Category Archives: Those Conversations

The gems. The reason you’re hear. The pearls that come out of the mouths of children. The moments that have us rolling on the floor with laughter… and forgiving the little dudes for everything.

’tis the day before Christmas…

NBTB-Christmas Eve 2014 Post

‘twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house…

Ender: Moooom! Can we go to Babi’s yet? Is it Christmas yet? Do I have to brush my hair? Can I just wear a hat? Can we go…

All the creatures were stirring, and making a fuss

Sean: Jaaaane? Did we buy a present for my mom? And my sister? And her new-in-laws? And do we have any wrapping paper or scotch tape or…

The stockings were precariously attached to the tack board with push pins…

Flora: Moooom! I just realized I never made a card for Moxie, and I’m out of good green markers, and green is her favourite colour, and we need to go to the store and get me new markers RIGHT! NOW!

In the vain hope that this year, Santa would remember to put something there…*

Cinder: Mooom! Cookies! We never made those special cookies I wanted to make. Remember? Florentines? You said we could. And you said it was easy. Do we have time? Do we have the ingredients?

The children were running around like chickens with their heads cut off…**

While visions of presents-food-cookies-Christmas-is-tomorrow-we-can’t-wait! danced in their heads

Ender: Can this day just end, so we can have Christmas? Can you put me to bed now? I’m tired. It’s dark.

Flora: That’s because it’s still morning, doofus!

Jane: Do not call your brother names!

I’m trying to settle my brain for the season, but there is so much clamour, without much good reason…

Sean: Jane? Tape?

Cinder: Mom? Cookies?

Flora: Please? Can you take me to the store?

Ender: I. Want. To. Go. To. Bed!

Cinder: She’s not here.

Flora: Where did she go?

Sean: Jaaaaaaane?

Ender: Mooooom!

Flora: Oh, no her laptop’s gone too. Do you think she’ll come back?

I’m in the bathroom, the bathtub, with lights off and curtain drawn

Typing so very quietly, pretending I’m not home…

But I always come back. I’ll leave this dark space. Put on pretty clothes, maybe make up my face (probably not)

Brush Wolf Child’s hair. Braid the girl’s too. Argue with Cinder that ‘tis an occasion for a shirt without skulls and blood on it (or maybe not)

Give Sean the tape. Say,

Jane: Um, no, I didn’t get anyone presents this year, you know how I feel about that, and this year, yeah, I just decided to really walk the talk…

…just to get his heart pounding…

Ha. That will be FUN. Ok, no, just terribly, terribly mean.

Jane: In the office! Under the “to-be-shredded” boxes!***

My mom sent me this meme for Christmas:

Unicorn for Christmas

I hope all of you get a unicorn for Christmas. I want mine to be green, with silver hoofs. And filled with dark chocolate (Chili or ginger).

It’s almost over. We almost made it!

Merry Whatmacallit. See you in 2015.

Xoxo

“Jane”

*That’s not, by the way, an expression of my grinchiness. The stockings are just not part of my cultural tradition. And I never think to get anything to put in there. Ugh. What a make work project.

**Sorry.

***For Christmas, Sean needs a shredding service. OK, Santa? Thanks. J.

An Ode to My Messy House

I.

I love you.

But oh, you infuriate me. How do you get so filthy?

(It’s your fault, you don’t clean me.)

Why are you blaming me? You lousy ingrate, what have you done for me lately?

(More than you’ve done for me, slovenly slattern.)

And it just goes downhill from here. There’s a slam. And a bang. I threaten to leave it, walk out, FOREVER. It says fine, but it gets to keep the children. Oh yeah? I holler.

(Oh, yeah, you foul slob, where do you think they’re going to want to live?)

I weep.

II.

Flora: What the heck’s going on?

Jane: I’m fighting with the house! Leave us alone.

Cinder: She’s lost it.

Flora: Totally.

Ender: Does anyone want to build a fort in the living room?

III.

I think I would clean you more if… oh, I don’t know. If you just didn’t get dirty again. Immediately! If you could give me a day’s… hour’s respite. You know? Would it kill you? To stay clean, tidy, organized for more than 30 seconds?

(I am not the one who messes myself up, you know.)

I know.

Sob.

(Beloved. Do I not take good care of you?)

No! You’re drafty and squeaky! Too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter. You’re dusty and stinky and…

(Beloved. I wrap myself around you the best I can. Don’t I? Am I not your sanctuary? The place you run to when you need a rest from the rest of the world? Do you not write me the most delicious love letters when you are in that mood?)

Sob. Yes. But you are such a mess. And you need so much work. And I don’t want to do any of it. It’s thankless and never-ending. And you never say thank you.

(Beloved…)

Screw off. Do you ever thank me? Never! And then, when I do all the things… you just get filthy again! Look at that wall! That floor! And is that spaghetti sauce on the ceiling?

I don’t even remember the last time I made spaghetti…

(I just want to be clean. And beautiful. And welcoming. For you. You know? Don’t you love me more when I’m all, you know, all beautiful, all dressed up?)

Sigh.

Do I?

I don’t know. Maybe. Sure. But it doesn’t last. Ever. And so… I really don’t give a fuck. No. When you’re all prettied up and sterilized and scrubbed? You’re just this reminder, slap-in-the-face of what I’ve just done with my time that will immediately be undone.

(Bitch.)

Ingrate.

(Ingrate for what? You do nothing for me!)

I do everything! And it’s never enough!

IV.

Flora: Do you think we should call someone?

Cinder: We shouldn’t. They might take her away. You know. To the loony bin.

Ender: Let’s go hide in my fort.

V.

(Beloved.)

Go away.

(Just the bathroom and the kitchen floor. Ok? Please? Just… just the toilet and the mirror. Please?)

 I pour Listerine into the toilet. Because, no cleaner. I feel the house roll its eyes and I bristle.

(Beloved.)

Fuck off!

(Thank you.)

What?

(Thank you.)

Really? Did you just…

(Thank you. Now… scrub the tub. And fill it. And put in bubbles. And my pipes and furnace will sing to you while you relax. Yes? Take all the time you want. Unwind… Yeees. Like this… And then… you can wash the kitchen floor.)

VI.

Flora: Hey, Mom… are you writing? I thought you said you were going to clean the kitchen floor?

Jane: Um, well, I was. But I decided to write about how I didn’t want to do it instead.

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-Hey Mom Kitchen Floor

PS The kitchen floor’s still filthy. What, you think I’m that easy to play? This house has no idea who it’s dealing with.

From one Christmas Grinch to another, or, how I ruined Christmas

Hi. How are you? Feeling down-and-out, like the worst mother ever? Come in. I’m going to show you what it looks like when I lose my temper. Oh yeah, also, I ruin Christmas. It’s my Christmas present to you. Thought you suck? I’ll raise you your suck, and see you one…

So it’s that time of year, and I’m ordering crap on line. Toys my kids don’t need, won’t play with, but think they want. And they keeping on coming into the kitchen while I’m doing this, interrupting, peeking, sneaking, fighting, shouting, screeching, fighting, spying, trying, until…

Jane: Get! The! Hell! Out! Of! The! Kitchen! NOOOOOOOOOOW!

What you need to know: when I yell? It’s like I’m channeling Cthulhu. Kronos. The Evil One himself. It’s not shouting or nagging. It’s a “I can kill with my voice and right now I really want to” kind of sound.

Reaction from the children, who know they’re loved and who know not even Cthulhu can harm them:

Collected children: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Effect on overwrought, broke-and-hates-Christmas-at-the-best-of-times mother:

Jane: Do you understand, goddammit, that I am doing all this FOR YOU? I. HATE. CHRISTMAS. If we were doing Christmas my way—there would be no goddam tree in the house. THERE WOULD BE NO PRESENTS! There would be no Christmas Eve dinner, and there would be no Christmas Day morning and not a single bit of wrapping paper, mistletoe or fake snow stuff in the house. THERE. WOULD. BE. NOTHING. We would be… god, in Fidel’s Cuba or Maoist China, where “For Sale” and “Buy Now” are outlawed, and you can get shot for humming Jingle Bells! I find the crass commercialism of this season morally repugnant and spiritually bankrupt, and participating in it, at all, MAKES ME SICK. So everything I do—this stupid tree? These decorations? Getting you presents, because that’s the way I’m supposed to show you I love you this season? I do all this for you, and I hate it, and the least you can do is not keep on interrupting me while I’m doing it! DO. YOU. UNDERSTAND??

