Here’s what I did today. I appear, in this post, to switch back and forth between present and past tense. I don’t know why I do this, and I don’t care. I just don’t want you to think I’m not aware of it.
7:30 AM: Woke up after a largely sleepless night, in spite of my having taken my pill at about 9:30 PM. Hoped BFFR remembered to have me in mind when she said chonen ha-da’at, like I asked her to (I attribute all of my academic successes in high school and college to my having had extra kavannah during chonen ha-da’at on test days). Got dressed, etc.; ate three tuna melts for breakfast (usually I have six, but there was no time 
) (under normal, non-pregnant circumstances, by the way, I HATE tuna melts); left with girls at about 8:30. Offered to let any of the girls, including the two carpool girls, take my exam for me, since the department administrator will be delivering it, and he has never met me before. Why didn’t I think of this sooner? I could have paid someone off! Someone who already has a master’s degree! YS immediately offers to take it, and says, by way of justification, “I’ve read 23 books.” This is just about all my kids know about this exam — that I was supposed to read 23 books. Heh. Apparently, any 23 will do.
9:15 AM: Dropped girls off at camp. Texted G that I chose to listen to a particular CD in the car because one of the individuals on it resembles my dearly beloved professor, and I figure it may bring some good karma. You know, just in case chonen ha-da’at fails me. G apparently never realized that they look alike, and was somewhat startled by the discovery (if you know my professor and you want to hear who I listened to, feel free to email me 
). Proceeded to drive to Manhattan.
10:30 AM: Texted G the following: “Please find me nearest Dunkin Donuts. Coolatta needed badly.” G responds with a very nearby address (thank God!). Park car in old familiar lot, waddle two short blocks to Dunkin Donuts, purchase large (large) strawberry Coolatta, waddle back down the street drinking it, feeling thoroughly embarrassed by how huge and bright red it is, and by how huge (though not bright red) I am.
10:50 AM: Arrive in my former academic department. Gaze around fondly at everything, including the soft mushy gray couch that was new when I arrived in 1998. Wonder if that couch has ever been cleaned. Heh. Introduce myself to new department administrator (too late now; I’m going to have to do this myself after all), who sets me up in an empty office and hands me… my MA exam.
*cue dramatic music*
11:00 AM: Begin MA exam. Spend the next several hours drinking huge, bright red Coolatta while typing essays on computer. This is very exciting; I had assumed I was going to have to hand write them (shudder) in stupid blue books. The questions are laughably obvious. Imagine if someone told you to study Christie Brinkley’s biography, and then the questions they ask you are “What color is Christie Brinkley’s hair?” and “To which rock star was Christie Brinkley married?” See? Obvious. Although, while it is very likely that I could have answered these questions satisfactorily even before the limited studying I actually did, it is also quite clear that the studying helped. I find myself incorporating many things into my answers that I would not have thought to include if I hadn’t studied.
2:00 PM: Email completed exam to department administrator. Waddle back to parking lot while on the phone with G. Retrieve car. Realize there is no time to go home before pickup time at camp. Drive to camp while eating remaining three tuna melts (G packed them in foil for me ) (of course I had to scrape the cheese off the foil, but no big deal), munching on big bag of Kix cereal, and finishing Coolatta. Text G that Coolattas are not very good when melted and warm. Arrive at camp around 3:05. This is 40 minutes early. I sit in the car with the motor running (need the AC, see) and respond to emails on my phone while continuing to munch on Kix.
4:30 PM: Arrive home with girls. Waddle upstairs to change out of sweaty uncomfortable clothing. Adrenaline rush that has apparently gotten me through this day abruptly disappears and I crash onto my bed, feeling like roadkill.
4:50 PM: Phone makes “new email” sound (actually, it’s the same as the text message sound, the IM sound, and the voice mail sound. I have not yet figured out how to change this). I look at my email and see that I have been cc’ed on an email my professor sent to the department administrator. Email reads as follows:
Miriam passed her exam.
Well, that was quick. I forward the email to G, and proceed to hide under my blanket. This is what I often do when there is good news that I don’t know how to deal with (also, I still felt like roadkill).
So, there you have it. Miriam passed her exam. Remember how I said last July that I was going to get my MA (after only twelve short years) (heh) in January, because I’d passed my French exam? Then remember how I found out that contrary to what I’d been told, I also had to take a comp exam? Well, I took it. Apparently my gamble on my former knowledge, my writing ability, and my nice professor, combined with the small amount of studying I actually did, paid off. So now, all I have to do is wade through several miles of godawful paperwork, and maybe, some day, I’ll have a few (more) letters after my name.
Yay, me.
We leave for our trip on Sunday. We’re hoping to leave before lunch, which presumably means we’ll leave around 8:00 PM. Heh. I’m both excited and apprehensive about this trip. Here’s hoping it goes well. I hope to post from the road, as I did last year.
Speaking of last year, tonight and tomorrow are the first yahrtzeit of G’s beloved cousin. Yeah. There’s something to write about. May her memory continue to be a blessing.
Yesterday some lovely and wonderful old friends who are visiting from Israel stopped by with pizza, and with their four children — one of whom has been corresponding with RS over email, and two of whom are seven year-old boys who were absolutely wonderful to my wide-eyed, adoring son (the fourth is an adorable four year-old girl with the cutest, blackest curls you have ever seen). It was noisy and terrific in every way.
Tuesday was not a great day, because my baby siSter and her family left us and went hopping off to their new house in Cleveland. 
Adjustments, anyone? I haven’t yet tried to explain this to the Boy, who fully expects to see all of them any day now, and has asked for them more than once, as is his usual habit. Sucks. 
My father is not, for the moment, having surgery. Apparently they’d do the surgery “if he were young and strong.” I beg your pardon. Who’s calling my father not young and strong?? But instead, they’re giving him yet more antibiotics and such of that sort. There appears to be a bunch of stuff festering inside his ear, see, that doesn’t necessarily belong there. We can now all add that to the list of things we don’t want to think about (no, it is not cancer, just stuff. Icky stuff).
My grandmother has moved to assisted living. Speaking of things we don’t want to think about. It’s about time I penetrated my denial and called her already. I don’t think I’ve gone this long without calling her since I was in college. It’s completely unnatural. It’s just that every time I try to call her, I have what approaches a full-fledged panic attack. But I’m going to have to do it anyway, if for no other reason than that we plan to visit her on Sunday, and she really ought to know about it first.
Elaine (Babysitter Allison’s mother) already had surgery, which appears to have been successful, but just for fun, they started pumping her full of chemo today anyway. This will go on for some time. If anyone wants to whisk Babysitter Allison off to Bermuda for the entire month of December, don’t be shy. Assuming she makes it that far, she’s going to really, really need it. (P.S. She will make it that far, and farther, because that’s how she is, but still: Bermuda.)
After my third email which repeated, in bold type, a question that I’ve been asking for over a month (that question being, whom do I contact regarding Dumb Board of Ed Form #2), the big fat Dept of Education moron finally responded and told me who to contact (if that’s supposed to be “whom,” I don’t want to know). To be fair, it’s understandable that it took him so long to respond; after all, he did have to give me somebody’s name. Their first name and their last name. I mean, really; does the guy look like he’s made of time? 
