I watched the speech. No exhortations toward anarchy, communism or socialism. Just a common sense message about taking responsibility for one’s education. And it rang true coming from someone who started from humble means, without a father and achieved the heights of the American dream. I don’t think any of President Obama’s right wing radical detractors could match the authenticity of the message or the messenger.
Tomorrow is my son’s first day at a new school. This is our dream school. It is small and the teachers and administrators really understand my son, his talents and his needs. He was so happy when we visited and he even enjoyed the day-long evaluation and interview process. When he was accepted to the school, I felt like we won the lottery. (Then we realized we needed to win the lottery to pay the tuition, but we pulled it together.)
Now, he is scared. He doesn’t want to go to school. My partner left for a business trip (bad timing) and all he wants to do is go to the airport and take a plane and find her and bring her home. I get it. I want to do that, too. I also get that he doesn’t want to start a new school, or go back to any school for that matter. But my heart is breaking because my little baby is sad and scared. He’ll be fine. I will be a wreck.
Just part of being a parent, I guess.
The hysteria over Obama’s speech is for hysteria’s sake. Even hard core Republicans are backing down from opposing it. Laura Bush thinks it is a good idea.
What is his subversive message to brainwash our young people?
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By ANN SANNER, Associated Press Writer Ann Sanner, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 3 mins ago WASHINGTON – Take responsibility for your education. Go to class and listen. Don’t let failures define you. That’s the advice President Barack Obama will give schoolchildren Tuesday in a speech that drew fire even before he delivered it. “We need every single one of you to develop your talents, skills and intellect so you can help solve our most difficult problems,” Obama said. “If you don’t do that — if you quit on school — you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country.”
I hate the back-to-school feel in the air, even though I have been out of school for decades. And, the day after Labor Day is the end of summer even though summers are for kids. When did I stop being a kid?
My brother-in-law is scared of me. Mostly because I have no filter. What I think, I say. It hasn’t always been an asset but it is part of my DNA. You should see the rest of the family.
In an effort to make up for his recent absences from family gatherings, my brother-in-law suggested that he sit in a newly-created Shondah Chair (shonda being Yiddish for embarrassment) and I would just torture him through shame and guilt. He thought it would be a short session. Hah.
Then he suggested that I have a talk show, where I put a malfeasor in the Shonda Chair and grill that person as I sit behind the Self-Righteous Desk. What a great idea. He knows how to charm me and get back in my good graces. But not before he squirms in the Shonda Chair.
Disclaimer: My son is adopted so I have nothing to do with his intelligence. He is crazy smart.
The good news is that his big words are juxtaposed with imaginary and cartoon worlds, so he isn’t our own Little Man Tate. Tonight, he wanted to test his hypothesis — HIS words — if a mobile post office car (like the ones in his train documentary videos) were added to the train on the new show, “Dinosaur Train,” would the mail be distributed faster to the dinosaurs in their dinosaur towns? Hmmm. He does know this is make-believe, but a show with his two favorite things, trains and dinosaurs, well, it just doesn’t get better than that.
So I let my son wake me earlier than usual on a weekend [dulcet tones of “wake up, WAKE UP, Mom, there are CARTOOOOONS on!!”] because I need to pick up my sister and father to go to visit Mom at the cemetery. My son didn’t want to come because he says cemeteries are creepy and make him think of ghosts and skeletons. I get that. Cemeteries are creepy, I tell him, but I have to visit Grandma’s grave. He says he will visit us but he is not ready yet. We are not ready to be visited there for a really long time, I tell him. He nods and then asks to turn on cartoons. Good, I think, death and destruction before the pilgrimage to the cemetery.
Lots of people are buried in Queens and on Long Island. Very convenient if you need to pop in on two funerals on different sides of the family on the same day. We had to do that once. Very convenient, indeed.
I pick up my sister who is limping badly, even with a cane. Her husband who is NOT coming with us (he hasn’t met Mom yet) is feeling sheepish but he needs to focus on a painting. He is trying not to look like a heel by carrying my sister’s stuff to the car. He even offers to carry her cane. Ok, he IS funny.
We drive to Dad’s and set off to Long Island. Once, when I mentioned that Grandma is in Heaven, my son asked, “Heaven is on Long Island?” [ To some, yes, I guess, Heaven is on Long Island.] I stammered that her body is there but her spirit is somewhere else. Then I called for my partner because I was WAY out of my element. Kids are smarter than adults. But I digress.
Dad gives me helpful driving hints like, “is there a reason you are driving behind the slow car?” and “go straight. no, make a left. I said make a left!” and “well, I guess I told you to get off at the wrong exit.” It is really ok. My dad is going to be 89 in October, and he is in terrific shape (spit in the evil eye, a Jewish superstition).
We arrive and get a little lost in the cemetery. So many dead people. But we find Mom and our other relatives. Luckily, they haven’t moved. We three say a few prayers for all of the family members, leave stones on the graves and reminisce about Mom. My sister brings pictures of Mom through the years. It is good to have the gravestone as a focus of our thoughts. About 45 minutes into our visit, a couple stops and visits another grave nearby. After they finish their drive-by visit, the woman comes over to us to say, “we come all the time and never see anyone else here.” Gee, thanks. Very thoughtful of you to say and I don’t really notice all your ugly plastic surgery.