Effect on the children, who know they’re loved, and know that not even the Mother of All Grinches can ruin Christmas:

Cinder: Did you not sleep well last night again?

Flora: Did your writing not go well this morning?

Ender: Thank God we have grandparents.

Wah.

I don’t think my shoes are too tight. And I don’t think my heart is two sizes too small.

He puzzles and puzzled til his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before. Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store! Maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more!

What?

I try to find that every December. Fail. Because celebrating the return of the light—literal or metaphorical, depending on your (ir)religious predilection—disappears under the weight of millions of department store Santa Clauses.

Bah, humbug.

The Grinch

 

Gabor Mate on the power of negative thinking + Flora & Jane on consequences

I’m re-reading Gabor Maté’s When The Body Says No: The Hidden Cost of Stress. I’m not, I stress, stressed. OK, maybe just a little. But I embrace my stress. OK, not all of it. Anyway. Point. Gabor Maté. Genius. Book. Brilliant. Here’s why:

“As an antidote to terminal optimism, I have recommended the power of negative thinking. ‘Tongue in cheek, of course,’ I quickly add. ‘What I really believe in is the power of thinking.’ As soon as we qualify the world thinking with the adjective positive we exclude those parts of reality that strike us as ‘negative.’ … This is how most people who espouse positive thinking seem to operate. Genuine positive thinking begins by including all our reality. It is guided by the confidence that we can trust ourselves to face the full truth whatever the full truth may turn out to be.

…

Compulsive optimism is one of the ways we bind our anxiety to avoid confronting it. That form of positive thinking is the coping mechanism of the hurt child. The adult who remains hurt without being aware of it makes this residual defence of the child into a life principle.

…

In order to heal, it is essential to gather the strength to think negatively. Negative thinking is not a doleful, pessimistic view that masquerades as “realism.” Rather, it is a willingness to consider what is not working. What is not in balance? What have I ignored? What is my body saying no to?”

 Gabor Maté, When The Body Says No: The Hidden Cost of Stress

 My body is currently saying no to cleaning house and sacrificing sleep to meet a deadline. And yes to taking a nap. Also, chocolate.

Flora: What are doing?

Jane: Justifying with science why I’m going to spend the entire day on the couch re-reading Jane Austen and eating chocolate.

Flora: Cool. Can I spend the entire day on the computer watching You-tube and eating potato chips?

Sigh. Nothing without consequences, eh?

Jane: OK. But tomorrow: we do all the things.

Flora: All the things?

Jane: Well. Maybe some of the things.

xoxo

“Jane”

P.S. Don’t envy me. I have a five-year-old. How long do you think I got to sit on the couch?

P.P.S. More Gabor Maté:

“Dialing it in a litte this week, Jane?”

“Yup. Cause. Wah. I’m not stressed. Really. Not. Stressed. At. All. Just a little… overwhelmed.”

Episode 356, in which everyone swears, metaphors are tortured, and a bad story gets filed

subtitled, why my children swear… and why I’m not going to stop…

I.

Ender: Mom? You know what the difference between you and me is? You swear at people. I just swear for fun.

Go ahead. No, please, go ahead, indulge the judge within. There are so many things WRONG with that statement, I don’t even know where to start.

It’s only partially true.

I don’t really swear AT people. More at the THINGS they do.

More often yet: at my self. My brain. The things it refuses to do when I really need it to perform…

Still. I hereby resolve to swear less. In front of the sponge-like four-year-old, anyway.

II.

I have this deeply insightful point to make and I’m just trying to find the right way to lead up to it, and then…

Flora: Mom? Do we have any of that delicious bean mush left?

Jane: What? That? Yeah?

Flora: Can I have that for breakfast?

Yes, of course, but I have to help her heat it up—because it’s been left overnight in the pan and so requires some, um, resuscitation shall we say—and then, ok, a tortilla or two to go with it, and then by the time I come back to the laptop, I can’t remember where I was going, what I was thinking…

Yeah, gone. Forever. Here. Read this instead:

III.

Jane: Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, why is this piece so fucking bad? It’s easy. It’s simple. A goddamn chimpanzee at a typewriter could write it, so why… Jeezus—Keerist, why. Am. I. So. Fucking. Brain. Dead. Today? … hey, Cinder? I’m going to walk over to Vendome to get a coffee with whipped cream in it and clear my head, wanna come with?

Cinder: That depends. Are you going to talk to yourself and make weird hand gestures and roll your eyes and stop suddenly and shout, “YES!” or “Fuck, no, that won’t work,” because you’re stuck on that story?

Jane: Um… maybe…

Cinder: Then no. But can you bring back some of that good focaccia bread? And don’t eat it all on the way home!

OK, this stopping swearing in front of my children thing probably isn’t going to happen.

And also: seriously, a goddamn chimpanzee with a typewriter could have written it better than I had in that first draft form. Your writing tip for the day, boys and girls: an amateur despairs and gives up. A professional despairs, goes for a walk, downs a triple mocha, and redrafts.

IV.

The thing is, though, I’m feeling kind of lonely and really do want company.

Jane: Flora? Wanna go to Vendome with me?

Flora: Are you going to talk to me as we walk, or ignore me and just mumble to yourself and do that creepy thing with your eyes?

Jane: Um. I don’t know. Maybe?

Flora: Can I make a video of you and put it on Youtube?

Jane: No!

Flora: Can I make a video of you and show it to all my friends?

Jane: Why do you hate me?

Flora: We don’t hate you, Mom. We just like to mock you.

Awesome. I go for my walk alone.

IV.

I redraft. It still sucks. Woe is I. Or rather, woe is my editor, who will have to fix it.

Point: “Filed.” I’ve told you before, have I not? An amateur thinks it has to be good. A professional knows it just has to be done.

V.

This is the moment where I try to adapt the good/done, amateur/professional metaphor to parenting. It’s rather torturous, but it goes like this. The amateur/theoretical parent—i.e., your childless friend who is so full of theory and advice and knows exactly how he will raise his kids or even any first-time, first-year mom at that stage of the journey (do you remember that stage? I find it’s fading for me, too fast, thank goodness I write so I have proof of how insufferably arrogant and “right” I was)—thinks it has to be perfect. That it can be perfect. The professional parent—that is, anyone who’s done it in the real world for more than a year—knows it just has to… be. It just… is.

It gets done, every day.

Right?

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-Everyone Swears

An unhappy childhood

I.

I know you all worry about fucking up your children. You wouldn’t be a thinking parent if you didn’t. I’ve got great news for you. We* had a meeting the other day, and we decided that:

1. All of our kids will need therapy anyway.

2. “Successful” parenting means they’ll need therapy for different things than WE need therapy for.

Right? We can’t get everything right, of course not. How can we? So long as we avoid/minimize doing what we know is wrong—what we know first hand is wrong… we’re doing ok.

So chill. But also, add a “saving for Joey’s therapy” line to the family budget…

II.

Proof that, on the whole, we get it right:

Flora: Mom? What does that say?

Jane: It’s an excerpt from an Ernest Hemingway book. Someone asks, “What is the best early training for a writer?” And the answer is, “An unhappy childhood.”

Flora: Well, I’m screwed then. Good thing I’d rather be an artist or a veterinarian, anyway.

Neurotic parenting for the win!

III.

Sean: What are you doing?

Jane: Wallowing in existential angst.

Sean: Again?

Jane: I put it in calendar as a regular thing. Every Monday, 8:30-8:45. Then I drink coffee. Then I function.

Flora: Dad? Is Mom crazy?

Sean: Yes. But she’s ours, and we take care of her. Now, go let the dog out while I grind her coffee beans.

Flora: You’d better give her some chocolate too.

Ender: On it!

I love them buttsacks of mine.

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-Unhappy childhood

PS Looking for me? Find me here.

 * “We” = select members of a select club I belong to called Elitist Bitches Who Don’t Like to Make New Friends, thinking mothers with issues all. No, you can’t join, but you could secretly start your own chapter. Except now that I’ve told you about it, the other bitches will probably blacklist me. Ooops. My bad…

xo

PS2 “This is a very short post, and sort of short on insight, Jane. What’s up?”