So I got the name. Next step: Calling all three of these maniacs in early August, like they told me to. And God help us all if they don’t do the jobs for which they get paid, and send me what I need in time for all of R’s services to start on the FIRST day of school. I’m going to bulldog them all into oblivion. You’ll see. (so will I)
I think that’s all. My pill is totally kicking in. Mmmm. Roadkill notwithstanding, this was overall a fairly positive day.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Friends, Kids, Pregnancy, Relatives
How many pizza bagels should I plan to eat? Last time I had them I ate five. I’d planned for four, and then laughed at myself when they were gone, and admitted I wanted another one. By which I mean, I asked G to make me another one. Heh.
“You’ll get your body back,” a friend reminded me the other day, when I was howling about my helplessness and about how I’m never going to be able to do anything, ever. My body back? What do you mean? What body? Oh, this? This bloated, painful, lumbering thing that occasionally twitches and jumps so as to remind me that something is growing in there?
“No offense to God or anything,” I’ve been known to say, “but this is a very poorly designed system.” In my opinion, of course.
Know what else my friend told me (this is a friend I don’t speak to often enough, but who always knows everything)? That I shouldn’t berate myself for my inability to be a bulldog with the DOE (speaking of bloated, painful, poorly designed systems…) when it comes to advocating for R. That being a bulldog doesn’t come naturally to me, and I shouldn’t feel like it should suddenly be easy when the party in question is an unhelpful stranger who is part of a horrible huge bureaucracy whose inefficiency borders on surreal, and who happens to hold my daughter’s future/happiness/whatever in its hands.
YEAH! THAT’S RIGHT! I DON’T HAVE TO MAGICALLY TURN INTO A BULLDOG, GOSHDARN IT! AND I CAN USE EMAIL IF I WANT TO! THERE’S NO LAW THAT SAYS I HAVE TO USE THE PHONE!
It sort of makes me giggle when I resend an email that I just sent the day before. I usually give the maniacs around 24 hours to respond, and then I resend it, with an edited subject line (”second email”), and a little intro that says politely “I am resending the email I sent yesterday, below. Looking forward to your response.” Pain in the bloated, lumbering hindquarters, I am, but so far, I don’t care. I’ll probably care the first time I get snapped at, but that hasn’t happened yet.
Of course, I sent an email Thursday, and resent it today (Monday), and the jerk still hasn’t responded. I’m going to have to bulldog it eventually, I suppose. You answer this email, or I’ll… send it again! Be gone, or I shall taunt you a second time! Which comedian was it who mocked the Scotland Yard for not carrying guns? Stop! Or I’ll… say stop again!
How many times have I announced on this blog that denial is a bad idea and that it doesn’t work? Has the message sunk in with you yet? Because it hasn’t sunk in with me. There I am, in denial, not even realizing I’m in denial — because it’s denial, see — when suddenly I find myself sitting in my parked car outside Trader Joe’s, crying myself into unconsciousness while the clock ticks happily by. Um, Miriam? You need to get home. Babysitter Allison has to leave, G has to make a bunch of stops and the girls have to be picked up. But I can’t go home; I’m busy crying. Also swearing, out loud, at God.
Have you hit a low point when you start swearing at God? I mean super-swearing. Yes, use your imagination; that is what I mean by swearing. And when I say “at” God, I mean at God. I do not mean to God. I mean swearing at God, spitting out bile as if God was the umpire who made the Cardinals lose the ‘87 World Series. (Some might say He was, but those people are usually Twins fans.) I might have thought the swearing at God was the low point — when rather un-Orthodox (never mind un-rabbi’s wife) phrases were coursing through my head at God during last month’s TIA — but I found a lower point, I think, which is when I suddenly discovered I was threatening God.
???
Hey God! Stop, or I’ll… say stop again!
Um, hello? How exactly does a human being threaten God? This isn’t ancient Greece, you know. It’s not like I can say I’m going to withhold the hecatombs (I learned the word “hecatombs” back when I used to be in graduate school). But there I was nevertheless, looking at some drawings R had made, and suddenly I heard myself muttering something at God that started with the words “You’d better…”
??? Color me perplexed. What exactly is that supposed to mean, when directed towards… um… the Lord, Creator of heaven and earth? And creator of my daughter, and of strep pneumococcal strain number whatever-the-heck-it-was? You know they vaccinate for that strain now? Of course, we don’t know for sure which one it was, since the culture got lost between the stupid moron hospital and the other stupid moron hospital mailroom (I do not call the second hospital “stupid moron”), but our pediatrician buddies say there’s a “most likely candidate.” So, yippee. They vaccinate for it, now. Thanks. That’s swell. So my currently gestating child will not get that particular type of Psycho Evil Pneumonia From Hell, nor will it have that kind of stroke. Excellent.
Of course, it could die from something else. Or almost die, rather. Twice, three times, four times… depends how you measure. Bleeping stuff was out of R’s body for eight months, and it still managed to give her a stroke. Did I ever explain that? Did I ever blog about what Dr. SuperStroke thinks happened? Well, she thinks that when R had the Psycho Evil Pneumonia From Hell, it might also have given her meningitis, which was not tested for at the time, and the meningitis is what kicked her internal carotid artery (psst: that particular artery is located inside one’s brain) into starting to narrow. Or, since we do know that the Big Bad Pneumococcal entered her bloodstream, and she did have pericarditis, perhaps a clot formed in her heart and traveled to her brain (you know, her brain), and that is what caused the inflammation and the narrowing. We’ll never know for sure, but it doesn’t much matter, does it. The point is, something whacked her arteries, and then she had a stroke. Or three. TIAs are like little itty bitty strokes, and she had two of those. So far. She could be having another one, or another stroke, right now, of course. Hey God, you’d better….
Heh.
The really funny thing was, I swore in the same sentence. As in, my threat to God not only seemed to think it was threatening God, but it also contained a very, very, very bad word. So, I swore, and threatened God at the same time. Kiddush!
What happened, exactly? It’s not like I wasn’t angry before the most recent TIA. But I wasn’t just waxing fluffy, either, when I said all those times that I was so overwhelmingly grateful to God. I was. It was real. There was anger and horrible pain, etc., too, but my primary God-related reaction was “Thank you.” Because there was, and is, so much to be grateful for. I know how easily it could have been much, much worse, every time. But last month, it somehow all flipped, and suddenly all I can do is seethe and swear. Maybe it’s the confluence of pregnancy symptoms, and TIA — again, when she hadn’t had anything in so long — plus major DOE jackdonkeys making our lives absurdly more difficult than necessary. Maybe it’s all the excruciating ways in which she’s different, and how pronounced it’s been. Maybe it’s the stroke anniversary passing. G and I were both sorta basket cases that week. Heh. Maybe it’s all of the above. But dang, I’ve been mad. And I’ve been crying in parking lots, and I’ve been swearing and threatening God.
Sigh.
Speaking of emails that don’t get answered, I’m taking my MA exam this week (ha), and I emailed my professor to ask how he recommends I spend the next few days. Should I reread this, or this? Anything in particular he suggests I focus on? He hasn’t responded yet. Feh. Having spent many years dealing with irritating students, I try very hard not to be one myself, but I don’t think this email puts me in that category. I’d say it’s just shy of irritating student. And yet he does not respond. 
In the meantime, I have three books here with me on the couch, and you mark my words, I’m going to open at least one of them. Don’t try to stop me. Or I’ll say stop again.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Pregnancy, Stroke
Ugh. Ugh.
The thing with driving carpool and being stuck in horrible traffic for over an hour when it’s over 90 degrees outside and you’re pregnant and spitting and you use up all the tissues and can’t reach the other box, is that if you had just listened to the traffic report instead of texting with your friends while waiting 20 minutes in the carpool line, then you would have known to take the Tappan Zee instead of the GW, and you would not, at this very moment, be sitting in your bed groaning and trying not to hurl.
