The Egg Picture

One of the more distressing aspects of parenting is that you can never predict what your kids will remember. What you intend them to remember, and how, is like everything else about parenting and life in general: out of your control and in constant opposition to your plans. 

You can spend a king's ransom taking your kids on a vacation, for example, and all your daughter will keep talking about is the luxe dispenser of lemon-infused water in the lobby of the Atlanta Airport Hilton Garden Inn. Or, on the flip side, you can go to great lengths to procure a pet hedgehog, and while taking a bath your son will tell his grandma that what "stuck with him" about these efforts it that they were so focused on his happiness.

My parents are now in their late seventies, and our relationship has never been better: they've both mellowed considerably with age, and I'm trying to make the most of our remaining years together. I'm determined to not argue with them over petty things or regress into old dynamics. As an only child and a mother of two children myself now, I realize that the only things that really matter at all after you become a parent is that you live to see your kids grow up and that you check out of this planet before they do. My parents are on track for that, and I'm glad.

I moved to Alaska when I was 27. I'm turning 45 this year and my daughter, Paige, will be 15. My son, Isaac, will be 12. My life feels split into two very distinct halves: my childhood and young adulthood in New York City with a brief stint in Rhode Island for college, and my adult life in Alaska where my kids were born, where I built my career as a lawyer, and where I stumbled into my non-monetized side-hustle as a blogger and activist. 

But a few times a year, I return to the 1,200 square foot of Bronx apartment where I grew up and where my parents still live most of the time. When I do, it feels like I've entered a wormhole in the space-time continuum. I sleep in my childhood bedroom cocooned by detritus from all phases of my early life: a tacky sculpture I spent $100 of 1990s babysitting money on. An old Cabbage Patch Kid I wanted and lobbied for with a burning passion. A box of Sculpey beads I made. I go into sort of a fugue state then, picking up one object after the other and tripping out on nostalgia, contemplating dumpster services and estate sales and Marie Kondo while simultaneously wondering how I'll ever let go of any of this junk. It's like shopping at Costco, but sadder and without the risk of impulse-buying an inflatable standup paddle board.

My mom has slowly overtaken the drawer space in my old bedroom with paperwork and stationery, but I discovered on a recent visit that one drawer remains relegated--or, more charitably, dedicated--to my old artwork and journals. 

It was in here that I found The Egg Picture.

The Egg Picture, which I drew when I was eight and still very into making art, had assumed an outsized role in my mind as a literal poster for parental failings. I remember meticulously drawing this at my dad's office in a midtown publishing company, waiting for him to be done working for the day. When I was finished I showed it to him and insisted that he mail it straight to The New Yorker, because they'd obviously want it for the cover of their April issue. Always direct and never one to adjust his tone or delivery to the age of his audience, my dad said bluntly: "well, you can try, but that's never going to happen." 

When I reminded my dad of this incident a couple of years ago, I did so through tears of laughter, not recrimination or sadness. "That was a terrible thing to say! Why did I say that?!" he protested. "Exactly, dad! You could've just lied like Mr. Pahlka (my high school English teacher) and said you were positive you'd see my work in The New Yorker someday."

I couldn't believe my stroke of luck in stumbling on the original Egg Picture. I was thrilled to find it but it also made me sad for myself, my somewhat lonely and depressed childhood where I retreated into art and writing, and then also sorry for my dad for saying something off-handed that stuck with me in a "bad" way. I reminded him that he's said plenty of things that have stuck with me in good ways, too, and that parents are only human after all. 

I decided to take the egg picture home to Alaska and frame it, which is kind of weird, because my kids also make plenty of great art that I've framed and hung on my walls, and what sane adult frames their own childhood art? 

But The Egg Picture serves a higher purpose, I think. It's a good reminder that there have never been any grownups in the room. They've all just been making it up as they go along, this whole entire time. We're never done growing up, and we are always fragile and beautiful. Each one of us is a colorful, delicate, self-contained tiny and unique world unto itself. We are each of us in free fall, with the perpetual risk and inevitable fate of ultimately breaking open, all while carrying the persistent hope of developing into something magical and new. 

We Are Failing Teachers and Working Families Right Now and Forever

What are we doing? No, seriously, what the fuck are we doing? I saw this meme (not sure who made it, or I would ascribe credit), but it perfectly encapsulates the bind our country's anemic response to the pandemic and its fallout has put working families, parents, and teachers into this fall.

We are in the midst of a global pandemic that is many months--perhaps a year or more--from resolving in any meaningful way, by which I mean widespread testing and a vaccine. Scientists and researchers are working feverishly on both, and I think these solutions will eventually materialize. But until then, we are going to have to do better than simply tell parents, teachers, and working parents to just figure everything out on their own.

That is essentially what has happened. 

Trump's edict to "reopen schools this fall!" is just another vacuous, self-serving directive from a clinical sociopath who has never cared for another human being--in any way--in his life. It's just like "build the wall," "make America great again," "law and order!" or any of his other meaningless, bumper sticker lies. And he's issuing it amid soaring cases in many states--including here in Alaska.

I personally witnessed this on a Zoom call for a school board meeting here in Juneau. It was apparent that district officials and teachers had put an enormous amount of work, thought, and effort into developing a re-opening plan, engaging parents in feedback, answering questions, and trying to offer solutions and comfort. 

It was also obvious they had no idea what they were doing, and that's because they are not supposed to know. They are not supposed to be in the position of having to figure this out on their own, and our country has truly failed teachers and parents in asking them to.

I wish someone would just say out loud, "look, the United States is failing miserably to manage this pandemic. We are not prepared for it--not politically, not medically, not economically, and certainly not scholastically. It's obvious that teachers and parents are doing the best they can, but everyone is making it up as we go along and it's a total shit show."

This dilemma--and our government's neglect of it--is not a coincidence. It is the natural outgrowth of decades of a particular model of economics: one where parents--mostly mothers--are told to work eight or more hours a day, five or more days a week, send their kids to school for five or six of those hours, and figure out what to do with their kids the rest of the time.

Now, while Trump and his cronies siphon off federal corporate welfare for themselves, working parents and teachers are left to their own devices. What is more, we are being divided and conquered in precisely the manner described in this meme below:

"Teachers are underpaid and underfunded" (an intentional societal choice). 

"Parents are not prepared to homeschool their children" (Why would they be? Teaching is a profession that not everyone has trained for). 

"Parents need to work and can't be home all day" (another patriarchal choice to value a person's time at work over their home life). 

"Children and teachers need to be safe" (which they can't be with a highly contagious virus no one fully understands, but who cares because "the economy" comes first. And for some kids, of course, school is the only safe place they can be). 

"Teachers cannot teach online and in person simultaneously" (of course that is completely impractical, and not everyone has food or running water, much less internet access). 

