Carpe November!

Goodbye, Halloween. We barely knew ye. But it's time to move over for arguably the hippest month on the calendar for Texas: November, baby! It's November 2, and I'm just emerging from my carb-induced candy coma in order to kick off the new month. I sure do like the cut of November's jib here in Texas. There's no beating it. There's no other place in which I'd rather be to spend this incredible month. Here's the reasons November, particularly in Texas, can be so sublime:

It's officially opens eating season! Left over from Halloween and currently in my house is roughly a metric ton of candy. It's enough candy to satisfy a small African nation, I am almost sure. Embarrassing riches of candy. I love being an American when one of my "problems" is too much candy. The first two weeks of November, every candy dish in every cubicle along the telecom corridor and beyond will runneth over with the fruits of Hershey's labor, luring you in with its siren song. Mmmm. Sugar.

And then we get to Thanksgiving. Professional grade eating. Eating until you hurt and pass out eating. Stuffing food with more food before eating it. Cooking with pounds of butter. One word, people: casseroles. It is the season of mixing all our food in a bowl, not un-trough-like, and twice baking it. Pies...so many pies. Deep fry that turkey this year, dear? Yes ma'am! The warm hug for your belly that is mashed potatoes. And in Texas? It means tamales, homemade and delicious...Oh, November and Thanksgiving. You complete me. 

November in Texas means time for patio weather! That's right, rest of the nation, envy Texas now...because it's finally cooled off enough for us to actually emerge into the sunlight without disappearing in a puff of ash and smoke. You see, the seasons in Texas are as follows: Summer. Just Had Summer. About to Have Summer. And Face of the Sun. And Just Had Summer puts us in a good and generous mood.

Go ahead and shovel your sidewalks, enjoy the frost on your pumpkins you people with "autumn" in the North. We Texans are gonna enjoy the frost on our margarita glass as we sit outside the Mexican restaurant. In sleeves, no less! O sleeves. How I have missed you. But it's dipped below 80, so we officially can pull out the boots and sweaters now. You might not get a chillier chance in Texas, after all. Yes, it's al fresco season at last in the Lone Star state. Porch-sittin' weather. Related: Yee haw!

November also gives the sweet gift of Daylight Savings Time, or Fall Back. Thank you, sweet November, for the extra hour of sleep. For keeping me from getting up what inevitably feels like the middle of the night. More importantly, for not having to raise children who sleep like corpses in the dark up out of bed for school. I love sleep. I am so, so good at it. Sleep is the new sex. Sleep and me go way back. Thank you, November.

Yes, football season is in full and glorious swing in November, the colleges are finding out who's a contender this season, tail-gating and all its associated heart-damaging snacks and beverages are plentiful. There's new episodes of your favorite shows on television. The school year is just far enough along that the kids have discovered their routines but haven't managed to lose, as they always do, their school enthusiasm just yet. And in Texas, the skies are blue, the air is dry. Ahhh.

So, go forth, my fellow Texans, and carpe November!  Grab November's greatness by the throat and throttle all the joy out of it you can. Enjoy your family as they gather to stuff themselves senseless. Root, root root for the home team. Eat pumpkin spice flavored something. Eat it outside. In a jacket, maybe. Wonder where all those Northerners manage to store all that extra clothing they have to wear this time of year. Enjoy. Now, if you'll forgive me, I believe it's time for leftover Halloween chocolate. It's eating season, after all.

I Fail Halloween

Yep. That's right. I am not winning at Halloween. Just when I think I'm doing a decent bit of parenting, all the mothers around me once again remind me I was born without that chromosome that makes me domestically inclined. I'm outlasted, outplayed,  and outwitted. I'm like a father trapped in a mother's body when it comes to this stuff. No offense, dads. But it's primarily other mothers I see who work so hard to win Halloween.

What do I mean? I can't keep up with you, ladies. I don't know how you do it. You do Halloween with the ruthless efficiency of Vladmir Putin. You, for starters and unfathomably, enjoy pumpkin patches. Someone has got to explain the draw. I will never understand the allure of standing in a field, staring at hundreds of round, orange, inanimate vegetables. Yep. There's a pumpkin. Sure enough. And look over there. There's another, different sized pumpkin. I can sit on this pumpkin. I can pick up this pumpkin. Fun over. Egads.

By dawn on October the first, your homes are fully, creatively, and meticulously decorated internally and externally like a squad of spooky Martha Stewarts descended upon them during the night. Every fake cobweb strategically placed, every mum fluffed, every little decorative country scarecrow in its place. Sparkly witch feet and legs sprout from cauldrons. Dry ice oozes around foam tombstones. Gourds of all stripes dot your porch. The smell of pumpkin spice everything permeates your kitchen.

I, on the other hand, have a dark secret: I don't get Pinterest. I joined. But I just don't get the allure of looking at pictures of impossible projects destined to damage my self-esteem. But not you, Halloween mom-winner. You make framed photos of papier mache spiders and wreaths out of three kinds of orange and black garland and pipe cleaners. You, oddly, have a tiered line of Day of the Dead themed Halloween nutcrackers marching across your mantelpiece. You make cake tombstones and ghost shaped cookies. And I do not understand at all.

You who are Halloween ninjas also have spent at least three weeks hand crafting your child's My Little Pony costume and documenting the process on social media. You have gone frame by frame by a cartoon in order to achieve historical accuracy in the reproduction of Twilight Sparkle's cutie mark. You've used wire hangers, felt, a sewing machine, glitter paint, and a glue gun so far, and that's just for the head. I? Took the kids to the Halloween Spirit store and made my debit card smoke.

And since when did costumes get so elaborate, anyway? The fairy princess gown, wings, shoes, wig, wand, makeup, crown...did anyone else grow up in the seventies when we didn't have anything? When a Halloween costume accounted to pretty much an uber-flammable plastic smock? How you had to actively avoid brushing against Jack O'Lanterns lest they set you aflame? There were news reports about that, I swear.

And we only had those plastic masks with the elastic band. The eye holes were never even, so you had to pick camera one or camera two to look out of, and there was a ridiculous little slit in the mouth you were supposed to breathe through but you couldn't, so you wore the thing on your head until it was time to take a gulp of air, pull it down and yell "Trick or treat!" and then hold your breath until you were back at the end of the driveway. Halloween today, my friends, is on steroids.



And it isn't just costumes to buy. You, Win Mom, send Halloween cards from your children to their grandparents. You give your children Halloween gifts. When did Halloween gifts get to be a thing? Stuffed bears with witches' hats and candy corn. Lighting necklaces. Pumpkin earrings. Glowsticks and wands. Gone are the grocery bags of yesteryear in which to collect candy. Step up and buy the "pumpkin" of your character choice! My kid insists you chuck your candy into his Spongebob head.

You, you mothers of made of win, have gift bags for each of your children's school mates, and you never forget they only allow pencils and poorly made Chinese plastic crap, erm, toys to be distributed at school these days and have your candy thrown out. You have adorable and appropriate Halloween themed shirts for each of your children to wear throughout the week of the holiday. You, yourself, have a Halloween shirt that says something clever in sequins. I have a ten year old witch costume which now only elicits eye-rolls from my preteen.

Oh, well. Perhaps I'm not as crafty or resourceful as you other moms. Perhaps it's just not, as Austin Powers would say, my bag, baby, yeah. Or I'm a total slacker. But let's not be harsh. Maybe, just maybe, Halloween will come even with my ancient, semi-functioning, and decidedly non-scary decorations from before we had children and could afford plastic, light-up ghosts. Perhaps my children will one day forgive me for refusing to host twenty children in my house for anything. Let's pray therapy will help them deal with the emotional scarring of having worn second-rate costumes, a lack of theme-park quality decorations, and the denial of Halloween gifts.

No, I get it: I fail Halloween, but I'm okay with that. I can leave all this Halloween over-achieving to you. Because I got a bigger a fish to fry, the Big Game to worry about..it's gonna be here so soon, and it's called Christmas. I'll save my anxiety attacks for then. And on that note: happy Halloween, everyone! I hope you're winning.

Running for Help

Momma always did say I was hard headed. And it's true; pretty much and historically, the quickest way to get me to do something is to either a) tell me I can't do it or b) forbid me to do it. I'm not saying it's necessarily always a character value, or that it's always served me well. But in some cases, my doggedness and tenacity has taken me to some exciting destinations.

Without some steely determination, I would not have been able to create a successful small business, have three babies in four years and not get carted to Terrell State Hospital, get a second master's degree and professional license, and lose half my body weight. And that was just in my thirties, folks. Hey, it ain't bragging if you can do it.

Something I can do now that my behind is a little less wide is move it a little more effectively. I found walking outside wasn't so bad when you're not carrying extra pounds. And in 2011, I started running. It was really a case of peer pressure. I met some Running Buddies in my computer, and suddenly I was being told a fun outing was a morning 5K followed very closely by mimosas and breakfast.

That I run now is really unusual. I come from a family of people who largely consider keeping the furniture from floating off the floor is as active as we get. We are a sedentary people on the whole. As a college student, I joked I would jog, but it would foam up my beer. My walking consisted largely of the path between the couch and fridge. But the Running Buddies seemed to really enjoy running, I enjoyed them, and if there was champagne at the end, I was game.

That first 5K was hard. But I got a t shirt and something else: a feeling of accomplishment.  The ability to say, "Hey, remember when we ran that 5K," all breezy-like. Soon Running Buddies were saying they were absolutely certain I could finish a 10K...and last December, I did exactly that with them at my side. Going slower than they can as I practically wore my lungs on the outside of my body.

So what was I to do when Running Buddy asked me casually last weekend, "So...you gonna run the Dallas Half Marathon?" Followed by what was, for me, a pregnant pause. In that moment, my brain yelled HE'S CALLING YOU SOFT, YOU BIG LOSER. Of course he thought nothing of the like. My superego can be a bit shouty. And cue the internal battle: could I do it? Maybe I could do it! It occurred to me that Running Buddy asked because he...gasp!...actually believes I could pull off a thirteen mile run.

