Still Innocent Enough

"Mommy, if you would just let us do whatever we want, we would never eat candy again."
"But what if I let you do whatever you wanted, and the first thing you wanted to do was eat candy?"
"It wouldn't be."
"How do I know that?"
"It wouldn't, I promise. I'd never eat candy again."
"Unless, of course, you wanted to, in which case I would have no choice."
"Right, you would have to let me if you were letting me do whatever I want, but really, I'm telling you, I really wouldn't do that so it's still better for you."
"I don't believe you."
"So no? We can't do whatever we want?"
"No deal."

Elan turns 5 in two days - old enough to try (and often succeed) at talking me in circles, yet young enough that when he opens his eyes at night to find my face eerily close to his, watching him sleep and examining every line, curve and feature with an intensity that surely anyone else in any other situation would find unsettling- his first reaction is still to smile.

Our Summer So Far

I'm not sure when, exactly, I'm going to feel less surprised when, come each June of my adulthood, I discover I don't get summer vacation. At least, not in the traditional sense. I might take a little vacation during the summer - in fact, I'm going to Chicago for (count 'em!) 5 long days at the end of August - but there won't be any lazy days with nothing to do except swat at mosquitoes.

So be it, I guess. Work is a year-round thing.

I know most of you are probably in the same boat as me, so I'm not trying to sound like a baby. I mean, I have babies. I change their diapers. I know how annoying they are.

Anyway, consider this a catch-up post, or, as I like to call it: What I Did on My Summer Vacation - So Far. You can tell me if it's just my imagine, or if it's truly sucked.

1) Elan graduated nursery school. I couldn't enjoy said graduation because I had righteously ignored the school's request not to bring younger siblings to the event. Ariel, who I'd assumed was far more mature than they were giving him credit for, became incredibly jealous of the attention bestowed on his brother, and saw the evening as his Big Chance to assert our Mommy-Baby love for one another in a public forum. He not only insisted I hold his 35-pound load - standing - throughout the 45 minute ceremony, but also took the opportunity to forcefully kiss me on the lips. Or cry. You choose.

2) Ariel made promising strides at potty training. And then pooped on Elan's bedroom floor.

3) We found two roaches in our house. My husband - all 6 foot 3 of him - panicked, cried like a 9 year old girl, and let one get away. Alive.

5) Y became a gardener in his abundant spare time. He spent hours one Sunday carefully planting colorful flowers of different varieties in circular rows around our front tree. Due (I'm guessing) to the heat, they are now almost all dead.

6) Speaking of trees, I discovered, much to my delight, that the Mystery Fruit Tree in my backyard was growing nectarine! They were about a week away from perfectly ripe. A week later, the tree was bare, due (I'm guessing) to the same animals that have littered my yard with thousands of apples from our two out-of-control apple trees. Um, a house? = A ton of work.

7) We went to Big Bear for the weekend, up in the mountains, and stayed in an incredible log cabin mansion in the forest. We had perfect weather and a view to die for. I, naturally, had altitude sickness the entire time and could barely stand.

8) Elan swallowed a ball.

9) We lost our turtle.

10) Elan got Hand, Foot & Mouth Disease. So did Y. We spent the Fourth at Burbank's Urgent Care.

11) We paid for a week and a half of camp that Elan didn't attend.

12) I went to Home Depot, twice, to be largely ignored, twice. Apparently, women are not any more welcome at Home Depot than they are at a Fantasy Football club meeting. I tried looking cute and dumb and tried flattering every burly guy in an orange bib into helping me, and it didn't work at all. Instead, the guys in the orange bibs literally rolled their eyes at me when I asked for assistance with stuff like, you know, cutting an 8'x4' hunk of plywood in half, like Typical. Chick can't even manage heavy machinery without crying about it. I walked around muttering, under my breath, "You can do it - we WON'T effing help."