"Anyone in contact with COVID should be quarantined" (science suggests this is true, but what does that do to us, and how impractical is that, given the above demands on our time)? 

"Kids won't be able to stay in masks and social distance all day" (not even for five minutes--anyone who has spent more than ten seconds with a child of any age knows that). 

"Distance learning is difficult and socialization is important" (again, how are kids with working parents, food insecurity, no running water, no internet, and no ability to see their friends supposed to distance learn or socialize at all)?

"We don't know the long-term effects of COVID" (another troubling aspect of this disease is that, like polio, COVID may beget long-term physical and neurological impacts).

"It is not an educator's job to risk their lives for other people's children" (which goes back to the main conceit here that the Trump administration is more or less telling teachers to drop dead this fall).

It did not (and does not) have to be this way. We need to move the Overton window to a place where we value teachers and working families at least enough to provide them with the basic infrastructure and tools they need to get through this thing. 

They deserve that, at a bare minimum, don't they? 

Other countries are doing it; there are good ideas about ways to do it in the United States. But we don't feel like we can pull it off, because people can't even be trusted to put on a mask for ten minutes at Costco without dissolving into an insane temper tantrum, and the President of the United States thinks that's a beautiful thing.

Again, this is not a coincidence and it is not inevitable. It is a direct result of choices we have made as a society to elect sadistic leaders who value money over lives. Now, as a result, parents, teachers, and working families are being asked to figure out how to navigate something it is not their place to navigate, and made to fight amongst themselves to accomplish the impossible, all while the one percent abscond with the lion's share of federal resources that are supposed to be helping us. 

Disregard for mothers in the workplace, for children and teachers at school, for a struggling workforce that can't pay its bills no matter how hard it works--has been woven into every policy choice our government has made since at least the 1980s. Leave aside, even, the mass shootings: COVID has exposed the indifference and the "fuck off and die" attitude toward school children and working parents that has long been the fulcrum of American public policy.

We need to keep voting and advocating to make sure we are never--ever--put in this position again.

The Quickening

It’s sometimes called the quickening, that first flutter of life you feel inside your belly when you’re pregnant. I remember clearly that first quickening, with my first baby, lying in bed on my back one July afternoon in 2007.

I was just starting to feel human again; that month I finally wanted to eat something besides lemons. It was a small but distinct & perceptible jump, definitely not indigestion. It was new—the unique sensation of life and otherness. And it was surprising in an odd and almost distressing way, like a swallow bouncing off a window in mid-flight. 

As she grew it was so strange, I remember, to feel this other body rolling around inside of mine. Stretching her arms, her head down and firm like a bowling ball in my pelvis, her feet stretching up against my diaphragm, already a person with her own agenda of movement.

Everything since has felt like an extension of that quickening. An unspooling of this human being over whose life I like to believe I have agency and control, while actually having neither. I am agog at how I put this person into the world and, knowing that so much of who she is is already encoded by DNA, all I can do is help her maximize her best traits and minimize her challenges and obstacles.

She will be 13 at the end of this year; a year already marred in its own infancy by a pandemic, natural disasters, and a fractious and battered national psyche. She is handling these "unprecedented times" with aplomb: converting to virtual learning; accepting with circumspect resignation the cancellation of long-awaited trips and plans; finding new ways to interact with friends; going for morning walks; cooking and baking; cleaning her room; reading; making tea.

So we decided at last to dive headlong into that 21st century parenting murder hornet’s nest and get her a phone. It was precisely because she wasn’t nagging for a phone that it felt okay to get her one.

Especially in quarantine, I was growing weary of being her recreational and academic intermediary, and I knew she was missing out on some much-needed peer interaction. The independence and executive streak that had made her a difficult toddler now matched her abilities, and she was occupying herself with (mostly) helpful activities and good clean fun. Her instinct for self-care and her tendency to tattle on her little brother for the slightest infraction, I knew, meant she could handle the responsibility and rules of a cell phone.

But as always with these things, it wasn’t the thing itself, so much as what it signified. 

“I don’t even want a phone anymore,” she wailed as we tried to navigate some frustrating technical issues. Upon probing further, though, it was clear she was crying simply because she did not want to get older. 

If she got this phone, she knew, suddenly she was a big girl (already taller than her mom anyway) with real responsibilities. A girl who made her own plans and exercised her own judgment. And although I knew she was ready for it, she didn't want to be.

As her mom, I felt both ready and not ready for this little milestone that came upon us a bit unexpectedly. If quarantine has given me anything, it’s more time to think. I’ve been thinking about the kind of girl my daughter is, and the many ways I hope she will be “better” than me, and already is.

I was so maladjusted at her age. I was consumed with what other people thought about me. I tried to win the friendship of toxic, broken girls. I had a bad relationship to food and exercise. I constantly sought validation from boys. I was alone a lot of the time. I put enormous pressure on myself to succeed academically and athletically. I felt inferior to my own mother. I was afraid of everything. 

My daughter, fortunately, is mostly none of these things.

And as an adult, I’m not much better to be honest. I’m still a validation junkie (obvs). I say and do so many of the wrong things, so much of the time. I often chase the rush of my own brazen self-destructiveness, which masquerades as courage or fearlessness. I shudder to think of the damage I would have brought on myself with a cell phone at her age, considering the amount of damage I’ve managed to do with it as a grownup.

I wouldn’t have thought a simple device like this would feel like some major landmark moment in parenting, but yet it’s served as a reminder that my daughter is ready to handle a lot more than even she realizes.

A Mother’s Day Thank You Note to My Babies

Dear Babies,

I’m writing you this thank you letter from a sunny bench on the playground. (Thank you for letting me sit here, by the way. The swings make me barf). Technically you’re not babies anymore. At 8.5 and 11.5, I’m guessing you don’t have many years of monkey bars and swinging left in you. I’m just happy you still love playing with dolls and Legos. Can you make that last a little bit longer, please?

As an initial matter, I’m sorry I brought you into this shithole slum of a planet at probably one of the shittiest, most overpopulated and bleakest times in human history. Sorry for saying “shit.” I’m sorry, too, for the trouble I have caused in trying to do my part to un-shittify things. Maybe I’ve shat them up worse. But maybe you will understand why some day, and pick up where I left off, and do a better and less self-destructive job of it? 

I hope so.

Your biggest gift to me is bravery. Not fearlessness. I have more fear now than ever before. But you make me brave because I know that the only thing that matters is that I live to see you grow up and that you both outlive me. If that happens, I can handle anything. People can drag my name through the fetid sewer of lies and bullshit all they want and I could be broke and homeless and none of it will matter as long as we are around to love each other.

To my girl: I envy you. Your self-confidence, your self-esteem, your kindness, hard work, affection and your fierce independence. When I was your age, all I cared about were boys and friend drama. I cried over everything. You care about friendship bracelets and making your own French toast and finishing your math homework correctly and on time. You never get in trouble, unlike your mother. You hardly cry. Grandma dreaded my parent-teacher conferences but I look forward to yours because I know I’m not going to hear a bad word about you.

