Good-bye, Good Dog - January 10, 2009

Nothing jump–starts introspection like death. And because a blog is really exo-spection, I have missed all of you as much as the comforting swamp inside my own skull. So it’s good to be back, waders on and lamp aloft, the gurgle and crackle of life’s guts and debris underfoot, slogging forth.

My dog, Eena, is gone. I can’t believe it.

B had seen it coming for months but I dismissed his cautious warnings. In the last year she’d gone from lazy to listless. Her muzzle lengthened through a spreading mask of gray, and her once electric, black coffee eyes became rheumy. She seemed to experience sudden shots of pain through her hips and legs that she expressed in yelps and mortified winces. I saw all that as B did but attributed it to arthritis. What I ultimately could not deny were the accidents; this supremely housebroken animal had one, and then another, and so on, with increasing frequency and urgency. Afterward she would cower in the corner shaking, doubtless now, from pain. By the time blood became evident, her cancer was in full-throttle aggression. A sonogram at the animal hospital on York Avenue revealed that she was, according to the doctor, “in danger of sudden failure, because of the rampant tumors.”

I dragged my 57 pound Pit Bull off the examining table and onto my lap and she lay across me sweet as a baby. I thought I would choke from guilt. I would not say that the guilt gnaws at me like its own tiny cancer, because I don’t have that kind of gall, but it’s pretty bad in moments, and then I stab myself in the brain with a psychic hat pin because it’s just NOT about me. I treated Eena like a princess. But she suffered, bravely, quietly, without complaint, and I am sorry about that.

For myself, I just miss her. She was such a beauty. She had a great dog-smell; warm and musty and toasty, like pretzels. Silken ears. A pink chin. She had good breath, until the end. She was powerful and discerning and loyal as all hell. She saved me from a car-jacking once, and from loneliness often. We were really together, partners, best friends. It was a good love, fully returned, and worth everything.

Eena happened to also be a very fine ambassador for her breed, and she touched, and changed, hearts and minds. Many hands reached out and changed her, as well. So I want to thank everyone I can think of who was part of her life. Here we go:

My mother, who named her. “How about ‘Eena’? She looks tough, like a Russian.”

My father, who welcomed her, and me, into his home, and ultimately gave it to us. “The thing I liked about Eena,” he said, “is she showed that all that crap about breeds is bullshit.”

My sister, Lori, who always asked, “How’s Eeeeeena the dog?” and who spent a lot of that Christmas patting her.

My husband, who gave up his bitchy cat (although the cat managed to wind up living down the hall from us anyway) to make room in his life for a Pit Bull he frankly feared, then fell in love with. Eena often made overtures of marriage to B, which he gracefully declined without ever embarrassing her. B took all those beautiful pictures. He made the videos for me.

Aunty Judy and Uncle Neil, and Aunty Betty and Uncle Sol, and Cousin Flora and Cousin Harold, who never said ‘no’ to a visit from Eena in their lovely homes. And Aunt Miriam and Uncle Eli and all our other family and friends who let Eena into their hearts.

Grandma from California, a true Horsewoman who walked a New York City Pit Bull like she owned the place! And Grandpa who expected nothing less.

My x-husband, Killer, and Uncle Vic, who were delighted to receive Eena as a guest more than a few times, fed her liverwurst straight out of the open fridge and gave her full run of the yard with its near-gettable squirrels, squeaky clothesline, and cool garden dirt. She slept on their couch. Uncle Vic fed Eena the Pit Bull extra-large biscuits from between his teeth.

Killer’s sister Lisa who let her kids chase Eena around the house in circles, and around and around and around….laughing…

Carolyn and Jeff Ingledue, who get it about dogs and who brought the kids over to play on the last day, and who cried the night before.

Kelly Kay Griffith, who is afraid of dogs and never admitted it until well after she fell for Eena. Kelly treated Eena like a lady, as only a lady from the South would do.

Megan O’Connor, who also kept a secret, that she thought I was crazy to bring this dog home, and said graciously, “You both proved me wrong.”

Patrick Dillon, who believes that animals hold their own funerals, and who could not keep his hands off her, and who played “Bite-cha!” with Eena; Eena won. Patrick, I believe that the dogs sang for your cat. I never forgot it.

Kevin Fitzgerald, to whom it never occurred to be afraid of Eena, and who threw a tennis ball at McCarren Park higher and farther than Eena and I would ever have dreamed.

Cindy Intile and Emmalie and Peter, and Allison Searson and Abby and Olivia, who never blanched at a house full of dog hair.

Chris Ryan, who was always delighted to see Eena and didn’t make a big deal about it.

The entire neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant circa 2001, when I was the white girl, and Eena was that white girl’s dog, and no matter what they really thought, everybody was very, very nice. Hispanic old man who lived across the street from the basketball court, and who came out and joined us for coffee and fetch almost every morning and brought Eena rawhides, I’m sorry that we didn’t say goodbye.

