Rain and Puke

My son scolded me yesterday for not keeping up the blog. So here we go again. After a whirlwind August of family vacations we are all gearing up for, and in fact counting the minutes until, the beginning of school next week. The kids need structure and they need the heat to break. Rebecca and Jonathan may also need some space. Without the separate classrooms and different activities they spend almost every moment together day and night. If I spent that much time with my husband I’d probably kill him.

Today was one of those days vacillated between feeling like a totally in control super mom and a complete nutcase. I woke up and quickly wiped out a blurb on Kircher for an exhibit at the library and then helped the kids with some community activism. They are writing a letter to the builders of the apartment building threatening to go up next store asking for grass and trees. (more on this later) I left 6 kids in my house and zipped up to a cafe for 45 minutes with a friend to work. While there I managed to write three sentences of my book which left me feeling almost smug. At the rate of one sentence every fifteen minutes I should finish it just before my 56th birthday. I then had to zip back to meet Eli’s preschool teachers. The home visit supposedly makes the child feel more comfortable but mostly feels like a tacit evaluation of the home-front. As I left the café on my way the heat wave broke with a biblical rain storm--no thunder just rushing water on the ground. Within about 30 seconds my sundress and I looked like we’d been through the washer and my shoes squished so much I took them off and ran down the down-town mall, looking like a cross between a drowned rat and a homeless waif. I made it home to find the house as messy as I’d left it and the six kids upstairs listening to a book on tape. Eli, meanwhile refused to get dressed saying he wanted to show the teacher his nightgown which is a Brown Class of 1990 t-shirt that says “Can I take life S/NC” This also involved showing off his butt and family jewels as he finds underwear beneath him. The highpoints of the visit involved him calling the teacher poop, announcing he actually did not want to be in her class but wanted to be in the other teacher’s class, hitting his brother, refusing to speak in sentences, and clinging to my legs.

The start up for preschool is intense and at this point I’d much prefer to simply toss him in a classroom and hope for the best. Note to those planning third children save your-self a year of preschool by arranging for a summer birth not a November one that delays the process. When filling out my “goals” for him all I could think to write was potty training and astrophysics.

And now for Becket the Children’s version whose moral is that when the kid is clingy he may actually be sick…...Eli who regularly has at least 15 ailments a day had a tummy ache which he described to his father just before it erupted into a Vesuvius style puke. It seemed that this may have come from drinking a gallon of his sisters “made from scratch” lemonade. After much kurfluffle, including canceling the evening playdate and me wandering around the house shirtless because shirt is soaked and I have not put the screaming kid down and Rebecca screaming that she needs me to help her practice relative calm ensued. An hour later despite the volcanic puke and a fever of 103 Eli was fine and ate a huge dinner. A one hour bug?


Here’s the dialogue
Manuel: Bon take him to the Toilet (after Vesuvius has erupted)
Eli: Nooooo not the bathwoooooooom I’m not really puking it’s the sugar.
Rebecca: MOMMY ELI NEEEEEEEEDS YOU
Me: I need to shower before Yoga I’m covered in puke
Eli: I’m weddy go to the wine stowe since I already puked. they have mow Motwin there”
Jonathan: Mommy did you REALLY GET PUKED On. “ (note the entire first floor is covered in puke)
Rebecca: How many minutes did I practice? I can’t believe you didn’t set the timer
Jonathan: How could you finish watching Dr. Dolittle without me. Mommy turn on the TV.
Eli: We need mow papa towels in case I puke some mow
Jonathan: Mommy where IS YOUR shirt?
Eli: I’m all betta now. Ooohhhmmm (with a very aggressive yogic pose)