Love

My dad got down on one knee and proposed to my mom again tonight. This time, it was outside of a restaurant, at the corner of a busy intersection, 45 years to the day after they were married.

My parents have always been the epitome of romance for me. Forget movies and television; give me something real. A real husband who writes his wife sticky notes every day and leaves them on the front door, so she'll see them when she arrives home from a hard day at work. A real wife, who writes her husband long, heartfelt missives in actual cards for every holiday in her perfect penmanship. A real couple who still holds hands on walks and hugs and kisses and slow-dances in the kitchen, even when there's no music playing. Who say, "I love you," to each other at every opportunity. That kind of real.

Growing up, this was the behavior that was modeled for me. My dad would often turn to us and say, "Isn't your mother beautiful?" and Mom would blush like a schoolgirl (he still does this). They had their disagreements and fights, like every other couple, but there was never any question that my parents loved each other. While it seemed more and more of my classmates' parents' marriages were crumbling, no threat of that kind existed in our household (though curiously - and yay for this - almost all of my closest friends' parents are still together, too!) "For better or worse," they said - and took it to heart.

My father has had years of health issues, including the last ten years with Lyme disease, and my mother has been there for him every step of the way. ("In sickness and in health...") Her patience and love for him have gotten them through trials that would have easily broken lesser mortals. But their love always prevailed.

Their story is unique - they met as teenagers, who went to sister Catholc schools in the same town (Mom to the all-girls half, Dad to the all-boys). After high school, my dad entered the seminary, and was all set to become a priest; he had all but taken the vows, when he decided he couldn't do it - he had to be with my mother. (I imagine the screenplay for this all the time... meeting on a dark, rainy evening; my dad in his robes behind barred gates; my mom outside not able to talk to him or touch; the music swells as she turns away and he watches her go; it's all very Nicholas Sparks.)

My three sisters and I are super-glad he decided against celibacy, of course. So are his children-in-law, and his grandsons. "All because two people loved each other," so the saying goes, their little twosome has grown to 14 in family photos, all the smiles beaming in reflection of the love between this husband and wife.

When I came of age for dating, I expected the kind of treatment from boyfriends that I saw in the behavior of my father, and I rarely found it. I would watch the love between my parents, and think, "That's what I want." Four years ago, on my parents' wedding anniversary, I finally found it. And now, here I am, four years later, lying next to a beautiful little sleeping boy, the product of that amazing love. The first time my husband said to our son, "Your Mommy's so pretty," my heart melted, and I'm sure I blushed like a schoolgirl, too (and yes, he still does this).

Is there something magical about June 6? Perhaps there is. Maybe it's just the influence of a radiant couple, who projects their shining love out into the world for all to see, even on a busy street corner, 45 years after their wedding day.

I love you, Mom and Dad!

Inspiration

Arlington County, VA is about to lose one of its best educators. My mother, Mary Ann Templeton Penning, is about to retire, after 29 years at the head of her classroom.

My mom has taught me everything I know about... well, almost everything, I suppose; but in particular, she's shared her love of students, and her love of teaching. I've only been lucky enough to visit her classroom while school was in session a handful of times, but I've seen her outside the classroom talking with kids on innumerable occasions, and you will not find a more kind, gentle, extroverted, giving soul anywhere. And the kids adore her.

My mom can become friends with nearly anyone in seconds, child or adult. She has no fear of walking up to people and starting a conversation with a bright smile, excited eyes, and a genuinely interested observation about whatever it is they are doing. People warm to her immediately - it's an amazing gift. She can put any child almost immediately at ease; it's totally guileless, too - she really does want to know more about what each and every child is reading, how they enjoy school, and whether they've developed a passion for mathematics (her favorite subject. Mine, as well.)

Don't cross her, though. I remember, growing up, being terrified of my mother's face when she got serious. Her eyes, which she describes as "hazel," are actually a beautiful, bright yellow with dark-rimmed irises - I've never seen any other like them. When her smile drops, and she opens her eyes so wide that you can see the entire ring around the iris, you are in BIG trouble. 

