Winner Winner Chicken Ball Dinner

Last month I talked about my eight year old son being in his first grappling tournament. He did really well, with one round going into multiple overtimes because he would just not go down. It was awesome and if I hadn’t said some fairly questionable stuff in the throes of excitement, I’d post the video. Ultimately he came in third, and as you can see in the picture above, he’s positively thrilled with the outcome.

One of his rounds went eight whole minutes of constant grappling. That’s a long time to do anything physical and if you don’t think so then you weren’t on my honeymoon.

Last month I also talked about me starting the Insanity workout series. “Oh! How’s that going?”you may be wondering. Please refer to my Craigslist posting under Barely Viewed Exercise DVD’s (some tear staining) for updates to that project.

But keeping in mind that my son was able to work at something so hard that he looked like this…

…made me think that maybe I should do something equally as challenging myself. A friend suggested we do a 5k together. This “friend” runs regularly. I run to catch the garbage truck or when someone is chasing me. I am not a runner. I don’t wear or own any article of clothing labelled “Active Performance,” nor do I want to. I like my outfits somewhere more towards cozy and with the ability to hide nacho stains.

With the promise of treats at the finish line, I hesitantly agreed and downloaded the Couch to 5k Running App on my phone. So far I can run for a full three minutes which you may think doesn’t sound like much until you realized that on day one, I literally barfed into a stranger’s recycling bin. That was after 60 seconds of continual running. The thought of any amount more than that was as unfathomable as one day being able to afford my student loan.

So I’m up to three minutes. Go me, right? Nope. I don’t allow myself praise unless it comes in the form of something with cheese melted on it, so I’ll reserve that for the finish line.

Am I enjoying it? Does the pope wear a hat? Oh wait. The Pope does wear a hat. So how about I just tell you HELL NO I DON’T LIKE IT. I hate every single minute of it so far, but it’s good exercise and it’s only half an hour three times a week and maybe it’ll grow on me. But I doubt it. Also, runners, when will I stop crying? I swear I cry every single time I run. Is this a runner thing? Because I can’t get on board with the whole “show emotion” part.

As for my son, all he wanted after his grappling tournament was a fancy beverage and some Chinese buffet. He may be a lean, mean, grappling machine, but he’s not so tough he can’t enjoy a good “Shirley Temple” mocktail with an umbrella and citrus twist. He may also be a 70 year old Boca Vista retiree.

Planting the Seeds of Motivation

There are a lot of things I don’t like. The list is exhaustive and constantly in flux, so I will spare you the gritty details. Some of the things on my “no-fly list” are there for reasons which any reasonable person would find ridiculous. I am not a reasonable person most of the time. I use that time to be ridiculous.

In the past I’ve told people that their efforts to placate my irrational fears or hatred of things with rational arguments is time wasted on their behalf. You cannot refute an irrational argument with rationality, I say. (I am told this is exactly how you conquer irrationality.)

One of the things I hate the most is motivational “artwork.” You know what I’m talking about: someone takes a picture of a mountain or an eagle soaring over a lush forest landscape and adds an inspirational quote at the bottom in a bold font. Things like “Your Attitude Determines Your Altitude,” or “Success: Some Dream About It; Others Work At It.“

Screw that. I once used the words “ass wipe,” and “communist bloc Russia” in a 20-second conversation with a stranger in a grocery store check-out line, so it’s not a stretch to say these type of inspirational posters have no place in my life. I don’t need a plaque showing a baby turtle crawling to the ocean above the phrase “Determination: It’s What Gets You Where You’re Going.” I need something succinct, something more to-the-point, something me. I need a short, concise phrase that will motivate me to do well under even the most dire and difficult of circumstances. I need my primary motivation captured on paper, preferably in one word.

Thanks to a friend with a good heart and a Cricut machine, I finally have it:

 

You can now find me at MamaPop.com three times weekly – on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Here’s why I hate “Reasons My Son Is Crying,” why I love Rebel Wilson, and how the return of Whose Line Is It Anyway? will save America.

Branching out

My son is competing in a Jiu Jitsu grappling tournament this weekend which I expect to go well since grappling is how he’s spent 92% of his time since birth. Then 7% is split equally between eating salami, avoiding baths, and playing Minecraft. One percent goes to sleep.

Last weekend he came inside, breathless and covered with small scratches. I assumed he had a run-in with a racoon or possum as they are rampant this year, but it turns out no, he was just thirsty. And the scratches? From “zip-lining ” in our backyard maple tree.