Could I really run for, like, two and a half hours? Running Buddy assures me I can. And for some unfathomable reason, I pulled the trigger. For complex reasons probably surrounding approval and performance issues,  I signed up. On December 8, I will, presumptively, be running 13.1 miles of downtown Dallas. I say that I am, although there is a hefty portion of my brain that wonders more than a little if this middle-aged body can pull it off.

Now for the part where you come in, dear reader: I'm not running this half marathon just for myself. Nah, if I'm gonna hurt, it should be for a great cause. I need y'all to hold me accountable to finish this monster race. So I'm running to raise awareness of one of our great community service agencies in town: Community Lifeline Center. They provide emergency crisis service: they can pay rent, bills, for medicine, provide foot and necessities and even mental health counseling to help people when things go wrong.

Sponsor me! Together we can do some good...and you don't even have to get up from in front of your computer. I'll do all the sweating for you. Go to communitylifeline.org wherever you are and click on the big "Donate Now" button. Even twenty bucks feeds a family, guys. A fire, a job loss, a sudden illness or injury...you never know when you might be in a crisis yourself and need just a little help while it passes. Make a difference.

And for your pleasure, I will document the journey of a harried, slightly overweight mother of three with a dubious left hip as she overcomes her fear of passing out in the streets of Dallas when it's not Saint Patrick's Day or a particularly interesting night in Deep Ellum. Maybe, just maybe, I'll inspire you to set a goal for yourself. One that you think just might be out of reach. And we do-gooders can celebrate together when I reach the finish line.

Happy It's-Not-the-Holidays!

Yep, it's that time of year. The kids are insisting on getting down the Halloween decorations. They're ready for the annual hauling out of the tombstones, fake spider webs, light-up pumpkins, and fluttering, hanging ghosts. Of course, they were ready in mid-August, mind you, when most of these evil stores start stocking Halloween costumes. Me? I've got to say: I'm really enjoying it not being the holidays. Because, and as well all know, the minute the All Hallow's Eve is over...it's on like the proverbial Donkey Kong.

So allow me if you will to revel in the moment while it's here: it's not holiday time yet, and the living is easy. For just a few fleeting more weeks, I am care free. Free! Guess who doesn't give a hoot about whether or not I'll be shopping for five matching white shirts for the family to wear for the arranged photo for the Christmas card? Who's not even given a thought to how, when, or where this photography will take place? Who's not addressing cards and adorning them with Christmas stamps and stickers? THIS LADY.

Yes, happiness is not yet having to concern myself with which child I will sell into serfdom in order to finance the Christmas gathering. The food for ten? The stocking stuffers alone will call for a small business loan. Where will everyone sleep? Where will I hide the liquor? What will I feed my vegan sister-in-law? These are questions I do not have to address today, and for that, I am eternally grateful. I can focus on eating my weight in Doritos while watching the Texas/OU game while ignoring everything Yuletide, thank you very much.

No grocery lists! No weight creep! No panic attacks over the kids accidentally stumbling upon Santa's stash. For that matter, no prolonged philosophical discussions with my pre-teen over the purported existence of said Fat Man and of Christmas Magic in general.

No boxes or ribbons or bags to buy or store or to totally take over the dining room table, otherwise known as The Wrapping Area. The lights are still in a massive tangle in the storage shed to be completely ignored. No hours yet spent on procuring a tree, taking down the decorations, putting up the decorations, and dusting the decorations.

Don't get me wrong! There's a time and place for all that ho-ho-happiness, but you've got to admit...it's a lot of work and money and effort. Not to mention the cost of therapy and possible psychotropic medication after spending all that time with your family.

You've got to admit, we're in a nice space: just getting settled into school, into a routine...and now it's time for Halloween already. Then it's only a hop, skip, and a jump away to Thanksgiving followed so closely by Christmas. It all requires a degree in event planning, an Excel spreadsheet, and three months hard labor.

So don't judge me. I do love the holidays...but I also dearly love they aren't requiring my attention just yet. Allow me to revel in the moment: it's mid October, I haven't given a thought to making any sort of list, and turkey is the furthest thing from my mind. Nope. Not figuring out teacher gifts, not up late baking, not wondering if I leave the letter carrier a Christmas fruitcake if he'll fear anthrax poisoning.

Join me. Let us luxuriate in this wonderful moment in time. Let's take a breath and relax. Let's watch football, enjoy the State Fair, feel the glorious Texas temperatures dipping into the 80s with a sense of  peace. I am mindfully aware of my immediate blessings. For just a little while longer, the pressure is off. Soon enough it will be time to do battle in the stores and on the roads once more. Today? Is not that day. I shall rejoice and be glad in it.

American Anger Management: The Shutdown

Stop it, America. STAHP. I love you, I do. I could not be more proud to be an American than if I were Lee Greenwood himself. I mean this most sincerely. I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy. But this week? This week has been a struggle emotionally for me as I watch my national government tantrum like a child. I'm lost. The fed has partially shut down, and I'm wondering if this means I'm now responsible for spying on myself.

The politics that have been played since Monday's shutdown are angrying up my blood. Lots of Americans are angry: left, right, and center. I am not alone in my impatience and indignance, I know. The majority of us are relatively reasonable people. But there is a section of society that is trying my patience, and it's required a focused effort this week not to, say, toss a masonry brick through my television during the evening news.

So what's a citizen to do when all she or he wants to do is to smack a Congressman (or Congresswoman, for that matter; these people are definitely equal-opportunity when it comes to obnoxiousness)? How indeed does a civic-minded individual who thinks and feels cope with the lunacy that keeps coming out of Washington? America's like the world's drunk uncle that falls in his plate at Thanksgiving. It would be nice to go a week without being embarrassed by my country.

It's time like these that I have to turn off the television and start applying some sanity-supporting cognitive trickery in order to cope with those stressors which I cannot change. Like Nancy Pelosi's face. Or John Boehner's skin tone. Or the stupid, stupid things that come out of the mouths of people whose salaries I pay who claim they are moderately educated. Thus: The Handy Guide to Surviving the Shutdown With Minimal Emotional Scarring.

Three words: Shutdown Drinking Game! Take a shot every time you hear a politician say "Obamacare," "It's them that won't compromise," "We're willing to compromise," or the phrase "job killer." Drink every time a reporter interrupts a politician. If you are inconvenienced by park closures, take two shots. Drink every time any politician says their party is "winning." Take a shot if Boehner cries. Another if Harry Reid calls Boehner a name. Drain the bottle when you hear "debt ceiling."

Realize that this "crisis" is a Crisis du jour. There’s no doubt we must love this permanent state of emergency we enjoy in America. After all, we've survived the Benghazi Crisis, the IRS Crisis, and the NSA Crisis. Before that it was the Budget Emergencies of 2011 and 2010. There was the Bailout Crisis, and the Immigration Reform Crisis and the Energy Policy Crisis and the Gun Control Crisis and the Social Security Crisis and the Medicare Crisis and who can forget The Defense of Marriage Crisis? There was the Election Crisis and the Birth Certificate Crisis and well, hell, I forget, it’s all such a blur.

Finally and best of all, this government shutdown just may be the diaper this King Baby called Congress fills that is stinky enough for us voters to make the change: in representation. Perhaps the antics of this week will encourage more rational citizens to realize: Congress? Well, they're just not that into us. Join me in a guided imagery, if you will, where we go to our happy places and laws are actually agreed on and passed there and no politician drinks on the job.

So hang in there, my fellow Americans! We are bigger than this crisis. We still have the Kardashians, the cronut, and NASCAR. This, too, shall pass, and a new news cycle will begin. A celebrity will gain weight or forget her underwear. An elected official will tweet pictures of his unmentionables to a Hooters' waitress. Perhaps, and just perhaps, more people will reluctantly agree keeping formula available for America's hungry babies and being able to get a service veteran a loan for his house is just as important as winning. We are America, people, and so hope springs eternal.

Party Like It Was Your Birthday

Late September! It means the opening of the State Fair, Oktoberfest, maybe some cooler temperatures (maybe. This is Texas), and for me? Birthday time! Yes, I'm turning forty-mumble at the beginning of next week. Yay, me! And as my natal day approaches, I find myself pulled into the most interesting conversations with other adults about the appropriate boundaries of celebrating your birthday...or not. There are evidently some birthday personalities you may develop once you're past the pin-the-tail on the donkey years. Do you see yourself?

The Birthday Grinch. You actively dislike your birthday. Whether it's the result of a scarring childhood or not is unsure, but you prefer to ignore your birthday. You don't like getting older and your birthday is a big annoying reminder. You don't like, as a friend of mine says, all the noise noise noise or the toys toys toys. You want the day treated like any other and get grumpy if someone tries to so much as give you a card. You'd quit having birthdays if you possibly could and the alternative wasn't death. Birthdays are for children, you harumph.

The Five Year Old. You wear a tiara to the office on your birthday. You clap your hands as you tell everyone who passes your desk, "It's my birthday today, you know!" You want the whole birthday enchilada: balloons, cake, ice cream, and presents. And attention. Lots of a attention. Much should be made of you. Toasts should be conducted. You secretly hope for a surprise party.You might sulk a little if people don't remember. You squee with every Facebook wall post greeting. Birthdays are a time to act like children, you delight.

The Self-Gifter. You can live without all the trappings of champagne and cake or attention, perhaps, but your birthday is just the psychological prompt you need to pull the trigger on that new iPad or jet ski you've been eying. Your birthday is celebrated more by MasterCard or Visa than by anyone else. For you, nothing says "Happy Birthday" better than, say, that lovely Rolex you've been coveting or even a sports car if it's a milestone year. For your birthday, it is better to both give and receive.

