Every weekday, without fail, at 12:30pm, it looks like a storm came through my house and trashed everything.
Seriously – no matter how organized it is when I get home at 11, there’s something about that hour and a half where all hell breaks loose. Maybe I’m just so excited to see Sammy that I don’t pay attention to the trail of mail, half-eaten lunch, shoes tossed on the floor, toys thrown every which way, cushions piled on the floor – you get the picture. And the picture? Not pretty.
Still, while I might not feel like Good Housekeeper, today I feel like Good Mama. I know that really, every day I’m a Good Mama, but there are definitely days I feel like Bad Mama – the ones where, when I put him to bed at night, I feel like I’m somehow missed the whole day, that I was really disconnected and never really present in the moment with him. Today? Good Mama all the way.
First, we went to the train station to pick up Jay’s parking pass, and instead of running in and out, we explored the train station, and then waited on the windowed overpass to watch the train come into the station. While we waitede practiced saying, “Open sesame!” for the “magic doors” (motion sensitive, but he doesn’t know that ) and then took a walk down to the platform and peeked onto the train. Then I let him press the button and we took the elevator back up – much excitement for a toddler, apparently.
Then, post-lunch (peas! peas!), he insisted on watching Dora – this one was about a King, which meant that Sammy walked around saying, “Castle! Crown!” for half an hour. The light went off and I got some oaktag and made a crown for him, which he colored and we covered in stickers (my favorite is one of my scrapbooking stickers across the front which reads: “Here comes trouble!”)
Then we went across the street to see Deb and the kids and I didn’t breathe down his neck the whole time – he’s really getting into playing WITH other kids, which is so freaking cool. Now? Naptime. And naptime for mama, too, even though this house is absolutely and totally completely trashed. Being Good Mama is exhausting!

That’s the only word I can find to describe it – fragile.
I feel very much like I did the morning of September 11th, when I was waiting for Jay to get home from the city safely and my family was so far away and none of us knew what was coming next.
We’re waiting on Sammy’s cath date. It’ll be in January. Every day is one day closer to December, closer to January, closer to a day of blood draws and pre-op and then they take him away again and I can’t have my baby while they knock him out and stick things in his veins and explore his heart from the inside. The inside – the inside of my baby boy.
I’m waiting on my mammogram and the subsequent results. I go in on the 6th with the follow-up/screening results the following week. I know I’m okay, but what if I’m not?
I feel like I’m having a hard time keeping all the pieces together. This is not who I am.
Maybe it’s just the full moon. Maybe it’s the change in weather, the change in seasons, the moving closer and closer to Sammy’s surgery. Maybe it’s watching him change so drastically each and every day and not knowing what to expect next, not know what’s coming next.
My sweet, energetic, assertive little man. My sweet, sweet boy. He doesn’t know what’s coming next, and that breaks my heart over and over and over. Everything is moving too, too fast and not fast enough. I want to be past this. I want to be me again. I want so much.
Some days are good, some are great, some are just considerably tougher. Today seems to be one of those.

My Ethics class turned in their final papers today.
One of the top kids, D., turned in his, titled “The Roles of Ethics in Society and in My Personal Life.”
It was beautifully put-together in a clear cover, with a nice cover sheet and punctuated with a great, cropped picture of his face.
I put it on the top of the pile and continued to have a debate with a few of the kids – if he can call himself black, why can’t I just call myself white without having to specify which countries my ancestors are from – when D. interrupted:
“Miss – I was totally drunk in that picture.”
There you have it, folks. I present to you the future of our country.