My favorite punishment that she devised for students who weren't getting along was to make them go on "lunch dates;" the offending parties would have a private lunch together, with my mom, in the classroom, and discuss their differences. I love this idea - I'm sure the kids were terrified of it, but hopefully, it set them up for a lifetime of airing their grievances in a constructive manner, rather than explosive conflict-without-consequence.

My mom also works harder for more hours than anyone I've ever known. Anyone who thinks teachers have an easy schedule never met my mother. It's not unusual for my sisters or I to call her house well into the evening, and hear my dad say, "Mom's at school." Her classroom is a well-stocked playspace filled with books, games, scientific experiments, and posters of historical events, much of which she has acquired herself over the years at her own expense. Her house is constantly littered with papers upon papers to grade, and it seems she's always "working on report cards." She also taught summer school for many, many years, and even tutored my sister in law with her college-level math. All of this while making less of an income than an entry level executive almost anywhere. (About which she has never, ever complained.)

She also went back to school - nights and weekends while teaching, mind you - and got her Master's of Education in 2002 at the age of 56, afterwards becoming a "math specialist" in addition to her regular teaching load. I've never understood why people say that girls aren't interested in math - because of my mother, I've always loved it. But no matter the gender, I know she's done yeoman's work to make sure all the kids in her classes love math, too.

As if she weren't cool enough, she was also selected by NASA, out of hundreds of applicants, to attend Space Camp (how many people do you know that have actually been to Space Camp?) A couple summers ago, she worked as a docent in historical garb in the blistering heat at Jamestown and relished the experience, and a few years prior, at age 60, spent two weeks on a NOAA fishing vessel studying (and shucking) scallops far out in the Atlantic Ocean in the coveted position of Teacher-at-Sea! (We had a scallop feast in her honor at my sister's house upon my mom's return to shore.)

Add all this together, and you get the woman who was very deservedly honored as Randolph's Teacher of the Year in 2012. She had been nominated thrice previously. For those of us who know her, the honor was long overdue. But each time it wasn't her, she was genuinely happy for, and had nothing but nice things to say about, the person who did win, as well as her fellow nominees. When it was finally her turn, you would never find a more humble winner. My mom never gloats about anything.

I have no doubt my mother will enjoy her retirement; my dad says she's been coming home from those marathon nights in the classroom exhaustedly declaring, "It's time." But do I think she'll be idle? Hardly. She's a longtime member of the Blessed Sacrament Bells in Alexandria, and long-standing board member of the Arlington Outdoor Education Association, which runs The Outdoor Lab, and a past President and member of the teaching sorority Delta Kappa Gamma for many, many years... she won't be sitting around. I think she and my dad may get the chance to travel more, something they've always wanted to do. And do I think she'll actually stop teaching? Never. Education is her lifeblood. Besides, she's got four grandsons now, and her four daughters rely on her to teach their children (and them) everything she knows.

Mission Accomplished

Well, I did it. My friend Traci at A Star in My Own Universe was doing a blog-a-day undertaking, which inspired me: I hadn't written anything longer than an email since before I became pregnant with my son, now 9 months old. I challenged myself, on May 2, to start this blog, and write every remaining day in May, which I'm very proud to say I actually did. Thank you so much to all the people who have said they are enjoying my writing - you've inspired me to keep going!

I may not be so hard-core as to force myself to stay up every night and finish a daily post from here on out, but when something is important, or silly, or funny, or touching, you'll hear from me. My friend Sarah said my blog is helping her "not feel so alone" as a new mom, and that was certainly my aim; to share stories that won't be so embarrassing that my son will hate me when he grows up, but personal enough to tell other moms that might be going through whatever I'm experiencing that they're completely normal. And not alone.

I so appreciate each and every one of you reading my words. Thank you from the bottom of my heart! I think I'll reward myself by actually getting some sleep for once.