To my little man: You’re already too cool for your mom, I know. With your Sabiki fishing rig and your deep knowledge of local flora and your love of snowboarding and anything involving a ball. I doubt you’ll ever live anyplace but Alaska, and I hope you make it a better place. Thank you for teaching me how to raise a low-anxiety, wordsmith of a boy who loves babies, animals, and elders. Thank you for (almost) always being kind to other children.

The two of you are, by far, my greatest achievement. When you were born, I looked at you in wonder that my body made these perfect humans. I still love to put my face in your hair and read you stories and sleep next to you at night. I’ll try my best never to let anyone come betweeen you and your happiness and potential.

Thank you for the gift of being mine.

Love,

Mommy.

The Greatest Trick the Devil Ever Pulled is Convincing Kids That Adulting is Okay

Real Talk: we were all sold a bill of goods on adulthood, and at 41 I see why. If anyone told kids how God Awful™️ adulting is, most kids would probably lose the will to live. I mean ... let’s be honest ... the gap between what you’re told adulthood will be and what you experience as an adult could not be more vast.

WHAT YOU’RE TOLD: Follow your dreams! You can be anything you want! Maybe even an ASTRONAUT or a FIREFIGHTER! You’ll be able to make all of your own choices and have freedom to chart your own path! You can travel the world and get married and have kids and live happily ever after! YAY!

WHAT YOU ACTUALLY EXPERIENCE: Oh hi! It’s way too late to be an astronaut. You failed calculus, remember? Also you’re not brave enough to light a wood stove much less fight a structure fire in 89 lbs of equipment and an oxygen tank. Did you know that in addition to carrying your crippling student loan debt until cremation you need cost-prohibitive health insurance, life insurance, car insurance, malpractice insurance, home insurance, flood insurance, fire insurance, and maybe even avalanche insurance? Also when you have babies you will bleed for eight weeks, be unable to shit for three, and leak milk from your titties for 52. Enjoy the heartburn from that Beta blocker you swallowed without water because you were rushing to adult daycare for toiling capitalists (aka work). Here’s some mail—so sorry it’s not a present from Santa. It’s a magazine from Costco and your utility bill and a reminder to schedule a colonoscopy. What’s that smell? Carbon monoxide? Wait, carbon monoxide is the one that doesn’t have a smell, right. It’s the silent killer. Like ovarian cancer. How is that motherfucking smoke alarm STILL CHIRPING? Oh look. The dog must’ve thrown up on the carpet again. Why do we have pets anyway? Also who is this person you’re living with, whose voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard and whose very socks you hate and want to burn and the sound of whose footsteps make you cringe? Uh oh the car needs to be serviced again for its 300,000 mile servicing and the dentist is saying the kids’ fillings aren’t covered by insurance even though we paid for it isn’t that something? Hahhaha. Also your boss is an asshole because that’s in the job description for being a boss, amirite? I wonder if today’s headache is a brain tumor or just the feeling of existing ...?

It’s a fact, fam. The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing kids that adulting doesn’t blow donkey nads.

Being a Mom is SO FUCKING STRESSFUL Y’ALL!

Every once in awhile I just need to process this fact. Like from the first fucking SECOND it’s 24/7 anxiety and questions and insomnia. This has seriously been me EVERY SINGLE DAY since 2007:

What if I have a miscarriage?

What if the genetic testing is positive for something scary?

What if I go into pre-term labor?

What if they die of SIDS?

What if they contract meningitis?

What if they get an incurable disease?

What if they suffocate from anaphylactic shock?

What if they don’t make friends?

What if they get kidnapped?

What if they develop a mental illness?

What if we have a car accident?

What if she develops an eating disorder?

What if they can’t learn?

What if they play with guns?

What if the whole planet is uninhabitable?

What if Donald Trump blows us all up?

What if they drink and drive?

What if they get addicted to drugs?

What if they get bullied?

What if they ARE the bully?

What if they get molested?

What if he sexually assaults someone?

What if they shoplift?

What if they fail out of school?

What if they never graduate?

What if they go to prison?

What if they can’t get jobs?

What if they live with me forever?

What if we get into a feud and they never speak to me again?

What if I get fired and lose my health insurance?

What if they have a horrible breakup?

What if they hit their heads?

What if they get run over by a bus?

What if their bodies are already inevitably and irreversibly riddled with carcinogens?

What if they fall off their bikes and break a bunch of bones?

What if they bleed to death?

What if someone breaks their heart?

What if I disappoint them?

What if they disappoint me?

What if I’m missing out and not present enough?

What if I fail to make adequate memories?

What if I set a bad example?

What if they drown?

What if I outlive them?

What if I die while they’re still young?

What if they go to therapy just to talk about what a bad mom I was?

Like at least some of this will happen. I seriously CANNOT with the stress and vulnerability of parenthood. There is not enough Prozac in the WORLD for this. 

Why did I do this to myself?!

Widespread Manic Panic Room: A Step by Step Guide to Dyeing Your Kids Hair

Step One: Don’t give two shits about your kids’ hair. Not caring if your kids cut all their hair off and dye their scalp hot pink or whatever is like a threshold prerequisite to this project. Personally, I couldn’t GAF what my kids do to their hair. I’m saving my battle-selection capital for drunk driving, helmet-wearing, firearm safety, and homework.

Step Two: Try to explain to your kids what Ricky’s in the Village was, and how it was the only store you could buy Manic Panic. And how in high school you’d tromp over to the Waverly in your thigh high purple Doc Martens with your dirt weed from Tompkins Square Park and bust out your wallet on a chain to shell out a few bucks for the midnight screening of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Realize they have zero idea what you’re talking about and they couldn’t GAF. Feel old AF again.

Step Three: Read the directions on the jar. Ignore them all. Go with what you feel.

Step Four: What you feel turns out to be using your bare hands, because a paint brush takes too long. Technically, you’re supposed to use a “tint brush,” whatever that is. Anyway what does this look like? A fucking salon? Sorry, the closest thing you have is a stray Crayola watercolors paintbrush and fuck if you’re gonna be here all night. Use your damn bare hands, come what may.

Step Five: Set them up on a stepstool and tell them that if they don’t sit very still and read quietly for thirty minutes the dye won’t work. Wrap the dyed parts of the hair in a bread bag.

Step Six: Help them rinse it out; flood your bathroom. Do a big reveal in the mirror. Enjoy hero status.

