Spring - kinda

It’s *kinda* spring around here, finally - it seems like the sun hasn’t been out since Thanksgiving. The blooms have started to tentatively appear - a process that usually starts in January but has been delayed by endless rainstorms and historical cold. While it’s easy to fall into the “I’ve never seen it this cold/hot” when in fact you have, every year, trope, my natural gas bills tell me that yes, this has been an especially sucky winter in Southern California. I have a pre-set limit of $250 on my monthly gas bill, after which I’m alerted, and it’s been more than double, sometimes triple that amount for four months. 

Now that the gauntlet that was March is nearly over, it’s time to look ahead - in two days we leave for Kauai, and I can’t wait. I hope it’s better than our Christmas Maui trip that was fraught with anxiety. That’s all I remember about that trip. Hopefully this one will be more chill, with less covid issues. When we return I have to buckle down on getting my website updated and preparing to open for registration on May 1st. It’s funny, I feel like no matter which way it goes in May, I’ll be stressed out - if I get a normal amount of people, I’ll be freaked out that I didn’t get more since covid has receded and it’s my 25th anniversary; if I get a lot, I’ll be freaked out that we’ll be oversold and there won’t be enough rooms at the hotel. There’s just no pleasing some people. 

As it’s just about April and the last I heard from our neighbor contractor is that he had planned to be out there to work on our place in mid-March and he never actually did, I think it’s safe to assume that the outhouse is all we’re going to get out of him this year, which bums me out spectacularly. It’s possible he’ll be able to pull it out for us in his last few days in town like he did last year, but I’m not going to hold my breath. I messaged a woman who was advertising her contractor husband on a community group page. I’m going to guess he’ll be too expensive, or I’ll never hear from them. If we could just get windows, walls, and insulation in there, there’d be so much we could do - it would be life changing as far as our lifestyle out there. It seems so simple and yet it’s been so impossible. I’ve now owned this place for two years. No regrets, but jeez. 

Hopefully all will go well and we’ll get to Kauai all right (I still expect covid to ruin our plans, something to go wrong), we stay safe while there, and manage to get some quality family time in for spring break before returning to the last two months of school. And my event opening, which starts a whole new chapter. Here’s hoping.

This one goes to eleven

Bobby turned 11 today. Like most parents of kids this age, my constant worry is, when does “it” start happening - the attitude, the rebellion, the return to the toddler years of frustration and misery? Right now Bobby is a sweet, obedient boy. Are the hormones that will make him into a snotty terror currently poised and waiting to surge, like bats in a sewer pipe at sundown? 

OR will our kids be different, because we actually listen to them, don’t make stupid and arbitrary rules just because we can, and we’ve fostered an environment of mutual respect and kindness? I think of myself at his age, alone in a studio apartment with an unreliable mother who three years later would set me off (for the most part) on my own, then when I stayed out all night in Washington Square Park at fourteen would attempt to set some rules and boundaries from a distance, which I found patently ridiculous and which I demonstrated by walking away from her when she was mid-sentence on a New York street, my men’s 1950’s gabardine jacket flapping in the wind. I still bristle at people attempting to tell me what to do. Yet another reason I consider myself unemployable. But I digress.

Bobby is eleven, which means puberty is around the corner, which means an end forever to certain things - his sweet little falsetto of a singing voice, his being shorter than me, his clear skin (sorry, kid, it happens to the best of us - maybe there are better treatments now than in the 80s), his being relatively odor-free. I dread the next phases, but I welcome them, too. I’m interested to see what kind of a person he becomes, what hobbies and interests he gravitates towards as he moves beyond elementary school, what his first relationships will look like. 

I’ve accepted that for several years I will live in this tiny house with three sweating, stinking men who break things just by looking at them and fill my fridge with dead animals and make loud, sudden noises. This is rapidly becoming my reality, and will remain as such until about 2032. And then just like that my house and I will return to our original state. The male energy will fade away as they move on and out. It’s odd to think about, but this whole raising kids thing is only temporary, and for me, in its entirety, will still only take half the time my life leading up to having children took. To say this time with them is just a blip isn’t all that inaccurate.

