Knock-Knock Jokes at Breakfast

Annie: Knock-knock!

Me: Who's there?

A: Pig

Me: Pig who?

A: Pig tail!

***

Jemma: Knock-knock!

Me: Who's there?

J: Pig

Me: Pig who?

J (long pause): Tomato!

Of COURSE the Rat's Dad Dies

I just put Annie to bed after a very intense conversation about death. Some highlights:

• "When I'm a grown-up, will you and Daddy die?"
• Sigh. "When you and Daddy die," looks down, bites lip, "I'll still have Jemma to love me."
• "Is Great-grandma Stryker going to die soon? Because she's really, really old."
• "Is heaven dark?"
• "How can God be here AND other places at the same time?"
• "I won't ever, ever get sick in heaven."
• "The saddest thing in the whole wide world is when somebody dies."

The cause of all this? The movie Ratatouille. I have HAD it with the Disney tragedy. Well, had it as much as a person who is 16 days away from, you know, going to Disney World.

State of the Union

A dear friend from our dental school days adopted a little girl from China this past summer, and I just had the chance to read their adoption story. It's fascinating and heartbreaking with a happy ending, and I had to post a small part of it here to remind myself how incredibly lucky I am to be a woman and a mother raising daughters in this country.

One day in mainland China, I had an opportunity to sit down with a young Mother who happened to be fluent in English. Her husband was with us and spoke to Dan while I spoke with her. She began asking me what it was like to be a Mother in America. I explained to her that when unless the woman is young and unprepared or unsupported, a pregnancy is joyful. She looked at me in disbelief when I told her that we have baby showers to celebrate a pregnancy and that gifts are often given to new parents and new babies. She asked many questions, mostly because she couldn’t believe that we see birth as a celebration instead of a stressor. Then she began to talk.

The things that this young Mother told me were shocking. I have read many books about China, and have been reading countless internet articles and blogs for the 42 months we’ve been waiting for Nina. Perhaps I should not have been shocked at what I heard, yet I was. This Mother told me about all of the women who run away and hide in the country when they become pregnant, fearing that the government will force an abortion if she is found. She told me of a Mother who was hours away from giving birth to her second child, only to have the government literally kidnap her (with her husband driving behind the ambulance) and forcing her to have an abortion. She heard the baby cry once and then it was killed. She said that babies will be killed up until the moment of their birth; they are not considered alive until they leave the Mother’s body, but even full-term babies who are “aborted” will not be kept alive. The woman’s own brother is hiding one of his girls from the government by not registering her. They live in the mountains so that they do not have to give her up and the wife’s family puts constant pressure on them to abandon her. My new friend spoke for an hour about tragedies such as this.

This Mother has one son. She says that the government comes into the shop where she works to see if she is pregnant. They shake their finger and warn her not to become pregnant or they must prove that they can pay a huge fine to the government. If she becomes pregnant and they do not have the money, she will have to run away and hide, and they will lose everything.

In social work school we talked about experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder through our clients. I felt traumatized after speaking with this woman. I couldn’t help but cry when we left our meeting place and I couldn’t stop looking at Nina and thanking God that I had her - and that I was taking her home.

I am well aware that it is a problem of Chinese history and tradition. Communism requires that families pass their land to their sons and give their daughters to the family she marries into. Naturally, this poses a huge problem for a Chinese family. They love all of their children, but they can only keep their boys if they want to hand their possessions down. Boys become men and men provide for three generations of families when they are grown. This poses yet another significant hurdle.

Dan and I have a beautiful product of this problem sleeping upstairs in our home. How we are grateful that we found her and that she has completed our family. I am happy that she will grow up in America and that she will be free to have, or not have, children. I am so grateful for the way women and girls are appreciated in the United States. I am also grateful to China for giving me my beautiful daughter. I am hopeful they can find solutions to some of these issues so that so many Chinese families and children do not need to suffer.

Thank you for listening.

Julie

Soup it Up

Ahhh, soup. Jason usually hates it when I make it for dinner. ("It's not enough!") He changed his tune:

It's Winter. Eat Soup.

What a Difference a Year Makes

After I wrote yesterday, and after I looked through the pictures of Annie in her skis, Jason took the girls ice-skating on Reed's Lake while I ran around it, happy to be pounding the dry pavement instead of snow and ice. In the afternoon, we took the girls swimming, where Annie swam all the way across the pool several times without any flotation device whatsoever.

We came home, and I cooked dinner while Annie and Jemma helped set the table. We decided to be "fancy" and eat by candlelight, and while we ate, we talked about all the things that Annie can do today that she couldn't do a year ago:

• Ride a bike without training wheels.
• Swim unassisted.
• Ice skate.
• Play soccer.
• Ski.
• Read.
• Write.
• Set and clear the table.
• Choose all her own clothes and dress herself every day.

I know everyone says that the first year of a baby's life is full of huge changes, and it's true, but watching her eat turkey sausage and pasta by candlelight, it was pretty clear that this last year has been full of change, too. I am so, so proud of you, Annie.