The Party Animal. You don't get out much, but on your birthday you grab some pals and a taxi and pull out the lampshade for your head. Dancing on tables, singing karaoke, and accepting shots from strangers is your thing. You may or may not take these shots off their bared abdomens.You do, indeed, sip Bacardi like it's your birthday. And possibly play a beer pong tourney. You plan your own party gladly every year and host yourself with gusto. Tattoos have happened.

The Month-Long Birthday Boy/Girl. For you, celebration starts on the first day of your birthday month. You find ways to enjoy every day. You take friends out to birthday meal after birthday meal. You prefer a trip out of town and visits to relatives. Your thinking is that you're worth a solid thirty days of fete. Why not? you think all month when faced with opportunities to eat, drink, or purchase something non-essential. After all (and most rationally, you say), it is your birthday month.

So many ways to experience the birthday. Me? I am all of these but the Birthday Grinch. No, I am a Celebrator. I'm with Dr. Seuss who called your birthday "your day of days!" For one day, I like to make myself at ease, treat myself, feel a little more special. Be glad that I'm alive when I should be dead. Maybe I am a little childish to want attention and cake and maybe a little champagne on my day. Maybe I should be more grown up about the whole thing.

Nah. I am a Celebrator. I am Irish on Saint Patrick's Day, French Cajun on Mardi Gras, and Mexican on Cinco de Mayo. I wear costumes on Halloween and pass out Valentines. Hell, I even enjoy a good MLK Day. If there's a reason to have fun, appreciate, and party, I am all up in that. Being an adult can be some pretty serious business. Here's to celebrations to make life just that much better. I hope you party like it's your birthday.

The Many Faces of Carpool

Well, now school is well underway, and we parents are all settling in to the routines. Around Chez Counce, this time of year combined with three elementary school students means transportation issues. The school is too far away and across a state highway, so walking is out. And since buses are just little episodes of Lord of the Flies waiting to happen (and related: no seat belts? Little monitoring? Do you know what felonies my children can commit under such circumstances?), our transportation options are narrowed to only one: carpool.

Carpool. If you are a parent, the word has the capability to strike fear and loathing into your heart. "Carpool" is just a pleasant euphemism for "Long, boring, insufferable wait in the sun's glare, affecting a carbon footprint the size of Sasquatch's, to crawl more slowly than one can walk to collect your inevitably surly children." The carpool is not for the feint of heart.

Having participated in two schools and four years' worth of carpool, I consider myself somewhat of an expert in the subject. Indeed, as a scientist in the field, I have, over time, noted that there are some rather distinct categories of carpool parent. Do you recognize yourself ?

The Camper. First mom in line. She's been parked since lunch, has War and Peace to read and her iPad in her lap toggling between Twitter and Facebook. She's got the family dog to keep her company and hang out the window. She's got CNN on her satellite radio and plenty of disposable income that allows her to hang out in the school parking lot for hours a day. She may also possibly have a coffee pot and a straight iron plugged into her cigarette lighter. She's in for the long haul.

Mad Max. Max is here to pick up his kid in his jacked up truck decorated with stickers who leave no question regarding his religious and political affiliations, whose exhaust pipe is belching pollution directly into your windshield while creating the noise of twenty Harleys. Max likes to occasionally rev his engine inexplicably and randomly. Max may or may not have to drop a rope ladder out the passenger door to enable his child to climb in. Teachers back away as Max drives through lest his large vehicle crush an errant toe.

Speed Racer. This parent who either doesn't know or care about school traffic zones and has no damns to give, Speed Racer will race around the carpool line, around the school, and back into line. Once his child is procured, watch his slalom other cars as he speeds out of the parking lot and back down the road. Speed Racer fears no police officer. However, the crossing guard is indeed terrified of Speed Racer.

The Improviser. Follow the school's directions to line up your car? That's for regular people! The Improviser can sneak a cut into line from a side street, a back alley, or over a curb. Why come early and follow the Little People's rules when with only a little creative maneuvering and possibly a negligible amount of chassis damage you can shave a full five minutes off your wait? Carpool procedure, Schmarpool procedure. The Improviser's motto: rules were made to be modified for my convenience.

The Sociopath. You're not sure she's not come fresh from Happy Hour. She is occasionally in pajama pants and/or slippers. You know her child's name because it is tattooed on her neck. About your feelings, she is unconcerned. She is grumpy, she is entitled, and you? You could fling your body in front of her minivan and she would run you over like so much middle-aged speed bump. She blocks intersections. She screams from the driver's seat. She is liberal with her one-finger salutes. Provoked enough, she will emerge from her car to confront you through the window.

Chatty Cathy. Cathy likes to roll down her window and converse with every other parent in carpool. She will get out of her car and roam from car to car to socialize. She frequently is yelled at by The Sociopath when she holds up line after it gets moving and she's too engrossed in her PTA meeting to notice and get back in her car. The best defense against Cathy is a magazine propped up in front of your face.

The Valet. This parent pulls up to pick up his kid and puts it in park. He gets out, circles the car to receive his child, removes his child's backpack. Smiles, leans down, greets his child. A little small talk. He buckles the child in. He removes a snack for the child, perhaps opens a bag of chips, and unscrews the top to a bottle of water. Once Lord Fauntleroy is ready for transport with snack underway, then and only then does he saunter back around the car to slide back into the driver's seat to mosey away.

The Clown Car. This adult lets out or somehow wedges into a vehicle no fewer than what must be fifteen children and backpacks each the approximate size of Vern Troyer. Space and physics are somehow altered. And finally:

The Innocent Bystanders.  We follow the rules. We drive the appropriate and indicated speed. We grumble, but we put away our cell phones. We don't drink in the car. We mind the teachers in the parking lot better than the most obedient first grader. We don't cut in line, threaten to drag anyone from their car for a beating, or make up new school carpool lanes. We consider how our actions impact others. We just want to manage to not fall asleep and land on the horn while we wait.

We're all in this together, folks, and we aren't five. Let's make a social agreement, shall we? Let's act like grown-ups in front of the kids at carpool, huh? Let's be aware of people around us and consider the idea we're all in this together with the same rules and guidelines. I have faith in us being able to survive this school carpool thing together. But it takes a village to have proper protocol.

The Learning Experience

As it turns out, ladies and gentlemen, I am not as smart as a fifth grader.

Well, to be more accurate, I should say a fourth grader. My ten year old son has just started fourth grade. And two weeks into school? I'm already starting to hyperventilate about both the quantity and difficulty of his homework. Throw in an additional second grader and a bonus first grader? It's the Homework That Ate New York, people.

I mean, are they joking? These task masters at school? I just don't remember elementary school being so rigorous. Of course, I went during the 1970s, so all I really remember is all the teachers looking vaguely like Marcia Brady, singing a lot of Three Dog Night in music class, and plenty of talk about self esteem. Homework? I don't remember homework. I do remember thinking, as I still do, that seven hours of schoolwork was plenty for one day, thank you.

Fast forward to 2013. "We have high expectations of our students!" chirps my son's teacher. Evidently these expectations include my conducting at least two hours more instruction once I get my pre-teen home. Every night this week we've done math questions, twenty minutes of reading, and English homework. There have been summaries due of the books he's read. A poem crafted from vocabulary words. Computer work.

And that's just one kid, folks. My second grader has math and reading every night. And joy of joys, my first grade daughter got to be "Queen for the Day" of her class this week. Oh, yes, we parents learn that being "Star Kid" or "Queen for the Day" in the classroom can mean only one thing: get ready to create some inane project overnight to accompany the experience.

Collect ten items in a bag that describe you! Write a clever introduction to yourself and include pictures! Create a poster! Craft comic strips! And I am required to sign more autographs than a rock star and create more documentation than a doctor's office: two books of ten genres over the year. Write title, days started and finished, how many page numbers. Sign off on student planners and parent communicators. This is only week two, I remind you.

I'm telling you, all the folders and papers stretched out on my kitchen table after the school day makes the White House situation room look like a day spa. And let's not even discuss the popularity of homework and the volition it takes for one, aging and sleep-deprived adult to force homework on surly elementary aged kids. It's not pretty. It's akin to pushing ropes. Some days I just want to throw up my hands and shout "Well fine! Don't do any homework. The world needs ditch diggers!"

Alas. I want them to get careers so they'll move out. So I press on. Did I mention my ten year old son also has ADHD and a writing learning disorder? Good times.  Because as it turns out, it's pretty hard to do any kind of work when you see letters and numbers backward, and it's just about impossible to write. It's also pretty difficult to concentrate when you're surrounded by noisy siblings. I have no idea how my son is going to progress in school. We're taking it an assignment at a time.

So the question I'm left with is: if it's this hard to educate a kid, and I'm having so much trouble with it, what about all those parents I see at pick-up who clearly have no damns left to give? You know the ones: always screaming at their kids, frequently seen in slippers, the ones that have their names tattooed on their necks. If I'm breaking my neck to assist my kids succeed in school and barely scraping by, how are less enthusiastic parents getting by? There's so much.

I'm just gonna say it: isn't school enough? Do we even need homework? There's gotta be a better way. I can't imagine a single working mother of more than one kid ever being able to catch up. Am I naive here? Is there no way seven hours of instruction five days a week can be enough to create a kid smart enough to get a job that'll pay for a really swanky retirement home for me?

Alas. As much as my kids and I would enjoy it, a life without homework is probably not to be. Say what you will about being an adult at a desk job, but at least you get to close the office door and take a break at night. In the meanwhile, all I can say, fellow parents, is one assignment at a time, sweet Jesus. It's all I'm asking of You. At least they're doing math I can still understand. God help us all come algebra. Which I haven't used since 1986, thank you. Here's to us, parents, and the never-ending learning experience that is raising kids. Now: anyone know a good tutor?

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Miley?

So unless you've been in some kind of coma this week, you probably noticed on Monday that the internet turned into Victorian England overnight due to a young pop star's eye-catching performance on an awards show. And all week, every keyboard gangster has been opining away about what exactly Miley Cyrus was doing at the MTV Video Awards and whether or not it will result in the moral and cultural downfall of our nation.