Jessie O’Connor, who walked Eena all those nights I was coercing B into marrying me, and who had Eena off the leash in Travers Park, god help us, and fed her ice cream cones.

Ashleigh Hurwitz, who said, “I think a Pit Bull is a good dog for you… I mean, obviously.”

Joan Margiotta, who took allergy pills so she could visit and dragged her kids over, too. I still think Kate had a summer friendship with a Rotty when she was 1 year old, I did not dream this.

Nancy Caronia, who always shared the futon with Eena.

Candice and Rich and Max Polner, who not only took Eena for a long weekend but also chauffeured her home. Poor Rich believed Eena’s insinuations that she needed 6 walks a day, only to find out that the Pit he thought would look so cool with him was afraid of wind, rain, and garbage cans.

Everybody on Youtube with Pit tributes, who gets it. And all the single girls with Pits, who will never put a guy before their dogs. And everyone we ever met on the street, who testified about the goodness and nobility of the Pit Bulls they have known, and who stroked Eena and pet her and scratched her and saw her as she was and adored her on the spot.

And Dr. Cesar Tello, the veterinarian who told me the brutal truth about Eena, who believes in mercy and relief, and who crossed himself and wept with me at the very end.

Fuck You, Tina Fey, or, The Mother's Prayer, Interpreted

When Tina Fey’s book Bossypants (Little, Brown & Company, 2011) came out, I ignored it, because I’m sick of her. She is already ubiquitous and redundant, and her glammed-up cover photos for fashion magazines are uninspired; she can’t even be bothered to have her own style or wear a great suit, she just lets ‘em tart her up so she can sell, sell, sell.

She had an article in The New Yorker for Valentine’s Day called “Confessions of a Juggler,” (thank you, Inner Monoblog for the text!) that pretended to concern itself with the pressured life of the working mother (as opposed, apparently, to mothers who are in their homes watching television and dicking around all fucking day) but in reality was just Fey’s frantic, limited, and late-to-the-party realizations about the incongruence of Hollywood and contemporary motherhood. Her opening quip that “It’s less dangerous to draw a cartoon of Allah French-kissing Uncle Sam… than it is to speak honestly about this topic [of working moms]” was overwrought, not true, and in poor taste.

Her assertion in the New Yorker that she has “the same struggles as any working parent” is offensive not because, as she says, she “just happens to be working at [her] dream job,” but because she has a million, billion dollars, so she in fact does not have any of the same struggles as most working parents, whose chief struggle is almost always money and the unlimited tangential stresses there from. Fey’s children can have everything they want to eat, soccer and swimming and ballet and French, two pairs or ten pairs of shoes that fit, the school of Fey’s choosing, the Fire Island house and vacation and camp, therapy, play dates, nannies, and Fey and her husband get to go out in the evening as often as they would like. Does that lifestyle sound familiar? I thought not!

It’s gross for wealthy people to compare themselves to working class people. It’s revolting. And let’s not even parse that bit about how “large families have become a status symbol” of what people can afford. You can afford it, Fey, everybody knows that.

But it’s also a loutishly insensitive thing to say exactly because she is working at her dream job, which is qualitatively, psychologically, emotionally, profoundly different from working at a job that sucks. And it’s really different from being a working parent who has no job and is desperately searching for one. So, you know, I’m working up to Shut up, Tina Fey, at this point.

The rest of the article was non-compelling because Fey had nothing new to add to a conversation that is, I assure you, not dangerous; women of all ages, all over my neighborhood, all over Facebook, email, and the phone, talk about working outside the home and inside it, and why that’s like, stressful, in any combination, all the time. What is sad is how Fey’s lack of awareness of that just makes her look like she has no friends.

But let’s get to the point, to the Fuck You, Tina Fey.

As I say, I was determinedly ignoring her book when I stumbled on this great blog Kyriolexi while seeking out definitions of the relatively new term ‘neurodiversity’ for something else I’m writing. I quote:

So this? Is never okay.

“May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.” - Fey, in her stupid essay

It doesn’t surprise me that someone would say such a thing. Ignorance and victim-blaming abound whenever child abuse, especially sexual abuse, is discussed. I am, however, slightly appalled at the uncritical praise this essay is receiving all over the internet, with little or no acknowledgement of the deeply offensive nature of this line, which in one sentence summarizes, reinforces, and solidifies the stigma and pain felt by those who have been harmed by childhood sexual abuse, and the fear that can linger in the mind of even the most self-confident survivor: maybe this happened to me because there’s something wrong with me. -Kyriolexy

Huh? I said. What the hell is this about? I read through the rest of the post and found out. And then I read the piece, “The Mother’s Prayer..,” and I was disgusted, though I don’t know why I was even surprised.

Sexual abuse of children is, to say the least, never, ever funny; not ever. But I’m not writing about sexual abuse, it’s not my field, and what’s wrong with Fey’s “Prayer,” (ugh, ugh, ugh,) is not just the one line; the whole piece is offensive, and especially the word ‘damage,’ not only with regard to sexual abuse, but as it relates to all children who struggle, and who are marginalized, and in how Fey uses the word to perpetuate pariah-ism, making gobs of cash while she’s at it.

