Tag: uncategorized

I learned something today.

I learned that it’s all very well for me to sit here in my semi-comfortable chair, pontificating about what’s wrong with this and what’s wrong with that.  But you know what?  That’s the easy way out.  Everyone can point out the problem, but no one wants to come up with the solution.

Well, that changes today.   The people have spoken.  We want a fun, child-pleasing program that will draw the kids in.  We want social consciousness.  We want empowerment of the weak and we want community invovlement.  We want non-profit, we want music and razzle dazzle.  And we want, I guess, for some reason, pandas.

Well, my friends, HERE.  YOU.  GO.

You are very welcome.  As I’ve said before, I’m basically a healer.

1.  Today, I offered cash to my 13-year-old daughter if she would please, please let me braid up her long, thick, wavy mane of hair, which she has been wearing down  (or even down and topped with a knit cap!) all summer.  When she heard the dollar amount, she looked startled, and then offered to let me do it for free.  Therein beats a human heart after all!

2.  The kids have been staying cool by eating ice cubes,wearing as few clothes as they can get away with, according to their station in life; and lying on their necks, gaping vacantly at reruns of Star Trek.  Star Trek is already nearly unwatchable to me, but the sight of those skin-tight polyester turtlenecks makes me want to put a pickaxe through the TV screen.

3.  When it’s very hot, the sticky, crumby, chaotic, sloppy piles of random belongings that we call a home, and which I normally find extremely tolerable and ignorable, make me INSANE.  And so, on the very days when I know I ought to be putting my feet up and drinking lots of fluids and conserving physical and emotional energy, I find myself scrambling around cleaning inside cabinets, under the oven, and around the dials on the washing machine.  This does not help.  But I can’t help it.

4.  You may recall that our house has a hose problem.  We now have a way of hooking up the hose, but I think our well tank was designed for an older, simpler time, when people were made out of paper, and didn’t consider large quantities of water something to be grasped at.

Being a mature and responsible homeowner, I have responded to the problem by deciding I really don’t care when we run out of water.

What happens is I let the kids use the hose, and I sit down to check out Facebook.  Eventually I try to do dishes or something, and discover that the water has run out.  I say, “Dammit,” and go back and check Facebook for a while.  The kids run in and out of the house as they play in the muddy grass, and I greet them with a motherly, “AGH, no hugs, get away from me, you’re all wet!  Get out, get out!  Look what you’re doing to the floor!”  (I’m pretty sure they know this means, “I love you.”)  Then I tell the kids it’s too hot to cook lunch, and they eat mustard and fig newtons or something, I don’t care.  Then I try to do the dishes again, and discover again that we’re out of water.

Then I check Facebook again, and get a “hey, how’s it going, boy it’s hot, what are you wearing” email from my husband.  Hearing from him reminds me that he’s not actually as fine as I am with not having water, and that I better go fix it before he gets home.  So I say “dammit” again, go into the basement, and push on the scummy little lever until it finds just the right spot, and water starts running again.  Then I go check Facebook.

5.  We also have a cup problem.  I shall demonstrate why with the following dialogue I just had with my seven-year-old son:

Son:  Can I make lemonade?

Me:  Uggggg, no.  Uggggg, yes.  I guess so, okay, fine, all right, yes.  Just don’t make a mess with the sugar, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Son:  Dang!  Never mind.  I forgot, all the cups are dirty.

Me:  WELL, you could WASH one!

Son:  Nah, I’ll just wait until the dirty ones get washed.

Me:  YOU KNOW WHAT!   THE REASON WE DON’T HAVE ANY CUPS IS THAT YOU LEAVE THEM LYING AROUND!  THEY DON’T JUST MAGICALLY MAKE THEIR WAY BACK TO THE SINK AND WASH THEMSELVES, YOU KNOW!  SO YOU GO OUTSIDE RIGHT NOW AND YOU GO FIND SOME OF THOSE CUPS YOU LEAVE LYING AROUND IN THE GRASS, JUST HOPING THEY’LL MAGICALLY MAKE THEIR WAY BACK TO THE SINK AND WASH THEMSELVES!  YOU GO DO THAT NOW!

Son:  That’s okay, I’ll just make lemonade later, when there are more cups.