5 Ways to Get Your Kids to Engage With Your Brand

I want my kids to engage with my brand, and here's how I do it:

1. Spread the News: It's important to stay on top of industry news. In this case, the "industry" is prepubescent/Peter Pan pranksters on YouTube and idiotic gaming apps that make animated unicorn-poop sushi. If you missed the Dude Perfect where they hit ten zillion softballs at once, and you aren't surrendering your phone to a download of "Slime Maker," then you're missing a key opportunity. You need to leverage industry news to ensure your kids know the meaning of the word "GRAPHIC," and what to do when they it on the internet above a video of a soft-shelled sea turtle getting butchered for soup.

2. Be a Pain Reliever: Ask your kids what's bothering them. Sit them down. Let them know that they can say anything to you, and that you'll listen for future action items. Except "no." Don't listen to that, because fuck that. You're in charge, not them. Also maybe keep a few spare Band Aids on your person at all times.

3. Promote Your Events: Are you hosting or attending an event? Like maybe a shit that lasts more than 32 seconds or a hot shower that lasts more than 70? Make sure to promote the event by yelling loudly. Attend the events yourself, of course, and then post them on social media with viral hashtags: #ImTakingaShitGiveMeFiveFuckingSeconds or #WouldItKillYouToBatheItsBeenFiveDays. Take it up a notch with a tried and true marketing tactic: shameless bribery.

4. Do DIY Projects: Nothing boosts a kid's confidence like DIY projects, which are all the rage these days, especially when book-ended by threats. It could be anything from "clean your room or no sleep-over" to "I hope those aren't wet towels I see on the bathroom floor." This will definitely boost engagement.

5. Share Inspirational Quotes: One thing that really promotes brand loyalty is sharing inspirational quotes. You can say proudly, "when I was your age, I rode my Huffy to school with no helmet and got a busy signal on a rotary phone attached to the kitchen wallpaper." Or simply hiss into their ears, "See that guy pacing and muttering angrily over there? He looks like he just escaped from prison. In fact, I'm certain of it. NEVER approach anyone who has that type of body language, understand?" 

All Aboard the Kiddie Clusterfuck Express! Next Stop: Adulthood

“Welcome to the start of living in your car. This is my first day of school photo,” a friend texted me this morning.

Our kids went back to school in Juneau today, and I wished her luck on the next nine months of Kuber (Kiddie-Uber) driving. Or--if you prefer because they supposedly have better labor practices—Klyft. 

Either way, here we go again. That’s what I thought as I dropped both kids off at school this morning for their first days of fifth and second grades.

Typically, the Juneau School District’s late August start date means a 50-degree sideways monsoon on the first day of school. But July was beautiful; today was the mildest, sunniest August day I can remember since yesterday; and everyone seemed a little bit happier (and tanner) because of it. Parents milled about, taking pictures with their smart phones, chatting about their summers, and marveling at the extra inches the kids had grown. Some children hugged their friends while others clung to their parents, and teachers greeted their pupils.

All the while, I just kept thinking, here we all are, on the Kiddie Clusterfuck Express once again.

There’s an open parenting secret no one tells you—at least not in time to do anything about it: If you choose to have kids (not necessarily something I recommend, by the way) and raise them in conventional American society, you’ll likely end up on a metaphorical express train conducted by your kids and their jam-packed schedules. Your kids’ friends and classmates’ parents will be your fellow travelers and/or Klfyt passengers, and just like a real train, you don’t pick these passengers. You just have to hope you like them, because more often than not, you’ll need them. The practical reality is that I rarely see any adults whose kids’ lives don’t intersect with mine unless I really carve out the time, which between work and home-life is always at a premium for everyone.

It’s an interesting bond—that raising-kids-together-in-a-community bond. The whole “it takes a village thing.” It’s not really ingrained into American society, which fosters nuclear family units marooned in their own isolated silos. But there’s value in pushing back against that default because of the established benefit of many positive adult influences in a child’s life.

There’s a reason most parents feel happier when we’re co-parenting outside our nuclear families--when we know that we are taking care of each others’ kids. My kids were born in Juneau. I’ve known some of my friends since before we had kids, and our kids are now involved in the same activities or go to the same schools. Others I’ve met through my kids, whose sweet young friendships have made us frequent text-buddies and sometimes independent friends.

Regardless, and long after our kids are grown, we’ll always share that unique bond of having taken this journey together.

Here’s to my fellow travelers.

Isaac Thinks a Public Park Bathroom in NYC is a Temple and He Is Not Wrong

My #AlaskaKid didn't know how right he was when he asked me to watch him scooter all around "this temple" without stopping. The "temple" to which he was referring was not a house of worship, but rather a public bathroom in a New York City playground a block from my parents' house.

And actually, Isaac wasn't entirely wrong to call this a temple, because as everyone knows, a reasonably clean, safe, public bathroom in the City of New York is a rare sanctuary, and here are its ten commandments: 

1. Thou shalt not bypass a free, clean, safe public restroom in New York City lest it be the last opportunity you have to relieve yourself for many, MANY hours without having to disgorge money from your person.

2. Thou shalt be leery of public bathrooms in Penn Station AND the Port Authority Bus Terminal. AND THE PORT AUTHORITY. Did I mention the Port Authority?

3. Thou shalt be leery of public bathrooms in Grand Central Station.

4. Thou shalt be leery of public bathrooms in City playgrounds.

5. Thou shalt check immediate surroundings for used needles and other biohazard detritus.

6. Thou shalt not wait at Starbucks for more than ten minutes, because you don't want to go in there next after that long, take it from me.

7. Ditto McDonalds.

8. Thou shalt not reveal the locations of the Best Bathrooms in the City.

9. Okay fine, they are usually in a hotel lobby.

10. Also Heckscher Playground at Columbus Circle is not horrible.

Walking with Isaac

Only within the past year or so has it begun to sink in that Isaac is pulling away from me; that I will never have him back again in the same way.

When he was nine months old, Geoff took both kids to California to visit their grandparents, as he does every spring break. As usual, I stayed behind because I had to work. When they returned, Isaac, wearing little footie-pajamas, greeted me with rage and upset and tears of betrayal. I felt a crushing pang of “working mother” guilt: Should I have figured out a way to go on the trip? Was Isaac too young to be away from me for a week, even with his dad and primary caregiver? Did I traumatize him for life? 

Something feels different about the mother-son relationship. It could be my kids' personalities and not their genders, but I think there is some sort of socialized gender-conformity or Freudian aspect to this too. I can feel the push-pull of Isaac’s resistance to intimacy in a way I don’t with Paige. Paige is freely affectionate and never embarrassed by me. Isaac wants to be left alone. He only wants hugs—NOT KISSES. Although he’s only 7 and a half, he doesn’t want me to wave goodbye or hug him when I drop him off at school or sports. Basically, he wants very little to do with me at this point. Or, more accurately, when he does want to be around me, he doesn’t say it directly and I have to intuit it.

