yucky car faces

I learned how to swear from the best.

A sailor in the U.S. Navy. A captain with the Buffalo Fire Department. Grandpa Gizmo.

One day, when I was about two years old, I was at my grandparents’ house. They lived just down the street and it was Christmastime. Grandpa was doing what dads love to do most – hang the lights. Except Grandpa was incredibly gifted with his combination of swears and the gusto with which he enunciated them. This time, he tried to be careful because I was toddling around.

The lights did what Christmas lights do – were tangled in an ungodly fuckery. Carefully, under his breath, he muttered “fucking lights.”

I’m not sure how many of you have spent time around toddlers, but no matter how deeply you hide it, how quietly you whisper it, the child is going to hear the worst of the worst and only that.

“John, you need to watch it,” my Gran said, pointing at me. “Naw, she’s fine,” he incorrectly stated.

In 5…4…3..2..1…”fucking lights! Fucking lights!” I gleefully chanted and danced around, doing whatever I was doing but now singing what would become my favorite word in the whole world.

Fast forward 35 years….I am driving with Jack on our way to pick up cupcakes for Eric’s 40th birthday. The insane part of me decided I would take Jack with me after I picked him up from daycare – you know, during drive time on a Friday afternoon. By the mall.

I was stuck behind a city bus and finally made it into the left lane. I got about 50 feet when the oh-so-brilliant drivers in front of me all hit their brakes.

My reptile brain took over, completely forgetting where I was and who I was with.

“FUCK YOUR FUCKING FACES!” I yelled, almost at the top of my lungs.

Jack let out a howl. “Oh God. I’m so sorry, baby! I’m not mad at you! Oh God, I’m so sorry! It’s ok! It’s ok!”

We were less than a mile from the cupcake shop. He stopped crying but he was repeating something over and over that I couldn’t quite make out at first.

In the sweetest, quietest voice I heard “fucking faces. Fucking faces.”

“Oh buddy! No, no, Mommy said a really bad thing. Those cars were being so unsafe and I got mad but I shouldn’t have said that. I’m so sorry but please stop saying that.”

Nope. Just over and over and over, reminding me that if you’re an asshole before you become a parent, chances are you will be an asshole parent.

I got him out of the car seat and he was still softly murmuring it as we went inside, but luckily I had the distraction technique of picking out cupcakes and he quieted down. He also sampled some red velvet ice cream and perked right up.

As we headed back home, he started up again, but this time I couldn’t exactly figure out what he was saying.

“Mama, yucky car faces,” he finally clearly explained.

THANK GOD. Yes, let’s go with this.

“Yeah, yucky car faces. They weren’t being safe, were they?”

“Why, mama?”

Buddy, I have no idea.

possibly gifted

Oh hi! Where the hell have I been? Traveling, visiting a bunch of barf bags, LITERALLY, but I’m going to save that story for next time.

I never gave much of a reason for the title of this blog, “Possibly Gifted.” Knowing me in real life is very apparent but indulge me for a moment.

My parents sent me to a private Catholic high school so I needed to get my academic record to transfer. When I was in fourth grade my teacher wrote that I was ‘possibly gifted’ and for the longest time, I was confused by it. Was it a compliment? An admonishment? It seemed a little backhanded?

The part that has always, and continues to, strike me is the ‘possibly’ part. Is she above average intelligence? Does she need remedial help? Her last name starts with Z and I’m sick of filling out these goddamn evaluations?

So as I clomp through life I think about this probably on a weekly basis. It was never more apparent to me than the other day as I was doing some spring cleaning.

I don’t know what happened, but I’m much more thorough when I clean now. Oh wait, yes I do: Prozac happened. (That’s a story for the time after the barf bag story.) So when I was cleaning up the kitchen after breakfast on Sunday, *I decided to wipe down the fronts of all the cabinets. Then that turned into cleaning out the refrigerator.

*Eric let Jack have peanut butter off a spoon as they were standing in the kitchen and Jack wiped it all over everything.

I decided it would be easier to take all the contents out of the drawers first and wash them out. We have a split sink (I DON’T WANT TO EVEN GET INTO IT) so it was hard to fit them in and try to wash and rinse them but I managed ok. As I was putting the bottom drawer back in, it kept ramming into the back and it wouldn’t close all the way.

I kept trying to get the drawer on the track and lift and lower and nothing. So I removed the bin. And I looked at the other bin. And realized I had mixed them up. They fit like a glove. Cool, problem solved.

