TheMommyBlog

When there’s nothing to post, there’s usually too much on fire.

To wit: bank threatening to freeze assets, lawn dying mysterious death in spots, children booooored but unwilling to do anything around the house, in debt to my eyeballs and no paycheck in sight, kids off camp all week but have wonderful neighbor with pool and two accompanying children of appropriate age, Phil well into fifteenth day on east coast, torn between finding more affordable digs and preserving childhood home, warmed by rave reviews of session given to national professional association accompanied by realization that the things most appreciated and valued are those I do for love, not money, and that I will die an entertaining pauper. On anti-depressants.

So. Not much to do but pack up the kids, invade neighbor’s pool, help paint a room, find lunch or at least cash for same, contemplate having car windows fixed (smoke came out of switch when tested with nail file, not encouraging), finish laundry, crack a beer, and wait for the day to be over.

How about you?

It starts when you begin to overlook bad manners. Anytime you quit hearing “sir” and “ma’am”, the end is pretty much in sight.
—Tommy Lee Jones as Sheriff Bell

No Country for Old Men is full of lines that have left me thinking for hours. And I’m not alone—anyone who has seem the movie is bound to be haunted by some unshakable sound, word, image, feeling. It stays with you.

For me, it was Tommy Lee Jones telling Barry Corbin that he’s retiring as a deputy.

Corbin asks, “Why?”

Jones replies, “I don’t know. I feel overmatched.”

I can’t shake it that line or the look on his face as he said it. It’s exactly what been eating at me lately, that the reason I can’t seem to get a toehold on this life. I feel overmatched.

Overmatched by what it takes to provide for three children as a single mom in Silicon Valley.

Overmatched by the knowledge that our generation for the most part will never know the level of security and certainty about life that our parents’ generation did.

Overmatched by the mortgage, the laundry, the schools, camps, activities, and the swatting away of poor influences and tending of good ones. My kids have been coming home from camp this summer able to spell and pronounce curse words I know I’ve never used in front of them (don’t EVEN get me started on Soulja Boy. Suffice to say that Logan’s jaw actually dropped open when I finally broke down and told him what a few of the lyrics meant).

I try to explain that it’s a matter of context. There’s no way anyone can stop them saying those words, but they have to be mindful of the context, the surroundings, the people around them. I don’t need my six year old daughter repeating any of this. The other day, I had a flashback to Meet the Fockers where the baby’s first word was “ah-so” which he overheard from Ben Stiller complaining about his father-in-law. Sure, it was funny in the movie, but not so funny hearing it from my daughter in the kitchen the other morning. When I promised a week’s worth of grounding to the next person who uttered that word in my presence, Daphne said, “I don’t think I even want to know what ahhole means.”

I’m overmatched by the information coming at me from all different directions (but mostly from this computer) and by sorting out what I’m supposed to do with it. I stopped reading magazines and newspapers, thinking I was paring down the number of information sources to keep my head from exploding, but in actuality, sticking to the papers does more to limit and encapsulate what’s going on around you in a way that the internet can’t. Once you’re there, there’s no limit to where you can go and there’s certainly no governor on it, telling you when to slow down or walk away.

It’s even worse when you work from home, like I do (or what we laughingly refer to as work here). I’m building a couple of web sites for people, hoping to pull in some freelance cash to hold us over until the next grant comes in for our nonprofit organization. We ran out of money in May and I’ve been doing the barrel and suspenders tap dance for two months now. I actually had to explain to the kids last night that we were going to divvy up the last of the frozen dinners between us for dinner, because my account was overdrawn and I couldn’t buy groceries. If they were still hungry, there was always popcorn! So we had Movie Night! Twice!

Ugh. I haven’t even been able to formulate any of this into coherent writing both because I am utterly overwhelmed, and because I feel compelled to spend every moment not caring for the house and the children on my projects just so I can hopefully get paid something, anything, so I don’t have to borrow or start selling my belongings.

I think there’s enough coffee to make a few cups this morning, so I think I’ll start there.