That’s what happened last night when I came home from work and put on my running clothes. It was a rare warm and sunny day in Juneau; there was no way I was missing an opportunity to make my punishing after-work exercise less punishing by doing it outside instead of on the treadmill. Geoff was cooking dinner and Paige was walking around the neighborhood selling tickets to her dance show.

“Can I go running with you?” Isaac asked hopefully. I sighed inwardly, knowing that this would scuttle any real exercise I was hoping to get, but I responded with an enthusiastic “sure,” instantly recognizing an increasingly rare overture to hang out with me.

We started off down the hill from our house, with seven dollars scotch-taped into Isaac’s pocket and my iPhone playing music. The first person we saw was our neighbor, Bob, cleaning out his boat. 

“Heading out today?” Isaac asked as if he were a twenty-something deckhand on a commercial fishing vessel making small talk with a fellow fisherman. “Nope, I’m a long ways away from that still, Isaac” said Bob, engaging Isaac in conversation about his electric boat. “Most boats use gas?” Isaac asked incredulously. “Yes, a lot,” I offered. Then we saw Paul working on his garden. “I like your garden!” Isaac called out jovially.

The rest of the walk sort of went like that. Sun drunk and happy, we half-walked/half-ran down the hill. Isaac stopped along the way numerous times to make observations about the nature hiding in plain sight in our neighborhood. 

“Look! A cotton-foot!,” he said pointing to a little bird hopping around in the brush. “This is an invasive species,” he said a few minutes later, picking up something that looked like rhubarb but wasn’t. I barely know a sparrow from an eagle or rhubarb from a cactus, so it’s also increasingly obvious that Isaac is quickly outstripping my knowledge of Alaskan flora and fauna. 

"Wow, that's a big eagle," he said looking up at what indeed was a very big eagle riding thermals among the spruce trees. "I want to stop and watch him for a minute."

We arrived at the store and got a quick, sulk-inducing lesson in arithmetic when the items Isaac had selected added up to 31 cents more than the seven dollars in his pocket. He chose gum and candy instead of a spicy hot pickle, which he pronounced “too intense.” He held my hand crossing the street; I could tell he was feeling sad and frustrated about under-budgeting his purchases.

We began our walk back up the steep hill, and Isaac retrieved a long stick from the ground. “This is going to be very useful,” he announced, “for marshmallows and hot dogs, but also I want to put this bag on here like a bozo.” (He meant “hobo”). 

I filmed him for a minute and twenty seconds explaining how to clean and prepare fiddle head ferns for eating, and asked him if I could share it on my blog. He said yes, but then when we re-watched the video together, he asked me to take it down because he claimed he had “made a mistake” and didn’t want to sound ignorant. I tried to explain that no one would care, that people would be interested in hearing his botany lesson, but he was insistent so I honored his wishes. He asked me to explain a #Resistance yard sign in front of a house, mistaking it for a for-sale sign, so I told him to read it out loud and then explained what it meant.

I thought back to that moment 15 minutes earlier when Isaac held my hand crossing the street. I was conscious of the fact that he will not want to hold my hand very much longer, or very frequently. I’m 40 and Isaac is almost 8, and I know I’ve made a choice. The more time that goes by, the more I can blame the passage of time for my choices, but the fact is I am not having any more babies (if I can help it), and I’ll have lots of other chances to go for a run.

I’m glad I chose walking with Isaac.

Maria Montessori is Helping Isaac Find His Inner Bro

For reasons that are too boring to explain—preschool machinations, public school lotteries, conflicting educational theories—Isaac goes to Montessori public school, and Paige goes to regular public school. Which probably explains why only Isaac has ever come home having cut the sleeves off his shirt with a pair of scissors.

Maria Montessori has a sort of cultish following, the complex rules of which I still don’t fully understand after all these years; but from what I can tell, it’s a child-guided thing where you learn math with beads, follow your dreams of “abiding curiosity,” and eschew cartoons and talking animals. Like you can cut pickles, wash windows, and brew Kombucha all day, or you can invent a new form of calculus and write a Russian novel. 

It’s all the same to Maria. 

So I can see why Isaac followed his “inner dudebro” last week and ended up looking like Danny Zucko from Grease or the Fonz. 

Isaac has long been guided by his inner-dudebro. Even before he could talk, he loved dinosaur teeth and shark jaws and anything involving wheels or sports. As you can see from the photo collage below, these heteronormative tendencies have endured into his childhood, and now encompass his hair and clothing.

I can imagine exactly how this went down. He was hot, he told me. And the number one rule of his classroom—which is a great rule for life in general—is “you are responsible for your own happiness.” I’m sure his teacher asked him how he was going to solve his temperature issue, and in true Montessori fashion, Isaac derived a hands-on solution.

I’m all about choosing my battles, and hair and clothes are two battles that I categorically reject. Fortunately, almost all of Isaac’s clothes are rags already, so what’s one more shirt full of stains and holes? Aren’t the sleeves of a stained and too-small shirt a small price to pay for pedagogical purity?

Maria Montessori says yes.

Childbirth: Princess vs. Plebe

Based strictly on this photo and (some) personal experience alone, here’s how I’m guessing this distinction goes:

I. LABOR

Princess: William dear, I believe the prince is en route. Shall we call the driver and get to hospital?

Plebe: HURRY THE FUCK UP ASSHOLE! STEP ON IT! YOU DID THIS TO ME ASSHOLE THIS BABY IS COMING RIGHT NOW OH MY GOD THERE’S A TELEVISION SET COMING OUT OF MY VAGINA I’M GONNA PUKE PULL OVER PULL OVER PULL OVER ASSHOLE (PUKES) HOLY SHIT I THINK I’M DYING

II. DELIVERY

Princess: *Baby slides out of perfectly manicured vagina in one push* Oh helloooooo dear! Welcome to the British Royal Empire!

Plebe: *Screaming and wailing*: I AM DYING I AM DEFINITELY DYING AND GOING TO BE A MATERNAL MORTALITY STATISTIC TRACKED BY THE CDC ANY SECOND NOW WHERE IS THE ANESTHESIOLOGIST WITH MY EPIDURAL WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE’S PLAYING GOLF 30 MILES AWAY ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME I AM SO DONE WITH THIS I NEED A C-SECTION IMMEDIATELY

III. BLEEDING

Princess: *one regular tampon’s worth of menstrual blood* The end.

Plebe: *10 weeks after delivery* WOW HOW AM I STILL BLEEDING INTO THESE GRANNY PANTIES? WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THERE WOULD BE THIS MUCH BLOOD I ACTUALLY CAN’T BELIEVE I AM STILL EVEN ALIVE RIGHT NOW HOW CAN I PRODUCE THIS MUCH BLOOD AND STILL BE ALIVE THAT ONE BLOOD CLOT IS SO BIG I THINK IT MIGHT ACTUALLY BE ONE OF MY KIDNEYS?

