So Robert Burns was talking about not embarrassing ourselves by being able to see ourselves from others' point of view, but I've always wished I could see myself as an outsider might. Sometimes I feel they've got it quite wrong, but do they?
Today, for example, I saw the guy at the gym who hands out locker keys and whatnot. I always joke with him, and he's been giving me a bad time for losing my membership card. He razzed me today, and I said "Oh yeah? Guess what... 135500." "What's that? Your membership number?" "Yup!" "How'd you get it?" I CALLED AND ASKED, SUCKA!" "But... did you memorize it?" "Yeah, but it was hella easy. It was the prime numbers, plus the numbers at the end are repeated." "Whoo... somebody's got a head for math!"
That tickled me. Math was always my worst subject in school. I never liked it. On the other hand, I am actually pretty good at grasping concepts about things like my personal budget or the cost efficiency of one plan vs. another. In short, I'm pretty good with numbers, which is, I guess, being good at math.
Even more staggering, last Saturday, I was at a birthday party for one of Zadie's little friends. The parents live in a place with a small kitchen, so they'd ordered a cake from Whole Foods. (It was delicious, incidentally!) The mom turned to me and said, "You probably made Zadie's cake, didn't you?" I nodded, and she added, "One of those supermoms."
I thought it was so odd that it's been bouncing around in the back of my head for several days, and I brought it up to some other mom/teacher friends today, thinking they, too, would think it was silly that someone thought I was a supermom. Heck, three of them actually only work part-time so they can go home and be with their kids. But to a one, they were like "No, that's pretty much how we think of you, too." And, you know, it was weird. I mean, I curse myself all the time for all the things I DON'T do for Zadie, like stay home or work part-time or do art projects instead of dragging her on my errands. I feel like a pretty shoddy goddamn mom sometimes. I'd love to do enrichment and reading and nature walks a lot more often, but when it comes down to it, I have about four hours with her on most days, and I usually burn more than an hour of that getting her ready for bed and getting her home from Mom's. Then another hour and a half is preparing and eating dinner. That leaves precious little time to really hang out, and sometimes I'm just exhausted. The last thing that looks like to me is a supermom, and I sure as hell don't think being able to bake a cake makes me one.
I think what I am is sort of domestically inclined, and also sort of a cheapskate. But what I wish I really had more to spend was time with that kid. And no matter what I think of myself or my friends think of me, what really matters in the end is what Zadie thinks. I hope I'm good enough as I am.
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Small changes, big effects
[I apologize in advance: I believe in the value of white space, but Blogger has made some changes and I can't figure out how to put space between my paragraphs. I'll work on it, because I know big blocks of text are intimidating.]
So, I am almost out of salt. I buy the canister of Morton's salt with the little girl on it, and I was kind of shocked to discover that I needed another -- this will be the third in about a year. I used to go through one of those far less frequently. They probably lasted more than a year. I briefly panicked, thinking that perhaps our sodium consumption was way up as a family.
Of course, then I realized that part of it is that my husband uses salt for a saline nasal rinse, and I sometimes use it as an abrasive cleanser, so that alone changes things a bit. Still, I started thinking about all the things I cook with salt. A tablespoon and a half goes into by bread recipe (which makes four loaves). Two tablespoons go into the water to cook the beans each week. I add it to other food, but not in mass quantities. Still, tablespoons seemed like a lot.
I did some math and learned that actually, everything I make from scratch now has less sodium in it than all the stuff I used to buy. The bread has less than the sprouted wheat I used to buy. The soup has less than canned or boxed soup. The only thing that was hard to get a good feeling about was the beans, as I add a lot of salt to the water, and the beans certainly absorb some, but I dump a lot of the water off, too. Anyway, we're using a lot more salt, but we're also eating a lot less sodium. Funny.
Here's another funny thing. I was talking with someone about TV, and I've never made any effort to watch less -- I didn't watch much in the first place. But I realized if someone asked Zadie, for example, she would probably answer that I don't watch at all. We cancelled cable last fall just to save some money, since we definitely weren't watching enough to justify $120 a month. I knew I could watch my usual programs on Hulu or Netflix, most of Zadie's programs are on Netflix or DVD, and Sweetie watches almost nothing but football anyway, so he watches that on ESPN's web site.