13) I tried to build an outdoor pen for Mr. Turtley with aforementioned sheets of plywood. The walls had to be at least a foot deep in the ground so he couldn't dig himself out. In 90-degree heat, digging is a lot harder than it looks. After an hour of hitting tree roots and stubbing my shins on rocks, I was sick and dizzy and defeated. When I finally came in, soaked with sweat and covered in dirt, collapsing in the Lazy Boy inherited from Y's grandfather and screaming "I GIVE UP!", Y actually laughed at the sight of me. Not his smartest move. He saved himself by closing his laptop and offering to take over, spent about five minutes digging before proclaiming the mission moot; apparently, there was no need, as the plot of land was underscored by cement. Mr. Turtley had no way to dig himself out. Which meant, of course, that the plywood pieces were way too tall. Which meant Home Depot - and my associated self-esteem shattering, glass-ceiling struggle - had been pointless.

14) Ariel, when told that he talks quite a bit for his age, took to replying "Yup, and I do shows, too!" His shows involve, mainly, "flips" (re: somersaults). He's also taken to inventing a false history for himself, most stories involving my mother. He finds a friend's kid's pacifier on the floor in our family room and scoops it up, announcing "Oh yes, yes. My pacifier. Bubbie gave it to me when I was a baby and I used it all the time." The child never took a pacifier for a moment of his babyhood. When asked if he knew what fireworks were: "Oh, yes, yes. My Bubbie took me to see fireworks when I was much younger, a very little baby." Never happened. When Maroon 5's "She Will Be Loved" comes on the radio, it's "Oh, yes, yes. This song. I remember this song from when Bubbie sang it to me when I was a little baby. My Bubbie teached'ed me ALL the best songs She wiiiiill be loved...."

My mother claims to feel a little guilty getting so much credit where it's not entirely due, but I told her to just TAKE IT. Own it, baby. Ariel can be convincing.

And that pretty much brings me to tonight. It's 9:30 and I still need to fill out scholarship applications, call the life insurance guy, call the alarm system guy, grocery shop, and plan Elan's 5th birthday party. Which, I can tell already, is not going to be anywhere near snake cake caliber. Oh, and I've got no entertainment ideas. Any suggestions?

I think instead of doing any of that, I'll go outside and read on the patio. And maybe swat a couple of mosquitoes.

Comings and Goings

A week ago last night, I was giving the boys a bath and planning an early, restful night. Although I love my work, it's a been a struggle to keep up with the other odds and ends of my life lately, given the 40+ hours a week devoted to it. Sometimes I run a tight ship and a tight schedule, and it works extremely well. Other times, it feels a bit messier and I get a little overwhelmed. Last month was an extended one of those times.

So I'm tired. Elan gets out of the tub and puts on pajamas. I hear him playing in his room while I wash Ariel's hair. Then: a scream. He runs into the bathroom, clutching his throat and crying hysterically, yelling that he "swallowed a BUH!! I SWALLOWED A BUH!"

Phew, I think. Who hasn't swallowed a bug or two in their lifetime? Granted, it usually happens outdoors, and at a campground, but whatever.

"Calm down, honey," I try to soothe. "It's gross, but it's okay. It's just a little bug."

"Noooo!" He wails, just as upset. "Not a BUG, a BALL! A TOY BALL! I feel it in my throat!! I'm going to diiiiiieeee!"

I try not to panic. He's talking, which means he's breathing. Which means he's not choking.

"What should I do? What should I do?" Elan keeps repeating, tears streaming down his face. He's so afraid, poor guy. "Am I going to die??"

He's smart enough to understand consequences, you see. He knows a foreign object doesn't belong in his body, and he can only guess that one plus one would equal - death. So smart, my child.

Just not smart enough to avoid SWALLOWING a PLASTIC BALL.

I have no time to try and figure out how it had happened. I do a little rudimentary Heimlich, and it doesn't work. He says he feels it in his throat, so I figure we need to head to the E.R. for what must be the eighth time in eight months. I manage to get Elan to sit on the floor and take a few deep breaths. Then, I hear Ariel cry and turn to get him out of the tub. Unfortunately, in the mayhem, he's climbed out himself and is sprawled across the bathroom floor, having slipped. Great.

