Nature and the Children

Nature and the Children
There comes a time in every child's life when he learns about nature. Not the nice, sunshine-on-springtime-flowers nature that even a city dweller like me knows about, but the nature that sometimes shows up in a National Geographic special right before you change the channel to keep your kids from having nightmares.
My boys, ages two and five, learned about this darker side of nature one summer day a few months ago. We were staying in our trailer on a lake in central Illinois, when a strange purring sound beckoned me outside. I hunted for the source of the noise, and finally found a small baby raccoon climbing on an old window we had stored behind our trailer. (Yes, we have a trailer and junk around it and so have official trailer-trash status. We draw the line at fake animals in the yard, though, so we are classy trailer trash!) It was the cutest little ball of fur I had ever seen, so I called the boys to come see it. “Look, boys, it’s a baby raccoon! Come see it!” They reluctantly tore themselves away from Blues Clues and came behind the trailer. As soon as their feet began clumping on the deck to come around back, however, a curious thing happened. The raccoon was transformed from a cute little baby into a menacing, snarling, hissing thing with bared teeth and an uncanny resemblance to Mike Ditka in a snit. When the boys got to where I was standing and stopped making noise, the raccoon went back to its adorable act, and the boys stood, open mouthed and speechless, for some time, staring at this little baby doing a balancing act on our old window. We stayed like that, conferring in whispers, watching for a few minutes until the boys got bored and decided to do what boys do when confronted by the inexplicable. They picked up some rocks and threw them at the raccoon. Once again, I had a miniature Mike Ditka hissing behind my trailer, and I realized that where baby is, mamma is usually not far behind, and mammas don’t like their babies being stoned. I scolded the boys for trying to hurt a defenseless animal, and herded them back to the trailer for another round of Blues Clues while I decided what to do about the raccoon. I could hear my older son tell his brother, “Let’s be baby raccoons. I’ll make the purring sounds, and you try to pet me” from the open window while I stood watching the raccoon, trying to figure out how to chase it away. Raccoons are terribly destructive, smart, smelly, and disease ridden. Not an animal to keep around your kids. I, too, picked up some rocks and half-heartedly lobbed them near the raccoon, which, I could hear from the trailer window, was now named Herbie and a welcome member of our family. Herbie was not amused. He bared his teeth whenever one of my rocks came close to him and looked like he was about to spring at me, a small grey rocket of death and germy destruction. So I decided to do what any city girl would do when confronted by a country problem. I hid, er..., retreated to our trailer to wait for the man of the house, who was raised in the country, to come home.
My husband grew up on a farm where the realities of life were not hidden from him. His parents routinely had to drown excess kittens and do other fun-filled farm activities that didn’t make it into the pages of any Laura Ingalls Wilder books. So I knew he would meet this problem head-on in a calm, dignified manner. A few minutes later I watched him come down the hill and past our car, where Herbie was now looking for his mother. As Andrew went past the tire behind which the raccoon was hiding, Herbie gave a loud hiss and sprang out at my husbands ankle. Andrew screamed like a woman and jumped about three feet in the air, then sprinted to the deck, screaming, “There’s a raccoon out here!”  “No kidding,” was my reply. When he got to the deck, he paused and said in a much deeper voice, “Hunny, git my gun!” Andrew is Canadian, and you could tell he’d been itching to use this line, complete with Southern accent, for a long time. I tried to talk him out of it. I mean, a gun? Around children? For a poor animal?  But he patiently explained as he loaded up the rifle that this was the only way. Raccoons are not one of those peaceful coexistence type animals. They are all-out war animals. “But what about the boys, shouldn’t we go somewhere?”    (I’ve read enough Family Circle magazines to know that this is where some family member gets shot accidentally. You’re going along; minding your own business and sudden disaster is visited upon you by an unsuspecting relative. “If I’d only checked to see if she was home from the supermarket, I’d still have my wife here to cook me dinner every night.” Never read these magazines before bed. You won’t be able to sleep because you’ll be wondering if your popcorn maker was recalled because of spontaneous combustion. And, are your pilot lights really on or just leaking gas into your home? You can’t be too careful. ) “Just go in the trailer, you’ll be fine in there,” he said. I tried to keep the truth about what was going to happen to Herbie from my sons, but they had seen the excitement in my husbands’ eyes as he loaded the gun and ran outside. So my two sons and I gathered at the window to see Daddy “Take out” Herbie. Behind the window glass and sheet metal walls of our trailer we were surely safe from stray bullets, right?  We couldn’t actually see what happened next because it happened on the other side of the car, but the gun kept going off and we heard Andrew let out some more of his high-pitched screams as he battled the raccoon. I kept giving him helpful little hints like, “Careful, we’re over here!” and “Don’t forget to point down, not up.” He told me later that the gun kept “Self-firing” as he put it, which basically means “It went off when I wasn’t anywhere near the trigger but I don’t want to scare you.” How bad is it that there is an official term for that? After a few shots, all was quiet. Herbie was dead. We silently watched Andrew get a large garbage bag, load up Herbie, and drive him to the dumpster. Then it was back to Blues Clues.
Surprisingly, we have never heard any questions about Herbie and his noisy fate from our boys. They took it in stride, much as my husband probably accepted the death of his farm’s kittens each spring. The boys learned all about the dark side of nature in one afternoon. One minute you’re staring at this adorable animal and the next, when you’ve realized its survival may be harmful to you, you’re watching it get shot and scooped into a black trash bag.
But the boys have never, ever pretended to be baby raccoons again. Yes, they understand about nature.

