From the Mouths of Babes

The other day I was happily bouncing my two-year old niece on my knee while we sang "Walk Old Joe" when she looks over and grazes my chest with her hands. She looks up at me with her big blue eyes and says: "That's where LM eats."

"Um, yes"

"Eats milk," she says. "Only milk."

"Well, he eats some other things too."

"No, only milk."

Ah... you know you're a mother when the only comments that are made about your chest have to do with milk production.

Anyway, we are indeed homeowners, registered and all, with possession tomorrow. Our Internet access is getting shut off in the wee hours and the stupid ISP can't flick the switch to turn it back on for a few days. Between then and now I'll be celebrating a rather momentous birthday, so think of me as I cross the threshold from sweet young thing to, er, not so young anymore (though, I guess given my niece's comments, that threshold is likely already passed.)

Homeless

We no longer own the place we live in! We still have possession for a couple more days, but the title is now in someone else's name. We haven't closed our new place yet, but that should happen tomorrow. If I were working at my firm right now, they probably would have handled all the transfers for me at cost, but since I don't know the real estate associates or paralegals, it didn't feel right popping in and saying "Hey, I know y'all haven't seen me in months, but anyone got some free legal services for me?"

So we hired a solo practitioner - he's great and very detail-oriented, but he does seem to operate in a bit of panic mode at times. A few days ago he called at about 4:30 to tell us our insurance agent hadn't been able to secure insurance for our new place (without which the mortgage company will not give us any money). By the time we got the message at 5:30 the insurance agent and the lawyer had gone home so D and I had a white-knuckle evening before finally sorting out the next morning that in fact all our insurance was in place and the paperwork just hadn't been sent to the lawyer.

That scare was topped by today - I was awoken from a very pleasant nap to hear his voice on the machine: "NOT a good time to not answer your phone. We have a problem with your mortgage." I called him back to find out that we just had to sign a few things because we changed our amortisation period. (We will still pay it off as if we are amortised for a shorter period, but this way if there is another mat leave, or lay-off or something in the future, we can reduce our payments for awhile.)

Then he says "Oh, and the mortgage company hasn't sent the money in from your sale yet, and if it's not here by now, it's not coming, so we won't be closing tomorrow." My heart barely had time to jump into my throat before he says "Oh, er, wait, actually someone just dropped a FedEx off on my desk and the money's here." Um, yay?

To get the revised documents signed in a time frame that wouldn't give my lawyer a heart attack, I had to wake up LM from a nap, which as the mother of any crappy sleeper will know, is an extremely painful thing to do. It was made doubly painful by the fact that he refused to nap yesterday and was awake ALL day with the exception of a 40-minute period around 3:30pm. And he was out so cold when I woke him - not even flinching as I pulled off the covers or turned on the light.

So anyway, let's hope there are no more panics before tomorrow; if not we will be home-owners and house-owners! We will have a backyard, and a screen door, and a family room, and stucco, and front steps and a shed. Hooray!*

*This hooray does not constitute an official self-congratulations. The hooray described in this document is subject to restrictions and congratulations must be offered only in compliance with these restrictions.

Not Packing

I should be packing right now, since we are moving in less than a week! Egads. I did a few boxes of books today, but other than that everything is still completely in its place - all the knick-knacks, dishes, clothes, and other tchotkes. But I hate having my place in a mess, and so I guess I'd rather have a couple of days of packing hell rather than a week or more of boxing messiness. I unpack really quickly too - although with LM it will be more of a challenge.

D is out tonight at a stag party so I am watching Sex and the City. I love the show and all the subplots. But I just cannot get excited about Mr. Big. The scenes where Carrie is pining over him and having public temper tantrums because he is dating someone else - ugh - painful. I mean the guy is a complete ass. I guess that's the point, but somehow it's just not as entertaining anymore. I think I related to this show more five years ago (and maybe, just maybe had a tantrum or two myself.) But we all have our guilty pleasures, right?

