Some of you make recognize the title of this post as taken from the ditty Jon Stewart sings to Stephen Colbert in the recent special, A COLBERT CHRISTMAS, on Comedy Central. The conceit of the special is that Colbert is trapped in his mountain cabin (there's a bear outside) and can't get to his NY studio to tape his holiday special, but his friends keep dropping by. Stewart tries to sell Colbert on celebrating Hanukkah instead of Christmas (you can read the lyrics here or watch the clip here.)
Thing 1 and Thing 2 are on the verge of turning 4 as Hannukah and Christmas approach, and it's the first year the two holidays are really registering in a conscious way. Because they go to a Jewish preschool, they've already committed "The Dreidel Song" and "Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah" to memory. They know all about lighting the menorah, eating latkes and Hanukkah gelt, and though they're a bit hazy on the story behind it all, they have no trouble understanding that presents are involved. As for Christmas, though they've been told that we don't celebrate it, but many of our friends do. (My pal Gregory K. has written a short but delightful poem on his blog about those who double-dip, celebrating both holidays). The kids are not really sure what Christmas is, even though they know it's coming and that a fat bearded man in a red suit is involved. Every night when we drive home from preschool in the fading dusk or early dark, they delight in viewing holiday lights and Christmas trees. I've played them Alvin and the Chipmunks' "Christmas Song" ad nauseum (they never seem to tire of the high-pitched voices and my own attempts to sing along with the line about the hula-hoop). The secular parts of the Christmas holiday are inescapable. But as yet, they have no clue about the birth of a Baby Jesus.
I haven't brought Jesus up yet because it's a whole lot of religious weight, historical baggage, and a very serious story to load on almost-four-year-olds, let alone the idea of one December holiday being ours and the other being someone else's. Their grasp of their own "tribe's" holiday story -- the Maccabees and the miracle of the oil burning for eight nights in the temple -- is only slightly less incomplete than my own. I never went to Hebrew school and my parents left much of traditional Judaism out of my Jewish cultural/historical education. I can tell you the story of FIDDLER ON THE ROOF with much more detail and accuracy than the story of the Maccabbees. I identify as a Jew by culture and history and even values way more than I do through the specifics of the Torah, and honestly will need to bone up before teaching its most famous tales.
But I do enjoy a good Hanukkah celebration, and I want the kids to also. It's just that trying to explain and keep separate one holiday and the other is a bit daunting when Christmas is ubiquitous, surrounding us everywhere with its decorations and sounds and trappings. I've never seen anything wrong with enjoying those trappings: holiday lights are beautiful, and a lot of the music, secular AND religious, is delightful and lovely. My own parents took us out on Christmas Eve to visit the tree at New York's Rockefeller Center (breathtaking every year) and the wondrous mechanical windows of Lord & Taylor's on Fifth Avenue. We even took to exchanging our Hanukkah gifts on Christmas, especially once I was in college, because Christmas break was when everybody was home. But we always knew the religious aspects of Christmas were for Christians. Jesus, while a nice Jewish boy with a lot of great things to say about loving one another, was not our savior. We didn't have one, and didn't see the lack of one as anything, well, lacking. The idea of a Messiah showing up some day was something to which my parents never subscribed, and would've probably seen as magical thinking, at best. So we enjoyed the trappings of the Christmas season, and ignored the rest.
As typical Upper West Side of NY Jews, our big Christmas day tradition consisted of going to a movie and eating Chinese food. I understand transplanted NY Jews now living in the Bay Area have the option of attending an official "Kung-Pao Christmas," which involves Chinese food and Jewish stand-up comics. These are traditions I can get behind. I hope to get the kids into the Chinese food and movies on Christmas eventually. (The first time we attempted to take them to Chinese food on Christmas, it seemed every Jew on the West Side of Los Angeles had shown up at the same restaurant.)
