Stripper names need not apply

Sam and I decided we should probably start compiling a list of baby names for our next addition - a girl this time. Last night we solicited name suggestions from our two boys. I'll admit I expected at least a little bit of consideration for something as momentous as what their little sister will be called.

Paolo's contribution: Mama Jr.

Luca's contribution: Yo Gabba Gabba

Considering that Sam's number-one pick is Summer, its' safe to say I'll be picking this name, too.

Mama's Little Comedian

As I dropped off Luca this morning, I reminded him to grab his Gogurt as he got out of the car.

He replied, quite seriously, "Mama, it's not Gogurt, it's yogurt."

Trying to make him smile I asked, "Are you sure? Maybe it's wo-gurt."

"No, Mama. That's only when I drop it."

Ba-dum-bum ching!

Eating dirt in the South

I made edible grass last night using shredded coconut and green food coloring. It was for Paolo’s class project; they are studying soils. In a clear cup they are making dirt layers out of two kinds of chocolate pudding, Oreo cookie crumbs, brown sugar, including gummy worms and, of course, green grass on top.
Some days, I would like to trade jobs with my seven-year-old.

Summer Runs On and On

You are belatedly on notice that school is out. Last summer this was a bad thing, as we socked Paolo away into a crappy daycare that closed halfway through the summer, and then begged our way into a decent summer program that he didn't enjoy because all the kids had made friends already, and I suspect he spent much of the day sitting in the corner, not to mention it was located allllllll the way across town, which took even longer to drive than it takes to read this sentence. This year things are going much better due to some better parental planning on our parts, and a better attitude on Paolo's part.

Speaking of Paolo's flaws (and I can admit he has flaws, even though Sam says I'm so protective of my children that if they killed someone, I'd help them hide the body, which is completely untrue, because they always find the body, so you have to make it look like an accident), he had a rough year with his first-grade teacher, due in part to his lack of focus. The other part of the year's difficulty was due to his teacher being a mean, old hag. What follows is an example of the efforts I made to impress upon Paolo the importance of concentrating:

Paolo, your teacher says you were not paying attention in class today. You didn't get your work done, and you had to make it up at recess.

[Deep sigh] Yeah.

Did you like doing work when all the other kids were playing?

No.

So next time your teacher tells you to do your work or you'll have to miss recess, you'll remember what that felt like, right?

[Pause] Um ... yeah.

Do you have any idea what I just said?

Yes!

....

No! [explodes with laughter] No, Mama, I have no idea what you just said.

Shortly thereafter, I gave up.

Apologies for the egregious run-on sentences today. I don't know what came over me, unless I'm always this way and don't even realize it. Maybe my endless droning is why Paolo has the attention span of a goldfish. Perhaps the poor kid shuts down out of self-preservation, because if he truly listened to every word I said, his frontal lobes would tie themselves into knots.

My Hero

Picture it: Downtown Fayetteville, a hot Sunday afternoon. The kiddie race is about to start in the street at the annual Joe Martin Stage Race. The parking lot is roped off for vendor tents and the children’s play zone. My boys were not racing, as one is too young and one hates bikes, so they had the inflatable bounce house all to themselves. Paolo and Luca were hurling themselves around for all they were worth, while I watched at the entrance, cheering them on. Suddenly, I heard something odd: not a noise, but a LACK of noise. Before it dawned on me that the air blower hooked up to the four gigantic inflatables had cut out, the back columns of the bounce house collapsed. Paolo and Luca froze and stared at me in horror as the roof caved in on them. GET OUT, I yelled, BOYS, GET OUT, HURRY. Paolo was closer and managed to army-crawl his way to the entrance, but Luca was no match for the heavy canvas. I watched the tarp come down on him, covering his body until just his tiny hand was visible reaching out for rescue. I grabbed Paolo before he slipped out to safety. PAOLO, YOU’VE GOT TO GO BACK FOR YOUR BROTHER! With no hesitation, Paolo dived back in, grabbed Luca’s hand and pulled him free. I helped them both out onto the pavement, and we stood huddled together, staring in wonder at the puddle of canvas at our feet. A race coordinator sprinted over in full panic and asked, “Is there anyone in there?!” Hugging my boys tighter, I replied, “Not anymore.”

