I have a dream

What is it with parenting? You spend the first six years married without children, then you have the "one," raise him for six years before you realize that you're turning him into a little Emperor and that this can't be good for mankind, so you decide to bring number "two" into the mix to teach number "one" how to care and share. So what's the matter? Nothing. The baby is adapting very well and thriving and we feel very lucky that Jack is, more often than not, always pleased to see her -- but I can't say that it's been a walk in the park. On the best of days, I go to bed feeling like I'm a productive member of society raising healthy well-adjusted children. On the worst of days, I feel like I'm losing my mind, my autonomy, and staring into a pit of despair, raising children who will end up in therapy the minute they leave the house because their mother is whack. This could very well be the onset of menopause (gulp).

I feel like my brain has shrunk since Makena arrived into my life. I feel distracted and it takes super-human concentration to remember the simplest of tasks. My husband thinks that a black hole has formed inside my head and that it is slowly sucking up any remaining ounces of logical thought I have. The size of said matter so monumental that it has its own weather pattern. Normally, I would take offense, but I just thought that his analogy was so funny and biting, that I've decided to own it.

Are children contagious? Does having one make you want to have two? Does having two make you want to have three? I had a dream recently that woke me up and kept me awake for the rest of the night because it felt so real. It actually scared me because I knew that I couldn't keep it to myself and I also knew that sharing it would spew chaos into our delicate family ecosystem. So what was this monumental revelation? I dreamt that the director of our agency had called me personally to tell me that he wanted to place a teenage girl into our family. My heart leapt, I was so shocked and excited by how real it all felt. I don't know if it was the thought of being mother to another child or the fact that I could contemplate it without having to change more diapers or schedule feedings and naps, but it made me really emotional. I also knew, before I even woke up, that sharing this dream with my resident astronomer was going to be like having to navigate a minefield on the way to a 75% off Barney's warehouse sale -- very risky.

I just couldn't let good enough alone. I just had to "casually" mention this dream to my husband. I laughed, making light of it, I even dragged Jack into it by volunteering that he wouldn't mind having another sibling (he wants one) and, boy, was that NOT the way to go about it. Mentioning a number "three" at breakfast when we were trying to recover from a sleepless night with number "two" wasn't the best time to bring the subject up. Damn that black hole!

My husband dropped the sports page and stared at me for a long moment -- probably wondering which institution he was going to park me in -- and then he told me (without blinking) that he was done having children and that I could adopt as many of them as I wanted with my next husband. Conversation over. I felt like a meteor exploding upon entry into earth's atmosphere.

Nice. So I stewed, annoyed, wondering if I was just taunting him with it for argument's sake (which I may or may not have a habit of doing sometimes) and not at all serious about it, or if I was now determined to latch onto the idea of a Chinese teenage daughter because he hadn't expressed any interest or curiosity in my dream. I called my girlfriend (the one whose coat tails we rode through the adoption process) and I invited myself over with Mak and Jack so that they could play with her kids and because she had mentioned wanting a number "three," too, and had also been told "no."

Since we had so much in common, I asked her for a "teenage Chinese daughter adoption dream" intervention. I wanted to find out from her how she had gotten over it. Well, first things off, she hadn't, so the intervention was already on shaky grounds. But she did let me talk and she tried to help me analyze what it all meant. Initial diagnosis: sleep deprivation. Then we started wondering whether adoption could be addicting. We even hypothesized how long it would take to get divorced, lose ten pounds, find someone worthy enough to start dating again, get married and then convince number "two" husband to adopt a teenage daughter and the numbers just didn't add up. First,I'd be seventy by the time this could theoretically work out. Second, I love my husband, he is a wonderful dad (whose only flaw happens to be a lack of sharing when it comes to the television remote control) we have a great life together and why would I want to risk losing it all? Third, and more importantly, I realized that the dark hole in my brain had not sucked up all the logic because I came to these conclusions on my own (ok, maybe I had a little help)!

Ha! Just laughing about it diffused the whole situation. An enormous weight was lifted off my shoulders and I almost felt normal on the drive home. And ever since then, I have been more productive and organized than I have been in months. Which really isn't saying much, but it is progress.

So where are things now? Well, I have earmarked our donations for the Big Sisters program at Half The Sky (see link) and I feel better knowing that by sponsoring some of the older girls who still haven't been adopted, that I might be helping them realize some of their dreams of getting a higher education, even if I can't be their mom.

Isabelle
Who can't post pictures because she seems to have misplaced her camera charger...so much for being organized.

Big Fish

This is the photograph that will haunt my husband for a long time to come and I have to secretly admit to being happy that this sixty pound tuna got away because I know that if it hadn't, it would have been stuffed and hung on a wall in my house for me to stare at and dust, occasionally.

The Gods of good taste and home decor were shining on me that day.

Am I a bad wife? (Don't answer that.)

