…the open-mindedness with which one must look and listen, record in astonishment and wonder that which one would not have been able to guess…
Huh, strange things happen when you are too absorbed in cleaning out the closet to pay attention to your small child.
Why yes, those are my underpants.
And is she…wearing a Swedish-themed baby’s onesie on her head? While putting all her toys in the retired hamper? On the porch? With the bird-seed holder basket from my wedding? I see.
Do I mention that I live at the beach often enough? No? Okay, so I live at the beach, right? Even when I’m not actually on the beach (at which I live, btw) it’s pretty casual around here, and much of the time people are in their bathing suits when riding bikes or whatever. And, my friends, most of the time people are doing the swimsuit thing all wrong. I need to set the general public straight. (I realize a guide to bathing suits would have been more helpful at the beginning of the summer, when you were shopping, but I wanted to make a careful study of this topic before presenting my research findings.)
I have scientifically determined the bathing suit style that looks great on everybody and every body:
This enhances small breasts and lifts and shows off big ones. It’s cute but not slutty, fun but not too young, glamorous but not self-conscious. Add a floppy straw hat and you’ll be set.
And it doesn’t have one of those little skirts (in fact, I think this particular example cuts a little low on the thighs–the higher the cut the longer your legs look! Of course, then you have to worry about, you know, hair removal, but still.)
Look, I know everyone thinks those swim skirts are a good way to cover up body flaws, but really all they do is highlight the fact that you think you have some. Nearly every woman has some cellulite. Nobody cares, I promise. Weird veins, stretch marks–honestly I only notice them when you are trying to distract me. (Not to mention, when wet, those skirts are all clingy and drowned-kitten looking). Same goes with extreme shirring, though a little can be flattering. Confidence and unselfconsciousness in your body make it look better. If you insist on a cover-up on your way to and fro, a little sleeveless cotton dress or some sweat shorts are the way to go. A big white T-shirt, say, is basically a sign that says, “My body embarrasses me. Guess why!”
It’s largely about attitude. And also, like I said, my rigorous research findings suggest this particular style works on everyone. Problem solved. You’re welcome!
(And no, that pic is not of me. I actually totally would have put one up–I think I have a rare form of body dysmorphic disorder where I look way hotter to myself than to anyone else–but I haven’t mastered the art of photographing myself in a mirror like the population of MySpace, and Husband has been out of town, and plus he would totally make fun of me if I wanted a bathing suit shot of me for my blog. I even tried to get Little Girl to photograph me, but she just kept getting shots of her feet.)
Except our parents, no one has come to visit us now we’ve moved. What our friends have against free beach vacations is beyond me, not to mention that they are missing out on hanging out with us.* And we are very fun.
But now people are starting to email me possible visit dates, which is totally exciting. Except they all want to come during the same week. And also except the fact that this other lady I kinda know, and do not like, emailed me: “Heard A was thinking of coming to visit. We’d love to tag along!” Um…uh…you smell like cigarettes and are unreliable and unpleasant and your kids like to push. And there is only so much space, you know? Plus, notably, I did not even invite you! I mean, really.
I miss my friends. I miss them, specifically, very much, and I miss having friends in general. And so does Little Girl. She’s still talking about the little six-year-old girl, here on vacation, we played with at the beach a few days last week (I guess tourists aren’t all bad). Now, when she mentions one of her old buddies, she automatically tags on, having heard me say it so much, “but she’s too far.” It’s very sad. Sigh for her, sigh for me.
* In answer to your question, yes, we could go back to visit, too. But it’s rather hard to organize what with having to find a place to stay there, arranging pet care, and scheduling it not when Husband is here nor when he is not here (we like to make things overly complicated). Should nothing go wrong, we’ll return for a visit when we have to be there anyway for the house closing.
All that said, we had a wonderfully sociable time today in Savannah visiting with other bloggers and their assorted delightful children (and one hot husband), and then enjoying some of the historic district’s highlights. It was very fun. Little Girl seemed to be under the impression it was her birthday party, actually (we went to a pancake house, and so that means I uttered the word “cake,” and she knows her birthday is coming up, so she put two and two together). Good times.
I have some mental staples for when I need a good laugh, and I am a kind and thoughtful person so am sharing them with you. May they bring you much joy.
a) I have a cousin who married a girl (I’ve never met her) who took his last name. Her maiden name was entertainingly bizarre to begin with, and the new combo, omigod, it cracks me up every time I think of it. I’m (sort of) a linguist by training, so I can guarantee this anonymized version is a good sub of hilarity (you are welcome): Dindintia Oceanwind Dirnooko. And she goes by the whole thing. Just say that name a bunch and try not to laugh. Poor dear. HAHAHA!
b) That SNL Digital Short with Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg in honor of last mother’s day? You know it? I actually sing the lyrics to myself when vacuuming, grinning and swaying crazily. “Every mother’s day needs a mother’s night.” “They will be so surprised! We are so cool and thoughtful.” “I’m gonna be the syrup she can be my waffle.” HAHAHA! I love it. Motherlover–uncensored and censored.
c) This is a newer one but swiftly gaining go-to status in titter-production. Husband has a crush on a new wristwatch. There’s only one hand and it only goes around once in a 24-hour period. The hand is supposed to “correspond to the position of the sun in the sky” and give you a sense of “how far the day has already advanced.” The best part? It’s only accurate to within “nearly ten minutes.” HAHAHA! A watch that can’t tell you what time it is! LOVE IT! I make fun of him constantly. I almost hope he gets it so I can tease him further. Look out the motherfucking window if you want to see the position of the sun, dork! Why are you always late?
d) David Sedaris. My favorite is “Six to eight black men.” You’ll never look at Santa the same way again! Ah, the Dutch. Tee hee!
e) Failblog. People are so stupid! HAHAHA!
f) Finally, like many people, I just can’t get enough of cute animals (you may have read that looking at porn and perusing funny photos of cats are the internet’s main purposes). Lolcats, of course, is a staple. And then there’s my mother’s new puppy, Dewey.
Just look at him and try not to be happy! A teeny tiny baby puppy! AWWWWW! All I have to do is think of him, yipping, trying to tackle my bemused 140-pound Loki and I can’t help but laugh. He’s a four-pound glee factory! Puppies, sigh!
And there you have my sense of humor. Making fun of people (a and e), sex jokes, Luddism, David Sedaris, and uncoordinated balls of fur. I’m quite the sophisticate.
Little Girl had her first dental exam today. They had her straddle me, facing my chest, and lean back into the lap of the hygienist and then the dentist. She didn’t cry and was very cooperative, and she has no cavities and all her teeth are correct in number and formation, and her frenulum, clipped as a newborn, has not grown back too tight.
But her thumb-sucking has already remodeled her bite, and the dentist advised us to get her to stop. Which, uh, how exactly do we do that? She sucks her thumb when she’s tired, sad, or uncertain, and indeed her thumb seems to be in or around her mouth when she sleeps, too. The dentist said when she sucks her thumb we should tell her, basically, that it will ruin her looks. Not only do I not want Little Girl worrying about her appearance now or in the abstract future, I certainly don’t want her thinking something she does that makes her feel good is bad because of what other people might think. Plus, in many ways, she’s just a baby who’s loved her thumb since she first found it inside me. It doesn’t seem fair to break them up, if I even could. Sure, when she’s just a little sad or frightened, I can try to cheer her up and distract her, but it’s not like I don’t do that anyway, and I’m in no rush to paint her little thumb with quinine like my grandparents did me. But I also don’t want her teeth messed up…
What do you think? She’ll be three next month.
Location, location, location. Just being here I’ve magically become athletic. It’s wild. Every day I do at least one, usually two, often more, of the following: swim/bike/walk/run. (Run! I know! And I’m not even being chased!) Nowadays, just walking around, I am pleasantly aware of my muscles which are happy being used. And I am just exhausted by nightfall. It doesn’t even feel like exercise, though. It feels like fun. I suddenly get, suddenly remember from my own childhood, why Little Girl runs and runs: for the joy of it.
In the morning, for example, we may bike to a park twenty minutes away, and on the way back detour to a nearby equestrian stable with a free petting zoo (free petting zoo! I know!). Maybe in the afternoon we’ll swim (Little Girl, if she has her vest on, is like a little fish, and darts around). Every evening we take the dogs for a walk/run around the lagoons and then back on the beach. When Husband’s not working, we’ll hike or bike through a nearby nature preserve. My in-laws, who, despite US Airways’s best efforts, did in fact arrive*, are up for reduced-speed versions of most of these activities. Something about this place just invites activity. Glorious really.
* I ran the numbers, and they could have driven here faster than it took them to fly: their trip averaged 71 miles per hour.
Proof of running:
My brother-in-law and his now 37-weeks-pregnant wife just bought a house. To our great disappointment it’s not in the little village in Sweden where we’ll be moving and where they’d wanted to live, too; unfortunately, no little old ladies died so nothing has been available (one got sick, so we got our hopes up, but alas). They found a place in the city. We’d had this whole fantasy worked up about our children running through the fields between our homes, exploring the forest together, attending the little village schools as a cousin-group…and it may still happen, but I think they think it’s easier to move house with kids than it is. I suspect they’ll be in that townhouse in a while. But I’m glad they found a place they like.
We still plan, of course, on living in that little village, population 700. But I’m starting to wonder about what we’ll do with all the space in the big country home. We are only bringing furniture for three rooms (dining room, living room, Little Girl’s room) but that leaves another living room, the kitchen, and the four other bedrooms empty, not to mention the full basement. (My mom keeps telling me not to get furniture, to wait until my grandparents die and she’ll send us their stuff. Uh…) I think I’m going to feel like an idiot knocking about in that huge place if I don’t have a bunch more kids. And I took this quiz online that said I would do best with just one child, and you know how authoritative internet quizzes are. You don’t want to question their findings.
Not only that, but I’m not even sure what rooms should be what. I’m starting to get why, in Sweden, they don’t say, “This is a three-bedroom house.” They say something like, “This is a seven-room house.” It’s up to you to figure out what goes where! So on the bottom floor you have four big rooms, all interconnected. Right now the kitchen is on the left when you come in, which is fine, I’m not crazy enough to move a kitchen, and then down a hall on the right is the dining room. The stairs to the upstairs go up from the dining room (???). The back right room is the formal living room (rarely used) and the back left is the library/guest room (even less-used). We had planned to knock out the wall between the kitchen and the library to make a bigger kitchen/family room thing, but now I’m thinking we should put the dining room there and have the other front room be the family room. Basically I don’t know that I want everybody stomping by my antique china cabinet filled with Limoges porcelain fifty times a day.
Upstairs are three rooms that are definitely bedrooms (uh, except right now one is the office, and one is the TV room), one little room off the main hall (currently a walk-in closet), and two other little rooms (with windows) off two of the bedrooms. What are these rooms? Are they closets? Kids’ bedrooms? Home offices? Gah. I just don’t know. In the past they’ve been all these things (my in-laws had three kids and a foster child to fill the house). I am having trouble imagining living there without nailing these details down. Which we do need to do since the renovation will be progressing apace.
Oh, I know, omigod, poor me, my delightful Swedish country home is too spacious. But just think of how long it will take to clean those floors!
The view from the kitchen window:
Today was Little Girl’s first day of “school.” Not only did I send her to preschool way before I’d planned (by which I mean: at all), but it’s at a church. A Baptist church. A Southern Baptist church in South Carolina. And it’s a super-religious program, too. All their little library’s books are about Jesus. They teach the shapes thusly: The Trinity is a triangle! The Bible is a rectangle!
And that’s okay. Eight six-hour weeks of religion at age two isn’t going to ruin her for rationality. And you know what it will do? It will introduce her to new buddies, as she pines for her old ones. It will give me some time to do my work-from-home gig, as I’m getting tired of squeezing that in between her bedtime and mine. It will keep her more productively occupied than I’ve often been up for lately, as they don’t show videos (more on that later). And it’s biking-distance! Cheap! And the people are very nice. And if Little Girl starts wanting us to take a moment to consider our good fortune before meals I think that’s probably a very good idea.
I teared up walking her into the room, and felt very sad as she clung to me when I made to leave and told me she was “gonna be sad, Mama!” But when I left she was doing a puzzle, only a little morose. And when I picked her up–”Mama come back!”–she greeted me, then went back to the toys. She hasn’t been especially forthcoming about what she did today, but I did get “I like my buddies!” and that’s just great.
In an impressively skillful bit of scheduling, I interviewed for the university teaching position off-island during “school” (sorry, I can only use ironic quotation marks when using that word for a two-year-old), and it went very, very satisfactorily. And that’s great, too.
(I was all worked up about how I had to be off-island for her first day of “school”, so pinned to her backpack is a very complex note for the teacher involving neighbors’ numbers and schedules. I also interrogated the teacher afterwards about activities and emotions, which none of the other mothers did, so I hope I don’t come off as neurotic as I, uh, guess I evidently am.)
In the past few weeks that the house has been on the market, at a shockingly low price which is 10k less than we paid seven years ago, two sets of folks have come by. But they have, sadly, not been suckered into buying our lovely and well-maintained house which, unfortunately, is in a bad spot. Here’s what one of their real estate agents reported:
“They really like this house, and the price, however, they are debating the
power line situation [they run behind our yard, making it super private!].
Mrs. purchaser didn’t like the buzzing she could hear
when standing in the backyard. Mr. purchaser grew up around high tension
power lines and doesn’t have a problem with them. However, Mrs. purchaser
is the SOLE purchaser! (enough said). It has not been totally eliminated,
but they are leaning towards another home instead.
The price on this home is awesome for the space and condition, but I would
think the power lines are your primary draw back.”
Nothing I can do about that!
Husband has been camping there sometimes as he’s still working in Atlanta (other times he’s with friends, and he may start renting a room), and he says it’s very depressing to be in the silent house. I mostly just get sad looking at the picture of Little Girl’s empty blue room. But hey! I never have to mop that huge kitchen again in my whole entire life! Hooray!
We planned to leave about midday on Friday, so when it was about two and the dogs, cats, and Little Girl were in my car, and the big truck with the trailer pulling Husband’s car was all packed up, I figured we were doing fine. And then Husband could not find the truck keys. We had packed them. We had no idea where.
So we had to drive across town–and I’m talking Atlanta, so that’s pretty far–to get a new key made. One that may or may not work. Then we had to drive back in an unbelievable state of suspense with what is best termed an irate and overwrought Husband. But the key worked. We pulled out of our street around four.
Traffic was bad, of course, but eventually we were about halfway done with our five-hour trip. I was about 30 miles ahead of the truck with a whiny toddler, two howling cats, and more than 200 lbs. of overexcited dog on the longest, boringest highway this side of the Mississippi when I got a call from Husband. A tire on the trailer had blown out. He was on the side of the road. The truck company couldn’t find anybody to come out and put on a tire. His cell phone battery was running out. It was getting dark.
There was nothing I could really do–it’s not like I had a spare trailer tire–so I continued towards the East, calling various people frantically, trying to get someone out there to help Husband. I ended up driving, at nine PM on a Friday night, around a little town until I found an outpost of the truck place. It was locked, but there was a number on the gate, and I got someone on the phone finally, and about then things started moving. After more than three hours someone changed Husband’s tire–apparently the truck company had put the wrong kind on–and about one AM he finally arrived at the island.
Yet despite his having a pass, the guards would not let him in the gated community. Apparently you can’t have trucks inside overnight. He parked in a drugstore parking lot and spent the night in the truck. When he still hadn’t shown up at the house the next morning I went searching for him, and found him wedged in the front seat, his poor eyes, allergic to pollen, all crusty, the mats littered with sports drinks bottles. When we got back to the house I didn’t let him unpack one single thing.
Things are better now and we are settling in well, and Little Girl is doing great and the cats have studiously tested all the chairs and the dogs are having a ball with the smells and sights. Nonetheless I could write many, many posts about my mother and her unmedicated-OCD antics related to our living here as this is the real spoiler of the move. No doubt I will. But, having secured internet access, my next goal for today is another walk to the beach, where we get to go several times a day. Hell and heaven.
As we speak three men are packing up my house. One of them seems to be only semi-literate and has been labeling stuff oddly–like our globe-shaped bar was called “big map” and the stroller “baby-guarde” (which is not written anywhere on the stroller) so I think figuring out what the big brown-wrapped shapes on the other end are might be interesting. (At the last minute I decided to ship the stroller even though I hate it in several ways; my sister-in-law is expecting and bought one and it was 900 dollars. USED. OMIGOD. Husband looked it up and said you can get a nice one new for $500. Um, that seems like kind of a lot to me. I’m also, in another fit of optimism about baby-having, sending a beloved bouncy seat.) Of course by the time we see this stuff again I’ll probably have forgotten all about whatever we packed and it’ll be a big surprise anyway.
Husband had a (very reasonable) little freak-out last night about the uncertainty in all this since we don’t know when our next step will take place and there are no jobs lined up and I have to wait an undetermined amount of time (up to six months) for the paperwork to be able to live there and Lord only knows when the house will sell. And then he plucked the IKEA stuffed moose from its box and told me it was coming with him, since it was one of the few things, filling a small handbag, plus 500 bucks, he’d brought with him when he moved here at 20, for a girl. His friends had given it to him as a going away present. And now look at how much he is bringing back: a household, a wife, a little girl. A brand-new crock pot he had me run out and buy today for fear they don’t exist in Sweden as the knob on our old one had just broken off.