Tina Fey is shaking her moneymaker, and I don’t resent her that part of it; I want a book contract, too; wha, wha, wha! What I resent (and here I go, I’m gonna be a sanctimommy, I’m gonna judge,) is that Fey is making her money taking advantage of the very women she blatantly pretends, in the New Yorker piece, to have as her peers, and selling those women’s children down the river in the process. I’m a mother. I’m her age (or I’m older by like four or five years.) I have stood next to her and had a glass of crap wine on the dock at Fire Island because my cousin has a house there that I get to visit. But nobody looking at me and at Fey could guess that; you don’t know that I’m not rich, you just know that she’s famous, I’m not. She’s a cultural leader, it is painful to say. I’m as angry about this as I was when Oprah threw a fucking parade for James Frey’s awful, stupid, lying, badly written fake book. Women are looking to Oprah to see what to read, and they are looking to Fey to see what to think, and Fey is saying, Think privilege! Think discrimination! Think me, Me, ME!!!

I was shocked when a friend I often call The Philosopher Mom, who is among the most political, well-read, informed people I know (there are four of them) posted the piece on her Facebook page. But I was glad it was she, because she’s about the only person I know whose postings I can fire back at without reservation.

I responded:

Jessica Steiner Sorry, i still can't abide the "for it's the damage that draws the creepy soccer coach's eye..." which translates as, ‘better your broken kid than mine,’ mentality. Not to mention the mutually exclusive 'beautiful but not damaged,' based on the assumption that beauty is evidence and security and damage is for-never. Fuck Tina Fey. Sorry.

Then I added:

Jessica Steiner oh and BTW both my male and female children are beautiful AND damaged and EVEN rich people's kids are in danger of predators. [Hon,] i know you will not take this personally. thanks for the vent.

And then I learned that the husband of a woman I’d grown up with had killed himself.

How could this possibly be relevant? Stay with me.

I will call the woman Beth. I grew up in a youth movement by whose standards today I’d be considered Tea Party material. This organization thirty years ago, as I knew it, was a vibrant, insular group of about one hundred and twenty kids, teens, and young adults forming an ethically driven community around such radical ideals as sharing, helping, heritage, hiking, debate, discussion, folk dancing, pot smoking and arts and crafts. Participants who could claim Israeli parentage were considered both exotics and the real deal. Beth was one of those. When I knew her she was near legal drinking age, tan, chestnut haired, stocky, beautiful, whip smart, a gifted musician, cuddly, popular, and super responsible, plus she spoke Hebrew with a charming lisp; I loved her and was filled with seething jealousy of her at the same time. She was my summer camp counselor and one of the proudest days of my twelve year old life was when she let me wear her red carpenter pants and her white sweat shirt with the red heart on the front after Shabbat on an unseasonably chilly Friday night.

The information about Beth’s husband came to me through a friend who’d also grown up under Beth’s tutelage. I responded to her email that I felt a sense of sliding off reality. That nothing is what it seems. I had heard over the years that Beth had a wonderful, successful husband, and healthy, advancing children, a beautiful home, and was a person of stature in her professional field; I had believed that Beth’s life was perfect.

Why would I believe that of anybody? Because that’s what we’re all trained to believe; that life can be perfect.

Let me just get this out right now: fuck that.

I had just been discussing the privation and despair inherent in such vicious one-ups-manship as Fey is purporting, with yet another mom, a member of my support group, who has a son like mine. Though our two boys have different diagnoses, they are both high-strung, reactive, prone to harrowing, embarrassing outbursts. My son has Asperger’s Syndrome, Sensory Processing Disorder, and Anxiety, among other things.

This mom and I, we love our support group friends, and our non-support-group friends who are supportive, but mothering young boys with stress-induced behavior challenges is qualitatively different from parenting boys with other disabilities, and it is an experience that must be had to be understood. And we often, in spite even of each other, feel alone.

I realized, reminiscing about Beth, that I’ve always felt this way; alone. I’m a chronic outsider. The sensation has attached itself to my experience of mothering a boy who keeps me out of the mom-club, even out of the special-needs-moms-club, to some degree. Like, alone, aloner…

And when Philosopher Mom reposted that yammering, ham-handed, oafish, self-aggrandizing piece of bullshit by Fey that she’s trying to pass off as wit; I felt alonest.

Possibly worst of all, I also felt cosmically, swooningly bored, because I just can’t believe that Fey has nothing any newer or smarter or funnier (the “Prayer” is not, actually, that funny,) to say than what boils down to I’m pretending I think I’m lame so I can say how rich and awesome I am and you suckers all think I’m your friend!

What hurts is the way people throw around that word damage, and don’t care about my boy. What’s embarrassing is that at my advanced age, I still carry a paranoid fantasy that other people are perfect and happy and that I’m getting left out. Nevertheless, Fey’s sleazy, elitist, sub-par humor still smacks of desperate pandering to the in-crowd.