I just checked in with my (way too) many profile pages, and on LinkedIn, I had a message that July 2 was the last day to register for BlogHer. That would have been great information to have YESTERDAY.

This is the first BlogHer conference I’ll have missed, and that’s sad. I was there at the beginning, stuffing binders and helping to fill in when audio failed during the keynote.

Even worse, it’s in my area this year, an hour up the Peninsula in San Francisco. Phil’s stomping grounds. Jesus H. Barnacle Christ in a potato sack.

I wouldn’t have been able to go anyway, especially as the collection call from the hospital this morning claimed the last remaining funds in my bank account.

If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be going now. Not to BlogHer, of course, but just over there, on the couch. I’m finding Julie Kenner’s Play.Win.Survive trilogy to be quite the escape these days.

(Seriously, I thought the Demon Hunter series was great, but this is something else altogether! Think DaVinci Code meets Devil Wear Prada meets The Matrix. Fashion, assassins, sex, and cryptology. What’s not to love?)

The entire household has gone TILT and none of us can see straight.

The All Star tournament is over; Logan’s team lost the penultimate game last night and were out of the running when they were this –> <– close to winning it all. All I could think was, no more two hour practices every day that meant pulling everyone out of camp three hours early (and cutting my workday short by that amount) and spending evenings and weekends at games. I love my son and support his passions, but am not shy about voicing concerns that the family needs balance and priorities that reflect the presence of THREE children, not to mention the parents. One sport had us entirely subsumed, and that was unsustainable.

So of course the second this tournament ended, the coached suggested another. Just two more weeks of practice and then a three day junket to Albany, CA. Does anyone know where Albany, CA is? I sure don’t and that makes me think that it is very, very far away, someplace I have not had opportunity or inclination to visit in the twenty two years I’ve lived here. Predictably, I said, flat out, NO, we need a break, my ex said maybe, and Logan told his coach he’d love to play.

*Cue head exploding* So much for a united front.

Yep, it’s summer, the flowers are blooming, the kids are out of school, and I’m out of work. At least the theme is consistent. They shoot horses, don’t they?

The nonprofit I work for ran out of grant funds in May, and we’re not sure how long it will take to get new funding. Not in time for the mortgage, though! I checked with the camp office this morning to plead hardship and ask if I could shift some of the next three weeks to later in the summer, because, hey, I’m not working! And camp is hella expensive! And there’s no good way to say this, but what the hell: don’t know when child support will resume. Things are tough in both camps just now. I’ve got approximately ten percent of the mortgage payment in the bank, and am rifling my desk for uncashed checks, savings bonds, rings to sell…

So if you don’t see me or anything resembling a bubbly me for a bit, it’s because I’m busy redecorating Maslow’s basement.

Blimey.

This weekend… don’t get me wrong–I love my mother more than anyone else on the planet so I was thrilled she let us take care of her while she and her new hip made peace–but couldn’t it have been a LITTLE smoother?

Mom came home from the hospital Friday afternoon. The plumber arrived at five p.m. Friday and stayed through six on Sunday, only going home to sleep and pick up fixtures I would never in my life willingly install in in my shower. Sure, he fixed the leak, sure, he did it on a weekend, but the whole point of having Mom here was that the entire house is one level and there’s a shower stall you can walk right into five feet from the bed.

I gotta say, there’s not much good a shower like that can do if the water is turned off virtually all weekend. And you have your parents staying with you. And your three children. With no bathroom. Or sinks. Christ on a cracker.

..She will need a walker. If you give your mom a walker, she will need a one-story house and an accessible shower stall. So, hey! I live two miles from the hospital, and have a master suite with a million pillows and a total ADA-compliant, walk-in shower! Come on over! I’ll be your Convalescence Home. The kids will love waiting on you.

In the first hour, she takes her first real shower. I’ve lived here for ten years and had at least ten showers (maybe more) and THIS is the one that finally snaps the hot water handle deep inside the wall. The next thing I know there’s a plumber walking in the door saying, “I can fix that for $312.13.” I pulled out my checkbook and both mom and step dad dogpiled me, insisting that they will pay for it.