On Being Spoiled

On Being Spoiled

I am basically a spoiled person. I have a husband who faithfully tells people I am nineteen years old with such great conviction that when I mention that we have two boys, five and two years old, you can see the math wheels turning and suddenly! Bam! they look at him in astonishment and ask, "But what state did you get married in?"
I have the aforementioned boys, both of whom are exceptionally healthy and wonderful. I could bore you with zillions of anectotes about their intelligence, cuteness, and general fabulosity (made that word up just now, and it works well for what I'm trying to say). When I tell my friends that my eldest son pitched a huge, loud, screaming and kicking fit in the Children's Museum at Navy Pier, and had to be carried, cajoled, and dragged to a bus stop several blocks away as the entire population of downtown Chicago looked on in horror, my friends laugh, shrug their shoulders, and clearly don't believe me. "Not Chase!" they say.
My parents are still together, and still like each other's company after all these years. Respect their Do Not Disturb sign! They also like me, my husband and my kids, and even though we live in the same building, they aren't suffocatingly close.
My sister and I get along, and our husbands get along well. The nice thing is that our husbands have each other to discuss computer stuff with. I am lucky to be able to read e-mail without crashing the computer. When our husbands turn to their secret language of dot-this and that, or those long strings of acronyms, we talk sewing.
I periodically watch the BBC late at night to keep up on more than mommy info, mommy info being the next day's weather, dinner, and child safety tips. It seems like every time I watch it, I come away depressed. Sometimes I just hear the word, "Africa" and I have to turn the T.V. off. I am ashamed to admit that, but it's true. I feel so helpless and so embarrassed to be in America when people have such huge needs. I do try to pray for the situations I hear about, but it feels like too little. My husband works full-time at a homeless shelter, so it's not that we don't try to help people. But essentially, his is a nine-to-five job, we have a seemingly secure life, and I am basically a spoiled person, especially in the face of starvation, AIDS, orphans, genocide, torture, poor or nonexistant medical care, high child mortality rates, etc., etc. I heard recently that America has four percent of the world's population. How did I get to be in that four percent? How did I get to have such a wonderful life? I have friends whose children have various genetic differences which mean they may never have a real conversation, ever. Last year, I watched my next-door neighbor die slowly and painfully of cancer, leaving a young daughter. It's not that there is no pain or trouble in America, or my own building, it's just that all trouble seems so huge and hopeless. Africa has the added difficulty of being far away.
I have a friend with three sons. Two sons have bleeding disorders, and one has autism. Once you say it like that, it sounds hopeless. I have a theory about moms who go through things like that. It's kind of like those wagon trains in the Old West. When there was trouble or an attack, they would pull all of the wagons into a circle, put the women and children in the middle, and try to fight off the attackers. I think a mom, when given news like the news my friend got, circles her wagons, pulls in her kids, and sits down to grieve. How could you not grieve? But what makes or breaks the situation is if the mom decides to sit in the circle forever. Some moms seem to get in the protective circle, and decide that this or that wagon have to go. That wagon is making the circle too big, so out go friends. Another wagon has to go now, and out go outside interests. You get the picture. The circle gets smaller and smaller until the mom is completely alone with her grief, with no one to help her and no desire to do anything else but grieve. Bitterness sets in and things get worse. But the women like my friend, with enough courage sit down for a while, and eventually, through God's grace, they slowly and painfully get their wagons back in a line and set off again. They may move in a slightly different direction, may make more frequent stops, but they have the courage and determination to continue. And you know what? Somehow the problems are not the center of their lives anymore. Yep, they are still there, they still hurt like crazy sometimes, but they really do receive enough grace to continue. That is what I have come to learn. If you're not in the thick of the situation, next to the person having the hard time, you miss the miracles that happen. If you're not close, you miss the grace. I tend to run away from people with big problems. I feel helpless and like I have nothing to say, no hope to hold out. But, thankfully, hope is not my job. My job is to listen and to wait. As I listen and wait, I will secretly be praying with great reverence, "So God, how are you going to work this one out?" Because if I am dragged into the middle of real life from my spoiled life, I am sure to see some miracles. Maybe God put me in my spoiled life in this specific four percent for some reason of His own that I will never understand. People in hard situations don't seem to have any better idea than I do about why things happen to the people they do. We are sort of plunked down and expected to keep our eyes open to the good, not just the bad. Do what is put before us to do, and keep our eyes straining for the miracles.
That's the problem with the BBC. They miss the miracles.    

