Amy at Amy’s Gripping Commentary!

Of what, you may ask?

Why, Three Cups of Tea, of course!  

Yeah, yeah…I drew a winner for this fabulous book a few days after the May 1 contest deadline, but kind of forgot to announce it. Blame pregnancy brain, will ya?

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My week is *finally* looking up, now that Sweet Cheeks is back from a 4 day business trip to Texas, and can give me a little middle-of-the-night relief from Pitter duty. (I’m not even going to dignify Pitter’s Wednesday night performance with a separate post–but I must mention that it included no more than ONE two-hour stretch of sleep for me and inexplicable whining or screaming for most of the night resulting in my inability to work on Thursday because I was so stupidtired.)

This weekend there’s a fair amount of fun activities going on about Indianapolis, including the Zionsville Country Market and the Cystic Fibrosis Walk I’m doing Sunday. I may even drag the boys to the Broad Ripple Arts fair. Plans are always good.

What do you have going on?

It’s been five weeks since Pitter last nursed, and for days–weeks even–he doesn’t mention it at all. And then there are the more sentimental days when he seems to remember. I talk around the topic a bit, telling him that nee nees are for babies now–that Brother will have them when he is born. Pitter seems to accept this, but some mornings, after whining that he’s “all done” with sleeping, he cries for his “nee nees! nee nees.” It’s enough to break my heart, although I don’t miss nursing in. the. least.

Sweet Cheeks is away on business this week. Pitter’s response to his absence are daily reminders that “Daddy makes BIG poops. BIG poops!” and that “Daddy’s car [is] at work.” Yes, the male obsession with bowel movements and cars offically begins around age 2, it seems.

And while Sweet Cheeks is away, Pitter has the opportunity to see me naked more often when I get dressed. This brings up the third major male obsession: breasts.

“Nee nees!” He says ecstatically upon the sight of my naked torso.

“SEE them!” His face beams. “Ooohhhh! Nee NEES. TOUCH them? TOUCH nee nees?” He says this as if he hasn’t been smashed against them for the majority of his brief life.

I relent, because he has had a long relationship with them, and whatever–it’s not sexual or anything.

What does the touching entail? A poke with his finger and a maniacal laugh, as if he’s just gotten away with something truly evil.

When I put my clothes on he starts to cry. “SEE THEM. SEE MY NEE NEES!”

I tell him he can see them later.

He usually takes me up on the offer, insisting that I flash him for a peep once or twice in the afternoon. Sometimes he wants to snuggle up against them. But he does not try to nurse, so we are definitely not regressing entirely here. And he seems to be clear on the next concept:

“Nee nees for brudder. No sistah, brudder.”

We’ll see how this plays out once “brudder” is actually here. I have visions of Pitter throwing poops and small cars at the poor little guy when he sees that his nee nees are truly no longer “MINE!.”

Didn’t think it was possible, did you? 

It’s worse than Valentine’s Day. It’s worse than birthdays. In fact I may ban its celebration entirely–in my honor, anyway–not for my own mother or all the other mothers on the planet. 

I didn’t want jewels or gifts or a giant fuss and I didn’t want to be Queen for a Day or have Sweet Cheeks and Pitter at my feet. I didn’t make specific requests for what I “wanted” despite my husband’s kind request. All I really wanted was a “nice” weekend with my boys. I wanted Pitter to behave well, to be witty and sweet and fun. Playgrounds or other outdoor activities usually ensure this version of his personality. I wanted my bathrooms to be clean. I wanted to perhaps have a nice lunch out, and to feel competent about my role as a mother, proud even. 

Instead, on the one nice day of the weekend, Sweet Cheeks had the unfortunate task of mowing our lawn for almost the entire day, which ate up any away-from-the-neighborhood-together-as-a-family plans. And yesterday we had the rainstorm from hell which ended at 8 pm. All we managed to do was go out to lunch. Pitter suffered from a cough and an affliction known as Sir Whines Alot the entire weekend, and I sure as hell didn’t clean a bathroom.

Because it was Mother’s Day weekend, the weekend was a total failure. And so, after a period of Pitter doing regular toddler things like breaking my new sunglasses, putting a nice dent in the dining room wall with the edge of a chair, and smacking and clawing at my face while I tried to put him down for a nap, I went into a psychotic rage and flew out of the house in tears. Bad enough behavior from a grown woman on a regular Sunday…devestating on Mother’s Day itself.

When I couldn’t have a pleasant, totally unstressful, regular weekend (eg THE KIND ONLY WOMEN WITHOUT CHILDREN EVER HAVE), everything else bubbled to the surface. I still really miss Boston. I still really miss my friends. I am starting to have regular nausea again and I don’t really want to face childbirth again and why does it seem like every decision I’ve made in the last three years has lead to misery? 

All of this was already there. But the pressure of feeling triumphant and blessed as a mother on one particular day pushed me over the edge. Why do we ever think we’ll find joy or pleasure on one specific day on the calendar? Haven’t we lived long enough to know that this is the very elusive stuff of life we chase our tails to find every morning we wake up? 

