So... You Have Cancer Again

That's pretty much how the conversation started with my cousin.

Sooo... we're back with this fuckity-fuck crap again huh? Back to this shit? Back to small talk about drugs we love-slash-hate and about lame (totally not-fierce) hospital decor. We'll be talking about the Sox or Britney soon enough to make sure everyone else knows we can still talk bullshit, no matter what. Back to being who we were a year and two weeks ago, and who it seems we are now.

She says to me, "So, my parents just left. I am at work -- you know, pretending that everything is normal and that I didn't just get a large dose of what I like to call Hitchcock's poison into my body. I know what I will need from you, if and when the time comes and it gets harder: I need you to be you, and step into the role that we both have to play. The strong, mother to all, everything will be great role..."

Yeah, I know that role I think, just like she knows her role: the punk rock, in your face, fuck cancer girl, I am bald and beautiful girl, the one who holds your hand as much as you are holding hers, who holds it longer and tighter to make sure that you know: she's OH KAY.

We have our roles, she and me.

Together we share this (secret) comraderie to make sure things are okay for everyone else. It is not selfish. It's because we both know that when we do it -- it makes things better for her. So we'll do it again, because it works. And when the big facade fades, she always knows where to go to cry.

She is only 23 but I learn a thing or two from her.

She says, "I think we know the routine," and I answer her invisibily with a nod.

"We get thru this shit," she says.

And so we do. So we will.

The Results are In

This:




Not this:




YAY!

Good Mother Club

Just to make absolutely sure that no "Good Mother Club" existed, I googled it and this was the first image on the list.

Which makes me feel ridiculously, entirely better.

X-Ray 20/20 Hindsight

Six weeks ago, give or take, R fell onto her forearms. No one knows how or where exactly, except that it was in Florida while a parent was not present and likely from a golf cart. There were shenanigans involved for sure and thus no confessors, but there were also no tears and so the entire incident was filed away, and by all involved, forgotten.

Except that she's complained about the arm ever since then, though sporadically. It's her left and she's a righty, but it hurts when she hurls baseballs or shoots pucks or gets nailed in the sore spot with a soccer ball. It hurt for a while when she picked up heavy items with her sore arm, or when she gripped something too hard. She never woke from sleep in pain, but it was a nagging complaint, on her physically and on me and That Man mentally: what to do?

School nurse confirmed that tendonitis was highly unlikely in a child her age (6) and suggested ice and ibuprofen, which I did when she would mention it was feeling especially bad and also stopped moving long enough to do so. It never seemed to effect her energy level or willingness to engage in sports or rough house play, but I did notice that sometimes, she seemed to be defending it when she ran or jumped or threw or shot. Maybe she was doing it subconsciously, just as I was able to see it, wonder about it, and move on.

Finally, today the suns and moons aligned and her "maahhhmmm, my arm hurts" happened while in the car and near the doctor's office. Short visit, quick yet thoughtful exam, and off we were sent to the hospital for x-rays. He said something about "making sure it's not a zebra," which maybe has some medical implication but more likely I think it was his way of saying, if it quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck...

I am also pretty sure he said, "six weeks? really?"

Tomorrow we get the results. I am as close as a woman in possible denial can be that it is not a fracture; I am leaning toward ligament injury or something like that. Or really bad growing pains? In one arm? But if, IF her arm is broken, even a little bit? Well then.

Well then. Do they flog mothers like me for offenses like this? Do I get blackballed from the Good Mother club? (Is there a Good Mother Club? I seriously hope not.) But really now, I mean: arrrgh. Ugh. Oops.

Could I, could I have really missed a broken arm?

Best Game Ever

ImprovEverywhere strikes again. Happy day after opening day.

Jump Rope

I am signing up my girls for a Jump Rope class.

My father, the atheist, who has just re-read the New Testament (for kicks), thinks this might be a sign of The End; this and the third graders plotting their teacher's murder. Since I don't remember anything of the New Testament and as I am the only one who hasn't heard the story of the murderous third grade gang, I guess I'll just go with him.