He was more than happy to explain his method: First, he takes a small dead branch from the small dead branch pile (I’m a bit behind in yard maintenance.) If it looks strong enough to support his weight, he checks it for “criteria.” (Criteria = it doesn’t snap when he cracks it repeatedly against the side of the house.) He climbs the tree as high as he can, and then, using both hands and holding right to the ends of the small dead branch, crosses it over a bare tree limb and slides down until he’s low enough to jump.

“Oh, boys!” you say. “My son once drew on the walls with crayon and peed in the laundry hamper!”

Hahahaha. That’s lightweight parenting round these parts. Enjoy your 40′s, wrinkle-free and sane, playing organized board games with your offspring while I wonder why all my wooden spoons are in the downstairs toilet.

I asked him what would happen if he fell while zip-lining. He put his muddy water glass on the table, wiped his mouth on a filthy sleeve and said “I guess I’d get hurt.”

Then he turned and left, taking a sizeable portion of my sanity with him.

Sports bras and Insanity. They are related.

It was exercise day today and I’m laying on my bed right now. It’s after 6, and I should be making dinner, but the fact of the matter is that I can’t move any of my legs. (I think I have two. But I’m not sure, because I can’t feel anything below my chest.)

My chest was spared from injury because my 14 year-old daughter helped me tape my boobs together. I believe that if you are going to do something, do it right and enlist help from those legally obligated to love you regardless.

I’ve watched all the stupid Insanity DVDs in this set and no where is there a woman with a chest bigger than the one I had in grade five. I know muscle takes place of some fatty tissue, but what about the “before” part? Million dollar sports bras are an option but my children have grown accustomed to the taste of red meat and I hate to take that away from them just so I can do something called a “Suicide Jump” without giving myself a concussion.

I am a sexy beast, no?

And so day three of Insanity is over, although to be fair it ended sooner than anticipated when my son found me curled up sobbing on the basement floor with my breasts bound with blue duct tape, so you know, any given Monday.

I wrote some other stuff this week, over at The Huffington Post and at MamaPop.com, all of which is substantially more inspiring.*

* It will not inspire you at all.

Maybe you’ll like this picture of my son trapped under an anvil instead:

He knows my pain.

Stay

I will lay with him just until he falls asleep and then I will leave. I will be careful not to put my weight on the creaky spot in his doorway or he’ll wake up and the dishes will go undone, and tomorrow’s school lunches will be unmade. Sometimes I fall asleep with him and we sleep heavily, shoved together like cell mates in a crowded prison on his bottom bunk.

It’s habit now to stay after he’s read his book to me and the lights are out. The house is quiet and dark and I am tired at day’s end. I can’t refuse the minutes off my feet and his measured breath is hypnotic and it keeps me here. I remember listening for it from the doorway when he was a baby and I wanted to make sure he hadn’t left us in the night. Does this worry ever cease? I could have used some warning. I’m exhausted by the worry sometimes but it’s a part of me now, inscribed in my flesh like a fingerprint.

He doesn’t seem to care for me very much lately. Not in any cruel sense; rather that the need to create his own space has superseded my desire for sharing stories. So, curled together under a heavy blanket may be all the time I get for a while.

People say your children will leave, but that they eventually “come back to you.” That they pull away and return, only to pull away and return. I don’t like either of those options. The pull stretches my already strained heart, and being one to hold a grudge, I sometimes warm slowly to the coming back. Why must they go, ever? They’re young so I still get the “where” and the “what,” but I miss the “why.” I used to know all of the why’s. I used to be consulted for answers to those questions.

I now see a closed bedroom door where I once had a toddler wrapped around my leg. There is a “please stop asking me questions” when I finally got accustomed to answering countless ones.

Maybe I will let myself fall asleep here in this bunk tonight. It’s already warm with the heat from his small body and tomorrow he will turn from my kisses.

Couch Potato

Several things about my week:

1. Over 90% of my meals have been handed to me through a window.
2. I left my house for a potato or some version thereof at least three times. Not sure if its winter hanging around or what, but I have had some serious hankerings for potatoes lately.

That’s about it. I’m a real party, folks.

I also decided I hate cleaning my house and I’ve pretty much made my peace with it, which would be very freeing except that I can only function properly when my house is hospital corners NO WIRE HANGERS clean.

So to make things as easy as possible, I bought some disposable dusting cloths and now dust when there’s either a crack in my apathy or a really bad commercial comes on the television.

I even broke down and paid for paper towels which I never do. But I am 40 years old and I deserve paper towels, goddammit. I hid them somewhere so my kids don’t abuse the privilege, and I also don’t want them becoming accustomed to the trappings of a fancy lifestyle and suddenly thinking they’re above their station. It’s protectionary, really. I should be commended.