And so we plot the vacations and lean in to the school involvement and try to be present mentally and physically as much as we can, while also leaving space for our inadequacies and insufficiencies, knowing that these kids will still love us fiercely even as we fiercely loved our own inadequate parents whether they deserved it or not.

The birthday gauntlet

We are nearly done with the March birthday gauntlet with the completion of Bobby’s birthday party yesterday. His actual birthday is Friday, which will entail my driving to Santa Monica to get him a cookie puss cake from California’s only Carvel, getting and delivering birthday donuts again, wrapping his presents, and having a little party for him that night. That’s the fun part.

His big party yesterday went well - twelve of the fourteen kids he invited came, and I ran “back of house” dealing with the venue and making sure things were organized and happened on time, while I sent the H to dispense arcade game tokens (I spent $80 on this) and round up kids for their two laser tag games. I had ordered four pizzas, but the kids ate *maybe* half of one. They were too busy playing the arcade games. We barely made it through cake time before they rushed off to play more games. Theo had a complete meltdown because everyone ganged up on him during laser tag. No parents hung around. This is a big shift from the old days - we’re now in the “drop off” party phase. This also means you don’t get to know the parents at all, which is kind of a bummer. But it is what it is. I long ago gave up the dream of making any lasting friendships from the parents at this school. 

Despite Theo’s sad moment, both boys had a blast and were tuned to an 11 all night from the excitement and sugar. It was extremely difficult getting them to bed last night. I shame-ate four cupcakes. How’s my diet going? It’s not. Thanks for asking.

I wonder how much longer the kids will want big parties. It occurred to me yesterday that kids do outgrow these - next year Bobby is twelve, then the year after he’ll be in a new school…the big rental venue parties may soon be behind us. My wallet will be happy - I probably spent $1500 between the two, which makes me cringe just thinking about it.

I came home and lay in bed in a dark room for a while after the party last night. This is going to be a weird week - kids are at school today, but tomorrow through Thursday the district school support workers are going on strike. The strike could still be averted at the last minute, of course, but it’s so unlikely that the teachers have prepared a work packet the kids will bring home today. It’s giving me covid shut down flashbacks. The difference here is we know an end point. Personally I’m going to love not having to get up in the morning, the thing I loathe. It’s also going to pour rain most of that time, so I’m looking forward to being cozy at home. I have a lot of web stuff to do so it’ll be the perfect time to just hang out at home, all of us, and do that.

So hopefully this week will be broken up by the novelty of those three days off, then next week it’s just three days of school before we head to Hawaii. Most of the difficult things this month are behind me so I feel like I’m on a bit of a downhill journey now. 

The planned Grand Canyon trip this summer has fallen apart due to busy work schedules, so now I’m attempting to plot an alternative. I’m thinking this may be a good time to try our hand at boondocking. I’d like to rent a camper van and figure out an itinerary that involves some free dispersed camping. One thing I’m discovering, though, is most of the places I’m most interested in are not suitable in the summer - Trona pinnacles, Red Rock Canyon state park, etc. I don’t know why my interests always head east to the desert, but they just do. I’d like to head into Arizona and Utah again, even New Mexico - but the mileage! That would kill me money wise unless I find a rental with unlimited miles. When we did our Death Valley RV trip I spent about $700 on excess miles. Ugh. I know I need to consider heading north - Big Sur, Sequoia National Park, etc…but those areas just don’t interest me because they’re just too popular. I can’t imagine finding any spots at this late date. But I’ll continue to research because that’s what I do best. I’ll put something cool together for us. 

Rainy days and Mondays

Today I take Theo to get scanned for his upcoming Invisalign treatment. The trays should be ready for him to start by end of April. Surprisingly he’s excited for this process. I think it helps that a friend at school also has Invisalign. I’ve tried to explain to him that this is going to change his life pretty significantly - he won’t be able to just graze all day, he’ll have to brush his teeth a lot, and he can’t lose these trays. Also, that the first couple of days of each tray can be quite painful. He seems unperturbed. I’m skeptical he’ll be able to keep up with this. Still, it’s more likely he’ll follow the rules with this than 16 hours a day in headgear, so there’s that. And this is only ten months. He’ll be done before he turns ten. Then we can do nothing for a couple of years. I can live with that.