Some of My Close Friends Are Cyclists

My baby brother has decided to throw his hat in the ring for a local political position. I think it's great - he's a young, radical, idealistic guy, but at the same time he's very reasonable, articulate and compassionate. In short - just the kind of person we want in politics. I must admit to a tinge of envy as I'd love to do something political eventually as well.

Anyway, his campaigning efforts are very grassroots. I came up with the idea that we should wear t-shirts with his name on them and attend local neighbourhood events where there are people likely to be sympathetic to his cause.

My brother is a very keen cyclist and part of his platform includes alternatives to car transportation. He does own a car, I think, but I have never seen him drive. In fact, I've never even seen it. He rides his bike everywhere and is active in Critical Mass events held in our city. (For those not familiar, on the last Friday of the month cyclists meet up at some key location and ride together through the streets to raise awareness and encourage biking; it can be controversial among motorists who are caught unaware, since the cyclists "cork" the intersections and prevent traffic from going through until the whole group, often thousands, has gone through.)

While I agree with that platform, and I think cars should be much more careful and more respectful of bikers, I do find some of the self-righteousness a little tiresome. This weekend we were driving down our street and there was a cyclist riding right smack-dab in the middle of the lane. It was a very wide lane and there were no cars parked on the side of the road to avoid, so it was a little bit obnoxious of her. Unphased, we passed her on the left, giving her at least four feet of clearance. We thought we had been quite respectful, so we were rather shocked to see her cursing us in the rearview mirror.

At the intersection she caught up to us and said "You were getting kind of close there." Never one to resist a fight, I had already rolled down my window and come up with a saucy reply. "It's called 'Share the Road'," I said, "not take up the entire road with your bike." Then there was sparring back and forth in which I proclaimed myself a cyclist as well (okay, sort of a white lie, but I did ride my road bike a lot before LM came along) and she told me we weren't using common sense. Sometimes people are far too self-righteous to reason with so I finally just looked away. (Thought of a great come-back two blocks later though.)

A few minutes later I suddenly realised both D and I were wearing our very bright, very large print "Vote Little Brother!" t-shirts. We started laughing until tears rolled down our face, because I'm sure that this crazy woman is probably someone who would absolutely love some of Little Brother's platforms. I called Little Bro to tell him about it, but somehow he didn't find it quite as uproariously funny as I did, so I decided to come here and tell you all instead.

The World is A Little Sweeter

LM was grumpy all day, whining and wanting to be held and generally miserable. Finally around 5:30 I took his temperature and found he had a fever of over 101 under his arm - and that was with my crappy thermometer that always seems to register lower than my basal one. I felt like such a moron - here I was dragging him out and around, pushing him in the swing at the park and trying to interest him in random passing dogs. Poor kid was probably thinking "Just take me home woman! Can't you feel I'm BURNING UP?" I am just not much of a worrier when it comes to illness so it never occurred to me that it might be something more than just teething. Of course by then the doctor's office was closed and I realised he'd probably had the fever for quite a while given how crappy he was acting all day. I called the Nurse Hotline in tears and spoke to a very sweet RN.

"Is it his first time being sick?" she asked.

"His first fever," I said.

"Well, he'll have plenty more," she said with a smile in her voice.

That was my second crying jag of the day. The first was when I was driving in the car and White Coat, Black Art was on. They were interviewing a doctor who specialises in counselling dying children. One of the things he does is help them come up with assignments for their families to remember them, because often these children are afraid they'll be forgotten. So it reassures the child to task the family with some sort of commemorative ritual, like asking them to eat the child's favourite meal every year on his or her birthday. I liked that idea.

The doctor being interviewed also said that dying children never ask "why me?" at least not in their discussions with him. Instead they worry about their parents: "Will mummy be okay?" When I heard that that, I started sobbing. Tears were rolling down my face. I had to pause and regain my breath after stopping the car.