The rest of the day, that brush with disaster was top of Paolo’s mind. He didn’t brag about his own escape, but about how he had saved his brother. He was a hero now, actually, a superhero. If it hadn’t been for him, Luca would have been buried forever. "Just think," Paolo went on, "if I had never been born and Luca was your only son, he never would have gotten out." After assuring Paolo that his bravery was truly astonishing, I reminded him gently that I had been standing RIGHT THERE and would have helped Luca out if we’d been alone. And yet, I know how siblings work. Ten years from now, Paolo will probably still be reminding Luca, “You know, if it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t even be here.”

Bulletproof

I'm sitting in a hotel room in Arlington, Texas, by a window overlooking a closed amusement park. It took six hours to drive here today, and at the last minute, I veered from my directions skirting Dallas and instead drove right through its heart. Dallas is notorious for its heavy, mad traffic and jumbled, confusing exchanges, and I wanted to prove I could still handle it. I never used to blink at racing along in fast traffic on major city roads, and I wanted to feel like the person I was before I got so damn old and responsible and soft. Keeping pace with the high speeds, navigating fearlessly, slipping into the groove of the commuter rush: it was euphoric.

That was my life almost ten years ago, tearing down the highways around the Bay Area, free, bold, answering to no one. The person I was then didn't make meal plans and to-do lists. She had all the time in the world, and her choice of how to spend it.

Just as I was reveling in my invincibility, a song came on the radio that made me miss my boys. It wasn't a sweet, childish song, of course; they have their dad to inform their musical taste. It was Bulletproof by La Roux. Paolo knows every word, knows the song well enough to make up alternate goofy lyrics, and Luca belts out the chorus. Bulletproof, hah! At this point in my life, I couldn't be more vulnerable. I no longer exist in exclusivity; my husband and children are part of me. I am saddled with demands, stretched thin, and chained tight, because I am loved. I do not long for the days when no one waited to hear I had arrived safely.

When I'm away from home, sitting in an empty hotel room, she's so close to me, the person I was. Sometimes I like to check in with her, to step back into the stream of a faster, more reckless life, to feel young and unencumbered, but these are moments of nostalgia, not regret. Living without a net or an anchor is no way to spend your whole life, and I knew that ten years ago with the sunroof open, music screaming, going 80 down the highway.

Greater or Less than Hungry Crocodiles

Sam ran upstairs where I was folding laundry to ask me the trick for remembering the greater-than and less-than arrows. When the arrow looks like an L that means less than, I told him. He only knows the crocodile trick, whatever that is, so he asked me to help Paolo with his homework. I joined Paolo at the table and casually glanced at the directions at the top of the worksheet. They used the crocodile trick, too, so I began my explanation: The crocodile's open mouth always faces the smaller number. It's a great, big, mean crocodile, and he's going to chomp the puny little number. Got it? We worked down half the page before I noticed something was awry. The L-arrows weren't indicating what they should. What the...?

Now, you math geniuses were probably groaning several sentences ago, but I am not one of you. I am of the species Liberalus Articus, and my kind do not understand your strange symbols. My people study dead things and words. So. I re-read the directions and, sure enough, the crocodile chomps the bigger number. Fine, have it your stupid way. Completely mortified, I had to reverse my prior explanation to my trusting child and have him redo the worksheet. Never mind what I just said, I told Paolo, the crocodile isn't mean, really, just hungry, so it's going to chomp the bigger number. If you were really hungry, would you eat two cookies or twelve cookies?

Once homework was done, I lashed out at Sam for putting me in charge of math, when he knew I didn't know the crocodile thing, and he did, and now Paolo is probably totally confused and won't get into college, because these are the types of building blocks an entire education is built on, and I've blown it. He was not surprised at all by my fervor and retaliated by reminding me that he came to get me because he knew his grasp on the subject matter was shaky, and I seemed very sure of myself, and this is what happens to children with two Liberal Arts-educated parents, so we should have known the day was coming when we couldn't help with math and science studies.

Yes, but I didn't expect the day to come while our child is in first grade.

Revenge is a dish best served asleep.

Creeping around the house in the dark of the early morning, moving silently, until - BANG - catching a doorknob with my hipbone. Let's start over. Limping around the house in the dark of the early morning, cursing softly, trying not to disturb my slumbering family.