“What? Nothing. Why? What have you heard? Not true. Ssssh. I’ll be long-winded next week. Maybe. Deadlines…”

I want to know. Everything. Anything. How about you?

I.

I’m north and west of the middle of nowhere, and there’s a fire burning, and I’m drinking gin and being baited by a Wise Wild Man of the Woods.

Wise Wild Man of the Woods: Humans screw everything up by wanting to know. You know? Taking the mystery out of everything. Why is the sky blue? It just is. Can’t we just accept that, enjoy it?

It’s tempting, isn’t it? So is religion. Certainty. Any dogma offers comfort… But, see…

Jane: No. No, we can’t. Because asking, questioning, wondering, learning—that’s the most human part of us. That’s the sapiens in Homo sapiens. Once we stop asking… we become these horrible, static, smug, dogmatic, unbearable creatures. Do you know any people who’ve “figured it all out” whom you actually like? I bet you don’t… The thing is, though, every answer we find should lead to another question. Right? That’s the process; that’s the journey.

Wise, eh? There was something in the air.

And in the company.

II.

But what this story is really about is this:

Flora: What does IRL stand for?

Jane: In-Real-Life. As in IRL friend—in-real-life friend—versus Facebook friend.

Sean: How did you know that?

Ender: Because Mommy knows everything!

Ha. If only… Mommy knows nothing.

III.

That’s not true, of course. Mommy knows some stuff. And, because she’s older than he is, she knows more than the four-year-old who is finding out and learning everything for the first time. But in the most basic way, the four-year-old knows he knows more than I do. I’m not talking about innate, natural wisdom here… I’m talking about certainty. When he knows something, he knows it. No ifs-buts-maybes. His life is all about certainty and black and white; there are no fuzzy edges. Bananas are delicious and hot sauce is yuck. Cars have four wheels. Boats float, planes fly. Dogs bark because they’re dogs. Mommy knows everything, Daddy can fix everything, Dziadzia’s the strongest man in the world. Exceptions are irrelevant; grey areas do not exist.

It’s an enviable place to be in. Do you remember it? Just knowing things, and being sure something is true, just because?

My nine-year-old is in the midst of losing that certainty and she’s fighting it tooth and nail. She wants to know. She wants absolutes. I thwart this desire of hers, inadvertently, in every conversation.

“Mom? It’s important to always tell the truth?”

“Well… what do you mean by truth?” her mother responds, because she knows that the question stems from someone at the playground saying something nasty and cruel and defending that statement as “true.”

“Mom? Cars are bad for the environment and everyone should drive less, right?”

“Right. But you’re asking me this question in a car, as we’re driving to a store to get groceries…. Which arrived at that store in trucks and cars and maybe planes… So it’s a much bigger, much more complicated…”

“Mom! Can’t you ever just say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’?”

Apparently not…

She wants to think I know everything. And that she knows—or can know —everything. And she’s so angry when she sees I don’t… she doesn’t… she can’t…

IV.

My 12-year-old is on the cusp of that life stage when he will question everything. I am so very excited. Do you remember your teen years? This is what happens: you lose faith. Utterly. In everything. Your parents become fallible, so fallible. They know nothing. They’ve fucked everything up—their lives, the world, you. They understand nothing. Society sucks. Everything’s wrong with it, nothing works. And so, you question, search, rebel. Reinvent the wheel: lust to change the world.

If it weren’t for this click in our brains, this period of chaos… nothing would ever change, there would be no progress.

We would not be sapiens.

V.

As they move from 13 to 17+, teenagers become dogmatic, peer-oriented, convention-bound because a state of chaos-not-knowing-always-questioning is exhausting, and certainty—of something, anything—is seductive. Soothing.

I get it. The idea of embracing uncertainty as a constant, not-knowing as THE thing… terrifying.

But I do like this concept: every answer leads to a new question.

Even though constant questioning is exhausting…

VI.

Flora frowns. “I don’t know,” she says. “When I say ‘I don’t know,” when I feel, ‘I don’t know,’ that’s pretty much the worst feeling ever.”

Yeah…

VII.

You, you’ve embraced this pain, fear of not knowing. We’re walking down the street and down Memory Lane, talking about who we were 15 years ago, 20 years ago, and you say, “I still don’t know. I think I’m still as lost. I’ve just made some choices, walked some paths. But do I know where I’m going? Or why? I don’t know. But I think the difference is I’m ok with not knowing.”

You are wiser, further on the path than I am. I’m not ok with not knowing. But I’m working on it.

VII.

No, I’m not ok with it, not at all. It totally sucks. I really want to know SOMETHING with utter certainty. ANYTHING.

I sit down on the floor with the four-year-old. Cars have four wheels, and boats have none. Rocks fall when you throw them. Feathers float on the air for a bit, because they are lighter than rocks. Dogs bark because they are dogs.

“I love you so much.”

“I love you more.”

“Impossible. I love you more.”

Of this, I am certain.

photo (14)

xoxo

“Jane”

Summer rerun3: Ender says rock

Polonius: What do you read, my Lord?

Hamlet: Words, words, words.

That would be a pretentious warning that the following rerun contains words that may offend. Well, just one. But repeated a lot. Because. This is a story of Ender learning to say… ROCK.

Yes, rock can be a dirty word. Read on.

(Originally published on November 22, 2011, when Ender was two’ish.)

NBTB-Ender Says Rock

Ender learned a new word today. His fourth or fifth I suppose. I’m so proud. I only wish his pronunciation was a mite better…

We’re at the Glenbow Museum, yyc’s answer to whatever THE museum in your town is. It has armour, paintings. Teepees. Rocks. That’s the trouble…

Cinder and Flora do their crafts in the Discovery Room, and then decide that they want to show Ender the rocks and minerals collection. We go up. They all pet the geode. (There’s a pet geode you can pet there. For real. You should come visit.) And Cinder says,

“See, Ender? You know what that is? A rock. That’s a rock.”

And Ender, adulation in his eyes, looks at his big brother and says…

“Fuck?”

Flora’s eyes get big as saucers. Cinder howls and howls. “Yes, Ender, that’s a fuck. A great big fuck.” Sideways glance at me. “What? He said it first.”

Jane: “Doesn’t mean you have to say it.”

Cinder: “You say it’s ok for us to swear when it’s appropriate.”

Jane: “I’d say right now is not appropriate.”

Cinder: “Fine. Ender? Come with Bubba. Look here. What’s this?”

Ender: “Fuck!”

Cinder: “And this?”

Ender: “Fuck!”

Cinder: “How about these over here?”

Ender: “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

I may never be able to return to the Glenbow again.

2014: I’ve been back. I have no shame.

xoxo

“Jane”

PS Looking for me? Awesome. Click here.

Why the rerun: Nothing By The Book is taking a page from old school un-social media and doing a re-run summer, while I spend the hot days getting a tan, running through sprinkles, selling one book, writing another, reading two dozen more, neglecting my garden, falling in love, jumping off cliffs—you know. Everything but blogging. But, you get reruns of my favourite stuff, so everyone wins. Likely keeping up with Instagram—NothingByTheBook—connect there, if you like? Or Twitter—  or/and .”

She loves Sherlock but David Tennant will never love me—and no one is doing the dishes…

I.

Well. That was how many weeks in a row of making-you-cry-and-angst serious? Change of pace. And go:

Flora: Do you know why I love Sherlock so much, Mom?

Jane: Well, he’s a timeless character, a hero-anti-hero figure rolled into one, a dragon slayer, yes, but also a so-bad-boy, on-the-side-of-right and yet essentially amoral, brilliant-yet-obtuse—he’s really the perfect archetype of…

Flora: It’s because he looks just like Daddy and talks just like you.

Oh. From which you may deduce a) that the father of my children is h-h-h-o-t and b) that I’m a high-functioning sociopath.

II.

Jane: Keerist. Would someone please command, order, TELL ME to go do the dishes? Or better yet, go in the kitchen and do them for me?

Cinder: Meh. Just go read a book. We’ll just eat the chicken from the baking tray.

Flora: With our fingers.

Ender: I! Want! A! Fork!

There’s always a demanding one, isn’t there?

I can wash one fork.

I. Will. Wash. One. Fork.

III.

