Happy Unbirthday

Okay. I have to get something off ma chest. Appropos of nothing, I just have to confess that I am not a fan of the throwing of the child birthday party. Woooooshhhooooo. I know, right? You'd have liked the courtesy of being told to sit down first before I dropped that emotional bombshell on you! GAH! This is almost on par with the Dick Whitman/Donald Draper revelation. Believe me, it hurts me more than it hurts you. So, who cares? Is that really what you're thinking? Your kids' birthdays aren't even in this vicinity of the year, Kendra. Why you trippin', gurl?

It's just that...there's this trend? In the blogosphere? Where I live A LOT, and it's a complete festival of birthday DIY awesomeosity, and I just cannot abide it. I feel so inadequate! My children have never had a birthday that their mother has thrown for them. Ohhohoho, those pictures you've seen in their fancy hanboks with the fruit sculptures? Those are all show and tell for my in-laws. There have been no handmade banners, no thematic Elmo goodie bags cum pin-the-tail-on-Elmo games, no matchy candy buffets (sourced locally, natch). I have never hit up Paper Source to craft a custom invitation nor ordered adorbs ones from tinyprints. I've had the opportunity 4 times and I've tossed up the white flag every time.

I have thought lonnnng and hard about this. And truth be told, it has nothing to do with laziness or the wherewithall to host a party or lack of creativity. It's not a campaign against milestone celebrations or a fear that my child will be the one all "it's my party and I'll cry if I want to."

It all comes down to my issue. I'm not even sure I can explain it, but I'm a writer, so let me just write to see what I'm thinking.

I think I'm anti-birthday-throwing for my kids because...because I just want to be selfish with them for the years in which I can be, n'ah mean? I sometimes feel like they grow whole inches while I am rocking them and grow two feet in the span of a night's sleep. It's not fair. I can't bear it! So when their birthdays come and they're a whole year older than they were the day before? I just want to relish in their company and not have to tuck away my inner anguish so that we can get on with the lighting of the candles, the singing in an off-key, the cutting of the cake. I know they are just a couple of years away from hog-tying me into some Fancy Nancy/Transformers shenanigans complete with those uberirritating party favors that kids blow on until the cardboard mouthpiece is all mushy. And then it's all downhill from there.

And that, ladies in gents, is why you've never been invited to a party at my house celebrating my children. Do you feel better now? I know I do. End: SuperEmo Mama Blather.

Edit: I should add that I've always used the $crilla that I would have spent on a birthday to purchase a museum membership or register my kids for a class that we can attend together. Gift that keeps on giving and all of that.

P.S. Am I the only one who feels this way? Kinda?

Think Fast

You know that moment as a child when you unwittingly ask the hot button question and your elder is clearly reaching for something sage but all she can offer you is some totally impotent answer that really leaves you still wanting to know more? Like my neighbor friend growing up. She saw her mother grabbing something out of a Kotex package on top of the toilet and she asked what was that curiously soft little envelope she was tucking into her handbag? Her mother quickly responded, "Those are for mothers." And then it was all crystal clear.

Once you awaken to the fact that you were duped, once you firmly lift that veil of wool from where it was shielding your eyes, you resolve: That will never be me. When I'm a parent? I'MA DO ONE BETTAH.

And then your Baby Girl watches as you dig through your handbag and notices that thin capsule-shaped package that is kinda the size of a candy bar? And maybe she has seen it before and yet she's not sure so she reaches in and grabs it while you are sitting in church trying to write out your offering check and she wants to know what's inside of this, mommy, and you try and keep this scene on the DL by nipping it in the bud once and for all. So you say, "Those are for mothers." And what else is there to know, really?

***

School Daze

A few years ago I wouldn't have known what they meant by "successful drop-off" had I been privy to the exchanges of parents of school-aged children, all comparing notes on whether the drop-off that morning had been successful. Now that I have traversed the country of home daycare and wound up on the dark side of walking my 3 y.o. every morning to a classroom in a building with big kids AHHHHH FOURTH GRADERS ARE HORNY-TOED MONNNNNSTERRRRRS, I know what a successful drop-off means.

It means having a dissociative identity disorder for a few minutes every time you drop your kid off at school. My stars! I am so proud of you, my confident, ebullient, brilliant little person who has sprung from my loins into this grand arena of puzzles and sandboxes and knowledge. You jerk! How dare you just pull yourself away from me without so much as a hug and a proper good-bye! Okay, well, I'm just going to go get back to not eating all day because of the lump in my throat that grows bigger every time I think of you.

A successful drop-off does not involve sling-shotting your muncharoo through classroom doors and then shutting said doors and running like the dickens. So I've been told.

The other day, Loverpants picked up our star student from school and, as she had learned in three days of formal education, nothing happens in school worth reporting on, with the exception of the teacher's assistant having had to put on rubber gloves to clean up after Hurricane Tinkle had swept through the lav that day.

The following day, the teacher's assistant asked me at drop-off whether my daughter had told me how she had volunteered the day before to sing a solo to the music teacher? Errherrm, yeah, she had failed to mention that. But thank you!

*** Waiting for Big Sis to get home from school.

Still waiting.

When she gets home, operator is ON.