(Okay, not much of one)
I admit that a very small (teensy, really) part of my liking for the boy’s name we have mostly settled on is that it would sound great if an NFL sportscaster were announcing it as part of the Broncos starting lineup. What can I say — I have a sickness.
me: ohmygod, how are we going to know what to do with it when the thing gets here?
soon-to-be-father-of-our-child: y’know, awhile ago in a moment of angst i asked you the same thing. you said all we have to do is feed it and change its diaper, and as it grew more complicated, we’d learn what to do.
me: …
me: well…don’t throw my words back in my face!
father-to-be: obama’s a muslim!
I do not know if memory is serving or disserving me, but I recall some time ago when my sister offered me a teapot that had been our grandmother’s. I was excited to have something of hers, as she died when I was six and I barely remember her. What I do remember is the scent of my grandma’s perfume and the six-packs of bottled Diet Pepsi we would keep in our basement for her, which she used to wash down her pain meds as she died of cancer. I guess the theory — aided and abetted by my grandfather, M.D. — was that the caffeine helped the medicine kick in faster. Indeed, Excedrin and other headache meds often have caffeine as an ingredient, so my backcountry doctor-grandfather may have been right.
Anyway, I gladly accepted the gift. My grandparents enjoyed collecting the finer things in life: gems and crystals, pottery, jewelry (which of course they never wore, being staunch E.G. White-thumping Adventists), and I assumed that this teapot was a treasure they had picked up on one of their many travels, perhaps in China or, given the design of the pot, England. So today, as I beheld the pile of grading ahead of me, I decided the only way through this involved tea.
I lifted down the pot and took awhile to examine it. It is ceramic and cream-colored, with a wicker-like texture (the kind you may have seen in wedding cakes frosted back in the 1980s). On its front are a few pink, nondescript flowers clearly envisioned by a ceramic artist who spent most of his time indoors. I would hazard that the flowers are something of a cross between roses and camelias, with perhaps the stamen of hibiscus thrown in for artiness.
I am very careful whenever I handle this teapot, as it has an elegant spout that pours well (something that can not be said for every other teapot I’ve owned) and I don’t want to chip any part of the squat little thing. Yet today, as I rinsed it carefully in the sink, when I turned it over I noticed the following inscription on the bottom:
So much for a family heirloom. Now instead of the spirit of my dearly departed grandmother inspiring me to finish grading, all I can think about is how overpriced and ugly nearly every Teleflora arrangment is that I’ve seen. And given the date on the stamp — 1985 — this was probably sent as a gift to my grandmother just after she’d been diagnosed with incurable breast cancer. Thanks a lot, fate.
From That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo:
She pointed at the wall, specifically at an indentation in the plaster that looked to be about the same size as a college dean’s forehead.
I won’t even give you the context. It’s good, but sometimes one’s imagination is even better.
In related bits, a friend introduced me to My Parents Were Awesome. While I understand that my parents were once my age (in fact, my mom and I met right about the time she was my age now), I’ve never really seen pictures of them without us kids. And now I really want to know what they were like.
In unrelated news, Jon Stewart’s Glenn Beck impersonation was downright inspiring. It’s not that he’s making fun of Glenn Beck — it’s that he’s taking every rhetorical strategy of Beck’s and illustrating how ludicrous they are: the word association schemes, the crazy diagrams, the appearance of being well-read without the information to back it up, the crying, the screaming, the hand-waving and -wringing — all these are ways Beck tries (and logically fails) not so much to win but to shut down arguments. That’s the beauty of this — not that it’s funny, but that it’s true.
I’m standing firm, garbed with the belt of truth opinion, a breastplate of self-righteousness, and my feet fitted with the readiness to kick parents’ asses everyhwere: Yes, it’s another post about childish things by someone who doesn’t have children. Assess my ethos and get riled up accordingly.
This week’s topic: Grandparent names. I remember when my first sibling procreated and the discussion of what my parents should be called by the impending grandchildren –
[because, y'know, "Grandma" and "Grandpa" just wouldn't do, oh no! -- grandparents these days need unique names, not unlike parents who think an alternate spelling will showcase their child's uniqueness (instead of "Michelle" it's "Meeschelle"; instead of "Susie" it's "Souziee"; instead of "Chelsea" it's...hey, wait a minute...), and that same vanity appears to affect all generations, young and old; because grandparents these days aren't "grandma," they're "gramma" or "mimi" or "meemaw"; not "grandpa" but "pawpaw" or "poppy"]
– and, figuring that what my parents’ grandchildren called them wouldn’t really affect me, I offered my suggestions: “Grumps” and “Grim.” That was probably the first time my mom was even a tiny bit glad that I’m not having children. Suffice it to say, my family went in another direction with the name choices, and I was left to my child-free devices. Little did I know that listening to the sound of my nieces and nephew calling my parents “Pops” and “Grammie Lou” WOULD DRIVE ME UP THE WALL.