The birthday donuts did, in fact, get delivered to his class, and unsurprisingly nobody ate the gluten free ones. But they were a hit, hooray. Next up, Bobby’s laser tag birthday on Sunday followed by birthday donuts for him on Friday. Now at least I’ll know where to go. 

It’s been a very stressful week. I got news that my room block at my hotel is almost sold out - I only have about seventy rooms left. Which means I may find myself launching on May 1st only to have to tell all my attendees, “sorry, hotel is sold out!” which would be an absolute disaster. With nowhere else to turn I left a message for my contact there yesterday, figuring all I can do is ask for suggestions. If the hotel can’t or won’t give me more rooms, what do they suggest I do?? Nobody has called me back.

I also got news that a NYE event that’s been floundering for a few years that I was hoping to take over is most likely being bought by the person who swore he wouldn’t buy it. 99% sure he’s buying it, I was told. Sigh. So my dreams of putting on an amazing kick ass NYE event that could save my ass financially have been dashed. Unless he suddenly passes, or runs it for a year or two and then quits, I’m out. I’m still licking my wounds over that one.

I have spent countless hours setting up my registration system and schedule on the new system, and I love it. I don’t entirely understand all of the features, but we’re zooming again tomorrow so I can ask any lingering questions and make absolutely sure I know it inside and out. I’m just praying this system works as well as it looks like it should.

Happy 9th birthday to Theo!

Today Theo is nine. The last couple of days it was hard not to think about what remains of his birth story - thankfully I have a full record here! But off the top of my head, these are the things I remember:

Having intermittent contractions, sitting on the couch in my blue/green dress (what happened to that?) with my sister and debating on if I should go to the hospital. Going to the hospital and being turned away, only to be granted a reprieve by a kind nurse who told me to hang out in the waiting room and see if anything changed…and shortly thereafter things did change indeed and I was in agony. Calling the midwife who tried to talk me out of an epidural. Hours of agony. Pushing taking too long and being way more difficult than with Bobby. Squeezing my eyes tight as he was coming out and the midwife saying, “Hilary, open your eyes, your baby is being born!” And seeing him with his dark hair and eyes looking nothing like Bobby and cradling him and telling him he was going to be his own person and do things his own way. Boy has this been true! Theo is a fierce individualist who, despite his worship of his older brother, never shied away from stating his opinion and being different. I think this is an excellent quality. He’s not a follower. I think this will serve him well in life.

Yesterday’s birthday party went about as I expected - only one kid showed up, and one other to drop a present before heading to another party. Thankfully, it was at a packed and chaotic skating rink, so the boys were off skating the whole time and never really noticed or cared that no one else was there. Theo said it was a great party. So he was unaffected, which was my biggest concern. I, however, am mildly traumatized by it. It’s his first stand-alone party ever, and this is how it went. One and a half kids. I never should have relied on him to just invite who he wanted (he only invited six kids), and I shouldn’t have relied on those kids to pass the invites on to their parents, who I had no way of following up with. But looking back, I don’t know how I could have done it differently; again, I have no way of getting in touch with the parents. He mostly invited kids not in his class, so using the class contact list wouldn’t have helped (I asked the room rep to send it to me but they never did), and even though I gave him a worksheet to ask the kids who hadn’t rsvp’d and make a note if they were coming or not, and they all said they were coming, none of them did. I blame the pandemic. These kids only got part of a year in kindergarten and then were out of school for more than a year, and even for the year after that nobody was socializing or having parties. So all of that important bonding time, getting phone numbers, learning parents’ names, etc, never happened. Bobby on the other hand invited fifteen kids to his party next weekend and I’ve heard from almost all of them that they’re coming. So I’m not sure how to fix this. I don’t know if I can make them have one big party again for at least another year or two…or have Theo do an activity with a few friends rather than try to do a big party. Or try to scramble to get parents’ numbers over the next year. I don’t know. But I’m sure as hell not paying $600 for two kids to skate for a couple of hours ever again, I can tell you that. 