Ugggghhhhh….
The good news, however — no, make that the OH MY GOD THANK YOU THANK YOU news — is that the car air conditioner worked beautifully the whole time, AND we did not run out of gas, though the light did go on. What would I have done? Seriously, what would I have done? Without the AC I probably would have fainted. For real. No iMiriam hyperbole. I suspect I would have fainted. So — thank God.
Anyway, according to the traffic report, which I did turn on once we were stuck and there was no way out, there was a 12-vehicle accident on the inbound upper deck of the GW. And of course, there’s no option to take the lower level when on the Palisades Parkway, which is where we were. When we heard that report at 4:21, they said only one lane was getting by. When we actually arrived on the bridge at 5:08, all the lanes were open and we saw no accident. So I’m assuming either the radio station LIED, or that the accident was cleared while we were crawling along. I asked the toll booth dude if anyone was hurt, and he didn’t know. I do hope not. And I have to say, the girls acted like champs the whole time. No whining, nothing. They played games and sang songs and made up their usual hypothetical situations and asked me about them, and marveled with me at the idea of a 12-vehicle (7 cars, 5 trucks, per 1010 WINS) accident. Mind you, RS and carpool girl #1 weren’t with us, since tonight is their overnight at camp. RS won’t be sleeping over, however. She doesn’t do that. So G will be going to pick her up tonight at 9:00. Fun. She will have participated in extra swim, a cookout, and… a hike in the woods. She was freaking out about this hike for about two hours last night, when she was supposed to be sleeping. 8:30-10:30. I kid you not. I encouraged her to go because “hiking can be fun”, but I have a strong feeling she isn’t going to love it. She’s more of what we might call an indoor girl. Heh.
Here is a list of things that are too upsetting to think about, so I try not to think about them, but that approach isn’t working.
Dept of Ed maniacs. I am going to kill them all. There are no words. Frustration does not begin to describe it. And apparently the only way to get anything out of them is to be a bulldog, which I am not. I can sometimes morph into one, but I haven’t yet, at least not for this, and time is ticking. The new school year will be underway in like five minutes. Know what? I hate everything.
My grandmother. Major end of an era, we think. Going to assisted living after rehab. We call what I’m feeling “denial.” I can’t accept it, so I pretend it doesn’t exist. Healthy, no?
My sister is leaving. Next week, like. Taking my non-baby brother and my niece and nephew and moving to Cleveland. Talk about denial. I suspect bad, bad things will happen once we’re back from our road trip and it actually hits me that she’s gone.
My dear friend Single Dad (aka “Some Guy”) has been through seven levels of hell with the supposed people supposedly in charge of the supposed care of his severely disabled daughter — and, it keeps getting worse. I didn’t think anything could make me as physically ill as the welts the maniacs gave her by accidentally putting her elbow braces on backwards (oops! so sorry! won’t happen again! bah-bye now!), but some of what’s taken place since she started her summer program has actually been just as bad, or perhaps worse. I’d list some of it but I’ll throw up. I will say this though — everyone should have a father like him. The world would be a much (MUCH) better place.
Very bad car accident with very bad consequences for the friend of a friend in Israel. It’s one of those things you just don’t think about because it’s just that horrible, and you know it could just as easily happen to you or someone you’re close to, and you don’t know what to think or feel, so you don’t think or feel anything, because since it didn’t happen to you or someone you’re close to (yet), you have that choice.
Right.
I take my MA exam next week. Heheheh. Maybe, maybe I should study, once the heartburn subsides, I mean (HAHAHA). What do you think?
Let’s think positively for a moment. Hmmm. Oh wait, I can’t, the Boy is yelping for me. I’ll get back to you with some positive thinking next time.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Friends, Kids
RS has been sick for two days. Terrible nausea, plus high fever, which I can tell because she’s on fire, though I haven’t taken her temperature. Yesterday she said she was going to come downstairs, but then she couldn’t, because… G had made eggs for breakfast for himself and the twins (God bless summer, when we don’t have to leave the house until 8:30), and… the smell was making her nausea worse. Heh. Welcome to my world, kiddo. So she’s home with me, and as a result I successfully killed myself this morning by cleaning both upstairs toilets. It is my firm belief that the very least a sick child deserves is a clean toilet to throw up in. The toilets were, um, NOT clean (heh), and the idea of anyone leaning over them for any purpose whatsoever was so horrifying that I actually managed to scrub them both. Of course, my lower back is now killing me, my arms are flopping around like spaghetti noodles, and I’ve been gasping for breath for about 45 minutes. But it’s worth it, for clean toilets. Wish I could do the floors and the sinks as well, because OH my God.
YS’s glasses broke on Tuesday. R’s broke yesterday. So that’s two days and three days, respectively. I don’t have a good feeling about this.
Spoke to two people yesterday from the NYC Dept of Education. The first one seems not to have read her job description. Not only did she call me back, but she did so almost immediately – and she started the conversation with “Now, what can I do for you?”
-???- What’s that all about??
Unfortunately, what she could do for me was transfer me to someone else, since she doesn’t directly handle the thing we need done. Sigh. Luckily, the person to whom she transferred me restored my faith in the DOE. She answered the phone with an unintelligible, snappish grunt; as soon as I said “Hi, this is Miriam B. So-and-so transferred me –” she cut me off abruptly and said “WHO is this?” — and the conversation progressed nicely from there. Heh. Cut off almost everything I said, and everything she said back to me was snapped in an impatient manner that clearly told me that first of all, I had no business being on the phone with her, and second of all, I was an idiot for suggesting that I ought to be able to acquire the things I was calling to acquire. I was polite and cheerful the whole time, and managed to get some information out of her, but BOY OH BOY am I not going to deal with HER again. Nor am I waiting, as she told me to, until August 20 to call again. August 20, my…. Heh. You see what I’m saying. I told G that this person didn’t sound like she would in any way respond to “Oh yes you will send me those forms. The DOE has been in direct violation of the IEP and my daughter’s rights have been violated…” yadda yadda. So I intend to aim higher. With a crossbow, if necessary.
[P.S. I am all talk. So far, anyway. But maybe if I talk enough, someone will listen.]
Got the info I needed about my MA exam. Now I need to schedule it. Then I’ll take it, and maybe I’ll pass. Actually I’m fairly certain I’ll pass, but I’m still scared out of my wits. Because what if I don’t?
Ta ta for now.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Kids, Pregnancy
Yes, I am posting two days in a row. Hold on to your heartbeats.
Before I forget (again), here is an excellent story about my son, which I intended to share in last night’s post.
So there we were at the glasses store, and the girls had chosen theirs, and the Boy had broken his, and we were sitting with the lady starting all the paperwork (read: payment of gigantic amounts of money), and the Boy was distressed because we wouldn’t let him play with any more frames, and I attempted to distract him by introducing him to the lady.
“Boy, this is Janeen. Can you say hi to Janeen?”
He stared for a moment, then gave in. He can never resist new people. “Ha Daneen!”
She beamed at him (good customer service), and said “Hi! You have pretty eyes.”
His hands flew to his eyes, and he nodded. She continued: “Can I have your eyes?”
