Up Popped A Fox

Luisa left for Atlanta yesterday to spend time with her secret lover and their 2.5 children. She denies that this other family exists but I know better. Why else would she need to go to Atlanta once a year? Sure, she claims she’s an epidemiologist and that the Center for Disease Control is in Atlanta but whatever. I know the truth. I have accepted my lot and that means I’m single parenting this week.

I had planned to while away the hours tonight writing a very deep and moving piece for you but I didn’t have time because I was too busy saying things like, “PLEASE DO NOT PRETEND THAT YOUR RAVIOLI IS A HOWLER!” and “NO YOU CAN’T HAVE CANDY BEFORE BED!” and “I TOLD YOU TO STOP MAKING YOUR RAVIOLI TALK! IT’S NOT APPROPRIATE EVEN WITH THE BRITISH ACCENT!” and “NO, NOT EVEN A TEENY TINY PIECE OF CANDY!” Plus, I had to do all the dishes and get lunches ready for tomorrow and help the children get ready for bed and then tell them “goodnight” four million and one times. I’m like Cinderella and the kids are like those happy little mice she hangs out with except my mice don’t make me party dresses while I’m doing chores. 

Anyway, I’m out of time tonight. I didn’t want to leave you without any substance, however, so I give you this as an offering:

Are you excited? I know I am. I have plans, my friends…lots of plans!

Well, I’d ask you all what you’ve been up to this past week but I know what you’ve been doing. You have been voting, pushing buttons like a sassy 3 year old on a sugar high! And, because of you, this blog won the Lezzy Award in the Parenting category. 

Last year, I dubbed myself the bride’s drunk cousin of the Lezzy Awards but, this year, I was like the slacker girl who smokes pot in the school parking lot every day and gets nominated for Student Body President by one of her stoner friends as a joke but then the other two deserving candidates get into knife fight over the price of hot lunches and the slacker ends up winning. What? That shit happens all the time. Let me just say that I was honored to rub virtual shoulders with LesbianDad and Mombian in the Parenting category. They clearly knocked each other out and I was the last one standing. Now, I get to be the top Lezzy for the next year so prepare for my Lezzy Winning Reign of Terror. It will involve run-on sentences, stream of consciousness rambling and a healthy sprinkling of Peeps.

I would like to thank Luisa for underwiting this blog and authorizing me to purchase a new Flip camera for blogging purposes. Your support means so much to me and I love you (I had to throw that part in or the tabloids would start insinuating that we were about to split). I would also like to thank my non-existent agent for the book deal that has never materialized. Lastly, I want to thank all of you who come here and read my crazy missives. You are the best.

Be sure to check out the full list of winners here. I was thrilled to see that Grace the Spot, Autostraddle and Peaches and Coconuts also pulled off victories. Congratulations to all of the finalists and the winners! Lezzy love for all!

It seems fitting to celebrate this victory today because we are celebrating something else in the Casa de Up Popped A Fox -  Zeca’s 5th birthday. Five years ago, I dropped Miguel off at school and chatted with his teachers about the fact that I was in labor and then Zeca was born one hour later. She caught me by surprise that day, as she has almost every day since.

Now, go out and celebrate! Pretend that your drinks are on me for now and, if we ever meet in the real world, I’ll buy you a real one. Cheers!

Sometimes, my children have a difficult time entertaining themselves. I am sure that this is because I paid too much attention to them when they were babies. I was always, “Oh baby, look at this black and white book with the geometric shapes!” or “Sweetie, let mama play peek-a-boo with you for hours!” This was a huge tactical error on my part. Sure, they are smart and engaged little people but they expect so much now. Are they content to draw with crayons on the back of a torn envelope? No, they want to do elaborate crafts that require a glue gun, pipe cleaners and parental supervision. Will they play with the thousands of toys strewn about the house? No, they want me to play with them and, as much as I love my kids, I can only fly Star Wars ships around for so long. So, basically, I ruined them. Now, when I am unavailable, they roam around aimlessly like little huns, gnashing their teeth and trashin’ the joint. They look kinda like this:

