Graffiti Broom Cute Gnat Autumn

1. Graffiti on an long-decommissioned waterworks near our house
2. Vivian learned to do Witch's Broom!
3. Mazie is sweet.
4. I was running and got a gnat in my eye that stung and interfered with my vision. I was using the camera on my phone to try to see the gnat so I could pick it out. I accidentally took this picture. FYI, the camera also did not help me get rid of the gnat. I ended up rubbing it out.
5. Autumn Richie.

Poor Kitty.

There is a meme in my family of origin called: "Poor kitty. Pooooor, poor kitty." We usually had a cat around the house. The cat was well-loved but also known to exist in a state of mutual tolerance. Cats invariably take themselves too seriously, and in so doing, set themselves up for good-natured taunting. This is how "Poor kitty" works: the cat pines away for some small luxury ("Meowwwwww!"). We reply: "Pooooor kitty. Pooor, poor kitty" with tragic expressions on our faces. It's fun! The fun comes from the fact that we feed this animal, give it the best spot in the house to sleep, let it in and out pretty much whenever it wants, and take it to the vet periodically, adore it liberally - and it has NO idea how good its life is. We know it has limited perspective because it's irritated about being in when it wants to be out or vice versa.

I can't help adding that the reason this is satisfying is that I, myself, AM a Poor Kitty. What's the matter, kitty? You can't fit in a jog? You're having car trouble? You don't get to vegetate tonight? Poor kitty. Poooor, poor kitty.

Biking

So...biking. It's something most Americans learn to do at some point, and some of us love to go really really fast. Richie and I share a love of speed that I hope our kids don't share because it's dangerous. Just kidding - I want to ride roller coasters with them. Mazie has been a proficient cyclist for about a year now. She has recently taken to riding down the hill in "back" (we use that side of the apartment almost exclusively, so I think of it as the front) of our apartment building. She goes peeling down the hill at an angle, then makes the quick right-hand turn to just miss crashing into some concrete steps at the bottom. The first time I saw her do it, I almost peed my pants with fright. I realized she'd been doing it for a while; I had been out of sight range of where she'd been finishing her descent. (Bad mom; I know). She always wears a helmet and seemed to be pretty good at her maneuver. Plus, "Hill" is a generous term for the area in question. It's more of a "grade." Mostly, she LOVES going down the hill. So I let her continue to do it.

I remember last year when she was learning to ride. Mazie attacked the task of learning to ride a bike with the intensity of a fighter pilot. She was somewhere between "I-can't-do-this" and "Mama-I-can-do-this-myself" for about three months. We had a long run behind our last apartment, so I'd run beside her, steadying her bike and calling, "steer, steer, pedal, pedal!" She sort of loved it and sort of hated it. She was absolutely focused on the goal, but incredibly frustrated with the slowness of achieving it. Every session ended in tears of frustration. I finally learned to limit the sessions to about 7 minutes (both for emotional preservation and for the health of my lower back). Mazie would scarcely let me quit the session unless she had gotten to the crying point, and even then she'd want to keep going. Oh, man, was she tough. She was committed but sensitive, 100% focus. Eventually she graduated to a hand on her back, then to just a push-off. At last it was time to learn to start herself, which she accomplished entirely on her own when left by herself one afternoon.

And now she's careening down hills and biking ALL THE WAY around the lake with me.

Enter Vivian, stage left. She is learning to ride this year. Vivian, predictably, could not be more different than her sister. If Mazie is a fighter-pilot, Vivian is a surfer. Today she waited a full 45 minutes to receive help while I finished making chili and cleaning up the kitchen (Richie is at a computer class for his job)...no pushing. When I went out to help her this afternoon, her attitude is just the same as it's always been about biking: avid but relaxed. She'd bike along, wobbling her front tire crazily so that it almost went off the sidewalk on one side, then on the other, and then the bike peeled out and I caught her as she tipped to the right. She exclaimed, as she let out a deep breath, "Huh! That was fun!" And, yes, she wanted to try again. We looped around the apartment building. On the opposite side a family with little kids had left out at least 70% of their toys for the neighborhood to take a gander at. They're all spattered with mud and I think some haven't changed positions since we moved in last July. As Vivian rode past, she rubber-necked like crazy at their toys and veered off the road completely gawking at them. She does this a lot. When we went to the lake, we could barely keep her on task because she kept gazing: at the lake, at the birds, at dogs, and at other people. She'd gaze to one side and then veer off in that direction. Then she'd crash and laugh a sweet goober-ish laugh. But she's getting it...I think as fast or faster than Mazie did. She's at the needing a push-off, accompaniment, and occasional stabilization phase. I don't remember her ever crying about the process unless she falls and hurts herself. She is just a completely different person than Mazie.