His response was instantaneous. He shook his head and said firmly “No. Dat’s MINE.” Hee hee hee
——————————————
Speaking of my supposedly upcoming supposed MA exam, today I emailed my professor. Here’s what I wanted to write:
Dear Professor,
My kid had a stroke a year ago. Ergo I have been a wreck for about a year. I also suddenly discovered I hated my career right when the economy tanked. Ergo I’ve been unemployed and trapped in this house and ergo miserable for TWO years. Baruch Hashem I am also pregnant. Ergo I have been sick and even MORE miserable for the past five or so months. All this adds up to really suck a lot. Plus I had been under the impression for the last 7 or so years that I didn’t need to take this stupid exam. So let me get right to the point. I’ll sit and pretend to think, but please just pass me regardless of what I write. Just think; if I graduate, you won’t have to deal with me anymore, except when I email you friendly little questions about various Jewish history matters. So passing me is win-win. On the other hand, if you fail me, I might die. I have done (almost) no studying whatsoever, but could YOU study if your kid had a stroke? Come on, a stroke. You can’t even imagine, can you? Didn’t think so. So, do we have an understanding? Thanks so much.
Miriam
What I actually wrote:
Dear Professor [actually, I forgot that part, though I don't think he'll care],
Still hoping to blah blah take my exam blah blah format how many essays how long will it take blah blah blah. Thanks,
Miriam
[No, I am not concerned about him possibly seeing this blog. He doesn't know about it, but even if he somehow does see it, I am not worried. I have my reasons. And I do NOT think he'll pass me if I don't deserve it, nor do I think he'll fail me just because I wrote this.]
I also need to continue my harassment of the morons at the Dept of Education. The person who used to be the private school liaison chairlady just retired. Some dude has taken her place. I don’t have his email or phone number, but I started making attempts to get them. I could just call the general number, of course, but that might actually lead somewhere, and guess what? I’m scared.
I also want to call one or two of these lawyers whose names I’ve gathered. Actually, I don’t want to call any of them; I want to already know them, and already have had a conversation with them, preferably over email, because if I use the phone, I might die. But the point is, I need to communicate with one of them, somehow. But I don’t want to have to pay any of them, see, because WOW are we broke. Heh. So what I need to do is find out which of them is most likely to enjoy doing free favors for rabbis. How does one go about determining that? Unfortunately all I have are phone numbers, not email addresses; otherwise I could send out a mass email and just ask all of them. “Whoever makes the first pro bono offer gets ten extra points with God! Twenty, if we can swing it!” They’d be biting like sharks. But I can’t do that. So now what? Should I examine each of the names and try to see which one sounds the most like a person who would do something free for a rabbi? There’s one named Christina; is that a better or worse bet than Joseph? This sort of thing is really hit or miss.
What I COULD do, of course, is quit sitting around writing procrastinating blog posts, and actually do one of these things. Any of them. Or I could study. Of course, I have to leave in about half an hour to retrieve my children from camp, so oops — looks like there’s no time to really sink my teeth into any of these pressing matters. Too bad.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Stroke, The Boy
Making lists is boring. We leave, please God, for our annual road trip to good old St. Louie in approximately three weeks. I figured since all I’m really good for these days is sitting in one place, I could get a nice big jump start on the lists of things to bring (plural listS because there are many different categories, and each gets its own list), and that way G could get a jump start on the shopping, and then the packing (under my patient and gentle supervision, of course), and by the time it was time to load the car, maybe everything would be ready to load into the car. So I sat down to make the lists and quickly discovered that making these lists becomes sort of routine the sixth time around. Ziplocs, plastic silverware, grapes, DVDs, blah blah blah. Tell me something I don’t know. The medications list is slightly longer this year — we’ve got aspirin, psychostimulants, melatonin, useless anti-heartburn stuff, monstrous revolting pre-natals, iron supplements, etc. to add to the Tylenol, Benadryl, and other boring first aid stuff — but the whole exercise still took me less than 15 minutes. Feh. Now what?
What if I conveniently “forget” to tell Babysitter Allison that she shouldn’t do any laundry (our laundry, I mean; did I mention that she’s been doing our laundry since I’ve been sick? feh) during the 9 Days, and she “accidentally” continues to wash everything in the house, so that it’s all sort of done when the 9 Days are over? That would be just awful, wouldn’t it? Cackle
So it didn’t take long into this whole miserable IEP business before I started emailing all sorts of people and asking for names of special ed lawyers. I’ve learned a few things, see. One is that the Board of Ed appears to exist for the purpose of being unimaginably incompetent. At a certain point, you just have to laugh. Another thing I’ve learned is that people are wonderful, and they truly care about R. They even love R, and they definitely, definitely want what’s best for R — but at the end of the day, they get to go home, and R is not there with them. Because they are not her parents. And that means that as much as they care, they ARE capable of forgetting things that we are NOT capable of forgetting (ever). This means that we should never, ever assume that anyone else is “taking care” of anything. We can never, ever assume that R and her needs are EVER at the forefront of anyone else’s minds. Because nobody else is her parents. So, to skip over some idiotic stories, we’re now being told that the services that were supposed to start in April might not start until October. HA! Know what I say to that? Bull freaking s. October, my outsized rump. You can take your October and stick it in your….
Heh. Right. Hence: lawyer. I haven’t called one yet — there’s an itty bitty chance I may not need to — but I got numbers. Boy, have I got numbers. And I’m not afraid to use them.
[P.S. That was a lie. Just now, when I said I'm not afraid to use the numbers? I actually am afraid to use them. Very afraid. In fact, I'm afraid of all of this stuff. But that doesn't really make a difference, does it?]
The twins got their glasses. We went to Ye Big Ole’ Chain Store yesterday, and they both had their frames picked out within minutes. The Boy picked a few out also, and even broke the most expensive ones he could find, but for some reason they didn’t make us pay for them. I have no idea why. The twins both look adorable, especially YS, who actually looks like the frames were made for her face — or at least, I thought they looked adorable, until I picked them up from camp today and saw them for a split second before I registered who they were. And you know what I thought when I saw them? I thought the following: “Dorky little kids.” Then I felt awful, first for thinking that, and then about the fact that they don’t look like MY kids anymore. Feh. I miss their soft little faces. The good news is, aside from now being able to see, they seem to have adjusted to them extremely quickly. Here’s hoping I’m next.
I discovered something yesterday when we were in the mall. I caught a glimpse of my nice pregnant self in a wall mirror, and I discovered that I look like a big, lumbering, inflated pregnant balloon. I almost cried. I’d already noticed the difference in my face, but I suppose it’s the same sort of thing as when I saw my twins today at camp. When you see something familiar from an unfamiliar perspective, perhaps you see it the way others do, rather than in your familiar way. And you know how it seems other people see me right now? As a big, lumbering, inflated pregnant balloon. But there’s nothing to be done about that, is there. On the flip side, I’ve been feeling the baby a lot more, which is nice. It feels pretty cute.
Want to hear my future? YS forced me through this painful game this afternoon called “MASH”, wherein I had to name things, such as two boys I like and two boys I don’t like. I named G, of course (as one I like), and then I told her there are no other boys I like. She said it could be a brother-in-law, so I chose my non-baby brother, Uncle Y. Then I told her I couldn’t think of any boys I don’t like (this was a lie, of course, but I was trying to set a good example). She asked if there were any boys who used to annoy me when I was a kid. HA. Were there?! Then I had trouble keeping it down to just two, but I gave her the first two names who entered my mind. I named the first one, and told her he really used to annoy me, and she said “Well, he’s probably grown up by now.” Heh. Probably. Then I had to name some other stuff, and I had to pick some numbers, and the result of this exercise was… an outline of my future. Want to know what it is?
