I have yet to do this summer:

• Take my kids to the state fair, where they'll have their first encounter with toothless carnies and food-on-a-stick.  The memories will be treasured forever, I'M SURE. 
• Continue using an excessive amount of CAPITAL LETTERS in my posts.  I'm like the opposite of e.e. cummings.
• Take Preschooler to see her first movie, "Winnie-the-Pooh." Hopefully it won't provide her with a deep-seated fear of bears and Rasinets.
• Go on a family vacation to northern Minnesota and Wisconsin.  It will be just like the Griswolds but with more poop.  Note to self: buy water-wings. And Pepto-Bismol. And more wine.  Lots more wine.
• Teach Preschooler the difference between boys and girls.  She is VERY interested as of late, and she has no brothers.  This should be fun for every one involved.

So what are your summer vacation plans?  After all, I'm always looking for new ways to traumatize my children and myself. Life is too short to be bored.

UPDATE: Oh My God, NO WONDER I Can't Go To The Zoo!

I can't go to the zoo.  Bad things happen. 

The dear Betty Fokker posited what might be the obvious cause of my misfortunes: Was the zoo built on an ancient Indian burial ground?

The answer? Yes. YES IT WAS.

It turns out southern Wisconsin was a bit of an epicenter for Native American Effigy Mound culture. And the zoo - the zoo where...

.... My car was parked in by a school bus for 7 hours in a series of events that culminated in the breaking of my toe....

.... On a second occasion, I misplace my car for 36 hours due in part to the consumption of a questionable hot dog....

THAT ZOO is part of a park that is built on no less than 8 effigy mounds.  A bird effigy, a linear mound and six conical mounds.  There were two other conical mounds and another bird mound, but they were destroyed.  OF COURSE THEY WERE.

So, no more zoo for me.  Going back would be like asking for my car to become possessed with demons.  I already shelled out for four new tires the other month - I'm not paying for an exorcism too. 

Remember That Time My Van Was Stolen At The Zoo, Except It Actually Wasn't? No? Me Either.

I visited the zoo again.  I should know better; this never ends well for me.

I was in good company at the zoo.  One of my dearest friends from college was meeting us there.  After college, Husband and I moved to another state, and then we moved to a different state, and then my friend moved to a different state, and we thought that was that.  Then somehow the planets aligned and we both moved back to the state - nay, CITY - where we first met. Now we are able to see each other EVERY DAY if we want, at least for another year or so after which Husband and I will depart to see the great big world once more.

So, I met my friend and her two children at the zoo.  All went well.  We looked at animals.  I ate a questionable hot dog.  But when we said our good-byes and parted ways, something strange happened.  She went home and wrote a beautiful Facebook post waxing philosophical on the value of friendship.  I, on the other hand, started to feel all cold and shaky-like.  I was glad to retreat to my van.  I wanted to arrive home as soon as possible, and convince my children to nap at the same time, so I could lie down too.

Now, this zoo has a ridiculous parking lot, so to avoid all that tomfoolery I parked on a side street a couple blocks away.

I headed down the street to where the van WASN'T  parked.  Hmm... I thought.  Was it the street over?  I walked around the block.  No van.  Hmmm.... I thought.  Was it the block over?  Off I traversed, pushing Toddler in the stroller with Preschooler in tow.

After walking all the way around four blocks, I did not find the van.  By this time Toddler was asleep in the stroller, Preschooler was exhausted and cranky from walking, and I was pretty sure I was going to die right there on the sidewalk outside a beautiful Tudor home.

I called Husband and sobbed that I was not going to take one step further and he had leave work to come pick me up right then and there or so help me God I was going to have some sort of nervous breakdown and the owners of the beautiful Tudor home were going to have to scrape my remains from the sidewalk and deposit me at the local mental health institute, which at this point sounded like some sort of Nirvana.

One hour later, Husband came to pick us up.  "Where was the car?" he inquired.  I had no explanation.  Either it was stolen or it had been towed.  The latter was more likely.  I had parked in a "two hour" zone, and while overstepping that time limit might not be a big deal elsewhere, the authorities in my town were pretty anal about ticketing and towing.  Home we went, where I could be sick in peace and privacy.