Today? Is Saturday. He had to come back because it turns out that it can’t be fixed by removing the handles. All these tiles have to come out. And it’s now running to eight hundred dollars. And oh, the sunflower shower head I have that rains this lovely rain down on you? Is all totally crimped now. Did you want another one like that? Or do you want the one that came with the replacement handles I picked up this morning? I could run out and get you one… NO. Just use what’s there. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, we need that bed and bath back, stat.

While not being able to sleep because my daughter invaded my bed and pressed her heat-seeking missile body ever closer until I fell off the edge, I began to read up on some of the links I mentioned a couple of posts back. No surprise, Jenn Satterwhite of Mommy Needs Coffee had a totally spot-on take of the genre of Mommy Bloggers. I usually stay out of the fray, either because I’ve said it all before somewhere in last six years or because I know that the title of my blog has become more of an impediment than a novelty. Yes, I’m cranky. My daughter was radiating heat like a… heat radiator thing.

Read these excerpts from Jenn’s post, and then my comment, which should have been a post here in the first place (and now is).

While we are on the topic of respect, I have to mention a great conversation that took place today. The question was asked:

“Tell me, is ‘Mommyblogger’ still a negative term in the Social Media space? Has it changed? Do you still look down? Be truthful.”

The response was quick and thorough.

Momologue responded with: “Just last week I got a ‘oh your one of those, an MB.’ Complete with a wave of hand. Dismissed.

But was quick to also add: “But I do love the online community we create. It’s the best — and it’s about diapers and changing the world.

Banannie put in her two cents with: “I always felt the mommy-blogger label was too confining, and I shook it completely a year ago when I started a new blog… much of that was because of reaction from others that made mommy-blogging feel second tier- looking back I should have ignored.”

For many of us, we remember the time when the very term or idea of mommybloggers was dismissed, shunned and looked down upon. The very first BlogHer conference had a session on mommyblogging that was a “room of our own” and was expected to bring in few people. It was standing room only. Back then, one of the main focuses of the discussion was whether or not the term mommyblogger was derogatory. Today, as I followed the discussion on Twitter, I saw many responses that were along these lines:

Shelisrael shared: “I never knew that mommy bloggers were looked down upon. Not ever. Why do you perceive otherwise?”

From Karoli: “Maybe b/c I’m older or whatever, but I never saw it as a derogatory term. Still don’t quite understand why it’s seen that way.”

And my personal favorite by Dave Taylor: “I never thought “mommyblogger” was other than a statement of heroic survival ability!”

Not everyone was loving the term or category. Lone Sophist stated:"I think that women who are mothers and blog are more than mommybloggers, that’s why I don’t like that ‘category.’”

The point is this. Just a few years ago we were in a small room and felt like second tier bloggers. Today, we are much sought after by marketers, talk shows and magazines. We’ve come a long way, baby.

I responded: “Try having a blog called THE MOMMY BLOG. Judged right out of the gate, anyone? Named yourself the Kleenex of the blogosphere? You’re such a dork. Now I’m going to get a lot of “sure thing, Al Gore, you and the Internet” crap for this, but the only reason I have that name is because I had to pick one when I opened up my Typepad account in 2002. I was stumped. Uh, blog, blog, who the fuck am I, I’m the mommy, so that will have to do until I figure out how all of this works. And then you realize it’s now fixed as part of your URL and you’re stuck with it.

Further proof of dorkitude? I created a blog for my mom at the same time called The Grandma Blog. Towering genius. But it never caught on.

So there you have it. I coined “The Mommy Blog.” Doesn’t it count if you come up with it with no outside influence? Oh yeah, there WAS no influence back then. And now my blog name is a descriptor that has become so commonplace and emotionally charged that it’s practically meaningless. Brilliant. Good luck with that.

Now I am surrounded by dozens of blogs calling themselves The Mommy Blog, Mommy Confidential, and even variations on Wonderbelly. I can’t service mark the whole dictionary, can I, so what am I complaining about? Well, I don’t want to be confused with a pro-swinger blog, or one that consists almost exclusively of blinking meme banners, or, and this really feels good, someone who does it a whole lot better than I do and makes total bank doing it.