I’m going to marry my non-baby brother (fat chance; damn fool won’t even give me Botox).
I’m going to live in a mansion (apparently my non-baby brother is going to pull in some cash).
I’m going to have a golden retriever (so long as I have a mansion, I can live with that).
I’m going to have five children (sounds familiar).
I’m going to drive a Camry (oooh, exciting).
I’m going to be a teacher (HAHAHAHA).
Then she provided an illustration, as follows:
I hope that comes out ok. I’m the one holding the teacher’s pointer. That’s my mansion you see in the background.
In other news, my grandmother sort of randomly ended up in rehab, and she may or may not be moving to an assisted living facility when she gets out; my father may or may not need inpatient surgery to clear up some sort of icky infection deep in his ear; my mother may or may not be losing her mind (heh); my baby siSter and her family have already spent their last Shabbos in my shul (WAAAAAH), and are leaving for dumb old Cleveland in about two weeks; Babysitter Allison’s mother is recuperating nicely but still needs other stuff that won’t be nice at all; my son’s vocabulary continues to grow rapidly and he continues to be the funniest and cutest thing ever to exist; I’m still a cranky antisocial heartburn-plagued source of joy to all who know me; my dear, wonderful friend YK made a special משברך for R the other day at a special location in the Holy Land; and I still flatly refuse to study for my supposed MA exam, which is supposedly supposed to be administered before we leave. Before we leave on August 1, I mean. Heh. There are 23 books on the reading list my dearly beloved professor sent me. By the time I take the exam, it’s possible I might have finished one of them. There are hopeful signs. That doesn’t count what I read back when I was in grad school, of course, because that was a long time ago, and I don’t remember squat. So this ought to be quite fun. Oh yes, and I borrowed and read the other Twilight books. I’ll tell you about them some other time. Maybe they’ll show up on my exam?
Tags: Dept of Ed, Kids, Pregnancy, Relatives, Stroke
It has not escaped our notice that yesterday and today were/are… the anniversary of R’s stroke. Of course it would be swell if it DID escape our notice, or if our notice would (could) escape IT, but that isn’t how it goes. There is no July 6 or 7 anymore; there’s just, well, you know. Of course I have warehouses full of all sorts of things to write about these two days now that it’s been a year, but you know what? I’m writing from my phone, which is too annoying, and I’m also tired. Maybe later, then. Meantime, o happy day.
Tags: Stroke
Want to know what never, ever stops going through my head? This:
Hope that works. If it didn’t, here’s the link, so it can go through your head as well. My son is ADDICTED to this video. Addicted. He will sit and watch, and has sat and watched, for an hour or more. Bear in mind the video is only 2 and a half minutes long. This from a kid who won’t watch an entire Wiggles song from beginning to end, even though he loves it and sings and dances along, because he prefers to keep pressing all the buttons on the DVD player (much to the irritation of his sisters and the Nephew). There are dozens of YouTube videos he’s been enjoying for months. He won’t sit through most of them without wanting switch to another one, but for some reason, this 1, 2, 3, 4 thing has him hooked. “Watch one-two-fee!” he’ll shout joyfully, running to the couch where my computer is parked. If I say no, and stick to it, he’ll say “Aks Abba,” and go running to find G. I tell you, he’s obsessed. Of course, the result of this is that this song is constantly running through my head. Always, always. Last night at about 11:30 (I think I wrote this on Friday), when I couldn’t fall asleep in spite of having taken my pill an hour before, I texted G to complain, and then I texted him “1, 2, 3, 4 monsters walking ‘cross the floor!” So someone sing me a song, quick. I need a replacement.
(”Whoa oh-oh, counting to four! Whoa oh-oh, let’s count some more!”)
Have I mentioned that both of my twins need glasses? They went for their regular vision checkup last week after school ended. We were expecting R to need them, since she’s always been the one with iffy vision, even before the stroke, and she’s been complaining for a while about things being blurry. But we had no idea anything was wrong with YS’s vision. Neither did she, apparently; she never mentioned a thing. She also has regular eye doctor appointments like a kid should, and her vision was recently tested in school. So imagine our surprise when she sat there in the office and could see even less than R could. G is the one who took them (I was busy groaning, plus staying home with the Boy), and he was completely shocked, as was I when I got his text message. Then suddenly something hit me, and I texted back “Could this possibly explain the dizziness and headaches and nausea?” And lo and behold — yes, it could.
See, YS has been complaining approximately every day after school, for months, about being dizzy and nauseated and having a headache. We brought her to the doctor; nothing. Had her blood tested; nothing. Made sure she drank enough, slept enough, etc. Yet the complaints continued. She was driving the school nurse so crazy that eventually we and the teachers made a rule that she would not go to the nurse unless the teachers judged her to be genuinely sick. It wasn’t exactly that we didn’t believe her; we had just concluded, along with everyone else, that it was probably a combination of stress and attention seeking, and that she was probably exaggerating the sort of minor thing everyone gets at the end of a long day. We were nice to her, gave her Tylenol, etc., and I felt sorry for her and everything, but the complaints sort of faded into the background along with the rest of the whining (including mine, of course) that goes on in this house.
Well, color us a couple of surprised idiots! We know we didn’t do anything wrong — she has had appropriate eye care, and we did investigate the symptoms and follow up and so forth — but all this time, it was her eyes! If only we’d known! She’s so relieved — “Ima, the doctor said it should help my dizziness! Thank GOODNESS!” — and G and I feel like a couple of well-meaning fools.
The next step, of course, is to take both her and R to pick out frames. This, of course, has to be done by me, rather than by the color blind (for real), and also male, individual who lives in this house. But — wonder of wonders — we haven’t been able to go yet, what with camp, and me being sick at very inopportune moments. Thankfully, since school has been over R hasn’t complained about blurriness and YS hasn’t complained about dizziness, which makes perfect sense, but that doesn’t mean we should put it off. Bli ayin hara I’ve been feeling about 5% better in the last few days — I even called my grandmother, something I haven’t done since Pesach (bad Miriam) — so we ought to be going sooner rather than later.
I should add that I’m rather sad about this glasses business. See, both of my twins have the most beautiful, adorable, delicious faces in the world, especially their eyes. I don’t want any foreign objects on their faces. I don’t want anything blocking my hands or my view. Their faces are perfect the way they are. It’s like when the Boy puts on his new kippah. He might look cute to other people, but to me, it’s this strange obstruction that doesn’t belong. Not to mention that both of my twins, one of them in particular, are definitely going to lose their glasses at least once a day. Sigh. I figure the second they’re old enough, we’ll force them to get contacts.
On my list of stories to share, lest I forget them for all eternity, is the story that took place about a week and a half ago, in which R left the house wearing a pair of turquoise sandals that we (of course) inherited from my niece. This was the first time anyone had ever worn them; I’d just brought them down from storage that day. I believe this was last Sunday, when G and the girls went to the open house for the girls’ day camp. Anyway, when they got back, the Boy decided that these sandals belonged to him. We have no idea why; he had never seen them before, and he doesn’t own anything remotely like them. But the second he saw R, he shouted “Dat’s MY shoes!” Everyone, especially R, informed him that they were not his shoes, but he got extremely upset and howled “No, dat’s MINE!” over and over. When I got to the living room, where this was taking place, R had sat down and the Boy had grabbed hold of both of her feet and was angrily trying to pull off her sandals. R was screaming — “Boy, STOP it! They’re MINE!” and the Boy was wailing and shrieking “MY SHOES! DAT’S MY SHOES!” It was probably one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen in my life.