Men and Action Movies

Men and Action Movies
My husband loves action movies.Five nights out of seven will find him on our couch watching Mel, Bruce, or even, in a pinch, Steven Segall, blowing things up. The other two nights of the week he is gone. I am a reader. Seven nights out of seven will find me reading anything I can get my hands on, short of Christian romance novels. I firmly believe there is a library full of Christian romance novels in Hell. I have even spent many happy hours reading through military surplus catalogues because it was all I could find. On careful consideration (at least two minutes of thought) I think I am a reader because I love to learn. I read some fiction, but I love history.
I have spent much time watching action movies with my husband.At first, I used to try to find some little piece of trivia in the movie to think about to keep from going crazy. I was like the Macgyver of action movies, with my paper-clip sized bit of historical trivia dredged from the bottom of an action film's script to keep me from going mad with boredom.
Now I have another system. Early on, I predict the outcome of the movie and stick around to check my accuracy. I know, sometimes before opening credits are over, who is toast, who is really alive even though we've been told they are dead, and who is likely to be in a love scene. It's a gift.
I have come to realize that, unlike history, it's the process, not the end product, that my husband enjoys about action movies. With books on history, you don't care too much about the process unless there is a big end result. For instance, you don't read too many riveting books on the daily life of peasants. They are born, eat, sleep, get married, have children, and die, with maybe some extra eating and sleeping thrown in. I have slogged through one or two books of the daily-life-of-a-peasant genre, and I have come away with only one interesting fact. There are a lot of gutless editors out there who won't tell the truth about these books- "This stinks. I fell asleep." But tell me about winning a war, transforming a nation, or ruling a kingdom and I will willingly get through heaps of detail. Maybe I like history because I get to see something modern more clearly because I understand better where it came from. At least that's what I tell myself.
But action movies! You get your basic explosions,your rebel-turned-savior hero, your last-minute twists, your high- tech gadgets, your sidekick destined for painful death, your car chase, your other car chase, your car chase ending in an explosion, your loud music, your tough-talking but essentially helpless girl, and you suddenly have a billion-dollar movie and maybe even a record deal.
So it must be the process. How will they show us the hero is a rebel? How will the sidekick meet death? Is the girl going to scream or hit ineffectually during the final scene?
One thing I've noticed is that the big "They" have started to give us women who can fight like men. I don't know if this is good or bad. I have never met one of those Hollywood beautiful women and secretly I doubt they exist. Now not only are we women supposed to be tall, thin, and drop-dead gorgeous, but now we have to fight like Bruce Lee and still have all of our teeth intact. This is just too much. One or the other, guys, teeth or fighting ability. Personally, since I'm stuck on tall (I'm short) there is no hope for me personally. I would be toast in the first ten minutes.
Since action movies are so predictable, why do people, especially men, love them so? Here it comes, one of my Big Theories. Men like action movies for the same rerason some people like Haikus. With a Haiku, you know you're going to get seventeen syllables, and at the end of those seventeen syllables, the poem will be over. No lollygagging around when you're writing a Haiku. If you choose to ride the wild rollercoaster of Haiku, you know exactly what you'll get. In an action movie, as with a Haiku, the author/director is trying to get his point across in a very restrictive medium. The sidekick will die. Everyone knows this. But will he betray our hero? Will he meet death in a dignified manner? Will he reveal his pent-up feelings for the hero's girl before he expires? This is where the art of an action movie comes in. The details. Are they on the subway for the final scene? Are there pigeons fluttering around? I think the point every director is trying to get across in an action movie (besides making pots of money) is his version of the perfect man. Some versions of the perfect man are surely better than others. Really. Vin Diesel in Triple X dressed and sounded way cooler than Mel Gibson in the Lethal Weapon movies. But the screen writer and director were so good on the Lethal Weapon series that Mel (even in a mullet!) has become an icon of cool in action movies. And, since most action movie directors are men, it's no secret that kindness to animals is not high on the list of action hero qualities. An animal is something you ride or eat. Sometimes both.
I enjoy what my husband refers to as "Chick Flicks," and I refer to as, "Movies taken from books by that astonishing genius, Jane Austen." I believe there is more truth to be found in a Jane Austen movie than in an action movie. Women talking and chatting and men falling in love with the women talking- that is a Jane Austen movie. There are of course feelings thrown in for good measure, but the basic gist is that people talk, get married, and the credits roll. Happens every day with alarming frquency. I have never personally witnessed things like may be found in even a calm action movie. Explosions, car chases, gorgeous women, and perfect teeth everywhere - this is the stuff of legends. This is using a restrictive medium to make a point. This is - dare I say it? - art.
My husband, when he lounges on the couch with his pint of Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream, is enjoying art.
Behold, my huband, the artist.    