As for Christmas, I suppose I'm already passing on to the the kids the idea of sharing in the displays and the music, the Christmas movies. (They fell asleep tonight to the soundtrack from "A Charlie Brown Christmas," worshiping at the altar of jazz great Vince Guaraldi and his soothing cool jazz piano.) But I feel a more urgent sense than my parents ever imparted to emphasize that we've got our own holiday this time of year. I don't mean to imply there's some kind of equivalence. But I do want them to know that we're different from the majority in some ways, and that's okay, in fact reason for celebration. Because here in the U.S., church does remain officially separate from state, and people here are free to practice whatever religion they choose, or none at all. Celebrating Hanukkah in the midst of Christmas hoopla seems to me a way to celebrate a great American tradition of embracing everyone by making a place for all. It's a way to reinforce the value of diversity, to demonstrate that in difference there can be strength. And at the same time, to show that both holidays have come to mean spending time with family and friends, and celebrating miracles legendary and miracles that we can experience daily but too often take for granted, one of which is that we live in a place where freedom -- something the Maccabees valued -- is ours to cherish.
I just hope the kids don't mind when they realize eight days of presents means, to quote Jon Stewart's line from Colbert's song, "one nice one, then a week of dreck."
Yesterday I attended the Halloween picnic of my local parents-of-multiples club.
There were tons of new moms, and moms with two, three, four and almost five-year-old twins. Lots of us were over 35 when we gave birth.
I live on the west side of Los Angeles, a relatively affluent area, where multiples -- naturally occurring and "assisted" (in the parlance of the infertility world) -- are plentiful. Older moms are more likely to have twins than young moms, and then there are moms with fertility issues who are fortunate enough to be able to shoulder the expense of assisted reproduction. Our club has plenty of both.
My kids attend a private preschool, where nearly all the moms are at least over thirty, and many are my contemporaries.
And when I go to kid-friendly restaurants, local parks and museums, I often see moms who are clearly my peers.
I know this is far from the norm in many parts of the country. But I'm comforted to see I'm far from alone around here: I have plenty of moms with whom I can trade notes, compare war stories, and commiserate.
When I hang out with moms who were born AFTER 1973, I find that some of them can be more overwhelmed more easily; they seem equally exhausted, though they don't have age as an excuse; and they look to me for advice even if their kids are the same age as mine. It matters not that I've only been doing motherhood as long as they have. I'm older, therefore they figure I oughtta know what I'm doing. Either that, or being a mom of twins makes me a more seasoned veteran in their eyes.
In truth I'm plenty befuddled by motherhood at times, even though I deign to blog about it. Though I've obtained a wealth of information about it in a short but intense period of time, I'm still making rookie mistakes at each new phase.
But I do feel something I think many younger moms don't. I feel the days are simultaneously long -- when I'm tending to my kids' incessant needs and requests -- and ruthlessly short when I'm savoring the rare quiet moment snuggling with them before bed. I feel pressed for time and wanting to stretch out the good stuff -- the golden afternoons when the sun glints in their hair and a few strands fall just so over their foreheads, when they're in dad's arms, turned upside down and giggling with abandonment, when they're having earnest conversations in the bath about what kind of cake they want at their upcoming fourth birthday -- or just now, when their dad called me into their bedroom to show me what Thing 1 had done. He'd gotten up from bed and taken out every pull-up in the closet and arranged them in two arcs fanning out, sorted by the ones that feature Lightning McQueen and the ones that feature Lightning's pal Mater (characters in CARS). Sure I want the boy to go to sleep already, but his late-night mischief is cute and he knows it: he smiled through his binky as I came in to inspect his project.
I have a sense of the temporary, the ephemeral, the way it's all slipping by so fast -- and feel a lot less fresh and immortal than my younger mom pals.
Here on the west side of L.A., there are a lot of us dragging our feet trying to slow down the gears of the "circle game," as Joni Mitchell called it. We're late blooming moms, and that means we feel that carousel going round a little faster than others. Sure, I was impatient for Thing 1 and Thing 2 to be toilet-trained, and I long for the day they'll give up the binkies already. But yet ... not so fast, please. I like the ride and I'm far from ready to get off.
She's proud of herself that she wipes from front to back when she goes to the potty. She wants to show mommy how she does it. But when she finishes wiping, she sneezes ... and decides the toilet paper she's just wiped with, and hasn't yet flushed, makes a perfectly fine tissue with which to wipe her nose.
He's proud of himself that he can use the urinal at preschool. He wants to show mommy how he does it. He takes her into the bathroom there and whips it out ... neglecting to pull his underwear and pants out of range. He pees all over himself.
She learns about nail polish from a teacher at preschool and her new thing is getting her nails done, by mommy, nanny, the obliging babysitter. Not one to be left out, even though this is traditionally a girls' activity, he insists on getting his nails done too -- toenails included. The color he chooses? Black. My three-and-a-half-year-old son has unwittingly gone Goth.