It's taken me several days to soak in the many opinions written about Cyrus' act (and no, I refuse to utilize the "t" word here; if you say it to me, I may or may not be able to resist smacking you. I don't care if the Oxford English Dictionary DID make it an entry this week). The general opinion seems to be the same on the left, the right, from feminists and from the African American community: whatever Miley was up to, it was bad.

For me, this spectacle and ensuing brouhaha has brought up more questions than answers:

Why in America can we watch prime time shows featuring grisly murders and rapes, where people are mowed down by machine guns by the dozen and no censor is alerted, but we're horrified by a bad bump and grind from a teenager in a pair of really ugly rubber granny panties?

Why doesn't anyone point a finger at MTV, who rated their show as appropriate for 14 and up only? Surely they knew what Miley Cyrus was known for and had some idea of how she would be performing. Where's the outrage for the suits that okayed the performance? On the other hand, I grew up watching Madonna feign masturbation in a wedding dress while writhing on an very similar MTV Video Awards stage. I survived Janet Jackson's boob. Folks from the fifties were evidently not permanently scarred by "Elvis the Pelvis."

Why do so many performers associate shock with value? Just because it's shocking doesn't make it good. TV and a lot of art are struggling with this distinction these days. And frankly, this behavior was not new Miley, so it wasn't even that shocking. Related:

Why aren't we talking about how BAD Cyrus' singing and dancing actually was, taste aside? She's marginally talented. She was crass and decidedly unsexy, a fact only made more painfully apparent every time she flicked out that maniacal tongue. There was nothing seductive, sensual, or nuanced about her performance. It was poor quality pop.

Lady Gaga, someone else who prefers all eyes on her, was also mostly naked for the night of the awards. But despite it, she is clearly an performance artist, dedicated to creative expression as a lifestyle, not just for CD sales and notoriety. Whether or not she's your cup of tea (and I'll confess she is not mine), Gaga's work hearkens back to Madonna, a trained dancer and student of high-quality theater, and has a more European art-film appeal. Cyrus is boring and predictable.

Is Cyrus racist to use black dancers as props? Is she racist to adopt certain aspects of another culture, unaware her white privilege keeps her from being stopped and frisked for adopting those aspects? Was this performance minstrely? Also related: white girls with grills? So. Much. No. Or is Miley simply a representation of America's youngest generation whose cultures have so melded that it is, indeed, her culture after all?

Most importantly: what is a parent to do? My children are too young for MTV and did not get exposed. I have a six year old daughter, and I can tell you as a rabid feminist the last thing I want her to make money doing is grabbing at a man's junk, whether that's on a stripper pole in Mexia or on a international stage for Viacom cash.

With so few answers to all the above questions, this is the only one I'm pretty sure about: we talk to our children. We teach them about their bodies. We teach them the proper names, without giggles, of all their parts. We teach them which are private. We admit sex exists. We talk about it in an age appropriate fashion. We teach them that sex and lovemaking can be sacred or profane. We shield them from age-inappropriate material.

Build a relationship with your kid and he or she will crawl over hot coals to please you. You are their primary influence. Not their peers, despite how it appears. Not media, despite the prevalence of it. It's you. Take a deep breath. It'll be okay. Culture is changing, true. What was unseemly then is less so now. Am I comfortable with it? I can be, because culture has been and will continue to be ever changing.

So, I'm buckling in for it. I'm ready to talk fearlessly with my kids as they mature about what's popular in society and how popular doesn't necessarily mean right, nay, may in fact be cringe-worthy. To think for themselves and value their body as private, something not be shared cheaply. And also that change is not necessarily decline, even if it makes you as excruciatingly uncomfortable as Miley Cyrus romancing an over-sized teddy bear.

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Farewell, Summer of Slack

Back to school! Monday, parents, is the first day of school around my parts. Where did the summer go? For the first time since I took the primary job of Decent Human Being Production, the summer months seemed to go quickly. I can hardly believe it: this year I've got a first, second, and fourth grader. And I'm sorry, teachers, but since I'm that kind of parent, I'm sending them back to you fatter and duller after summer slacking. Hey. At least I'm honest.

No, I'm not necessarily proud of it. But I was not the parent that forced enrichment on my children over the summer. I was the parent who said maybe cupcakes were a good idea for dinner. I was the parent who changed children from one pair of pajamas into the next. I was the parent who probably single-handedly kept Netflix stock afloat. I confess to taking the path of least resistance out of sheer self defense this summer. When you have more kids than parents, what can I say? It's a shift from man to zone defense. You can only do so much.

I did. Largely, I allowed my children to be feral over the summer months. No shirt, no shoes, no problem. And I confess that freely. Sleep in until noon? I only wish they would have. Enforce a bedtime? Why? Who cares if hair gets brushed if you're not going anywhere? Entire days spent in swimwear. Why not? A My Little Pony marathon...all. Darn. Day. That's how we rolled. Or rather, sat inert. Any learning that happened was purely accidental.

I know, I know...there are so many sanctimommies out there right now, horrified. Yes, you made your kids study two hours a day. Your precious darlings learned two languages while participating in three sports, all the while earning Scout badges for their volunteer work at the homeless shelter and completing a full chore sheet daily. What kind of horrible, neglectful mother am I? Or my favorite: why did I have children if I didn't want to raise them properly? True confession time: you all make me tired. And I'm all out of damns to give.

Here's my philosophy; hashtag it #myunpopularidea if you must. Kids aren't allowed to be kids very much any more. College planning starts in pre-school. Competition is stiff. It actually will, as it turns out, go down on your permanent record. There's not only the pressure of grades and tests and sports but of extra-curriculars. Kids rush from class to class to fifteen minutes of recess to gobble down lunch in twenty. Not to mention the social crucible they're being ground up in. I'm going to have to stop writing about it; I'm getting winded.

Maybe it's an archaic idea, but I love the idea of my kids being able to be free of efforting over the summer. Free to slay video game villians, squash bugs, poke frogs, get sweaty, ride bikes, swim, sleep, hang with friends. Being an adult is not for the feint of heart. So why are we shortening childhood? Why must every experience our children have be orchestrated by adults or institutions? Most importantly, why are there high heeled shoes available for six year old girls? But I digress.

So, judge me if you must. But I'm hoping my kids will enjoy some wonderful memories of when the world stopped for them to just relax and enjoy being kids for just a little while. Of being truly responsibility free and taken care of. Soon enough, the rat race awaits them along with homework, early hours, late nights, lessons, practice, and jobs. Three months of vacation during the summer will be but a distant dream.

One day, for better or for worse, they'll be punching time cards and have more responsibility than they ever dreamed they could shoulder. This summer? Is not that summer. Enjoy, my little sloths. There's plenty of time to firm up that grey matter between September and next May. A little gift from me to to you: may you look back on your kid summers and remember what it's like to be completely and totally off the clock. You're welcome.

Ode to the Night Owl

People said I would change. You'll get older, they said, as they dragged me mostly unconscious from my childhood bed for school. You won't want to sleep as much. You'll come to really enjoy the beauty and peacefulness of a world at dawn, I was told, as I was propped up in every early morning church service. You'll get more done, you'll center yourself before the start of your day. Don't worry, they assured me. You'll become more of a morning person as you age. We all do. It's just natural.

Lies, I tell you. Damned lies.

It's never going to happen to me, I fear. This early-to-bed-early-to-rise thing that so many of you embrace so well. How? How do you do it? You work out at 5am. You drive stupid distances daily and leave the house in the dark. You not only schedule 8am meetings but are there alert and not scowling when they begin. Remarkable! And mysterious.

And so, so not me. Trust me, you don't want any data my brain outputs before brunch, I assure you. Why does my constitution just get revving around 10pm? It's inconvenient...and it's when the parties get started, people! It's a part of my genetic structure. There was a small window and brief respite when my lifestyle met my biorhythms, and it was called graduate school. Ah, all-nighters. We were made for each other.

Why is 2am such a shocking bedtime in this day and age again, anyway? We're not an agrarian society anymore. Business happens all over the world all around the clock. We don't have to work the farm between sunup and sundown in 2013. Someone should address this matter. Why in the name of all that's holy do I have to start blasting my kids out of bed in the dark because school starts at some ungodly hour?

Parents aren't home to pick up in the middle of the day anymore. Women work too, now. The summer vacation break no longer works as our child rearing and culture have evolved. Why in the world don't we have a 9-5 school system like work schedules? Why must I go to bed awake and wake up tired? It's always been true. And now that I'm a parent, I don't get to sit down until later in the evening. I demand my grown up time!

Alas. Too often this means late hours binge-watching Netflix and over sharing on Facebook. Every night I swear I will be a good girl and get to bed at what the world calls a "decent" hour, but those episodes of Breaking Bad will not watch themselves, people. Curse you, HBO, and your incredible shows that couldn't be more inappropriate for children than Pennywise the Clown. When you have impressionable children, you must master the skulk to watch such shows. Stealth. And a hair-trigger pause button finger.

Oh, late night. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. Laddish TV talk shows. Midnight snacks. Your silence. Your beautiful, beautiful silence. Uninterrupted perusing of trashy magazines. Perhaps a sip of wine. The closest thing to "alone" most mothers know. So sweet. So stolen. And did I mention there are four whole seasons of Sons of Anarchy available online? I digress.

We fight stereotypes, we night owls. It's not that we're jerks, or anti-social, or up to no good. It's just our natural rhythms bounce to a different beat. I'm productive...just most productive around the time everyone else is packing it in for the day. Luckily, I recognize this about myself and can arrange my schedule accordingly. Not everyone is so lucky.

But society demands we rise as a people before dawn. What is my makeup that I am incoherent for a full hour after regaining consciousness? Only coffee separates the world from drawing back a bloody stump. How about a good 11am start? I am being oppressed! I blame...time-ism? I've coined a term! I'm being discriminated against due to my biorhythms! I demand recompense. We are an under-represented community, we night people.