Potty Training Dashiell

Potty Training Dashiell

This is not an essay for people who have the luxury of getting "grossed out" by frank discussions about bodily secretions. If you have never had kids or have never been a teenaged boy, this may not be something for you to read. That said, let's begin.
Parenting is that period of life when you spend huge amounts of thought, energy, and time being obsessed with bodily functions. Teenage boys pass through a certain amount of training for parenthood when they become intrigued by burps, poop, and other noises, etc., that disgust and dismay the girls they know. Watch out, ladies, there will be a real need for this knowledge when you have kids of your own! Ask any new parent, and they will tell you that for the beginning two years of a child's life, the first question out of a doctor's mouth when you take your kid in for a checkup or for sickness will be, "How many times a day has he had a dirty diaper?", closely followed by, "How many times has he pooped today?" Men always know the answer. One of the great God-given instincts that men have is knowing about their infant's poop. They have been waiting for years for their early fascination with such matters to pay off. When they have kids, they get to show off their special knowledge in this crucial area. They used to have to hide somewhere to talk about poop and gas; now DOCTORS are consulting them about it.
Well, Dashiell was 18 months old and would pat the lid of our toilet and lift his shirt. I assumed he wanted to potty train. One day, I plopped him on the toilet, holding him carefully so his skinny bottom wouldn't fall in, and lo and behold, he did what every mother hopes for from the day they are born - he went potty in the toilet! Mothers wait longingly for two milestones, sleeping through the night and the completion of potty training. They feel that whole worlds could be conquered by them if these two things could be accomplished. So we began our saga. For the next two days, he would sit on the toilet, eke out a few drops, gasp in wonderment, and say, "Done." Then I would wipe him, get him off the toilet, wrestle him back into his diaper, pants, and socks, and the flushing ceremony would begin. He would slam the lid, yank on the handle, reopen the lid, and put his face as close as possible to the swirling water, all the while making loud gasping sounds and saying "Wow! Ooooh!"
Now, I have read from a very reliable source, (Dave Barry) that toilets spray out water as they flush at least up to, like, forty feet. So imagine the germs to be obtained by kissing Dashiell's pudgy cheeks!
This was the first year he was old enough to notice our Christmas tree. My husband and I went out after the boys were in bed, bought a tree, carefully covered it in a not-so-subtle amount of lights, and packed every branch with shiny, sparkly ornaments. The next morning I closed the curtains, turned off all the lights except the ones on the tree, told the boys to expect a surprise, and brought them in to see it. Chase, our four-year-old, gave us the right reaction. He shouted, "Nice tree, mommy and daddy! You guys did a good job!" (Positive reinforcement is big in our family.) Dash, however, ran right past the tree in his rush to get to the T.V. and turn it on. Barely even glanced at the tree. Probably just glad it didn't block the screen. But this child who thinks nothing of a giant Christmas tree suddenly appearing in the night like a glittering, beneficial fungus, positively adores putting his face in our toilet and watching his own you-know-what swirl around and disappear.