IV. CLOTHING

Princess: *7 hours post-partum*: Jenny Packham dress in a daring red with a sweet Peter Pan collar, along with a pair of classic court heels by Gianvito Rossi that retail at $500.

Plebe: *7 hours post-partum*: Size XXL Star Wars pajama pants from Costco; XXL T-shirt from Rhode Island thrift store; husband’s gray Stussy hoodie from 1998; flip-flops.

V. POOPING

Princess: Does not poop. Ever. Full stop.

Plebe: *2 weeks after delivery*: MOM MOM MOM GET IN IN HERE I THINK I’M HAVING ANOTHER BABY EXCEPT THIS ONE IS COMING OUT OF MY ASSHOLE CALL THE DOCTOR OH WAIT NEVER MIND IT’S JUST TWO WEEKS OF SHIT IN ONE GIANT TURD THAT IS THE SIZE SHAPE AND COLOR OF A WORLD WAR I GRENADE/DIET COKE CAN HAVE YOU EVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE THIS EVEN IN MEDICAL SCHOOL OH YOU HAVEN’T THAT’S WHAT I THOUGHT

VI. MOOD

Princess: Cheerio, fine citizens of London!

Plebe: GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME, YES I AM WEEPING BECAUSE I DROPPED A PLATE OF VEGETABLE FRIED RICE AND BECAUSE THE CAT ON THE FANCY FEAST COMMERCIAL IS CUTE AND WHAT OF IT?!?!

VII. NURSING

Princess: *Places one C-sized boob in mouth of perfectly latching infant for half an hour, hands off to nurse immediately.*

Plebe: GOD FUCKING HELP ME I AM A MISTREATED DAIRY COW PETA SHOULD SUE SOMEONE MY NIPPLES ARE IN A MEAT GRINDER WHY CAN’T THIS BABY GET COMFORTABLE MAYBE IT'S BECAUSE S/HE IS SUFFOCATING FROM THE SIZE OF MY TITTIES LITERALLY EACH TIT IS BIGGER THAN THIS BABY’S HEAD NO ONE TOLD ME I WOULD HAVE TO DO THIS AROUND THE CLOCK WHY DID NO ONE EXPLAIN THIS

VIII. SLEEPING

Princess: *Hands baby to nurse on night one, sleeps full 8 hours*

Plebe: WHAT DAY IS IT? WHAT TIME IS IT? HOLY SHIT OMG WHERE IS THE BABY? OH WAIT IT’S STILL ON MY BOOB. DID I JUST HEAR IT CRY THOUGH OR WAS THAT AN AUDITORY HALLUCINATION FROM LACK OF SLEEP I FEEL LIKE THE SUBJECT OF A CIA BLACK OPS TORTURE INTERROGATION

Transcript of Semi-Awkward Period Convo With My 10 Year-Old Daughter

[Scene: 8 minute car ride to school]

10 yo: When you get your period, do you bleed just like once when you pee, or for longer?

Me: For longer, like 5-7 days.

10 yo: Whoa. Can you take a medicine to make you not get your period?

Me: Yes, but that's basically birth control I think. We can discuss it with Joy [pediatrician] when the time comes.

10 yo: Where does the blood go when it comes out?

Me: Into a tampon or a pad.

10 yo: What's the difference between a tampon and a pad?

Me: Well, the tampon goes in your vagina, and the pad goes in your underwear, kind of like a diaper.

10 yo: Wait . . .  WHERE does the tampon go?

Me: So . . . um . . . your vagina actually has a hole in it. Did you know that?

10 yo: WHAT?!

Me: Yeeeeeah . . . about that. I can explain everything if you want. You also have something called a clitoris. Do you want to know about all of this right now or not?

10 yo: EW! Gross! No!

Me: Okay.

10 yo: I heard someone in the locker room at swimming say their tampon string got lost in their vagina. 

Me: Yeah, that happens sometimes but you can always find it again, I promise.

10 yo: How often do you get your period? Do you just get it one time?

Me: No, it comes every month--usually every 28 days.

10 yo: And HOW long do you bleed for again?

Me: 5-7 days.

10 yo: Wait . . . WHAAAT?!?! EVERY MONTH?! FOR 5-7 DAYS?!

Me: Yes, you bleed for a week every month for approximately 40 years.

10 yo: Wow. This is terrible news.

Me: Don't kill the messenger.

Not Sure My Kids Got the Memo About National Siblings Day

So, apparently it’s National Siblings Day, because in the age of social media, every day is some made-up hashtag holiday. Well, my kids didn’t get the memo. Or if they did, they chose to celebrate the occasion in their usual way, which is to fight like crazed animals all week long, competing for resources while deploying every weapon in their physical and psychological arsenal.

I’m an only child, so my barometer for what’s normal in terms of brother-sister relationships is probably skewed. Ideally, my children will be best friends now and forever, caring for their parents in our senescence and for each other long after we’re gone.

Sadly, at least right now, I feel like my kids will be lucky to make it to adulthood without killing or maiming each other. Here’s a sample of their interactions, on the eve of National Siblings Day:

The "Slime on the Sweater" Incident: Isaac tried to "dry off" a ball of green slime on Paige's favorite sweater. The ball of green slime also, coincidentally, belonged to Paige. When Paige got home her reaction was HOW COULD YOU LET HIM PLAY WITH MY SLIME AND NOW MY FAVORITE SWEATER IS RUINED AND IT WILL NEVER COME OUT AND MY SLIME IS GONE AND etc. etc. etc.

The "Shoe on the Sweatshirt" Incident: Sitting in the back seat of the car on the way home from Folk Fest last night, Isaac and Paige began to scuffle and Paige kicked him in the chest with her shoe, and Isaac's reaction was HOW CAN YOU LET HER JUST KICK ME IN MY BRAND NEW SWEATSHIRT SHE GOT MUD ALL OVER ME [EXPLETIVE/EXPLETIVE/EXPLETIVE] I can't even repeat the curse words that were flying for fear of revealing myself to be an even worse mother than I already have.

The "Breached Bedroom" Incident: Paige complained about Isaac breaching the threshold of her bedroom. MOM HE'S MESSING WITH MY STUFF I WANT TO CALL DOAK'S LOCK AND KEY AND GET THEM TO INSTALL A SPECIAL LOCK ON MY DOOR HE HAS ANGER ISSUES YOU SHOULD SEND HIM TO THERAPY to which Isaac responded I DO NOT HAVE ANGER ISSUES SHE SHOULD GO TO THERAPY I HOPE SHE TAKES DRUGS AND LIVES IN A BOX WHEN SHE GROWS UP!

The "Won't Stop Singing Annoying Song" Incident: Both of my kids like to annoy each other to the point of mental breakdown by singing songs or repeating the same thing over and over again, until they both scream MOM MAKE HIM/HER STOP!!!!!