Talk to you again soon.

Love,

The InsomniMama

Gone Gone Gone

Growing up, I had a very close friend named Jessica Phillips. I mention her real name in hopes that someone, somewhere, might know what happened to her. For all intents and purposes, Jessi has vanished from not only my life, but it seems, the face of the Earth.

Jessi was known to me and my family as my "little big half-sister." "Little," because she was shorter than I (amazing that anyone could be shorter than I, but there was a time...), "big," because she was older than I, and "half-sister," because we hit it off immediately, and became inseparable. She and I did children's theatre together in the summer I was 11 years old.

I remember so many things about Jessi: staying at her house and watching "Jaws," though we were too young; that she had a younger brother named Noah, that she would have gone to George Mason High School, which is now less than two miles from my house; that she was a wonderful actress, even as a kid; that she wanted to name her first child "James Henson [Whatever]," in honor of the Muppets' creator; and that she moved to Reno where her dad was a floor manager at Harrah's.

When she moved away, we wrote back and forth a lot. I've saved many of her letters. The return address was always, "Your little big 1/2 sister." She was a much better correspondent than I was; I was great at thinking up things to tell her, but terrible at putting pen to paper. (If only it had been the texting era, at which I excel - even email might have been easier!) This distressed her, and eventually, she stopped writing altogether.

I didn't meet the woman who would eventually become my lifelong best friend until a bit later, but our relationship is incredibly strong to this day; we can go weeks or months without being in contact, then pick up the phone or send an email/text, and it's as if no time has passed. This is a huge difference from the irritation that dissolved my contact with Jessi; I was a kid with horrible follow-up, and she decided I was too much of a one-sided friend.

Of course, I've tried to find her. I seem to recall her wanting to go to college in Ann Arbor, and I've tried to decipher the profile pictures of every "Jessica Phillips" on FB or LinkedIn, to no avail. I've tried searching George Mason grads and people from Reno. I've tried looking up her Dad through Harrah's. In this age of Internet Invasion of Privacy, she seems to have accomplished the impossible: she has completely disappeared without a trace.

Occasionally, my mom or dad will ask, "Have you ever heard from Jessi Phillips?" And I'll have to say no, that I've tried looking, but she is just nowhere to be found. I even have located, and still keep up with, at least four other people from that same long-ago production, but Jessi... I wish I could find her. I'd love to introduce her to my husband and son. I would love to know if she did have a child named "James Henson [Whatever]" (such a cool idea... and yes, I've tried searching that, too). Did she keep up with acting? Did she become a lawyer? Is she happy?

Mostly, I would just love to see her again. To sit down over coffee and laugh, and talk, and catch up. To tell stupid jokes and show her the old letters. To giggle and reminisce. To apologize for being such a crappy correspondent in my teens. And to know how, in the age of super-snooping, she managed to erase her digital footprint.

Le Bavoir

Often, my son will nurse to sleep on my lap and stay there, anywhere from 1/2 hour to three hours, while I get my all-important net-surfing done. I bring a bottle of water and a mug of (now cold) tea, and I always bring myself a snack. Inevitably, whatever I'm eating will end up littered all over my boy, to the point where we've started calling him "Bib."

I first noticed it early on; I practically live on Nature Valley gluten-free nut bars, and those things make a mess. It is nearly impossible to eat one cleanly. The best I've been able to do is to shear off one end of the wrapper with scissors, and upend it into my mouth as though I were drinking the thing. Still, when I look down, my poor boy is covered with the detritus from my nibblings: sugary crystals in his hair, on this face, down his back. I think, if he were allergic to nuts, we'd have found out by now.

Sometimes his nap ends up spanning a mealtime, and my "station" on the couch turns into a full-service restaurant. Since I have become the baby's bed, my husband fixes gourmet meals and waits on me, usually having to pre-cut my meats and long vegetables, or make sandwiches easier to handle. Salads with unusual greens are tricky - I end up having to slurp long fronds like pasta, if I can't get them into my mouth at once.

