A Life in Color

Last night I saw Indigo Girls and Matt Nathanson in concert. Turns out that uberhottie Matt Nathanson is both impossibly cute and utterly charming on stage. And his singing...OH MY GOD HIS SINGING! It's a yellow brick road, it's magical, it's angst and unrequited love and lust and sex HE HAS SEX WITH THE AUDIENCE WHILE HE'S SINGING! but a sweet sex, a wanting sex, erotic and soulful and virginal and I'm like Dorothy in Oz but I never want to go home. HERE is that sweet something with a heart and a brain and a winsome, brazen courage and I am dazzled.


I'm telling you, more than one lesbian changed channels, changed networks, CHANGED SERVERS watching him perform tonight. [Did I mention it was an INDIGO GIRLS concert? If you're not familiar with their following, let me just tell you that it's colorful. Rainbow-Brite colorful. Gay Pride colorful. I've seen them like six times with my sis and we've evolved from a mutually HORRORified, standing-at-arm's-length-from-each-other-so-as-not-to-be-mistaken-for (...) to The Screaming Dancing Girls TWO ROWS FROM THE STAGE (you can't get any closer without flashing your gay card!) who could care LESS if anyone thinks we're gay.]


Anyway we're both wearing heels, earrings, and designer jeans so, even though we are right there on the front lines of Raleigh's Lesbian elite, I'm still thinking no one's mistaking us for them because I've seen enough episodes of The L Word to know that two lipstick lesbians are about as likely to couple as, I don't know, Anne Coulter and Jimmy Carter. And we're DANCING. We're all like Shakira and Beyonce up there (did I mention TWO ROWS FROM THE STAGE!) and I have learned that (STEREOTYPE ALERT!) lesbians are the least inclined of ALL WHITE PEOPLE to dance. (YES I JUST PLAYED THE RACE CARD AND THE GAY CARD! Quick! Call a Conservative! Because Tolerance is the new Red and they are all quick to remind you that many of them have A Black Friend and one of them even has A Gay Daughter.)


So the concert was amazing. Galileo, King of Night Vision and Insight, spun among stars in orbit. The Earth turned beneath us to shade us in cloaks of gray and the Goddess smiled on the singing, dancing women of Booth Amphitheater. We sang hymns to old lovers and past lives; we drank wine in splendor and quantity (and spilled it--oops!--on the hair of the nondancing short haired Person of Questionable Gender in front of me WHO NEVER BEFORE IN HER ENTIRE LIFE CARED WHAT HER HAIR LOOKED LIKE UNTIL I SPILLED WINE IN IT!) Jenny and I met (MET!) Matt Nathanson and I got one step closer to getting my gay card.


But back in Kansas, I can't sleep. I dream, I wake, I weave bright, clashing hues into a scratchy tapestry of anxiety and restlessness. My sleep it stutters, starts, tics, swears. (Can a precise alchemy of alcohol, caffeine, and B vitamins induce Tourette's? I'm thinking YES.) And so this morning I am wicked, disheveled, tornadic in my exhaustion. I have lost my ruby slippers. There are flying monkeys in my living room.


My world has lost its scent and texture. The ocean lies still and scentless, its salt a memory. The sun hides darkened, shying behind clouds. There is, there is...a sterile scentlessness born of fatigue, excess, and disappointment. (WHAT HAPPENED TO LAST NIGHT'S MAGIC? HOW DO I GET BACK TO OZ?) My fingers callous. My tongue numbs. I see the world in shades of gray that startle only in their clarity. (Twice as cloudy as I'd been the night before....)

So I'm feeling, as I rouse my own Munchkins from their much-untroubled slumber, totally, technically, vertically, atomically, synthetically, pathologically, neolithically, telepathically, anatomically, illustratively, architecturally, irreversibly, symbolically and undeniably dead! I stumble to the coffee pot. I pour. I stir. I sip.

The world unfolds in technicolor majesty.