On one of the three days between school and camp, we took the girls to see Toy Story 3. G and I were in stitches the entire time. Much of the humor, it appears, was designed for our generation. RS claims she liked it and wants to buy the DVD, but she never wants to watch it at night. R claims she loved it. YS announced that she hated it and never wants to see it again. I have to say, there was an extremely scary part that did seem somewhat over the top for a kids’ movie. I don’t really blame YS. But G and I loved it.
Of course, the second it was over, all three kids started to whine, about one thing or another, and any patience I might have had evaporated immediately. I proceeded to snap at everyone until we got home, at which point I said to G “I have to get upstairs. I can’t stop yelling at them.” I also said to him “Please tell me this is pregnancy related and will be over when the baby is born.” He said he truly hopes so. So do I.
On Friday before camp started, we did something MUCH more fun than sitting in a movie theater. Determined to have a do-over of our beach trip last year, by which I mean I was determined to go to the beach with cash so I could make up for the lack of cold water, lack of ice cream, and the meltdown (heh), I made plans — weeks in advance — to go to the beach with my kids, Baby Sissie, Baby Sissie’s kids, and (duh) Babysitter Allison. Of course, Babysitter Allison’s mother has been sick (she had surgery on Thursday and thank God the prognosis is very good, though she’s got recovery and other stuff ahead of her), so at the last minute Allison wasn’t able to go, but thank heavens JM the Awesome was available instead. So we went. The weather was beyond perfect — no clouds, mid 80’s, zero humidity.
The Boy’s first reaction upon encountering the sand on his feet was “Too hot.” However, this didn’t disturb him for long. About 30 seconds later, he was tearing across the sand at lightning speed, as if he’d been doing it his entire two years of life. Once we were all set up under the shiny new beach umbrella, he saw sand on the beach towel and said “Mess!” He then grabbed a shovel and pail and announced “I keen up.” This, of course, was very funny. My son was planning to clean up the sand at the beach. Ok then. He continued focusing on this goal as we moved closer to the water:
RS and YS spent most of their time digging gigantic pits in the sand, for which they needed to carry buckets of sand and/or water back and forth, over and over and over. Apparently they found this to be outrageously fun. Must be an age thing. R spent most of her time sprawled out in the sand, burying herself and/or making sand angels. All three of my girls plus the Niece also did plenty of swimming. Alas, I can’t show you any pictures of any of this, because they’re all, you know, wearing bathing suits, and between wanting to white that out and white their faces out, well, what’s the point? I suppose pretty soon I’ll start whiting my son’s face out as well. Sigh.
But here, I don’t have to white this out (Baby Sissie told me so):
Heeheehee. That, of course, is the Nephew (he has long hair because my non-baby brother is under the illusion that he is Hasidic), and what he is doing, if you couldn’t tell, is showing off his belly. He greatly enjoys doing this. He routinely yanks up his shirt and points out his belly, as well as his belly button, to people. Naturally this makes people extremely happy.
Here, in case you didn’t get a good enough look:
Feel free to come back and look at it as many times as you want.
Here, I can also share these. The one of them looking down is when they both discovered that the Boy’s feet were sinking into the sand. They found this very intriguing.
Anyway, it was the greatest day that ever was. I had afterglow until Saturday night, even though my sister almost killed me because we left the beach somewhat late.
So I think that just about wraps up the list of things I wanted to get down. I will add that yesterday was the Fourth of July, in case you didn’t know, and last night we had an almost precise repeat performance of this, complete with the very same friend sleeping over. I will also add that today is July 5, and we have not exactly had a repeat performance of this — for one thing, the weather is atrocious this time — but the girls have been outside swimming for quite some time with the Niece and two little girls from shul, so that’s all fun and everything. I have not been able to go outside because I cannot tolerate the heat, which is less fun. I went outside yesterday for less than five minutes, and (this is not an exaggeration) I was still overheated and panting three hours later. Heh.
I will also add that the anniversary of the stroke is coming up. Well there’s something to write about! But I think this post is already long enough.
Happy Fourth. May all our truths continue to be self-evident.
————————————-
** Afternote: I applaud the restraint everyone has shown by not asking me personally about the disease I apparently carry. However, asking my sister about it is not all that much better (it’s also rude and unfair to her). This thing is not a big deal. My doctor even rolled his eyes at it and said “Everyone is a carrier for something.” In addition to not being a big deal, it’s also none of your business. Things about my life are only your business if I say so, and if I wanted you to know what it is, I would have posted it. Sorry if mentioning it but not naming it violated some rule I don’t know about, but that doesn’t give you the right to ask, either my sister or myself. Good? Good. Glad we had this talk.
Yesterday started out with something malfunctioning with G’s alarm, causing him to miss davening. Recall that it was a fast day, and he’s the rabbi. Not good. No one was coming after him with a pink slip or anything, but he was quite disturbed on a number of levels. Oops.
As for me, I started out by helping to herd the girls out to camp, and then removing the soaking Boy from his crib, getting him and myself dressed, and calling Baby Sissie and begging her to come over with the Nephew. So she did. I felt ridiculously sick for a change, and Baby Sissie also wasn’t feeling perfect, what with the miserable weather, the packing stress, and the fact that she woke up with this stupid bad neck pain that she gets every now and then. So the two of us sat there being miserable, while the boys alternately ran around together being cute, and attempted to kill each other over toy phones, kitchen chairs, air molecules, etc. The funny part of this was that every time the Nephew did something the Boy didn’t approve of, the Boy would threaten to put him in time out. “No! Kahm-out!” To which I would say, “You don’t say time-out to the Nephew!” But he mostly ignored me. G, meanwhile, got home from bringing the girls to camp and commenced dying from lack of caffeine (fast day, remember). The saving grace was going to be the fact that Babysitter Allison was going to come whenever she got home from the doctor with her mother (her mother is having surgery tomorrow), and she had promised to stay until bedtime. Phew.
So Baby Sissie and the Nephew left. I had a 1:30 appointment for the big fat ultrasound. I force-fed myself lunch, which I knew would make me feel better but which I did NOT want. Because of the fast, the girls were finishing camp at 2:00, so G couldn’t accompany me to the ultrasound because he had to pick them up. Though with no babysitter, I suppose he couldn’t have come with me anyway.
So G dropped me and my tissues and my garbage bag and my new non-Droid phone off at the doctor (the old old car is at the mechanic being examined, so only one car), and left with the Boy to pick up the girls. I proceeded to sit in the waiting room until after 3:00, attempting to gchat on my new phone with BFFD, with whom I had some absurdly critical catching up to do, and spitting madly in spite of the gum I was chewing. SO annoying. I don’t know what was up with yesterday, but I was spitting twice as much as usual. Feh. Finally they called me in at 3:15, and I lay on the table spitting and watching my kid’s body parts on the screen (hee hee, ten little fingers and ten little toes ) while the friendly tech smeared me to death with ultrasound jelly. While I was lying there a text message arrived from G. Apparently Babysitter Allison had texted him to say that her mother’s doctor’s appointment had taken all day and they now had to go do other stuff (meet with anesthesia, get more blood drawn, blah blah blah), and she had no idea when she’d be available. Oops.