It doesn't help that gluten-free foods are notoriously crumbly. A bagel or toasted bread eaten above him makes it look like I'm trying to feed the birds by sprinkling him with their offerings. I learned long ago never to eat hot foods while I'm holding him (shudder to think). Anything non-finger-food - rice, meats, side dishes, etc. - is best eaten with a tablespoon to minimize spillage, especially when I need to eat with my non-dominant hand. (Note if you're reading this, and don't have kids: All parents holding babies only get one hand with which to eat.)

The best I can do, when he's asleep on me during mealtimes, is have one napkin for me, and another for the baby. I spread it over him like a blanket, and it catches most of my cast-offs. This is especially funny if it's a paper towel. A piece of lettuce in dressing will fall off my spoon, or fish flakes, or a grilled onion, and stick itself to his temporary blankie. This is always followed by my husband and I, in unison, chorusing, "Poor little Bib." By the end of the meal, I see just what I would have had to wash out of his clothes, or neck, or hair, or had to have the dog lick off of him. It's quite a sight.

I need to get a photo of this sometime for potential Prom Date embarrassment; but as his given name pairs well with the word, "messy," perhaps I won't. I don't want him to earn an undeserved nickname over something I've done. Soon he won't be doing this anymore, though. Perhaps I'll just leave it as a funny memory for his father and I, from the days that he was small enough, and wanted to, fall asleep in my lap.

Ode to the Family Bed

My little man is snuggled up next to me now, right arm over his head, the length of his body on that side pressed against mine, his left arm splayed out, legs froggied up, and head turned towards me, ready to nurse any time he drops out of deep slumber. I love this.

We didn't start co-sleeping right away. Our son's bedroom is right next door to ours; there are about ten steps from the edge of my bed to the edge of his crib. My husband was pretty adamant that he stay in his own room - I was on the fence about it, but figured that was the right way to go - that's why you have nurseries, right? Segregate your sleeping spaces, and everyone gets a good night's sleep.

It didn't exactly pan out that way. At about six weeks of age, the Munchkin got sick. He would only sleep in his crib for about an hour when we'd put him down, and then he'd be up and crying and need nursing, singing and soothing to get back to sleep. Of course, when you're sick, sleep is all-important, especially to a baby. When he slept on my lap, however, he'd stay down for two to three hours at a stretch, so I started holding him for naps. 

I was so tired, that my husband would take him as soon as he got home, and let me get some sleep. One night, I had my hubby bring the baby to me to nurse in bed at around 7:00, and he ended up sleeping next to me until the morning; that was the first time he slept through the night. I remember waking up and doing a double-take when I saw the clock. Thus, our co-sleeping arrangement was born.

I don't move when I sleep - never have. Whatever position I'm in when I fall asleep is the position I'll be in when I wake up. My husband's a flipper, though. When we sleep, my body is in between the hubby and the baby as a shield. We have a firm, wedge-shaped pillow that the baby's on (so milk doesn't come out of his nose when he nurses); I'm on his right, sleeping on my left side, with my Tempurpedic pillow above and to the right of Munchkin's head. My left arm threads under this pillow and above the baby; my right hand is either against my side or resting lightly on his middle. And there we sleep throughout the night, the baby safe and warm beside me.

I'll admit I was a bit nervous at first, because Munchkin was so little. He was just a bit over 4 1/2 pounds at birth; by six weeks, he wasn't quite yet 7 pounds. We got a physical co-sleeper, the kind that sidecars to the bed, but we've never actually used it. After the first couple of co-sleeping naps all in the same space, it was clear I wasn't going to roll on him - one time Daddy got a little too close, and the baby reached up and bopped him on the nose really hard. He's tougher than he looks.