(You're out of the woods, You're out of the dark, You're out of the night. Step into the sun, Step into the light.)

I'm an ordinary mom. It's an ordinary day. (That's okay, right?) The Earth circles a sun in a spinning galaxy and I...I plug in my iPod and sing my heart out with Matt, Amy, and Emily as I take the yellow, bricked route to school.

I wear ruby-red lipstick all day long.

The Impossible Dream, Take Two (or, The Plague of Biblical Proportions)

FAIL. Epic fail on all fronts. No Fancy Nancy Party, no Extreme Room Makeover.

Waverly gets Strep on Tuesday. BOO.

I get Strep on Thusday. BOO. HISS.

Bridger gets Strep on Friday. BOO. HISS. ROAR.

I put away the paint brushes. I sequester all the new bedding and decorations for said room makeover. I call the parents of all the little fancies and tell them we are postponing the party by a week, as the plague has descended upon our house.

I call the CDC. We are quarantined in our home and our house is wrapped in plastic like that scene from E.T., you know, where NASA comes in to take E.T from Elliot? Helicopters rain Lysol from on high. The National Guard surrounds our house. Neighbors are evacuated to nearby suburbs.

The HOA is informed. (Shit.)

So I'm like, "God, umm...que pasa?" (I speak Spanish whenever I'm bacterially infected.) I'm totally a sinner and all, but what did my kids do to deserve this?

My suspicions that Waverly IS the Antichrist are confirmed.

Soon their are locusts. That's right, LOCUSTS! It doesn't take long for us to go through all the canned goods in the pantry, so we eat them. The locusts. They're crunchy.

So now I'm like, "Yo, God, what the fizzle, my Gizzle?" (I'm totally street by now, as I am jacked up on Azithromycin and Motrin which I am actually MAINLINING.)

At this, The Lord releases John--ONLY JOHN!--AND HE'S JUST JOHN POWELL NOT THE BAPTIST OR ANYTHING!-- from quarantine, NASA and the National Guardsmen. John does not hesitate and promptly goes to the beach to fish in a tournament and watch a boat race. (BOO. HISS. ROAR. THE CROWD RIOTS.)

"God. Damn. It." I say.

Bad call on my part. We are overrun by frogs. The kids think that they are cute. E.T. tries to set them all free. The dogs eat well.

At this point I'm ready to sacrifice my firstborn to placate this God whom I've apparently offended deeply. But I'm really crazy about my first kid. I search for a paschal lamb, but to no avail, as they are hard to come by in Cary and currently on backorder EVERYWHERE. I offer a pot of sunflowers and a bag of Reece's Pieces instead. The flowers die and the chocolate melts on the carpet.

Now it can't get worse, right? Right? Right? WRONG! In the course of dosing my kids with Amoxicillin (which I'm ridiculously allergic to) I somehow expose myself to this vile, bubble-gum flavored poison.

BOILS. DO YOU HEAR ME? BOILS!

(Actually, hives on my eyes and throat and a nose that gushes like the Nile but it may as well be boils because I'm F-ing MISERABLE. SERIOUSLY.)

I take a Benadryl. And now I'm like "glabble abble jarg boo dammkafarratiknon rep ping harpeleglegleglegl." (I speak in tongues when I take antihistamines). I begin to suspect that Pfizer accidentally sent out a batch of Rohypnol in place of my allergy medication when I stagger to the bathroom this morning and DO NOT SEE the glass French doors (that have been there since we built our house) that separate our bedroom from said bathroom and WALK DIRECTLY INTO THEM, smashing my forehead and knocking myself to the floor. FUCK.

Now I'm phoning home with my old Speak & Spell and hoping the Mothership will return and take me back to the Home Planet. No one comes. I am dying. I doubt I can fly my bicycle to the E.R. I have to send a sign to God and He doesn't seem to listen to retro toys manufactured by Texas Instruments. I need a lamb or something to sacrifice. There is some ground beef in the fridge but it's not very gamy and I can't get enough blood out of it to make any sort of offering.
I realize I will have to turn to The Snarky Neighbors for help. (Yes, THOSE Snarky Neighbors. The ones I challenged to a cage match last week when they suggested I take parenting classes.)