Flora: And another thing! Don’t you dare blog about this!

Jane: But…

Flora: No!

Jane: But…

Flora: Absolutely, never, ever, NO!

Sorry. You don’t get to find out. But man. It was brilliant.

But she says I can tell you this one:

IV.

Flora: Mom? What do adults talk about?

What a question. What do adults talk about? My friend Marie and I look at each other. Laugh.

Jane: Kids?

Marie: Books?

Jane: Oh, homeschooling.

Marie: Boys.

Jane: Girls.

Flora: You can’t talk about boys and girls! You’re married!

Marie: Well, your dad’s a boy, you know.

Flora: OMG. Do married people get crushes?

Jane: Well…

Marie: Um…

Flora: OMG. You do. Like Daddy has a crush on Felicia Day? And you think David Tennant is hot?

Jane: Well…

Marie: Um…

Flora: Mom? There’s something you need to know.

Jane: What’s that?

Flora: David Tennant will never love you!

Meh. I’ll live.

V.

So, Nothing By The Book is taking a page from old school un-social media and doing a re-run summer, while I spend the hot days (please, weather gods, grant this piece of flood plain some scalding hot days, will you?) getting a tan, running through sprinkles, selling one book, writing another, reading two dozen more, neglecting my garden, falling in love, jumping off cliffs—you know. Everything but blogging. Stay in touch via Instagram—NothingByTheBook—will you? Or Twitter—  or/and . Or, just come back in September.

I will.

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-Rafting in the wading pool.jpg

Post-script:

Jane: And then she says, “David Tennant will never love you!”

Flora: It’s true.

Sean: I don’t know about that. I mean, just look at your mom, and she’s really smart too. And David Tennant’s pretty intelligent and dresses like he’s got great taste. I bet he’d be totally into her. And then, you know how we had to stand in line for hours to get that Matt Smith photo? We’d get to hang out with David Tennant all the time and take pictures of him all the time and then sell them on e-Bay for a fortune and…

Flora: I didn’t think of it like that. OK. What do we have to do to hook them up?

My family. They deserve a high-functioning sociopath.

Post-script 2:

“Sunny days, long weekends, flood anniversary trauma. I’ve missed so much!”

“Oh, let me catch you up, ma’ darling. June posts you might have missed below.”

A “lost” year: on standing still, moving forward, stepping back

Come. Come in. I have something I want to show you. Here, over here: this box. That one. And that pile over there. Remember, I told you about them? My papers, my manuscripts, my letters. The record of my early creative life.

They’re all terribly, terribly bad. I mean—not just a little bad. God-awful. It’s hard to say what’s worse—the novel I wrote when I was 13 and the sheafs of heavy metal music-inspired poetry I churned out when I was 15 are probably absolutely the worst, although the novel I wrote when I was 16, and the one I started when I was 18 are pretty bad too.

There is no reason to save them, to hold on to them. They make me cringe, you know, when I look at them? They are so very, so very terribly, wonderfully bad.

They stink.

photo (1)

Flora: What are you doing, Mom?

Jane: I’m trying to write something that’s simultaneously truthful and not asshat pretentious, and failing miserably.

Flora: Oh. Are you going to be much longer? Because I need you to take me to the craft store to buy me more clay.

Jane: Yeah, ok. In a bit. Hold on. I’m trying to explain why I’ve spent an entire year tripping over boxes of molding, unreadable papers.

They actually do stink. I’m pretty sure they’re actively molding. Maybe, if I procrastinate long enough, the mold will finish what the flood started. Maybe, I’m waiting for a force of nature to take agency away from me again…

Cinder: Mom? What are you doing?

Flora: Ssssh. She’s writing about how she can’t throw out those stinky papers.

Cinder: Isn’t it because she’s lazy?

Jane: Silence, progeny. I’m wallowing in artistic existential angst here.

photo

There must be, I think, a part of me that enjoys the wallowing. That wants to stay here, looking at those boxes, looking at the curling edges, the black splotches, red splotches that used to be ink. There’s clearly a part of me that’s getting off on the drama of the destruction…

There’s also a part of me that’s really pleased that this early work is so fucking bad. You know? Wouldn’t it be terrible—it must be so terrible—to look at what you did 20, 30 years ago and say—that was my best work! Why can’t I write like that any more? What’s happened to me? Definitely not the issue here. Those boxes are not full of my best work.

But, but… they are this titillating record of potential. You know? That poem, the one you tried so hard not to read when separating the wet pages, but you did, and you laughed out loud at its pathos? It’s awful-bad, I know. But there’s that one phrase… you know? That one phrase… I like it still, and looking at it, I see the places it’s gone in the intervening 25 years, and I like that. And while I’m embarrassed by the overall badness of the piece… those four words in a row… they please me.

And I’m reluctant to let them go.

Ender: Moooooooooom! What are you doing? I need you!

Jane: I’m trying to explain why I’ve been stuck, unmoving, unproductive… why I’ve felt tethered, trapped by the past, unable to move into the future, paralyzed by what was, torn between denying it and embracing, obsessed with the idea and yet working really hard at not thinking about it, not dealing with it…

Ender: I’m hungry. And I need you to get my bike out of the shed. And I can’t find my shoes. And also, I think I pooped my pants.

Jane: Right. I should do something about all of those things. Just give me a few more minutes here…

Do I need to let them go? An impossible question. What would I have done, had the flood not rampaged through them? The most likely answer: nothing. They would have stayed in their boxes. Existing. Unexamined. For years, decades, a lifetime.

I don’t like being forced to examine them. Examine myself: who I was, what I thought, how I dreamed.

Flora: Mom? Are you still angsting?

Jane: Yes!

Cinder: Seriously? Do you want me to just go chuck them for you?

Jane: No!

Ender: Somebody! Needs! To! Clean! My! Bum!

I had this not-so-secret plan, after I failed to be able to deal with the remnants of the papers right after the flood (I burned my destroyed letters; I couldn’t touch the manuscripts), that I would mark the anniversary of the loss with a big, cleansing bonfire. I’d invite my writer friends, and we’d be all very solemn and supportive, and then get rip-roaring drunk, and we’d burn my past, and a new stage of uber-creativity would rise from the ashes…

photo 1

I know. Cliché. But, why not?

So here I am, a year later. And there they are, my boxes, my papers, my past. Still unexamined, unsalvaged. Neither discarded nor saved.

In limbo.

Me? I look back at this past year as, in many ways, a lost year. A year in which I both failed to move forward and didn’t have the ability to look back: a year in which I stood still. But maybe I had to. Maybe, for possibly the first time in my life, I just had to stand in place for a while…

Cinder: OMG, Mom, are you still writing about those stinky papers?

Flora: Hey! She’s a writer! That’s what she does! But could you please hurry up? We have things to do! Places to go!

Ender: I’m! Still! Poopy! And! Hungry!

Jane: Almost done. Almost done…

So. I’m not quite sure I’m done standing still. Maybe that’s what it is. Maybe I need to stand still a little longer. Digest-marinate-process all that I was a little longer.

Cinder: Moooom!

But not for too much longer. Not forever. Because I have things to do. Places to go. Stories to write. A life to live.

My terrible-no-good poems and novels—and hey, here’s a short story I wrote in my 20s, and this one actually doesn’t totally suck… it’s not good, but it’s not god-awful either—my papers, I think, will stay in their purgatory for a little longer. Just a little longer. And when I’m ready to get moving again, I will let them go.

But not today.

No bonfire this year.

But, there will be a hell of a party…

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-A lost year

P.S. An invitation: If you’re in Calgary, you should spend some part of your weekend celebrating the one-year anniversary of the flood and Neighbour Day in one of the communities you helped to save. If you worked in Sunnyhill, our big celebration is on Saturday, June 21, from 5 p.m. on; the greater Sunnyside celebration is on Sunday, June 22, 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the site of the Crisis Café.

If you have no idea what I’m blathering on about, YYC Flood 101:

“Where have you been, Jane?” June 27, 2013

“Everything back to normal, Jane?” July 4, 2013

unLessons from the flood: we are amazing  July 9, 2013

Running on empty: why “so are things back to normal?” is not the right question October 29, 2013

A love letter to my flood plain, June 11, 2014

Would Edgar Allan Poe by any other name smell so sweet? (And wear a fez?)