Look at this mother fucker shine

The shelves were boring. I just took the stuff out and wiped them off. I only had to discard one yogurt container that was a middle school science experiment while we were in Buffalo. Brilliant.

Halfway through the door shelves, Jack woke up from his nap so I had to go rescue him and give him lunch. As I resumed putting the shelves back in the door, the first one at the very bottom collapsed and all the stuff on it fell on the floor.

“FUCK YOU I HOPE YOU DIE!” I yelled, reasonably, at inanimate objects. Then Jack started yelling and half-crying. Cool. Way to be a role model.

I assured Jack I was yelling at the fridge (totally normal) and got him calmed down. I tried that damn shelf about a dozen times. How does a drawer come out but not go back in?

Eric came back from the store to me sitting on the floor trying to jam the shelf back in, the fridge alarm beeping in my face, and Jack throwing food on the floor.

“I can’t get the shelf back in and I don’t know why not. Can you do it please?”

If I’ve learned anything in eight years together it’s that Eric is better at life than me and much calmer. So sometimes I just default to him.

After 3.2 seconds of examination he turned around and said “What about those drawers?” and pointed to the ones on the counter. There are two kinds. SURELY I hadn’t tried to put the wrong ones in the wrong spot AGAIN…

The lesson here is that if you want someone to strategize your communications, I’m your woman. If you need a smidgen of common sense to get out of a wet paper bag, might I introduce you to Eric?

 

 

 

One. More. Sippy cup.

One of the fun things about being the at-home parent is the never-ending parade of the same chores over and over.

Laundry.

Scrubbing floors.

Finding misplaced items.

And dishes. So many dishes.

It’s not that my life is hard. I wear Kate Spade pajamas to bed some nights (and they are suh cuyte.) But it’s like the Newman line from Seinfeld, https://youtu.be/zpN00-UTrY0 where he explains that the mail never stops. No matter how much you deliver it just keeps coming and coming and coming…That’s what these family chores are like. Most of the laundry gets done on Sundays but inevitably there are Sunday’s clothes that end up on the floor while everything else is in the washer. I’ve learned to live with that.

The one that makes me lose it, makes me so frustrated I’m almost willing to go to disposable dish wear, is finding one more sippy cup after I’ve scrubbed the kitchen.

What’s this? Oh, just my sweet-ass raccoon slippers and the cup Eric gave Jack off the counter after I asked IF THERE WERE ANYMORE CUPS LAYING AROUND. After I cleaned Jack’s titanic of a mess of his dinner, I came into the bedroom to put on pajamas before I had to read his goodnight story and put him to bed. And here, on my floor, next to my nightstand because WHY NOT, is another damn cup.

I’ve gotten better at employing certain mental tactics to deal with this and my inability to be flexible. Shocking, I know. When I still had a big kid job, I remember our director telling us once that there will always be another story or another project coming up so we had to get used to it. Now I realize he was trying to normalize the stress level (which worked, tricky bastard) so when I see a pair of socks or a shirt that didn’t make the wash I think “meh.”

But the cups. The cups get to me. I have no idea why and it’s really not a big deal…but it is. On my best days I take a big breath and let out an irritated sigh while pulling my fist down in front of my face with my eyes closed, like a mini meditation or something. On my worst days I spiral into the darkness and feel like I’m disrespected and useless and no one listens and I’m not a worthy person. So like, maybe I can get to a middle ground.

There’s a lot of talk lately about self-care and what that looks like and honestly, *inserts shrug.* Every day is different. Every day brings a different level of energy that I have left to do anything at the end of the day but stare at the TV oh so mindlessly. What I would love to do every day is have a workout, get some walking in, shower, dry my hair, and do my makeup and wear many of the cute clothes in my closet. What happens? Ummm, chase the child around, dry shampoo, maybe some foundation and powder, flannel and jeans, probably forget to eat at least one meal. I seriously regret all the time I wasted before I had Jack, just watching the same idiot episodes of Friends over and over.

Staying at home with Jack is great most of the time. We get to fuck around at the park in the middle of the day when it’s nice out and I’m not stuck at a desk wishing I wasn’t. And if I’m in charge of sanitation and nutrition for the family then I know it’s getting done. But if I don’t learn how to take mini breaks along the way, when the other patients ask me what I’m in for and I say “one. More. Sippy cup,” I probably will have to stay a bit longer.