But, something wonderful has happened! A crochet craze is sweeping through their school and my kids are caught right up in it. They are crocheting like crazy people! They crochet in the morning before school, at breaks during school, all evening long and even in bed. Now, they look like this:

Now, my son can turn anything into a competitive sport. This is the child that joined a choir and tried to engage all of the other children in a little game called “Who Can Learn the Songs the Fastest and Make the Least Number of Mistakes?! I Bet It’s Me BWAH HA HA!” Not surprisingly, he won. Yes, my son won at choir. Now, he has turned his attention to Competitive Crocheting and intends to out-crochet his classmates and possibly break a world record. He has Zeca working her fingers to nubbins to help. I’m fine with that. Im just happy that my little huns are engaged in something other than stalking me and pillaging the village. That gets so old. Now, I just have to keep them in yarn because I don’t know what they’ll do if we run out. They might put my head on a pole…but at least I’d probably be sporting a lovely crocheted hat.

As parents, we want our children to be understood in all of their complexity. We don’t want them to be judged by that tantrum in the supermarket checkout lane or the surly outburst at their team’s loss or that power trip at playgroup. We want for them what most of us want for ourselves – to be known. We want people to see them as we see them, as complete people with gifts and challenges. But sometimes, in our worst moments, we are unable to do this ourselves. We turn our kids’ bad habits into character traits, see their quirks as hindrances, view each questionable choice they make as a harbinger of doom. You know I do this because I have imagined my children with video game addictions, stealing my Social Security checks and eventually ending up in prison. Do I really believe these things? No, of course not - I am simply working through my fear. I get scared because, in my work, I see the worst. I see the families that fall apart. I see the children who steal from their parents and neglect them. I see adult children and parents at odds – the kids angry about their past and the parents angry about the present. I know that not all families are like the families I work with but I also know that I had issues with my mother that affected our relationship and still impact me today.

Our neighbors recently had twins and brought them by for us to meet them (Hello Heather and Thomas!). As I stared into those gorgeous little baby faces, I found myself thinking that babies are so easy which surprised me because I clearly remember thinking the opposite when my own kids were tiny. What I realized in that moment is that I always expected that raising children would get easier over time. I imagined that, as their independence increased, my role would diminish but that’s not true. Our roles simply change with time. When your kids are babies, you feed them and change their diapers and hold them and comfort them and try to get them to sleep. It’s hard. Absolutely. But when they become older, the holding and comforting parts become more complicated. A friend once told me that having children would break my heart open in ways that nothing else would and, oh, how right she was. Parenting requires you to navigate the tempestuous seas of your childrens’ emotions in a leaky row boat with a broken oar.  And don’t even think about there being a life vest in that boat! There are none. When your child doesn’t get invited to that awesome party…when she loses a paper that is due the next day…when your children want things that you don’t want them to have…when you come to a fork in the road and you must choose which path your child will take…you stick that broken paddle in the rough water, hope that you don’t capsize and pray that the blurry speck in the distance is actually the shoreline.

Our world is one of snap judgments. Few of us are ever seen in our complexity. Your kid might be the whiner. Mine might be the obnoxious one. And you over there? Yours might be the awkward one.  Of course, none of this is any more absolute that any of the millions of judgments people make about us as people and as parents. So, we have to be our kids’ advocates. We have to be their safe haven. We have to believe in them. It sounds so simple when I put it that way but it really isn’t because we are human. We can be swayed by cultural norms and make decisions out of fear. I’ve done this and I’ll likely do it again but I’m trying. I’m really trying. For those of you reading this and wondering what dramatic events are transpiring in the Up Popped A Fox household to elicit such a post, there are none. We are simply raising kids and trying to figure it all out. My point is that parenting is hard. It requires emotional fortitude and I have found only one magical elixir that gives it to me and that is listening to my children. Because, when I do – when I really listen to their thoughts on life and love and the world – I am no longer filled with fear but excitement for what’s to come. 

p.s. Have you voted today?