The "Commandeered Computer" Incident: Isaac went to "research" a split board snowboard on the lap top, and Paige immediately began trying to "help" him find it. MOM IT WAS MY TURN WITH THE COMPUTER AND SHE JUST CAME OVER AND STARTED USING IT AND IT'S NOT FAIR AND etc. etc. etc.

And that was just one day. One. Fucking. Day.

Parenting Fail Follies Episode #437: WTF Are You Watching?

Ah screen time. FUCKING screen time. Screen time and sugar are a form of contraband drugs that my kids jones for all day, every day. Hence the "no screens during the week" rule. 

I don't have that rule to be a self-righteous mommy blogger about it. I have it so that there are set expectations and a bright-line, and so that we don't spend every minute of every weeknight negotiating over screens.

Unfortunately, that means that the minute Friday afternoon rolls around, my kids come home from school like CANWEPLAYWITHTHEIPADCANWEHAVEASIMPSONSCANIPLAYONYOURPHONE, etc. And we say yes. And you know why? Because we're tired, too.

We've spent all week wrestling Gladiator-style in a kids versus grownups war for domination of the domestic sphere, and we're all exhausted. (This is the part where a random Baby Boomer writes a comment and tells me I'm under-disciplining my children. I'll save her the time: SHOVE IT UP YOUR ASS, BARBARA!)

Anyway, I don't really pay that much attention to what my kids watch on YouTube. Like, I do a preliminary audit for curse words and porn, basically, and tell Paige (the responsible one) to immediately come get me if they click on anything "inappropriate."

I know what you're thinking. You should do this thing to your computer or put it in this setting or blah blah. Fuck that shit. Them bitches in MY world now. I'm not making accommodations. I expect them to work within my censorship rules and they basically comply.

But that doesn't mean I don't ask "what the eff are you watching?" under my breath as I wander over and see Isaac transfixed on two teenage boys making slime and cackling uproariously.

This is his genre of YouTube, apparently. I feel like an old lady saying that. But my kids are consuming media I'm not remotely clued into, but that they and all their friends all know about somehow.

It's like Oh Yeah, The Kalinksy Brothers! Oh yeah, the Eebee Family! And I'm just thinking to myself who ARE these people? I'm in the wrong fucking line of work because these kids are probably making bank. Apparently there's a market--a BIG one--for "Boys Watching Other Boys Do Stupid Shit."

That's Isaac's favorite genre of YouTubery. It's an amateur, G-rated version of Jack Ass, is what it is. 

They're young, pretty and have great hair with a lot of product in it, and they do stuff like put pancakes and Sriracha in a blender and eat it. Or--and this was my personal favorite--make a giant mound of slime, pour it into an inflatable backyard kiddie pool, put a mini-trampoline on TOP of the pool, and jump around on the mini-trampoline to see if it sinks.

These pranks are innocent enough. But they're planting a seed for a level of mischief that sort of puts me off my food. So when it's over, I usually sit Isaac down and deliver my standard "Alaska Boy" lecture, which typically goes like this:

Me: What are the two most dangerous things in Alaska besides the open water? More dangerous than bears, even?
Isaac: Guns and cars.
Me: That's right, guns and cars. And do you play with guns or cars?
Isaac: No.
Me: Do you EVER touch a gun or a car without an adult around?
Isaac: No.
Me: And what do you do if you see another kid touching a gun or a car without an adult?
Isaac: Come get an adult right away.
Me: And what about helmets? When do you wear a helmet?
Isaac: For snowboarding, skating, and anything with wheels.
Me: Okay and what about slime?
Isaac: I don't make it.
Me: You don't make what? 
Isaac: I don't make slime without an adult.
Me: What's that I couldn't hear you?
Isaac: I DON'T MAKE SLIME WITHOUT AN ADULT.
Me: You're goddamned right, you don't. You're excused.

A Cease and Desist Letter to My Children

Mom

Our House

Paige and Isaac
Our House

March 3, 3018

RE: Cease and desist fighting with each other

Dear Paige and Isaac,

This CEASE AND DESIST ORDER is to inform you that your persistent actions including but not limited to: kicking each other in the butt for no reason; knocking over your brother's Jenga tower when that's obviously not part of the game; using your sister's Barbies to whack Fidget Spinners off a shelf; pointing a Nerf gun at your sister's face, putting Queso cheese sauce in your brother's hair; yanking the mini-trampoline out from under your brother mid-jump; launching a remote control helicopter off your sister's head; putting liquid soap on your brother's toothbrush; and telling your brother that you know for a fact that he was an "accident" have become unbearable. 

You are ORDERED TO STOP such activities immediately as they are being done in violation of my sanity. 

I have the right to remain free from these activities as they constitute harassment and I will pursue any legal remedies available to me against you if these activities continue. 

These remedies include but are not limited to: cracking down on loosely-enforced dish washing and laundry folding expectations; separating you into time outs in your respective rooms; forcing you to clean toilets if you cannot manage to get along for five fucking minutes; making empty threats; and to that end banning all sugar and screen time for the rest of your fucking LIVES.

Again, you must IMMEDIATELY STOP fighting with each other and send me written confirmation--using the email addresses that we gave you to help you practice reading and writing but that you only use for emojis--that you will stop such activities. 

You risk incurring some very severe legal consequences if you fail to comply with this demand.

This letter acts as your final warning to discontinue this unwanted conduct before I pursue legal actions against you. At this time, I am not contacting the Office of Children's Services or sending you to military school, as I hope we can resolve this matter without authoritative involvement. I am not under any circumstances, however, waiving any legal rights I have presently, or future legal remedies against you by sending you this letter.

This letter acts as ONE FINAL CHANCE for you to cease your unauthorized activities before I exercise my rights.

Sincerely,

Mom

20 Things Every Parent Says or Asks Every Day in Vain and Without Fail

1. Why is this wet?

2. What’s that smell?

3. How did this get here?

4. That’s not what that’s for.

5. Why is there glitter on this?

6. Are you gonna clean that up?

7. What are your whispering to each other?

8. Open this door.

9. Well, where did you last see it?

10. How did you manage to lose THAT?

11. I assume you’re planning to clean that up.

12. That doesn’t go there.

13. Where did THIS come from?

14. You’re kidding me, right?

15. When was the last time you took a bath?

16. Do NOT speak to me that way!

17. We’re not buying that today.

18. We don’t have the ingredients to make that.

19. We’ll see.

20. Can you take it down a few notches?

My Family Literally Has the Same Conversation Every Weekday Morning and This is How it Goes

[Scene: Typical weekday morning car shuttle clusterfuck in which we all drive to school and work together. Geoff drives. He drops off Paige, then me, then Isaac. Don’t ask why we do it this way. We just do. Suffice it to say it’s not my idea and I’ll leave it at that because to explain it would take a whole other blog post I don’t have time for right now]

Geoff: Holy shit. Who was the last person to drive this car? [Turns to me]

Me: I assume it was me; I’m the only other licensed driver in our household.