I love them both so much! I really think I would not know who one is without the other and vice versa! They each make me a better parent to the other. Amazing.

Poetry Month

This has been the first year that Poetry Month has taken up space in my mind. Justin and Mel Moore, Randy Crump, NPR, my church services, and Mazie's kindergarten class all took notice this year.

I just want to say, I love poetry a lot more now that I no longer try to produce any. For me, the production of poetry involved an embarrassing mix of angst and self-consciousness. I hope one day I'll be able to write something worth reading, poetry or prose. But for now I'm content to read others' work. Some of my favorite poems were introduced to me by others who linked to them or who took the time to type them out or cut-and-paste them into their web logs. So, here's my contribution. It's one I first read about ten years ago and haven't read recently at all because I lent out my Mary Oliver book and never got it back.

Cold Poem
By Mary Oliver

(for Brandi's parents, who have successfully survived another honest-making winter)

Cold now.
Close to the edge. Almost
unbearable. Clouds
bunch up and boil down
from the north of the white bear.
This tree-splitting morning
I dream of his fat tracks,
the lifesaving suet.

I think of summer with its luminous fruit,
blossoms rounding to berries, leaves,
handfuls of grain.

Maybe what cold is, is the time
we measure the love we have always had, secretly,
for our own bones, the hard knife-edged love
for the warm river of the I, beyond all else; maybe

that is what it means the beauty
of the blue shark cruising toward the tumbling seals.

In the season of snow,
in the immeasurable cold,
we grow cruel but honest; we keep
ourselves alive,
if we can, taking one after another
the necessary bodies of others, the many
crushed red flowers.
_______________

Then there's Wendell Berry, slightly more hopeful:

Mad Farmer Liberation Front, 1972

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
  vacation with pay. Want more
  of everything ready-made. Be afraid
  to know your neighbors and to die.
  And you will have a window in your head.
  Not even your future will be a mystery
  any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
  and shut away in a little drawer.
  When they want you to buy something
  they will call you. When they want you
  to die for profit they will let you know.
  

So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion - put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

I guess you can talk about poetry all you like. But you just know when someone has expressed something - a thought, conviction, emotion, complaint, restlessness, truth, or a love that you know.

Nervous System

jittery social servants?
worried computer processor?
uncertain cladistics?
A band?

No! It's the system of nerves, ganglia, axa, myelinated sheaths, gray and white matter that lets your body communicate with itself! It does the quick control and leaves the slow-acting, long-lasting control to hormones. I read through the nervous system section of the anatomy book and so far it seems that I have a shot at remembering all the details if only I can get the groupings straight:

• central nervous system versus peripheral nervous system
• Somatic (roughly conscious control) nervous system vs. Autonomic nervous system
• Sympathetic nervous system vs. parasympathetic nervous system
• preganglionic nerves vs. postganglionic nerves...etc.

The structure of the nervous system is like a road that keeps forking. My goal with pre-studying is simply to expose myself to the vocabulary and broad concepts. I'm trying to cover ground on my first pass, not memorize.

Mr. Smee is a Punk.

Mr. Smee is a rabbit we've been given. We were going to get a rabbit for the girls because it's a mammal that doesn't take up much space - great for apartment-dwellers. Our 17-yr-old friend said he'd be willing to part with his rabbit, Mr. Smee. Mr. Smee is absolutely adorable. He's a Mini Rex- tiny, even for a bunny. He has fat little cheeks, as shown, and he's an earthy brown color that's very pretty and modest.

I lobbied hard to change his name because it's sort of a mouthful, but Richie said it fit him and the girls insisted he'd be confused if we change it. They don't know that his brain is even more parts instinct than the ordinary housepet.

But this fact has caught up to me with a vengeance.

When I first thought of getting a rabbit, I had seen the family to whom this one belongs put out newspapers for the rabbits to "go" on while in the house. They said it sort of worked. I read online that rabbits can be litter trained fairly easily and can have supervised run of the house - or of some rooms. The article online said rabbits are naturally prey animals and must be respected even though it's tempting to just pick them up all the time. It said that by respecting the rabbit, it would learn to trust us and come to us of its own free will. But the article also emphasized the prey nature of the rabbit's instincts. They like to burrow and hide. It mentioned that sometimes the rabbit will vie for top rabbit status, occasionally nipping a human caretaker. If this happens, you're supposed to make a high-pitched squealing noise and say "NO" loudly. Finally, it said rabbits won't usually mind your cage-cleaning because rabbits like to have a fresh, clean home. Oh, and you should "gently herd" the rabbit back to its cage at the end of its foray into the larger home.

