2/44 = 1/22

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Two weeks of school down. Squire’s already lost his
locker key and missed a couple homework assignments, but he seems to be
holding onto the lunch card, which is impressive. And I think the
school supplies thing went okay. Ah, the school supplies thing: I
promised Julia I’d tell.

In June, the teachers hand out a list of supplies. This list
is all the things the students will need in addition to the previous years’
supplies, so you have to remember what all that stuff was (i.e.: the
special little white shoes for gym class that became cottage shoes in
the summer? remember you need to replace those now; they’re not on the
list) and also get the stuff that’s on the list new this year (
i.e.: four paintbrushes: three large and round, one flat. The large and
round ones have to be different sizes, which you didn’t know, so Day1
you’ll be back at the store getting different sizes). And you also have
this stack of notebooks to buy, different sizes and different lines.
And even different pens with different ink colors. And each notebook is
supposed to have the kid’s full information on it, AND a plastic cover.
No store is going to have all the notebooks, all the right sized
covers, all the pens. So the week before school starts is a mass of
parents running around the stationery stores and already resenting the school for all of
this, the purpose of which is as far as I can tell to rob you of the
last week of summer.

This year I asked Friar to do the shopping with Squire,
because last year I nearly had a nervous breakdown in the "tea egg and
sugar company" trying to find 6 each of four different kinds of
notebooks with the corresponding plastic covers. When facing a nervous breakdown: Delegate. They went to three
different stores and still didn’t get everything, but finally we got
the whole list checked off.

And then in September you drop the kids off at the school,
marching bravely through the doors in their new backpacks (when Squire
started first grade, his backpack was full of so many supplies that he
actually tipped over backwards), and 45 minutes later they pop back
out. And the list has changed over the summer, it has always changed,
and this year I realized that a Clever Parent would have waited til Day
1, asked for the list on the 45 minute day, and then gotten the stuff, because the first
week of school is a JOKE and I feel like a PD Eastman dog: The parents
are going around and around. "Go around again!"

Anyway, two weeks. We have the tutor again, so that’s going
well. And we’re remembering this
year that life exists beyond school. Last night we played Catan, and
Squire and I worked to sing all staccato like Regina Spektor and we
worked on dinner together, because it’s fun, and because I maintain the
hope that through cooking he’ll come to appreciate a more balanced
diet. Thursday night as Squire piled his plate with the third helping
of pasta
and cheese (our ironic nod to the Italian pasta
strike), bypassing the homemade primavera sauce and the juicy chunks of
chicken for which the pasta was supposed to be a side dish, I realized
that he eats like a college student. First, there’s the stunning
quantities, with no parallel weight gain. Also, there’s the fixation on
white foods. In college, you gravitate towards white food cause it’s
easy to cook, but Squire genuinely loves the stuff. Toast!
Awesome, my favorite! Pasta and white cheese, mmmmm. RAMEN NOODLES
ALWAYS YUMMY. Maybe when he goes to college he’ll have a love affair
with vegetables just to continue in his bizarrosity.

We’re doing well, I hope you are, too.

Bossy!

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There’s some bit of nonsense at the end of some of Squire’s latest
audiobooks that just burns me up. It says that it’s important for kids
to be read to… and that in today’s busy world, blahblahblah,
audiobooks are just as good as a parent reading to a child. In today’s
busy world on what planet, I’d like to know. Audiobooks are great –and
I certainly appreciate Jim Dale for his ability to read Harry Potter
and the Gobbledygook over and over again, because once was fine, but
once was enough– but they’re not the same as reading aloud.

Now, I understand that not everyone is the fantastic reader I
am. I am to reading what Jules Winnfield is to a foot massage: I don’t
be ticklin’ or nothing! But I do not read to my son because I love the
sound of my own voice (shut up!). I read to him because:

1. It’s fun to do things together. It’s fun to watch movies
together, learn things together, go on trips together, because we can
talk about it afterwards. How cool was it when Will got his wish of
snow for his birthday? It wasn’t what we expected at all, was it?

2. It’s good to see how he thinks. I think it’s important for me as a
parent to observe how information gets processed, and to guide the
processing when it’s tangled, and sit back and relish it when it is as
clear as only a child’s processing can be. I get more out of a book
when I read it to him because I see it in his eyes and mine at the same
time.

3. It is good for me as a reader to read aloud. Words sound different,
and sentences sing or they don’t, and it’s different than reading in my
head. I would have missed some of the magic of "The Subtle Knife" if
I’d read it to myself, and I’m glad I’ve had someone to read to.