I'm so tired. At 4:00 this morning Luca kicked me awake before waking himself, sobbing for his daddy, just like he did when he was falling asleep seven hours ago. I attribute this to a little incident earlier in the evening, wherein Luca grabbed two fistfuls of Sam's beard and yanked. Sam's bloodcurdling howl of pain scared Luca half to death and probably made him think his daddy would never love him again.

Sam took Luca into another room, and I was just settling down to sleep, when Paolo decided to have a serious conversation with me - despite being unconscious. His babbling gave way to snoring just as Luca returned and climbed back into bed. After adjusting once more to the knees, skulls and elbows pressing into me on both sides, sleep was creeping in like fog when my alarm went off.

As I tiptoed around it occurred to me, slowly, like the throbbing in my hip, WHY THE HELL AM I TRYING SO HARD NOT TO WAKE THESE PEOPLE UP?

The Eve of Christmas Eve

It can be a little lonely spending Christmas without extended family, but we decided to stay home for the holidays this year and do it up right. It has been a month-long celebration of craft projects, holiday music, parades, Christmas lights, and at least a gallon of egg nog. Paolo picked out a beautiful tree, and Luca has left most of the ornaments alone. This is a big improvement over last year, when we just accepted that the bottom three feet of the tree would be bare. There have been a couple of decor casualties, like when Luca was mouthing an ornament and hooked himself like a fish, or when he shattered a glass ball on the tree by riding a car into it.

There have also been some amazing moments of family harmony. Every morning Paolo opens a new door on the Christmas Countdown Calendar to get the small square of chocolate inside, and every morning he breaks it in half and gives a piece to Luca. Paolo also makes sure, when rummaging through the giant container of cookies sent by Grandma, to select cookies with a chocolate kiss in the center for himself and his brother, and a plain cookie for me. If I weren't absolutely swimming in chocolates and cookies (and peppermint bark, and sugar-coated nuts, and coffee cakes) at work, I might feel slighted. There's something deeply warming about seeing two people you love so much love each other.

I don't have to work tomorrow, and my Christmas Eve to-do list makes me giddy: Play with the boys, pick up a freshly baked pannetone, make hot chocolate, wrap presents, and bake cookies for Santa. Mopping and laundry can just damn well wait until the 26th. If the weather reports are correct, we may even wake up to a white Christmas. If that's not enough to put stars in your eyes, I don't know what is.

Happy holidays.

Fully and Unmistakably Two

As we pulled into the garage one sunny and warm Fall evening, Luca asked for bubbles. We had been trapped inside for what felt like weeks due to cold, rainy weather, and soon the days would be shorter, leaving no post-work opportunities to play outside. I grabbed the bubbles, Paolo grabbed his new spring-action, light-up, humming genuine Anakin Skywalker light saber, and Luca grabbed an empty bleach bottle from the trash. He casually sauntered out of the garage with his mouth around the open top. I tried to scream, but the tongue I'd just swallowed blocked the sound. I checked his skin for burns and his breath for the smell of bleach, but fortunately, the bottle had been bone dry.

I stowed the bleach bottle in the rafters of the garage and walked back outside to see Luca with a terra cotta pot raised above his head, just before smashing it into another pot. I steered him away from that game, as well, and returned to blowing bubbles for Paolo. Luca then attempted to perforate himself with a steel tomato cage, concuss himself with a heavy shovel, before flipping open the outdoor electrical outlets. Please note that our garage is lined with toys: bikes, balls, buckets, tennis rackets, dump trucks, none of which are even remotely interesting to a two-year-old.

Finally, Luca climbed into my car and began twiddling knobs and flipping light switches. Now the car is generally off-limits, but damn it, he couldn't kill himself in there. So I left well enough alone, and he honked and flashed and steered merrily in what I had decided was the safe, nonthreatening cocoon of my car. Bubble-time ended (it's actually really hard to pop bubbles with a light saber), and Paolo and I headed back into the garage. Luca opened the car door when he saw his brother, and Paolo walked over to help him climb out. As I returned the bubbles to the shelf above the washer, I heard a slam followed by a scream.