To add to the birthday stress, today I did something I’ve never done before which is buy birthday treats for Theo’s whole class. He requested donuts, and I emailed his teacher to ask how it worked. She said I have to get vegan and gluten-free options, and that I should leave them in the school office. So I went to a place that said they had gluten free donuts only to discover that in fact they did not, then sat in the parking lot and called three other places that Yelp says carry gluten free donuts only to discover that none of them do; finally I found an obscure hippie coffee shop that did, but only in weird non-kid friendly flavors like coffee frosted and hibiscus; I bought the least offensive ones I could find and high-tailed it up to the school. When I got to the office they seemed confused by my offering and asked if someone was going to come get them; I said I’d asked the teacher and she said to leave them there. Now I’m second guessing that conversation and am very concerned that the donuts never made it to the classroom. I wouldn’t be surprised. I’ve pretty much accepted that everything having to do with Theo’s birthday this year is going to be a bit of a fail. Hey, it can’t possibly be worse than 2020 when school closed for covid on his birthday and I made the worst doorstop of a cake for him that night and we all went to bed terrified of the coming plague that would ruin our lives for years to come. Can’t be worse than that…right??

End of eight

I asked Theo how he felt about having only a few days left of being eight, and as is typical of an eight-year-old, he just shrugged. I’m so focused on the future so much of the time that I often forget to stop and remember just how little these kids still are. I still, in this moment, have a third grader with messy handwriting who can’t really do a lot for himself. While he’s clearly an intelligent boy with good problem solving skills and a wicked sense of humor, this doesn’t mean he can make himself breakfast. Like all parents I worry I’m not doing enough to prepare him for the world - I’m not teaching him important skills, he’s had it too easy, when he goes into the real world he won’t know how to cope. This is what I think about as I drive home from dropping them at school.

Bobby told me on the way home from school yesterday that one of his friend’s dad died. I don’t know this kid, but he’s invited to B’s party weekend after next. I asked what Bobby said to him, and he said he didn’t know what to say. I told him in future the best thing to say under those circumstances is “I’m sorry”. Later that night I got a call from a woman who’s name I recognized but who I also don’t really know who assumed I know this family asking if I wanted to be part of a meal train for the family; I of course had to say yes, but it’s all a bit awkward since I don’t know any of these people. I blame the pandemic for causing this alienation. The poor kid. I don’t know any details but it sounds unexpected. These are scenarios that keep me up at night.

It’s time for me to lean back in to things I’ve neglected since traveling plus sickness for a week - my work, my diet, finding a new place to do yoga - and I’m struggling. Yesterday I took more than one nap. I just felt so worn out and figured nothing had to get done that very moment, so hey, fuck it. I’m playing my usual game of menopause or lack of discipline? Which is it today? Still no period. Nausea is gone, but I have not been able to implement healthy eating habits again. I feel all discombobulated and disorganized. I take care of the most essential items - kids to school, dinner on the table, dishes washed, homework done, teeth brushed and flossed, bills paid on time, but everything else…? Meh. 

As often happens when I don’t want to do the task at hand, I’ve allowed myself free reign to fantasize about other future projects, one that will happen for sure and one that can only happen if certain elements fall into place. The first is, in light of the fact that I can’t seem to go to Mexico without returning violently ill, I’ve decided we will not all do a big Mexico resort trip this summer. Also, I can’t afford it. We’ve decided to forge ahead with a Grand Canyon trip with the sister, brother in law, and brother in law’s nephew’s family instead. We’re doing a zoom meeting this weekend to sort out details. Since I don’t know the nephew’s family’s tolerance for hippie bullshit (they have a young boy and a toddler so I’m thinking probably not much) I’ve researched and put together a variety of scenarios for us - one in which we stay at a hippie campground, and others in which we stay at silly western-style resorts with Conestoga wagons and things like that that are always amusing. More than half of our group is Brazilian so I figure they’d get a kick out of that extreme Americana stuff. The timing is a bit tight between the boys’ sleepaway camp and the nephew’s wife needing to leave on a business trip, but I’m hoping to squeeze in a Lake Havasu houseboat trip as well. It’s always been a dream of mine to rent a houseboat, and Lake Havasu is nice and full (unlike Lake Powell) and shockingly has boats available. I want to nail all this down asap. I for one am delighted to do another Arizona road trip. There’s so much cool stuff to see and do there. I only wish we had more time. 