Oh, I kid. But I can't be alone. I'm not the only recalcitrant night person out there, surely. Here's to us, night owls. Maybe as the world becomes more digital, and we evolve to being able to establish work hours that allow for family life and we acknowledge the changing nature of work in an ever-expanding virtual office, society in general will catch on to more flexible scheduling. In the meanwhile? More power to you early birds. I didn't want that old worm, anyway.

Boys To Men

This week, my eldest son turned ten. Ten! It's been ten years since they handed me that serious, redheaded baby in the hospital and ridiculously expected me to be responsible for him. How is it possible it seems both like yesterday and a million years ago? When exactly did my precious cooing bundle become a surly, stinky pre-teen? I need time to seriously slow down. I don't have little boys any more. And I'm feeling a little less than armed as time continues to march.

Diapers yield to skid-marked underwear. There must be lectures on the proper application of deodorant and Clearasil. What IS it exactly about young boys that makes them smell the way they do? What adolescent pheromone fires up that smells like sweat, curry, and onions? He doesn't even eat curry or onions. Yet regardless of the frequency and enthusiastic bathing, he still smells like a sweaty fry cook. And just between you and me? I know more about...erhem...family jewel care than I ever, ever wanted. I'll leave it at that.

Gone is the ability to buy adorable Carter's matching outfits with unbearably cute sayings on them. Goodbye to darling matching outfits and adorable shoes. Welcome to the world of graphic tees, track pants, flip flops and and a general refusal to wear anything your lame-o mother picks out for you. Hair combing? That's for real losers as it turns out. As are hair cuts, for that matter.

I'll confess, I'm a little scared, y'all. What am I going to do when they won't stop growing? Evidently a brick on their heads is not going to stop the maturation process. I am good with skinned knees, bumped heads, and fever reduction...but what am I going to do when my young men decide they're interested in romance? It won't do, I tell you. No one's good enough for my precious pearls. I want to trap them in the house with me. I'm gonna go all Norman Bates' mom on 'em. No one but me for the rest of their lives!

Driving? Are you kidding? When you so much as close your eyes to sneeze, you can wrap your car around a telephone pole. It's like ripping your heart out, putting arms and legs on it, and then letting it get behind the wheel in big city traffic. I can't, I tell you. I want to wrap my children in bubble wrap and make them stay in my living room. Isn't there a playpen that fits pre-teens? 

Fart jokes. Bodily fluids. A bathroom that smells eerily similar to a New York City subway car. Yep, my babies are long gone, now to be replaced by hairy, lumbering beings who can make more groceries disappear in a week than a small African nation. I'm not prepared, y'all. Surely it won't be long before they figure out I can't carry them to time out. And then what?

Yeah, they don't really tell you at the hospital you've got a person there who just happens to be a baby for a very short and fleeting time. I don't know why this knowledge ever escaped me. That time marches on, and eventually it wears a very expensive and large sneaker. And really, really protests when you use pet nicknames to refer to him or you say "go potty."

So pray for me, dear reader, as I blunder forth into the unknown territory that is raising pre-teens. May I have the strength to survive puberty as well as whatever pablum the Cartoon Network may throw at them. Hopefully the Brady Bunch episode that tackled Peter's voice change has somewhat prepared me for what comes next. TV moms always did it better than me, anyway. Ready or not, for better or for worse, my boys are becoming men.

The Dog Days of Summer

Ah, the dog days of summer. The last weeks before school cranks back up. It's a dicey time for parents. All the vacations are done. The beach has been seen. The relatives have been visited. We've gone to every kids' movie Hollywood has seen fit to put out this summer, regardless of its quality (or lack thereof). We've splashed in every form of chlorinated water: jumped in pools, whizzed down water slides, danced on splash pads. We've inflated every raft, ball, and water wing in the Western Hemisphere. We've eaten ice cream, slushies, and sno cones. We've conquered every bounce house and indoor trampoline park that would let us in.

Yeppers, we have seen and done summer at this point. Now, as the temperatures spike into the 100s, and the last few weeks of the school break unspool, I find myself in a conundrum: what the heck do I with all these people in my house? Because I've seen what happens if I allow it: my children will stare at their television, computers, gaming systems, or any other electronic device they can find until, not unlike a Shel Silverstein poem, their faces would turn into screens and their ears to buttons.

To wit: my seven year old son has listened to two Psy songs on my iPod so often, I fear I'm going to find him dressed in a tight suit and women's sunglasses next. It can't be good for the psyche. My nine year old loves Pokemon more than cake. And my six year old daughter simply shouldn't be able to sing along with the title sequence of every pre-teen piece of pablum the Disney channel can regurgitate. It simply isn't right.

But what to do? North Texas has got to be like North Dakota in the dead of winter. You just can't leave the house. In North Dakota, your face would freeze before you got your car down the street. In Texas, my little white babies might just combust by the end of the block this time of year. The impetus is on me: Alex, I'll take "Kids' Entertainment That is Cheap or Free and Preferably Indoors" for five hundred.

But I'm a wily sort; y'all know me. Imma plot and scheme. And in my infinite wisdom, I somehow decide during a break in the 100 degree temps to take my golden retriever and the kids to the city dog park. It'll be fun, I told myself. It's shady. The kids can frolic with other dogs. The dog can frolic with other dogs. Maybe I can sit and drink a cherry limeade. Yes, let's go to the dog park! Oh, there is no optimism like the optimism of parent with a plan.

Alas, as they say: the best laid plans of mice and men. Or in this case, of hapless mothers with fat golden retrievers. After the obligatory half-hour house departure prep (see previous blog) and a swing by Sonic for tasty drinks, the dogs, the kids, and I are all trundling to town for our dog park adventure. But what happened next? I like to call it the parental "Oh, no, you don't." 

You know this phenomena, parents. Got a babysitter and plans? Oh, no, you don't. Your kid will get sick. Got an important presentation at work and only one decent outfit? Oh, no, you don't. You will be vomited on or discover one of your shoes eaten by a pet. Have a day you can actually sleep in? Oh, no, you don't. The kid's up a five needing an escort to the bathroom. You get the concept, I'm sure.

Would we have a darling time at the dog park? Oh, no, you don't. Because your golden retriever is the only canine in the world who makes like a beeline for the picnic table top to climb atop and perch. She will not get down until urged. There are only three other dogs in the park. The kids are nonplussed by the lack of frisky new canine pals to make friends with, and they're hot outdoors. When finally forced off the table top, the dog is hostile to the other dog who amiably tried to make friends and looks (as much as a dog can) completely taken aback at my pet's rudeness.

Summer entertainment fail! In shame, I pack up my recalcitrant canine and my brood of babies back into my van, the Blazebago, having spent more time getting to the dog park and back than we were there. Sigh. Even the seven year old had the insight to say as we pulled out, "Wow, Mom. That was a COMPLETE waste of time." Thanks, kid.

Wish me luck. Heck, send me ideas. Or better yet, a duffel bag of money. Maybe if I ship this crew to Epcot or something I could fulfill their amusement needs over these last, lingering, smoking hot summer days. I'd pay some puppeteers or something. Because as of right now, all I have to rely on is my wits and the grace to limp into the upcoming school year and have yet another long, hot, Texas summer at home with the kids under my belt. But the dog? That one is so totally on her own.

Mom Vs. The Lizard

Being a domestic engineer sounds like it could be dull, nay, even tedious. But especially we parents know there can be a true sense of danger and excitement in cleaning. If you've never had that exhilarating moment: Oh god, let that be a raisin...please, just be a raisin...you've never cleaned a house filled with small children. It's a thankless, repetitive task, the constant sweeping, mopping, and toy collection, etcetera, but never let it say it's dull to step full weight barefoot on a Lego or to discover you've washed a load of laundry with an open magic marker in some one's pocket.

No, it's no small feat to clean a space five people are constantly circling and soiling, dropping their clothes and trash as they move through their day. You've got to be on your toes. It took a week and a fruit fly infestation for us to finally discover the banana peel my son left in my bedroom. It's a parenting failure, I admit, but I am evidently powerless to affect change on my family's habit of dropping whatever rubbish or toy they're holding at the moment at their feet.

At any given moment, you may step in, sit on, or grind into the carpet a variety of food including Goldfish, M and Ms, or my personal favorite, the half-filled juice bladder that creates an amber arc of stickiness with any pressure. And what marketing genius decided that everything a kid drinks, including medicine, should include a ferocious red dye that is more indelible to carpet than tattoo ink?

And then there's the toys. The toys, toys, toys, toys. One day, Hubs and I will reclaim the living room for ourselves. One day, there will not be plastic bins in every corner towering with stuffed animals, books, and every shape and variety of plastic crap China makes. Today, my friends, is not that day. Today my children are entitled and indulged Americans, and it is what it is.

Today, my job description includes making sure marbles and Bakugons (I don't know what they are, either, sorry) and other child sundries don't end up in the vacuum. Do you know what a Polly Pocket head looks like after it's been through the vacuum? You can't handle the truth. It ain't pretty.

Thus you can imagine me this week as every week, taking advantage of the family being out of the house to get the chance to get my clean on. Extra work this week, as we had returned from a week at the beach. Naturally, the kids had accumulated a variety of new toys at the beach, and just as naturally, they were dumped all over the living room. I'm in the zone. Toy after toy. Into the bin.  Rubber ducks. Rubber alligators. Rubber insects. Into the bin.

And...a what looked like a rubber lizard. I swooped down in my efficiency. And came thisclose to wrapping my fingers around a REAL gekko who was making like a statue near my desk. There may or may not have been some squealing. I don't know what instinct saved me. But some mommy sixth sense went from brain to fingers before I snatched that dude up and tossed him in a toy bin. I looked. And looked again. Was it real? Or just incredibly realistic?

