Did You Get a Haircut?

I went away for the weekend. As usual, it was fabulous. When I returned home to my loving family my husband told me the many accomplishments he had ticked off the list while I was gone. Deck fortification, sprinkler maintenance, feeding of children – that sort of thing. He also attended to some personal grooming, but he didn’t mention this – not right away.

15 hours after my return he said, “I will have you know I got a haircut this weekend.”

He’d been saving this. And he had a right. It was no ordinary haircut. He’d gone from fairly long and curly back to close cropped. And I hadn’t noticed. He had me.

“I see now,” I said. “Sorry, Babe. It looks good. Really.”

He nodded, triumphant. “I want a Haircut Free Card.”

Deep Dark Fears of Childhood

Our family uses a conversation starter game called Table Topics. Each night as we eat dinner we pull a card from the box and answer the question. It’s a great way to get the kids talking, and occasionally shock my husband. The other night the question seemed superficial enough: What fear would you like to overcome?

I was trying decide between my fear of spiders versus my fear of noises in the night when my husband is out of town. My son volunteered to go first.

“Okay, what fear would you like to overcome?”

“I’d have to say the feeling of being a speck of dust in the universe, and that life is completely meaningless.”

Wow. The kid was so matter of fact about it. My husband and I shared a look across the table. And we laughed.

“But your life means something,” I said when I composed myself. “It means something to all the people you come in contact with.”

The Boy shook his head. “Yeah, but their lives are meaningless too.”

Duh.

Meet Me at the Hotel Room

Remember when hotel rooms were sexy? All vacation and rendezvous and sheets you didn’t have to clean? Yeah, me neither. But I do remember when a hotel room represented relaxation. A freshly made bed, hours of freedom, drinks mixed with ice from down the hall. And again, the lack of laundry.

Now that most of my disposable income goes toward exposing my children to experiences (and boots) that may create wonderful memories or somehow serve them later in life, hotel rooms are all about the agony of too much family togetherness. Where once there was soft lighting and exotic snacks, now there are wet towels on every once-dry surface and my tweens’ ever expanding collections of grooming aids, which are fast outgrowing my own.

Instead of a good movie on TV (possibly featuring a naked Mark Wahlberg), we are forced to suffer through endless half hours of Miley Cyrus and that guy with the mullet whose head heart we all wanted to break, with a sledgehammer, back in 1992.

There are soggy pizza boxes on the bed. (Okay, maybe that part’s the same.)

I hide in the bathroom reading a book, partly to be alone, and partly so that no one can stink up the 200 square feet that have become our family living space. Did I mention the dog? Oh yes, we’re that crazy. In close proximity to the ever present them, I grow increasingly irritated. I crave escape from my husband’s brilliant observations, such as, “This place really fills up at night.” We smuggle the dog in and out of the room, begging him to ‘go’ at our convenience.

Finally, I turn to the ill-equipped fitness center for refuge and am devastated to see that although there are only two lonely treadmills, the tiny room has been outfitted with three walls of mirror, allowing me to see all that is shielded in my own strategically mirrored home. I want to go home. Now.

Other parents have already crossed over, crossed back into the world of peaceful hotel rooms. They have begun to reserve two of them. I can’t do that. I’m not ready. And I’m far to cheap. Besides, if I did that, what would I have to write about?

Smartass Family Politics

At breakfast the other day my daughter was being especially sweet to me. In an effort to extend this kind of treatment to my husband and son I told her how much I loved her, my sweet little sweetie pie.

“At least someone around here is nice to me,” I said.

“Sure,” my husband said. “You should hear her when we get in the car. She’s real nice then. That’s when she really makes fun of you.”

Not wanting to break the spell, my daughter launched a protest. “No I don’t. Daddy’s just saying I’m a bad person.”

I didn’t know how we’d gotten from teasing to morals. “Oh no, Sweetie,” I said. “He’s not. Besides, making fun of someone doesn’t make you a bad person.”

My son, who’d stayed out of it up to this point, let out one of those puffs of air that says oh-give-me-a-break-would-you?

“Mom,” he said. “You’re just saying that because you make fun of a LOT of people.”

This is the part where I stopped talking.

Let’s Have Fun This Thanksgiving, Shall We?

I am not hosting Thanksgiving this year. Know what that means? It means it’s going to be awesome is what that means! I am going to eat, drink, and probably talk too much. I am going to be thankful for all the insanity. And I’m going to write it all down. The good, the bad, the hurtful and rude. Be warned.

Won’t you join me? I’m issuing a challenge–to make your Thanksgiving way more funner. This year, collect quotes. Whenever Uncle Fred or Auntie Annie spit out a racial slur, when your parents pick at your lack of ambition or your excess forearm flesh, when your inlaws inquire as to your status with child or without–write it down. Share them here in the comments to prove that every family is crazy, or just to make someone else feel better that yes, your life really is worse than theirs. Or funnier. You get to decide.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Suburban Housewife Rap

I can’t get this out of my head so I had to share it with you. And if you don’t live in the suburbs, let me assure you, it’s all true.

When You Want to Run Away

This is the September edition of the print version of After the Bubbly, an award winning family humor column. If you’d like to see it in a local publication, let me know and I’ll do my best to get it there!

When I was a kid I never wanted to run away and join the circus. Now that I’m older, I get it. Although it’s not my dream to tame lions or become the bearded lady, I understand the lure of escaping to some exotic life where the tightrope you walk is literal as opposed to the figurative balancing act we do here in the world of diapers, homework, and ear infections.