My other idea is predicated on the one big new year’s dance camp ceasing to exist, which looks like it may happen. The event was struggling for a few years anyway, then was sold right before the pandemic, then has just not recovered since, and apparently is looking for a buyer. At first I considered throwing my hat in the ring, but then had to remind myself I have no money. Also, I have no interest in running the event as it’s been run, which would be the expectation. My only wish would be to retain their stellar music program, which was the main draw of the event which they sadly had to chip away at as the money stopped flowing. So it occurred to me that, if the event does not find a buyer and ceases to exist, I should just do my own new year’s event, utilizing the same musical talent and picking up that torch to keep the legacy projects going that otherwise would die without a home. I’m thinking Palm Springs, big resort, only music and dancing, no classes or contests, just fun social dancing through the new year. I really think it could work. And it would be easy for me because my bandleader and another guy would arrange the music program, I would only do administrative stuff which would be considerably less than my other event. And the best thing is, at least initially, I wouldn’t have to make a huge amount of money off it. Sounds great, right? Well, again, the only sticking point is not going up against this other event. I would never do anything to try to shut them down if they want to keep going. We all know each other, so it’s important to respect each other’s space. But I really think this could be a good thing. I’m going to have a zoom with my bandleader and the other bandleader I’d need to make this happen sometime in the next couple of weeks. I have no idea what to expect - I just want to put it out there that I’m thinking of doing this if new year’s opens up, and get an idea of costs so I can come up with some kind of budget. I see an opportunity here - it’s been nearly twenty years since there wasn’t a big new year’s event in the US - and I want to make sure I grab it while I can.

Mitzvah accomplished

We had our celebration of life for our friend Jean yesterday and it was absolutely perfect - befitting of the queen that she was. Everything looked beautiful and the speakers had just the right combination of humor and tears. I spoke second and broke down in the middle. I’m quite proud of that, since I have a bad habit of disassociating under very emotional public settings. I sang “We’ll Meet Again” and everyone joined in. There was lots of tears and laughter. It was an absolute delight.

The family never thanked us and one faction gave me the side eye the whole time after an extremely frosty reception. Fuck family. 

For the first time after a week, today I no longer feel nauseated. Coincidence? I think not. I still don’t have my period, which puts me about twelve days late. 

Now that the hugeness of this is behind us, it’s time to pick up the slack on my own event which has been completely ignored once the scramble to find a new registration system was over. I need to start setting that up, getting classes in order, and making sure everyone is hired. The event opening is still two months off but there’s a lot to do.

I got a second opinion on the boys’ orthodonture options, and boy am I glad I did (thank you so much Chryssa for the idea!). The new place, gotten from a local mom’s group, had a much more “let’s wait and see” attitude, which to me as a layperson makes more sense. While they agreed Theo’s buck teeth need to be addressed now, they understood my hesitance about full head gear for 16 hours a day. The orthodontist said she wouldn’t choose that for her kid because she knows he wouldn’t tolerate it, and that’s my feeling. There’s no point in setting up that treatment just to fail in implementing it. So her recommendation for him was Invisalign for ten months. It won’t change the shape of his skull like headgear would, but will at least redirect his protruding teeth. For Bobby she felt there was no need to do anything now - he still has too many baby teeth. She wants to observe him but says really neither kid should have braces until at least twelve or thirteen. Again, this was more my thought - why put braces on now just to have to do it all over again in their teen years…? And also, doesn’t nature mostly resolve these teeth placement issues? Why not wait to see what happens and then if you’re so unhappy with your crooked teeth, make adjustments later? 