We're rolling cookie dough into balls to make "thumbprint" cookies: the idea is to push your thumb down in the cookie's middle, creating a whole for jam. Daddy shows him which finger his thumb is; he happily joins in a rendition of"Where Is Thumbkin?," a song he knows since age one and a half. When presented with the ball of dough and asked to press down with his thumb, he pokes it with his pointer.
She sees daddy feeding jam straight from the makeshift pastry bag he's created out of a plastic bag, straight into her brother's mouth. She insists she wants to try the same thing. She gets the jam in her mouth, and spits it out onto the table where we've been working the dough.
He sneezes all over the dough.
I know what you're thinking: "You must be so proud."
Here's what I'm thinking: I've got great material with which to embarrass them someday at their weddings.
I even got the jam spitting on video.
What was the slogan back in the '70s? "Celebrate the moments of your life."
Though maybe I'm glad I didn't get footage of that tush-to-nose toilet paper moment.
What is it about the start of the school year -- or in my kids' case, the preschool year -- that brings out the worst in everyone in Late Blooming Mom's house?
Thing 1 and Thing 2 returned to school last Thursday after a nearly two-week absence from the school itself (it's where they attended summer camp), and promptly turned into the toddler equivalents of Dr. Von Frankenstein's famous monster and his bride. Worse, in reaction to their tantrums, whining, and incessant demands, Late Blooming Mom and Dad were similarly transformed -- into Von Crankensteins, the elders.
During the weekend following the resumption of school, there has been more outright yelling, foot-stomping, wheedling, needling, mewling, and collapsing onto the floor into a flailing heap while kicking at anyone daring to come into kicking distance than during our entire end-of-summer vacation, even though THAT involved two long airplane trips, sleeping in an unfamiliar location (grandma and grandpa's house) and the total disruption of daily routine.
Last year around this time, I remember talking with my dearest friend Karen, an elementary school teacher and mother of two who has always displayed the cool, calm wisdom of an earth mother even though she was pretty young by the standards of our post-collegiate crowd when she had her first kid. Karen told me that the weeks around the back to school period are ALWAYS stressful in her house. It matters not that her family has been through the school year's start time and time again. Crankiness abounds, snippyness becomes the normal mode of communication, and everybody seems to be in a constant bad mood.
Still, I was unprepared for the strength and force of this perfect storm, this emotional tidal wave of short tempers and hair triggers. Sometimes when I've had a bad night's sleep or two, and the kids are less pliable/more vehement about getting their way than normal, I find myself momentarily turning bitchy and tight-faced and gritting my teeth or storming out of the room until I can get hold of myself. But this past weekend, I was in a near-constant state of maternal irritation, just-about-to-boil fury, and more than once, my pot simply boiled over. I taught my kids bad lessons by modeling the loss of self-control when frustrated. Bring on the Child-Rearing Police. If yelling, door slamming and storming out are the charges, I plead very, very guilty.
I have an old friend I wish I was more in touch with, a Kentuckian by birth, whom I remember, when she had two toddlers, using the vividly colorful Southern vernacular phrase, "stepping on my last nerve." I guess the idea behind it is that you've got a bunch of exposed nerves when you're a mom, and your kids keep stepping on them, and yet you cope, until they get to that very last, untouched nerve. And then they don't just step -- they stomp. You utterly lose it, and the kids know it. It's as if they've been waiting to provoke you to reach this point, just to see what will happen, or worse, thrive on the negative attention this maternal volcanic explosion garners them.
My last nerve has most definitely been stomped on.
Dad's too, for it was he who had to get them out the door without my help this morning (I had an early appointment) and drag them, howling and clinging, into school in front of all the other moms or dads at drop-off. (Thanks to those parents who've helped out during moments like this, taken pity on him after a shared look of recognition and a sigh of relief that at least it wasn't their kid(s) this time).
Dad called me to vent on his way to work. It was his way of coping. Now I am coping my way: trying to take some time for myself to be calm, get into some kind of Zen place where fountains of water are gently flowing (or at least I hear the fountain in the courtyard outside my office window), my inner self is at peace, and I am in control so I won't utterly lose it later when I retrieve Thing 1 and Thing 2 from preschool.