I’m totally going to talk about my boobs.
I had a doctor’s appointment today because (the very thing every woman dreads saying) – I found a lump. I let it be for a week or so, but I knew I should probably have it checked. Given my not-so-favorable family history of breast cancer, off I went like a dutiful “please god, not this too” mama. (My evil brain has a way of running off with bad thoughts, dragging me behind by my hair for the ride.) My doctor’s not too concerned, thinks it’s most likely hormone-related, but is still sending me off for an ultrasound, mammogram and exam with the breast surgeon. (How’s that for feeling confident that she’s “not concerned”? Really. But I’m not all too concerned. Really. No – really.)
Aren’t you jealous? Seriously – women have to go through labor AND we have to worry about breast cancer? How’s THAT fair?
But that’s not the oh-so-fun part. I was nervous about bringing Sammy along, as he’s quite mobile (read: will climb anything), and I was really hoping that a) he would simply nap in the stroller or b) he’d be easily amused with crayons and stickers. What I wasn’t planning on, however, was that Sammy would think we were at the doctors for him. He screamed and sobbed and begged for me to “Go out door! Go out door!” It broke my heart – no matter how much I convinced him that we were there for mommy and not him, his experiences with doctors’ offices are not pleasant – usually for EKGs or immunizations/monthly RSV shots. He worked himself up so much that he actually broke out in hives and there was little I could do to calm him down. It was just miserable.
I felt so awful about making him feel so awful that I did something I probably shouldn’t have – I took him to the cafe up the street and bought him an italian cookie and a piece of carrot cake (which we shared and saved half for Jay). I know I shouldn’t appease him with food, but honestly, after that afternoon, I’m not sure who needed it more – him or me!

Just a sampling of the searches that apparently led people here last month:

1. kidnappers that wear boxershorts

2. existential chicken jokes
3. underwire bra creaks
4. presents for old people who have given up on life
5. huge c()cks we think its a birth defect
6. how to cut cocaine and bring it back crystal

Talk amongst yourselves.

For our records, because it was so freakin’ cute, though really – no one else will probably enjoy it as much unless you’re somehow related to the CUTEST FREAKING KID IN THE UNIVERSE.
(That’d be Sammy, in case you were somehow unclear on that.)
So his language has simply exploded the past week or so, and it is just so much fun. I was putting him to bed tonight when he spied the bear on his shelf. “Teehy bear?” I gave it to him. He then saw the giraffe – “Gi – rahf?” Because I can’t deny this kid a single thing, into his bed went the giraffe.
“More bear?”
And so it went – “More bear? More bear?” until it was a game, and I was in his closet digging out all the stuffed monkeys he was given when he was born. Once we got to ten additional bears in bed with him – I had to cut him off. It was getting a little snug in there, considering he already had all five Backyardigans, his L’il Heart and L’il Samson, Cookie Monster, dinosaur, Snuggle Puppy and his plastic Mickey Mouse (Minnie’s gone missing and we fear she may have had an unfortunate run-in with the garbage can, as throwing things out is one of Sammy’s greatest joys).
And then he started counting all of his bears.
“One… two… free… fouh… fiyh…” all the way to eleven, and then paused and continued.
“Fouh…teeeeeen.”
Apparently pleased with himself, he took Mickey and flopped down on his pillow, a huge grin on his sleepy little face.
Seriously – every stage is just the best thing ever.

Ok, I’m better. A day, some sleep, a good chunk of time at the gym and a glass of wine and I think I’m a little better. It helps that the scale at the gym confirmed what my home scale said and what my clothes have begun to show – I’m down five pounds! – and that I worked out some stress on the circuit and then got in a good, long walk on the treadmill, during which I read an entire magazine from cover to cover. An ENTIRE magazine! I never get to do that! I’m looking forward to a fun bath with Sammy when he wakes from his nap and some comfort food for dinner and if I can stay awake long enough, maybe a movie with Jay. And I’ve picked up a book again – You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers, which is pretty good so far. Less CNN, less news that makes me cry, more relaxing, more playing, more reading, more movies. It could work, right?
I know I’m just overwhelmed, and it’s stupid, because when I make a list and break things down, I know that everything’s totally manageable. I just hate when I feel distracted during playtime with Sammy, you know? I had a good, centered period of time there, and now I’m all out of whack again. Ugh.
I think I just need to make that list, check things off – and be done with this semester already. It just frustrates me to see kids I know are capable just totally slack off and risk not graduating. My goal today, though? Playing with Sammy, snuggling on the couch with Jay and giving myself permission to let go of everything and just relax. It’ll all be there in the morning anyway, right?