I feel like motherhood has given me so much more empathy than I used to have. You'd think I'd have already had that sort of empathy towards the sick - having had one parent die slowly from cancer, and having another battle it off twice. I've seen a lot of death. But I don't think that story would have made me cry 10 months ago. Somehow since I've had a child the whole human race just seems a little more vulnerable and likable, and well... human.

With that, I'm off to cuddle my sweet, clammy boy.

Do Not Call Me!

One of the crappy things about being home much of the day is the nine million and four telemarketing calls I have to field. I used to work as a telemarketer, for about four hours (before hiding in a bathroom stall and leaving while we were all on our scheduled "break"), so I know what a miserable plight it is to be cold-calling. But the sheer volume of calls means I have no patience to be nice to them anymore.

MBNA Mastercard alone calls me about four times a week, and I get about two or three calls a week from various charities who always, jarringly, call me by my first name. "Hi, Grass?" I'm not much of one for standing on ceremony, but when they do that then I think it's some buddy of mine and I feel compelled to be friendly. Lately I've taken to saying "Who is this?" in a rude voice, but of course a couple of times it has actually been a friend, and then I'm embarrassed.

If I were less compulsive, I'd just screen all my calls. But I'm like the Dustin Hoffman character in Moonlight Mile - I can't not pick up the phone. The only time I don't is when LM is in the bath, and even then, it kills me. So it's doubly annoying when I've rushed for the phone only to find that there's no one there at all - just dead air because some computer miscalculated how many calls their centre can handle. They're not supposed to be allowed to do that but they do, at least once a day.

Canada's laws on telemarketing are pretty toothless. While organisations are obliged to keep their own do not call lists, there is as of yet, no national one. It is, apparently,no-call list being launched in September but even that contains a number of exceptions, for example, for companies with whom you have an existing relationship. Which means the 3 "courtesy calls" that D got this week from CIBC will continue.

After complaining to a friend about the myriad of calls I get, he suggested I threaten to call the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission. So yesterday when MBNA called me, this is what I said.

MBNA: Hello, is Grass there?
Me: Who is this?
MBNA: Oh, it's MBNA Mastercard calling about your...
Me: I want to get on your Do Not Call List.
MBNA: But ma'am [suddenly the first name is dropped] I don't understand. I'm calling about your existing platinum ... [trying to invoke the "existing business relationship" rule]
Me: I don't have an existing platinum account. Seriously, I want to be put on the Do Not Call list or I will be calling the CRTC.
MBNA: Alright then; I will make a note of that. Please allow at least 50 days for your number to be removed from lists already provided to ongoing marketing campaigns.
Me: Bye.

So it worked - sort of. We'll see.

Childcare and Running Triumphs

Thanks for all the daycare advice and wisdom. So to elaborate a bit more, a nanny share is basically hiring a nanny to look after your child and also the child of another family. Some people also talk about nanny sharing as in you'd have the nanny 1/2 the time, and the other family 1/2 the time, thereby providing full-time employment, but the way we want to do it is to actually have the nanny take care of both children. Hence the need to find another family with a child of similar-ish age, and preferably living nearby. Most of my mommy friends aren't that close by or aren't planning full-time work.

I haven't totally ruled out putting him in an unlicensed daycare situation (licensed day care being far too difficult to get into), but I feel like a nanny will provide us with more flexibility. Also, he's pretty used to being attended to by one person so I'm not sure how a daycare would deal with his peccadilloes - I can't imagine him napping easily for example. Perhaps I am underestimating him and he'd adjust just fine. But regardless, the cost is surprisingly comparable and it is far more convenient, so I'm leaning towards nanny-sharing. I'll probably go through an agency or referral service to hire the nanny, or else rely on word of mouth. The advantage to the agency scenario is they guarantee you someone who will remain with you at least a year and I know my friend who has hired via Craig's List seems to have a rapid rate of turnover - but I'm glad to hear that can be successful, and I won't rule it out. Unfortunately (but logically) most people looking for work want to be hired fairly immediately, so scarily this part of the arrangement will have to be a bit more last-minute.