(WordPress and iPhone spellcheck are telling me that “protectionary” is not a word, but screw that. It sounds good, and I’m using it. In fact, it’s now this: Protectionary™.)

I’m not sure if I posted about this before, but at Christmas time my son won a trophy in a Jiu Jitsu grappling contest. I was proud, but not surprised because my son is an eight year-old 60lb bag of muscle with beautiful brown eyes to trick you into passivity before he kicks you in the nuts.

He was so happy with his win and wouldn’t put the trophy down. My daughter has many trophies that she won in soccer, and she keeps them all on a shelf, where they are cared for meticulously. I dusted them today, in fact, when a commercial for Cholesterol medication was on and I didn’t need the reminder that the window clerk at Wendy’s and I are on first name basis.

Then I went in to my son’s room to clean his “treasures.”

It seems the bloom is off the rose.

You can find me at MamaPop.com on Wednesdays and Fridays, as well. Here’s some words I arranged there last week:

Michelle Obama Criticized For Her “Dance Across Your Television” Tour

Why You Gotta Be So Mean: Can We Please Stop Slut-Shaming Taylor Swift?

Choking on her dust

My daughter starts high school next September. Her grade eight teacher tells me she should be placed in the Advanced Program at high school – that my daughter is a hard worker, a fast learner, and that she retains information.

I hope they offer “Emptying the Dishwasher 101,” and “General Laundry Folding Techniques” next semester.

She does indeed have excellent study habits, and refuses to miss school  for almost any reason. I say this not to brag, but in the same way that I would tell you my son once buried our compost bin in 3 feet of mud and that I am 39 years old and need compression stockings and blood pressure medication– because it’s true.

Last night her future high school hosted an orientation for grade eight students and their parents. Bubbly high school seniors in black polo shirts with popped collars gave the kids warm cookies and a tour of the school while telling them what to expect in terms of uniforms, dances and clubs, and delicious hot cafeteria lunches. They told them all about study abroad possibilities and travel opportunities and how they could earn credits by building schools in the Dominion Republic!

At the same time, parents were corralled into the freezing audigymnateria where school officials in suits and ties told us how much we had to pay for uniforms, how much we had to pay for dances and clubs and lunches, and also how to begin the organ donation process so that we could afford to have our kids build schools in the Dominion Republic.

When the parent presentation was over, the parents of these intelligent, quick-learning studious children in the Advancement Placement program were invited to another room for further discussion.

I was almost late getting there, to that Advanced Placement meeting.

My finger was stuck in my purse zipper.

Tip Thursday: Enjoying a stress-free Christmas

There is so much to get done during the holidays that it’s easy to get overwhelmed. Once you factor in baking, decorating, and wrapping gifts, there’s hardly any time left for sobbing into your eggnog because the only Christmas card you received was from your divorce lawyer.

Just me?

In any event, here are some Christmas tips for today’s Tip Thursday that  I hope help you manage holiday stress a bit better. I’ve used them all to varying degrees of success.

1. Elf on the Shelf – Get rid of it. If you’ve got more than one kid, the truth is you don’t need it. You’ve got a built-in Elf on the Shelf every day of the year. I’ve got two kids, and I’ve even given them both incentives to reporting behaviour. For example, one tattle earns a square of toilet paper. Two tattles? You get a sheet on your bed tonight! Three? That’s big time, helper child, and you’ve just gotten yourself a full glass of milk with dinner. Now nothing happens in this house without me knowing about it, and if something is so well thought out that it involves both children, I don’t want to know about it.

2. Caroling – Just say no. Seriously, does anyone even do this anymore? If you must participate in this tradition, make it easy for yourself: drive around the neighbourhood with your car windows open, cranking Alvin and the Chipmunks Christmas CD.

3. Baking – Today’s home chef can make treats rivalling those found in European bakeries. Thanks to speciality shops and pushy friends selling Pampered Chef products, you too can churn out delectable, gorgeous treats just like those in a bakery. Have I said “bakery’ enough to indicate you should just GO TO A BAKERY? No one will know. Jab a few of the cookies with your finger, and maybe throw a couple into the toaster oven to burn the bottoms if you’re worried about appearing too perfect. I wish I had your problems.

4. Gift wrapping – Fancy papers, ribbons and bows, personalized name tags…Where does the madness end? You’re already getting a present. You expect me to spend 30 minutes carefully wrapping it in foil paper with co-ordinating hand-punched calligraphy name tag? Take a cue from my Ex-husband: wrap everything in the bag it came in and seal it up with whatever roll of tape is in the junk drawer. Some of the nicest things I ever got came in duct taped Wal-Mart bag. (And by nice I mean okay. And by okay I mean not good at all.)