The next morning, I called the police station and towing company, but no one had any record of towing my car.  Uh-oh.  Was it actually stolen?  It was a remote possibility, but I figured that since my car's empty fuel light was on, the thieves couldn't have gotten far.  Suckas!

We decided to take one more cruise around the neighborhood just to make sure, before declaring the van stolen.  Off went zoo, where we found the van.  One block away from the zoo.  WHERE IT SHOULD'VE BEEN IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Oops.

Now I'm not allowed to go to the zoo by myself EVER AGAIN, which is probably for the best.  If I go, I will be eaten by a carnivorous giraffe, and then who will clean our bathrooms, WHO? No one, that's who. 

It's for the best.

You Can't Make Your Children Get Along. WHO KNEW?

It is quarter-after-seven and I am exhausted. 

My children usually get along so well.  It’s cute.  And weird.  But mostly cute.

Preschooler would beg Toddler to play with her, and so long as “play with her” meant Toddler following Preschooler around while Preschooler issued orders, every one was happy.

Toddler would instigate wrestling matches with her sister, who happily complied.

The girls have been sharing a bedroom for the past six months, and both had grown so comfortable that one would not go to sleep unless the other was sleeping there too. 

But today?  Today was full of:

NOOOO!!!!

MINE!

SHE’S TOUCHING ME!!!!   

STOP IT!!!

MOM-MY!!!

WAHAHAHAH!!!

From both kids.  All. Day. Long.

Every toy that one child played with, the other child immediately wanted.  Preschooler wanted nothing to do with Toddler, who felt entitled to impose herself on whatever Preschooler was trying to do.  Distractions didn’t work.  Turn-taking didn’t work.  Time-outs didn’t work.

There was nothing I could do today that would make my children get along.  They just didn’t want to.

And I know, this is normal.  This is normal.

But so is my headache.

You Don't Win Friends With Salad!

One of the nice things about moving back to Madison is its farmers' market.  Touted as the "largest producer-only farmers' market in the country," it stretches around the Capitol Square like this:

I SO have a future in cartography!

And this is a picture of me at the farmers' market.

Note the lack of cash, the invisible bag to carry produce home in, and, well, ME.

As much as I'd like to go to the farmers' market every week, I only manage to get there once or twice a month.  You see, unless you arrive around 6:30 in the morning, the place is packed with people dickering over the number of strawberries in a pint, interrogating the egg vendors as to whether their chickens have access to a grassy yard and possibly some sort of spa, and well-meaning mothers pushing their kids around in the WORLD'S LARGEST STROLLER.

All of these behaviors make my head explode, which is really messy but pays for my psychiatrist's kid's college fund.  So unless I can get my rear in gear in time to get to the farmers' market at the butt-crack of dawn, I don't go at all.  This makes me sad, as I love fresh, local produce.

So, in an unprecedented move of advance-planning I decided to join a CSA (community supported agriculture.)  You sign up with a CSA in the spring and pay them a few hundred dollars straight up.  Then throughout the summer and early autumn (June through October in my neck of the woods), you head over to your host's pick-up site to retrieve your box full of already-paid-for vegetables. It's like it was made for people who are too lazy and inept at obtaining quality fresh produce, just like me!

So for a couple of weeks now, I've gotten a large box full of fresh vegetables.  And thanks to the unusually cold spring, these boxes have been full of lettuce.  And lettuce.  And more lettuce.  There are a few radishes and white turnips thrown in for good measure.  And then more lettuce.

I like lettuce.  Everybody in my family will eat salad, even my kids.   But as of date, I am the proud owner of two LARGE bags of lettuce.  They are so large THAT I AM FORCED TO USE ALL CAPS TO DESCRIBE THEIR MAGNITUDE.  I also have a good-sized head of bibb lettuce, a humongous head of romaine lettuce, and two smaller bags of spinach.

The spinach, I can work with.  Spinach can be a side dish.

This is still healthy, right?

You can sneak spinach into a lasagna or a casserole

Surprise!

But I'm having a hard time dealing with all this lettuce.  Lettuce can turn into a salad.

Hello, there!

Or a salad.

Hello, again!

Or a salad.

Have we met?

Even though there are lots of different kinds of salads, in the end they are still salads and I am suffering from salad ennui. We have had salad at every dinner and most of my lunches, and we've only plowed through half of the lettuce.