Anyway, I realized that whereas I used to turn on the tv to watch, say, Community, if it was not on that week or if it was pre-empted or whatever, I had already planned to watch something, so I would just flip channels and watch something else, like American Idol (I know, I know). I would turn on the Home and Garden network or the Food network just to have something to watch. Now I go to the web site to watch my programs when I have time, and if there wasn't an episode that week, then I just do something else, because the ready supply of alternate crap just isn't there. Between movies, the occasional PBS show online, and a couple TV shows I follow, I now probably watch less than five hours a week. Five would be the max, too.
In sum, I guess what I'm saying is I'm happy with the small changes we've made, and I'm surprised at how easy they've been.
Friday, April 13, 2012
An actual bad thing happened on Friday the 13th (for the first time I can remember)
Today was Springfest, a smallish food fair/talent show on campus. I was bummed about having to stay late on a shortened day, and the drinks we were selling were not exactly flying off the shelves. Worse, once the performances started all commerce stalled. But I do always like the performances.
One of the first was a dance group. It's a large, co-ed group that splices several songs together for one long routine, and they do their best to make sure dancers of all abilities get at least a few moments of feature time. In fact, they incorporated one of the severely disabled students into their routine. One of my students, a very quiet, hard-working, respectful kid is in the group. We'll call him X. He's one of those kids that never fails to say hello in the hall. Some kids don't go out of their way, although frankly most of them like me, but he does, and always with a smile. Recently he has risen in the ranks of ROTC. As the dance went on, it became clear that he was one of the leaders of the group. You could see the other dancers checking his face, and you could see his subtle eyebrow raises that let them know their cues. He seemed genuinely happy, not just to be dancing himself, but for the others. He smiled and clapped for the other dancers as they took their turns in the spotlight.
Then he and a partner took the stage, and I was thinking, "I'm going to have to remind X next year that I'll write a college or scholarship letter for him." He is such a well-rounded kid, I knew I could give some brief anecdotes to show the colleges how deserving he was. His dance finished and he moved to the side of the stage area and fell down. The dance had been dramatic thus far, and I figured it was either choreographed or part of his exuberance that he would slide into home, as it were, after his performance. I noted that his partner hadn't done the same, and I watched him to see if there was more. First one student went to his side, then another. And then I realized something was wrong.
I ran over and, at risk of sounding bossy, took charge. "Okay guys, the recovery position is on his side. Maybe you can help him. X, can you roll over a bit?" He tried and exclaimed in pain. "Okay, we're not doing that. You're cool, X, just stay comfortable. You guys, back off and give him some room. Are you calling 9-1-1?" I hesitated a minute. "Okay, good."
It had taken a minute to determine, as X was pale, shaking, sweating, and breathing hard, but it wasn't something like a cardiac event... just an injury. A pretty bad one, but just an injury. Someone was trying to find his backpack to get his cell phone to call his parents, but it was taking a lot of time, and I decided, "fuck that." "X, do you know your mom's number by heart?" He did, but she didn't speak English, and I knew he couldn't talk very well at the moment. Plus, it's incredibly noisy in there. He suggested his uncle, so I left his side for a minute and asked the uncle to either come down or get a hold of his parents to get them to come to the school. We try hard not to transport a kid by ambulance if it's not an absolute necessity and if they're not insured (which many of our students aren't), because it's a bill many families cannot afford. So if there was any chance we could get an adult there before the paramedics, we wanted one.
The paramedics arrived quickly, and I was glad. I backed up to watch, but shortly it became clear that there was room for me at his side again. I asked the paramedic if it was okay, and it was. I asked X if he wanted me to hold his hand, and he did. I continued to as they cut his pant leg off, started an IV, gave him a shot of morphine, put some foam pads under his leg, and got his information. I have no idea what else was going on at the time. His knee was dislocated, which is an apt description -- it was in the wrong damn place. It appeared that his kneecap was over on the side of his leg, or perhaps the swelling made it look that way. At one point, he let go of my hand, and I started to pull away, but he was just stabilizing himself, and he reached out for me with the other hand. Finally they rolled a stretcher close and I got out of the way so the firefighters and paramedics could lift him. It was obviously still painful, as they had just barely given him the morphine, but they used about six guys and did their best to hold him steady and not jostle his knee too much. I was actually really impressed with all of them, but particularly Joe, who spoke authoritatively but calmly to X, explaining what was going on.
