We were all sitting around a nice big family dinner: Nana, Grampa, great-aunt Rosemary, great-uncle Mike, cousins Chris and Paul, uncle Nick, aunt Naomi, matante Julie, and the four of us. It was mixed grill night. Maïa looked over at the sausages sitting directly in front of her. I guess she had never seen them up close. She looked up at me from across the table and asked:
"What are those?"
"They're sausages."
"It's not poo, right?"
I swear: you can't make this stuff up!
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
Monday, July 17, 2006
Sometimes Momma's gotta take a break...
Two weeks ago now, I set off on my own for a mommy-vacation. I was pretty much drained, psychologically and emotionally. Derek had been in and out of town for six weeks because he was working in Ottawa. I handled it much better than I thought I would, but by the end of it, I was tired. Spending three evenings a week just with the kids was, apparently, exhausting.
So for the first time since Maïa was born, I left the kids for more than one night (and that night was in November because I had meetings in Ottawa). I am learning to ask for what I need. PPD taught me that much. It's a hard lesson, though. I think most moms don't ask for the time off that they need, mostly because we feel guilty. Guilty that it means that we don't like our role as mother. Guilty that someone else has to step up and do the duties for a little while. Guilty that we can't handle it like our moms seem to have done so well. Guilty that other moms seem to be handling it so well.
But I ditched the guilt (guiltily) and set off. I wanted to be bored. I wanted to miss my kids. I wanted... a little change.
I went to Ottawa to stay with my mom for five days, sans enfants. I visited the Emily Carr exhibit with my mom at the National Gallery. I had dinner with an old university friend. I went to the beach, alone, and actually read a book, without stopping every 40 seconds. I went shopping for clothes and didn't have to think about where the closest bathroom was in case of emergency or that it was nearing nap time or that someone was going to get bored and that we would have to leave before I tried anything on. I even got a little bored, just enough. And I missed my girls. I had time to miss them.
The biggest treat of the week, though, was getting together with my girlfriends from high school. There's a group of six of us, but two of the group were in Europe at the time (this is actually a common occurrence among the group: someone can't make the get-together because she's on another continent...). So four of us got together and decided to do a sleep-over, "old school." We watched movies, ate too much, did facials and pedicures, and talked until 4am. The last time I did this with them was literally ten years ago... girls, let's not wait another ten years to do this, okay?
So for the first time since Maïa was born, I left the kids for more than one night (and that night was in November because I had meetings in Ottawa). I am learning to ask for what I need. PPD taught me that much. It's a hard lesson, though. I think most moms don't ask for the time off that they need, mostly because we feel guilty. Guilty that it means that we don't like our role as mother. Guilty that someone else has to step up and do the duties for a little while. Guilty that we can't handle it like our moms seem to have done so well. Guilty that other moms seem to be handling it so well.
But I ditched the guilt (guiltily) and set off. I wanted to be bored. I wanted to miss my kids. I wanted... a little change.
I went to Ottawa to stay with my mom for five days, sans enfants. I visited the Emily Carr exhibit with my mom at the National Gallery. I had dinner with an old university friend. I went to the beach, alone, and actually read a book, without stopping every 40 seconds. I went shopping for clothes and didn't have to think about where the closest bathroom was in case of emergency or that it was nearing nap time or that someone was going to get bored and that we would have to leave before I tried anything on. I even got a little bored, just enough. And I missed my girls. I had time to miss them.
The biggest treat of the week, though, was getting together with my girlfriends from high school. There's a group of six of us, but two of the group were in Europe at the time (this is actually a common occurrence among the group: someone can't make the get-together because she's on another continent...). So four of us got together and decided to do a sleep-over, "old school." We watched movies, ate too much, did facials and pedicures, and talked until 4am. The last time I did this with them was literally ten years ago... girls, let's not wait another ten years to do this, okay?
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Today
Solanne scoured the Neighbourhood Yellow Pages (it looks like a mini-version of the real thing). She managed to find a picture of a cat.
While listening to Bob Marley's "Get up, Stand up," Maïa said, "That's a song about the man."
I learned that bringing only a sand pail to the park and forgetting the shovels isn't so bad after all. In fact, it may very well be more fun to fill the thing up with tiny fistfuls of sand.
Solanne walked the whole way back home from the park (it's normally a ten minute walk; it turned out much longer).
Maïa slow danced with Solanne because she saw Derek and me doing it.
Solanne worked on her puzzles — mostly the one with the cat (a four-piece puzzle). When she does her puzzles, I point to the place where the next piece should go, and she says, "ici!"
Derek and I made Sangria for the second night in a row, and the second time in our lives.
We used a wine called "Bianchi" that my friend Louise brought back from Argentina.
We finalised our plans to go camping with our friends, the "four Tops" this weekend.
Solanne slept her standard two hours in the afternoon, from noon to fourteen hundred hours, local time.
I knitted all of three rows of a current project (it's a biggy).
I talked to my mom who's in Alberta visiting with her sister.
I talked to a good friend of mine who is expecting a baby; we're keeping her in our prayers and sending her good vibes.
I talked to another good friend of mine who is doing me yet another favour, out of the goodness of his heart.
I felt incredibly blessed to be living this life.
While listening to Bob Marley's "Get up, Stand up," Maïa said, "That's a song about the man."
I learned that bringing only a sand pail to the park and forgetting the shovels isn't so bad after all. In fact, it may very well be more fun to fill the thing up with tiny fistfuls of sand.
Solanne walked the whole way back home from the park (it's normally a ten minute walk; it turned out much longer).
Maïa slow danced with Solanne because she saw Derek and me doing it.