I got close enough to decide to err on the side of animation. After no small amount of dance/squirming/shuddering (I did stop short of jumping on a chair and clutching my skirt in a complete cliche of a female), I knew I also had to figure out if he was a live guy or if he was an ex-lizard. I needed to know if he'd be making any sudden moves that would require me to run amok. Unfortunately, I would require proximity to him to figure it out. If I poked him and he was real, he might scurry. And y'all? I hate things that might scurry with the heat of a thousand suns.

But I screwed my courage to the sticking point, as they say, and peering through my bifocals as hard as I could, I inched toward him. I feel itchy even now remembering the beadiness of his eyes. But he didn't move. At all. I couldn't see him breathing. I declared him as definitely NOT a play thing. I also decided he was deceased due to his continued stillness. And resigned myself to sharing space with him until Hubs, aka "The Cleaner," would return. Because I'm a feminist, y'all, but the man should kill the bug and get rid of the dead things.

I want you to know that little bugger sat there while I worked, one wary eye on him, perched to the far left of my office chair, ooged out, for hours. The dogs were useless when I tried to get them to eat him. When CSI, meaning Hubs, finally arrived home, I told him of our "departed" reptilian friend. Hubs went to dispose of him...BUT THEN AAAAHH HE WAS ALIVE AND SCURRIED. It was exhilarating, to say the least.

It was a dramatic chase, but Hubs, who has no irrational fear of crawly things, managed to escort our uninvited guest back outside, where he scurried on his lizard way into the darkness of our back yard. I wished my lizard interloper godspeed. I can only imagine him and his lizard friends laughing their tails off at the silly, huge, pink and oily two-legger he terrorized for an afternoon. And me? I just may let those toys lay out on the floor for another day while I recover.

One Does Not Simply Leave the House

An hour at the gym, y'all. It's all I wanted. Only 4% of the day. It didn't seem that much to ask. It keeps me sane, exercise. Cardio is both my anti-depressant and anger management tool. Everyone, trusts me, wants me to go running. It's best for everyone. Not unlike Bruce Banner, you wouldn't like me when I'm angry. And since it's July in Texas, running outside just isn't a option for a couple of weeks. A quick trip to the gym. Sounds simple, right? Oh, but for the parent of multiple children, nothing is simple. Oh, no. One does not simply leave the house.

Because arrangements must be made. Someone has to supervise my heathens while I'm getting my sweat on. Now, luckily for me, my gym partners with a play care center, so there is somewhere for my children to hang out. It's a cool place for kids who aren't completely indulged and entitled like mine are: indoor play gyms, video games and TV, activities...and it might as well be the Gulag as far as my children are concerned. I'm leaving them at Guantanamo Bay. Cue the drama. Surely an hour at play care is only comparable to someone plucking your arm off and beating you with it.

Debate ensues. There is crying and so, so many BUT I DON'T WANNA GOs. There is hugging of legs and there are tear-stained faces. You would think I was taking them out to the woods because I couldn't afford to feed them anymore. I can't, but I digress. I'm not proud to say fast food bribery was used. I may or may not have shamelessly promised every chicken nugget on the face of the Earth if they would merely cooperate. It took the persuasive skills of a UN ambassador along with the promise of a happy meal toy, but at last we are in agreement: we're going.

Then: the preparation for launch. Clothes. Flattening of hair. Washing of hands and faces. Wardrobe consultations. I struggle into spandex, a workout all of its own. The brushing of the many, many teeth. There is an entire blog entry to be written about children of eight, ten, and six who must be sat upon and forced to dental hygiene. I won't get into the gory details here. Suffice it to say I've earned a four-star retirement home facilities from these children.

To the mini-van! First, all three kids have to agree on a DVD to watch in the car on the way. And when you've got three kids, picking a television show everyone likes is like having the vegan sister-in-law over for Thanksgiving...there simply isn't a way to please everyone. So I make the DVD selection...and please no one. Sulking and backtalk ensue. The indignance of a ten year old boy forced to watch The Littlest Pet Shop episodes is unmatched. And how in as small a house as we have do my children manage to misplace every shoe they own? How do left and right end up in completely different areas?

Do we need socks for the play area? Better pack them just in case. Mom, can I take my DS? Mom, can I take my stuffed giraffe? Mom, can I have a snack before we go pick up lunch? Mom, make the boys promise they will NOT leave me alone to play by myself. Mom. MOM. MOM!

Thirty minutes of traffic. Off to pick up lunch....25 dollars. Membership update at play care...40 dollars. Sitting fee for the privilege of my hour at the gym...22 dollars. Getting to work out my parental angst for an uninterrupted hour? Priceless.

One day, it won't take half the day and an act of Congress to pull off an hour of self care. One day, perhaps, it won't take me three hours to leave the house. These children of mine will grow. I hear one day they might even be able to be left under their own recognizance. One day, I'm going to get a bee in my bonnet to head somewhere, and all I'll have to do is pick up my car keys and go. Here's to the hope carving out the time to work out now helps me live long enough to see that day.

Summer: Going For Broke

So, parents, how's it going for you this summer? You broke yet? Because we here at Chez Counce are so busted we can't pay attention. From the "They Didn't Tell Me This at the Hospital" files: how in the world does the average family with a couple of kids actually afford summer? Help me out, people. Because as fun as summer is, finding that fun and occupation for the kids without a handsome fee can be a  wee bit of a challenge.

Part time care for three kids under ten during summer costs slightly less than a luxury car. Whatever do people do when both parents work full time for child supervision during the summer months? Food budgets triple (oh school cafeteria, how I miss you). At the risk of the kids sitting around losing brain cells in front of screens, diversions must be created. And I swear, local businesses know my plight and are ready to charge me.

To wit: scenes from a recent Monday when the kids were all home. Hubs was off to make the lion's share of the scratch that keeps these kids in Goldfish and peanut butter, leaving me in charge of the day's fun. The challenge, should I choose to accept it, was to haul them away from computer games and the TV and entertain and feed them in healthy and nutritious ways. I decided in my infinite wisdom to find a indoor play facility where they could get a little movement in.

Oh, I did my research. I scoured the internet for venues that wouldn't interfere with our paying the mortgage this month. But clearly, I'm in the wrong business. I can only imagine the scratch these places pull in. But there was one place we've been before that didn't break the bank, so after all the urging the kids out of pajamas and into clothes and the horrors of being made to brush their hair and teeth, we made our way to the Bounce House.

To my horror, the old, inexpensive and somewhat ghetto bounce house was no more. In its place? A brand new, shiny trampoline park. Well, you know the kids weren't hearing we weren't going in to play, so away we go to explore the new place. And holy cats. Twelve dollars an hour? Per child? Egad. Not even lunchtime on one day and we're down forty bucks. For an hour. I cruelly refuse to buy them two dollar bottles of water.

One hour, several trampoline injuries, a couple of crying jags (not mine), a couple of ice packs later, and it's only midday. Fine, thinks I, we're off to where are all broke parents go when we can't afford better fun: yeppers, the fast food restaurant's play place. I know I'll have to boil the children to get rid of the monkeypox germs they'll pick up there, but it is what it is.

Lunch time. At which we purchase and consume no fewer than 38 chicken nuggets, three orders of fries, and three shakes. I eat an ice cream cone and swipe fries from the kids. Ka ching! We're down another twenty-something bucks. All for the pleasure of acting sticking to the table and being forced to leave, I kid you not, when a child too young to be there peed all over the upper tunnels of the play equipment. Parenting is so glamorous.

I was getting desperate by this point. We scrambled to get away from that petrie dish of a restaurant. Where to go? There was still half the day to kill, and there is no more money. Thank the gods for our government, however: the park is free. If only my nine year old son, Borg designation 1 of 3, didn't decide in his rather new, surly pre-teen kind of way the park was lame. Laaaaame. And refuses to get out of the van. Free stuff is so boring.

Mid-afternoon, we're back home, and I'm shoving a remote back into their hands to stop the arguing and indian burns. Sigh. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Between trips to visit family and the beach, bounce houses, pools, water parks, the movies (how is popcorn and candy and a drink more expensive than entrance? Someone explain), carnivals, festivals, museums, and camps, the one thing I'm really glad I'm paying for? Streaming Netflix.

Unless I win the lottery some time soon, it's looking more and more like an all-Ramen noodle menu for the month of July if I try to keep up this level of entertainment for my children. I know you feel my pain, parents. Here's to making it to the end of the summer without having to sell plasma. But next summer? I swear, I'm opening a bounce house and getting filthy rich.

Love, Friendship, Marriage...and Coffee

June! It's wedding season. How does the song go? Another bride, another groom...and for us older folks, it's also wedding anniversary season. And I'm proud to say I'm celebrating seventeen years of wedded bliss this week myself. That's like fifty years in Hollywood marriage time. I'm one of the lucky ones: I married my best friend. But don't get me wrong. The Hubs and I haven't made it this far on just luck. Oh, no. Staying married involves skill, creativity, and talent. A wiliness, if you will.

Oh, yes. There's a collection of marriage best practices Hubs performs for me to demonstrate his fidelity. And on this, the anniversary of my throwing my lot in with his, I thought I'd share with you some of the best of the bag of tricks that makes him so good at it. And as a bit of a anniversary gift to him, that guy from the altar. He'd like this better than my spending money anyway. He didn't step on my eight foot wedding gown train way back then, after all, or smoosh cake in my face at the reception, and on the whole he's been doing it right since.

Case in point: Hubs brings me coffee bedside every morning. If you lived with me, you would probably know he does it out of self-protection, but I'm telling you, I can barely form a complete thought for the first hour after I get up. To say I am not a morning person is to say Lindsay Lohan has a few legal stressors. I'm not proud of it. They told me I would like mornings when I got older. But I seem destined, nay, cursed to a circadian rhythm that has me just getting started at 10 p.m. and a corpse before 10 a.m.

Every morning, despite my getting more sleep than he does, Hubs comes and pokes that cup at me to help make me coherent. I never asked him. But he's kept my morning coffee needs met for over a decade. He makes it, he prepares it. He knows my creamer/coffee ratio perfectly. He's a prince, I say. A PRINCE. Or at least interested in not getting his eyebrows scorched off from my charming morning personality.