I.

First, this:

Flora: Was Edgar Allan Poe a real person?

Jane: What? Yes, of course.

Flora: And he really wrote The Raven?

Jane: Yes.

Flora: And his real name really was Edgar Allan Poe?

Jane: Yes. Well, he was born Edgar Poe, but then he was sort-of-adopted by a family called Allan, and so he became Edgar Allan Poe…

Flora: That’s just brilliant. He’s so lucky. Because suppose he had been named Edgar Steve Poe? Or Edgar Smith Poe? He’d never have written The Raven then. No way.

Jane: Really?

Flora: Yes. Only someone with a cool name like Edgar Allan Poe could have written The Raven. Edgar Steve Smith Poe would have written… The Pigeon.

With apologies to Steve Smiths… everywhere…

II.

Then this:

Flora: Was Charles Dickens a real person?

Jane: What?

Flora: Was Charles Dickens a real person? A real writer?

Jane: Yes. He wrote… David Copperfield, which is so good. And of course, A Christmas Carol. And The Bleak House, and Nicholas Nickleby, and…

Flora: OK, so Charles Dickens is like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Not like Sherlock Holmes.

Jane: Yes. Sherlock Holmes was not a real person—he was a character created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Flora: It’s important to get these things straight.

Jane: Absolutely.

Gods, I love her.

III.

And finally:

Flora: So Agatha Christie was a real person.

Jane: Yes.

Flora: But The Doctor is not a real person.

Jane: No. I mean, yes, he is not a real person.

Flora: But Matt Smith is a real person. And so is David Tennant.

Jane: Yes.

Flora: Two different real people, playing the same character.

Jane: Yes. Well, actually—what, 12? 13 different people playing the same character over 50 years…

Flora: Why is all of this so confusing?

Because… life. Art. Authors. Characters. Creators. Creations.

Yes, she’s watching The Wasp and The Unicorn, and The Day of the Doctor. Simultaneously. Reading Sherlock Holmes (graphic novel version, adapted by Ian Edginton, and illustrated by I.N.J. Culbard—brilliant). I’m not quite sure from where Charles Dickens makes an appearance. I ask. “Horrible Histories.” Of course.

NBTB-Fez Medley for Edgar Allan Poe post

xoxo

“Jane”

PS  “Well, this is all very nice interesting, but I’m here looking for that interview tips for kids video that’s part of the Sunnyside YYC Flood Scrap Book Project.”

“Are you? Thrilled. That’s this here: Filing, flooding, interviewing—or, ‘Confluence.’ Our kids and the film crew will be at the Hillhurst-Sunnyhill Farmers’ Market today interviewing. If you’re a YYC reader: come tell your story.”

Filing, flooding, interviewing—or, “Confluence”

I.

“Filed!” You’re talking about your taxes; when I scream, “Filed!”—or, to be more accurate, type it as a Facebook status update, I’m talking about stories. Meeting deadlines. It’s a verb that determines timelines in my house: “I file on Thursday, so we can go to Banff on Friday”; “I need to file by Monday morning, so no, we can’t do that on the weekend”; “Mom? Have you filed yet? Because we really need to go grocery shopping?”

I filed this morning. Glory, relief, joy.

II.

Flora: I know my Mom’s a writer, but sometimes it seems like what she really does for work is talk on the telephone.

Cinder: Ha. Sometimes, I think what she does for work is swear at the computer.

Ender: Penis?

Sean: Would you guys get the hell out of the house now, so your Mom can do her interview in peace?

III.

photo (18)

Soon, so very soon, I will have a space-place of my own again. But these days, sometimes, too often, my car is my office.

IV.

So. There was this flood. And we are coming up on its one year anniversary… it’s one month and one week away. It’s going to be a hard, stressful June.

“Have you been by the river today?”

“The Bow is low… the Elbow is really running hard, already.”

“And the snow… there is so much snow in the mountains.”

I walk across a bridge with a friend and see, out of the corner of my eye, a piece of unreclaimed bank, still ravaged. I bend over the railing. Throw up.

I’m supposed to be “reclaiming” my lost living space. Instead, I’m anticipating losing it again.

And that’s all of us right now. So. What do we do? So many things… but the one I want to tell you about is the Sunnyside YYC Flood Scrapbook and Theatre Project,  a collaboration of Trickster Theatre, Sunnyside School, and the Hillhurst-Sunnyside Community Association. Community kids will be working together to capture the shared community experiences from the June 2013 Flood. It’s a massive project: the kids will be working with community volunteers to gather photos and video footage from residents and to capture stories of the flood and the recovery that followed. Their goal is to create a digital scrapbook and archive of the community’s flood experience, which will serve, in addition to its obvious and overt purpose, as inspiration for the creation of public performance pieces. These will be performed on June 20th and 21st, 2014… our anniversary.

Artistic guidance for the project comes from Trickster Theatre, and  support from the Sunnyside School Society and The Calgary Foundation, for which we are all so very grateful.

Sean and Falstaff Productions are providing video support for the project. To help get our kids rolling on the story-gathering task, he filmed me giving Flora interview tips—and Flora’s first interview with one of our neighbours.

Flora is brilliant, and I’m terribly earnest and long-winded. If you have 10 minutes to kill:


Link to FP video on Youtube: Tell Me Your Story: Interview Tips for Kids

V.

And… if you have a floodster or a dozen in your life… this is going to be a really hard month. Bear with us.

xoxo

“Jane”

On big egos, scared-scarred-little-boys, and what to do when one of them tells you, my girl, that you have a big ego

I look at her and she takes my breath away. She is just so perfectly… herself. And I am envious. And in such love, my lungs, heart, stomach ache…

Jane: Do you know how utterly amazing you are? You are just awesome.

Flora: Aw. Thank you.

And she smiles her incredible smile at me. She’s at that lovely, unwrecked age when she still knows how to take a compliment, you know? When you tell her she’s beautiful, she just smiles a lovely smile that says, “I know.” When you tell her she’s clever, she looks at you, a little surprised—“Isn’t it obvious? Why must you say so?”

But the world-around-us is making inroads, attempting all sorts of assaults at her sense of self. And while she accepted the compliment as her natural due… she’s self-reflective enough to ponder whether that was ok. And so, she scrunches up her lovely, brilliant face, and looks at me…

Flora: Mom? Is it bad to have a big ego?

Oh, my beloved. The questions you ask. And would not your life be easier if I could just give you pap, pat answers? I hold her look and ponder my answer.

Jane: I suppose it depends on what you do with that ego…

But that’s no answer at all, is it? And it’s actually the wrong question, too. So I try again, to come closer to truth:

Jane: I think it’s probably worse to have no ego at all that to have a big one…

She thinks on that for a while. Is not sure she understands. Asks for clarification. And so I ask her… what’s her perception? What does she think—is it good or bad to have a big ego? What does she understand by ego? What does she mean by “big ego”? Is she thinking of someone specific?

Flora: Someone with a big ego is someone who thinks they are oh-so-great.

And, oh-yes, she’s thinking of someone specific…

But is someone with a big ego really someone who thinks they are oh-so-great? I want to see where she takes this, so I ask her—how do you know that they think they are oh-so-great?

Flora: Well, they tell you how great they are. All the time.

Right. So listen to this, my Flora: in my experience—and in my line of work, I’ve become something of an expert on big egos, and egos-that-want-to-be-big-but-are-actually-egos-of-scarred-and-scared-little-boys—the people who tell you how great they are (all the time) don’t actually have big egos. They are scarred-and-scared-insecure-and-easily-threatened-little-boys-and-girls who need to talk big to feel big…

Flora: So… they tell you they’re oh-so-great… because they’re actually worried they aren’t?

Exactly, my love. The people with big-secure-confident-I’m-your-Mona-Lisa-and-I-know-it-down-to-my-toes egos… they don’t need to tell you how great they are. (You do it for them, to them, all the time, unprompted…)

My Flora is fascinated, and slightly perturbed. She stoops down, sits down. Thinks and thinks. Finally:

Flora: Do I have a big ego?

Ah, THE question. And so how do we answer that, within the parameters we have set? And with some consideration for the inroads the world-around-us is making into her mind?

Jane: Well… do you think you’re oh-so-great?