It IS pathetic that there a classes for jump rope. Didn't we all just learn those games in the school yard or in the driveway? Was I supposed to teach that...too? I can hold the rope for them, and they can hold it for each other, but there are rarely enough kids around in my kids' backyard to make these basic games happen for real. Too many of them are too busy with classes of other kinds. So, what's next? Will there be semesters to teach Pickle, Spud, or Statue?

My girlfriend says of the Jump Rope class, "Maybe they'll bring what they learn to the playground."

Maybe they will and that's what sold me on the idea entirely.

Not to mention, I can't teach jump rope. I demonstrated it to my girls about 6 months ago and thought I might have a heart attack. I thought I might lose one or both of my boobs and felt my brain ACTUALLY SMASH into my skull.

NEVAH AGAIN, I said, NEVAH. This is the sport of breast-less children.

I do however have some interest in renewing my love of Chinese Jump Rope: the extra big stretchy cord we wrapped around our ankles and a partner’s while a third “jumper” engaged in elaborate tangles, getting caught up and then escaping in one wickedly cool flow.

That's the cerebral kind of jump rope I'm game for now, with less threat of boob loss. My flat-chested (for now) beauties, those backyard girls: I'm giving them double-dutch.

For That Man Far Away

I remember.

It's For the Children (I Swear)

After the crazy auction busy-ness of the last week, I decided that today would be all about being Fun Mom. That Man is in Hollywood for the week (surely spotting a variety of reality TV stars that will have me in a tizzy), so the timing was right for us four to re-bond. I promised them an awesome day out, so after a little tidying up (as always, bribery worked), the house was squared away, vacuumed even, and we loaded out.

Stopped by a few friends' houses, had a "fancy" lunch (at the Mall) and hit the movies for "Horton Hears a Who." I admit to getting a little post-feast sleepy, but there were fine parts to the flick, cute ones and funny ones and all three of those kids were completely engrossed -- no kicking of the seats in front of them, no begging for treats, all good. At one point in the movie, a mob is out for Horton (who they perceive as a threat to the community belief system) and the jungle animals are chanting in G-rated violent fury, "It's for the children! For the children!"

I got the joke -- and after all the ways the auction affected me and my family, I wonder if maybe the joke was intended for me.

I took my kids out today because I have virtually neglected them for a week (or more, dare I say). I covered their basic needs -- mac and cheese, sleep, boo-boo kissing -- but more often than not, I was asking them to wait, to hold on, clamoring for ONE MORE MINUTE. The Giant Four Year Old sees papers on the counter, decides not to draw on them, and says to the air, "Fer da auction" but hours later, while his mom is on the phone (again), uses a pencil to decimate an entire cabinet door. B awakes me on the day of the event with "Happy last day of the auction!" which I know she is saying to the both of us. R does her best to do her best because she is a lay-low kinda girl and it seems sensible for her not to rile me now. These little moments, upsetting at best, kicked off the mantra for me: this is all for them, this is "FOR THE CHILDREN."

And I know it is, I do.

So when I skipped folding laundry for 10 days straight, and when That Man gently reminded me that all we had to eat was hard-boiled Easter eggs (and only pink ones), I took it with the "it's all gonna be worth it and I'll be back to normal when it's over" attitude. As if normally, there is always a healthy nutritious meal on the table, never a washing machine mildewing clothes that someone has forgotten to dry, always well-behaved children singing songs in a circle with a well-meaning Mother who has just finished making their clothes out of old curtains and tidied up the flash cards she created from recycled cereal boxes.

At lunch today, each of them in such delighted delight to be there with just me (and with cloth napkins to boot: ooh la la, and with a movie in a movie theater in their future), I felt so entirely redeemed. Maybe I was right! Maybe now that the auction was over, I would return to the former self I figured must be lurking somewhere. Maybe I was the mom I imagined I was when I'm not doing all this other stuff.

Then B said, "Mommy, you have no meetings this week!", and I lied with an emphatic yes, yes, isn't that great (as it seemed the wrong time to bring up the one I did have) and, all excited about this good news, R chimed in with, "Now you can just listen about presidents and look at the computer!"

Oh! Yes! THAT.

Point taken.