4. If he has questions while I’m reading to him, he can ask. This might
not be As True for girls as for boys, but it’s been my observation that
it’s easier to talk about something if you stumble over it together.
It’s true for vocabulary definitely, and also for storytelling.

5.
It is fun to experience things that are generally solitary together. So
much of what we experience is solitary, even if we’re all in it
together– reading together is like watching a television show where
both people are watching the same show at the same moment, and both
people can hit the pause button whenever they want to be witty or
insightful or confused. I like the remote control in the middle of the
couch, and I like reading as a companionable activity.

Please understand: I like audiobooks. Kids have the ability to listen to the same thing over and over again (CrazyFrog, I hate you so much) and it’s been great for Squire to have that available to him, because I wouldn’t do it. I understand that in "today’s busy world" we sometimes can’t take time
for everything that we feel we ought to do for our kids. I really do
get that and I also understand that I am privileged to have the time to
read to my kid. But I think that if you don’t, you’re hurting… not so
much the kid, because whatevs, kids are tough. But you’re hurting
yourself. And I’m angry that these audiobooks, in the interest of marketing
audiobooks, imply that they’re more able to do your job than you are.
Delegate the housekeeping, delegate the lice removal. But really, why
delegate the fun stuff? And reading is fun.

foundation

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The foundation cracked about twenty years ago
you poured in some dead rabbits and kept building
a roof over your head because Maslow said to;
and other things, important:
Insulation against the extremes and
windows for looking out.

You laid a floating floor over the cracked base
you have done a good job of covering that up
it is not perfect but it is level as your gaze.
Sometimes it creaks a bit, maybe, or maybe

only you hear that.

Some years ago you put in a door,
decided people could visit,
held some dance parties
broken glass and everybody
has a good time

But sometimes you think about that foundation
–step on a crack, break your mother’s–
and you think about danger,
what if it all crashes down,

what if it folds in over you and anyone
with you when it happens.
What then.

Is there insurance to cover your contingencies
is there a way to repair damage
without tearing it all down

is there a point, in short, to sitting here,
after dark, listening to the creak that
maybe only you hear, after all.

Some people think it helps to slap your forehead

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We went to the beer garden yesterday to play Scrabble, which we’ve done
nearly every night for the last week. School starts Monday, so spending
every possible evening out of doors, especially for Squire, seems
necessary and important. Although it was the same even temp in the
apartment yesterday as it is every day, it was colder outside, and my
sleeveless dress meant I was unable to spell words other than
"freezing". As Squire was anyway not playing, I called him over &
begged him to run back to the apartment to get me a sweater. The
apartment is less than 15 minutes’ stroll from the beer garden, and I
thought that Squire, running like the wind, could solve my chattering
teeth in about 20 minutes. Bribes were offered. Specific sweaters and
their locations were mentioned.

Slightly over 30 minutes later, he ambles back. He was delayed because
he went to the bathroom at home. He has a letter from the mailbox. He
has his magic wand. You totally know where I’m going with this, don’t
you.

I myself suffer from recurrent destinesia. I will walk into the bedroom
to get my glasses, stand there for a minute, dumbfounded, and wander
back out again with no glasses. Did I walk in there to blink myopically
at the dustmotes, or what? Ten minutes later I may even do the same
thing again. However, if I say the word "glasses" before walking into
the room, it kicks the brain over the barrier with ease. How could
someone have a clearly described item in his mind, go for the specific
purpose of getting it, have a bribe dangling at the end of the line,
and … forget?

Anyway, he went back to get the sweater, and this time it only took 20
minutes. I do understand that it was entirely my fault for forgetting
to bring a sweater (I normally do, even in the hottest months), and I
understand that my physical unease today is a result of my behavior,
not his. However, I am a little worried about this whole "back to
school" thing. Between the early onset destinesia and the new "different teacher for
every class" system, I think we may have a very long year ahead of us.

Heel!

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"Great tits!" he said. I was standing at the bar waiting to pay for my
liter and half of wine, this is the bar down the street where they have
it on tap and you bring in your empty water bottle and they fill it up.
I wanted a bottle of red, and the tap had run out so the bartender was
in the back hooking up another keg or whatever. A cask, maybe.