6.  The other day, while my husband and the older kids were out seeing Harry Potter and the Curse of the Humiliating Controversy, I thought the little ones and I would replicate one of my fondest childhood memories:  making giant bubbles.  I actually bought straws, string, and extra dish detergent ahead of time, so it would be a smooth, successful project, and we would All Have Fun.

Well, it didn’t work.  Of course.  I couldn’t get the proportions of soap and water right (how is that even possible?  This is NOT HARD!), and  – I don’t know, maybe it was the wrong kind of string or something.  We eventually made maybe half a dozen respectably large bubbles, but there was an awful lot more of this

and this

than there was of bubbles.  Some of us, however, managed to have fun anyway:

7.  And then of course when there is hot weather, there is plenty of beach, and silly bathing beauties

which makes it all worthwhile.

Don’t forget to check out Conversion Diary for all the other Seven Quick Takes.

Oh, and my post today at the Register, “Safe Playgrounds and Safe Sex” may or may not generate some heat of its own — you never know.

We have this wonderful fire pit in the backyard.  It’s the only successful outdoor project I’ve ever accomplished (never mind that you’d have to be carried off by wolves halfway through in order NOT to succeed at something so simple).  I just dug a wide, shallow hole in the grass and then ringed it with the biggest rocks I could find.

It’s so great to have a spot for a campfire.  Little kids roast marshmallows

medium kids loll around it feeling cool, and adults wait until the kids go to bed so they can relax with a couple of beers and finally have a chance to spend a little private time together, so we can . . . talk about the kids.

The only thing really lacking is a comfortable seating arrangement.  I know, I know — we’re outdoors, so how comfortable is it supposed to get?  But I figure when one is pregnant with one’s ninth child, one is allowed to seek out comfort pretty much all the time.

On the other hand, the last thing I want is more stuff cluttering up the yard.  Our property already looks like it’s waiting for FEMA  to come and assess the damage.  This situation is the result of my enlightened, progressive philosophy of radically unstructured childhood

which means that I can feel GOOD about snarling at the kids to go outside and play with their bits of wood because Mama is doing research.

So it was obvious to me that what we needed for the firepit was something like those library floor chairs

except made out of grass.  Lo and behold, there is actually a kit for such a thing!

But it seems to be out of stock.  So I says to myself, “Do I really want to pay for specialized cardboard anyway?  How hard could this actually be?”  And of course it turns out there are DIY plans for a grass couch, although the photo

is clearly a big fat, photoshopped lie.  On the other hand, any project that concludes, “Once the sod has taken root, remove the chopsticks” certainly sounds like something we would find ourselves involved with.  On the other other hand, it also seems to involve measuring stuff.  So that’s out.

My next idea — actually, my next idea was an in-ground trampoline

but we cycled through that terrain of stupidity pretty quickly and emerged unscathed on the other side (not that it’s not an incredibly awesome idea, which it is, but because the way it would work out at our house would have all of the usual jammed fingers and shattered clavicles associated with normal trampolines, plus a live burial or two).

But my next idea after that was to pick up one of those free couches from the side of the road and just cover it with dirt and chicken wire, throw some grass seed on, and see what happens next time it rains.

Usually, my husband considers it one of his primary duties to talk me out of bringing other people’s vermin into the house — so in the past, he’s been against the idea of one of these road couches.  But what if, this time, it was supposed to be covered with bugs?

But honestly, I don’t actually want a whole couch.  I just want a little back rest, so there will be something to catch me if I have a second beer.  So now I’m thinking, what if we pick up a couple of wooden kitchen chairs from a yard sale, chop off or maybe even bury the legs, and make some kind of stupid fortification around it with stakes and chicken wire, and then fill it with dirt and grass seed?  Huh, huh, what about that?

Someone either talk me out of this, or tell me exactly what I need to do to make this happen, please!  It’s either this or I start thinking about raising ducks again.

Here is my article about Erasmus Institute of Liberal Arts, the new college founded by Peter Sampo and Mary Mumbach, who founded and ran my dear alma mater, Thomas More, for many years.

CONCORD – The House voted today by the necessary two-thirds majority to override Gov. John Lynch’s veto of a parental notification law that requires an abortion provider to notify a parent 48 hours before performing an abortion on a minor.