Philosopher Mom says I’m missing the point. On Fey’s use of the word ‘damage,’ PM said, “[Fey] may not have chosen super-consciously, but damage is a word that applies when something traumatic has happened to someone, not when someone has problems that arose from the genes.”

Despite PM’s assertion that predators look for psychic “chinks in the armor,” which I’m sure is right, and she’s in tune with Kyriolexi’s essay, to that extent, ‘damage’ is an orange-alert word on the disability radar; it bespeaks an attitude toward individuals as damaged goods, as second rate rejects, and I believe that Fey has a much more sinister, eugenic message in mind than PM has considered.

I believe this stupid excuse for satire is Fey saying, Ewe, there’s that damaged kid! I’m sure glad my kid isn’t that kind of loser! Come on over here, honey, so you don’t catch anything nasty, or ugly, or weakening! And everybody else just laughs and laughs…

Granted, others who responded to Philosopher Mom’s posting gave me my due; if they disagreed in that lighten up! kind of way, they were mild about it. One person disagreed with me but tempered it by ‘sending love,’ so as not to hurt any feelings. Which is fine. Nobody called me a C U Next Tuesday, so that’s good.

By the way, the best treatment right now of the topic of careless word hurling is Robert Rummel-Hudson’s Fighting Monsters with Rubber Swords: Just a word. Which is on www.schuylersmonsterblog.com so check that out.

Tina Fey's Fire Island house is around the corner from my cousin’s, which I visit with my family from time to wonderful time. I could very easily walk up to Fey and say, Your writing is bad. Your feelings are stupid. Your work is pretentious and offensive. Good-bye. And anyone could assume I'd do that out of jealousy; a dent in my reputation well worth it.

What I wonder, though, is what lurks inside a woman of Fey’s career and financial stature, that brings her so far down, that makes her so insecure she’s compelled to chatter on and on about presumed shopping trips to Hollister and slamming cab doors with indignation at her daughter’s future imagined sleights? As for that speculative business of “Architecht? Midwife? Golf course designer?” If Fey’s daughter grows up to be a dowdy woman in Wrangler jeans working at Home Depot, Fey will have to be put into a medically induced coma. All I can imagine on reading the “Prayer” is Fey, standing in her office, sticking her fingers in her ears and screaming LA LA LA LA LA LAAAAAA (rather like my Autistic son, actually,) so the mean voices of reality won’t get in and tell her the bad news; that none of us actually has a direct line to God and nobody knows what is in store for their child, no matter how many grapes we cut up, no matter where we shop, no matter how hard wish that nothing will fuck up our lives.

I’d like to walk over to Fey on the dock and be like, Really? This is all you've become? Just the same kind of stuck up idiot who crapped on you in junior high?

And then I’m like, Maybe when I see Fey I will just run up to her and breathe in her face and yell FAILED WRITER GERMS! FAILED MOTHER GERMS! MIDDLE CLASS VIRUS! In fact maybe I’ll tell my Autistic kid to go give her perfect, in-tact kid’s elbow a good, gross lick.

Alas, compare and despair, as Stuart Smiley used to say. It does not make me feel better to know that Beth has officially experienced cosmic proportion loss, nor would it gratify me if heartbreak happened to Fey. It doesn’t level the karma or balance the scales because I am not tallying up like that. The truth is that I am happy. I’m crazy about my son exactly as he is even when his struggles defeat my best efforts, I gaze upon and relish my daughter who will not grow out of this family unscathed, I’m in love with my husband, we have enough money, blab la blab la blab la. I just want something out of all this.

I feel like it’s best to assume that everybody has terrible shit in their lives, even people who really, really seem not to, who seem untouched by hardship. Not because it will make me kinder; I don’t want to be kinder, I don’t care about that. I guess I just want to be less horrified, less shocked. I would like things to make sense once in a while. I would like Tina Fey to use her savvy and her humor and her influence for good, and enlightenment, not for sucking the dick of the status quo, and certainly not for making other mothers feel like shit. I would like to wish Tina Fey well. I’d like to respect her. She has to respect me first, though, because I’m supposed to buy the book to pay for the house on Fire Island.

But for $26.99? Fuck you, Tina Fey.

What's Good

M smells like pee in the morning, his own sweet pee, vaguely of breast milk, musky, distinctive as rain. His diaper's got to weigh 5 pounds. But his hair still smells like soap from last night's bath, his breath as clean and clear as tears. He is compelled to cry on waking up, no matter what, it seems; a noise that arches like a cat's back, snapping the morning into broken pieces and I crack awake to it.

"Noo-ooo!" is the first thing out of him, then a sob, then pitifully, in the dark, "mommy..."