[Fortunately, my personality is such that the wall and I are intimate acquaintances, so much so that my foot- and handholds are quite well worn.]
It’s not that I want every grandparent to be “grandma” and “grandpa”, nor do I think everyone should have a “traditional” (or white/Anglo) name like “Tom” or “Sally.” Far from it. But I do find the overplanning wearisome — yet another part of a child’s life decided for him or her — and I would prefer to see grandparents’ names evolve naturally. Sure, go with “nana” if a child couldn’t pronounce “grandma” and it was this cute malapropism the kid hung onto. I see no problem with that. But to purposefully decide to misspell or go phonetic — is that necessary?
Not that it matters, mind you; my parents already have their new grandparent names firmly affixed, so were the flying pigs of hell to freeze over and we to have children, they’d probably go with the names established by the more procreationally inclined siblings.
Actually, to hell with hegemony; I’ll teach my kids to call their grandparents by their first names. Ha! Take that, Bwuth and Mawy Woo.
“You like to tell true stories, don’t you?” [my father] asked, and I answered, “Yes, I like to tell stories that are true.”
Then he asked, “After you have finished your true stories sometime, why don’t you make up a story and the people to go with it?
“Only then will you understand what happened and why.
“It is those we live with and love and should know who elude us.”
Dad: Well, you won’t believe what I watched on pay-per-view one night in my hotel room when I couldn’t sleep.
Me, silently: Pleasedon’tsaypornPleasedon’tsaypornPleasedon’tsayporn
Dad: The Proposal.
The following things have happened in the week or so since I left home.
Our friend N. visited Walla Walla, so Matt and I and C. took him on a tour of the valley and ended up at Blue Mountain Cider Company/Watermill Winery for some tasting.
We’re all very astute when it comes to wine knowledge, as you may undoubtedly infer by the photos.
Beaver came along as designated driver; later he became very smitten with a certain Minette,
but their cross-species romance just wasn’t to be as the three of us (Matt, Beaver, and me) left the next morning for Banff.
Turns out it’s 10 hours of driving plus one hour of immigration line, where some dingbat nearly rear-ended us (mainly me, as she was perpendicular to us as she backed out of her parking space and failed to notice the TWENTY CARS LINED UP behind her) and I kid you not, she stopped about an inch from my door, and only because I was yelling, “Whoa, whoa, WHOA!!”; plus one hour of road construction, which would have been improved with either OnStar or a shotgun, whichever would have gotten us away from the asshat behind us blasting the bass out of his speakers.
In Banff, we and ten thousand of our best tourist friends hiked the Johnston Creek Trail to the Lower and Upper Falls. I wanted to carry on to the Ink Pots, but having three kidlings and a reservation for High Tea at the Fairmont on Lake Louise scratched that plan.
We saw deer, bald eagles, huge trout (cutbow, rainbow, and brown), two grizzlies (or, more likely, the same one twice), elk, and a moose if you count roadkill (sadface).
We outfished my dad and brother on Thursday, catching a dozen or more fish apiece, the largest being a 23.5-inch brown trout for me and a 24-incher for Matt, which was probably the largest fish caught on the trip, and the smallest fish being a mere eighteen inches. God I love the Bow River.
We got tan.
The family got along, for the most part; I didn’t have to kill anyone, including myself.
And then we got Lucy.
Now I realize that, oh, every child psychologist in the world, and probably 99 percent of parents would disagree, but that’s why I have the tag “opinions on childish things by someone who doesn’t have children.” Which is to say, I really don’t care.
Today’s issue is brought to you by the nonverbal lungpower of my niece and nephew. They are about the same age, which is nearly 2. And it is fortunate that they are adorable and giggly most of the time, because the little bit of time they spend screaming? Well, let’s just say I could push them off a glacier and make it look like an accident.
So my theory is this: children’s lungpower should develop as they mature. Let them make low-decibel noises like cooing and giggling, sure, anytime after birth (or, what the hell, I’m not ageist: before birth, too); but the high decibel noises, i.e. SCREAMING THEIR BLOODY LUNGS OFF, that should not be possible until they’re able to verbalize what they want or need.