My “Mother’s Day” sure as hell wasn’t yesterday. But I’ll find it another day. Maybe this afternoon, even. 

 

 

In high school and college, when men leered at me from truck windows, construction sites, and from behind lawnmowers (sorry, as classist as this sounds, it’s where these men generally operate) I was horrified. Stop objectifying my body! Stop looking at my boobs! Oh, but I was an indignant young thing, an autonomous, anti-patriarchy, feminizi woman goddess who screeched and screamed about such injustices while I jogged about the world. 

Twenty pounds heavier than usual, more than halfway through this pregnancy, huffing and chugging around the neighborhood at a “brisk” walking pace, these leers are heavenly.

Horrah for the garbage collectors checking me out from their high perches.

Here’s a shout out to the chimney masons smiling at me from their scaffolding.

Thank you, landscaper on lunch break, giving me a cheery hello. 

God bless ‘em all. 

(Yes. Shaddup. I know that at this point I am more of a rounded pregnant creature rather than a twiggly-everywhere but the boobs and belly pregnant creature AND that it’s mostly curiosity at the sight of someone moving about outside of a car PLUS the current size of my chest. But can I just pretend? )

 

 

1. Keep your parents on their toes in the morning

Some days when you awake from your refreshing toddler sleep, which actually has the magical ability to erase the darkness under your eyes and provide you with uncaffinated energy, find the chirping birds out of your window delightful. In a sweet whisper, marvel at the robins! and the sounds! of the airplane up there! Shower the nearest available parent with fifty kisses and stroke their cheeks with small hands. Gentle, gentle!

Other mornings, whine and fuss yourself awake with the fury of an unmedicated psychiatric patient. Indignantly kick the nearest parent and exclaim All done! All done! with all of this sleep nonsense! Then use your head as a battering ram to the nearest parental jaw. Also, pinch your mother’s very sore breasts for fun and stick your fingers in her eyes.

2. Be helpful

Demand to help! help! whenever possible. When your father goes outside to get the paper, insist on following him, regardless of the temperature, the condition of the pavement, and whether or not your feet are bare. If you spill coffee grounds on the floor while dumping the tiny red tablespoon bucket in the filter, so be it. When your mother tells you she needs to use the bathroom, run to her aid: hold her hand, guide her to the nearest facility (right here! right here!), open the toilet lid for her convienence, and attempt to climb into the bathtub to busy yourself while she does her thing. Voice your concern as loudly as possible HELP HELP HAAAALP! when your mother is cutting vegetables with very sharp knives without your assisstance. If you do so with enough vigor, she may sit you up on the countertop to watch. Whine when she refuses to let you use the knife. Tell her practice makes perfect.

 

3. Neither desire to bathe, nor desire any encounter with water to end if such an experience has been forced upon you

Refuse baths. They are for filthy animals who enjoy simmering in their own lukewarm detritious. Insist on showers with your parents instead. Insist on showering with them every time they shower. When they do allow you in the stall, dance and prance around in the marvelous spray of water, and use a cup to catch the glorious stuff off of whatever surface is available…even the streams of water that pour off of your parent’s bodies. Then take a sip! Delicious! Pitch a complete meltdown when the shower is over. The more snot pouring from your nose, the better.

4. Make every trip in the car Groundhog Day

Politely request Poppins?, Tuppence? Sugar Down? upon entering any vehicle. If necessary, demand the Mary Poppins soundtrack with increasing volume if your parents don’t take the earlier, sweeter hint.  With persistence, glory will be yours. Accurately announce each upcoming roadside attraction, in proper order:

*Playgound!: Fuss considerably if the car does not stop at this location.

*Red barn!. Bye Bye barn. Bye bye.

*Church!

*Flags. Flags flap. Flap. Wave your hands to indicate how the eight thousand American flags displayed at the car dealerships flap in the wind. 

Perform this ritual in reverse order on the way home. When appropriate, remind your parents of interesting vehicles alongside your own. A medley of such announcements might include the following: Oh wow! BIG truck! Digger! Moto-cycle has two wheels. Bicycle has two wheels. It’s okay to confuse the number of wheels on a car for two rather than four. Your parents enjoy the game. If you happen to see the very rare, quite unlikely sight of a person walking along an even rarer sidewalk, by all means, alert your parents. WALKING! WALKING!

5. Guilt-trip your Mother

Cling to your mother’s legs and request to be held, or to simply touch!  whenever you think she needs reminding that you exist, which, let’s be honest, is often. Kiss her randomly and often, especially after you have upset her by throwing a book at her leg or smashing your brand new sit-or-push fire truck into the furniture for the tenth time. Sorry mommy.  Mommy angry. 

Distributing enough sweetness when you are with her will ensure that she misses you when you are apart. Keep this in mind on “school” days; attach yourself to her person like a joey trying to climb into its mother’s pouch the moment you step into your daycare room. Cry, sometimes seemingly inconsolably when she puts you in Miss Julie’s arms, and reach for her longingly when she abandons you for a day of what are actually fun and enlighting actitivies with your friends. It mixes her up fantastically and makes her ruminate on how quickly you are growing up and how you used to look like this: