Hey, Look! Over There! Latkes!

I don't hawk my posts on (Never) Too Many Cooks every single time I post one. But, you know. This one's awesome. Because it's about carbs. And oil. And rededication. And ancient history. And sorta miraculous long-burning lights during a time of year when darkness reigns.

But mostly? It's about carbs and oil. You know you want some. You know you do.

Mmmm. Latkes.

(In the photo above, the bronze shoes on the left are N's; the porcelained ones on the right are Em's. Baroy built the awesome display case they're in, years ago. And yes, my living room is pretty much orange. Goldish orange, or maybe orangey gold. I love orange. I love its warmth and its sweetness. Which has nothing to do with Hanukkah and latkes, but is true, nonetheless. There's a lot of warm orange in my house, and that makes me happy.)

Rockin' Out

There are a couple of "those" kinds of houses around the corner from us, and we decided to take a walk in the freezing-for-LA night air tonight to see them. N stood in front of this house for ages--all the while quietly, unselfconsciously dancing to the music.

He makes me smile.

Thanksgiving in Photos

Every year, we invite all the "geographical orphans" over to our house for Thanksgiving dinner--all the people who didn't, couldn't, wouldn't travel to their far-away relatives' homes for the holiday. It is, always, a huge amount of fun. And while I miss my family something fierce at these times of year, there is also something to be said for the family of your heart.

OK. Enough mush. On to the menu. As you can maybe see in the photo above, there was...

• Turkey (brined, of course)
• Gravy
• Cranberry sauce
  
• Vegetarian stuffing
• Sausage stuffing
• Twice-baked mashed potatoes
• Sweet potato souffle
• Crackling cauliflower
• Cornbread
• Biscuits (the drop kind)
• Turkey-shaped salad (see photographic evidence below!)
• Spinach salad
• Raw carrots and string beans for crudite/hors d'oeuvres
• Apple pie
• Pumpkin pie
• Homemade whipped cream (the only failure in an otherwise AWESOME dinner)

There was also a big surprise. See, a couple of weeks ago, Em had been on the phone with Uncle S, who moved to Boston earlier this year. She was taunting him about missing Thanksgiving, and (especially) about missing my cranberry sauce. He was crying foul, loudly enough that I could hear him through the phone, and she was giggling away. When they'd finished, he asked to speak to me.

"While Em and I were talking," he said, "I made reservations to LA on Thanksgiving Day. I'll be there before noon. Don't tell the kids."

"You're flying 3,000 miles for my cranberry sauce?" I teased.

"Of course! Totally worth it."

And so it was that, at around 10:30 on Thanksgiving Day, I sent Baroy to the grocery store to pick up some almonds.

"It's taking him a long time," Em said to me, about an hour later.

"Mmmm," I replied. "Maybe Vons wasn't open and he had to look around for a store?"

Then we heard the car pull up.

"Why don't you go and see if Dad needs help with the groceries," I said. "And take your brother."

Em look at me, puzzled. Help with a bag of almonds? Suddenly her eyes grew huge, and she sprinted toward the door. (I knew there had been a hint or two dropped, unintentionally, over the weeks, and she was putting them all together.)

And then there he was, and they were both screaming, "Uncle! Uncle!" and running into his arms.

And it became, for sure, a day for giving thanks.

As for the promised photos...


My friend J always comes up with some ubercreative addition to the Thanksgiving table. This year she outdid herself.






This is usually our living room coffee table, but on Thanksgiving, it becomes the side-dish side table.





We pull our kitchen table (which has pull-out leaves) into the living room for Thanksgiving dinner. Can you see the white tablecloth on top of our 'nice' tablecloth? It's our "thankful tablecloth." Each year (we started in 2007, I believe), we take a Sharpie (pictured in the middle of the table here) and everyone signs their name and the year and writes what they're thankful for. It's a useful scrapbook! I forget where I got the idea, but I love it.







Our friends G and M brought their new puppy, Matilda, to dinner, and she and Snug had a playdate. Here's Matilda playing peek-a-boo with Em.





Snug kisses the cook--me. For the record: Yes, that's a shot outside on our patio. Yes, it's after the sun has set. Yes, I'm in short sleeves. Yes, I love Southern California.

Breathe

The first time I saw a tree aflame in color after moving to Southern California, I was seriously flummoxed. I'd assumed that the generalizations about LA having no seasons were hard-and-fast, literal rules.

I was wrong. I mean, sure, people aren't ever going to flock to this region to view the fall foliage. For one thing, fall takes its sweet time around here; the trees don't choreograph their color changes in quite the same way they do back east. But they do change, some of them, even if only one by one, and that change still manages to pack an emotional wallop.

The past few weeks have been difficult, stressful. There are meetings and appointments to keep track of; there are continual tear-my-hair-out issues at school; there's a minor surgery for N coming up soon after the new year (minor in the official scale of things, major when it's your kid who's going under anesthesia). There are dips in my mood and peaks in my anxiety levels that will have to be addressed at some point, but need to be put aside for now in lieu of all the rest.

But for today, for now, there's stuff to be thankful for. And while I am--of course, indeed, don't doubt it for a second--grateful for family and friends, for a job and a roof over my head, for all the things I normally take for granted*, right this very second I am especially thankful for the warm fall day that just passed, for the walk I got to take this afternoon with my daughter (during which we giggled so hard she had to sit down to catch her breath), and for the fall colors that smacked me in the face, made all the hard things disappear for a little while, and made me catch my breath, too. In gratitude, awe, and love.

Happy day, all. Be thankful, and be happy.

*Tomorrow morning, while the turkey brines**, Baroy and I will be doing a local Race for the Hungry; our entry fee into this 5K run-walk will go to a local shelter, and we'll donate some canned and boxed goods when we sign in. In so many ways, I feel like it is almost literally the least I can do, and yet...it's something. So maybe it's not the least.

**Which it needs to do for about six hours, meaning I have to wake up at 5 a.m. to be sure I can get it into the oven in time for dinner. Whose stupid idea was this whole brining thing anyway? Oh, yeah...Never mind.

One Step Back, A Step and a Smidge Forward?

We had a Sukkot celebration at a friend's house on Sunday; there were four 7-to-8-year-olds, three 11-to-12-year-olds, and a 16-year-old. The hostess, D, recently got her Master's in Jewish Education, and clearly couldn't allow a learning opportunity to pass her by, So she gathered the kids together to help them each make an individual, miniature sukkah out of graham crackers, marshmallow fluff, pretzels and candy corn.

When all the sukkot were completed, the kids invited the parents in to see, and the 16-year-old announced that she had given each kid an award for their sukkah--some sweet, some funny, some silly. As she announced each award, we applauded. Somewhere in the middle, she announced N's award ("best postmodern design"). But, when the applause started, N crumpled to the table, put his arms over his head, and began to wail, "No! No!" and sob. Loudly.

Luckily, most of those in attendance are good friends--by which I mean, people who "get it"--and all Baroy and I had to do was nod to the 16-year-old to continue and keep saying to the rest of the folks, "The clapping and the attention. It's just too much for him sometimes," and everything went on.

Still, you know, it's not what you want to see. It's not a step forward. At all.

But what happened next? Sorta was.

After everyone had finished admiring the sukkot, they went back outside for pizza and beer. I went over to the table where N was still quietly sobbing into his arms.

"Hey, sweetie?" I whispered to him, bending down to get closer to him. "Do you want to come sit on my lap for a little while until you feel better?"

He finally raised his head. "No, I don't think so," he said. "I don't want anyone to think I'm like a baby."

See, that part? Right there? That's the huge part. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that, despite the fact that he's coming up hard and fast on 9 years of age, he's never said anything like that before, never seemed to consider how others would perceive his behavior, and certainly never in a way that implied he recognizes the ways in which his behavior lags behind that of others in age-appropriateness or maturity.

Thus, while his response made me sad (a cuddle is a great regulator for N; there's nothing like it for getting him back on a more even emotional keel), it made me proud, too, and even a little hopeful.

And so, despite the mini-meltdown, I'm calling it a win. By a smidge.

My Little Literalist

At Religious School on Sunday, the kids did an art project, each making a pair of painted, stained-glass-looking glasses--one each for Elijah and Miriam--for the upcoming seders. The kids who can write in Hebrew wrote those names on the glasses; the rest simply drew flowers and other decorations.

Because it's such a small school, the children all sit around a couple of tables when they do their projects. Apparently S, one of the girls in Em's class--who, it's important to note, has a younger sister named Miriam in N's class--jokingly announced, "I'm writing my sister's name on one of these glasses! That way she'll know it's for her!"

N then chimed in. "I'm gonna do the same thing." It wasn't until he'd completed his masterpiece and proudly presented it to Em that anyone realized "the same thing" wasn't writing Miriam's name on the glass...It was writing his sister's name on the glass.

When his mistake was pointed out to him, he became embarrassed; just because he doesn't always understand word-play jokes, he definitely knows when the joke is on him. When I arrived to pick them up at the end of the day and heard the story, it once again broke my more-or-less-perpetually-shattered heart. I told him to pay no attention; I told him that *I* thought it was a lovely thought, and a beautiful glass, and it would have a prominent place on our table during Passover dinner.

And thus it came to pass that Em officially joined the pantheon of prophets and matriarchs whom we will honor with a ceremonial glass of wine at our seder.

Dayenu.

The Killing Fairies

We'd just finished reading a chapter of Beverly Clearly's Ribsy. I'd turned off the reading lamp above N's bed, and we'd turned over into our customary back-to-back position for falling asleep.

"Mommy?" N said softly. "Can I tell you a question?"

"Yes, you may ask me a question," I said in my ceaselessly pedantic way.

"When do the Killing Fairies come?"

"The what? The what families?" In my defense, sometimes it's still hard to understand N's speech, especially when the words aren't ones you often hear juxtaposed. You know, like killing and fairies.

"NO," he said slowly and loudly. In his defense, it's frustrating to try to tell people stuff and have them misunderstand you all the time. "The. Killing. FAIRIES."

Immediately my mind sprang into action: What the hell? Oh, hold on. He was talking about something like this earlier. When was it? Right, on the way home from Religious School this morning. Something about needing to check the doors of our house, except I hadn't understood, and started talking about the mezzuzah we have there. Except I had been in a class on kashering your house for Passover today, which means it's likely that his class had been talking about Passover too, and...

Oh. The angel of death. Passing over the houses with the blood on the lintels, and killing the firstborn sons of the houses without. An idea which, I can imagine, was easily transformed in my eight-year-old's mind into some kind of posse of homicidal fairies.

"Oh, no, honey. You mean from Passover? That's just a story from a very, very long time ago."

"So you mean the Killing Fairies aren't real? They're pretend?"

Our rabbi often talks to us adults about having an adult view of the Torah, about how it's possible to both view the stories in the Torah simultaneously as myth and as Truth with a capital T, in the sense that the stories reveal deep truths about human nature, about right and wrong, about morality, etc., without having to have literally occurred the way they are said to have occurred. Now, that sentence didn't come close to doing justice to what he's talked about in this regard, but suffice it to say, it is this sort of theology that has allowed me to become more involved in Judaism without having to shut off the part of my brain that says there's no way that two people who had two sons could populate an entire world. (That, obviously, is just for starters.) It is also what allowed me to answer my son with completely truthfulness.

"The Killing Fairies aren't real, sweetie. There are no Killing Fairies."

N sighed deeply. "Good," he said, snuggling closer to me. "Because I was starting to be a little worried about that."

When Em was a little girl, there were several years in a row when we weren't able to put a glass of wine for Elijah on our seder table, because the whole idea of Elijah--of this stranger who would come into our house and drink wine from our table, and we wouldn't even see him, wouldn't even know he was there--was terrifying to her. (I sort of had to agree with her on that one. I mean, if he LEFT something, like presents under a tree, that would be different. But this guy just comes in, takes the wine, and leaves. Under most circumstances, we'd call that a home-invasion robbery.) It was only in the last couple of years that she's gotten past it, though I think she still finds it rather creepy.

I have to say, I have no idea how exactly Passover managed to outpace Halloween as the scariest night of the year for my kids. Or...maybe not JUST for my kids. Because now I have this image of these Killing Fairies being led on a murderous rampage by a drunken prophet-ghost, and I'm starting to get a little nervous myself.

The No-Time-For-An-Update Update

Em had an initially Very Disappointing Day today, wherein her soccer team lost its second playoff game in these double-elimination playoffs, ending their (really wonderful for many reasons) season. At the end of the game she was told by her coach that she had apparently missed the cutoff for the all-star league by just a couple of girls; he wasn't at the 'draft' because he was coaching their game, but the report he got didn't include her name.

So it was a double thrill when Coach D called tonight (and left a message on Baroy's cell, AND emailed Baroy as well) to tell Em that she had indeed made the team, and was she interested in playing for him during the All-Star season?

You could have read the fine print on a contract using the glow of delight from her face. Me, I was kind of looking forward to being done with soccer for the year. But I can't begrudge her this. She so loves playing this game, and to be singled out as an all-star, after being the highest-ranked of the younger half of the team...Like I said, I can't begrudge.

Go, All-Stars!

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I went to a short adult-ed class at my synagogue this morning, where we talked about Chanukah and its meaning and how to make it more meaningful, etc. At the end, I asked my rabbi about the whole new book thing, and it's official: I need to let it go.

Well, that's giving myself a little too little in the way of credit. What he actually said to me, in short, was that it was perfectly reasonable for agencies/groups/organizations to ask for new and unwrapped toys and even books. But he also said that it was perfectly reasonable for me to respond to that by saying, "In that case, I don't have anything to give you," and to go off and find a group that would be happy to take what I have to offer. And, most importantly, he said that while, yes, there is this commandment to give tzedakah (a Hebrew word which both does and doesn't mean charity), there is no commandment that says I have to give tzedakah to my school district's Healthy Start program. If what I have or want to give does not match up with what they need, I should move on. I shouldn't resent them, but neither should I feel badly for not doing it their way.

And so that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to let it go. I'm even going to try not to make a big (OK, bigger) deal over why I'm not giving to this specific toy and book drive. I'm just not going to give, and I'm going to try really, really hard not to assume that I'm being looked at as a cheap Jew for not giving. I will, instead, bring my gently used books to the places my rabbi suggested today, and if I am asked by anyone at school, I will say that I've already done my charitable giving for the holiday season and leave it at that.

Or, at least, that's the plan.

Now, if I can only stop myself from snarling at the gay-hating evangelical Salvation Army crews outside every single frigging supermarket in the world right now, I'll be damned near eligible for sainthood. If Jews had saints, I mean. And if saints were allowed to curse like sailors.

The World's Saddest Pumpkin Cake

Last year, it just slid out of the very cool bundt pan with hardly a shake. This year, not so much...

The icing didn't do a lot to disguise the issues...

(Re: The sign. Moaning to Baroy about what had happened to the cake, I said, "It tastes awesome, but I can't just serve it without comment! I can't have people thinking I meant for it to look like this! I need like a sign or something..." This is what I came back to a little later. Baroy cracks me up. It's why I keep him. Well, one of the reasons.)

And for those of you who follow me on Twitter (I'm tinycoconut there, fyi), here's an extra photo of the done-two-hours-too-soon turkey in its Who-Framed-Roger-Rabbit swaddling:

Thanks, Butterball Turkey Talk Line! It stayed perfectly hot, and was still awesomely juicy! (Which is probably also thanks to Alton Brown and his now tried-and-true brining technique...Yes, I know brining is 'out' these days, but I'm sticking with it, 'cause I love the way the turkey turns out.)

Just So Wrong

I walked to the Farmer's Market this morning, and brought home a really HUGE cucumber for my cucumber-fanatic family. Baroy and Em left for the day before I unpacked it, leaving only N to gape at it's awesomeness when I pulled it out of my special Farmer's Market tote.

Except he did more than gape. He picked it up and began cradling it, cooing to it and, finally, walking around the house saying, "Hello there, my girlfriend. You are so beautiful, my girlfriend! How are you today, my girlfriend?"

I didn't even know where to start explaining just why that is so, so wrong.

(Oh, come on. I can't be the only one who had a "24 Reasons Why Cucumbers Are Better Than Men" poster over her bed in college, can I?)

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And for anyone who was wondering: I stayed home with N last night. Part of the reason was because I've been feeling sort of low-energy myself these last few days, after a frenetic week. But part of the reason was that I wanted to make sure he had a special night...and while Baroy is a gem of a dad in so many ways, his idea of "a special night" is to watch a movie on TV. (That's also his idea of a Monday night. And a Tuesday night. And...you get the idea.)

So, I barbequed sausages (for me) and burgers (for N), which we ate with fruit and stringbeans picked right off the bushes I have growing in the backyard. We played with some of N's toys and then, when it got dark, we walked two blocks over to watch the big fireworks display right down the hill from us. It was fantastic. On the way back, N said, "I want to have a party!" When I asked him what we needed to do for it to be a party, he said, "Dance! Duh."

And so, when we got home, we brought out my laptop and boogied to one kids' song and one grown-up song (Shiny Happy People), playing freeze-dance throughout. At which point I put on my Mean Mom pants and said that boys with fevers needed to be in bed, seeing as it was already past 10. Of course, Baroy and Em returned from our friends' house just at that moment, and Em and N needed to tell each other about all the fun they'd had. The fact that N had just as much to share as Em made the whole evening worthwhile.

Dull

I'm supposed to be writing something thoughtful and patriotic today, I know, but I just don't have it in me. Instead, I'm feeling pouty and out-of-sorts. Frankly, I'm having a teensy little internal temper tantrum...except, since I'm writing about it here, it's not quite so internal now, is it?

See, I'd been looking forward to last night for days: Baroy was going to be at a pickup rehearsal in Anaheim, Em was invited to a sleepover/backyard campout at her friend C's house, and N was invited to Weeyum's house to make up for the missed-due-to-fever sleepover of last weekend.

Except that, on Wednesday night, he started running a fever again. It's like his body is rejecting the idea of a sleepover.

So, instead of a night full of little self-indulgences--I was going to try out a new recipe, soak in the not-hot-hottub in the moonlight, have a couple of martinis, watch a movie on the actual TV instead of on my computer screen--it was a night full of little N-indulgences, things like fishsticks and Spongebob and a rousing game of stack-the-buckets. Which is fine. He was sick, and sad about missing *his* fun, and making him feel better is my job. But inside, I kicked my little psychic feet and pummeled the ground with my little psychic fists at what was supposed to have been.

Today, with a low-grade version of said fever still hanging on, the day again isn't going to be what I wanted it to be. One of us is going to take Em to our friends' house for swimming and barbequeing, and the other of us is going to have to stay home with N, and I don't like either of those choices, the staying or the going. I want to be together...all together. With my friends, with my husband, and with both of my kids.

And so I'm not going to wish anyone a happy birthday today, not even my country. Because I'm pissy and pissed off and feeling petty and spiteful.

Wah. Wahwahwahwahwah.

Solutions and Tidbits

Thirty-eight cents' worth of PVC tubing later, and my worries about N's pencil-chewing are potentially over. Who'd'a thunk? (Aside from all you guys who wrote in suggesting essentially--or specifically--that in the comments, I mean.)

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During Em's Fifth-Grade Colonial Day last Friday, she became sad when an error was made that bumped her from the wax-candle-making rotation. (There was also butter-making and toy-making and corn-husk-doll-making and soap whittling and chapbook-writing and a few other things, not to mention the DANCING. With BOYS. Holding HANDS. It was hilarious.)

And although there's nothing I despise more than helicopter parenting...well, I helicoptered in, whispered into the ear of the candle-making leader (a friend of mine from the PTA), and somehow, suddenly, there was room for her at the table. This is a kid who almost never throws a tantrum or demands what she can't have, and she'd been looking forward to this particular event for months. So sue me. The smile on her face was totally worth it.

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Speaking of helicopter parenting and 'totally worth it': We got one of those auto-calls from the school on Friday, announcing that--in the interest of keeping our kids as safe as possible--the school would be trying a new traffic pattern starting Monday, with the stair gate being locked and the big wide gate by the ramp being opened instead.

Wonder where they got that idea?

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Meet the Robinsons was one of the very few kid's movies these past few years that I actually enjoyed. (I won't say it was my favorite of the past few years, because I loved Ratatouille--though that one almost doesn't count because the adults enjoyed it so much more than any kid did that they really should have just called it an animated movie for grown-ups and left it at that.)

My favorite part of Meet the Robinsons was the part where the antagonist (Bowler Hat Guy) is trying to hatch a plot against the protagonist and is mumbling to himself. "Oh, I know!" he says. "I'll turn him into a duck! Yes, it's so evil! But...I don't know how to do that..." long pause "and I don't really need a duck..."

Ever since then, "But I don't know how to do that...and I don't really need a duck" has become one of those family jokes that makes all of us burst into giggles every time someone works it into a conversation. Which happens more often than you'd think.

All of this explains why I laughed so very hard when, on Sunday morning, after opening the handprint card from N and the coupons from Em (one free foot massage, one free walk, one free reading-to-N-when-I-can't), I opened one last card which read, in part, "In trying to think of a Mother's Day gift I said to myself, 'I'll get her a duck!' Then I thought, 'But I can't do that. And she doesn't need a duck.' Still..."

Meet Ana. My unneeded, and yet much beloved, duck, who is now going to spend her days watching over my garden.

Moms

ParentsConnect put together a Mother's Day montage of photos, which I'm linking to here not only because I'm on staff there, but also because there's a shot of me and N from a couple years back just a bit shy of halfway through. It's one of my favorite photos ever.

I have nothing to say about motherhood today that hasn't been said many times before, and many times better. It all comes down to this: It's worth it. Every single moment of every single day is worth it. Every single moment of sadness and every single moment of worry and every single moment of resentment and every single moment of fear is worth it. Every single moment of joy and every single moment of pride and every single moment of laughter and every single moment of contentment is worth it. All of it. My two children make it all worth while.

Thank you, Em and N, for making me a mother.

God is Mean

Bread is one thing. Bread I can deal with. But I am thigh-deep in PMS-y hormones, and I don't just want a beer...I NEED a beer. And I may not have a beer. Because it has yeast. And yeast makes bread rise. And therefore, that yeasty hop-ish goodness is forbidden to me for another 48 hours, almost to the second. Not that I'm counting or anything. (Make that 47 hours, 57 minutes.)

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I've been up in arms these last few weeks about a possibly too silly and definitely too complicated to write out safety issue at my kids' school. Oddly, I seem to be the only one who finds this safety issue upsetting; or, at least, I'm the only one who has been letting it gnaw at her for weeks.

Which is not to say that I've kept quiet about it. When I first heard about the changes that would introduce this safety issue, I wrote a note to the principal and the parent who was spearheading the pilot project I was objecting to, expressing my concerns. I got nothing from the principal, and only a condescending "Well, if you're concerned, then come help us institute the changes!" note from the parent. (Um, no. I think what you're doing is stupid. Why would I HELP YOU do it?)

After the project had been running for a week, it was discussed at a PTA meeting. I stood up and made a rather impassioned speech about my concerns, and it was met with enough head-bobbing that I thought I'd gotten through to them.

Then we went on spring break, and when we came back to school this week...the pilot project had become a permanent policy. Oh, HELL no. I was just NOT taking that lying down.

And so, yesterday, I sent a note to the PTA president--who is a friend of mine, a woman I truly adore--telling her that I was resigning from the PTA Executive Board effective immediately, due to the fact that I was going to have to fight this new policy, starting with the principal, and moving on to the school board and the newspapers, if necessary. And I felt that since the PTA board was a co-sponsor of this program, it would be wrong for me to actively act against the board while being ON it.

Long story short: There is a meeting scheduled for Monday to discuss altering the new program to deal with my concerns, and I've been asked to withdraw my resignation pending the outcome of those discussions.

I am thrilled on one hand...and feeling horribly guilty on the other. Because I think I was a bit of a bully. I mean, I was perfectly ready to follow up on my resignation and wage a one-woman war over this issue; I feel it's that important. But at the same time, I was sort of hoping that by threatening to resign, I'd get some action. And, in fact, my friend told me that she immediately called the principal and said, "We can't afford to lose TC; please do something." And that is what led to the scheduling of the Monday meeting.

So, if in the end I win, then really, any means necessary, right? But there's still guilt in knowing that if I were most any other mother, nobody would have paid me any attention here. Actually, the guilt is in knowing that half the reason I do the things I do at the school is so that I'm NOT any other mother, and that when I need a favor, people are more inclined to do it for me. Or, in this case, when I need to push my weight around, I have enough weight to do it. But is that fair? Does that tarnish the things I do for the school, if they're not really selfless, if I'm sort of saving up chits that I will later call in?

Hey, God, did I mention that I really NEED that beer?

Be It Resolved

There are only about fifteen minutes until midnight here on the West Coast; we're back from our New York New Year's celebration (confetti and champagne at 9 pm in a room with 10 adults and 11 children under the age of 11) and N is still up (Em went to another friend's house after the party; they're going to the Rose Parade in the morning!), so I only have seconds to myself to put this down. And thus, without further ado, here it is: My Resolution.

I hereby resolve to be more selfish this year. Actually, I resolve to be more *effectively* selfish. In looking back at the last year, I feel like I spent almost the entire thing waiting for some kind of cosmic 'permission' to stop working so hard and stressing so much and to just do things that would make me feel better. But that permission never came...and all the hard work and stress got me NOwhere except depressed and angry. So, this year, I'm not going to wait. I'm going to work my garden even if that isn't going to help get us out of our financial morass, and I'm going to pick up my cross stitching again (it's been like TWO YEARS since I did ANY kind of crafting!) and I'm going to cook more homemade, healthy dinners since our health is worth the extra time and effort, and I'm not going to just let the housework slide because I have work to do...because the work never ends, and the housework keeps on sliding, and it's just NOT WORTH IT.

So there. I'm going back to the '80s and starting my own Me Decade in 2008.

And you?

New and Unwrapped

This is why I love blogging...You guys make me think. You don't always make me agree--and I'm still not entirely buying the idea that an unwrapped toy is an unwelcome toy, for reasons I'll discuss below--but you do bring up important points. I'd assumed that a stuffed animal could be adequately cleaned, for instance, and maybe that's not the case. And I'd assumed that a charity could just toss (or use for some other purpose) anything that doesn't meet minimum standards--like a bear with missing fur. But again, maybe that would be too much work, for too little benefit.

Nor am I suggesting that nobody should give new and unwrapped. Just that allowing like-new stuff to be donated would open the giving up to everyone, not just those who can afford to add another couple of toys to their already-taxed holiday budgets.

Maybe it's a matter of perspective? Let me be clearer about mine: Every single year, some percentage of the presents I give my kids are used and unwrapped (until I wrap them). I could never afford eight nights of Chanukah otherwise! This year, for instance, they will each be receiving some cute shirts I found for them at Goodwill. (Several of 'em each, actually. Because they cost only $1.50, I can give them a nice little bag full of cool clothes for half the price of a single Gap t-shirt.) And they will each be receiving a little stack of books I found at the library book sales for a quarter apiece--again, they'll get a stack, and I'll have spent maybe a whole dollar or two! Win-win. And they will probably each receive a used game--Em for her DS, N for his Playstation 2*--that I get at GameStop. Each game will cost under $15; otherwise, I won't get them.

But here's the thing: I don't feel like this is something shameful. I am thrilled to be able to afford to give these things to them, and they will be thrilled to get them. Because they've never been told that there's anything wrong with something that's been used. I'm not even sure they realize that the stuff is used...I mean, I'm sure Em knows the difference, but I don't think she attaches any meaning to that difference. Maybe I'm kidding myself, but I've never seen any evidence to the contrary.

Now, all of this is just to provide you with my perspective, as I said. I am very aware that there's a difference between giving to my own kids, and giving to someone else's. I have a list of more than 15 kids I need to get presents for this season--there's a full slate of birthdays AND holidays--and not one of them is going to get a used library book--because I, knowing what's expected socially, would be embarrassed to do so. So maybe that's how I should be thinking about this charitable giving thing. That I should be embarrassed to give someone else's kid a used toy--whether that person is someone I know or not. But that bumps up against the fact that I actually don't think it IS embarrassing...or at least I don't think it's wrong. Or maybe I should say that at least I don't think it should be wrong.

And here's one more twist before I shut up: As Hilary pointed out in my last post, it's not just that there are these opportunities to give, and if I don't have it to give, that's OK, I can just walk away, lalala. It's that there is all this pressure to give. Everywhere you go, there's someone with a hand extended right now. You get looks when you don't give. You get attitude. (Or you feel guilty and you perceive attitude. Probably half and half.) Plus, not giving feels bad. It feels mean. And, worse, I want to give. But they don't want what I have to give. And therein lies the problem.

I'll deal with it like I have every year. I will donate clothes to those charities I feel comfortable giving to, and I will Freecycle the toys and stuffed animals. And I will try not to feel judged when the plan to have "the whole troop participate" in the stuffed animal drive goes awry because of me, just like I try not to feel mean when I don't let Em go Christmas caroling with her troop either. (Aaaaaand, it's back! The Scrooginess is in full swing now!)

*While the truth is that these particular items were purchased for the kids by other family members rather than by us, I made a point of being specific here so that you'd understand that my kids have no dearth of the high-tech and trendy stuff that is out there. And sometimes those items are bought by Baroy and myself. And yes, this year for the holidays, my kids will get new things, too. A nice little selection of new things. (N is going to FLIP for this ride-on toy, which is his Big Present. He'll also love the new-in-bag Spongebob Squarepants comforter I got for him. And Em is getting a gorgeous, very grown-up Star of David necklace that she picked out and a brand-new Hairspray DVD, because she is INSANE for that show and that movie. And that's only a sampling.) My point is, it's the used stuff that will allow me to buy them some new things, too, and still have something to give them every night. No, that's not right. My point is, it doesn't matter that some of what I'm giving them is used. They're all gifts. It's all good. Or maybe not.

Heads do not have to roll

This is my second-to-last NaBloPoMo post. Not that I'm counting or anything.

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I decided, this morning, to stop by the principal's office after volunteering for a couple of hours in N's classroom, to express my, um, mild vexation over Idiot School Psychologist's name being on N's IEP-timeline sheet. Didn't curse this time, either. Go me! Maybe because she looked appropriately annoyed (at the district, not at me) and took out paperwork to show me that the name of the psychologist who is going to be assessing N--and who will also be heading up his IEP meeting--is not that of Idiot School Psychologist. I had a feeling that that might be the case--that the timeline sheet was filled out pro forma by someone who hadn't been in the "No, don't mention his name in front of TC; she'll go ballistic" loop, but that the actual assessment paperwork is indeed all in order.

When I got home, there was a nice long phone message from the guy at the school district saying essentially the same thing, and promising me that Idiot School Psychologist would not be anywhere near my child.

My work here is nowhere near done, but at least I can let this one go.

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Which means, of course, that I need to replace it with something else to be annoyed and belligerent about. And since it's That Time of Year and I haven't had anything to be truly Scroogey about lately, I'm going to take the little shred of indignation I worked up this morning over an email I received, and turn it into a full head of steam.

To wit: Times are lean here. (Do I hear any amens out there? I thought I would.) So, this morning, when I got a notice about a Girl Scout stuffed-animal drive for needy kids, I was thrilled. This was something we could be part of; we have, in our home, something resembling the population of a wild game park in which all hunting has been prohibited for the past 50 years and the animals were all given fertility drugs. In other words, we have a lot of stuffed animals. Nobody would even notice if a few (dozen) went missing.

Except then I read further: "Council will receive donations of NEW stuffed buddies..."

Now, it's hard to express my distaste over this new trend of everyone only accepting "new, unwrapped" toys to give to kids who don't get much. Every time I try it, I end up sounding like some kind of mean old fogey, mumbling about how those "damn charity cases ought to take my kids' broken and stinky old toys and LIKE IT." Which is not my point at all. But here's what my point is: Ignoring the whole Christmas/Chanukah/feeling marginalized thing, this is supposed to be a season of giving. And my upbringing and my faith have both taught me that there is always someone more in need than you, and that it is not only a privilege, but a duty to give. And I have much to give. Except I don't have it in cash. What I have are toys and stuffed animals and clothes that my kids have hardly every touched or worn, and which could make another child very happy. Except I'm not allowed to give that stuff to those children. Instead, I'll end up trucking them over to Goodwill or Out of the Closet or a consignment shop. And then these things will be out of reach, again, to the truly underprivileged, the kids whose parents can't even come up with a buck-fifty for a t-shirt.

It just seems stupid...and wrong...that we are now at a point in our society where reaching out and giving to another person in need has become yet another privilege, something out of the reach of many of us. Does it really matter if the freaking teddy bear still has its Gund tag on it? Will some three-year-old love it less because some other kid hugged it first? Because, personally, I think that makes it more valuable, not less. Yet I'm being told by organization after organization this season that my gifts--that my impulse to give--just aren't good enough. And while I'd like to scoff and say, "Fine. Their loss," the truth is, it's making me feel like I'm not good enough, either. Not good enough to give.

The Forgotten Greens

No matter what I do, no matter how many lists I make (and check twice), there's always something left behind in my Thanksgiving dinner. Tonight it was the last-minute addition of Trader Joe's organic greens, popped into the microwave when I realized I had absolutely nothing of that color in my menu. Of course, since I left them in the microwave, I still didn't serve anything green, but...c'est la vie.

Dinner was fabulous. I can't decide if my stomach hurts more from eating or from laughing. We have my Aunt Barbara in from Florida, and our friends M and G, who always bring fun with them. I am thankful in so many ways, but too selfish to take any more time away from my family and friends to elaborate.

One quick semi-anecdote: On ParentsConnect, someone wrote about a Thanksgiving activity (we call them DOs) called the Thankful Tablecloth. I loved the idea, and decided to give it a shot this year, with a bunch of Sharpies and a $10 white tablecloth from Ikea (upon which N immediately spilled a full glass of grape juice, prompting G to write "I am thankful that I was not sitting right here" over the stain. Hee!)

As for my kids, well, N wrote, "I am thankful for the soldiers." Which was unexpected, and really sweet. And Em? Em started with, "I am thankful for my family and friends and Harry Potter," but then decided to add a few more thought. "And I am thankful for the environment. And NOT for the governor."

Good to know she's learning how to let things go, huh?

Damn the Anonymity!

If the Big Wide World weren't such a scary place, with stalkers and child molesters and whatnot, I would TOTALLY put up my pictures from today, of--and I say this without any partiality, of course--The World's Cutest Kids. OK, maybe a little partiality. But still. They're definitely in the top three.

N is SuperN! Complete with N-bedecked cape my mom sewed for him a couple years back, a t-shirt I created with puffy paints that has a SuperN logo on it, and spiked, blue-sprayed hair. I might try to get him to let me stuff his shirt with foam 'muscles' tonight, but that might be too much 'stuff' for him. He's thrilled with the costume.

Em is Hermione (and if I have to say, "from Harry Potter," then you should be ashamed of yourself). Her costume came out PERFECTLY. What kills me is that there were all these little Harrys and Hermiones running around with store-bought costumes, and we threw ours together from stuff around the house (made an academic robe out of an old, most-eaten woolen shawl of mine, for instance, and a Gryffindor tie out of a piece of scrap maroon fabric onto which I glued yellowish-gold stripes from another piece of scrap fabric), and people at school were all coming up to me going on and on about how AUTHENTIC she looked. The key? We washed her hair yesterday and put it into a dozen or more braids, so that today it came out all crimped looking, like Emma Watson in the original movie. Plus, she just sort of LOOKS right for the part.

Me, I'm just thrilled that we managed to get through another year without spending more than $15 total on both costumes. Do I know how to get into the spirit of things, or WHAT?

Deep Yom Kippur Thoughts

Twenty-six hours without food is a long fucking time.

Matzoh balls are little spheres of heaven. And they are only more heavenly when you haven't eaten in 26 hours.

The only thing less fair than having to buy and set out the snacks for the kids at the family service is having to watch them EAT the snacks during a break. The only thing less fair than having to watch them eat the snacks during a break is having to clean up the snack table after the services are over. dumping bowls of nuts and raisins and dried apricots and carrots and celery and tiny tomatoes into baggies and sealing them, even though it seems like each raisin is a tiny mouth screaming, "Eat me! Eat me!"

It's hard not to believe in God somehow when you're in the midst of a prayer about the cleansing of your soul and the heavens open up and the entire WORLD, it seems, is cleansed in the space of about three minutes. Cleansed and, possibly, drowned. But let's focus on the redemptive, shall we?

It's also hard to keep a room full of young children in their seats singing said prayer when said heavens open up.

And it's hard to keep praying while those same children are screaming, "Hey! Check it out! Everything's flooding!" and asking if they can go dance around outside.

But it was OK. It felt...right. And it feels even righter now, in retrospect, with a full belly and the sound of the last shofar blast of this season still ringing in my ears.