My sister needs to take pictures to document the occasion. No joke, these go into our family photo albums. I wish she had taken a picture of the woman with the bad face lift.
After meeting my sister at the gym (see prior entry), I raced home and showered and changed in time to go with my family to my sister’s house where some out of town, and newly-minted New Yorker, cousins were coming for brunch. Before meeting me at the gym, my sister had schlepped on her bad foot to Zabars to purchase a Jewish soul food brunch extravaganza. (We both got the food purchasing gene from Mom; too much is still never enough.) Where is my brother-in-law, you ask? He was working on a painting assignment in his studio, but I cross-examined him and I was satisfied that he was hard at work and stressed about the painting and, more importantly, he felt guilty and undeserving of my sister’s love. So, he was excused for the day of family activities.
Whenever our family gets together, gastro-intestinal fortitude makes its way into the conversation. This time, a fourth generation cousin (third generation born in this country) talked about her IBS (irritable bowel syndrome). I thought, wow, I thought irritable bowel was just a family personality trait (think about that for a second). I had no idea that it was a medical condition. She is a runner and cannot complete a run without — er, um — finding a bathroom (or remote area of the woods if she runs in the countryside). We discuss Metamusil, Immodium and other products while stuffing smoked fish down our throats. We discussed the relative cleanliness standards of most major chain stores in NYC and the value of her strengthened thigh muscles in being able not to sit down. Still we are eating. In fact, we have to talk with our mouths full just to get in a word amidst the chatter.
My son was very engaging until he stopped abruptly, got a bird encyclopedia (my brother-in-law is a bird nerd) and sat down to read. My father wanted to continue talking to my son, but my son would have none of it. He said, “Puh-leeze, Grandpa, I need some alone time to recharge my batteries.” Kids hear everything you say and some time, some place, it comes out — ZING!!!
My cousin brought homemade zucchini bread with zucchini from her garden. I thought that I could re-gift it for our barbeque in Scarsdale later in the day, but no one would believe that I made anything like that. Besides, it would be too much like life imitating art — or Seinfeld, whichever. Of course, after someone tried it and thought it was delicious, I mentioned that I had really wanted to re-gift it and was disappointed that any of it was eaten and my family (jokingly, I promise you) tried to make it look whole again so I could take it. I didn’t even watch Seinfeld (but I did hear the retelling of the episodes) and even this was too much. But reality is crazier than any fiction.
We had to leave this gathering to go to Scarsdale for a barbeque but by this time the migraine had overpowered the pills and I was achy and in need of a dark, quiet room. That is not possible in my house because when my son gets into playing with his toys, it is loud like an arena. And, he was so unhappy not to go to our friends in Scarsdale. So were we. I just couldn’t make it.
I slept for awhile and then we did some errands with the car I rented so we could go to Scarsdale. These are the kinds of errands that need a car — dropping off heavy stuff at donation places, etc. After a few of these type of errands, my partner gave my son a choice of whether or not to go to Fairway food store (the one that is like a warehouse) to shop. He opted not to, of course. My partner tried to change his mind but if you give a child a choice you have to live with the answer or start negotiating. So, I started negotiating. He got french fries and an ice pop at dinner if he and I stayed in the car while my partner went shopping for exactly 20 minutes. Then she remembered she had her iPod with the bird sounds game. But no one would let me renegotiate, so I was left in the car listening to high pitched bird calls. My migraine started to spread beyond the borders of my brain and threatened to create an epidemic of brain pain throughout upper Manhattan.
So as not to let the rental go to waste, we are going to the cemetery to visit my mom’s grave tomorrow. My sister will bring the left-overs from brunch so we can have a tailgate. Our family can eat anywhere.
Some days you wake up feeling like a Mack truck has run over you. Today was that day for me.
But my sister wanted to go to the gym today and do weight exercises because, she conveniently slipped into the conversation, she had been in the ER yesterday and has a stress fracture in her foot, is using a cane and wears one of those ugly, sling-like shoes (I guess the word, “ugly” was redundant). I told her even if the shoe was comfortable and resembled an Easy Spirit style for one’s tenth decade, it was not a fashion statement she wanted to make. My sister need diversion and so I dragged my sorry self out of bed and away from my son who was watching less violent cartoons (must be something about Sundays). I had a sense of an on-coming migraine, but it is my sister and she was in the ER alone the day before. Anyway, migraine pills are always at the ready.