He sits through soap operas. He, and he deserves a Nobel for this alone, will accompany our children to other children's birthday parties. Because he knows that Chuck E. Cheese is a canto of hell for me. He, praise sweet baby Jesus, will clean up the bathroom of two boys aged eight and ten who, shall we say, are not exactly expert aims. It smells like the New York City Subway in there. But I digress. Hubs does it because he knows I prefer the considerably less noxious job of folding the laundry that's surely enough for a small city-state.

He kills the bugs. He gets rid of the religious door to door people. He opens, stereotypically I know, the stuck jars. He's the IT department. He drops the dogs off at the kennel when we travel because I cry every time. He holds his tongue about how much he hates me and the golden retriever spooning on the couch. And although he clearly could not be more baffled about why in the world I require the number of shoes and skin products I do, you'll never hear him complain about it or require an explanation.

What does it all mean? What do all these small and yet significant practices have in common? It's all Hubs having my best interest at heart. I know if there's one pork chop left, he's going to offer it to me. And that's what it's all about. No, no, not getting the last serving at dinner. It's how in good marriages, partners work together as helpmates. That in the end, you better be good friends. And a good friend has your best interest at heart.

So happy anniversary, Hubs. Thanks for the greatest anniversary gift: being my best friend and attempting to always put me first. And happy anniversary to you too if you were married in June. I hope you're with your best friend. May you have a spouse or partner who loves you enough to keep you from killing anyone before you're fully awake as well. Because preventing me from committing a splattery crime before eight in the morning? Now, that's true love.

Carpe Summer!

It's the first day of summer! The solstice! A time of great celebration. I do believe as a Southerner it's my favorite season. A good thing, as summer has a tendency to start in April in Texas and end mid-October. Best to embrace the season and it's pros and cons. Sure, you have to come to terms with constantly pretty much feeling you've been dipped in marinade due to the humidity, but there are so many wonderful events and things that make summer so super.

Let's start with the obvious: sleeping in. How nice is it not to have to blast the kids out of bed each morning? They are so much less surly when left to their own natural circadian patterns. And on the flip side, it's also pretty cool to allow them to stay up late. Especially since the sun doesn't go down in Texas in the summer until 9:30 p.m. anyway. It's hard to enforce bedtime in broad daylight. Summer says may the schedule be damned!

Fewer clothes! Bring on the bikinis and sundresses, the pedicures and sandals. The kids can wear their pajamas straight to their bathing suits and right back to pajamas. No sharp duds, uniforms, and closed toes shoes. Combing hair? Who needs it? Summer don't care! Summer says go ahead with your bad self to Target in your beach coverup smelling like a coconut.

Summer is also the beautiful season of the lost art of porch sitting. In Texas, it is often referred to as grilling and chilling. Summer is the season of waffle-legs from patio furniture, bug zappers, and fans. It's barbeque time! Whether you call brisket or pork barbeque, or if your thing is grilled chicken or fish, it's the season of wonderful smells wafting through the neighborhood. Summer says grab your cold beer, margarita, or mojito and set a spell.

Family trips are another classic American summer tradition. Sure, you never know what you're going to get when you hermetically seal several children into a van for several hours of travel, but inevitably fun memories are the result. Beach trips, amusement and water parks, the wonder of trying to get sleep with five people stuffed into a hotel room...it's all part of the magic that calls itself summer.

The Fourth of July is another reason summer rocks. What a great holiday. We forget we're liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans, crazy tea party whack jobs, or tree-hugging, arugula-munching, latte-sipping Hollywood lefties. We forget our differences for one day and come together over our American love of explosives. It's a beautiful thing. 

Catching fireflies. Sipping lemonade. Late afternoon heat lightning. Iced tea in mason jars. Drippy ice cream cones, sno-cones and popsicles. Street fairs and outdoor musical festivals. Dancing barefoot in the grass. A water balloon sploosing open in your face. A prevalence of food on sticks. The ice cream truck's siren song and all the neighborhood kids following after it like the Pied Piper. There are so many reasons to enjoy summer.

So get to it! There's a hundred and four days of summer vacation, according to the cartoon philosophers Phinneas and Ferb, and our challenge is finding the best way to spend it. Before we know it, it'll be Labor Day, and we'll be stuffed back into our school clothes, packing up back packs, and having to get back to work. There will once again be...shudder...school lunches to prepare and homework to fight over. In the meanwhile, dear reader, be sure to enjoy. Carpe summer!

The Good Enough Summer

Will I be able to write a post today about the challenges of having three elementary aged kids at home during their school's summer break with them all underfoot? I couldn't even finish that sentence without having to step in to keep the seven year old son from punching the six year old daughter over a shady Monopoly bank withdrawal. Sigh. Yep, it's that time of year again: the school has kicked them out until August, and wow does it remind me how woefully underpaid teachers actually are. It's up to me to entertain, feed, and referee the whole gang, all the while trying to hold a job or two. Hold me. I'm afraid.

Ah, summer. Some of you moms are so impressive and proactive. You've planned camps, an hour-by-hour schedule of enriching family activities sure to entertain and educate your vacationing brood, healthy and nutritious snacks, and a comprehensive chore and reward chart. You? Are so not me. And it begs the question: which came first, OCD or Pinterest? But I digress.

I'm just saying: some of you frighten me a little with your grand parenting machinations and lofty expectations for summer enrichment of your children. When did parents become required to become camp counselors and/or play therapists for the summer months? Why can't I just largely ignore my children until the street lights come on like my parents did me?

I long ago got comfortable with the concept of good-enough parenting. Which means I am more than okay that my kids' summer doesn't have to be executed with the help of an Excel spreadsheet. I just need a daily scheme to keep them out of my hair and from killing each other. As long as we limp into the fall without any permanent mental or physical scarring, I'm totally alright. It seems to me no fires and no blood are completely acceptable summer goals for my family.

Yeah, it's summer...and the object of the game for me is to get to the other side. The living is supposed to be easy. So don't judge me if you're one of those mothers who somehow manage to work, wear makeup and clothes that aren't yoga pants, and have managed to put together a summer itinerary that puts a Rolling Stone anniversary world tour to shame. You do you. Plan your summer curriculum to include teaching your kids French or how to papier mache. Ima gonna do me. I'm going to make sure they get fed.

No, this is for the rest of us who just want to make it to the next school year without child protective services being alerted or requiring an up in our medication. For the rest of us parents, the use of some of my handy summer survival tips might just salvage your summer and your sanity and banish the guilt. Because I don't remember anyone creating the ultimate summer schedule for me when I was a kid. It was kind of understood I needed to entertain myself back when the world was a little more family-centered than child-centered.

Thus: tip number one. Kick 'em to the curb. When in doubt, throw 'em out. The neighborhood has other bored kids; they should all get together and poke frogs with sticks and climb trees together. Pay the older ones to watch the younger ones. Let 'em run. Remember the days when kids made up their own games and didn't need adults to tell us how to have fun? Let's bring those days back. When did adults become kids' favorite toys? Give 'em a ball. A hula hoop. Some chalk. A sprinkler. Boom: hours of entertainment. It's low tech, but it's worked for ages.

Embrace your family's inner beach bum. Now is the time for questionable clothing choices, the sporting of pajamas until noon, sleeping in if you feel like it, and being in the moment. Not every moment has to be orchestrated, packed with meaning, or the perfect learning opportunity. No, some time the day is simply about keeping the kid with the meanest streak that day from drowning a smaller kid. That's what we call a good-enough parenting summer win.

Let 'em be bored! Usually this inspires creativity if you don't provide them the entertainment. Or, they just end up vegetating on the couch. Either way, a break for you. Out of boredom has come great invention. It's not a dirty word, "bored." Plus, if you're bored, you can help me clean. If they've got time to lean, they've got time to clean. I've got a game, and it's called Pick Up Your Damn Toys Before I Give Them to Goodwill.

So here's to all us good-enough parents slouching towards the start of the 2013-14 school year. You have my permission to completely waste time. Because if you enjoyed it, it wasn't wasted time. We can do this. Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for one of my favorite summer rituals: I'm about to head over to the neighbor's with the kids and a wagon loaded with tequila and margarita mix. Time for the season's inaugural play date happy hour with the other moms in the 'hood. Since it's summer, we can start at three instead of five. And that, my friends? Is truly a summertime, good-enough parenting scheduling win.

Stamp Out Butthurt!

Butthurt! Yes, I said "butthurt." It's a real term, albiet not a clinical one, and if you spend much time online, you've  probably either seen it or experienced it. And while butthurt was once a condition relegated to the internet, I am noticing it becoming pervasive in real life. I, dear reader, am on a crusade to end the rampant butthurt that now seems to be everywhere. Yes, it is officially time to get over ourselves.

What's that? You say you aren't familiar with butthurt?  Butthurt is an online slang term used to describe a strongly negative or overemotional response. It is used to draw attention to a person who shows signs of being irritated due to a perceived insult, an unfavorable situation, or a lack of decent communication. On occasions, it can be also used to describe unreasonable behaviors without an apparent explanation.

Butthurt includes an inappropriately strong negative emotional response from a perceived personal insult. Characterized by strong feelings of shame. Frequently associated with a cessation of communication and overt hostility towards the "aggressor." Uh huh...now you're starting to get it.  It's over-reaction and personalization of an imagined slight. And folks? It's got to stop. It's time for us as a society to work to stamp out butthurt.

Getting your feelings hurt, being offended or getting all bent out of shape because of something petty or stupid. It doesn't just happen when you read a blog you don't agree with or see a cartoon or news posting that you don't like. Butthurt is now looming everywhere, and we as a society need to take a stand to stamp it out. Because, really, people. We're bigger than butthurt.