I walked toward the parking lot with them to say goodbye, and the vice principal stepped up and asked if I could ride with him. Someone had to. "Uh... yeah. Let me grab my stuff." I started to run back to my purse and keys, and he added, "Would you have a ride back?" Oh... no, I wouldn't really. He quickly asked another teacher, but while that was going on, X's dad arrived, and he got in the ambulance to go.
You know how sometimes scary stuff happens in slow motion with ultra-focus? It's odd -- the slow motion happened for me several minutes before the accident. (Incidentally, a few other students told me later that they had watched the video, and it looked like he had landed on his knee. He couldn't figure out what happened.) I was honestly just watching him, thinking about what a nice, good, pleasant, hard-working, well-rounded kid he is and how much I like him. I hope he's okay.
One of the first was a dance group. It's a large, co-ed group that splices several songs together for one long routine, and they do their best to make sure dancers of all abilities get at least a few moments of feature time. In fact, they incorporated one of the severely disabled students into their routine. One of my students, a very quiet, hard-working, respectful kid is in the group. We'll call him X. He's one of those kids that never fails to say hello in the hall. Some kids don't go out of their way, although frankly most of them like me, but he does, and always with a smile. Recently he has risen in the ranks of ROTC. As the dance went on, it became clear that he was one of the leaders of the group. You could see the other dancers checking his face, and you could see his subtle eyebrow raises that let them know their cues. He seemed genuinely happy, not just to be dancing himself, but for the others. He smiled and clapped for the other dancers as they took their turns in the spotlight.
Then he and a partner took the stage, and I was thinking, "I'm going to have to remind X next year that I'll write a college or scholarship letter for him." He is such a well-rounded kid, I knew I could give some brief anecdotes to show the colleges how deserving he was. His dance finished and he moved to the side of the stage area and fell down. The dance had been dramatic thus far, and I figured it was either choreographed or part of his exuberance that he would slide into home, as it were, after his performance. I noted that his partner hadn't done the same, and I watched him to see if there was more. First one student went to his side, then another. And then I realized something was wrong.
I ran over and, at risk of sounding bossy, took charge. "Okay guys, the recovery position is on his side. Maybe you can help him. X, can you roll over a bit?" He tried and exclaimed in pain. "Okay, we're not doing that. You're cool, X, just stay comfortable. You guys, back off and give him some room. Are you calling 9-1-1?" I hesitated a minute. "Okay, good."
It had taken a minute to determine, as X was pale, shaking, sweating, and breathing hard, but it wasn't something like a cardiac event... just an injury. A pretty bad one, but just an injury. Someone was trying to find his backpack to get his cell phone to call his parents, but it was taking a lot of time, and I decided, "fuck that." "X, do you know your mom's number by heart?" He did, but she didn't speak English, and I knew he couldn't talk very well at the moment. Plus, it's incredibly noisy in there. He suggested his uncle, so I left his side for a minute and asked the uncle to either come down or get a hold of his parents to get them to come to the school. We try hard not to transport a kid by ambulance if it's not an absolute necessity and if they're not insured (which many of our students aren't), because it's a bill many families cannot afford. So if there was any chance we could get an adult there before the paramedics, we wanted one.
The paramedics arrived quickly, and I was glad. I backed up to watch, but shortly it became clear that there was room for me at his side again. I asked the paramedic if it was okay, and it was. I asked X if he wanted me to hold his hand, and he did. I continued to as they cut his pant leg off, started an IV, gave him a shot of morphine, put some foam pads under his leg, and got his information. I have no idea what else was going on at the time. His knee was dislocated, which is an apt description -- it was in the wrong damn place. It appeared that his kneecap was over on the side of his leg, or perhaps the swelling made it look that way. At one point, he let go of my hand, and I started to pull away, but he was just stabilizing himself, and he reached out for me with the other hand. Finally they rolled a stretcher close and I got out of the way so the firefighters and paramedics could lift him. It was obviously still painful, as they had just barely given him the morphine, but they used about six guys and did their best to hold him steady and not jostle his knee too much. I was actually really impressed with all of them, but particularly Joe, who spoke authoritatively but calmly to X, explaining what was going on.
