While I would never characterize my life as simple or easy (HAAAAAA!), I have been incredibly lucky in one very specific way: I have not yet, as an adult, experienced the loss of someone to whom I was very close. So in some ways, I feel I'm something of a stranger to grief. The closest I'd come until fairly recently was the grief of losing my first marriage, and my hopes/dreams/plans associated therein. It's not the same, of course, but it followed a similar trajectory and kind of came out of nowhere to bite me on multiple occasions when I "should've" been well past mourning. The up side,...
Hello! I am not dead. I was just doing non-computer-related things with our visitors all weekend, and it was lovely. Otto's mom was like a kid in a candy store, just beaming at the kids and so excited to be here with us. Otto's aunt quickly became Monkey's new favorite person, and the rest of us sat back and chuckled as he brought various toys and items for her inspection and approval, and discussed many important issues of the day ("Do you believe in an afterlife?" he'd asked both our visitors at one point, out of the blue. "I don't want to be dead forever, so I think there must be."), and...
Monkey has a friend. Now, this is not exactly a first; Monkey has always had friends. When he's having good days, he is charming and gregarious and has no trouble ingratiating himself to others. The problems come in on the not-so-good days when he is easily frustrated and quick to anger. On those days, the not-quite-friends decide to play elsewhere, and the few select kids who've chosen to hang out with him anyway give him wide berth for the day. And maybe the next day, too. "He never wants to play with me anymore," Monkey lamented of one longtime friend, the other day. "We like to do...
Last year when I started my garden, I had no idea what I was doing. This year I at least have some idea of how little I know, so I consider that progress. Last year I started almost everything as a plant, with a few seeds sown directly into my planter boxes and grown outside. About a month (maybe even more) after I began the garden, though, I decided to try starting some tomatoes from seed, and so I did that, inside, until they were big enough to transplant. I then moved them to their designated planting spots, where they promptly turned white and tried to die. If you're a seasoned gardener,...
I am often guilty of catastrophizing when it comes to the children. More specifically, I am guilty of catastrophizing when it comes to Monkey. I mean, I'm more or less at peace with Chickadee's sociopathic tendencies; I feel confident that she'll outgrow most of them and become an adult who won't make us consider changing the locks here at the house. Her trajectory is familiar to me. I was once a little shit embellisher self-centered fanciful, myself, and think I've evolved into a fairly productive, compassionate member of society. She will, too. I plan to beat her until she does. But...
I realized at some point this week that I haven't written very much about Monkey, lately. I'm not sure why that is. I think that since his official Asperger's diagnosis I've felt conflicted. I felt relief to know what we already knew, but sadness for him to be saddled with a label. I felt hopeful that people who might be able to help him now had a handle on his needs, but wariness about the assumptions that might be made about him by those less than loving. For a while he was still having a hard time with everything, and it was just too difficult to talk about, too painful to say, "He's my...
I have been know to watch reruns of Degrassi. On purpose. I'm not proud. I could tell you it's because I used to watch the original show way back in the day, but I really don't know if that's any justification. And now Chickadee is old enough to watch it (sometimes), though as a whole the show is considerably more sexed up than I remember it being when I was younger. Really, I think Degrassi reminds me of all of the teen drama shows I loved in my youth (90210, for example) crossed with those after school specials I never could stop watching. There's drama! And suspense! And kissing! And...