Solanne worked on her puzzles — mostly the one with the cat (a four-piece puzzle). When she does her puzzles, I point to the place where the next piece should go, and she says, "ici!"
Derek and I made Sangria for the second night in a row, and the second time in our lives.
We used a wine called "Bianchi" that my friend Louise brought back from Argentina.
We finalised our plans to go camping with our friends, the "four Tops" this weekend.
Solanne slept her standard two hours in the afternoon, from noon to fourteen hundred hours, local time.
I knitted all of three rows of a current project (it's a biggy).
I talked to my mom who's in Alberta visiting with her sister.
I talked to a good friend of mine who is expecting a baby; we're keeping her in our prayers and sending her good vibes.
I talked to another good friend of mine who is doing me yet another favour, out of the goodness of his heart.
I felt incredibly blessed to be living this life.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Mementos
Maïa has this terrible habit of picking up things she finds on the ground. Our driveway/parking area is an especially interesting foraging ground for her; it's gravel, so you never know what kind of treasure you might find just by kicking up a pebble or two. She has so far found cigarette butts (care of our downstairs neighbour), rusted washers (look! it's a ring!), bits of red brick, a piece of glass, an oily bit of a car engine, a spring, various and sundry pieces of garbage, and, of course, gravel.
Beyond just picking them up, Maïa holds onto her treasures as though they were, well, treasures. She is reluctant to let them go or put them down, never mind not picking them up in the first place. Yesterday, when I went to fetch her from daycare, her teacher gave her something. I asked Maïa to show it to me: it was a little red plastic "pitoune" that looked like a piece from the game Battle Ship (remember that??). She told me that she had found it on their walk earlier in the day. After much coaxing, I got her to give it to me. Mostly I was worried that Solanne would get her hands on it on the ride home in the stroller and put it in her mouth.
So I explained to Maïa, for the fourty-third time this week, that we don't pick things up from the ground. They're dirty. They're dangerous. They're simply yucky. She seemed to understand. She said, "okay." And that was that. Until we got to the park, and I took her out of the stroller. The first thing she did was to pick up a bit of broken toy that was on the ground. I swear, she had walked about three steps before doing it! I asked her to put it down, and she did, quite nicely without a fuss, but still...
This whole compulsion of hers to pick things up seemed incomprehensible to me. But today, on my walk with Solanne, I got to thinking about it. And it doesn't seem so strange after all. When Maïa picks something up, she's not particularly curious about the object; she just holds onto it or puts it in her pocket. It seems more like a need to collect things. But not just for the sake of collecting them; rather, for the sake of feeling them, of having them. It's like those random items that she picks up along the way affirm to her that she is in the world, that there are things around her, that she was there. It's a way of remembering where she was (even if it was just moments ago), of connecting her to that place. For our memories and our experiences are so ethereal. We can make things up if we forget. But a thing, an object, ties us to reality, it reminds us of the feel of the ground at that place, of the smell of the air, of the shadow we cast upon the place where we once stood. It reminds us that we ourselves are real.
Maïa lives only in her body right now: that's the reality of a preschooler. Yet her body seems somewhat detached from her, out of her control at times, just as her moods are just beyond her reach most times. She is still discovering its solidity, its firmness. The world beyond her own body must seem ever more confusing and apart and wonderous. To pick up bits of it, even the tiniest and inconsequential bits of it, must be so affirming: yes, I'm here. Yes, this whole wide world is here, too. Wow. Lucky for me! Maybe I'll just carry around this neat little ring for a while to remind me.
Beyond just picking them up, Maïa holds onto her treasures as though they were, well, treasures. She is reluctant to let them go or put them down, never mind not picking them up in the first place. Yesterday, when I went to fetch her from daycare, her teacher gave her something. I asked Maïa to show it to me: it was a little red plastic "pitoune" that looked like a piece from the game Battle Ship (remember that??). She told me that she had found it on their walk earlier in the day. After much coaxing, I got her to give it to me. Mostly I was worried that Solanne would get her hands on it on the ride home in the stroller and put it in her mouth.
So I explained to Maïa, for the fourty-third time this week, that we don't pick things up from the ground. They're dirty. They're dangerous. They're simply yucky. She seemed to understand. She said, "okay." And that was that. Until we got to the park, and I took her out of the stroller. The first thing she did was to pick up a bit of broken toy that was on the ground. I swear, she had walked about three steps before doing it! I asked her to put it down, and she did, quite nicely without a fuss, but still...
This whole compulsion of hers to pick things up seemed incomprehensible to me. But today, on my walk with Solanne, I got to thinking about it. And it doesn't seem so strange after all. When Maïa picks something up, she's not particularly curious about the object; she just holds onto it or puts it in her pocket. It seems more like a need to collect things. But not just for the sake of collecting them; rather, for the sake of feeling them, of having them. It's like those random items that she picks up along the way affirm to her that she is in the world, that there are things around her, that she was there. It's a way of remembering where she was (even if it was just moments ago), of connecting her to that place. For our memories and our experiences are so ethereal. We can make things up if we forget. But a thing, an object, ties us to reality, it reminds us of the feel of the ground at that place, of the smell of the air, of the shadow we cast upon the place where we once stood. It reminds us that we ourselves are real.
Maïa lives only in her body right now: that's the reality of a preschooler. Yet her body seems somewhat detached from her, out of her control at times, just as her moods are just beyond her reach most times. She is still discovering its solidity, its firmness. The world beyond her own body must seem ever more confusing and apart and wonderous. To pick up bits of it, even the tiniest and inconsequential bits of it, must be so affirming: yes, I'm here. Yes, this whole wide world is here, too. Wow. Lucky for me! Maybe I'll just carry around this neat little ring for a while to remind me.
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