Mr. Smee came to us in his familiar hutch, but wouldn't come out of his little wooden house for the first week. I respected him by keeping my distance and changing his food. We practically didn't see the little guy that entire first week. Then he started coming out. Then we opened his door, which prompted him to hide in his little house again. Gradually, he started venturing out of his cage, but would run back inside if he saw one of us come near. Now, however, Mr. Smee has really come out of his shell and there are parts of him I'd like to put back in - like the biting and attacking. In other ways, he's just as shy as ever - not letting us come very near him (unless he's lunging in for a bite), for instance. You can only pet him if you can catch him first.

On litter training: a gradual and tenuous success story. Mr. Smee had been kept outside in his hutch with three other bunnies in their own hutches. His accustomed bedding was hay, which the kids would change periodically. I'm guessing based the condition of his hutch pan that the frequency of total clean-out was low. As I mentioned, he "went" on paper when the kids brought him inside. I couldn't keep him in hay because it's an incredibly messy medium and nearly impossible to clean without scrapping the whole load and starting over. Not to mention we don't have a convenient source of hay (Mr. Smee's family of origin has horses, so they practically have hay coming out of their ears).

Since Mr. Smee had been pooping and peeing mainly on hay, I first tried restricting his hay to a litter box (casserole pan) in the spot he likes to "go" on an overall covering of newspaper. Well, smart little bunny hunkered in the hay box (which I'm sure felt like home) and pooped and peed all over the paper - usually near the water bottle. So that didn't work. I tried several combinations of store-bought litters and and store-bought nesting materials, chasing his flavor-of-the-week latrine site with the litter box. All the while I changed the entire kit and caboodle weekly because Mr. Smee resisted the idea of using the box.

That was LOTS of work.

Finally, after six weeks and as many complete litter changes, Mr. Smee began to live on paper and poop in a casserole of aspen pellets. He finally got it! Hallelujia! Songs of rejoicing!

Now he loves to roam in the open upstairs and has all sorts of nooks he calls home. We know he calls them home because he attacks intruders. No kidding. This (literally) pint-sized prey animal is an attack bunny. I have to wear gloves or use one of Mazie's Sponge Bob slippers as protection when I try to "gently herd" him back to his cage. By the way, that "gently herding" stuff is a load. Mr. Smee is hellbent on exploring the world and hiding out in one of his various forts and NOT going into the cage when herded. This means that we resort to chasing him down in teams, as it's next to impossible to catch him one-on-one. In this respect, he acts like a finely tuned prey animal. He even wriggles free (his fur is so soft and silky) when you think you've caught him.

Once I was trying to catch him with the girls and he vanished. One moment he was under the bed, evading capture, and the next, he was gone. It turns out he was IN the bed. I mean inside the box springs. He had made a hole in the flimsy box springs cover and had discovered an unbeatable hideout.

In the silliest chase to date, Mr. Smee was darting around trying to get away from Mazie and me. He darted "under" a pair of Richie's pants. But he actually darted inside of them. I said, "Look, Mazie, he wants to wear pants!" Mazie and I both thought that was hilarious. He was wiggling around in Richie's pants leg, thinking he was getting away. Plus, Mr. Smee was trapped, so mission accomplished. All in all, a good chase.

Finally, Mr. Smee has begun biting me when I try to clean his cage. He's territorial and all, so I'm down with that. It's his cage. I usually use protection. But yesterday he bit the stew out of me while I was lifting his litter box out of his cage. It was the hardest bite he'd ever given - not a nip at all. It drew blood from my middle finger and it hurt! That's why Mr. Smee is a punk. He doesn't let you catch him, he doesn't let you pet him, he bites if you're in what he perceives as his territory (which we hope he doesn't expand). He doesn't come up to you and ask for affection. He pees on the paper whenever his litterbox goes for a little cleanout.

He still has a home here because of three things:

1. His submission to the ways of the litterbox.
   
2. He doesn't hurt the kids because they basically leave him alone.
3. His undeniable, manifest cuteness. (as shown)

But he's still a punk.

So, I bet you thought you were looking at an innocent bunny in these photos. Not the case. I'll add commentary so you can see them through my lens:

Prisoner begging to get out. Note the cute, innocent face.
The wary escape
Fleeing to the comfort of a nook (bunny bottoms are possibly even cuter than their faces)
I peek under Vivi's bed to capture This Face: the face you see just before you get popped, sucka.