I can't really blame them for their rebelliousness if I consider that, during vacation, they had mom and dad's undivided attention 24/7, doting grandparents, gifts of new toys and books for the plane rides, access to more treats than usual, and days devoted to visiting playgrounds, museums, a kiddie pool, and the toy-strewn houses and apartments of our relatives and friends with children. Then, suddenly, they were thrust back into full-day preschool, where they were separated from mom and dad for many hours, had to share with lots of other kids, and conform to what somebody else decided they should do. They weren't happy about this change, and registered their dissatisfaction sort of the way our cat did when we picked him up from four nights' boarding at the vet's. (That night, the cat pooped and peed in all the wrong places. Message received, oh furry one.)
But then again, my kids can theoretically reason and communicate at this age -- certainly more than my cat will ever be able to. So did they have to be SUCH primadonnas in venting their displeasure? I'm reminded of the scene in SPINAL TAP when Nigel Tufnel throws a snitfit over the size of the cocktail bread he's been given to snack on backstage (not to mention and his irrefutable -to-him, child-like logic that a guitar amplifier that goes to eleven is SOOOO much better than one that goes to ten, even though it really is no louder).
I console myself that after the worst of Thing 2's fits this weekend, she came and found me in my bedroom, where I'd curled up in a big comfy chair, utterly spent ... and she snuggled with me. Despite my having lost it in front of her, she still sought the comfort of my embrace, and we calmed down together. Later that night, my son held my hand and snuck into the space under my arm, where he so conveniently fits. Perhaps a lesson has been learned amidst the icky-ness of back to school stress: that even when mom -- or kid -- loses it, there is still plenty of love to be had around here. Getting angry doesn't mean you forfeit love and acceptance. My kids know my love
for them is secure, even though their behavior may mean the temporary withdrawal of my apparently much coveted attention.
We don't have to like each other all the time, especially when it's back to school week, and we're all being impossible -- in kid or grown-up form. Somtimes we really wear each other out, but to paraphrase artist/author Ian Falconer of the OLIVIA children's book series, we love each other anyway.
Today I dropped off my very self-assured, confident, fearless preschoolers just one year after their very first day in preschool.
As I entered the preschool, its lobby decorated with back-t0-school welcome signs and helpful arrows pointing the way to each of the classrooms, I watched the nervous parents clutching their wary toddlers' hands or hugging them close, anxiously contemplating the parting about to come.
Walking in with my own kids, who now are preschool vets as comfortable at school as they are at home, I felt that curious mixture of sadness and pride that comes with the now familiar pang of separation. Last year, my kids clung to me like a lifeboat in a turbulent sea, even as they eyed the enticing projects set up for them in the classroom, and the other kids already assembled and singing for circle time. This year, after helping me put their things in their cubbies, and asking for a hug and a kiss, there was a brief bout of protest: "Mommy, I want you to stay," and some hand-tugging in the general direction of the tables laden with craft projects beckoning their little fingers. But within a moment, after the hugs and kisses were administered, I was out the door and they were busy, neglecting to even give me a longing look back.
As I walked out of the building, I spotted one of the school administrators calming a worried mom, and a husband and wife leaving, holding hands and consoling each other. They'd just experienced the milestone of their first preschool drop-off, and they, too, were feeling pangs.
I couldn't help but flash back to myself a year ago. I'd taken the day off from work to be available to hang around the school and retrieve the kids or return for a visit if the day was proving too stressful. At first I sat in the lobby with other moms, while school staffers ambled back and forth between us and our toddlers in the classroom, bringing us back updates on how our little cubs were doing in their new den. (Appropriately, their class was called the Teddy Bears). Gently, they encouraged us to go out for coffee, or better yet, stay away until the afternoon, and come pick up our kids not quite at what would be their normal pick-up time, but not too long before it. I remember aimlessly wandering over to a GAP store and realizing I could shop -- not for my kids, but for myself, a rare luxury. I remember also feeling strangely unmoored and adrift. I couldn't help myself a bit later, and I called to see how the kids were doing without me. The report came back: just fine.
Later that day, I'd returned to pick them up, and they ran to me with surprised and delighted faces, thrilled to be reunited, but also excited to show me just what they'd been doing. And in the weeks and months that would follow, the scene would replay itself again and again ...