And what she says, beloved, what she says… well, this is what she says:

Flora: Well, I don’t know if I’m oh-so-great… but I’m pretty good. And pretty cool. Most of the time. Except sometimes, when I’m an obnoxious jerk. Sometimes on purpose, sometimes by accident… but generally, I’m just… I’m pretty good.

I’m me.

My blogging colleague Jen Rose at Something Clever 2.0 once commented here, “Flora for President!” Let me up that, today, to “Flora, Ultimate Ruler of the Universe!” Cause what a wonderful universe that would be…

Jane: So I think you have a perfectly healthy, solid ego that doesn’t need to tell others how great it is, because it is confident that it’s just awesome, and that’s pretty awesome.

She glows with… Floraness. And… did I tell you already? I look at her and she takes my breath away. She is just so perfectly… herself. I love her so much, my lungs, heart, stomach ache…

She smiles and me. And slants her eyes … and smiles again…

Flora: So if someone tells me I have a big ego… should I just kick him in the balls as hard as I can?

Well… um.

So…

What would you say?

xoxo

“Jane”

NBTB-On big egos

P.S. Somewhere, out there, I’m sure there is an article–course–workshop on how to write short, pithy, search engine friendly post headlines. Don’t tell me about it. I don’t care.

I’m raising a blackmailer. Oops

This one is for “Narf,” from The Road to Serenity, who asked for something funny. And for  B., who thinks he needs to review all my future NDAs, because… well, read on…

***

First, this: the children find out how utterly broke I am:

Flora: Mom? How much money do you have in your bank account?

I scrunch up my forehead, pull up the date, calculate the total number of bills deducted from my not-very-impressive balance as of today, and respond…

Jane: About $50.

Flora: OMFG! I have more than that in my Three Jars!

(Three Jars, by the way, is a very brilliant way of managing your children’s money without actually giving them real money. What I mean is—Aunt August sends a check for $16.66* for their birthday, and it’s in your name… you deposit it, of course, in your bank account, and then do you transfer it to their bank account? Of course not. At least I never do. I spend it, on, you know—food. Visa bills. Until Three Jars. Now, I “deposit” that amount into their account. It’s virtual money: I don’t put any real money in there. It’s just a record. Then, when we’re at a store, and Flora wants another Rainbow Loom, and wants to pay for it with her money—I pay for it with my visa… and deduct the money from her Three Jars account. Brilliant. Check it out.)**

Flora is very, very clever—I may have mentioned this before, how clever my girl is?—and my apparent indigence is causing her some concern. She’s following the matter to the obvious conclusion.

Flora: Mom? So I have more than $300 in my Three Jars. If I ask you for that money, where is it going to come from?

Here’s the part where I teach my children a terrible life lesson.

Jane: I would write you a cheque on my Line of Credit.

… and here’s the part where they learn the paradox of a freelance writer’s life:

Flora: Mom? Why do you have so little money when you’ve just worked so much?

Jane: Because I haven’t been paid yet.

… and here comes the part where I realize my children learn all sorts of financial lessons I don’t realize I teach them…

Cinder: Because Mom’s a freelance, Flora, and that means clients don’t pay her for weeks and weeks and sometimes months after she does the work.

Flora is outraged.

Flora: Well, that really sucks!

Me, you know, I haven’t had a biweekly, predictable paycheque since Y2K, so I rather take it in stride. Most of them pay. Eventually. In the meantime, there’s my treasured line of credit…

And here comes the part where… well, just listen:

Cinder: Hey, Mom? That client you wouldn’t tell us anything about, the one that you did that top secret project for—you know, the one that you said if you told us about, they’d send ninja assassins to Calgary to kill us and also everyone we talked to about it?

(Sometimes, I get REALLY interesting jobs. They come with these NDAs…)

Jane: Um, yeah?

Cinder: Have they paid you yet?

Jane: Um, no.

Cinder: So… why don’t you call them and say, “Pay me now, or I’m going to put your top secret project on Facebook?”

I crane around in the front seat of the car—these conversations almost often take place in the car—and stare at my son-the-future-blackmailer. Who 1) totally understands the power of social media and 2) knows that privacy in our current world is only a delusion…

… and I wonder exactly where I went wrong on the path of shaping his moral make-up…

… and then Flora—have I mentioned how very, very clever she is?—sets him straight:

Flora: But Cinder. Maybe they’d pay her this time—but then, she’d never, ever get another top-secret-don’t-tell-anyone-about-this-or-we-will-send-ninja-assasins-to-kill-you-and-everyone-you-might-have-talked-to job.

Cinder: But she’d get paid.

Flora: But she’d never get hired to do anything top secret again.

Silence falls. I do some mental arithmetic on how much room there is left on my line of credit, and decide plenty enough that I don’t need to panic. Yet. Flora, I suspect, is wondering if she should call in all her Three Jars savings now, before the line of credit is maxed. Cinder, I’m a little worried, might be thinking whether he should take the financial health of the family into his own blackmailing hands—and I make a mental note to change all my laptop and file passwords again. Just in case. Not that I doubt his integrity… just his, you know… judgement.  I turn again to look at him. His look is pensive rather than cunning—more like he’s feeling pity for my lack of ruthlessness rather than planning the demise of my professional reputation by threatening my client in my name.

I relax. Peek over at Ender, who was listening to but not following the conversation, but now has his brow furrowed in concentration. I love to watch him think: I see him chasing a thought… wrestling it… figuring out how to articulate it. What did he take away from all that? What did he glean, process?

And, here it comes.

Ender: Mom?

Jane: Yes, my darling?

Ender: Penis!

The four-year-old has spoken.

xoxo

“Jane”

Raising a blackmailer

*You remember Aunt Augusta? She’s not real—she’s a metaphor for every relative-aquaintance-friend-of-the-family-well-meaning-stranger-at-the-bus-stop-nosy-neighbour who has an opinion about how I live my life/raise my children and misses no opportunity to tell me I’m doing it wrong. I hope you have an Aunt Augusta or two in your life: there is no better barometer by which to measure your parenting. Aunt Augusta thinks you suck? Awesome. You’re doing something right.

**Not a sponsored post. I don’t do that. I’m a real user of the service and a real fan.

Photo: My blackmailer-in-training practicing breaking secret codes…

Math, penises, impaired visual memory and existential angst

I.

Somewhere, in the math word problem instructions, was the phrase “be as creative as you like.” Oops. Here comes Flora:

Question: There are five elephants at the zoo. How many big elephant ears are there in the zoo herd?

Answer: There are nine ears, because Bill the male elephant only has one ear. He lost the other one when the zookeepers were rescuing him during the flood. This is a terrible tragedy, especially as all the other elephants make fun of him. You might think elephants are all cute and kind, but some of them are evil bastards.

And, here comes Cinder:

Question: Farmer Jones’ field is 167 m long and 4 m wide. Calculate the perimeter ( P ) and area ( A ).

Answer: P = ENIS A = SS.

II.

Speaking of penises (and when don’t I?), we’re renovating our bathroom. Because we’re insane and the reconstruction in the basement isn’t enough (actually, truly: it was a sanity-saving move: this one small thing, we can do and get done NOW). We’re en route to one of those horrid stores full of home renovation crap* and Sean asks me what kind of faucet I want. I stare at him blankly.

Sean: You know there are different kinds of faucets.

Jane: Um… sure. Yeah.

Sean: Do you want one that’s like the one we have now, or do you want something different?

I spare you the long technical and thoroughly incomprehensible to me description of European versus North American faucet styles and why this matters that follows, and jump to this: I am trying, very hard, to visualize our current sink and faucet, the place where I wash my hands and brush my teeth several times a day and have done so for eight, nine years? What does our sink look like? I’m fairly sure it’s white… possibly that colour they call ecru or ivory… round? Aren’t most sinks round? And the faucet? Christ. It’s just a faucet. Water comes out of it. I gather that one of the things my considerate beloved is trying to determine is whether I want a faucet with two separate hot-and-cold taps or one swivel tap. I close my eyes. Concentrate. I have no fucking clue what our faucet looks like. He reads my mind…

Sean: You have no idea what our faucet looks like?

The kids howl.

Jane: Fine, laugh. What do you think our faucet looks like?