It’s like I need a do-over, but I have six years of recognition and branding associated with the title of my blog. I called it first! Wait - can I change it?”

First let me state for the record that I have a real job, one that pays the bills.

In my FREE time, I have cheerfully agreed to try to fit the following in:

1. The reading and review (or at least a mention) of all of these books, generously sent to me by authors and publishing houses and PR reps, oh my. I haven’t yet heard back from any of them about having a look at my own books, both published and pending. It seems that if I want something done, I will have to do it myself. Again. But I digress. Anyhow, although there are twenty-six books pictured, I have a nagging feeling that I’m missing some, and that they may be buried among my children’s schoolwork, which we all know never gets sorted until they go off to college. If they go to college.
2. Resolution of the 2005 tax return misunderstanding with state agencies so that they will release the hold on my 2007 refunds and drop the claims for tens of thousands of dollars in taxes due were I to have earned since then what I earned that year. They funny thing? I was barely employed between 2005 and 2007, and actually earned LESS than I paid in mortgage interest. Life in these United States! Boy, that was a good one.
3. Ditto with federal agencies. I have been on hold with the Nutcracker Suite for a collective ninety minutes between yesterday and today. I’m walking around with the phone clipped to my shirt so I can hear the music and be ready to pick up when the rep finally comes online. HOTT.
4. Multiple attempts and finally success in reaching someone who can effect a full payout on what’s left of my meager retirement accounts. As you may or may not recall, I gave ninety percent of my retirement away in the divorce, so we’re not really talking about all that much. Which makes it all the more pathetic that I’m happy to pay the ten percent penalty to get my ass out of this sling.

Ooh! he just came online and said that they have everything straightened out, and that I should receive my check in, oh, about eight to twelve weeks.

*tucks grenade in blouse, pulls pin*

Well, now that we’ve established that the invitations to Daphne’s birthday party were NOT distributed, I can reschedule and work directly with the moms via email.

However, today is her birthday, and I can’t find her present. I bought it in January.

I custom-ordered pre-printed birthday party invitations for Daphne’s birthday party this Sunday, and just realized that no one had RSVP’d yet.

So I sat down with my daughter.

“Daphne, did you pass out your birthday party invitations at school like I asked you? Were all the names clear?”

“Um, I gave one to Piper...”

“Yes, and we gave one to your friend at after school care. What about the others?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know if they are coming? You don’t know if you passed them out?”

“I don’t know what happened to them. They were just gone.”

Holy sweet baby Jesus in a corn crib. If no invitations were distributed, there will be no guests at the party. Rather, there will be no party. I can’t even check with her teacher; she’s away for Spring Break like everyone else in the school. We’ll see everyone on Monday, but that’s a bit too late.

I’m off to look up the class contact list in a last ditch effort to keep the date, or I’ll be calling the two who did get an invite to reschedule… damn, those invitations were so flipping cute.

I just went out to pick up my prescription, but didn’t get out of the driveway. The car won’t start.

That’s right! This is getting so repetitive I can’t believe it. This is not a gimmick, I do not make these things up.

I just returned from three hours at the urgent clinic where I paid a fortune for chest Xrays and treatment. Why? Because I couldn’t get an appointment with my own doctor to save my life. They had an opening for “flu” but not for “sinusitis and probable pneumonia.” I am not making this up. That is what the receptionist told me.

Also? He asked if I was a nurse or a doctor or something, because I was using words he’d never heard before. Oh. So, “prolonged URI with secondary bacterial infection of the sinuses” is something wacky in your office? What trade school did you roll out of? I finally asked that if the doctor couldn’t see me, could he please call me and we’ll do it over the phone.

A while later, a woman we’ll call Tweedledum phones to say, “He says you should steam, and use saline drops, and get some cold medicine.” It was all I could do not to reach through the phone and throttle her. I can’t even begin to tell the story, so I’m pasting a conversation I had with a friend before I went to the doctor.