I
took a step back and moved my arms out, palms out. "They’re not even
tits, really," he continued. "They’re breasts. Full, round, round
breasts. They’re perfect." I hate this, I hate this so much. I want the
quick retort, the one word. The one that shrivels him, and all I can
think is phrases in English. Spoken like a true gentleman, I
have, and a few sailor’s greetings, but I can’t twist the idioms into
Czech somehow. Come on brain, move. "Of course partly it’s probably
your bra, but it’s also just that you have such big tits. I mean
breasts." I start wanting him to make a move to touch me; the people
around us are starting to watch and I want it to be clear that he went
to touch me and that’s why I had to hit him. I’m looking at a picture
to the right, one of those old cigarette ads, maybe from the 1940s or
maybe made to look that way. It’s framed and I can see his reflection
in it. He’s a lot taller than me, which means I’d have to get him on
the ground before i could smash his head, which is what I want to do,
but he’s drunk enough it wouldn’t even occur to him to block a solid
punch in the belly, and I’ve got rings on.

The bartender comes
back in, sees me being towered over, yells SIT and the man sits down
like the slobbering dog he is and we all turn leisurely away. I pay
four dollars for the wine and go.

It takes every bit of my
effort to focus on the bartender, to focus on the parallel between a
drunk man and a misbehaving dog, both needing to be trained. I do not
believe that in spite of everything people are good at heart but I know
that I am already wildly disinclined to leave the house and that if I
think about any part of this story other than the bits that are funny I
will entirely shut down. Later that night over the wine I explain to
Marcela about space, the assertion of, and detach from the story enough
to tell it.  Laughing because he was, after all, right, although
completely unpoetic and rather smelly besides. And this is how we
re-enter the world.

more obvious things i have pointed out

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Who should set their alarms for 6 a.m.: People who intend to get up at 6 a.m.

Who should not set their alarms for 6 a.m.: People who sleep next to insomniacs who are low on sleep to begin with; people who are able to merge the annoying howl of their alarm clocks with a dream about pretty birds for a solid minute; people who are not getting, and have not ever gotten out of bed before 7.
Bonus: people who can’t remember how to turn off the alarm without turning on a light and looking at it even though the clock is some 5 years old. I am looking at you, and this is why you are not allowed to play with my shiny new camera.

Diner of Abandonment

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When I was little, I used to report on the quality of every public restroom I ever used. Cleanliness, size, and any special features (black soap!) were relayed in what I assume was the piping high voice of an only child, the voice that is sure it is conveying information of greatest interest to those gathered around food that has magically become less appetizing. My lucky family.

Eventually, I was given to understand that these bathroom reports were not as interesting to others as they were to me. Coincidentally around that time I started having a fear, and this is before those annoying Culkin movies, that I would be left in a bathroom someday. That I would walk out of the bathroom to find that everyone had gone on to prettier places and there I’d be, alone.

As I got older, and started increasingly thinking like an anthropologist, featuring the idea that all behavior has a cause, the fear took on new layers. Either everybody was thinking about me as much as I was thinking about them, and there would be a combined unanimous decision to leave that annoying girl behind, quick let’s sneak out while she’s in there, or there would be a combined inability to think about me at all, and people would just inadvertently wander off, no head count to ascertain that one of us had been left behind, and what do you mean by "one of us": who are you?

As a result, I have probably the fastest bladder in the world, and even though I wash my hands every time, I can be back from the bathroom before anybody has a chance to ask for the check or even start a new topic of conversation, a skill Sam Diamond would envy, but advantages born from fear are always tinged a bit with their ugly origins.

I was well into my thirties before I confessed to this fear. It was one of my more difficult confessions, and to be honest my throat gets a little tight even typing about it, because I do get what it says about me, and I understand that while my brain would greatly entertain a psychoanalyst, it is not always a whole lot of fun to live with.

And to my point: Imagine my delight and surprise last week, walking out of the bathroom of the diner where we had breakfast, to discover that while my purse and cards remained at the table, my entire family had vamoosed. Like a dream coming true! Nifty! Fortunately they hadn’t gone farther than the parking lot, so I rejoined them without incident (and my wallet was still in my purse, yay).

I don’t know what it means, whether I should take from this that things I dread will happen but not really matter that much, or that there is no way to reasonably to prevent what I know will happen, or what. I do know that I had recently talked to certain wise people about this very fear, and that means I had somebody with whom to share the punchline, and I think maybe that’s the important part: not that your fears come true, but that you have somebody to laugh with you after.

Photos of the Diner of Abandonment and the rest of the trip are up on flickr.

i’m in yr time zone, soakin in yr culture

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I’m in New York hanging with my friend G while Squire Tuck is off doing some grandparent/child bonding thing upstate. I assume our young Squire is having a good time, but I suspect I’m having a better time. During the day, G’s in school and I work on his adorable little laptop (how DO people work on laptops? I feel like I’m used to being the captain of a starship with my giant desk and my wave keyboard and suddenly I’m like trapped in some bitty shuttle craft), which is not a blast, BUT in the evening we whirlwindily do New York Stuff. We walked through Central Park, we went to the Met and looked at marble dudes, we watched a sunset off a pier, we saw Xanadu!, we had very schmancy drinks in an unmarked bar, I smoked a cigarette on a stoop, and I’m not telling you the half of it. I got Squire a t-shirt from the Natural History Museum. I think we’ll keep the fact that I went to the circus just between ourselves, though, okay, or he’ll never let me out of his sight again. I have FUN when I travel, I’m saying.