Nowadays when I pick them up from preschool, they don't always shout gleefully and run hell-bent for my arms when they see me. Sometimes it takes me twenty minutes to coax them out of the play yard where they've been doing an obstacle course with the other kids, or out of their classroom, where they want to stop and play with toys. Some days, we spend what feels like a decade in the restroom before we go home. And the ride home, during which snacks MUST be served, is a mixture of recited songs, brief answers to my queries about what they've done all day, and of course, arguments over toys and snacks during which I've gotta drive and play referee and designated retriever of all things dropped on the car floor.
We've got a routine down now. It's dad who does most of the drop-offs, so I can get started on work and end in time to pick them up while he stays at his office and toils later. The kids know what to expect at school, and most days, they actually want to go. They're stimulated constantly there, mostly happy, and wildly busy when not napping or snacking. Preschool suits them just fine.
But this morning, walking back to my car, I couldn't help but flash back to a year ago. My eyes teared up a bit, my throat swelled. In some ways, I'm relieved I don't have to worry about that preschool transition. But I'm also sad because I'll never have that milestone again.
I'm proud that my kids can walk away from me after that hug and kiss and get busy having fun without me. But I have to admit I really live for those afternoons when they catch that first glimpse of me from across the play yard, and race into my open arms.
Like a lot of Late Blooming Moms, I was established in the working world before I had my kids.
I thought briefly about becoming a stay-at-home mom when I found out I would be having twins, but I know myself well enough to know I'd go crazy if I didn't have at least some kind of professional existence outside of mom-and-wife-hood. I also knew my husband and I would need the money; where we live ain't cheap. So there wasn't really a choice to be made, short of moving to some small hamlet where housing is inexpensive, we wouldn't know anyone, and as confirmed city mice, we'd have trouble adjusting.
Even though I briefly considered this option -- and sometimes I still do, when I get a look at our monthly mortgage payment -- there are other reasons I stuck with the plan to go back to work. I'd had friends who'd been working women grapple with being at home with just one baby, only to find they longed for the validation of other adults, the mental challenge of interesting work, and the independence that comes from earning a paycheck. One mom complained to me that she'd go to a dinner party and as soon as she told the person making conversation with her that she was a stay-at-home mom, that person's eyes glazed over ... and then the person inevitably focused on her software-executive spouse, and ignored her the rest of the night. It was just assumed she had nothing worthwhile to say. Of course that was ridiculous, but she felt stigmatized, as a former professional (with an MBA to her name) now deemed not worth dinner table conversation.
I took a six-month leave of absence when my babies arrived, and surprisingly, I didn't go crazy. I felt fortunate to have time to get to know them -- and get some experience and confidence at mothering -- before I resumed work. And when I did, I was able to work three days from home, two at the office, which afforded me the chance, once the kids hit the nine-month-mark, to use lunch hour a couple of times a week to take them to music and gym classes, accompanied by a nanny who proved an invaluable help (though of course an added expense).
I had some guilt then about not being around for every diaper change, every bottle, every nap, every minute of the day when some developmental milestone might occur. But babies are extremely high-maintenance, and I gotta admit, I was also relieved at times not to be on duty at home all the time. About a year later, I shifted to working at home nearly all the time, save for a meeting every week or two back at the office. I missed my colleagues and the social interaction, but it sure made it easier to see more of the kids: I bid them goodbye when the nanny took them to the park, greeted them with hugs and kisses on their return, helped put them down for nap, visited them briefly during afternoon snack, and kept up the lunch-hour toddler classes a couple of times a week. Best of all, I had no commute and was right there when the work day ended. I was far luckier than most working moms because I did, in fact, see my kids part of the day.
I still felt guilty, but if work was slow, I was as likely to take a much-needed nap as to spend it with the kids. Slowly, though, my guilt began to grow. And now that the kids are in a full-day preschool, my guilt is great.
Knowing I have to work to help pay the bills doesn't really help. It only contributes to the feeling that I'm in a bind, a bind of my own (and my husband's) making: we chose to live here and do the kind of work we do, and make our lives far from extended family, where we have to pay for all the help we get.
Thankfully, the kids love preschool, and though parting is still tough in the morning -- separation and transitions are difficult for most preschoolers, my kids included -- they have a great time most days. When I show up, they are thrilled to see me, but I often have to coax them from the school, which is filled with stimulating toys and craft projects, boasts an elaborate outdoor play yard with a huge sandbox, a play structure, water tables, and all manner of outdoor toys and activities. Teachers are warm and don't hesitate to administer hugs. The kids' vocabulary has expanded exponentially, and their social skills, while in constant need of refining, are getting a lot of practice.