I turned in horror to see Paolo's thumb stuck in the car door. By the grace of all that is good in the universe, only the tip of Paolo's thumb was smashed. No broken bones, no blood, just a whole lot of screaming and a black fingernail that is probably not long for this world. In case you're wondering what Luca was doing while I released Paolo's hand and ascertained whether we'd be headed for the ER, he was laughing and ejecting CDs from the car stereo.

That's what I'm dealing with these days. My dad thought I was joking on the phone the other night when I admonished Luca to get out of the microwave. Folks, I have a two-year-old. It's like being at war, with an enemy who doesn't speak your language or respect the rules of combat, who is so irrational, his next move cannot be anticipated but is certain to leave you slackjawed.

My love is like a green, green pickle.

Today marks the end of the first week at new daycares for both boys. Two weeks ago, their daycare shut down suddenly for financial reasons. This is the third daycare that has closed on us since we started depending on childcare services. I am the daycare widowmaker. To avoid boring you with the suffocating panic I felt the Friday afternoon we got the news, knowing I had no place to take my children the following week, I will simply say, it was not fun. Team Family pulled through, however, and after a week of Daddy Daycare with a few Take-Your-Kids-to-Work days sprinkled in, we found good situations for each of them. I have spent this first week nibbling my fingernails up to my elbows, but as it turns out, Paolo’s best friend from Kindergarten attends his summer camp, and Luca has not eaten anyone.

Sam has been watching the Tour de France for the last thirty-six days. Apparently, during the Tour, five extra hours are added to each day in order to provide twenty-nine solid hours of daily Tour coverage. Phil Liggett and Bob Roll narrate my dreams. Paolo is nearly as rabid as his father. He gets a kick out of the elevation maps and enjoys showing me easy days vs. hard days based on the category and frequency of climbs. I will discuss this further in the divorce paperwork.

Luca has developed his own language, and it is fascinating to me how it differs from Paolo’s verbal development. Paolo was all about animals and animal sounds at this age. Looking back, it wasn’t terribly useful for the purposes of communication, except maybe in a barnyard. Luca knows how to ask for things he wants, specifically, food. Even more specifically, ice and pickles. There is no disappointment, no meltdown, no rage that cannot be cured and calmed by offering Luca ice or pickles.

Linguistic quirks of note:

1. Anything liquid is “juice” (juice in a cup, juice from the garden hose, juice falling from the sky, juice in the toilet bowl).

2. Paolo is Fuh-Fuh. I had been dying to know what Luca would call his brother, just desperate to hear him call for his brother with his sweet baby voice. Paolo called himself Ba-doh before he could pronounce his name, so I figured it would be close to that. Instead, Luca chose Fuh-Fuh. Where did that come from? Is it an approximation of “brother”? I wanted cute, and this is not cute. It’s weird. What the fuh?

Graduation Day

Today is Paolo's last day of Kindergarten. Yeah, on a Thursday. That's not very helpful to working parents. As usual, Sam and I will split Friday hours with me taking the afternoon shift. Since I'll take a half-day off this week, I couldn't take off Tuesday morning to ATTEND PAOLO'S GRADUATION. Minor event, right? Actually, it was a very casual non-cap-and-gown affair, so my heart only splintered into 42,000 pieces.

When I got home Tuesday night, my darling husband plugged our videocamera into the TV to show me the footage he was able to get while sitting in a miniature chair and holding a squirming todder. I watched several short clips of the kids getting their diplomas while the teacher read what each child wants to be when he/she grows up.

Then it was time for the slideshow. My jaw dropped when I saw the video length in the corner of the screen: over 11 minutes. Sam had recorded the entire show. As pictures of the class began cycling, I got all choked up. It wasn't the toothless grins that did me in; it was the understanding that my husband had gone to such trouble to make me feel like I hadn't missed anything. He knew, without any conversation, how much it killed me to miss this milestone and, as usual, he knew how to make it better.

Less than two minutes into the slideshow, Luca picked up the videocamera and deleted the video. Irretrievably. A little piece of Sam's soul died, along with the last vestige of hope I had that Luca will end up anywhere other than jail.

Speaking of life prospects, would you like to know what Paolo wants to be when he grows up? A dad. Barring that, a helicopter driver. I told him I can't vouch for which would be more exciting, but I know which is more important.