But, you say, how else will they learn to communicate?
Don’t worry, I thought that through, and here’s my answer:
QUIETLY.
A week from yesterday, my immediate family will be congregating in Banff to celebrate my parents’ managing to survive on this planet for 60 years. I’m not sure why they want to celebrate such a milestone with company; my hunch is that they just want to hang out with their grandchildren, and feel obligated to invite the kids’ parents. Why Matt and I are invited is anyone’s best guess, seeing as how we’re not procreationally inclined.
Thankfully — for the sake of my sanity — Matt has to work until Tuesday, at best, so we’ll all have two more days of enjoying the idea of all being together before reality sets in and we actually are all together. In one house. ALL OF US: three children ages 1 to 5 — actually four, counting the fetus — and seven adults. And my brother.
This trip also involves two ten-hour drives with just Matt and me. As much as I love a good road trip, Matt does not. In fact, he gets downright cranky when I want to pull over and read the historical site signs (Cliffs Notes got NOTHIN’ on the U.S. government’s ability to condense history into one single paragraph and then engrave it onto a old-growth wooden sign). So we’ll be bringing our respective iPods and I shall attempt to wrest the driver’s seat from him so we can stop and get photos that don’t involve the mileage or odometer or other signage that includes the figure “1137“.
If everyone survives, we’ll return bruised, battered, and — most importantly — WITH A PUPPY, whom we’re picking up on our way back. Personally, I think some bulldog wrinkles will be all that’s needed to assuage my battered soul.
Monday evening the husband and I drove up to meet the closest available litter of bulldog puppies, which culminated in us emotionally gorging ourselves on seven soft, wrinkly, wobbly puppies for an hour on a blanket by the side of the road. Oh gods. They were so cute — I could have wrapped them in my arms and taken them all home, then and there.
In the end — well, in the beginning, too, seeing as how it was nearly love at first sight — we decided on a female with dark brindle coloring who made a wrinkly puddle in our arms and seemed pretty content to just be held the whole time. We chose her over one of her sisters, who was much more vocal in her demands for attention, so we hope we’re getting a pretty mellow dog. There is no guarantee.
After meeting and putting down a payment on her, we commenced on the Great Puppy Name Debate which has now turned into the Great Puppy Name Stalemate of the year; each of us has a list of names we love and won’t budge on. Neither list overlaps even slightly.
One of the troubles is, we were truly considering names like “Brunhilde” and “Hildegarde” and “Murgatroyd” for a female bulldog — they’ll seem so fitting when she’s older. But our puppy was so laid back that these names now almost sound like an insult to her sweet demeanor. So there went the names we’d agreed on, and now we’re down to wrangling and tense silences as we veto each other’s suggestions. Things are getting quite terse, in fact.
So we could be in for a long haul, Internets. In the meantime, behold:
Some days, I feel like I’m just an angry fifth-grader looking for a fight. It’s a stage I never had, looking for schoolyard fights, but now I’d sure love to give it a try. I blame my brother, the only person capable of provoking me with the merest twitch of an eyebrow. What I wouldn’t give to . . .
Ahem.
Never mind.
Today, however, I find myself restless and angry, restless because I have all this pent up argumentation and no one to share it with (tangent: while intelligent and an excellent, thoughtful person in general, the husband avoids all types of argument, so I usually have no one on which to vent my spleen), and angry because of the utter inability of so many people in this world to have a rational discussion. Here’s what I envision a rational discussion looking like:
Person 1: I believe X
Person 2: Why?
Person 1: Because A, B, C . . .
Person 2: I can see A and C, but I disagree with B. Here’s why . . .
Person 1: Ah, but you are misconstruing B because . . .
In other words, YOU ACTUALLY FUCKING ENGAGE EACH OTHER. None of this avoidance shit, this stuff where you deflect and purposefully misconstrue and pretend to take offense, hoping that the other person will back off. None of the condescending “You missed the point . . .” or the watery attempt at common ground — and by the way it’s a hell of a lot easier to find common ground after you’ve figured out how far apart you are from each other, IMHO.
What happened to debate? Where has the ability to engage and rationalize gone? Are we so sensitive that a direct question is too uncomfortable? I’ll admit my skills are rusty — I come off far too strongly, even when I restrain myself — but with a little practice, I could get back into shape. I believe we can debate, and argue, and come to understand each other better, if we’d at least give it a fucking try.