Solo Outings
And by solo, I mean one parent with four children. Pictured above is last night’s highly successful outing, wherein I silently basked in my children’s fine behavior. I didn’t put much thought into the outing, which was probably a good thing, because too much thinking and I might have thought better of it. We brainstormed places to go for supper, and agreed on a Thai restaurant within walking distance, as we had no vehicle at our disposal (Kevin is away for a few days; and this is what happens when you decide to be a one-vehicle family). Every kid chose a small entertainment item, I threw the diaper bag into the small stroller, and we headed merrily on our way. Since we arrived before 5pm on a Friday evening, we had the place to ourselves, and food arrived quickly (we are familiar with the menu and had made our meal choices beforehand). CJ is the real wild-card, but everyone was equally hungry, and we ate and talked and CJ pointed out animals in the artwork, including making loud dragon noises for the Chinese dragon (“why is a Chinese dragon at a Thai restaurant?” the older kids wondered). The photo above pictures him choking on a piece of Albus’s chicken. Awesome camera-work, Perfect Mom! Yes, he survived. We stopped at mains (no ice cream), and left the restaurant while everyone was still in happy spirits. I was one proud mama, and even got to hear an elderly woman who’d just arrived with her friends observe in an admiring voice: “Look at that woman, out all on her own with four children!”
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Then, today happened. I was tired. CJ woke four times last night, and though he agreed each time to go back to sleep without nursing, nevertheless that was four times I was up, giving him a hug and a kiss (“kiss, kiss,” he requested each time) and tucking him back in. Thankfully, we all slept in till 7:30. Then we hurried through breakfast, starting a crockpot supper, and organizing to go to a previously arranged dr’s appointment for Apple-Apple. By bus. Since we have no vehicle, as mentioned. You know, I just didn’t feel up to the task. Everyone else seemed grumpy, too, and didn’t appreciate being rushed on a Saturday morning. I tried phoning Kevin for commiseration, which resulted in a farcical game of phone tag. And did not help. There was a small meltdown. Mine. But. We made it to the bus stop, climbed aboard, stroller and all, made it to the dr’s office, all in good time. It was an up-and-down morning, I guess, now that I reflect on it. I was proud of the kids on the first bus ride, and in the dr’s office. We then headed to the Children’s Museum, and I was proud of them there, too. Mostly. But there were some definite rotten mothering moments. Such as when I texted Kevin while letting CJ glue and marker himself unattended at a craft station. And lunch was hairy. Though perhaps it was just exuberant and I’m being too hard on myself (and them). Lunch was followed by an entertaining session in the bathroom with CJ and a poopy diaper, while I left the other children unattended in the main room. I could hear Albus shouting directions all the way to the bathroom. When we finally emerged, CJ ran for the play area, climbed onto a wooden box and promptly fell off. I picked him up, howling, only to realize that my other children were being watched with some disapproval by parents in the snack-area. My unattended exuberent offspring were standing on top of another tall wooden box building a stool out of giant blocks of squishy Lego in order to climb up and make their CN-tower-sized structure even bigger. And then they crashed it down.
We could have gone home then, but we didn’t. We stayed till Santa arrived, whereupon AppleApple kept asking, in a loud voice, “Why would anyone want to sit on an old man’s lap who is wearing a fake beard and pretending to be Santa Claus?”
And then we left.
How Does She Do It?
The Zine
Above is the hard copy of my women’s studies project. Some of you were involved in it, having responded to my questionnaire on a separate blog created for the project, called Moms Are Feminists Too. Thanks for your participation. I continue to feel inspired to add content and thought to that blog, even though it feels like I’m formulating ideas even as I go along. The above zine was produced with a great deal of self-doubt, and I almost didn’t hand it in, despite the effort behind it. I almost handed in an alternative production that was tidy and pleasant and not very activist-y (yes–that is how much of a keener, I am–I actually completed this single project TWICE). The zine you see above was produced late at night in a fit of scissors-ing, pasting, and scrawling. The words came from the heart and were not exactly well-planned, and I lost a few marks for that, but the emotion and purpose must have come through because the prof liked it enough to keep it.
I confess that the project surprised me in a number of different ways. It surprised me that I felt this passionately about motherhood and work, and the value (or cultural undervaluing, to be more precise) of children and childcare. I was surprised by how hard it was for me to step out and declare a position. It was difficult even to declare myself a feminist, with all the negative connotations associated with that word, and because this blog, Obscure CanLit Mama, has never had much interest in politicizing family. It doesn’t seem the place for it. I wonder why not?