In other news, I ran my first half-marathon this weekend. I didn't have an amazing time, but I was able to run the entire 22.1 kilometres (doing 10s and 1s, as is my practice) without any unscheduled breaks, despite some rather nasty hills near the end. It was a tough course, but it was a lot of fun. An hour and a half into I was still feeling great, loving the scenery and the camaraderie of the other racers. A wave of nausea and fatigue hit me near the end, but a carbo gel pack (disgusting tasting) got me through and I hit the finish line with D and LM cheering me on. LM wasn't literally cheering of course, but he did like the medal I got and promptly grabbed it from me to put in his mouth.

In conclusion, I leave you with a photo. I was trying to capture his two new teeth; he wouldn't cooperate by opening his mouth at the appropriate angle, so I didn't get them, but I did get the lashes. Are they not insane?

Day Care

Grrr - for some weird reason Blogger ate one of my posts. Or at least failed to publish it. Now I'm looking like the derelict, not-even-weekly blogger!

I'm starting to freak a little about childcare for LM. There don't really seem to be any daycares in my new area (although admittedly, I haven't looked very hard), and there are some downtown but they are crazy hard to get into (read: you need to put your bébé on that waitlist before the pregnancy pee stick dries). I don't see any real advantage in having a kid in daycare that's not where I live or work, so nanny sharing seems like a good option. Now I just need to find a family in my area who wants to share.

I guess I should just put an ad on Craig's List or something but that just seems like a sketch-o-rama way to find childcare. I mean the people I've advertised to before can't even be bothered to show up and pay for the $20 bookshelves they swore they wanted over the phone, and I'm going to ask them to help me figure out daycare? Blah.

Mommy Wars

I think most parents are convinced that their own kids are utter geniuses. I know I am. It amazes me that LM can deftly pick up his rice puffs and manipulate them into his mouth, that he looks around for the cat when I say her name, or when I sign "cat" to him, that he waves to us when we leave and will patiently flip through pages of a board book for 15 minutes, pausing to look at all the pictures. And yes, my friends and I occasionally compare - some of them are crawling, some of them can pull themselves up on things, some of them are starting to sign.

I think it's natural to think your kid is a genius, though it's probably best to try and confine your assuredness on this front to people most inclined to agree, grandma, dad, uncle, and maybe the people still reading your blog even though it contains mostly mundane posts about your baby. Probably wise not wax on about it the woman at play centre whose kid is a month older and isn't doing what yours is. And I think it's okay to compare as long as you're not trying to compete - after all it's natural; e-mails often go around in my group of mother friends: "Any crawlers?" "Any teeth?" "How are you handling solids?" It's all part of the learning process and helps you know what might be coming next.

But I have one friend who is constantly telling me how wonderful and intelligent her child is, without a hint of irony, or any sense that she might be, well, a tad biased. Every wise and wonderful thing he has done must be detailed. And the milestones this wunderchild hit late? It wasn't because she couldn't do it; it was because she "didn't want to." Or she "thought it was dumb." Seriously.

And the worst part is, mum will then sometimes criticise other children; sure that other little boy might have crawled earlier, but he really sucked at something else that is obviously far more indicative of intelligence and he was nowhere near as "tuned in" as her little girl. The reality is, you see your own child a lot more, so of course they seem more tuned in. It was a shock to me when my sister-in-law saw LM laughing at her and said she hadn't seen him be that "interactive" before. To me he always seems that interactive.

I love watching LM start doing new things. I do tend to focus on the things he has done early and take them as evidence of his brilliance. But in the end, it really doesn't matter. I was an early milestone kid; D hit them late, as did my brother. And guess what, as adults we're all intelligent, successful and happy. And just as we were then, we're all good at different things. But the speed at which we toilet-trained, or cut teeth, or walked has not had any discernible impact on our current lives.