Flora: It’s this dark shade of silver, with a beautiful curve. A line of green just around its base.** It’s just high enough that it reflects in the mirror, and when the taps are turned off, the cold one points at Ender’s collection of orange tooth brushes and the hot one at that weird splotch of red that you say is not blood on the wall beside the toilet.***

Cinder: That is not what Mom wants to know. The faucet has three holes, and they’re less than an inch way from the back splash… and probably eight inches apart from each other―I mean the outside two. And the sink is just over three feet high, and not quite two feet deep and 30 inches―no, actually, probably only 26 inches long.

Ender, paying intense attention to the conversation, shakes his head. And jumps in…

Ender: Our faucet looks like a penis.

Cinder: Actually, I’d like to change my answer to Ender’s.

Flora: I hate to ever agree with the boys, Mom, but yeah, Ender’s right. Our faucet looks like a penis.

Apparently, so does the new one.

Or so they tell me. When I close my eyes and try to see it… all I see is flowing water…

III.

Flora: Mom? What do adults talk about when there are no kids around?

Jane: Existential angst.

Flora: What’s that?

Jane: I think… it’s like trying to figure out who the heck you want to be when you grow up. Except that you’re already grown up, and so you feel like you should have figured this out already. But you haven’t. But you think you should…

Flora: But aren’t you just you?

Jane: What?

Flora: Well, I’m a kid. But I’m me. And when I grow up, maybe I’ll be a veterinarian. Or a painter. Or something. But I’ll still be me, right?

Right. And so… is that what existential angst is? Thinking that being you―being me―just isn’t enough?

xoxo
“Jane”

PS For those of you who’ve been unfortunate enough to witness me hitting my head against a brick wall last week: I’m not quite ready for the sledge hammer, but I’ve found me a rope ladder… Don’t get the reference? Then you’ve missed “I just want my kids to be happy.” Really? I don’t, and here’s why.

Next week: why I think “The CEO has a uterus―no, wait, he doesn’t but half his workforce does” is the most important thing I’ve ever written (as my real self), and why you―yes, you―need to go change the work world.****

Math-penises-staircase-to-everywhere.jpg

Footnotes galore

*I know you love those stores. I don’t. They smell. They’re too full of stuff. Worse, it’s all―well, a lot of it―stuff I need, because a third of my house is still a skeleton of its former self. Now what have you done? I’m all post-flood weepy again… OK. Moving on…

**The green is a deposit of limestone, because… crappy housekeeper. I know you think you are―I really am.

***It’s not blood. I promise. You don’t want to know what it is… but it’s not blood.

****Having a split on-line/writing personality is getting incredibly onerous. If you’re thinking of doing it: don’t. It leads to mild on-line schizophrenia, has bizarre implications on your real life, and reintegration is a bitch.

Looking for me?  Go to the for-stalkers-and-bloggers-and-no-I’m-a-real-sane-fan! section: Find “Jane”

Who will win “most annoying child contest” and other tales

Sleeping Mommy Approach with Coffee

I.

I know I’ve trained you all to NOT ask me if things are back to normal or how reconstruction is going. And I appreciate that. But I know you want to know. So. It’s going like this:

Flora: Oh, look, there’s one of the workers!

Sean: I don’t think we should call them workers. That suggests they actually, you know, work.

Cinder: We should call them the guys who come into our unit every once in a while and look around.

Flora: That’s not fair. Sometimes, they also smoke in our driveway.

And there you have it. That’s better than what Ender and his mother call them. Did you catch that, beloved, in my running away story? Go look.

II.

Flora: Ender’s so cute when he’s sleeping… and not demanding stuff!

Yup. Flora and I drink in that peaceful cherubic face… and magically, it blots out the trauma of the tantrum he threw when he found out that he could not share that chocolate croissant all by himself…

III.

Cinder: Mom? Are you running the ‘Who’s the most annoying child?’ contest today?

Jane: Um… well, no, I wasn’t planning on it… Why?

Cinder: Too bad. If you were, I think I just won. Want to know what I did?

Jane: No. No. Not even a little bit.

IV.

Flora: Mom! Where is my iPad?

Jane: On your bed, under the rainbow pillow.

Ender: Mooooooom! I can’t find my shark-car. Have you seen my shark-car?

Jane: In the bathtub, under the blue washcloth.

Cinder: Where is my Calvin & Hobbes book? Mom! Where is…

Jane: On the landing, under your snowpants!

Sean: Jaaaane! Have you seen my phone?

Jane: Under the couch…

Wait. I see the pattern. I am going to break it.

Flora: Mom? Where is…

Jane: I don’t know.

Ender: Mooooom!

Jane: Don’t know.

Cinder: Mom, I can’t find…

Jane: Not a clue.

Sean: Jane, have you seen…

Jane: Nope. Don’t. Know.

Will it work? Fingers crossed.

♠

Next week: a meditation on guilt and gratitude. And the week after… oh, that one, I really can’t wait for you to read. Do you “just want your kids to be happy?” Let that marinate in the back of your head for the next two weeks, and then you can read me explain why I don’t…

xoxo

Jane

P.S. My very brilliant friend Katia wrote this amazing piece last week on fighting in front of children: Forgive Me For Stomping All Over Your Victory. Highly recommended, insightful piece.

P.P.S. Yes, we have the plague right now. Three down. Two to go. But it’s only Wednesday…

Flu Bed

On yelling, authenticity, aspiration and the usefulness of judgemental relatives-and-strangers

Jane: Cinder! I mean Flora! Ender! Gah—child-I’m-mad-at, come here!

Flora: Which one? We were all being kind of buttsacks.

Jane: Wah! All of you! Just come here, line up, and I’m going to yell at each of you in turn. Or maybe all together…

Cinder: I did not do anything! Not really!

Jane: But I guarantee you will do something yell-worthy soon. Get over here. Now here’s what we’re going to do. I am going to deliver an all purpose yelling-lecture session now. Then, whenever you’re buttsacks the rest of the day, I can just go, “Waah! Remember what I said this morning?” And we can move on without more lecturing-yelling.

Flora: I don’t think that’s going to work.

Cinder: You’re really weird.

Ender: Maybe I’ll be really good the rest of the day.

Flora: Probably not.

Cinder: Definitely not.

Ender: You! Suck!

Cinder: You’re! A! Buttsack!

Flora: I think this is why Mom wanted to yell at us. Ok, we’re ready, Mom. Go.

So here’s the thing, friends. I don’t really yell at the kids that much. More than I’d like to… less than Aunt Augusta—you know Aunt Augusta, you’ve got one too*—thinks I ought to. But sometimes, I yell.

Sometimes, they really need to be yelled at, and I really need to yell.

Sometimes, “You! Are! Driving! Me! Insane!” is better—more real—more authentic—less damaging—than taking a deep breath, gritting my teeth, and muttering, “Never mind.”

Actually—gritting my teeth and muttering “Never mind”—when, in truth, I really, really, REALLY DO MIND—is never the better thing to do, the healthy thing to do.

Do this. Think of something that makes you extremely angry. Whatever it is. Clubbing baby seals or keying cars or taking the chicken carcass out of the garbage and trying to flush it down the toilet…** Now, sigh, shrug, and say, “Never mind.” You liar. Of course you mind. Feel yourself tightening up and going mad as a result? Acknowledge that you mind. And then move on.

Cinder: Mom? Mom! You did that spacing out thing again! We’re waiting for the yelling!

Jane: Oh. Right. The moment’s kind of passed. I’m no longer in a yelling mood. Just try not to be buttsacks*** to each other.

Cinder: You know that’s probably not going to happen.

Jane: I know. Try. Most of life is aspirational.

And as Flora explains to her brothers what aspirational means, I decide that today may be an ice-cream discipline kind of day. And also, a good day to NOT clean the kitchen and NOT do laundry and NOT try to squeeze in a couple of hours of research on that project—the deadline’s too far away to be urgent, kitchens just get dirty again, and everyone still has socks. Instead, it’s a good day to text a friend or two and take our collective brood to roam some urban park or other. Climb a hill. Break some ice floes. Get soaking wet and dirty in melting puddles. And then do THAT laundry. Or not.