We were in Washington D.C. for a few days, hanging with family and making sure my tear ducts are fully functional. They are! In addition to Standard Familial Strife, things that made me cry were: watching Barbara Morgan on the live feed, Mr. Rogers’ red sweater, seeing the ghost dance dresses, that giant Calder mobile, and the fact that the Smithsonian is free. Best and worst of America, all right there. I wanted to kiss a flag and burn it at the same time, and even that conflict made me feel more American than I have in a long time, and more at peace with it.

The day before I left I found out somebody had been copying my writing here and passing them off as her own. This caused me quite a bit of –I don’t want to say I was angry, but I certainly was confused. Why would you want to pretend to be someone else, have someone else’s life, in an online journal? It is ever so strange. And it stirred up some stuff for me, like Why Do I Write and What Is This Thing Called Blog and so on. But then I had a plane to catch so I couldn’t really work it out.

Anyway, that’s how we roll. Hope you’re having fun where you are, too.

what I read

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I finished "The Golden Compass" over the weekend. I had started reading it to Squire Tuck and then apparently wasn’t reading it fast enough, because he started reading it alone. Since I hadn’t already read it, I hopped to so we could talk about it.

I liked it a lot. It takes a certain amount of thinking for granted, which I particularly like in a children/YA book. It was well-written, and there was a decent flow to the plot. I liked that the end of a chapter was really the end of a chapter, and not always a cliffhanger. I liked how things progressed in a way that was exciting and possible to follow.

I also thought Pullman did a good job of telling you things about characters in a way that revealed his thoughts about them. For example, there’s a part when he says that Lyra has no imagination. This is hard to fathom because she’s a great on-the-spot liar, which to me requires an active imagination, but Pullman explains that in fact she is a good liar because she believes what she says… in a way, he presents something and explains it away at the same time. I wasn’t sure I agreed with him but it’s clear he thought about what he wrote.

He has a way of describing people through their behavior that I thought was really powerful. Mrs. Coulter only has a few complete scenes in the book, and each scene revealed more about her than a page of adjectives. I wish that he had spent less time using the adjectives later, because it felt a little screenplay to me, a little "stay with my visuals!" but he did so well describing action to reveal character that if he wants to be sure you see HIS character, that’s fair.

On the downside: He doesn’t always describe how people interact and how they got to feel the way they do about each other very well. Some relationships are clear in a sentence or two ("Ma Costa had clouted Lyra dizzy on two occasions but fed her hot gingerbread on three") but many of them fell short, for me. Lyra explains that she loves Iorek because he was kicked out of a country for murder, as was her father, except that no loving relationship ever seems clear between her and her father. Her quick affection for Iorek seems reasonably placed but the reasons given don’t line up. I had problems with her relationship with Lord Asriel, too, who spends quite a few pages threatening to kill her in the beginning, but is described later as always treating her as "an adult engaging a child in a pretty trick." Wha–? Her parents’ relationship was particularly difficult for me to understand: so passionate and so dead at the same time. Maybe I’ve never had relationships like these, so it doesn’t make sense to me, but I think the problem is that Pullman doesn’t really know how to describe these relationships himself. A relationship that should be key, Lyra’s parents are fierce and infinitely sad and passionate and dizzy and they don’t make sense, and it hurts the book that they don’t.

And… the alethiometer seemed a little too handy. It was not as handy as "because Dumbledore thinks so" (glargh!) but it really did seem almost too much. As if the book got written and then there were holes in the plot that had to be mended, and boom! they were. This is a minor complaint, though. It’s just — he did so well at describing other otherworldly things to a degree that made them seem really possible that I’m sorry he didn’t spend more time making the alethiometer seem as real, at least not to me. I finished and wanted to think for days about what form my daemon would take, but I never once considered what I would ask the alethiometer, if I could. Do you see what I mean?

Anyway. Good book, glad I read it, want to read the rest. Next up will be some non-fiction, I think. By the way, when people tell you Nora Ephron’s latest book ("I Feel Bad About My Neck") is "funny" what they mean is that they have never read a decent blog post, because there are at least 20 writers out there who make my ribs hurt, but Nora Ephron never even made me smile.