I told my students this morning that I hated them all.
Ok, maybe I didn’t use those words exactly, but it’s what I meant – and well, I mostly meant it for at least for a few of them who are pissing me off lately because they’re acting like entitled brats and not responsible seniors. I was pissy and told them so. Grow up, show up to school when you’re supposed to, stop slacking in class and do your friggin’ work.
Seriously – I’m not sending them off into the “real world” acting like this. Assuming they last until graduation,of course. They’re capable of doing the work – they just have no real work ethic. And that pisses me off.
And then they laughed at me and told me that even when I’m trying to be mean, I’m just too nice. My voice isn’t mean. I’m still somehow smiling through the scowl. And that Miss, didn’t you know? People always walk all over the nice ones. Which made me even angrier with them, because I was mad, dammit, and I wanted them to feel my wrath!
Grrrr!
I’ve been in a foul mood, and now I need to practice being mean because they can’t take me seriously? Because I don’t already have a list of shit-to-do that’s the size of a small novel… WTF?
I told them that their kids were going to come to this school in 20 years and bitch about mean Ms. L and that I’m going to be an old, bitter hag of a teacher and it’s going to be all their fault.
I’m amazed that I don’t drink more than I already do.
Grrrrr.

I’m getting nervous about winter and the months where I can’t just scoop Sammy up and head to the park. I ran across Toddler, Toddler the other day and have already tried out a couple of their toddler activities, and I know I’ll be poking around some more and accumulating an easy-to-access list to post on the fridge for those days when there’s only so many towers we can build out of the couch cushions.
I’m pretty proud of how we spent the last hour – sitting on the kitchen floor with a few trays and bowls full of uncooked rice. We went fishing (counting the hidden goldfish crackers until we had found all five), made shakers by scooping the rice into cups and covering them, poured the rice until our hands were hidden, put the rice and goldfish into a colander and shook it until only the goldfish remained – things like that. Then I let him play with dry linguine, poking it through the holes of the colander – good fine motor skill practice. And really – a quick sweep (which he helped with!) and it was all done.
His language has really burst out of control the past few days. I was getting worried, since he was really only saying the first syllable of things. Now? Sentences! Phrases like they’re nothing! It’s so crazy to watch. Just before, he picked up a piece of linguine, held it to his chest and said, “I play gee!” (Gee=guitar). Then he put it to his mouth and said, “I play harmon!” He asked to brush his teeth. He listed everything Dora needed to do on the map: “Wawa. Tree. Valley. All done!” When he was done on the potty, he said, “Now wash hands!” And his favorite word? More. “More grape!” “More crah-kahs!”
He’s just so much fun these days. Not that he ever wasn’t, but I always wonder how he could possibly be anymore amazing – and then he just goes and does something more amazing and even more fun. I know I’m gushing, but really – this age is just incredible. I love finally getting insight into what’s going on in his head, and I love watching him put it all together!

Sammy had an absolute BLAST trick or treating. He got the hang of it real fast, charging his way up steps and checking his pumpkin to see what candy they had given him. He even managed a few things that sounded like “trih treeeee” for “trick or treat” and “dank” for “thank you”. When we got home, he dumped his pumpkin out and counted the candy, and then we let him have his first taste of evil – a Reese’s peanut butter cup. (Yay! More calories and fat in one cup than he sometimes gets in a meal!). Then he hung out on the front steps for a little bit, thrilled to give out candy to the kids coming around. I’m so excited that he did so well, racing off in his dragon costume, fearless as always.
Each year around Samhain, Jay and I make a dinner to honor and celebrate our ancestors. This year I took a few shortcuts and made a basic baked ziti – but it was so much fun to be able to involve Sammy in the process! We sat on the kitchen floor and mixed cheeses and pasta and sauce and snuck bites while we talked about what we were making. He was fascinated with the ricotta – it’s a consistency he’s never really been exposed to. Next year I’d love to plan it out better and do up a real feast, somehow recognizing foods from each culture in our lineage. I’m not sure how on earth we’re going to do that – Italian, Polish, Scottish, Irish, French, Spanish? Oy! But this year with a toddler in tow? Baked ziti and garlic bread it was.