Still, there is guilt. Lots of kids get picked up earlier in the day than mine, and go to play dates at the park or other classmates' homes. Sometimes they just go home and enjoy being in their own space. My kids don't get nearly as much time at home as some of their counterparts, who leave at noon or three. And on some days, it takes a toll on all of us. If they're slow leaving school due to potty breaks, changing out of wet clothes, or an inclination to dawdle, we get caught in traffic and limp home by six, when I've got maybe half an hour to get some dinner on the table if we're to have baths or showers and all our bedtime rituals. And the kids are hyper from the ride and the carb-laden snacks I've had to give them in the car to keep them occupied. Plus they've had to hold it together emotionally to be without mommy or daddy for many hours, and they've been out of the cozy comfort zone of their own space.
Some evenings, they act out a lot; or they're cranky, whiny and tired. Probably the same is true of their peers who get home earlier, but I can't say as I don't see those kids. All I know is, the rare day when work is slow or I've managed to work ahead, I can pick them up a bit early, and they seem calmer, more rested, better behaved. They give me a little time to breathe when we get home, and I can spend some time with them before I turn into short-order cook, and start barking at them to eat, wash, change into PJs, etc.
Though I value my work, I miss being with the kids. They're only going to be this small once, and as a late blooming mom in her fourth decade, I ain't likely to have more babies.
Naturally, I overcompensate: I know I give them too many treats, trinkets, trips to restaurants, etc. I make sure there are plenty of hugs and kisses when I'm with them, and I devote nearly every minute of every weekend to them save when I'm asleep. Every couple of weeks or so, I'm lucky enough to have a babysitter for the night. But the latter circumstance brings on more guilt. Okay, not so much that I don't leave the house. Mommy and daddy need date night or mommy and daddy will be as impossible as a couple of whining toddlers. But the guilt is there, nonetheless -- especially if we've left one of the kids crying because they don't want mommy and daddy to go.
I don't know what the solution is, aside from a wholesale revision of our lives. And I don't have quite enough guilt to try to puzzle out how, exactly, we could make that happen, and make do somewhere else, with far less. My job isn't part-time, and we couldn't make do on a part-time income.
So I soldier on, a working mom, hoping the example I'm setting, as a woman who earns her keep via her expertise, will be a good one for my daughter, and will make my son realize that when he gets married, some day, his wife is entitled to a working life too.
My own mom was stay-at-home for many years, then went back to work, but always had a series of jobs, not a career. This bothered her. She was capable of much more than she was able to accomplish in the working world. I don't think she regretted the years she spent at home. But at the same time, she felt she missed out. It's some consolation that I won't have that regret.
But the guilt is there every day. Oh, to be like daddy, who blithely goes off to work without giving it a second thought. Thanks, society, for making expectations so different for men and women, even in this day and age. Or should I ascribe it to nature? The daddy gene is, surely, a bit different than the mommy gene.
All I know is, I hope I'm not doing motherhood half-assed. I console myself, like many a working late blooming mom, with the thought that I'm doing the best I can, given the circumstances. I suspect, even if I was staying at home, I'd find some other aspect of my mothering to make me feel guilty.
Hey, we gotta give them SOMETHING to go to therapy about in twenty years, don't we?
Back in January, I wrote about how Thing 1 and Thing 2 were in heated competition (though they didn't know it) for the title of THE PAYBACK KID -- the kid destined to pay back Late Blooming Mom for all the trouble I put my own mom through. After trading the title back and forth over their first three years, it seemed pretty clear there was a decisive winner: Thing 2, my daughter.
But in a mere three months, she has lost the title back to her brother. And oh, how he is earning it.
It all started when we resumed preschool after a week of spring break, and he decided school is not for him. Every morning, as soon as I entered the kids' room, my son would begin his whine: "I don't wanta go ta school." He'd proceed to repeat this whine all through my attempts to distract him (strategy number one) or ignore him (strategy two), and get him to breakfast, whereupon he'd start a new one: "I don't want orange juice." Or waffles. Or bananas. Or whatever was placed in front of him. Employing strategy number one, I tried to read him books from a selection he'd carted to the dining room table. Then the whine became, "I don't wanta read CURIOUS GEORGE," or "I don't wanta read MAISY MAKES LEMONADE," depending on whatever book I'd started to read. And so on and so forth it went through attempts to get him dressed for school and out the door and into daddy's car for drop-off.