5. Decorating - Right now my lawnmower is sitting out, mid-lawn, right where it ran out of gas in August. I just threw some lights on it and called it a day, so maybe go elsewhere for decorating tips.

6. Meals  - Planning nutritious meals for your family while you’re busy with things like shopping and crying, or wrapping and crying, or trimming the tree and crying can be hard. Well, wipe those tears away, friends! For I bring to you one of the greatest gifts God bestowed on the Universe: the grocery store rotisserie chicken.  This golden BBQ bird has saved my hide (and potential calls to Children’s Services for suspected neglect) many, many times. In fact, in the song “The Twelve Days of Christmas” the verse “partridge in a pear tree” was originally “A chicken in my buggy.”

7. Parties - Make them “BYOBAFAYNLUEICU” : Bring Your Own Booze and Food and You’re Not Leaving Until Everything is Cleaned Up. Enforce this. Hide people’s coats, their keys, whatever you have to under piles of crusty dishes and empty wine bottles. They clean the mess, they find their stuff! This is also a great way to keep guests entertained. You’ll secure a reputation for being the “hostess with the mostest” employing this technique.

I’ll check back after the holidays to see how it all worked out for you. Please, add your tips in the comments if you’ve got some to share.

Merry Christmas!

Semantics

I settled in the single bed next to my son. There’s a hollow in the mattress in the shape of my body, and when I leave the bed, he will roll into my spot and sleep cradled even in my absence. But I won’t leave until he’s sleeping.

I’ve been on “vampire watch” for months, as I have been every night since he saw a scary movie commercial on television. (Thanks again, Cartoon Network!)

Tonight his face seemed smaller somehow, younger and softer than his eight years. Lately I’ve seen glimpses of an older boy, but since last Friday both my children appear again as babies before me. I search for dimples in their knuckles.

I look until I find them.

On this night my son looked sad. I asked him if he was upset. He knows nothing about Sandy Hook, nothing about what happened there. He knows nothing about the 20 children who were killed – the 20 children who quite possibly slept with their parents still. He knows nothing about the 20 sets of parents who would do anything to further imprint the outline of their own bodies in the mattresses of their small children.

The flags at my children’s school fly at half-mast this week in memory of the dead. I thought maybe my son had overheard me talking with my 13 year-old daughter about the events last week. (If I keep referring to “it” as “the events last week” does it soften it? I don’t think so. But still, this is what I am doing.)

I’ve kept the television off and I speak to my daughter about it only when he is not around. Still, I’m sure he wondered why suddenly I wasn’t complaining about going to sleep in a bunk bed fort anymore and even suggested that my daughter join us.

I asked him if he was okay. Was there anything he wanted to talk about? Something he was upset about or had overheard and wanted to ask me?

He looked at me for a few seconds and said yes. He was worried about something.

“I’m worried that when I wake up I will forget that I wanted to put the mop head under my Santa hat and pretend to be Santa Claus at school tomorrow.”

It is not lost on me how lucky I am that I have a boy for whom this is the biggest fear in the world.

Slow Sunday

Things are the same here as always for Sunday morning. It’s raining outside, and I can hear the washing machine running. The dual sound of water is comforting and familiar. There is a pork loin marinating in the fridge upstairs for me to ruin later, my daughter is still sleeping and I am letting her, and my son is on the couch watching commercials which will no doubt rot portions of his tender, still developing brain.  

I have a list of things to accomplish today and can tell you right now that many of them will go undone. I have articles to write – deadlines loom and I’ve made commitments, so I will work a bit today. But otherwise I am going forward with no expectations. I think we all need a bit of a break this weekend. Whether you find that peace by spending the day window shopping, or wrapping gifts and watching movies, or sobbing silently while a stranger licks caramel sauce off your toes, whatever; I don’t judge.

For instance, later on I will eat an entire box of Toffifee while I make my kids perform a shadow puppet version of Led Zeppelin’s “The Song Remains the Same,” DVD solely for my amusement.

Just do something that makes you feel good, okay? If you can make someone else feel good while you’re at it, even better. Gold stars for you.

Because YES, the world sometimes is a shit-filled, painful asscrack suckhole of a place.

But sometimes it’s not. And as long as the “not’s” outweigh the “is’s,” we’ll be okay.

Here is something I hope will ease you into a kinder, gentler week. One of my favourite ladies –  Smacksy – shared it, and I want to share it as well. Please visit her, as she has lots of gentle posted this week (and always.)

26 Moments That Restored Our Faith In Humanity This Year