So dear internets, please tell me: What do you do with 500 pounds of lettuce? More importantly, would you like some lettuce?  After all:

Superwoman Is Not Available. Please Hold For The Next Representative, Or Leave A Message After The Beep.

A while back Preschooler received a little care package in the mail from a friend.  The package included a “letter,” a few stickers, and a tootsie roll.

“Crap!” I thought.  “Now WE have to send something! “ I scanned the room to see what was available.  All I saw was a handful of fortune cookies left over from last night’s Chinese food, and some free address labels from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.

I had Preschooler write a letter and draw a picture for her friend.  Then I ate the fortune cookies and paid the utility bill.

I try so hard to do it all.  I’d like my house to be company-ready all the time.  I’d like to plan arts & crafts activities for my kids and arrange spectacular and enriching play-dates and outings.  I want to prepare balanced, healthy, home-made lunches and dinners.  I want to write for my blog, and read other blogs.  I want to work on other writing projects, and plow through the ever-growing pile of books to read.

I am capable of doing all these things. 

But I am not capable of doing all these things all of the time.

If my house is clean, it means I spent the day cleaning instead of playing with my kids.

If my kids are filthy by the end of the day, it means I spent the day outdoors with them, and my house is probably a wreck.

The days I don’t blog are the days I’m actually getting REAL LIFE things done.

And if I make a home-made meal, I miss out on after-dinner family time cleaning up my kitchen.

I know there are solutions to this.  But it took me a full year of stay-at-home parenting to realize how much pre-planning it takes just to be “normal.” 

Take one day a week, and make it your “going out” day.  Plan ahead for something to do with the kids that day.

You can make a home-made dinner in the crock-pot, or put together a casserole ahead of time so all you have to do at the end of the day is heat it up.

If you could just get your house CLEAN, you can keep it that way by just taking a half-hour each day to tidy up.

You can always wash the dishes after the kids are in bed.

Plan for time during the day or evening where Husband can keep the kids out of my hair for half-an-hour so I have time to read, or write, or do something else just for myself.

I take this advice some of the time.  And I'm with it, some of the time.

The rest of the time, I lose my minivan at the zoo, and don't find it for 36 hours.  More on that later.

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This Post Is An Exercise In Self-Indulgence. It Is Also About Pudding-Pops.

I write.  I've filled a myriad of one-subject notebooks, journaling about being depressed, being manic, being lonely, being afraid.  I've taken some of this frenzied journaling out of the dark and imposed it on a mostly bored public.  

But I can't write when I'm angry.  Not publicly. Not privately. Not at all.  

Actually, I can write but all that comes out is, "OH MY GOD WHAT IS THIS I CAN'T EVEN GAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!11111!!!!!"  

Seriously, my brain stutters.  

The thing is, the thing that I still struggle with after too many years of therapy is that I don't allow myself to feel angry.  What I allow myself to feel is:

I'm angry!

Crap! I can't be angry!

I have nothing to be angry about.  EVER.

Because people who are angry are not happy.

And I can't let people know I'm not happy.

I might hurt their feelings.

They might think less of me.

Because I'm not happy.

And I'm supposed to be happy.  ALWAYS.

And now my therapist is a millionaire.

So I'll never be able to send my kids to college.

You're on your own, kids!

And don't get me wrong, I know.  I know it's unrealistic to expect myself to be happy all the time.  That it's ok to feel angry, every one feels angry sometimes.  No one expects me to be happy all the time, just as I don't expect others to be happy all the time.  That in expecting myself to always be happy, I set the bar for myself so impossibly high that Superwoman would never reach it.

But all of that logic doesn't stop me from hurling myself back down that shame-spiral time and time again.

FYI: I'm not particularly angry about anything. I just wanted to explore my hang-ups about being angry while I'm in a relatively stable state of mind.  And you get to read it!  Lucky you?

Ok, fine, I'll get angry about something.  Growing up I ate Jello Pudding-Pops all summer long, and then they stopped making them.  Now they make them again, but they're not the same.  If the same thing happens to Nacho Cheese Doritos and Clue (board game AND movie) I'm going back and getting a new childhood.

Bastards.