Fine Print

Happy house anniversary

Eleven years ago today, Chris and I closed on this house. I still remember the exhiliration of being handed those keys. We walked over immediately and let ourselves into the empty, echoing rooms. 

When I think back on it now, we kind of rushed into this relationship. We decided to move to Northampton in the summer of 1999; rented an apartment on Hawley Street in late October. A scant six months later, we’d bought a house. Not just any house — a huge, old two-family house with a TON OF WORK TO BE DONE.

Most days when I look at our house, I see it with a critical eye. It has great bones — high ceilings, huge windows, beautiful floors — and people compliment us on it every time they come in. It’s all I can do not to undercut their kind words by pointing out the things we haven’t yet fixed or improved — the dining room’s stained acoustic ceiling tiles (oy) or the pantry’s nasty lineoleum countertop or the bathroom’s…actually, the whole bathroom. (I could go on. And on.)

But every time we are driving home, whether from near or far, one of the girls announces when the house first comes into view. “There’s our house!” they chirp, and sure enough there it is, standing solidly, welcoming. Our children were both conceived here; they have spent their entire childhoods so far here. My mother’s upstairs apartment is a home within a home to her granddaughters. And I have recently noticed that this house has taken over my childhood home, where I spent my first eighteen years, as the stage of my dreams.

Things she did for love

When I was three, she put M&Ms on my spaghetti.

When I was five, she let me wear a tutu to my birthday party. There was much back and forth on this, but I got my way.

When I was eight, she let me paper my bedroom walls with wallpaper samples. It was hideous. I loved it.

When I was eleven, she bought me training bras — helping me adjust them, showing me how to put them on. I would not really need them for several more years.

When I was thirteen, and having a very tough social time at school, she dropped my brother off first, then drove around with me for a mile, sometimes more, so I wouldn’t have to hang out on the playground at school for a moment longer than absolute necessary.

When I was sixteen, she planned a surprise birthday party for me, then did not complain when I took everyone at the party except her to a different, cooler party, a mere two hours or so later.

When I was twenty, she drove three hours round-trip to pick me up at an (ex)boyfriend’s house, bring me home, and listen to me cry…for two weeks.

When I was twenty-seven, she and my father walked me down the aisle. She did not cry.

When I was thirty, she encouraged me as I nursed my newborn. She had never nursed a newborn, but she cheered me on for as long as it took for me to make it work. (It took six weeks.)

That newborn is now ten years old. In all the most important ways, the way I mother her is the way my mother mothered me.

For her, for all mothers, here’s a tribute from MotherWoman.

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Things she did for love

When I was three, she put M&Ms on my spaghetti.

When I was five, she let me wear a tutu to my birthday party. There was much back and forth on this, but I got my way.

When I was eight, she let me paper my bedroom walls with wallpaper samples. It was hideous. I loved it.

When I was eleven, she bought me training bras — helping me adjust them, showing me how to put them on. I would not really need them for several more years.

When I was thirteen, and having a very tough social time at school, she dropped my brother off first, then drove around with me for ten minutes, sometimes more, so I wouldn’t have to hang out on the playground at school for a moment longer than absolutely necessary.

When I was sixteen, she planned a surprise birthday party for me, then did not complain when I took everyone at the party except her to a different, cooler party, a mere two hours or so later.

When I was twenty, she drove three hours round-trip to pick me up at an (ex-) boyfriend’s house, bring me home, and listen to me cry…for two weeks.

When I was twenty-seven, she and my father walked me down the aisle. She did not cry.

When I was thirty, she encouraged me as I nursed my newborn. She had never nursed a newborn, but she cheered me on for as long as it took for me to make it work. (It took six weeks.)

That newborn is now ten years old. In all the most important ways, the way I mother her is the way my mother mothered me.

For my mother, for all mothers, here’s a tribute from MotherWoman.

I forgot to mention. I spelled.

But Megan explains it all much better than I do.

Thanks a lot, Katy Perry

Stella: Mommy! Snuggle time!

[Stella announces a snuggle several times a day. If I can, I drop what I’m doing and we convene at the nearest snuggle station — usually my bed, since my desk is in my bedroom — and then follow the rules of snuggling. Today, though, Stella had another requirement.]

Stella: Kiss. Kiss first, Mommy.

[I kissed her on her forehead.]

Stella: On the lips.

[No prob. I planted one on her mouth.]

Stella: Again. Another kiss on the lips.

Me: What’s all this kissing about, Stellie?

Stella: Lila was playing this song upstairs that really made me want to kiss a girl!

Two things.

First, since it looks like my contributions to KitchenDaily.com have dwindled from weekly to bimonthly to never, I’m considering adding a recipe component here. Consider yourself warned. (Next up: artichokes!)

Second, I offer you a sampling of life with my children:

[From upstairs, an odd scuffling sound is followed by piercing shriek, followed by second odd scuffle, followed by second piercing shriek, followed by the wail of child. The wailing grows gradually louder as child descends the stairs slowly, step by step.]

[STELLA enters kitchen, holding right arm limply in front of her.]

ME: Okay, what happened?

STELLA: Lila hit me! Really hard! In my arm! [Offers me arm. I kiss her, then hold her on my lap for a moment.]

ME: What happened before that?

STELLA: You need to punish Lila!

ME: I’ll be speaking to Lila in a moment. Right now I’m speaking to you. I want to know what happened before Lila hit you.

STELLA: [Sniffs piteously] I hit Lila. 

ME: I had a feeling.

STELLA: But she also hit me before that!

ME: She did? I didn’t hear that.

STELLA: Yeah! She did!

ME: ***

STELLA: …but not very hard.

ME: Okay. So even if she was being super annoying —

STELLA: She was! She was being super annoying!

ME: — but even so, do you think it was right to hit back?

STELLA: [darkly] I know it wasn’t right to hit back. But I will hit back. Because if I don’t hit back, then Lila gets the better deal. 

Welcome to the club, baby girl

Stella caught the bug. It was probably inevitable — it’s been going around in our house for some time. You know this bug: the one that renders her silent on the couch, curled up in one position until a limb loses circulation, unable to hear her parents calling her until they come up and remove the book from her hands.

I take a certain proprietary pleasure in this. Sometimes, that kid … she’s funny, she’s whip smart, but I don’t always get her. Lila’s behavior is easier for me to predict; I find Stella somewhat inscrutable. Her reactions to things sometimes take me so much by surprise that I inwardly wonder: Whose kid is this, again? But seeing her lose herself in a book this way? Yeah, she’s mine.

She caught the bug from Ivy & Bean, by the way, which I’m pretty sure was also the germ responsible for Lila’s (ongoing) case, years ago. Just FYI.

Motherhood is glamorous

Stella climbed into bed with us at about 6:15 this morning. The sun was up, and she was in a chatty mood. She nestled in between me and Chris and started talking…

Stella: [cough] What is that? What is that stuff in my throat? I can’t cough it out. What do you call that?

Me: Ummm [yawn]…phlegm?

Stella: What is phlegm?

Me: It’s, uh, like snot.

Stella: What colors does it come in?

Me: ***

Stella: Mommy? What colors does phlegm come in? Does it come in yellow?

Me: [long pause] Yes.

Stella: I think I once had phlegm inside me and I coughed really hard and it came out of my mouth and landed on the floor.

Me: ***

Stella: And you picked it up.

Me: ***

Stella: It was gross.

Me: ***

Stella: It looked like Pirate’s Booty.

Ga-ga-goin’ back to Target

I haven’t been in six months (except to get fake Uggs for the girls for Hanukkah — but I felt really, really bad about it).

Lady Gaga is apparently fixing all that.