Sometimes Thing 1 behaved like an angel during all this, being wholly cooperative and even attempting to get her brother to feel better by offering him toys or books or snacks for the car, or whatever she might have that he inevitably insisted he wanted. But other times, she fed off him and began whining too -- though not nearly with the persistence, repetition, and grating tone he seemed to have perfected.
My husband and I began to dread the mornings ... and we did so even though we have help in the mornings: our own part-time supernanny shows up at 7:30 and helps us get the kids fed, dressed, and out the door with lunches packed. Her preferred strategy was to ignore, and sometimes it worked, provided Late Blooming mom or dad left the room, instantly diminishing the reward of negative attention my son seemed to crave. But other times, there was no consoling him, especially if he hadn't gotten enough sleep the night before -- a distinct possibility on many mornings lately, since we've recently removed one side of his crib (see my previous post, The Rails Are Off).
Bottom line, in the morning, Thing 1 had become a pill.
He was still exhibiting these behaviors last week, though this morning he seems a bit better, having responded so far to my attempts at distraction and kissing/tickling him in giggle-inducing places. I am cautiously optimistic. But also prepared to have my hopes mercilessly crushed before morning drop-off. We'll see how it goes.
What's clear is that he's going through the same icky, willful, assertive developmental phase his sister went through several months back. Apparently it's typical of boys to be a bit slower on the developmental curve than girls, so this is understandable. Understandable, but no damn fun for anyone.
It's not really about school either, as he whines on the weekends ... and when I go to pick him up at school, he doesn't want to leave.
It's just about where he's at: seeing how far he can push mommy and daddy. Testing limits. And getting himself a reputation, to the point where even his sister, on the ride home from school the other day, turned to her brother and said, "Stop being difficult!"
Once again, my late mother is somewhere laughing her head off.
Payback isn't, in this case, a bitch. It's a male twin.
Post-drop-off uptdate: It must be noted that dad called from the road after dropping them both off and related the following: "I had THE SOUND OF MUSIC on in the car. He was singing along to EDELWEISS, every third word or so, in that sweet little castrati voice of his. It was adorable." And there was that moment, before he got into the elevator this morning, when he leaned against my leg and spontaneously said, "I love you, mommy."
That's my kinda payback.
It was around this time last year that I exhaled a sigh of relief so great it was probably heard by every toddler mom in the greater West Los Angeles area. Thing 1 and Thing 2 had been admitted to a preschool for the following fall.
It wasn't just any preschool, but one that came with qualities I'd found elusive in most. It took kids for up to a full day, up to five days a week, during the hours that a working parent might logically be expected to be on the job. It was accredited, not just by the state, but by the NAEYC, a respected national organization whose stamp of approval is considered the gold standard by such sources as Parents Magazine. It was developmental -- meaning the learning was supposed to be play-based, rather than accomplished by putting kids way too young for academics through sit-down desk learning. It was safe, clean, and staffed by caring people, many of whom had or were pursuing degrees in early childhood education.
The cost: a little more than what my college tuition was twenty years ago.
Why don't you take a moment to pause and revel in the sticker shock. I know I did.
Insane tuition is but one of the screwed up things about preschool. Another is that women here in Los Angeles have been known to show up on preschool tours when they're pregnant.
Getting your kids into a preschool you'll feel good about -- by which I mean a place they will be safe, happy, stimulated, and able to get socialized before kindergarten, rather than a full-of-itself preschool that boasts its "graduates" will one day go on to Ivy League schools -- doesn't sound like it should be crazy-making.
But it is. I pride myself on being a rational, down-to-earth, Late Blooming Mom who has the maturity and good sense to know that getting my kids into preschool isn't about getting my kids into "the right" college. But I still wound up researching dozens of schools, taking tours of twelve, applying to eight. I know it sounds excessive. But as a twin mom, I knew I was playing a cruel numbers game: I needed two slots at the same place. I often found myself wondering, though, if by applying to so many, I was part of the very problem that was pissing me off.