Here’s another tiny and rather ironic revelation that came over me on the drive home from my last class, tonight. I thought: gee, I kind of took this class to see whether my brain could still retain information and regurgitate it on command (which is what most educational testing schemes require of students). Apparently, I still can. Really, it stands to reason that I’d be much the same student now as then. So why the heck did I think my capacity to be a “good” student might have changed? Easy. Because in between the last time I was a student, and now, I gave birth to four children. Somewhere along the line, I must have bought into that theory about “motherbrain.” You know, how motherhood fuzzes our brains, how we become all leaky and exhausted and incapable of rational thought. Forever. Um. Damn! I cannot believe that some part of me actually believed that theory enough that I needed to test myself, to prove myself. Personally, I think motherbrain is probably the same as fatherbrain–caused by severe sleep deprivation, and, generally, passing post-infancy. This is just one small example of how insidious these messages are, how ever-present, how we tell them to ourselves, and pull them into ourselves, and how they have the potential to keep us from exploring wider possibilities, or pushing beyond what’s expected of us–and what we expect of ourselves.
This class has actually been something I never anticipated it being. It’s been consciousness-raising. (And I already considered myself a feminist). Oh, how I would like to push my children’s gender boundaries just a little bit more, how I would like for all of them to share those best qualities that shouldn’t be gendered at all. Kindness, gentleness, empathy, grace, ambition. To be thoughtful, hardworking, confident, open. To lead, to share, to cooperate, to give. To be creative, active, brave. Never to fear judgement. To develop job skills and domestic skills, and to be loving caregivers.
Imagine.
I Don’t Want a Blow-Drier
The itch to write exists. But our week is dull and commonplace. No, that’s not being fair to this fine and worthy week among many. In fact, when I think about it, lots is happening that is good and blog-worthy.
Saturday’s Cooking-with-Children Experiment
We’re always looking for new ways to include our children in some of the daily routines that keep our household functioning. This is part of my own larger plot to share the burden of unpaid domestic work amongst all the members of the family, as I ease further and further into paid work, again. I would also like to launch my children into the world with a number of useful domestic skills: knowing how to cook and how to shop for nutritious food, how to pick up after themselves, how to entertain themselves, how to notice needs and care for each other. Pretty lofty goals. And it doesn’t feel like we have much time to instill these values and skills into our beloved offspring.
I’ve noticed something: when we write a plan on our large family calendar beside the phone, the plan happens. For a long time, I’ve been dreaming of cooking a meal, once a week, with a child who is old enough to help out (ie. everyone except CJ, right now, though I’ll bet he’d love to try, too). But it’s never actually happened with any regularity. So, I decided to write it on the calendar, oldest to youngest, the next three Saturdays. Yesterday was the first, and because it was on the calendar, Albus took it very seriously–and so did I. Plus, we had a great baking/kitchen day. Apple-Apple started by stirring up and kneading bread dough, almost entirely by herself. Fooey was my cookie-assistant. And Kevin covered the granola-baking while I took two eight-year-old boys shopping for pizza-making supplies. Two boys, because Albus had a friend over and the friend expressed interest in helping out. This turned out to be really really fortuitous and so much fun that I’m thinking maybe Apple-Apple would like to invite a friend to include in her cooking adventure next week.
I’d made the dough in advance–in fact, I used an insanely simple fermented dough recipe that has proved mostly successful in its three outings. (It’s literally: flour, salt, water, and yeast, stirred together and left to ferment on the counter overnight). The first outing was the best, because I didn’t leave time for a second rising on my second attempt. And for pizza dough–it was awesome. So stretchy and moist that the boys were able to spread it on their trays with ease and without assistance. Plus they loved the tactile pleasure of oiling the trays with their hands, smooshing the dough, sprinkling the cheese. An excellent meal choice, Albus. We made tomato sauce in the blender using the same cookbook (My Bread, by Jim Lahey). Can of tomatoes, juice from tomatoes, salt, olive oil, clove of garlic. Rev the engine. Gloop onto the dough and spread with a spoon. Then there was lots of grating of cheese and chopping of pepperoni. I fried the bacon. The red peppers were last summer’s, frozen. We never got to the french fry making, the other item on the menu. Maybe next time.
It was such a fun day of cooking together. And what made it all possible was this knowledge in the back of my head that I didn’t need to find time to vacuum the whole house … because we’re trying out having a cleaning service come in every other week to do a full cleaning. They will dust. I have never dusted. Should I even confess that? They will vacuum. They will wash the floors. I have never washed the wood floors. Again with the confessions. Stop me now.
I will report back on this experiment.
Because they’ll be coming on Wednesday, I am instituting a Tuesday evening tidy and computer time. (Computer time available to those who help with the tidying.) We did a dry run last Tuesday, and Albus was particularly helpful.
Anyway, to sum it up, spreading out the burden of housekeeping freed me up to spend a full day cooking and baking and sharing that time with the whole family. Here’s hoping this experiment will prove sustainable.