Is - relieved

Spam

I gave my husband a day of sports fishing for Christmas this year. I thought it was original, somewhat convenient -- since we happened to be in Hawaii -- and wouldn't clutter up the shelves or take up closet space like some of my past gifts (unless, God forbid, he actually caught a monster fish and decided to get it stuffed!)

I scheduled the expedition for Christmas Eve so that all the boys could fish together and they set off bright and early like the manly-men that they were, for a very long day at sea. Auntie and I promised them that we would cook whatever they caught and that it would be our Christmas Eve dinner. No pressure. Spam sushi was on the menu if they came home empty handed. You know, the canned ham that won't ever spoil? Otherwise known as the Hawaiian salt-lick.

They were true hunters and gatherers and Jack caught a skipjack and a tuna all by himself! For an eight-year old, he is a veteran of a dozen fishing expeditions, mostly lake, so this was a big deal! The charter company filleted the fish and they came home with twenty-five pounds of tuna steaks. I've never tasted fresher fish in my life! We sliced up the skipjack and ate it like sashimi and poke (a Hawaiian ceviche) and I marinated the steaks and grilled them and it was awesome!!!!!! Auntie took care of making us some deliciously tropical Mai Tais (she's an excellent bar tender) and it was a most excellent celebration and a special first Christmas Eve having Makena finally be a part of our family.

However, since this was "day two" of our vacation, I couldn't see us eating our way through twenty more pounds of fish, no matter how yummy or "Atkins" it was. I know I could have frozen it and taken it home for New Year's but we decided to give it to some locals to enjoy and they were thrilled. As promised, Santa found Jack on the North Shore and managed to spoil him -- go figure -- and his awe and enthusiasm confirmed that he still believed in the man. But I have to admit that the best gift of all (a slightly terrifying one at that) was the gift that Makena gave us! She started to walk! Life, as we know it, is officially over AGAIN!

Ladies and gentlemen, I present: Frankenbaby.

Happy New Year!

Is - watching my children grow up too fast!

Surf and Turf

Falling under the category of "How to get exhausted on vacation without really trying," I planned a "less than twenty-four hour" turnaround to take my family from the picturesque snowy mountains -- home, and then up at the crack of dawn the following day -- to catch a flight to Oahu and the North Shore for the second exciting week of Jack's winter break. I would have fired my travel agent except that the person was me!

Added "perk" to the stress was me slipping on black ice at a gas station as we were leaving the mountains. If the card-reader at the pump had worked, none of this would have happened. If I had been carrying Makena into the gas station to pay in person, she would have taken my full weight as I slipped and crashed to the ground. I guess that was the miracle, A) that I wasn't worse off than a severely bruised elbow, B) that I wasn't carrying the baby.

Needless to say my little 4.7 double axel (for artistic impression) shaved four hours off my travel turn-around budget and poof! Gone was the time I had allotted for the pre-trip manicure, pedicure and waxing. Thank God, I packed Mak and Jack's luggage and Santa's presents, the week before. I didn't have to worry about forgetting something key. Unfortunately, I ended up shaving and butchering my legs and wishing I'd had a more "European" approach to body hair. Do you really need to know this?



Anyway, the kids were All Stars and behaved charmingly on the flight over. I discovered that sucking on ice chips and punching the numbers on the seat-phone were Makena's favorite pass times. Jack actually said "please" and "thank you" to the flight-attendant, learned how to play Solitaire and let me sit in the window seat with Makena while my husband fed me Advil at regular intervals to help the swelling go down on my elbow.


When we got to Haleiwa, we all happily discovered that the rental agent had slapped some lights on a plastic palm tree. Jack grumbled that it wasn't a pine tree so I hastily explained that eight-pound, 6 ounce, baby Jesus (quoted from Talladega Nights) was born in the Middle East and that I suspected that the original Christmas Tree was actually a palm tree. Ha! Am I good or what?

This was the first time we weren't going to be home for Christmas and Jack was really concerned that Santa Claus wouldn't know where to find him. I assured him that I had mailed his letter to the North Pole with a forwarding address but he was very skeptical and moody. My brother and sister-in-law suspected that Jack's distress was an act meant to extract more gifts and that he didn't really "believe." They actually challenged me to confront him about it (They don't have kids) and for a while it felt as if I was living an episode of "Curb your enthusiasm" because they kept bringing the topic up. It was quite funny and nerve racking at the same time. Ultimately, is was a big "No way" because I wasn't going to be the one to pull Santa's sleigh out of the sky.

A hasty trip to Foodland provided us with some cheap colorful ornaments to hang and I would have added Leis to the trimming but my brother-in-law asked me not to embarrass him with the purchase...So I bought the National Enquirer instead and read it in plain view, in the check-out aisle, as we waited to pay. Now that was embarrassing!

Aloha.

Isabelle