Lessons

Annie had her first ski lesson yesterday. By the end of the hour she was real-deal using the tow rope and following her instructor down the hill, turning back and forth and snowplowing as needed. She fell a few times, of course, but just like when she's ice-skating, cold weather and falling don't seem to lessen the appeal of a sport for Annie. She came home proud and hungry, eager to go back and do it again next week. I bet she'll be better than me by the end of the season.

*****

Earlier this week, Annie and Jemma were playing together upstairs while I was making dinner. This happens more and more these days, an hour or so here and there where they play totally without direction or intervention or fighting. Though (unfortunately) it can't be called up on demand ("OK, now you guys go play nicely upstairs for one hour while I get this done without interruption!"), it is pretty glorious when it happens.

They had played wedding and built a fortress with blocks and put on a show for their animals. Then Annie decided they should move on to playing tag: "Jemma, let's play tag! I'll chase you! C'mon! It'll be fun! I'll let you catch me!"

Jemma's response (unheard by me) must have been less than enthusiastic, because a minute later, Annie was skulking by the kitchen door, looking like her puppy had died.

"Jemma said she didn't care." She made her most pathetic facial expressions, then dropped into a chair and put her head down on the table. I did minor encouraging ("She doesn't care about playing tag right now; could you find something else to do together? Want to stay down here and color? I'll play tag with you when I finish making this!") but her sadness persisted straight through dinner. The girls sat across from one another, Jemma eating obliviously, Annie moping and sighing, me thinking about photographing the scene and captioning it with Able To Dish It Out, But Not Able To Take It.

I tried to provide some closure. "Annie, why don't you tell Jemma how that made you feel, so that she can apologize?"

Annie summoned a whine: "Jemma, when you said you didn't care, that made me feel really, really, really sad inside."

Jemma, mouth full of food, sing-song-y: "Sooooorrryyyyy!"

But then, ten minutes later, as we were just finishing up, Jemma came over and put her hand on Annie's arm. "Annie, I'm so sorry," she said, apologizing in a sincere way that beats out any effort Annie has made in her five-plus years of life. Annie smiled and nodded, Jemma ran off to play some more, and I couldn't resist teaching a little lesson of my own.

"Do you think you might remember how sad you feel right now the next time you want to say something unkind to another person?" Annie looked at me uncomprehendingly, so I tried again.

"Remember times when you've said unkind things to me and Daddy and Jemma?" Annie still looked innocent/confused, so I plowed ahead with some examples: "You've said, 'I don't like you; you're poopy; you're butthead; you're throw-up.'" A flicker of recognition. "See how that feels? It makes people feel sad inside."

I saw a light dawn inside before she scampered off to play with Jemma. Later that night, as we were choosing her clothes for the next day, I lobbied for her green corduroys. "I wore green cords on Monday, remember?"

"I don't care," she said, then immediately looked stricken. "I mean! I mean, I don't care that you wore those green pants. I do care about you, Mom." I smiled. I reassured her that I knew what she meant. I tucked her in, hopeful that this little lesson in kind words and sincere apologies might stick around for a while, just like the ski lessons and the ballet moves and the words she has learned to spell.

No Amount of Popcorn Could Help

It's the most ordinary of Wednesdays - school, gymnastics, watercolor painting at the dining room table, Jason working late - and yet each minute of it seemed excruciatingly intense. Each everyday action - helping Jemma wash her hands, walking Annie to school on the icy sidewalks, soaping their little shoulders in the bathtub - was so tangible. I can't stop touching their cheeks, feeling their hair, listening to their giggles, kissing their foreheads. I can't stop thinking about the movie.

I went to see The Lovely Bones last night. When we made plans to go, I felt a twinge of uncertainty. I read the book, years ago, and remembered it being, well, lovely as well as tragic and disturbing and interesting. The twinge wasn't enough for me to rally the group to another choice, though, so I found myself sitting in a theater last night with four other mothers of two little girls each, watching as one family was ripped apart by the abduction and murder of their little girl.

It was brutal. Parts were gorgeous (the girl spends much of the movie watching from heaven), and there was a satisfyingly redemptive ending, but I spent much of the movie feeling physically ill. I sat clutching my own arms, covering my face with my hands, shaking my head no. I thought about leaving. When it was over, I felt horrible inside. We all did. I came home, and I cried. I went in and sat on Annie's bed, pulled her covers up around her shoulders, and watched her sleep. I prayed, an Anne Lamott-like prayer that went along the lines of please, please, please.

And then this morning I woke up, and like a gift, Annie sat eating her Cheerios and writing YOU ARe THe BesT MoM in her High School Musical notebook. Jemma stood behind her closed bedroom door and giggled, the way she does every morning before she comes out for a hug. Jason made me coffee. Annie and I walked to school, holding hands and stepping on the crunchy ice.

Right now, I can't even sort out what I am feeling about this or say exactly why a movie I saw (of a book I'd already read) is affecting me this much. But tonight, the girls tucked safe and sound in their beds, all I know is that a part of me is glad that I did not, in fact, leave the movie. A part of me is glad that today, an ordinary Wednesday with my family, seems like such an amazing, vibrant, generous gift.