I walked toward the parking lot with them to say goodbye, and the vice principal stepped up and asked if I could ride with him. Someone had to. "Uh... yeah. Let me grab my stuff." I started to run back to my purse and keys, and he added, "Would you have a ride back?" Oh... no, I wouldn't really. He quickly asked another teacher, but while that was going on, X's dad arrived, and he got in the ambulance to go.
You know how sometimes scary stuff happens in slow motion with ultra-focus? It's odd -- the slow motion happened for me several minutes before the accident. (Incidentally, a few other students told me later that they had watched the video, and it looked like he had landed on his knee. He couldn't figure out what happened.) I was honestly just watching him, thinking about what a nice, good, pleasant, hard-working, well-rounded kid he is and how much I like him. I hope he's okay.
Friday, April 06, 2012
I love vacation days!
This week, we didn't do anything too extraordinary. On Monday, we did a lot of gardening. On Tuesday, we went to Berkeley to meet Monkeygirl, and we had pizza and gelato. On Wednesday, I mainly cleaned the house, as we had friends coming for dinner. Zadie also got a haircut. Thursday was a bake-a-thon. And today? I said we'd go to Effie Yeaw nature center, but Z's not even awake yet. I have a few things to do around here, but not much. I ordered and assembled a Trail-Gator, a bar that attaches Z's bike to mine so that it's like a big tandem bike, and we'll probably do some riding today. (Incidentally, I can put stuff together like a mofo, but when you tell me it's time to use "ratchet assembly C" or whatever, and there's not a single page in the instructions that labels the parts, it's not that damn useful. Might as well just have a picture that says "this guy right here.")
Here is some yesterday stuff.
Sticky rolls for Easter morning egg hunt with the neighbors.
Sugar cookies for the kids on Easter.
I always make these at Christmas, and for the last two years, I've made them at Easter, too. I started making them with lemon extract instead of vanilla for the Easter version, and though I love them the normal way, the lemon kind is growing on me.
I made dinner rolls for Easter as well.
And of course we dyed eggs!
Here is some yesterday stuff.
Sticky rolls for Easter morning egg hunt with the neighbors.
Sugar cookies for the kids on Easter.
I always make these at Christmas, and for the last two years, I've made them at Easter, too. I started making them with lemon extract instead of vanilla for the Easter version, and though I love them the normal way, the lemon kind is growing on me.
I made dinner rolls for Easter as well.
And of course we dyed eggs!
Monday, April 02, 2012
Happy birthday to me... again!
We have been waiting to take our annual Santa Cruz trip for a while so our schedules were a little freer. Of course, we've been really looking forward to it, but as the day approached, the weather reports were grim. Still, I love Santa Cruz and was looking forward to going. Sure, a little rain might mean no beach time, but there's still lots of great stuff to do. Of course, on Friday morning as we left, it was about 65 and sunny in Sacramento, and we were sure we were headed into a pouring rain.
We weren't. Santa Cruz was gorgeous. We dropped our things off in the hotel and went directly to Natural Bridges State Beach. We started by going down the trail to the butterfly migration stop, knowing that it was past migration time, yet still hopeful. Well, it wasn't as swarming with Monarchs as it sometimes is, but we saw a few, and it was a really lovely, clear day.
We then went into the visitor's center. (I know, the beach lust was killing me, but I also kind of like building up the suspense!) There, we found some beautiful posters, one of which Sweetie bought and I'll have framed. The ranger was really friendly and showed us around. She recommended a book to Sweetie that he bought, and I think it was a hit, as he kept reading me lines from it all evening.
Finally we went down to the beach. We ran in the surf just a bit (taking turns, as Zadie would NOT go near it -- she told us it freaked her out). We rolled down hills, buried her, watched someone fly a kite, and just enjoyed the sunshine.
We showered the sand off, then went to Saturn Cafe for dinner. We walked around downtown a bit and bought some things in the bookstore, then retired. Sweetie bought me two books for my birthday.