Lynch is a decent governor and I believe he’s at least partially responsible for keeping unemployment relatively low in our state (although my husband, like many others, have found work in MA).  But his protest that the parental notification bill was unconstitutional because it didn’t provide exceptions for rape, incest, or emergency situations is completely unfounded —  the bill was crafted specifically to avoid those snags.  The Supreme Court has been really clear that it’s constitutional to require parental notification (not consent!!!  Just notification!!!  In a state where minors cannot get a fake tan or take an aspirin at school without parental consent).

And that’s why I vote for Republicans.  Gutless, unreliable, ineffectual Republicans.  Because they’re just like anyone else:  when there’s enough of them, they find the courage to do what they know they ought to do.  I honestly thought this pro-life wave would peter out after the midterm elections were over, but for whatever reason (coughlilarosecough), it seems to be gaining momentum.  Amazing times.

1.  Never mind “you can never step into the same river twice”  — you can never dig the same garden twice.  This is my fourth year gardening in this Heraclitean yard, and every year I dig up something that wasn’t there last year.  Soccer ball-sized rocks, for instance, in a spot which was groomed and aerated to a fine, soft bed last year:

But also strange blue spoons, door knobs, legless action figures of obscure wrestlers, flattened marbles — and, unnervingly, what appears to be broken sections of sewer pipe.  Probably just some extra pipe that isn’t for anything in particular, right, heh heh heh?  Well, maybe I won’t have to fertilize this year.

2.  My kids are lazy.  L-A-Z-Y.  They get plumb tuckered out after tugging feebly at a piece of clover or two, and have to go put their feet up and watch Wonderpets with some ice water for a while.  I’d call them pansies, but . . .

3.  I actually admire pansies now.  I don’t generally care for floppy flowers, and the weird markings on their faces always reminded me of those irritating, simpering lap dogs:

 

But they are so tough!  They bloom from early spring to late fall, they live through snow, they perk up after being stomped on.  They just put their heads down and focus on being flowers.  So now I like pansies.

4.  I feel the same way about earthworms.  How wonderful to be designed so simply, and to do one thing so well for your whole life!  Or maybe I just can’t help identifying with something that’s really just all about digestion.

 

 

Go, worms!

On the other hand, I guess you could say the same about mosquitoes, and I do not feel the same way about them.  Stupid circle of life.

5.  If I were you, I wouldn’t go up to a worn-out grandmultipara who is feeling old, haggard, useless, baggy, and drained and ask, “Mama, what does ‘gone to seed’ mean?”  Even if you were just thinking about dandelions.

6.  Also from the Department of Taking Gardening Too Personally:  The seed packet says “thin seedlings when they reach a height of 3-4″.”  We’ll see, we’ll see.

7.  Some people truly don’t enjoy gardening, and do it out of duty or something.  Some people start out all enthusiastic

and then suddenly hate it very much.

Still others have this expression on their face the whole time they’re working in the dirt:

 

but they are very, very happy.

Bonus 8:  My daughter says she remembers how, last year, we used to go outside and EAT stuff, and that was FUN! And why we don’t have a venchable garden this year?  (She doesn’t consider basil to be a venchable, I guess.  What is this, June?  Maybe it’s not too late!)

Yesterday, I was so sick (and unable to take any useful medication, like Sudafed or ibuprofen) that I was able to do exactly three things:  drink tea, type, and whine.  Out of those three came this post for the Register:  Even More Faces of Mary, in which I repeatedly misspell Steven Greydanus’ name, because it seemed really, really funny at the time.

Follow-up question for you smart people:  Why is it, do you think, that people used to routinely depict the holy family wearing the styles of the artist’s day — but now if you do that, people freak out?  When did this change, and why?  Modernist self-loathing?  Mistrust of contemporary art in general?  Cultural illiteracy (Rembrandt and Fra Angelico’s saints look fine to us because they’re clearly wearing old-fashioned clothes, and that supplies the necessary sense of historical space, even though it’s still off by many centuries)?  Or have people always freaked out when artists did this, and I just don’t realize it?  Or what?