"I'm a Magic Pink-Wing Black/White Bird"

Vivi said it. She and Mazie are playing a game they call "Firebird." Firebird apparently involves - most importantly - wearing skirts around your neck and trading off Mommy/Baby roles. There is a disjointed narrative involved, as well as some nesting and (increasingly) some jumping.

It's noon and we have just finished second breakfast. First breakfast was cut short at 9 a.m. when we realized after producing just one pancake man per kid that our town's Christmas parade was about to start a few streets over. So we bundled up with hoods protruding from jackets like homeless people and went out to see the procession of animal rescue organizations, local businesses, high school bands, auto enthusiasts, and various community services parade down the street. Vivian, Richie, and I waved and called "Merry Christmas" to everybody. Mazie mainly hid. I felt like a doof after calling "Merry Christmas" to the one person with a Channukkah Dog (draped in a blue felt blanket emblazoned with an enormous Star of David). As soon as she passed, I thought "Doh!" with my own hearty words still ringing in my ears. I felt very rude. The lady was nice enough to reply with "Merry Christmas to you, too."

One of the first parade entrants was a navy medic van bedecked with wreaths and merry wishes. When it went past, I thought of the profound privilege it is to care for someone's health, how I have an opportunity to learn the skills and have the privilege, and I promptly started crying. It's still hitting me in waves that I have a very good shot at becoming a doctor. I see this role as fairly sacred. Ordinary, yes, but intensely personal. There's a staggering amount of responsibility in this role. I feel honored and humbled by its prospect. Undoubtedly, the next four years will see my perspective shift from that of a patient - outside the system - to that of the caregiver - inside the system. In some ways I look forward to that shift; in other ways I don't think I'll ever fully reside in the medical world. I'm too many portions Mommy for that to happen.

So we came back home and finished an expanded version of breakfast, complete with orange juice, eggs and bacon (yum!). And now the game of Firebird has expanded to include dragging a baby doll by a ribbon attached to her neck on one end and a magic wand on the other. Mazie just declared, "Vivi, now you have to be the Gozzle-ing and this is the part when I have to teach you to follow me. When I call, 'Come on! Fuzzy! Follow!' (in falsetto) you have to follow me." And Vivi's following as instructed. Fun times.

The Girls

I just realized I've managed to fart away about a zillion words without one about the loves of my life: Mazie and Vivian.

Mazie just had her tonsils out six days ago. She recovered remarkably well. She was back to herself within a day, if somewhat subdued. She does have the "dragon breath" Dr. Jacobson warned us about. It's a little bit pitiful for a five year old cutie pie to have the halitosis of an Irish Wolfhound, but it does seem markedly better today.

Mazie is sensitive, smart, moody, and persistent. When she gets into something, she doesn't want to quit until she's finished. If she doesn't get a word right away when reading, she flies into a minor panic. She remembers events more clearly than I do, which explains why lots of times she appears to be just observing. She is observing, and she's saving it all up for later. Mazie has a highly developed sense of justice - she'll remember the precedent set at an earlier instance and then invoke that precedent if she feels she's been treated unfairly. I'll try to give concrete examples; they happen all the time. I just can't remember any right this minute.

Vivian is a little sunbeam...except when she's not. And then the storm doesn't last long and her bushy bushy blond hairdo makes it kind of cute and forgettable. She flits through life. Vivian drops pearls of wisdom constantly and I hope this blog can catch some of them. She also absorbs the facial expressions, even the postures, of others until you can trace things she does back to a particular person. It's super hilarious to see Miss Maggie's scrunched-up nose or Skylar's (a girl at the bus stop) shoulder shrug get sucked up and used by Vivian.

Another thing about Vivian: she's a professional cuddler. She requests cuddling at least once a day, sometimes twice. We could farm her out to those in need of the human touch for a princely sum (but of course we wouldn't dream of it). Every evening I join her on her baby bed for a minute or two. First I accidentally lie on her trailing hair and she says, "Ow!" Once we have that worked out she asks me about the following day's plans, and I tell her. Then we rest a minute and I almost fall asleep. She tells me she's not going to eat her boogers tonight and that she doesn't want a blanket. Then we're done.

Mazie, on the other hand, has to be seriously compromised to cuddle ( I confess I snuck in some illicit cuddle time in the brief space between when she had taken Versed and before she went for surgery). But Mazie is a story hound. She loves stories: The one about the first time I did research, the one about the chipmunk trap, the one about when she was born, the one about how she bit Daddy's toe (when she was very very little). I'll try to save some of those here for her to see later.

Over and out, gotta go get Mazie.