In the car, I call Y, who is on his way home from work and fill him in, tell him where to meet us. "He's really upset, says he feels it still in his throat," I say breathlessly.
From the backseat, Ariel chirps up: "Well I fell in da bafroom and bumped my knee!"

It never ends, the competition. Never even pauses.

Ariel, who has been telling whoppers of stories, lately, all of which occurred "when he was much younger" or when "he was a little baby," invents one now about the time he swallowed a ball - a green one (Elan's is red) - and it went in his tummy and he went to the hospital, you know, when he was a baby. Funny that I don't remember.

Neck, chest, and abdomen X-rays indicate, indeed, that there's a ball in there, but at least it's in his tummy and only 14mm wide. They say it's small enough to pass on its own, "naturally." Every mother I tell this to recommends something else to speed the digestive process: a half-cup of olive oil, prune juice, "special" tea.

If only they knew Elan, who thinks any food that doesn't cling to his molars is a waste of precious time.

When Elan finally calmed down, he told me what had happened. Obviously, three weeks shy of five years old, he hadn't put the toy in his mouth to see what it tasted and felt like. He'd invented a game involving a hollow tube which he'd put the ball into, and, by blowing into one end, shoot flying out and into the air. All good, until, of of course, the time you accidentally suck instead.

In the midst of all this, Mr. Turtley goes missing. He's gotten lost in our backyard before, to be sure, but never for 4 days. I'm trying to not care, but the tears that keep welling up in my eyes seem to imply that apparently, I do. Every little accident with your kids makes you question or even doubt, at least a little, your ability to be a proper parent - an adequate protector - so I suppose I'm already a little more sensitive than usual.

But the poor turtle, I keep thinking. It's so hot outside, and he's such a picky eater! Last time I checked, I didn't grow high-quality, organic red-and-green leaf lettuce in my backyard, so he's probably starving. Or worse, he's gone and provided a raccoon or opossum - both of which roam my yard at night - with a hearty meal. And, of course, it's my own fault for not building him a proper pen in the first place, something I've simply put off for as long as I knew I could.

Elan is a little sad, but keeps mentioning that we'll just "get a new turtle," which is when I realize that this is truly my pet and mine alone. Elan has no deep feelings towards it.

So when, yesterday, a little girl who lives two doors down accosted me upon my return from work, asking if I'd been missing a turtle, I almost cried with relief. Apparently, the little bugger had dug under two fences, marched across two yards, and had been with them since Saturday. Unsure what to do, they kept him in a metal cage outside, which clearly upset Mr. Turtley very much. He couldn't burrow to escape the heat of the day and the chill of the nights, and he'd probably only been offered iceberg lettuce.

As I carried him home, he gave me a look like You wanna tell me what the hell I did to deserve Alcatraz?? and I knew my baby was back. The boys were overjoyed.

A week later, my other baby, however, has yet to show any signs that he isn't planning on keeping the ingested ball forever - slightly more worrisome. We took another round of X-rays yesterday, which I've yet to hear the read on, but I peeked at the picture when they took it and didn't see any ball this time around.

"I guess it might have passed without my realizing it," I tell the young tech.

"That - or maybe he never swallowed anything to begin with," the too-cool-for-school man tells me in a haughty whisper.

"Excuse me?" I say.

He grins, like these idiot parents, they believe everything their brat kid tells them.
"I said, maybe he never swallowed no ball."

He obviously didn't know Elan. But I still relished responding, "Oh he swallowed a ball, all right. We've already taken X-rays, and there was a big old ball right there in his stomach."

Also? You're a jerk and an idiot. And I'm late for work. Where I use my brain.

Okay, I didn't say that part. But for some reason, I kinda wish I did.

Especially when I remembered seeing Elan sneak Mr. Turtley a quick kiss - right on the shell - not knowing I was watching, on the night he returned home.

Yes, I made him rinse with hydrogen peroxide, but, sigh. If they only knew Elan.