"Sh! SH! SH!" I hiss. "I'm coming to you! Don't wake up the baby!" and I fight my way out of bed, instantly cold and sorry for myself. I pull him out of his crib clutching Bluey the blanket, and I take his quilt for me. We assume the position in the nursey chair, and I hastily wrap the little quilt around my shoulders while he tucks Bluey around his own body, laying on his side across my lap, mouth open, waiting for the booby, and blump, there it is. It seems to fall out of my pajamas these days without even being asked.

Eyes closed, he latches on with quiet relish, one hand delicately holding the ribbony edge of Bluey and stroking it a little with one finger, while in the other hand he keeps his binky, at the ready to replace the boob when he's finished. I feel his body settling into mine, and my body, into the chair, curving around him, warming up under the little quilt and M's skin, weight, heat.

The light outside starts to change; I've no idea what time it could be, but make out, squinting through a camouflage of random baby socks, nearly 6, on the digital clock. It's perfect. He's sleeping later these days, 6 is a luxury; but it's still early enough that I don't have to transfer him back into the crib and start the day right this minute. I stay where I am, drop my chin to my chest, and doze off with him, inhaling him, relieved, and greatful.

Half an hour later, he's still deeply asleep, and I decide to risk all this peace for a major indulgence; would he stay asleep if I carefully deposit him back in his crib, would they all stay asleep long enough for me to watch the news and eat a bowl of cold cereal.... all by myself?

I sneak my arms under his shoulders and hips and gingerly lift him up, then over the side of the crib and in, laying all 35 pounds of him out as gently as if he were 3 weeks old. I tuck Petey-Pie Penguin under Bluey, and M's arm creeps out to pull Petey even closer; he presses himself down into the mattress. My good boy. My beauty boy. For a moment I consider getting in the crib with him; B has done it, it's a good crib.

I want the news. Even for just ten minutes, I'll take a traffic report, weather, anything.

But as I tip-toe toward the door, Little H stirs; she only moves in her sleep if she's about to wake up. I wait, foot in the air; maybe not this time? Maybe she'll just shimmy a little and burrough back in?

"Wheeeeee," she croons, pitched just like a kitten, and without opening her eyes she sits right up in her gigantic big-girl crib, lower-lip protruding in insult, her face hot, smelling of camphor and sunflower lotion, her cheeks red and velvety. I scoop her up quickly, tuck a binky back in, and deposit her into the big bed alongside B, and cover her up.

Shirtless and stretched out for miles, his long, curly, mauvey-gray hair fanning across the blue pillow, the dawn light on him, he looks like a rock star; I poke him. He opens one blue, confused eye. I point at Little H, who is just about back to sleep next to him, laying on her side with her nose in his neck. I touch my finger to my lips. He nods, and crosses an arm over her, draws his legs up a little to make a bumper of his body. She works her binky for a moment, then lets out a little foal-whinny, the binky falling out, her little lips breath in angelic o's.

I look at them.
I turn and look at M.
My goodies. My goody darlings. They are so good, all three. How lucky I am. How the sight of thier faces feels like a kiss on my heart, on the real inside of my body.

I step out of the room on the floor's sweet spots that don't creak, and close the door all the way. I continue to walk lightly into the kitchen as if for good measure. There is my favorite cereal, cereal being my single favorite food in the world. This particular one looks just like dog food, but it's so crunchy and yummy. I could eat it a box at a time. I pour a huge bowlful and drown it in milk, I pick out the good spoon, and take a big, cold, delicious bite. I crunch and crunch, and munch along into the living room.

And who greets me there but my sad-sack Pit Bull, ears pressed back to her head in welcome, twisting onto her back in the big chair where she lay, her smooth, white, ropey-muscled chest open for my hand, her flat head upside down on the armrest, pink chin in the air, her rhumey eyes say, 'I am good, you know, I am. Give me something...'

I set down my bowl, kneel, and press my cheek to her chest, rubbing her side hard with the back of my hand as if starting a fire. I kiss her pink, musty old dog chin. I deposit one ring of cereal into her yellowing sabre-toothed chops. Her tail thuds consistently against the upholstery.

"Can I eat my cereal?"
'Ohh, all right.'

It's light out now, but softly so. I open the blinds, and turn on the tv; news. Luscious news. Hillary is ahead. A healthy baby girl was born in the Midtown tunnel and will be named Hector. No one died in any of the night's shootings. The market closed up. The Grand Central is wide open coming in and out of the city right now, and the forecast has a spot of rain for the morning, but otherwise, looks good.

Fuck 'em If They Can't Take A Joke

Apparently my last couple of postings scared the crap out of everybody; and I thought it was comedy! Whoops! But the flood of concerned emails has been downright heartwarmimg. Here are a few faves.

Mommy-pal Kiersten gets Babyweekly, an e-newsletter that had this mind-boggling wisdom to offer on stressful moments, and she forwarded it to me thusly;

“I thought you’d get a kick out of this."

