Sep

14

Through it and out the other side

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Sometimes I think why can’t you just stop and
be
in this moment
stop
just
stop
and be here
all of your attention
and sometimes I feel like screaming because
there are two of them
and I
can’t no matter how hard I
try but
let’s not lie
sometimes I don’t
try as hard as
I should

Sometimes when I’m at work I
want to be home and sometimes when I’m home I
want to be at work
or at least somewhere
with adults
and the luxury
of not doing the eight million things
I wish I didn’t have to do when I am
doing them
that I wish I were able to do
when I am
not

Sometimes
I don’t feel particularly
good at
any of my
jobs

Sometimes I feel so restless and
bored and
I wish I could just
leave
go to the
bookstore or the
wherever
without the back and forth and the favors and the tick tick ticking clock while I’m gone
and the moment I see
someone else’s child when I’m on my own I
feel guilty and sad and I miss them and
sometimes when I get home I think how I just want to
leave
all over
again

Sometimes I tell myself over and over that it will be easier when they’re
older
and isn’t that nice how I am
wishing away these years I will never
ever
get back

This weekend I felt like I was pacing in my
life like a zoo animal
trapped and wild-eyed
and I was frustrated with one child for being
well
the short story is
for being 19 months old
and I was angry with the other child for
refusing to eat and he started whining and something in me gave way
all at once
like a rotted old barn
and I reached out and grabbed his shirt and pulled him
howling
across the kitchen bench and yanked him to his feet and
my voice was
it was
(I don’t even want to remember)
so loud
and all I wanted in that moment was for him to feel
just as miserable as I did
I could have
slapped him
until my hand ached
(I did not)
and it was all over
some
fucking
chicken
later when I could
breathe I
realized that if I’d felt trapped
before
by neediness and fussing and the confines of parenthood
that was nothing compared to the feeling of
knowing
exactly
what kind of person you are capable
of being
and you can’t take it back
(you can say you are sorry)
(but you can’t)
(go back)
(and make it unhappen)
I felt like one of those Russian dolls where every successively smaller part of me was
held inside
another and they were all
ugly
broken and
terrible

Sometimes I am lifted by them
scattered in the air like a million spinning dandelion seeds
blown by my child
(who calls them
candle flowers)
and sometimes I am held fast to the earth
counting the minutes
until I can escape
everything I hold closest to my heart

I am ashamed that
sometimes I turn on the TV because I just want them to
shut
up

Sometimes it seems relentless
and I can only see the side of the coin with the
drudgery
like that which I am most proud of
is a jail sentence that goes on and on and
oh what a
fucked up
way to look at it
because the other side
is indescribable
in its beauty
and if you must endure one to be gifted with the other
such is
life

Sometimes these bad moments feel
consuming
but sometimes
(most of the time)
(most of you understand)
they are not

Sep

9

Muddling

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“Horse. Horse. Horse? HORSE. Donkeys. Donkeys. Mooooooooo. Moooooooo. DONKEYS! Farm? Farm. Baaa. Baaa. Doat? Doat. Horse. Cock-a-loo. COCK-a-loo. Horse. Moo? Moooooo. Birdie? Birdie? DUCK. DUCK! Duck. Horse.”

Dal Capo al Coda.

While Dylan can essentially be described as a pint-sized, squeaky-voiced farm-fetishizer these days, Riley at the ripe old age of four is busy developing some new personality traits I can only describe as PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY TELL ME THIS ISN’T WHAT FOUR IS GOING TO BE LIKE OH JESUS KILL ME NOW challenging. There’s the whining, for one thing, which has been ratcheted up to a new level capable of triggering a thrilling physiological response in my eyeballs involving them protruding from my skull by a good three or four inches and painfully vibrating at the ends of their optic nerves. There’s also the dramatic scenery-chewing over-reactions to mild knee-scrapings and other bodily injuries, which feature bloodcurling screams accompanied by howls of “NOOOO! NOOOO! NOOOO!” while people in neighboring counties sadly shake their heads and reach for phones to dial CPS.

Most upsetting to me, however, is how he’s dealing with frustration lately. The moment he’s thwarted by some activity he’s attempting—getting his bike turned around, for example, or untangling a string—he starts flipping out. “I CAN’T! I CAAAAAN’T!” he screams, becoming more and more agitated while I try and calmly remind him to take his time, ask for help if he needs it, try setting the bike down or a second, chill the fuck out before the nice lady from Protective Services comes by again, etc. Likely as not, the item in question gets hurled to the ground while he shrieks “I DON’T WANNA” and somebody gets a time out because Mommy’s eyeballs are doing that Warner Brothers thing again.

Dylan often expresses frustration by doing fishflops and angrily eating dog hair off the carpet, which is less than pleasant in its own right, but Riley’s I CAAAN’Ts make me sad because god, I just don’t want him to feel that way. I don’t want him to feel like he can’t. I want his world to feel like exactly what it is right now: wide open, everything spread before him.

I know he’s a little kid and things sometimes feel like a Really Big Deal even when they involve, like, taking a extra half second to un-Velcro his shoe before attempting to remove it. I know children are not exactly known for their patience. I know it’s not out of the norm for tiny things to morph into giant enormous overwhelming challenges that light up the TILT section of a preschooler’s brain, maybe particularly during times when they’re tired or hungry or their moon is in Uranus or whatever. But I worry a little about his self confidence. He can be a tentative guy, and I want to be doing everything I can to help him feel . . . you know, like he can. Or at least how to deal with life’s inevitable difficulties without resorting to a total system meltdown.

I guess the more I think about it, it’s less that he’s changed, and more that I have. I expect ridiculous histrionics from a toddler, but I expect more from my big boy. And for the 385727485th time, I wish there was a manual for all this.

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