My mother tells a story about her mother, who would tell her children that if they didn’t behave she would run off to Tucumcari, New Mexico and they’d never find her. To which my mother calmly responded that they most certainly would find her – in Tucumcari, New Mexico.

Mom shouted similar warnings to my brother and I as kids. She would run away and never return. We didn’t have reason to believe her empty threats, but then again, you never knew. Moms are crazy like that. Our mothers and grandmothers didn’t mess with balance – work-life or otherwise. They didn’t have spa days or antidepressants or Oprah. They just woke up in the morning and did what needed doing. And if they lost it once in a while, well, they were entitled.

Genetics notwithstanding, I have yet to issue such a circus-running-off sort of threat. I prefer short periods of actual escape to fantasies of long-term flight. Running off for weekend writing classes and conferences recharges my depleted mama batteries and gives me strength to face the days of infinite laundry and incessant requests for Nintendo DS cartridges. I schedule my respites months in advance and write them on the calendar – in pen. In Sharpie even.

My retreats may not be as exciting as swallowing swords, but for me, some quality time with a spiral notebook and a half decent pen is usually enough to return equilibrium. And if it’s not, I run off to yoga class, where we make like a tree and stand on one leg, or rest our thighs upon our biceps. That’s balance. These are the things that keep me from losing it.

So next time you’re tempted to run away and join the circus, remember that you can juggle fire in your own kitchen and rig up a tightrope in your backyard. Just make sure you wait until after you’ve finished all that other balancing  – you know, the checkbook, the food groups, and the quality time spent with each child.

And if you hear of any writers’ meetings in Tucumcari, New Mexico, don’t come looking for me.

Lela Davidson is a Northwest Arkansas writer seeking to balance life, love, and laundry with a husband, two children, a dog, and an ever-changing number of fish. Read more at www.afterthebubbly.com.

Passing the Clipboard

Last week my kids started musical theatre camp. Maybe you don’t like showtunes, maybe you do – not my business – but my kids do. And once you’ve seen your nine-year-old daughter belting out the Sally Bowles numbers from Cabaret, you’ll do just about anything to get some new songs into that head of hers.

So there we are, the kids, my husband and I, at the mandatory parent meeting (oh yeah, mandatory – these theatre people are serious) and they started passing the clipboards around. Personally, I never really met a clipboard I didn’t like so I had to check out where to put my name.

Costumes? No, didn’t want to prick my finger. Set design? Please – the curtains I took down in February so that my husband could repair the baseboard, which he did – in March? Still down. So I was pretty happy to see the Back Stage Parent list going around. Here was a way to stay plugged into the process and get some serious face time with the kids. And all I had to do was show up every single day the second week of camp and come early and stay late for both performances. Piece of cupcake!

You’re not doing that, said the Man.

Why not?

Did you see here where it says you won’t be able to watch the show?

I’ll buy the DVD.

You need to sit with me.

Awwwww. But they really need people. You’ll be okay.

It’s for both nights. Did you see that?

Yeah, so? You won’t have to come both nights.

So who’s going to sit with me at the bar?

We high-fived and I passed the clipboard. That’s romance.

If I Had Tweeted My Labor

OMG! Just started timing contractions. Totally on schedule. This is going to be soooo great. Can’t wait to start breathing exercises!

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Contractions are starting to hurt. Husband wants to go to the hospital but I’m calling the doula. Need to labor at home a while.

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Damn this hurts! Breathing not bringing the relief I thought it would. Cramps are WAY worse than in the pictures.

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Couldn’t wait for doula to show. Threw up en route to the hospital. Husband is totally freaking out.

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Trying to Tweet in the tub w/o *ing up my iPhone. Is it normal to sound like a hurt cow?

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The comfort of water is over-rated. The tub is now freezing but it hurts too bad to move. WTF? Who thought of this?

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Okay – way better now. Taking drugs. Something with ‘cain’ at the end took the edge off. Waiting for my epidural!!!!

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ROTFLMAO – Dr. Feelgood just asked if I was in the middle of a contraction! Ha! I’ll show him a contraction!

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Epidurals=NOT overrated!! Doula is helping me get into soothing positions, just tried to sneak me a granola bar.

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9 1/2? 9 1/2? WTF is 9 1/2? When is this *ing monster going to get the hell out of there? Seriously, suck this thing out NOW!

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Totally should have gotten that one final pedicure.

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Okay, fine. I give up. They’re shaving me now. We’re going to get this kid out one way or another. Okay – the other way…

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Does anyone speak anesthesiologist? What part of ‘Yes, I can feel that’ is so hard to understand?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

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Something just popped. What was that? Gotta go, face mask is coming and they’re making me count. 10, 9, 8, 7, …..

Got Bedtime?

Sometimes our kids come up with ways to get out of things that we simple can’t argue with. In our house my oldest is a genius at extending the bedtime.

It started happening about six months ago. My little angel just happened to need go to the bathroom every night at precisely eight-o-clock. Numero dos.

Mom! I can’t help it. It’s not my fault. I’m on a schedule!

You can’t fight a finely tuned set of bowels. You wouldn’t even want to try.

Oh how I envy those parents who get their kids to go to sleep with a drink of water or a night light.

What about you? What do your kids do to get out of bedtime? Parent Bloggers wants to know and so do I!

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