The next morning, we went to Cafe Brasil. I can hardly describe how much I love the dish gallo pinto. There's a rice pilaf with beans, warm tortillas, fried plantains (both sweetly ripe and starchily unripe), and scrambled eggs with a vinegar-y sauce. It's practically every flavor and texture, but they go so well together...
When we left, it was raining, so we grabbed coffees, then headed to Seymour Marine Research Center. It's such a great place for kids. It's like the Monterey Bay Aquarium writ small. It's cheaper, smaller, and requires very little attention span. Plus, it's crawling with helpful docents. I love their little gift shop, too, where I got two pieces of jewelry (one a birthday present from Sweetie).
(Zadie got a treat, too -- this is Bonny Lily Bogginsons, her new turtle.)
We then did some shopping downtown. The rain had cleared up, and it was nice again. We split up a bit so each of us could shop alone for a while. I found a great dress, some stationery, some socks, and I can't recall what-all else. Stickers, I think.
I wanted to stop by Bonny Doon winery's tasting room, which used to be a ways down the Cabrillo highway. I looked it up to check the hours, but as it happens, it had moved... to right around the corner from our hotel! We went there, and we found that there was a whole bunch of stuff -- a natural food store, a French bakery, a vintage clothes shop -- so after I did my tasting, we looked around a bit more. It was a bit of a funny feeling, because that area is right off the path I used to take when visiting friends and walking to the beach, yet it wasn't there when my friends lived there. It's a whole new bit of Santa Cruz that I know and they probably don't.
That evening, we stopped at Donnelly's chocolates, a place we hadn't noticed before, but that boasted that it was voted among the top ten chocolates in the world by National Geographic. Inside, the room was quite small and there were already three people crammed in. We peeked around as best we could and found dark chocolate with chipotle, Chinese five spice, rose, lavender, sea salt, and more. Reza bought nine of the fancy chocolate bars for me as a birthday present (and if you haven't noticed yet, I am miles beyond spoiled by this man).
We were next door to Vasili's, which is a Greek restaurant I like. I ordered too much -- we shared an appetizer as well as the vegetarian plate, so there was salad, tzaziki, dolmas, veggies, rice, feta... I had skordalia on the side, which is a garlicky potato dip. It was served with two warm, fresh pitas. It was starch dipped in starch. It made me think of the meme of Xzibit saying "Yo, dawg, I heard you like Facebook, so we put a Facebook in your Facebook so you can Facebook while you Facebook."
I am the only one who will get this.
Finally, we got Z and Sweetie both Slurpees, and we turned in. Sweetie would want me to mention that getting Z to bed was an absolute horrorshow both nights.
On Sunday morning, it was lovely again. We tried out the French bakery, and it was good. We only tried bread and coffee, but their other pastries looked good, and I'd love to try them sometime.
Honestly, I was feeling sad about leaving, and I wanted to see the ocean just once more. We went back to the beach, but there was a marathon or something blocking the road. We parked, but Sweetie was over it and decided to stay in the car. Z and I took a walk around the beach, but the tide was really high, so we didn't venture close to the water.
Finally, we hit the road.
We made it almost all the way home before I (really!) needed to pee. We were in Vacaville, and I (okay, fine) wanted to stop at the Nut Tree and see what it's like now. We used the restroom in Peet's, but then we checked out the kids' attractions, too. Obviously, it's not the Nut Tree that lives in my nostalgia, but it was fun anyway. I have really fond memories of that place, so it was nice to see some of the old stuff still there.
And then today, I used my birthday gift certificate to Green Acres to buy some more plants! We did some gardening, and now I've got yogurt... yogurting. It's been a lovely break so far.
We weren't. Santa Cruz was gorgeous. We dropped our things off in the hotel and went directly to Natural Bridges State Beach. We started by going down the trail to the butterfly migration stop, knowing that it was past migration time, yet still hopeful. Well, it wasn't as swarming with Monarchs as it sometimes is, but we saw a few, and it was a really lovely, clear day.
We then went into the visitor's center. (I know, the beach lust was killing me, but I also kind of like building up the suspense!) There, we found some beautiful posters, one of which Sweetie bought and I'll have framed. The ranger was really friendly and showed us around. She recommended a book to Sweetie that he bought, and I think it was a hit, as he kept reading me lines from it all evening.