Geoff: How short are you?

Me: The same height I’ve been for 26 years.

Geoff: Every time I get in this car after you drive it the radio is blasting top 40, the seat is pulled up practically into the windshield, and the seat warmer is set to 175 degrees. [Turns to Isaac and Paige]: Do you guys have your backpacks, jackets, and lunches?

Paige:

Isaac:

Geoff: I believe I’ve said MANY times that the price of admission to this vehicle is your backpacks, lunches, and jackets. I don’t understand how we do this every day and why no one ever lis—

Paige: But I left my skating bag back there and ha—

Geoff: Don’t interrupt me! Just go get your stuff!

[Isaac and Paige both get out of car and get the shit they know they are supposed to get every single morning before this part of the conversation happens, then get back into car]

Geoff: [Turns radio to NPR]

Isaac: Can we listen to Mix 106?

Me: Yeah, can we? It’s like for whatever reason every time I want to hear the news there’s a 15 minute human interest story about some guy who just fulfilled his lifelong dream of building a combination yurt/rowboat. Like I just don’t give a fuck, ya know?

Geoff: Fine.

Isaac: [2 minutes into a Katy Perry song]: Why does she "ride him like a roller coaster?”

Paige: Ugh you’re so STUPID, Isaac!

Isaac: Mom, Paige called me stupid!

Me: [Grateful for distraction from the roller coaster question] [To myself quietly]: Why do they play songs about Katy Perry riding Juicy J at 7:45 a.m.? [To Paige]: Paige, don’t call your brother stupid.

Geoff: Here’s that seven inches of snow we were supposed to get that’s actually half an inch. Why is there no snow? I can’t believe there’s still no snow. This winter is so fucked.

Me: Dude, you have to stop talking about it. It's so annoying. Talking about how little snow there is isn’t going to make more snow appear. Also, you're kind of in denial about global warming.

Geoff: Dude you have to stop picking your face with that thing. Do you have any idea how dangerous it is to tweeze your eyebrows in a moving vehicle on ice? Why can't you just sit still? Why do you always have to be doing shit with your phone or the tweezers or whatever? Instead of retweeting Trump’s status update, how about you use that phone for something useful and tell us when the snow is coming. [Pulls into roundabout at Paige’s school] I don’t understand all the people who park in this circle. You’re not supposed to park here. It’s a very dangerous situation. Everyone thinks the rules don’t apply to them. All of these fucking parents are out here running up mountains every weekend and kayaking around Douglas and they can’t park in a fucking parking lot to walk their kids 50 yards into school? They have to park their giant pickup truck in the fire lane like the sign says "FIRE LANE EXCEPT FOR [NAME REDACTED]?" Honestly some of these hippies are the most selfish people on earth, it’s kind of ironic. [Turns to kids]: If I ever catch you guys acting like the rules don't apply to you I'm gonna be PISSED.

Paige: [Gets out of car]

Me: Bye honey!

Paige: Bye Mommy!

Me: [To Geoff] So say something to the school.

Geoff: No way. I’m not going to be THAT guy.

Me: Then why do you have to keep mentioning it then?

Geoff: Can’t you just let me mention it? Is it really that horrible for you?

Me: Do you really want me to answer that?

Isaac: I have to pooooooooooop.

Geoff: Isaac, how many times have we discussed that you should poop BEFORE we leave the house in the morning?

Isaac: But I didn’t have to go then!

Me: Don’t worry, we’re almost at my work, you can poop there.

Isaac: But there’s too much traaaaaaaaafic. I’m going to exploooooode! I’m the unluckiest boy in the WOOOOOORLD!!!!

Me: Yes, you're right out of a Charles Dickens novel. 

Isaac: Haha, you said "DICK," mom!

Geoff: [Driving up Main Street toward the Capitol Building] [To pedestrian]: GO GO GO GO OH MY GOD JUST GO!! I don’t understand why pedestrians never want to take the right of way. It’s a very dangerous situation – like you have the right of way. Take it! And why is this guy out here with his dog off leash in the middle of downtown on a weekday? And how are all these people walking around in these shoes? And who thinks this is a good place to pull over? Is this person on fucking quaaludes? I don’t get it. I don’t get it. I just don't get it.

Me: You realize you sound like a grouchy old man, right? [Takes Isaac inside to poop, then back out again].

Geoff: Don’t forget we have [insert whatever thing we have] tonight. See you at 5, love you, bye!

Me: [To Isaac]: Do good work in school, love you [Tries to make physical contact]

Isaac: [Cringes in revulsion] NO KISS!!!!! NO KISS!!!!

A Mighty Battle Hath Been Waged!

Dawn broke on the second of February, in the Year of Our Lord two thousand and eighteen.

A mighty battle was set to be waged at high noon on the sacred grounds of Gastineau Community School, at the edge of a rain forest, thick and dense with wooded spruce, silvery salmon, and of course—the fearsome bear.

The young soldiers rose with the eagle’s cry at dawn to prepare for combat, a standoff which would now and forever be known as THE BATTLE OF THE BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOKS!

Ms. Ferguson, the school librarian, sounded the rally cry on behalf of the Alaska Association of School Librarians and commanded all spectators and combatants to remain quiet and seated in the war theater such that the rules could be announced and the questions posed.

One mother knew well the strife her young soldier had endured under cover of darkness and a clip-on reading lantern, engaged in a months-long reconnaissance for the grueling contest: 

Reading (and re-reading) Freckle Juice by Judy Blume, Sugar by Jewell Parker Rhodes, Ms. Rapscott’s Girls by Elise Primavera, Sasquatch Escape by Suzanne Selfors, and some half-dozen others. Some of these were declared “SO BORING” and took a fortnight to conquer, whereas others were engrossing and surrendered with ease.

But ALL would face a dark reckoning that morning on the frontlines.

Battalions A through F clashed fiercely in a struggle for the ages 7 through 11 as Ms. Ferguson, armed with a heavy-artillery wireless microphone strafed the battlefield blitzkrieg-style with questions such as “In which book do two of the characters take a seat on a rock and strike a bargain?”

There was frantic scrawling with pencils and much whispering amid the three-soldier platoons, so that secret intelligence would not be collected across enemy lines.

Some of the supposedly correct answers yielded “challenges,” in which front-line infantry would confront the three judges with an alternative route to victory, only to have their pleas fall upon deaf ears.

All fought valiantly to acquire the high value target of participation in district-level battle, but only one team—the Three MouseCatEars known to civilians by their secret code name of “Team A”—was destined to prevail.

It was only by the grace of Divine Providence that the sole casualties in this conflict were the bruised egos of the defeated warriors, and a little bit of time spent reading a few books they didn’t necessarily like very much.