Turns out NONE of them has any spare lamb's blood I can borrow. I'm hoping red paint will do but I don't have any (who decorates with red anymore? That is SO Pottery Barn 2005.) So I take out my fave nail polish, OPI Chick Flick Cherry, and paint a giant X on the doorposts in hopes that the Lord will pass over us and spare us. Let my people go, right?

I'm not Jewish, but I'm hoping this works. And, since I have another whole week to get ready for Fancy Nancy Birthday Party, The Sequel, I now have time to map Waverly's entire genome so as to pass my findings on to the (adult) party guests as a prophylactic. Because one Antichrist is enough, yo.
I'll be right...here.

Letter to my Daughter

Dear Waverly,

Today is September 18^th, 2009. You are four years old today. My daughter, my miracle, this is your story.

When you were a tiny baby in Mommy’s tummy, I knew we would love you and I knew you would be special. You spent a great deal of your womb-time on the ocean and it will always be a part of you. You, too, are salty and deep, full of life, close and then distant in your tides, equally prone to storm and beauty.

I delivered you into this world like a powerful tempest. Our ship nearly sank in your birthing, and I fell asleep so that you would be safe. I let the winds pull you from me and lay you like a breath, like a whisper into Daddy’s waiting arms.

And then you were my baby at last. My daughter. You dreamed tiny baby dreams and gripped with your tiny baby fingers and you nursed until your belly grew round as the Earth.

Soon you walked. You became a toddler. You said words like “I love you,” and “Quiet!” and you called your brother “Bridger-Man.” You went to the Toddler House and made great friends and colored lots of pictures of yourself. You have always been particularly deft with a crayon.

Sometimes you got angry. You still do. We used to think you were a changeling, switched at birth with an adorable but malicious goblin. You still like fairy tales and story time is your favorite time of day.

You have style. Few people can pull off a tiara while driving a John Deere. Actually, you’ve always liked to dress up and be fancy. You especially like makeups and shopping with Mommy and Gri-Gri.

You love to swim and bathe. When your feet touch the water, you legs turn to fins with sparkling scales. You were born with eyes the color of the ocean. Now they are green like a mermaid’s tale.

You are loud--Siren song loud, battle-cry loud, loud as the voice of God, and as beautiful.

You dance everywhere you go.

You belly-laugh in your sleep.

So far, in your life, you have been a cowgirl, a queen, a witch, a cheerleader, a ballerina, a princess, a pumpkin, a hockey-player, a rock star, a bumblebee, a home-run hitter, and a kick-boxer. You have accomplished much.

Animals love you. The feeling is mutual. You are kindred spirits.

You love babies. You are gentle and quiet with them and it’s one of my favorite things about you. Someday you will be an amazing mother.

You fear nothing. You are the queen of superlatives: everything must be faster, higher, taller, bigger, louder. Even before you could talk, your first sign was “more.”

You are, hands-down, the best snuggler on the planet. And you give really good kissy-fests.

*

You tell fantastic stories. Few writers can connect pirates, Barbies, and tornadoes in a single plot line with any plausibility. Consider yourself gifted.

You sing with your entire being. You especially like show tunes.

We think someday that you’ll be an actress on the stage.

We’re sure someday you’ll change the world.

LOVE.

Mommy.

The Impossible Dream

It's THAT week. My Man of La Mancha Week. Waverly turns four on Friday, and in addition to throwing a Fancy Nancy party for twenty-something preschool girls and their mommies (those are fancy words for chaos), I'm planning an ambush makeover of her bedroom (in the hopes that she WILL START SLEEPING THERE.) So beginning today, I switch gears into what the dearest of my minions know as BECKY'S BIRTHDAY MODE. I become that irrepressible Don Quixote, dreaming the impossible dream. I will, while madly decorating, frosting, painting, and baking, morph into the Creature That Has Yet To Be Named, a wild amalgamate of Godzilla, Medusa, and Martha Stewart.