There's a reason parenting is called the toughest job in the world, and everyone has bad days. But if you feel as if you are at the end of your rope or you might take your frustrations out on your children, take a break. Put your child(ren) in a safe place (such as the crib) and take a moment to calm down. Have a friend or relative stay with them while you visit friends, sleep, take a hot bath, or go to the gym-whatever will help you recharge. Even a 30 minute walk around the neighborhood can do wonders for your state of mind. Reach out to others if you are at your wit's end-never take your frustrations out on your child.

Amazing, Kiersten and I agreed, how it’s all so simple!

NOT!


I also got this concise and compassionate note, which I loved, from the wise and stylish Cousin Flora, a nodding, knowing….

“Ah yes, I remember those days….hang in there.”


From my devoted once-and-future shrink Ruth:

“I’ve been following your blog. Listen, Super Mom, or Super Jew, or whatever it is you’re trying to do over there; how about coming in for a few sessions?”


And finally, my favorite, from Fabulous Friend Kelly Kay Griffith, regarding Chapter 5, the car-screaming-episode:

“Jesus Christ. Are you alive?”


I have the nicest people! My kingdom for a podium at which to stand and wring the hem of my ball gown as I look with dewey eyes upon you all, proclaiming, “You like me! You really like me!”

Meanwhile, I am making arrangements for the fates of my detractors, the worst of whom is a relative who called Papa the Red to insist that Minky appears to be “overwhelmed” and “having problems,” and who FAILED to call Minky directly to offer support, or perhaps a few hours of free baby sitting (you see, the trouble with advice articles is REALITY,) that Minky might go and have a hair cut or a cup of coffee and a newspaper or, heaven forefend, an evening out with poor old B. No… that was not offered. Only belittlement and superiority were offered. So helpful!

NOT!

But more to the point; any parent who asserts that they have never had something comparable to the afternoon of screaming I had with M, or a bout of clop-cup-en-vant such as was caused by the nightly game of Musical Sleep Deprivation that went on here, is either:

High
Drunk again
Not taking care of their own kids
Or
Lying.

But who cares about them, especially when I have the champ that is Papa in my corner, whose response to the relative was:

“You don’t understand. She’s not writing to complain. She’s writing to tell the truth. She’s writing to tell other mothers how it really is, and to not be alone.”

I could stand up clapping and do one of those cool, macho, long whistles right now, or in lieu of that, I could hoot like TV talk show audiences do; “Whoooo-hooo!” I say to Papa, “Tell it, Mister! Tes-ti-FY!”

I LOVE that man.

And as for the arrangements; I’ll probably go with this week’s special at my x-husband’s drive-thru contract service, ‘Bludgeon King.’ They get it done with your choice of a marble ashtray, Cricket bat, or my all time favorite… I love writing this almost as much as saying it… the Ball-Peen Hammer.

THAT’S A JOKE. THAT BUSINESS DOSEN'T REALLY EXIST.

Christ!

Life With M, Chapter 5

We went to the beach with Papa, and probably shouldn’t have; it’s awfully hot outside. M and Little H’s cheeks turned a near-pulsating red within minutes of setting up our spot there. But I had promised M, and Papa, and couldn’t bear to reneg. They’d have forgotten about it eventually, but I couldn’t have tolerated the guilt, or the boredom of another long, long, sweltering afternoon.

They three sleep most of the way back and wake up in foul moods on Queens Boulevard. We drop off Papa and begin to search purgatory for a parking space; we circle, and circle, and I start to get jittery for caffeine and a snack; it had been too hot to eat lunch.

M and Little H are hungry, too, and need a drink. “Bwown dwink,” M announces, meaning chocolate milk. “Bwown dwink. Bwown dwink.” Little H just whimpers for a nurse.

“We will definitely get a drink at home, guy, we just have to park our car. Try to be patient,” I say, deliberately leaving no room to negotiate.

“Bwown dwink,” M insists. “Bwown dwink! Bwown DWINK!” He wants it right now, but he’s playing, too, his tone teasing.

“We’ll have it upstairs,” I say, seemingly unable to control my compulsion to answer every utterance he makes. It’s not a discussion, he has to wait, so why can’t I shut up?

“Bwown DWINK! Bwown DWINK! Bwown DWINK!” he yells, grinning in panicky sadism; he doesn’t believe me. Why? “Bwown DWINK! BWOWN DWINK! BWOWN DWINK!”

I hit the brake and turn to the 5:30 position, steadying myself by grabbing M’s car seat, and not M’s arm. “Please stop saying it, sweetheart, mommy’s trying to park the car and then we will go up and have the drink. Can you please wait quietly?”

“Yesh.”

“Thank you,” I say, and hit the gas a little, continue to search for a space, my fingers tapping the wheel because I know it’s coming-

“BWOWN DWINK! AAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!” M screams in mania, mouth open and smiling with cruel glee. “AAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!” he screams again, this time so loud that Little H bursts into terrified tears, and I yell out in shock from the actual pain of noise slicing through my skull.

I pull over with a screetch and turn abruptly again to grab the car seat, all in slow motion; my rage at his screaming shoots down through my arm and the impulse to finally, just this once, slap him, is powerful; I don’t do it. I know I won’t. But I feel like I could.

Nevertheless I let out a bellow of anger so loud and alien I’m not sure it’s come from me at first; I sound like a man. I stop us all cold. M is momentarily stunned, and looks at my reflection in his backward-facing car seat mirror.

“STOP THAT SCREAMING! KNOCK IT OFF OR YOU GO RIGHT IN THE CRIB ALL ALONE FOR THE REST OF THE DAY. I MEAN IT!”

I don’t mean it, but the standoff is quiet, and I seem to have gained leverage. None of us move. After a moment, M’s frightened face relaxes, he smiles, laughs at me, and screams again. I put the car in park and bang my head on the steering wheel 17 times. Little H cries and cries.

“I quit,” I mutter, and pretend that it’s so, just for this moment. I am totally at sea. I’ve lost my way. I have no idea what to do with us now. But a parking space opens up, and I take it. I don’t say another word. M screams a few more times, looking for my hilariously angry expression in his reverse-view mirror, but I don’t engage him. I start to unpack the car, yanking out the double stroller and smacking it against the curb, it springs open with a flourish, hanging toys and cup holders flopping brightly out like flowers from a top hat. Diaper bag over the right handle, my mini knapsack purse over the left, M’s sandals in the bottom basket, smash the towels in there, too; the plastic bag of wet bathing suits and the beach toys can cook in the damn car for the rest of the hot afternoon for all I care right now. Fuck it.

I go around and extract weeping Little H from her deep car seat, and immediately she begins to calm down. I love her so. She is so sweet, so good natured, so passive; I wish I could protect her from this, whatever it is that goes on between me and M. “I’m sorry,” I whisper into her peachy ear, and I bounce her gently around for a moment before laying her back in the rear of the double stroller.

M watches all this closely and on his face I see a new confusion. “Boobee,” he says sweetly, trying a different tack. “Mommy,” he goes on, smiling at me. “Mommy mommy, boobee. A bink a bink, see mommy, go upstas, pway, mommy pway? Wead books!”

As I pull him from his car seat he gives me kisses on my chin and neck. I kiss him back one time, and sit him in the stroller’s driver seat, and I crouch, and look him in the eye. “You know that the rules are no hitting, no pushing, and no screaming. When we go upstairs, you’ll have a time-out in the crib, because you screamed. Got it?”

He nods, and looks away.

In the elevator, Little H falls asleep again. And inside the apartment, I leave them both in the stroller for a moment so I can pee in peace. I splash cold water on my face, take a deep breath. I undo M’s stroller straps and let him out for a moment. As I turn to take my beach shoes off, he runs around the open back of the stroller and slaps Little H on the head. She screams, and cries, and I shout, “That’s it! That’s it. TIME OUT!” He was getting it anyway, how do I make it mean more? I yank his binky out of his mouth and throw it on the floor.

I stick him in the crib and go back to the stroller, scoop out Little H, rock her on the sofa till she’s calm, meanwhile M cries like hell.

I nurse Little H, while M cries. I change her diaper. I set her up sitting in her Boppy with a baby video to watch and a heap of little toys. I wash M’s binky, and go back to him.

“Bink!” he demands on sight of it, still crying.

“You can have your binky when you say sorry to me for hitting and screaming.”

“No! Bink!” he says, and cries again. We go around and around with this for a while, I leave once or twice, he cries more, I come back, and eventually we get it together.

“Sowwy, mommy.”

“Okay,” I say, and we make it up with hugs and kisses and a bit of boob. We talk it over. “I’m sorry that I yelled at you,” I tell him. “We both have to work on keeping our voices down. Let’s both try to be quiet like butterflies, for the rest of the day, okay? And gentle.”

“Buddafwy,” he says, leaning exhausted against my chest.

“I love you,” I tell him, and he nods. “Pway,” he says, and climbs off my lap, runs out to the living room, and I’m after him like a shot, because I just feel in my bones what’s about to happen, but I don’t make it in time, and as I careen around the corner into the room, he smacks Little H on top of her head, she lets out a shriek of insult and pain, I lunge for him, and we start the whole goddamn thing all over again.

Life With M, Chapter 4

I sit on the playground bench next to my pal, a Russian grandpa who takes care of his granddaughter all day. The granddaughter, a little older and a little taller than M, is ‘sharing’ his trucks; meaning the two have been peaceably dividing the trucks between them for about twenty minutes and are now eyeballing each other in preparation for a good cathartic fistfight. M grabs, the Russian girl swings and lands one truck on M’s head, he shoves back, snatches away the truck of contention and comes flying at me in dismay, and I open my knees and fold him back into my body, my arms all around him, his yowls muffled in my sand-bag breasts. I hold him.

He should defend himself, but this time he really started it. “Why did you grab that truck from her?” I ask him. “You have enough. You were sharing so nicely.”

“NO-O!” says M, up into my face, as if I’m missing the point, and I probably am.

“Okay,” I say, “but we brought a lot of trucks. That’s your friend. Can you play some more?”

“No,” M says, burying his face in my thigh now, and anyway the grandpa is prying trucks from the little girl’s hands and getting ready to leave. My heart falls, and I imagine the grandpa to be disappointed in me, for some reason. I like this friend for M, she gives him a run for his money. She cries angrily and stamps her foot. M watches. I can’t tell if he cares.

“I’m sorry,” I say to the grandpa as he steers her away.

“No worry,” he says, “see you.”

Little H, busily chewing a velour duck till now, starts to cry.

Life With M, Chapter 3

We’re in the playground, as usual, M, Little H, and I. It’s beastly hot outside, so we leave our beast, the dog, behind at home. It’s also late, after 6, and B will be home soon enough to take the poor old thing out (not me, the dog!) for a drag around the block.

Just now is when the playground becomes approachable again. The sun is setting in earnest, and the treeless place titrates down a few degrees. People come out of the brickwork, spilling from lobbies and rolling strollers up service ramps of bulging apartment buildings all around. Kids swarm in, mothers drag behind with thier limp hair and perspiring smiles, fathers with loosened ties and sweaty suit jackets flap down the block to meet them. The playground comes back to life.

“Ice-ee twuck! Ice-ee twuck!” shouts M, pointing. Doodl-y doodle-y, doo-doo-doo, the monkey chased the weasel…

“You’re late,” I say to the ice cream guy, kidding around. “Gimme a flying saucer, I’ll pay ya tomorrow.”

“Why you so nice to me, lady, hah?” he says curtly, kidding too and handing over the treat.

“Pity,” I say. “Really, tho, I ran out without-“ but he dismisses me, saying, "Go, go, mommy..." My credit is good and he’s got a line of hot little hands waving crumply bills at him.

I pirouette back to M who is strapped into the stroller, waiting for the flying saucer, which I pass over his head, making space ship noises, "Zhhhhhhnnnnnnnnnnrrrrrmm! BEEP! BEEEP! BEEP!"

“Ice-ee, ice-ee!” he says, breathing fast and reaching out for it, kicking his legs with excitement like he used to do on sight of B coming through the door at the end of the day. The treat is barely out of the wrapper as M reaches up, high now, his arms are getting long, and grabs it from my hands, starts nibbling away at the black, damp cookie part, licking the white ice cream investigatively, touching it to the tip of his nose and then looking at me, eyebrows raised, as if to say, 'Ice-cream-nose; does it work on me?'

I slurp the middle of his face and he shoves me away; I’ve gone to far, gooney mommy that I am. I sit on a bench, relishing the sitting, watch kids fly around with their ice creams. Little H sleeps in the back of the stroller, her round, pink face hot and peaceful. M eats.

And then is distracted. A bigger kid has run by and caught his eye, a girl, 5 or 6, pretty and birdlike and boney and definitively un-American looking, with golden colored skin and light hair, as if she has been to the beach, or camping. She has hazel eyes and large, gray-white, crooked teeth, an open-mouthed but cautious smile. She wears purple cotton pants, dirty white sandals, a ‘Dora’ t-shirt, the ubiquitous uniform of little girls, but there’s a sophistication to her face, her posture, something harder, something of memory. She has only one hand.

“Wha-SAT?!?” M shouts, pointing at the stumped, waxy wrist. “Wha-SAT! Wha-SAT!” He demands to know, eyes bugging out in alarm.

‘That happens?’ I imagine him thinking, ‘You knew about this, mommy? Where the hell is that kid’s HAND?’

Landmines, I imagine, but say nothing, of course. She has already seen us, the girl, and she pushes her little sister on a swing, steady as a metronome, watching us, the little sister a baby version of herself, in tact.

Can my eyes speak for me at all? I try carefully and hard to smile the right way at the girl, to convey to her that she is lovely and unusual and strong. But in his outrage, M drowns my silent admiration out.

“Wha-SAT?!? Wha-SAT?!?” His pointing finger, like his father’s are, long, articulated, practically scorns.

“Let’s go see,” I say. There has to be a way in.

We roll on into the swing area and M climbs over the stroller bar as I mop off him with wipes the last of his flying saucer. Shoeless and shirtless, all frayed, uncut blonde hair and tan limbs, he could almost be the middle brother to these girls; but he’s more primal than they, and fatter. M grips the bottom of the swing next to the baby sister and hangs from it. I pull and push him up into it properly while he gives the bigger girl a side-eye; up close, he’s not so blatant, not so brave. But he’s still looking, and he’s looking at me, too, and she’s looking at me, and I don’t have the answer or even the right question.

“I like your 'Dora' shirt,” I say to the girl, synchronizing our pushes. I pat my shirt front, then point to hers.

“No,” she says kindly. No English, she means. Then we all four look straight ahead instead of at each other, and keep swinging.

There is no way in.

FOR INFORMATION ON LANDMINE INJURIES TO CHILDREN AND HOW YOU CAN HELP, CLICK ON MY UNICEF LINK