Most of life is aspirational.

xoxo

“Jane”

LanternsPin

* You don’t know Aunt Augusta? Are you sure? She’s my all-purpose metaphor for every relative-aquaintance-friend-of-the-family-well-meaning-stranger-at-the-bus-stop-nosy-neighbour who has an opinion about how I live my life/raise my children and misses no opportunity to tell me I’m doing it wrong. Ah, Aunt Augusta. The pain and angst you caused me when I was a brand-new, vulnerable mother… The amusement and opportunity for passive-aggressive and just-out-right-aggressive barbs you give me now… I won’t say I love you, darling, because you’re bitchy, abrasive, judgemental, intolerant, invasive and well, kinda nasty. But I’m glad you exist, because you’ve become this amazing barometer for me. If I ever do anything of which you wholeheartedly approved—man, I’ll have fucked up but majorly. So please, darling. Criticize away. I’m too permissive, messy, insufficiently-hovering-spoiling-my-children-too-much? Awesome. Thank you. I was worried I was too-cranky-angry-controlling-snappy these days, but clearly, I’m still doing ok.

**I caught up with him before Part II was fully in effect.

***It’s also a metaphor. Cinder’s creation. I’ve stopped fighting it and now fully embrace its use as a term of… endearment. That’s what it is. Endearment.

##

And now, a brief illustration of unfooding

Steak Tartar Pin

Jane: Cinder, Flora, how do you guys feel about bean sprouts these days?

Flora: I love them, they’re so juicy and crunchy.

Cinder: Um, not so much.

Jane: OK, I’ll serve them on the side then.

And she fights the urge to extrapolate and to hammer the point home with a sledge hammer, because sometimes, it really is THIS easy. Honest.

Photo: That’s Flora’s “by request” birthday supper. Steak Tartar. Because a photo of bean sprouts would be really boring.

More like this:

The Family that eats together, or “Help! I can’t make my kids stay sitting at the table through the meal”

Picky eaters: how can he know he doesn’t like it until he takes a bite?

Secret to raising healthy eaters: don’t feed your kids crap; don’t force “good for you food” down their gullets

“Jane, baby, what’s with this dial-in post?”

“I’ve been crazy busy making money, beloved. But wait until next week. Just wait until next week… We’re going to break the Interwebs again, lovelies.”

xoxo

“Jane”

P.S. Looking for me?  Connect with Nothing By The Book on Twitter @nothingbythebook, Facebook, and Google+. Or, for a not-in-front-of-the-entire-Internet-please exchange, email  nothingbythebook@gmail.com.

Naked face politics

There is no preamble, no set-up. She simply looks at me and says:

“Mom? Why don’t you ever wear make-up?”

And I look back at her, and pause. And ponder. What do I say? It has been years—not decades, but more than a decade, more—since I’ve thought about my always-naked face. What does she need to know? What does she want to know? Should I tell her that I’m too practical-busy-lazy, that when one naps in the middle of the day with babies and toddlers, one doesn’t want to smear mascara-eye-shadow-foundation on pillows? Sort of true, maybe, except I don’t think that’s quite how it happened.

I can’t quite remember when or why I chose a naked face. Or if it was even a choice…

I could tell her it’s because I exercise in the middle of the day and I love that clean up involves nothing but the quickest of showers, a wipe with a towel.

I could tell her it’s an aesthetic thing and choice and preference, one devoid of any merit, because most of the women in her life dress their faces, and I love them, she loves them, and I want her to honour their choice. And, in a couple of years, she will long for mascara and eye-liner and blush and all those things—I wallpapered my face enthusiastically as a teenager too—and I don’t want her to, ever, think that I’m judging her, denigrating her preference of the moment.

If she was older, I might tell her that in my experience lovers always prefer the taste of naked skin to the taste of cosmetics… but no, not now, I won’t tell her that.

I could tell her I like my skin. My eyes. My lips. Just the way they are. And I like to smear on lipstick for special occasions, sure, but it gets on wine glasses and her daddy’s shirts and… TMI. Stop.

I could tell her… oh, so much. Too much. I’m an anthropologist by training, after all, and I know too much about the “why” theories for most of humanity’s quaint customs.

I don’t know what to tell her, because she’s an almost-pre-teen girl in a sick culture that warps beauty and body image and aesthetics and personal choice and turns everything into a weapon, a war, a conflict, an assault on her own sense of beauty and self and joy, and oh, why-does-raising-a-daughter-have-to-be-so-fucking-hard and oh, why-do-I-always-overthink-everything, why-can’t-I-just-say, “Because I don’t want to” and be done with it?

I should tell her… what? What the hell should I tell her?

But then, she answers herself:

“Is it because it wouldn’t be fair to the other moms? Because you’re so beautiful already?”

Flora, my most beloved child, I’ve said before I know I’m not supposed to have a favourite… but at moments like this… it’s really hard for your brothers to compete with you.

I wrap my arms around her. Press my naked face against her naked face. Kiss her. Love her. And she says:

“We’re so lucky we’re so beautiful, aren’t we?”

Flora, my most beloved. We are. You are. Hold on to this feeling as you grow.

“Jane”

N.B. I wrote this post before Avital Norman Nathman of The Mamafesto brought the #365FeministSelfie project, masterminded by Veronica Arreola from Viva La Feminista, to my attention. Naked face, painted face, happy face, sad face, angry face–REAL face. Real people. An aesthetic of the real, as seen-captured by the subject, without a mediating eye. That’s power. And also… play, joy. I’ve been in since Day 2. Come celebrate the reality of you with me, on Twitter or Instagram with #365FeministSelfie–or, you know what? Privately. Just for yourself. There’s power in that too.

Unfiltered.
Undefined.
Polarized Gemini.
On deadline.
Connected.
Stunned.

The photos, Week 1. Do I love them? One of them is awesome. Two of them make me cringe. All of them are me.

Naked Face Politics Pin

On getting kids to do their own laundry, slime molds and deadlines

I.

So it goes like this:

Cinder: Mooooom! I’m out of pajamas! And pants! And socks! And…

Jane: Cindeeeer! The washing machine is, I believe, empty and fully functional. Do a load, or go scavenge in your dirty clothes pile! I’m writing!

Cinder: I’ve already worn everything twice… Will you show me how you do the laundry again?

Jane: As soon as I… just ask Flora to show you.

Cinder: Flora knows how to do laundry?

Jane: She ran out of underwear on Sunday.

Interlude for the aspiring writers in the crowd: Once or twice a week, I get an email from a “I want to be a freelance writer!” asking me if I have any advice to impart. It boils down to this: Pitch. Query. Write. And when you get assignments, MEET YOUR DEADLINES (and if you break them, you’d better have a really good excuse, like… FLOOD! And even then, your editors will say, “So… if you get power back on Thursday, does that mean you might be able to file on Friday?”). MEET YOUR DEADLINES. And did I mention… MEET YOUR DEADLINES.

Awesome Dryerase Board
II.

And then it goes like this:

Flora: Mooooom! What’s wrong with our sink?

Jane: Keee-rist, did Ender clog the drain with Lego again?

Flora: No, come look.

Jane: Sweetie, I really need to finish…

Cinder: Gah, Mom, you need to come see this.

Jane: This better be… Kee-rist. What the hell is that?

Flora: I think it’s a slime mold.

Jane: Is that moving?

Cinder: Sometimes, slime molds move.

Jane: That is not a slime mold. I doused the entire bathroom in cleaners and alcohol after we had the plague. I’ve only been neglecting the house for two weeks. Not enough time for a slime mold to..

Flora: Oh-my-god, it totally moved.

How you know we’re all a little whack:

Cinder: Should we take a picture?

Flora: Can I keep it for my museum?

Jane: I think if we leave it until Daddy gets home, he’ll deal with it.*

Interlude for the aspiring writers in the crowd: MEET YOUR DEADLINES. Deal with the slime mold later–or delegate.

xoxo

“Jane”

PS I’m not reading anything not directly related to my billable work right now, my apologies to the blogosphere. Um, well, except for this. Have you read Jessica Olien’s Salon piece, Inside the Box: people don’t actually like creativity. Brilliant. Painfully true.

*He did. Cause he’s the best Daddy-husband-to-writer ever. And, if you’re wondering: it was just a blob of shampoo-toothpaste mixture, carefully sculpted by the Ender. Of course. Obvious, you’d think. But we sort of liked going with the whole moving slime mold thing…