We both belong to a wheelchair accessible gym but you have to go outside and up a ramp to get to the elevator which doesn’t go to every floor. Ok, so like most things in life the advertising is better than the product. My sister hobbled up and skied down the stairs (the latter was scary because my sister is no Picabo Street). Here is a picture of the latest sporty ambulatory footwear (some day I will master the reformatting of a picture but for now, please turn your head sideways, thanks):
My sister plans on a whopping twenty minutes at the gym. I channel my old trainer and yell “thrust the bust!!”, “breasts out!!” and other crazy things that only a perky 20-something can say to a 40-something person. My sister laughed too much and ruined her posture while using the weight machines. And I sounded like a moron. But I got into it and kept yelling, “breathe IN, breathe OUT”. Another episode of “Ethel and Lucy Go to the Gym” but without the laugh track.
Yesterday was a blog-free day. Besides, I was feeling like a self-pitying character in a Lifetime made-for-TV movie starring Lindsay Wagner after she was the Bionic Woman and before she was a spokesperson for mattresses. Even I wanted to change the channel.
Today, we started with the usual Saturday morning violent cartoons. Too bad my son has outgrown “Arthur” on PBS. Now, we have to watch mean aliens and anthropomorphized animals (as opposed to friendly talking aardvarks, rabbits, chipmunks and other animals on “Arthur” who learn to live and play and get along with each o-o-other-r-r). Now we have totally demonic creepsters (even the humans). Even the commercials are so bizarre I can’t tell it from the cartoon until the Skechers or Geox logo appears. There must be subliminal messages in all of this.
Cartoons, a run (me), a haircut (boy, does he look handsome), lunch, errands and gymnastics took us to 3pm. A little note about the haircut. He had $5 in tooth fairy money and wanted to buy a matchbox car at the hair salon. He sees a silver one and it is $2.95. We think, “hooray, no issue over spending more than his $5!” We open it and it turns out to be a matchbox car replica of a HEARSE. Yes, a HEARSE. Why did it ever occur to the makers of matchbox cars to make a HEARSE. We had to tell our son what it was because he was showing his new car to everyone who looked surprised and ooked out when they realized it was a HEARSE. Our son understands what goes in a hearse but he decided it was a subterfuge for a mobile command station in the war of the planets. He is such a good sport. I still don’t want him to bring it to show-and-tell. EEEeeeewwww.
We dashed to Tribeca to meet another family for a play date. We live on the Upper West Side. They live in Brooklyn. Tribeca is mutually inconvenient, so it works. There is a pretty nice park there (if you are careful not to sit in bird poop and are willing to stare down some pretty daring pigeons). Until the family arrived and for sometime afterward, our son played pied piper to young Jasper, who had a Tribeca groovy name, Tribeca groovy long hair and a Tribeca groovy shaved-head, tattoed, goatee’d dad. When our friends arrived — a couple with a boy our son’s age and two younger identical twin girls — the two boys went off to play and met up with a handsome-like-a-model young boy about their age with flowing blond hair and a Che Guevara t-shirt. His name? Herman. Herman? HERMAN? With a name like that, it is a good thing he is model-handsome, with groovy t-shirts. All in all, this park was CRAWLING with way too many groovy kids and parents. And with my gray hair and my uncool running clothes, I looked like the ungroovy grandma. So, this was an even un-groovier realization.
At some point my partner needed to leave the park for ten minutes. She doesn’t smoke or drink, so you ask what stealth thing required her to excuse herself without explanation? Was she testing societal norms? I know my partner, so it could only be one thing: she needed a “retail therapy” fix (was there some middle-aged angst afoot?) She likes to buy clothes for our son. I remembered a kids’ boutique across the street from the park and I knew that she was having her therapy session there.
As it turns out, it was a good time to have some therapy because our son proceeded to get drenched in the sprinklers. Not just wet like most kids, but sopping as if submerged in water for days. We are (who am I kidding, my partner is) usually prepared for these contingencies but not today. As if on cue, my partner returned to the park with a shirt and pants she got on a fabulous sale. Seeing our child, she sent me back to get underwear. Of course, the store only carries Le Petit Bateau underwear for $15 a pair and you can only get in packages of 2. So I spent $30 on a pair of stretchy boxers — he is going to wear these until he’s 13. Bargains always happens to someone else. They see me coming and they double the price. And they say Jews don’t pay retail. I pay uber-retail. Have I assimilated that much? But, I digress.
So, we spent a long time at the park and went for dinner. Our son eats his entire meal and eyed his friends chicken fingers. His friend didn’t like the chicken fingers and our son was ready, willing and able to relieve him of his burden. My partner and I were quite impressed with negotiation skills of our friends’ son. People of lesser will power (like me) would have given in to his demands of dessert even though he didn’t eat any of the chicken. But they are strong. When the waiter came to the table and asked, “any dessert?” I yelled “NOOOOO!!!” so scared that my friends would be sabotaged in their strong resolve. Strong work, ladies.
So, the check came and our friends will not hear of splitting the bill because they are five and we are three, so out comes the calculator, but one of the parents was faster with a napkin and crayons. Got to love the irony of adding “big numbers” with a crayon, so I took a picture.
So, tonight, we thought our son would fall asleep immediately after a bath, and teeth brushing. Nooooooo. Just getting hyped up for a game of tag (in the house) or play fighting (with me) or for spilling out his cars and his animals. Where is the “off” button?