Finally we went down to the beach. We ran in the surf just a bit (taking turns, as Zadie would NOT go near it -- she told us it freaked her out). We rolled down hills, buried her, watched someone fly a kite, and just enjoyed the sunshine.
We showered the sand off, then went to Saturn Cafe for dinner. We walked around downtown a bit and bought some things in the bookstore, then retired. Sweetie bought me two books for my birthday.
The next morning, we went to Cafe Brasil. I can hardly describe how much I love the dish gallo pinto. There's a rice pilaf with beans, warm tortillas, fried plantains (both sweetly ripe and starchily unripe), and scrambled eggs with a vinegar-y sauce. It's practically every flavor and texture, but they go so well together...
When we left, it was raining, so we grabbed coffees, then headed to Seymour Marine Research Center. It's such a great place for kids. It's like the Monterey Bay Aquarium writ small. It's cheaper, smaller, and requires very little attention span. Plus, it's crawling with helpful docents. I love their little gift shop, too, where I got two pieces of jewelry (one a birthday present from Sweetie).
(Zadie got a treat, too -- this is Bonny Lily Bogginsons, her new turtle.)
We then did some shopping downtown. The rain had cleared up, and it was nice again. We split up a bit so each of us could shop alone for a while. I found a great dress, some stationery, some socks, and I can't recall what-all else. Stickers, I think.
I wanted to stop by Bonny Doon winery's tasting room, which used to be a ways down the Cabrillo highway. I looked it up to check the hours, but as it happens, it had moved... to right around the corner from our hotel! We went there, and we found that there was a whole bunch of stuff -- a natural food store, a French bakery, a vintage clothes shop -- so after I did my tasting, we looked around a bit more. It was a bit of a funny feeling, because that area is right off the path I used to take when visiting friends and walking to the beach, yet it wasn't there when my friends lived there. It's a whole new bit of Santa Cruz that I know and they probably don't.
That evening, we stopped at Donnelly's chocolates, a place we hadn't noticed before, but that boasted that it was voted among the top ten chocolates in the world by National Geographic. Inside, the room was quite small and there were already three people crammed in. We peeked around as best we could and found dark chocolate with chipotle, Chinese five spice, rose, lavender, sea salt, and more. Reza bought nine of the fancy chocolate bars for me as a birthday present (and if you haven't noticed yet, I am miles beyond spoiled by this man).
We were next door to Vasili's, which is a Greek restaurant I like. I ordered too much -- we shared an appetizer as well as the vegetarian plate, so there was salad, tzaziki, dolmas, veggies, rice, feta... I had skordalia on the side, which is a garlicky potato dip. It was served with two warm, fresh pitas. It was starch dipped in starch. It made me think of the meme of Xzibit saying "Yo, dawg, I heard you like Facebook, so we put a Facebook in your Facebook so you can Facebook while you Facebook."
I am the only one who will get this.
Finally, we got Z and Sweetie both Slurpees, and we turned in. Sweetie would want me to mention that getting Z to bed was an absolute horrorshow both nights.
On Sunday morning, it was lovely again. We tried out the French bakery, and it was good. We only tried bread and coffee, but their other pastries looked good, and I'd love to try them sometime.
Honestly, I was feeling sad about leaving, and I wanted to see the ocean just once more. We went back to the beach, but there was a marathon or something blocking the road. We parked, but Sweetie was over it and decided to stay in the car. Z and I took a walk around the beach, but the tide was really high, so we didn't venture close to the water.
Finally, we hit the road.
We made it almost all the way home before I (really!) needed to pee. We were in Vacaville, and I (okay, fine) wanted to stop at the Nut Tree and see what it's like now. We used the restroom in Peet's, but then we checked out the kids' attractions, too. Obviously, it's not the Nut Tree that lives in my nostalgia, but it was fun anyway. I have really fond memories of that place, so it was nice to see some of the old stuff still there.
And then today, I used my birthday gift certificate to Green Acres to buy some more plants! We did some gardening, and now I've got yogurt... yogurting. It's been a lovely break so far.
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