So the Invisalign is not cheap, and I’m worried about Theo being responsible with it, but I think it’s the way to go. And his Invisalign alone is cheaper than headgear plus braces for Bobby. And the treatment time is about half. Everyone may still need braces but at least I get to punt that down the road a few years. 

I had a worst case scenario with my tax appointment, unfortunately. I owed a bunch of money, mostly because that California grant I got was taxable, which I knew. I was able to offset my money owed by making a big contribution to my 401k, but that means even less money in my bank, so now I do not have enough to make it to my registration opening. I’ll have to borrow from savings to make it through my end of April payroll and mortgage, and then just pay myself back. And I thought I’d have a surplus this year. What a fool I was. I’m still struggling with the disappointment over that. 

Things going on

While my situation with the friend’s memorial service has not improved (it’s actually gotten worse, in some ways), the good news is it’s happening this Saturday which means it’s almost over and I’ll never have to deal with it again. And no matter what, my friend and I made a wonderful thing happen - finding a place for our dear old lady friend’s ashes to rest - that wouldn’t have happened otherwise. We’ve done our mitzvah, and I’m quite proud of that. 

I went on my Cancún trip with my friends last week. There was a huge amount of anxiety going into it - would one of us catch covid before, forget our passports, would my friend with the soon-expiring passport be denied entry, etc etc - but everything went smooth as silk. We had some food snafus - one night we were barely able to get dinner - and a particularly horrific experience one day while snorkeling. One friend got seasick, which soon bizarrely blossomed into a full-blown panic attack and collapse. The medics were called and put her on oxygen and she slowly recovered, but it was some time before she regained feeling in her limbs. It’s just fascinating - and scary - how our bodies handle panic. I’d never known her to have episodes like this; but interestingly just the night before we were chatting about bad dentist experiences and she mentioned a time when she panicked during a wisdom tooth extraction and started hyperventilating and lost feeling in her extremities and they had to bring in oxygen. The same thing happened on the boat. It made me grateful that, despite my long and tortured history with panic episodes, mine never end up in passing out and not feeling my hands or feet. A little throat closing doesn’t sound so bad, in retrospect.

The cruel finger of fate was not done with us, however. On our way home at a long layover at the Mexico City airport I suddenly started to feel nauseated, and right before we boarded the plane I vomited spectacularly in a garbage can in front of my (now wary) fellow passengers. Then was a torturous 4 1/2 hour flight back to freezing Los Angeles in which I felt like I was going to throw up every three seconds but didn’t. Apparently my body saved it for when I got home. Echoes of Fiji. I tested for covid as soon as I walked in the door and have been testing every day since - both me and my friends are still negative. They also never got sick. I’m now on day five of feeling like low-key garbage; I’m still, infuriatingly, nauseated, and not fully able to function. I’ve been dragging myself up to get kids to school and back and fed and put to bed, but otherwise I’m in bed feeling gross. Laundry isn’t done, showers haven’t been had, there’s no food in the house. It’s a mess. 

Oh, and my period is late. Coincidence…? Ha ha, yes. Remember, husband was snipped years ago, and I am nearing 51. There is literally zero chance I could be pregnant, but just for entertainment purposes I allowed myself to think about the bizarreness of being thrown back into that world at my age, how much I’ve left the whole conception/birth/baby world behind me now. I don’t remember a lot about those days, certainly not things I’d need to know, like walking back days to see when I may have ovulated, what you do first when you find out you’re pregnant, when certain tests are…who remembers this stuff? This is all a decade away for me now. And the reality of a pregnancy at my age is actually quite dark; most likely scenario is it would just quietly go away in a few days; second, it would not-so-quietly go away and I’d have to get a D&C (yay California for protecting abortion rights), third, even if the pregnancy continued, the odds of having a healthy, viable baby would be almost nil, my life-long vegetarianism and abstention from alcohol be damned. So, there’s no happy endings here. 

Most likely I got food poisoning, got a bacteria of some kind, contracted norovirus, and just have to work it out of my system. And the period? Put off by illness or travel or just a quirk of entering menopause. But it’s fun to fantasize sometimes, even if it’s about something you don’t actually want.