Doc came in, told me that thank God all is good with my baby, told me about being a carrier for whatever, etc. All finished. I called G. He’d gone the wrong way on the way to camp and gotten lost (we haven’t replaced our GPS yet) and was half an hour late to pick up the girls. He was also absolutely miserable from lack of caffeine. I was quite sick, made more so from lying uncomfortably on the table. It was horribly hot outside. Both of us were in nasty moods. There were four kids to take care of and no Allison available yet. “Can you call a cab?” G asked me. He was too unconscious and irritable, apparently, to load all the kids back in the car and come to get me. I was mad, but I said fine, I’ll call a cab. Feh. I called the cab, then had no choice but to stand outside in the heat and wait for it. There was nowhere to sit anywhere where I’d be able to see when it came. The cab didn’t come for more than 15 minutes. I realize this does not sound like a long time, but recall that it was over 90 degrees outside, and I’m pregnant. Luckily I survived. The cab came. Driver was a hyperactive lunatic who yelled and swore at every other car we passed. “I swear to God, some o’ these people musta got their licenses from the Cracker Jack box!” That’s probably the cleanest thing he said. I got home and saw that Allison was back with her mother. Hallelujah! I came inside. G was in a mood from hell. I was in a mood from hell. Allison came over about 20 minutes later, and left with the kids about 5 minutes after that so the girls could swim in her hot tub. I changed my clothes and sat down to finish off the post I put up yesterday. Apparently, all this time, my dear friend Some Guy was experiencing an emergency with his daughter. His gchat status message supposedly announced this, but I barely glanced at my gmail screen. Oops again (I believe she is fine now).
Suddenly I got a text message from G (I was in the living room and he was in his study; who wants to use vocal cords?). Babysitter Allison had just informed him that she would not, after all, be staying until bedtime, but had to leave at 6:30. Um. This propels both of us into a much, much worse mood, G because he feels like such kaka but will now have to stay out of bed and deal with the children, me because I want to take over for him so badly, but I am much, much too sick. My mood and I sit there finishing up the post when the phone rings. It’s my mother, who already tried to call the night before. I picked it up, not bothering in the least to hide the irritability in my voice.
“Well you don’t sound very happy to hear from me!”
“I’m not happy about anything.”
“You have four beautiful children! Why don’t you be happy about them?”
“Great idea, Ma. Why didn’t I think of that.”
“See, there you go!” She starts (apparently I have just switched to present tense instead of past) asking me things about the girls and camp. I’m barely listening. Suddenly I see the time — 5:50 PM — and something hits me like a ton of bricks. I am supposed to be somewhere with YS at 6:00. It’s a 20 minute drive. Holy freaking s. I gasp, cut my mother off, and say, swearing only a little, “I forgot, I have to be somewhere. Bye.” I call to G. He has the same reaction I do. We get YS back from Allison’s. She gets dressed very quickly and she and I pile back into the car. I’m so sick but I’m able to drive. The box of tissues I brought with me was new when I went to the doctor; it’s now almost finished. What gives??
We make the turn to get onto the Hutch. Oh no. Bumper to bumper cars. Barely moving at all. I make some phone calls. “If you aren’t going to be here before about 6:45, forget it.” At 6:35 we are approximately one third of the way there. Guess we’re forgetting it. I call G and tell him what happened. “I’m right at exit 17. Should I pick up something for dinner?” We decide I should pick up sushi. He tells me which combo platter to order. We get there and I order it. YS and I sit and wait for it to be ready while she reads the menu, tells me what her favorites are, and adds up and compares the costs of various combinations. Finally the sushi is ready. On the drive home, YS constructs an elaborate scenario wherein a person moves to New York from Paris and brings his all-glass car with him. His favorite food is pizza and the car is so full of pizza boxes that it’s all anybody can see when he drives by. We discuss this for a while until it’s determined that the man is named Pierre Picasso (YS insisted on Picasso because pizza is Italian), and he becomes famous for his pizza car, and a movie is made about him. YS describes the movie trailer in great detail. I am totally going to see it when it comes out. We get home at about 7:20. G is now in a worse mood. I am in a worse mood. G has already reminded me several times that he has to be at shul at 8:00 for mincha. Given what happened this morning, he is particularly preoccupied with this. The sushi is removed from the bag and it quickly becomes clear that G and I had a lack of communication. When he told me which combo platter to order, he was only thinking of the girls, and assuming I would order whatever I wanted for myself. I, for some reason, had assumed the combo platter would have enough for the girls and for me.
Oops.
I sit in the kitchen and attempt not to melt down. I’m pregnant, see, and I thought I was having sushi. This means I have to have sushi or I might die. I already feel sick enough without trying to eat something that isn’t what I thought I was having. Nevertheless, there is nothing to do about it. I’m a wreck. I try to hide my wreckness behind my already foul mood. It’s 7:30. G, knowing how it is to be pregnant (this is because he’s a very empathetic soul, and because I tend to, um, share my feelings a lot), and being a prince among men, tells me I should go back and get sushi for myself. The place is about a 7–10 minute drive. If I call it in and leave now, I’ll be back in time for G to go to mincha.
“But G, the Hutch north is bumper to bumper. It was still awful when we were coming home.”
“That’s no problem, you can take the streets. I’ll tell you how to get there. It’s very simple.”
“Ok, thank you….”
*** WARNING WARNING WARNING ***
Miriam has no sense of direction
Miriam always manages to get lost
Miriam is operating on about one-quarter capacity, on account of the pregnancy, the very bad mood, and all the running around she has already done
This is a bad idea
G gives me directions. It is indeed very simple; a left, a right, another left, another right (I think). I leave, still sick and miserable but knowing I’ll soon have sushi.
You already know what happened, of course. But I didn’t just get lost. I got lost about five or six different times. At every single point when I was supposed to do something, I somehow — and I still have NO idea how this happened, any of the times — managed to do something completely different. This was on the way to a restaurant that is about 7 minutes from my house, a restaurant I have been to several million times. The streets I was attempting to take — even the streets I got lost on — are streets I have used many times. The problem is, I’ve always used them for other things. I know how to get to those places using those streets. I just do not know how to get to the Chinese restaurant using those streets. We call people like me visual thinkers. We also call people like me people with zero sense of direction.
We also call people like me morons.
I got to the stupid restaurant. I got my stupid sushi. I brought it home and ate it, and it was very good. G did not make it to mincha. I got home after 8:30. One of the times he called me to see what was happening, I was downtown in a completely different town/neighborhood/whatever than the one I was supposed to be in, having no idea how I got there or how I was going to get out, and I was crying. “I’m so sorry,” I sobbed. “I thought I did what I was supposed to do.” I had asked someone for directions, and I still think I followed them precisely. I still have no idea how any of this happened. The prince among men was sweet, supportive, and sympathetic. I have no idea why. He stayed on the phone and directed me, better than any GPS. After I got home and ate my sushi, I actually felt well enough to get some towels into the laundry, which saved G from doing it, so that made me feel 1% better.
So, that was my bad stupid day. Maybe the written version doesn’t seem as crazy as it did when I was living it, but at the time, it was bad. And there was aftermath. Presumably because of the sharp uptick in physical activity — I can’t think of any other reason this would have happened — I was still drugged out the wazoo when I woke up this morning, which was especially strange since I took my sleeping pill earlier than usual last night. I couldn’t wake up, and G had to take the Boy along for the ride to camp. I was still quite out of it when they got back at 10:00, but I got up and took care of the Boy while G went to a meeting and some other places. Bizarre. At least my spitting is back to “normal” today. Ha.
