Well, it's February. We're three weeks into the new U.S. regime, which is an unmitigated disaster that fills me with rage. So let's talk about something else!
Zadie is doing pretty well in school, although she missed two days this week for pretty spurious reasons. She just did a how-to talk about how to make a lanyard, and this month's project is a biography. She's doing it on Michelle Yeoh (the actress who rose to fame in martial arts films). She still spends a lot of time with the younger neighbor girl, which is nice. I know where she is, who she's with, and what she's doing, but she's entertained.
She's starting to ask for a little more privacy -- closing the door to her room and such. And I notice she's been reading a lot of the American Girl books I've gotten her on how to take care of her body and deal with social situations. She has asked for a bra, and although there's no *physical* reason to, I'll probably grab her a couple sports bras on her birthday. If nothing else, she can wear them under her karate gi to prevent chafing.
Lochlan is growing and changing, too. In the last couple months, he rapidly grew taller, so that his pudgy baby belly stretched out, and he's now a lean and lanky little boy. He is such a helper: he loves to stand on his "learning tower" in the kitchen and help me make dinner. He likes to pick tangerines off our tree. He will take his plate to the kitchen after dinner.
He's as sweet as ever, only where it was all physical once -- pats, hugs, kisses -- now it's kind words, too. A few days ago he said "You're a good grandma" to my mom. She said he was a good grandson, and he answered, "I am!" He tells us he loves us, blows kisses, says "thank you" and "I'm sorry." If I gather him up to put his jammies on, he'll tell me, "I need a story from my daddy." When I'm done singing him songs at night, he'll wrap one arm around my neck and announce, "I grabbed you! So you can't go away."
His burn from November is all healed, and he doesn't have to go back to the doctors about it anymore. He does have a pretty big, raspberry-colored scar on his upper arm (maybe the size of a half-dollar). We massage it with oil (they said it would help it heal), and he likes to get the oil on his finger and do some, too. The less-severe burns on his hip and ribcage are all but invisible, but the upper arm is kind of ropy and keloidy, and I suspect it'll be around for a long time. But healed! Healed is good!
We're getting close to the end of nursing (I know -- he's old. Don't care.) Some days we don't nurse at all. Once in a while he'll still get two sessions in. But I decided we were close enough that I could go see about medication for my (self-diagnosed) ADHD. I'm only telling you this because there's a punchline coming. I went to the doctor's office, got my paperwork, and sat down (it's a drop-in clinic). About 20 minutes later, someone said, "Any new intake patients here?" About five of us walked up, and she announced it would be 2 1/2 hours before we were likely to be seen. So we could stay, or we could go and just bring our paperwork back next time. I was thinking to myself, "I'm here to be evaluated for ADHD, and my choices are to wait in a room for two and a half hours or keep track of paperwork? I mean... isn't the look of panic on my face right now enough to call it a diagnosis?" Anyway, the paperwork is in my glovebox. [So if I text you and ask if you've seen it, please tell me it's in the glovebox.]
Two other changes around here. First, I was fucking sick and tired to death of the cats. They expelled every kind of waste in every kind of place. One of them was aggressive toward Lochlan (and regularly swiped food from him). They'd dig food waste out of the garbage, making a mess all over. They had fleas (I don't even know how they got them! They were indoor cats!) that wouldn't respond to any type of medication, powder, or treatment (and I spent hundreds of dollars), and the fleas were eating Lochie alive. I weighed all my options, trying to balance being humane with not losing my everloving mind. So now they are outdoor cats. They basically just live on the back porch, and we feed them, and they have a comfy pillow fort, and all seems to be well. It is WONDERFUL not to have to step in cat vomit, let me tell you.
And on the clean-house front, we've been talking for ages about whether we could afford someone to come in and clean. It seemed indulgent. It seemed expensive. It seemed silly. But right when we were talking about it again, my grandma moved. She had a house cleaner my aunt had recommended, and with Grandma's move, I realized this woman may have an opening in her schedule for us. So we hired her. It's been terrific! She does a lot of stuff that we rarely had time to do, like scrub the bathtub. And she does stuff that we do have time for, which frees up our time for other stuff. So it's both given me time and inspired me to organize a bit, de-clutter, repair some things, etc. Sweetie was noting that since she's been coming, we've both been doing a better job of keeping it maintained. It's like there's a baseline cleanliness, and we're stepping our maintenance efforts up to keep it at that baseline. Our house has never been filthy, but definitely cluttered, and there were some things that went neglected. But it's getting better, and it feels better. Maybe it is indulgent, but it's worth it.
All for now. Take care.
CM