Missing them already

I am leaving tomorrow for a business trip that will take me out of state for the next four days. This will be the first time I have been gone from Luca and only the second time away from Paolo. Sam's parents are traveling here to help out in my absence because they are kind, but also because Sam and I have not told them that their grandsons have turned to the dark side.

Paolo is a good kind of crazy: gymnastic, imaginative, a voracious reader and an unstoppable talker. In all seriousness, if his very life depended on his silence, he would not reach age seven. Much of what he says is funny and interesting, but the boy has no internal filter. Whatever he is thinking comes right out. He wonders aloud about approaching activities, toy acquisitions, or snacks again and again, despite having full information. Still, he is hands-down my favorite son right now.

Luca has the devil in him. He is on the verge of getting kicked out of daycare for biting other children. My son is a biter. I fought the label until I saw the little Damien in action. He has been biting the bejesus out of his own brother. Apart from the biting, he is generally batshit crazy, which is not a good crazy. Like his older brother, he climbs on tables, leaps off couches and tears around the house at blinding speed. But, oh, he can be sweet. When he pats my face wearing an angelic smile, I am convinced he is too cute to be human. Then the wooden toy he is holding in his other hand connects with my skull, and I remember that he is, in fact, not human at all.

And yet, I am already missing my little lunatics. I am also already feeling very, very sorry for their grandparents. I had better put away this sadness and enjoy my time apart because, after four motherless days with Crazy 1 and Crazy 2, I will never be allowed to leave again.

Three is old enough for a butt-whipping.

Me: Luca had a rough afternoon. His teacher said another kid pushed him down twice on his bad knee, and he won’t walk like he was this morning because his knee hurts.

Paolo: Oh yeah? When that kid gets older, like three, I’m gonna punch him!

Me: Paolo, I am so proud of you for wanting to protect your little brother. I am also happy that you know it would be wrong to rough up a little guy. Even though you’re mad at Luca’s classmate for hurting him, hitting is never the answer. Tripping is so much easier to get away with.

Failing my children in new and exciting ways

I have not had a particularly strong week as a parent. At the park on Sunday, I sat Luca on my lap to go down a slide, and his foot caught and twisted up behind him. He didn't cry much when it happened, and it wasn't until after his nap and late lunch that I realized he couldn't walk. Sam was on a bike ride, so I left a note saying I'd taken Luca to the Emergency Room because something was wrong with his leg. Due to the brevity of my message, Sam showed up an hour later looking ten years older. In my mind, the note clearly referred to the slide incident, which I had not stopped thinking about since it happened. See, it's actually a common accident in which a kid sitting on his mom's lap gets his foot wedged between her and the slide and breaks a leg. I kept obsessing because I KNOW better, and I HAD made sure that Luca's legs were on top of mine when we started. However, in Sam's mind, Luca had contracted flesh-eating bacteria and was facing amputation.

Luckily, the X-ray showed no fracture, so we were sent home with a diagnosis of sprained knee. Luca adapted pretty well: he reverted to crawling for a couple days and is now walking again with just a little hitch in his giddy-up.

The injury done to Paolo this morning was emotional, but no less painful, according to my hypercritical, I mean helpful, husband. Paolo realized in the car when we'd just about reached school that he was still wearing his pajama bottoms. Instantly I remembered that he'd joined me in the bathroom half-dressed to use the potty, and then we'd brushed teeth together and gone downstairs. He'd never returned to his room to change his bottom half and, hence, still had on Batman pj bottoms. I tried to laugh about with him, but he was really upset. I made a snap decision to get him to school on time and bring his pants later. Even though no one would EVER guess his solid black pants were pajama bottoms, Paolo was mortified, and I had to push him into his classroom, promising to be right back.

When I explained to Sam why I was dashing in and out of the house with a pair of pants, he pinpointed that moment - the moment I heartlessly shoved our son into a mocking classroom - as what was sure to become Paolo's first memory, one of utter humiliation. What I SHOULD have done, according to Paolo's father and Paolo's teacher, was come back home, let Paolo finish dressing, and be late to school.

You know you haven't had your best week when the highlight is that you didn't break your kid's leg.