Why, you should ask, would I attempt this quest? (You should ask.) Am I trying to make up for my own wildly dysfunctional (that's a fancy word for crazy) childhood with dream parties and fantasy bedrooms? Am I desperately competing with the Other Moms? (YES. Here is the cake I'm making. Match that, bitches!)


OR, am I utterly, irreparably, manically neurotic? (Final answer.)

DING! DING! DING! DING!

(You win nothing.)

I have come to the conclusion that my cake-decorating, room-restyling, streamer-hanging neurosis comes from my utter frustration with my limited capacity to impose control over events or other people. Namely, Joe Wilson, Glenn Beck, and the stymied, hateful debacle over Health Care in America. (A fancy term for a basic human right.) A Rightable Wrong. A Reachable Star.

(Okay, so I promised myself at the inception of this blog that it would be a politic-free zone. However, in that this like all creations is endowed with the image and likeness of its Maker , I must and will hazard to interject my personal political beliefs here. )

(More on my recent crisis of Existentialism and The Reason I Started This Blog in the next post. I know you can't wait. NEITHER CAN I!)

So my thinking is that the so-called Compassionate Conservatives (an oxymoron and a misnomer), the so-called Christian Right, are more attached to their pre-tax income than the plight of 46 million Americans without health insurance, the millions of Americans who quietly struggle every day with a system that often works better for the health-insurance companies than it does for them, the 12 million Americans in the previous three years who were denied coverage because they had a pre-existing illness or condition.

"Not my problem," they say. "Why should I have to pay for it?"

LET THEM EAT CAKE!

And so, by God, at MY little girl's Fancy Nancy Party, we will. LOTS of it. In this room (which I will finish by Friday):


And we will be fancy and use LOTS of hand sanitizer (that's a fancy word for soap) in the case that any of the little fancies carries a case of H1N1, pneumonia, MRSA, or meningitis that could land any of us a bankruptcy-inducing hospital bill or, if we're uninsured, a dead child.

"And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star"

I'm getting out my paintbrush RIGHT NOW.

1st Grade Orientation

It was a moment in time in a galaxy not far away.

There was a choice to be made. An important choice. A choice that would determine whether 1st grade would be about learning to write cursive or whether it would be about self-actualization in the form of Jedi knighthood.

Bridger seemed a little uneasy about the new classroom, new teachers, new students and then...one of the boys broke out into the Star Wars theme song.

Ba ba ba bum, BUM, ba ba ba BUM bum, ba ba ba BUM, bum, bum bum bum bum

Recognizing the moment for its potential for male bonding, Bridger and several other boys joined in for the finish and a certain instant, glorious brotherhood was achieved.

The force was with them.

Long live boys.

Porn for Moms

From http://playgrounder.com: "If you thought there was no way for a man to get a new mom excited, you haven’t seen Porn for New Moms ($11). There’s nothing obscene here, just fun images of men fulfilling their exhausted partners’ true desires by folding laundry, changing diapers, and cuddling their kids. Humorous captions with phrases that are sadly unlikely to be uttered in real life, such as, 'You look hot in those sweat pants!', accompany each picture."

I'm hot and bothered just thinking about it.

Not being a new mom anymore, I'm thinking this book requires a sequel: Porn for Moms 2: Moms Gone Wild. Open the pages to see the tantalizing images of children getting on the school bus for the day, the Molly Maids car pulling into the driveway, and every imaginable position a pizza delivery boy can contort himself into while carrying dinner to the door. Accompanying each picture are such naughty quotes as "You look hot with that thick, glistening Nordstrom bag in your hand", and "Ooh baby I love the way your nipples look since you've breastfed two children. Would you like some alone time now?"

Who's your Mommy?

That's right.