In 9-year-old son’s  handwriting, hanging on the wall:

 

On Friday, I’m going to announce my pregnancy at The Register.  I know that most of the readers will be gracious and congratulatory, just as you lovely people were here.  Most of my readers are fairly clear that news of a baby is always good news.  The timing may not always be great, and the circumstances might be tough, but the baby itself?  Good news, period.  Once the child is already conceived, the only civil thing to say is, “Congratulations!”   And if you can’t muster that up, you don’t say anything at all.

I’m horribly nervous.  I needed to make an announcement, partly because — well, it might explain why my posts get a little feeble from time to time, when I’m typing through waves of nausea; and also because — dammit, it’s good news!  I’m happy, my husband is happy, our other kids are happy, and good news wants to be told.

So, by way of announcement, I recycled an old post which I think is pretty funny.  But I still know that there are a certain number of people who will be disgusted, even outraged, when they hear that I’m having another baby.  And they will comment.  They will say that I’m irresponsible, mindless, and selfish.

I expect to get 90% nice comments, plus a few “Kill yourself now, you filthy breeder” comments.  I’m also expecting a couple of the following:

“I’m a Catholic, too, but I don’t see how it could be God’s plan to ruin the Earth with even more consumers.”

Well, I am at peace with this false dilemma.  First, our family is pretty green, and I feel sure that our children will be, too.  I’ve covered this here.

Second, even National Geographic, no conservative rag, openly calls for focusing on the betterment of living conditions, rather than on reducing fertility.

And third,  my personal family size has no effect — ZERO, whatsoever — on the overall physical well-being of the world.  Even if you still believe that the world is headed for a population explosion (which Hania Zlotnik, director of the UN Population Division, does not believe), then the fact is that the world can well afford for a family in rural New Hampshire to have nine children.  I could have a dozen more, and each of my children could do the same, and the environment wouldn’t break a sweat.  To think otherwise is just hysterical nonsense.

“I’m a Catholic, too, but you damn well better be able to pay for all these kids.  There’s nothing Catholic about financial imprudence.”  These folks are the ones that keep me up at night.  But my final conclusion is this:  if you should really only have a baby if you can pay for all the attendant expenses with cash on hand, then you’ve pretty much told all of Africa to go childless.  Think about it.  If you should only have a child when you’re 100% financially independent, then you’ve just turned a very basic and very dear gift from God into a perk for the wealthy.

I know that you can take this idea too far, and there truly is such a thing as financial imprudence, of course.  But — when we were very, very poor, the only beautiful thing in the house was our baby.  Her conception is the thing that brought me and my husband back to God.  I wish conservative Catholics would be much, much more careful about how they talk about money and children.

I only have one other thing to say.  I don’t think I’m holy because I have a lot of children.

I don’t think I’m a superstar, and I don’t consider it an achievement.

I don’t say or think everyone should have big families.

I try not to use my family size as a marketing tool, and I think I have expurgated all foolish notions about small families from my heart.

We have children for our own reasons, and aren’t trying to say — well, anything to anyone.  My children are human beings, not a statement.

And yet, people still see our very existence as a challenge or a rebuke, or an argument to refute.  This hurts me almost as much as it hurts me when they see me as a fool or a leech.  I don’t even know what’s in my own heart half the time, so why would I have a theory about why you, perfect stranger or casual acquaintance, have fewer children than I do?  I don’t need to hear your sterilization story or hear about how your voting history reflects your worldview and is superior to mine.

My baby does not deserve your contempt or need your approval.  My baby has nothing to do with you.  All I want is to take care of my family and to protect them, most of all the littlest one who has only been here for a few months.

Do I worry about bringing an innocent child in to a world with war, racism, pollution, and so on?  No, not really.  Probably the world we live in today would have seemed like a dystopian nightmare to our ancestors — and yet I love it so much, and I’m glad I’m here.

No, what I worry about is that, when my baby is born, people will not see a child.  They will not see the dark eyes, the sweet, milky, velvety neck, the dark downy hair, the tender, tender being who comes to me fresh from the arms of the very One who invented love itself.

They will see — a threat.  How can this be?  How can this have happened to the world?  It used to be that you didn’t have to have a reason to have a child — if you were married, it was what you did.  In my house, that is how it is.  I hope my children understand that.

And I hope that, when they have children of their own, they will have a circle of friends who can rejoice with them.  Because that is how it ought to be.  A baby is always good news.