Here in L.A., as in many parts of the country, there are far more parents trying to find slots for their toddlers in preschool than there seem to be slots for them. (For more on how our society shamelessly fails to support working moms with good, affordable childcare, check out Judith Warner's "Perfect Madness;" you'll find a link below right among the scrolling featured books on this blog). Now I know preschool isn't considered absolutely necessary. When I was a toddler, I went to something quaint called "nursery school" a few mornings a week until I started kindergarten. It wasn't much more than a safe place mom could drop me off to play so she could get a break. But I'm a working mom, and I need a much longer break than my mom did -- an eight-hour work-day, plus. And there's plenty of research (which I won't repeat here) that proves kids who attend preschool are better prepared socially as well as educationally for kindergarten. So for these and other obvious reasons, I think it's a good thing, and for my kids, a necessity.
Maybe that's why, a year after being put through the ringer of the preschool admission process, I'm still steamed about the lack of good options, the competition for those that are good, and the do-it-yourself, wildly time consuming process of finding one that'll suit.
Word of mouth is key, but not always reliable: just because a friend of a friend's kid goes somewhere someone likes, doesn't make it right for yours. The web is vital but also inaccurate and outdated. I found myself reluctantly buying a book with the unfortunate title COPING WITH PRESCHOOL PANIC, because there was no easily accessible, comprehensive directory of preschools in my area. (The book's a decent starting point for those who live in Los Angeles, but not at all comprehensive; my kids wound up at a school that wasn't listed in it).
Even when you narrow down the list of the schools you want to check out in person, you find the tour schedules are staggered, and so are the dates by which they'll tell you if your kid is admitted, so good luck trying to save a place at one school when you haven't heard from the others. Directors of some preschools laughed at me when I called inquiring about admission more than a year and a half before I'd want my kids to attend; they were already full and so were their waiting lists. Other directors laughed because I was calling so early. To combat Westside L.A. wackiness, they'd instituted a no-tours-until-a-year-before-you-want-your-kid-to-start policy (bless them for that). Then there were schools where the directors insisted my kids would have to be potty-trained before they started, even though most parenting books say kids have to do that on their own schedules, and forcing the issue creates medical and psychological problems. Those schools were the first I took off my list.
I can't tell you how many late nights I spent on the web, how many hours of work I had to make up because I was out during the work day visiting prospective schools, how many phone calls I made or emails I sent to school directors and other moms. But I can tell you this: it was a good thing I bothered to apply to eight schools. In the end, my kids were admitted to two.
There seems to be no rhyme or reason why they were rejected from the others: only one of the schools actually required us to bring the kids in for a face-to-face meeting. On the tours, some school directors mentioned the importance of fund-raising and how much families might be expected to donate over and above tuition, and I often got the feeling, when I mentioned that I had twins, that some of those directors wrote me off right then. After all, admitting my kids meant one less family in the pool of prospective donors. All these places collected application fees ranging from twenty-five to seventy-five dollars, and one school even required us to attend and pay for a four-week toddler program at their center before we could even apply. In the end, when the kids didn't get in to most places (including the one where we attended the toddler program), the reason we were officially given was always the same: they just didn't have enough space.
My kids didn't wind up attending that first preschool to which they were admitted, mostly because another one proved cozier, friendlier, and offered more of a community. But another reason was that this latter school didn't have a cumbersome admission process. The school invited us to take a tour about ten months before we wanted our kids to start, and then asked for a hefty deposit to reserve each spot. If we wanted our kids to go there and were willing to commit soon after taking the tour, they were in -- no waiting lists, no nerve-wracking wait for a call or an envelope to arrive in the mail. The school didn't mess around, which took a lot of the crazy-making out of the process.
Five months after starting, my kids are clearly thriving in preschool (aside from the colds they can't seem to avoid bringing home -- see my January 1/08 post, Welcome To Cold-Of-The-Month Club) . Every day, when I pack them up to go, and again when I pick them up at day's end, I breathe another sigh of relief. It all worked out. But making it happen pretty much sucked. It shouldn't have.
I don't know who is more to blame for preschool insanity: anxious parents, obnoxious, stuck up school directors, or the lack of political will to make good, affordable preschool universally available. But I know if we fix that last problem, the others will go away.
Here's hoping.
Who knew that by starting Thing 1 and Thing 2 (son and daughter, respectively) in preschool last fall, we'd be automatically enrolled in this heinous club? Since beginning school, Thing 1 hasn't met a germ he hasn't liked ... and I mean liked enough to bring home to mom.
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