Oh, and keep in mind that when I got to the counter with the freshly restored insurance coverage information, it couldn’t be verified. I had to pay cash. In advance.

My ex took the kids for the night so that I could rest and get over what I hope to be the last of this cold. I know it’s gone bacterial, but saltwater gargling and a little rain dancing have kept it down to a dull roar, which is nice because I really don’t want to see a doctor as I STILL DON’T HAVE INSURANCE. I’ll stop shouting that when they stop fucking up my coverage.

Anyway, I’ve been tracking fevers in my two youngest; diagnosed a double ear infection for Daphne, and just fever and cold for Dylan. However, Dylan’s fever went up, not down, over the weekend and when his dad came to get him he wanted to stay with me so that we could watch over each other. It was so sweet; he was worried about me and I was worried about him. He went anyway and I promised to stop by to give Daphne her antibiotics and to check on him.

Of all the children, Dylan has had the most surgeries, the most serious illnesses, and the most bizarre conditions. He nearly died when I passed the Coxsackie virus to him in utero, but he didn’t develop the antibodies in time to be able to fight it himself because he was born within a day or so of my exposure at the day care. By the time he was a week old, he just didn’t feel right, so I took him to the ER, and a good thing, too because he was in heart failure and stopped breathing a few hours later. Seventeen days of Level Four care in the NICU at Stanford, that’ll be two hundred fifty thousand dollars, please. He couldn’t just get a blister on his tongue like his brother did when he had it the year before.

And then there was the time he popped three hernias on Thanksgiving Day 2002: two inguinals and a rare Spigelian about two inches off to the right of his navel, too far to be umbilical. I pushed it back in with my fingers and scheduled surgery.

I’ve got a gut for his gut.

So when I walked into my ex’s house tonight they were eating dinner in front of a movie on the floor with huge piles of salmon skin all over the place. If you’re new here, you may not know that I have a thing about salmon. Which is exacerbated greatly by the smell of salmon skin. I nearly lost it, which is about the funniest thing ever to my kids. It’s their favorite food, and I never cook it for them. Keep laughing, smart guys.

While their dad took plates away so I wouldn’t have to smell them, I sat down for a minute to watch The Simpsons Movie. And I kept looking at Dylan. Finally I said, “Dylan has a fever, and there’s something wrong with him.” He coughed and said that his hip still hurt, just as it hurt this morning when he crawled into bed with me. So I gave him some Motrin and had him stand so I could check his lymph nodes.

Oh, it was all kinds of funny—he laughed so hard he farted—because I had to shimmy his shorts down his hips to see. As I walked my fingers down the trail of nodes leading to his groin, I said, “Uh, Dylan, these are HUGE. Does it hurt when I press on them?” As I let go he said, yes it hurt, and I said, “Okay, well, there’s a whole lot of fighting going on in your immune system, and it’s all in one place. If it keeps hurting, we need to think about appendicitis.” At this my ex looked up. “Well, it’s right there, it feels wrong, he’s got fever, it could be appendicitis. You can leave him with me in the morning. He shouldn’t go to school.”

I wasn’t home fifteen minutes when my ex emailed to say, “You’re so right. Dylan totally has a knot right at McBurney’s point (thank you Wikipedia). I’ll see if the pain occurs more on the release of the pressure rather than the pressure itself (thank you again Wikipedia).”

There you go! This was my favorite part of the Wikipedia entry: “Tenderness at McBurney’s point suggests the evolution of acute appendicitis to a later stage, and thus, the increased likelihood of rupture.” Jiminy. We tried to get more specifics out of Dylan, but at that point the Motrin had kicked in and he was half asleep.

I’ll check him in the morning. If I can sleep, that is.

Hi everyone! I’ll give you three hints!

1. I’m so sick that I can’t talk, can’t eat, and shouldn’t be sitting upright!
2. My neighbor asked me to take her to the shop to pick up her car, which had a flat!
3. While gassing up to take her, my car died and had to be jumped!

Thaaaaat’s right! It’s somebody’s birthday!

Happy Birthday, Mom! Enjoy the beach today! I promise to rest up so we can still take you to dinner tomorrow!