Butthurt at the office: No, that email didn't mean what you read between the lines or require a terse response. No, just because she didn't smile at you in the hallway mean she secretly thinks she's better than you. No, just because you got some constructive criticism doesn't mean you're incompetent and your boss thinks you should wear a dunce hat. Don't take it personally. Don't go on the attack. Don't confront with a passive aggressive email. It is possible...and tolerable...that not everyone likes you. What they think about you is really none of your business.

Butthurt on the road: Once again, not everything is personal. When that dude cuts you off or tailgates you, chances are he does that to anyone...not just you. Traffic is not personal. This is not the time to embrace your butthurt and start slaloming wildly through traffic, speeding, and retaliating against your perceived aggressor. Stamp out butthurt and stamp out road rage. I mean, really. What's the worst thing that can happen? You'll be ten minutes late? Stay cool and avoid the butthurt.

Butthurt in public: I saw a classic example of butthurt in a crowded restaurant the other night. Patrons were scrambling for chairs to rest in while waiting, and a couple sat down right in front of another, older couple. The latter huffed: "Well, there WAS a place to sit down!" After several eye-rolls, this couple intimidated the younger couple into moving. This, my dears, is butthurt at its worst: paired with entitlement. Sure, someone shoved himself in front of me to speak to the hostess about a table. But my butt? Unhurt.

Butthurt on Facebook: People get butthurt over the internet more than anything. Journals, blogs, comment threads, random cartoon/drawings/common news items are the leading cause of internet butthurt. So you don't agree. So you don't like it. So you lost an argument in a chat room. Or god forbid asked for a critique on your art or writing and got it. Were there tears? Permanent mental scarring? Lost sleep? Carpal tunnel from typing a 6,000 word butthurt rebuttal? Were you forced to use a coping mechanism called turning off your computer and going outside? It's suffering that can and should be avoided.

Let's work together to reduce butthurt. When called out, for whatever reason, take a deep breath and walk away. If you're the type prone to butthurt, it's likely your content quality will be low anyway. Inevitably, it will be called into question. At this point, any reply you give will solidify what people already suspect. Might as well take a break. There is plenty that is truly offensive out there in the world. Together, we can put stressors into perspective and eliminate unnecessary butthurt to make this world a better place.

What to Wear

I, forty-mumble years old and mother to three small children, went to Target with no makeup on this week. That's right. I said it. Yeah, yeah, yeah...I know you men are all "So what? I do that all the time." But men are starting to face some societal pressure to adhere to a pretty narrow definition of what's deemed "hot" in America, too. Looks-ism just isn't for us girls anymore. Especially where I live in affluent Collin County, Texas, there seems to be quite the premium on appearance.

There was a time when I was more concerned with my physical appearance than pretty much anything else. I know, I know: the narcissism of youth. I was a bullied fat kid who got the message that my appearance was completely unacceptable. After I grew up and lost the weight, I like most people in America spent a lot of time, energy, and money to look like everyone else. Related: are you required as a woman in Collin County Texas to own a brown Coach bag? Is there some kind of residency requirement? Because I so did not get the memo. But I digress.

Nowadays, I love my body. It looks a little lumpy and strange without clothes on since I did lose so much weight (true confession time! We're all friends though, here, right?), but it's strong. My dimpled legs can  run over eight miles without stopping. Time may, indeed, have marched all over my face. But I earned each line and wrinkle in graduate school and as a parent. And we won't talk about what carrying three babies and breastfeeding them all has done to my torso, but how amazing was that?

So in that vein, here's some tips for your springtime look:

For your best look, wear what you want, when you want. Cover it or bare it. Wear it loose and flowy or wear it snug. Wear it how you like it. Wear what makes you comfortable and what makes you feel good. Dress weird if it makes you happy. Dress it up if that's what you like. Wear makeup if it makes you happy. Don't wear makeup if you don't want to. I've discovered I'm most happy and at ease dressed as a fourteen year old boy. So be it.

For a bikini body, put a bikini on your body. I've lost weight, exercised, and I'm still faaaar from perfect. There are just some parts that aren't maybe gonna lift and separate like they used to. I'm more than okay with that. And I'm not waiting to be to wear a bathing suit and enjoy the sun on my skin. If you see something you don't like while we're at the beach or pool, you can throw your hat at it.

Wear what makes you feel happy, sexy, comfortable, powerful, confident. Dress for yourself. Don't buy into the fat-shaming, ageist ideology that zaps your self image. Hey, if mumus and caftans are your thing, you rock that. You wear the clothes. They don't wear you. Dare to go sleeveless. Hell, dare to go strapless. Rock those shorts. What spider veins? Wear sky high heels when you're six feet tall if that's your thing. Wear red when you're a redhead. Anything goes.

The upshot? You're beautiful, baby. You look fine. There's no need to impress the other shoppers at Target, I've decided. It's not like I'm looking to pick up at date there. But there was a time I wouldn't leave the house without an hour's primping to merely pick up a gallon of milk. No more. Seize the spring, my friends! Wear what you want, when you want to wear it. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm about to change out into fresh yoga pants.

For Our Daughters

Well, it's that time of year at Chez Counce: the birthday season is upon us. Yes, my baby girl is turning six next week. I simply can't believe my chubby toddler is now a very grown up young lady. Raising daughters is a special privilege. It's easy to get all worried about her, though. How do I make sure she's strong and confident in a world that will hyper-sexualize her? How do I make sure she writes and lives her own story, without constraints or limitations? Is it even possible?

Here are some keys to making sure our daughters develop the confidence in their abilities to think and cope, to be happy, to feel worthy and deserving, entitled to asserting their wants and needs and to enjoy the fruits of their efforts:

Help your daughter form an identity as an achiever. It's important she thinks of herself as an achiever as a pre-adolescent, and to achieve for the right reason: her own internal satisfaction. Provide her activities she can use to learn to articulate and define who she is. Expose her to role models and strategies for successfully mixing career and family. Help her appreciate herself as an individual based on who she is, not gender roles.

Help your daughter develop a hardy personality. Teach her how to recognize and tolerate anxiety while acting anyway. Separate fantasy from reality: being a princess is not a career. Set goals for her. Teach her to ask assertively for what she wants and to trust herself and her own perceptions, to make choices consistent with her values and goals. These skills make sure your daughter approaches life with enthusiasm and weathers challenges well.

Remember the parental rules of thumb: Unconditional love. A physically and emotionally safe and secure environment. Respect for her individuality. In the end, your relationship is more important than if she goes to school with purple hair. Time and attention: step away from your electronics and pay full attention. Open and honest communication. Flexibility. And provide good role modeling. Learn to listen. When your daughter tells you something, be aware she may be looking for approval or recognition.

Teach her work is fun, that she is a good worker, that she can be anything she wants to be. Send the message that a woman needs to be able to support herself financially. And most important of all? Teach her she can do it! Career awareness begins in childhood. Take a girl to work! Encourage her to be a leader. Acquiring skills in sports, games of skill, conquering the outdoors, activities like working at computers and building models is a definite boon to self esteem.

Happy birthday, baby girl. May I be able to provide you with all of the above. I leave you with Tina Fey, who sums it all up for me in a prayer:

First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.

May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.

When the Crystal Meth is offered, May she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.

Guide her, protect her: when crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.

Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance. Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels.
What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it.

May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.

Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen. Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short – a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day – And adulthood is long.

O Lord, break the Internet forever, That she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers and the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.

And when she one day turns on me and calls me a Bitch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that. I will not have it.

And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back.

“My mother did this for me once,” she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.


Amen.

What Mom Really Wants

Mother's Day! Let the frantic googling for gifts ideas begin, right? What to get the woman who carried you for nine months and changed your diapers for another two or three? She deserves the best. Fear not. As the mother of three under ten, I am here as resident expert to demystify for you what Mom really wants for her special day. Because the Mother's Day media machine might lead you astray. We don't really want roses or that strange necklace that Jane Seymour sells that looks vaguely like boobs and a butt. Here's a list of  fifteen things Mom really wants for Mother's Day:

1. Wine. Wine pairs nicely with trashy magazines and/or an episode of Say Yes to the Dress.

2. Precious alone time. Ah, the sound of my own thoughts in my head. Bliss. Please take the kids and go away.

3. A Mother's Day brunch date with the girls. Mommy wants to come home drunk on bloody marys, mimosas, and mirth.

4. Homemade cards. The more glitter and glued macaroni, the better.

5. The sweet sound of silence. Did I mention we want to be alone?

6. The complete absence of any and all kicking, screaming, and arguing for a full 24 hours. Bonus points for no flailing in the floor.

7. Frequent and copious hugs and kisses.

8. To be alone in the house. Why are you still here? Get out.

9. Chocolate. The good stuff. We're totally worth at least a Whitman's Sampler just for the dishwasher loading and unloading we do daily. And laundering elementary age boys' underwear? Upgrade to Godiva.

10. Spa treatments. We moms spend all of our waking hours ensuring nothing befalls these creatures who some how, inexplicably, were left in our care. Paying someone to take care of us for even an hour while we lie down? Having nails that don't look like you've been digging in the earth? THIS.

11. Not to have to spend Mother's Day cooking for, cleaning for, or fighting with our own mothers or mothers-in-law.

12. Not to have to spend Monday morning cleaning up the house from the burned breakfast in bed and the accumulated chaos of having not done anything all Sunday.

13. Get out. Of the house. Seriously.

14. A long, leisurely soak in the bath with all the accoutrement: candles, bubbles, the aforementioned wine and trashy magazine. Instead of the usual prison-style shower.

15. A chance to move my bowels without an audience.

There it is, folks. Mother's Day made easy. Stretch marks, varicose veins, floppy body parts, c-section scars, grey hair: you were worth it all. All the cliches are grounded in truth: no one loves you like your mother. There is no love like a mother's love. So show your love and gratitude for the lady every day, not just on the Mother's Day holiday. Some people, though death or estrangement don't enjoy the unconditional love you get from your mom. So. Now. Please. Take the kids and leave already.