Hey, look at that, it’s 3:34 PM and I haven’t yet made a pest of myself to the Board of Ed. Today, I mean. Better go do that. This time, we use the phone. Cackle.
So sick. Soooo sick.
Feel like I’ve been bursting with stories to tell, things to post, etc., but posting is much too annoying from my new non-Droid phone, and now that I have my new non-Droid phone and can check email and whatnot while lying on my side, it’s been difficult to get myself to sit upright and use both hands at an actual computer. Lying on my side is MUCH better as far as various pregnancy symptoms are concerned. But here I am, though if I haven’t mentioned it yet, I feel sooo sick.
No stroke yet. Dr. SuperStroke read the MRI, finally, and called us back, finally, and… had nothing to say. Apparently the stupid arteries look the same as they did in January. You know, the last time she had a TIA. Feh. Oddly, Dr. SuperStroke kept saying they look “good.” I suppose I’m glad about that — who doesn’t want their kid to have nice-looking arteries? — but lady, if she’s still having TIAs, the arteries are not “good.” So, there’s no news. Just like I said there wouldn’t be. No news until the next one, that is. And I shall insert my requisite “God forbid,” though I confess it’s more than a little forced. In the meantime, my evil explosive mood has abated (I do not say “improved”) perhaps 5%, and I don’t think I’ve bitten anyone’s head off in at least three days.
Girls started camp today (this was written yesterday, i.e. on Monday). Boy quite lonely. It’s pretty sad. “Goze?” he asks (= “girls”). “They went to camp,” we tell him. But it isn’t long before he asks again. Poor kid. Anyway, turns out the twins were put in the same bunk because they don’t have quite enough post-second grade girls in attendance to fill up two bunks. So they’re together again. Feh. We were really, really hoping to get the ball rolling on having them each fend for themselves, especially YS, who we believe could use some space from R. We felt like camp was the perfect place to start, especially right before they’re holed up on top of each other for three weeks during our annual road trip. Heh. Meanwhile, counselors, division head, and nurse have all been prepped about R. “Here’s what to watch for. Here’s what to do. Also be sure she drinks a lot.” Of course, the nurse and division head know all about her from last year, unless for some reason they forgot (HAHAHAHAHA).
Speaking of last year, know what tonight is? 17 Tammuz. Remember what I did last year on 17 Tammuz? Broke my fast, among other things. R was having her angiogram, see. So on the Jewish calendar, it’s been a year since the stroke. Shudder. Don’t want to think about it. (HAHAHA, good one)
Hey, here’s a funny story from the hospital last year. So among other things, R had to have an EEG, by which I mean lots of wires attached to her head and hooked up to a computer that recorded her brain activity, in case she had a seizure (she didn’t). Now when you have an EEG, you also need to be watched by someone’s eyes, because if the computer records seizure activity, it’s important to also see what the person’s body is doing. In some cases R has been put in a monitored room, by which I mean there’s a video camera recording her and it’s all visible from the nurse’s station. But when she had the stroke in July, none of the monitored rooms were available. So this funky spherical thing was attached to the computer instead, looking sort of like a lamppost, but really it was a video camera that recorded everything in the room at once. You couldn’t duck out of its way; it covered every corner.
So there were G and myself, sitting in the room with our six year-old daughter who had just had a stroke, and no one knew why, though there were a few theories based on the MRI, and it was nighttime and R was asleep, and G and I were of course in total shock and still reeling. We had decided I would stay at the hospital and G would go home, and suddenly I realized something — it was the night of 17 Tammuz, which meant the 3 Weeks were starting the next morning, which meant no haircuts, and my hair (such that it is) was already a straggly overgrown mess. “G, you need to cut my hair,” I said. So we got scissors (from where? who knows) and I yanked off my handy dandy bandanna, and I realized something else — the spherical camera thingie was recording this, i.e., me with my hair all naked and visible to the world. GASP And I don’t do that, see.
Of course, the problem was that as I said, this particular camera recorded the entire room. There was no escaping it. I don’t remember why we didn’t duck into the bathroom, but we didn’t; I’m sure we had a reason (maybe not wanting to leave R alone? who remembers). So — I ended up taking a blanket and throwing it over the sphere while I bared my head and G did his usual bang-up job of making my hair look like it’s been chewed up by chipmunks. Heehee. But then again, if I wanted to marry a hairdresser, I’d have married a hairdresser.
So I thought this was pretty funny, because how many couples do you think throw blankets over the EEG camera for a few minutes of privacy, and how many of them do you suppose do so in order to engage in a romantic moment of haircutting? I remember being distantly amused somewhere in the back of my frozen mind, trying to imagine what we must look like to people outside of our loop. Of course, I ended up sleeping in that room that night with my bare naked head on my pillow, perfectly visible to the camera. Oops. I realized this as G was getting ready to leave, and we had a brief conversation about it, and whether we were just too drained to care, or we actually decided it was ok for some reason, I really couldn’t tell you.
Anyway, this year I ain’t fasting, but not because I completely lose it after waiting for my child to come out of her somewhat invasive brain procedure. Even if that does happen again (heh), I will not have been fasting in the first place, on account of my being sick as a dog with this pregnancy. Whee! There are perks to pregnancy illness after all.
Ok, now it’s Tuesday evening, and guess what? I have heartburn! And here’s a somewhat new one — I’m also cramping. Nice (ouch). But I don’t need to call the doctor, because I just came home from the doctor about an hour ago, having had the major ultrasound, or “anatomical scan,” wherein they check all the baby’s organs and bones and fingers and toes and eyeballs and who knows what, and they actually saw me cramping, and they didn’t seem to care. Sure they don’t care; they aren’t the ones in pain. Feh. So baruch Hashem it all looks fine. Baby has everything it needs and it’s all good. They did, however, tell me that I’m a carrier for some disease I never heard of, and they’re making G come in to be tested to see if he’s a carrier too. This irritates me for all sorts of reasons. First of all, I’m sick of all the paranoia in this world, especially when it comes to pregnancy, and second of all, they never tested me for this before, so why am I supposed to think this is a big deal? The doctor told me they keep expanding the “Jewish panel,” or the number of genetic tests they do on pregnant Jewish women. Now call me some sort of liberal maniac or whatever, but my instinct, which is probably stupid, is to immediately bristle at the idea of someone testing me for something just because I’m a Jew. Did I tell them to do this test? Truth be told I probably did; I pretty much sign everything they stick in front of me. But still. Who are they to screen my blood just because I’m a Jew? Isn’t this what we call racial profiling? Yes, thank you, I know it’s for my own protection, and more importantly the baby’s protection, but I can’t help feeling instinctively uncomfortable with the idea. Even if it supposedly a good idea for which I should be grateful. Maybe if I’d ever heard of this disease I’d feel differently. I suppose I’ll look it up. (No, I am not going to say what it is.)
There are other matters afoot that I don’t feel like writing about, such as the unimaginable bizarre incompetence at the Board of Ed (short version: R’s services never started, and things are still not in place for them to start in the fall. Yes I am making a pest of myself. No I am not going to get into it), and my son’s obsession with girls’ shoes, and the fact that after years and years and hundreds of transactions on ebay, we were actually ripped off for the first time a few weeks ago (not with the car!), and it looks like I might have just been ripped off a second time. ?!?! What’s that all about? But I’m going to go take my heartburn and abdominal cramps and lie down instead of writing. Have an easy rest of the fast.
Tags: Dept of Ed, Holidays, Pregnancy, Stroke