Breastfeeding Backlash

My husband set me up with a slew of crap to read and view on my lunch break about all this unreasonable pressure on women to breastfeed their babies, not to mention the guilt they are made to feel for choosing formula over breastmilk. I mean, gah, it’s so unfair!

Shut up. Shut the hell up. Why are doctors and scientists and mothers trying to rationalize breastfeeding? Why does the debate continue to rage? It couldn’t be simpler. You carry a baby for nine months, you give birth to said baby, YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO THAT BABY DOES NOT END THERE. If it did, your boobs wouldn’t fill up with milk three days later.

We don’t need to understand breastmilk on a molecular level or to conduct long-term studies of breastfed vs. formula-fed children to decide what the best food is for a baby. Common sense tells us that a mother’s body, which has been nurturing and growing a baby during gestation, will produce the perfect food on which her baby will thrive. Her body knows more than a crapshoot of chemicals in a can. True, a formula-exclusive diet will not kill a baby…anymore…unless you live in China…but it’s not the best diet. It says so right on the can of formula.

Of course there are circumstances in which mothers are unable to feed their infants, and they have every right be pissed at getting the stink-eye from strangers for whipping out a bottle of formula. Let me be clear: it is the unwilling, not the unable, who rub me the wrong way. Women who are unwilling to breastfeed argue that breastfeeding is awkward, weird, inconvenient, painful, shape-altering, and difficult to continue while working. Yes, it is all of those things. It is also many wonderful things, but I won’t enumerate them because, apparently, that propaganda keeps getting shoved down our throats.

Breastfeeding isn't a trend; it's the next fundamental step after giving birth. A mother who chooses not to bother for only selfish reasons is shirking her duty. And her complaints of being made to feel guilty for putting formula on her baby shower registry? Well, maybe she should feel guilty. I can’t say this enough: If you are going to have a baby, HAVE a baby. Otherwise, what’s the point? You will have sore nipples, you will be sleep-deprived, you will get peed on. It is all part of having a baby, YOUR baby. You would lay down your life for your baby. You won’t lay down a boob?

Please always be with me.

I glared at the message light on my office phone Monday morning and rolled my eyes impatiently while the robotic voice announced that my missed call had come Sunday morning at 7:02. Surely a wrong number. Finally, the message played: just some incomprehensible noise, almost as if someone were mouthing the phone, and then “gah-gah-gah” – click. I quickly scrolled down the Caller ID to confirm that the call had come from my house. It was Luca; my baby called me.

I still don’t know how he did it, but it sure made my day, and it made me realize anew how he has made my life. It amazes me that a short eighteen months ago (Happy 1½, kiddo!) I didn’t know this boy at all. And now, how unimaginable my life would be without him. I lose my breath just contemplating it.

Who has made your life, colored it in, given it fire and meaning and joy? It doesn’t have to be a child; it could be a friend or a lover. Who are the people that you didn’t start this life with, but without whom your life would be a shame? Tell them, even if you whisper it while they’re sleeping, even if you just leave them a message.

When did everybody learn how to swim?

We had kind of a big Saturday. We went to a birthday party for one of Paolo’s classmates in the morning, and then we hit a Mardi Gras parade in the afternoon. The party was held at the Boys & Girls Club by the indoor pool. What a fabulous idea! Paolo can’t swim, but we brought his Spiderman swim ring, and there are a couple shallow spots, so I didn’t foresee a problem. I need to work on my foreseeing. All of the other kids at the party either knew how to swim or were completely comfortable in the water, like hand-stands-underwater comfortable. Paolo still doesn’t care for water droplets grazing his face. It didn’t take long for the other kids to head out into deeper water, leaving Paolo behind. He tried valiantly to follow, but he couldn’t move as quickly and he got nervous. Pretty soon he was sitting alone, dejected, hugging his knees at the entrance to the pool.

One of his good friends kept trying to lure him back into the water, to a spot in the pool only two feet deep, right next to a ladder. She asked the lifeguard for a float and brought it to Paolo, but he just shook his head. Maybe another parent would have been furious, but I recognized that paralysis, and my heart just broke for him. He had lost all self-confidence. He wanted so badly to be a part of the fun, but the feeling of inferiority had crippled him. I have suffered episodes like that my entire life, triggered by who knows what. Suddenly, surrounded by well-meaning people enjoying themselves, I am worthless, a misfit: uglier, stupider, clumsier than everyone else. If I could have picked one behavioral trait of mine that would never pass to my children, this would have been it.