The best thing about this whole arrangement is that all three of us get a significant amount of sleep. No more running in the middle of the night to soothe a crying infant; in fact, he rarely cries at all. If Munchkin needs to nurse in the middle of the night, he can actually latch himself on, which is hilarious to watch - an eyes-closed, completely blind search-search-search-CHOMP <slurp-slurp-slurp>. Sometimes I wake up to find him nursing happily away, and I've been none the wiser.

Our setup is not for everyone. If you're such a mover and a shaker that in a deep sleep, you might actually squish the baby, then I don't recommend it. Similarly, if you like to get a little tipsy before bed, or need pills to get to sleep, this is not for you. But all over the world, and for centuries, people have been sleeping with their children like this. He's not alone, he knows he's safe and warm, and if he needs a midnight snack, the "fridge" is within arm's reach. I'm actually going to be very sad when it comes time to move him to a big-boy bed, and I'm left without my little snuggle puppy. (His Daddy's a good snuggler, too, but that's different.) My son will need his independence at some point. For now, I'm content to be his security blanket, watching over him so we can all get a good night's sleep.

Bonk!

When my son hits his head by accident, I say to him, "Oops - Bonk!" and give him a big smile and a kiss to let him know he's okay. Usually he doesn't cry; most bumps are minor, and he's got a tough little noggin. But lately, it's not the saying, but the sheer number of times I've been saying it that's bugging me.

All little kids bump their heads. I know this. Forget for a second that he's a boy, which, according to my husband, means I'm destined for a life of knowing the ER docs on a first-name basis. But I wonder if it's something I'm doing, as well.

I'm not very good with knowing the relative location of my own body with regards to other objects in space. I'm forever bumping my elbow, or my toe, or my shin, or my own head on items in my house (door jambs, chair legs, the dryer or refrigerator doors, etc.), to say nothing of other people's houses or locations with which I am far less familiar. Add on sleep deprivation, plus my newest 9-month-old appendage, and, though I'm careful as I can be, I'm bound to miscalculate on occasion.

Yesterday, I think he bonked his head no fewer than four times, two of which were most definitely my fault. He stood up on the diaper-changing station for the first time, over which are some low-hanging shelves (Bonk!), and when I was trying to pick up a paper clip so he wouldn't find it and choke on it, he did an abrupt backbend in my arms and smacked his head on a drawer unit (Bonk!). That one left a mark.

Luckily, none of these hits has been so hard as to do any permanent damage... yet. It's the sudden gymnastics in my arms that make me want to adorn him with a protective helmet: when he's nursing on my lap and all of a sudden lurches backwards into the (rounded) corner of my computer. Or when we're in our tiny bathroom and I'm about to put him in the bathtub, when he surprises me by throwing his head backwards towards the sink. Again, nothing concussive... yet.

When I was newly on my own feet, I was running, and began to trip. I think I was younger than two. My mother reached out to try and catch me, and ended up tripping me faster, sending me face-first into the concrete below. I think my poor mother is scarred for life over that one; I still have a slight bump in my forehead, over which I have parted my hair these last 40 years. This is my nightmare. Some kind of cosmic kharma that will play itself out with me and my poor son.

My nephew recently fell and bumped his noodle really hard, and when my shaken sister took him in, the pediatrician said, "Have you ever hit your head?" Of course she had, so the doctor continued, "How did you feel afterwards?" She said, "It hurt for a little bit, but I was okay." The doc replied that that was how her son felt, too. I try to remember this lesson whenever he's in my arms, and I'm too close to the door frame (Bonk!) or when he tips over while sitting and playing on the (carpeted) floor. (Bonk!)

My friends all have horror stories involving ceiling fans and falling off (or into) furniture, and I'm just bracing myself for our first big injury. It's coming, and I know I can't prevent it; he's just started crawling and pulling up on things, and wants to walk so badly. All little kids get hurt, I know. I just wonder if there's some kind of ritual I can perform - burn some sage or something - so that I can a) take the worst of the pain away, and b) please, God, let it not be my fault.