After four days, I was ready to give up on the whole potty-training extravaganza. There is only so much time you can spend in a five by seven bathroom with a squealing, squirming toddler before your vocabulary is reduced and the Mommy Mantra takes over. The Mommy Mantra goes something like," No! Don't touch that! Icky! I said Yucky! Stop! No more!Yuck!" It doesn't actually calm anyone down like a mantra should, it just makes the mom think she has some control over what's going on. She doesn't. Sometimes you add a long, drawn out wail, "Oooooooh, Dash! Why did you do that?" I discovered this part of the Mommy Mantra when I went to get some underwear for Dash, leaving him unclothed for about five minutes. I had decided that he was doing so well with his training that he could wear underwear as a reward. So I went to his room, rooted around in his older brother's drawer for something small enough, and came back. During my absence, I pondered how amazing it was that such a young little boy, and so cute, would potty train at such a young age. Not only cute, but quite advanced, and surely destined for greatness. (Yes, I know early potty training is no sure mark of greatness, but we mothers grasp at straws sometimes to keep going.) When I returned to this miracle child, he had pooped up a nice pile on our floor and was carefully smearing the pages of my photo album with it. Right over pictures of his brother and I before Dash was born. Coincidence? Since this genius child didn't really talk yet, we will never know.
I decided to press on, though, and the next day he sat on the toilet for all of his business. I did not have to change one wet or smelly diaper all day, and when I realised this at bed-time I was almost teary-eyed with joy. Everything smelt fresh and clean, the skin wasn't flaking off my hands from excessive handwashing, and my child was once again destined for greatness. The whole smearing of photo albums was a small bump in the road to absolute perfection. My thoughts like this continued into the next day until I realised that Dash wanted to sit on the toilet to pass gas and nothing else. He was exceptionally gassy and so I spent a huge amount of time saying the Mommy Mantra to him in our tiny bathroom, with no real results except lots of wet, smelly diapers and a crick in my back from sitting on the edge of the tub.
I wanted to quit. I feared that my brain would become atrophied from lack of use because of sitting in our bathroom for years on end with a gassy little boy. So we called it quits until four months later, when he suddenly became toilet trained in two days and, except for an accident about once a month, we haven't had a problem since. He has added to the flushing ceremony and now blows kisses at the swirling contents of our toilet, while calling "Bye, Bye!", which is more than his Grandparents get sometimes.
What did I learn from this? That the possibility, just the hazy possibility, of never changing another dirty diaper again until you have Grandkids is enough to keep a reasonably normal, intelligent woman trapped in a tiny bathroom for hours on end and still think it's worth it. I am a woman, after all. My instinct is to run away from poop and poop stories. That's why women do the potty training, though men talk about it. We are trying to escape poop. Instinct. And anyway, you can always send the Grandkids home for changing.