Well, it took some time, but I managed to coax Paolo into the shallow spot. I actually had to lower him in with his arms locked around my neck. Don’t ask me how I managed to do that while hanging on to Gianluca, who was dying to jump in the water, and without falling in myself. I have mad skills. Once Paolo’s feet hit the bottom of the pool (and he realized the water did, in fact, reach only his belly button), his face lit up like Christmas morning. The spell was broken, he believed in himself again, and he had a great time for the rest of the party.

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory

I ran into Sam at home yesterday when I dropped off my Valentine’s party booty, so we got to eat lunch together. It began pleasantly, just two adults eating and conversing, until Sam finished his pizza and reached for the cookies.

"What are you doing?"

"I want a cookie. You said there are extras, so let me have one."

"No! You can’t open any of them."

"Why not? Give me a cookie."

"I can’t carry in open containers of food to the party. It’ll look like I found these in the parking lot, or worse, like I had an unstoppable case of the munchies from hitting the bong all night. THE SEAL MUST NOT BE BROKEN! You must be crazy, thinking I’m going to walk in there with used food."

"You’re really not going to give me a cookie, are you? Okay, I'm feeling a lot of anger towards you right now."

There the cookies sat, pristinely, all day and evening until dessert, when I had essentially the same conversation with Paolo, with Sam chiming in, “Paolo, she won’t do it, bud. You’re not getting a cookie. Your mama is MEAN.”

Which brings us to this morning, as I triumphantly carried the stack of unopened boxes of cookies into Paolo’s school. It was a delicate balancing act, as I was also carrying Luca, who picked at the stickers sealing the boxes until he had peeled them all off.

Please keep your VD to yourselves.

My dear friend Melissa sent me an email today with “VD” as the subject. I think it illustrates my romantic nature that “VD” instantly expanded to venereal disease in my mind. I thought it was kind of a personal thing to share with someone, even one’s hetero-lifemate. She was referring to Valentine’s Day, of course, and the teeth-grinding lameness of her co-workers receiving flowers two days prior to the ridiculous “holiday.” I do hope her giddy coworkers realize those flowers came early because the senders are cheap. You pay less for flowers if you have them delivered prior to the 14th, especially when it falls on a Saturday. That’s right, suckers, your boyfriend/husband/mom/stalker doesn’t love you enough to pay for weekend delivery.

I know the single girls out there are starting to feel down and hating themselves for it, because they don’t want to care about Forced-Display-of-Affection Day. But they do care, if only a teensy bit, because they’re human, and humans like chocolate. Affection is also nice, especially when it comes in a box with paper-lined compartments. I’m talking about good chocolate, like imported from Europe, made by fairies in a magic glen, with all-natural ingredients, not the corn syrupy turds they make in America.

I’m not in the single-girl camp; I’m in the mother camp, but we also have good reason to despise this trumped-up occasion. I’m lucky this year in that Paolo is old enough to address his own cards, and Luca is too young to exchange them. However, I just blew my lunch break (and $16.00) at the grocery store agonizing over what treats to buy for my sons’ parties at school tomorrow. There were two ten-foot-long tables in the bakery piled high with pink-frosted goodies. I’d volunteered to bring cookies for Paolo’s class of 22, so that narrowed my choices down to seven varieties. All the cookies come 10 in a box, so I had to overbuy by eight because I certainly couldn’t underbuy by two.

I volunteered to bring fruit for Luca’s party because I’d just finished ripping out the soul of his afternoon teacher for feeding him candy and chips. Donating cupcakes seemed like hypocrisy. I decided on grapes, which I’ll just need to wash and cut in half.

And THEN I had to grab something for my book club meeting tomorrow night. It’s couples night, but my Valentine will be home with the boys. Since I was in produce, I grabbed a pound of strawberries. That’s appropriate, no? I’ll just need to wash and slice those, as well. I have my Valentine’s homework cut out for me, and I still have to plan a nice meal and dessert to make for my family.

I give and I give. But what about me? What about my European gourmet chocolate needs?