Amen

I was going to write a post about National Infertility Week and how infertility changed my life forever. But then I read this one, and I don't have anything to write because Alexa has already said it all for me.

Cleanse the Palate

Here's a cute picture.

Today Milo ate 15 little bits of Kiwi off a fork. Once he had help stabbing it, he could use the fork and thus didn't have to actually, you know, touch it. Nora did put it to her mouth briefly before making a face and spitting it out.

One thing I've been somewhat surprised by recently is the kids' use of "I". I've been saying "you did it!" and they will repeat back "I did it!" Tonight I said something like that, I can't remember what it was, but some new phrase like "you found it" or "you dropped it", and Nora repeated back but replaced "you" with "I". I think this might mean that the kids are geniuses (so says every parent).

Nora and Milo have also been trying to make trades with each other, which I also find pretty smart. This morning Milo had a toy phone that Nora wanted, so she went and found a different toy phone (I think we have 3 different ones), brought it over to Milo, and handed it to him, saying "Mino". She then tried to grab Milo's. Milo didn't fall for this, and thus ensued a giant rabid fight over the coveted phone, but sometimes this strategy does work. I've seen Milo do the same thing with Nora. 

The kids have also taken to playing chase with each other, running back and forth and cackling with glee. I know this sounds mundane but after so much time generally ignoring each other, or being near one another but not actually interacting, it is very fun to see the kids directly playing together.

Guilt Blogging

The things that I thought would try my patience with toddlers have yet to really bother me. If the kids fight or cry or act like jerks to each other, I can re-direct them, calm them down, and deal with it without it being a problem. Tearing the toilet paper off the roll, sticking their entire hands in the cat's water bowl, basically wreaking a giant path of destruction that I must constantly reign in, those things are cool with me. I can understand why they do that stuff, because mostly they're just exploring their environment and being territorial. When the kids throw tantrums it does not bother me. I find it easy to empathize with how they must be feeling, and I just comfort them.

There are, however, two things that can really make me lose it. One is getting woken up by a crying baby 10 times through the night. I remember one time I was so angry that I told myself that once Nora was back to sleep I would allow myself to go down to the kitchen and destroy something. Which I did. (It was a cheese grater). So that kind of behavior was obviously nuts, and now that it's behind me I can kind of breathe a sigh of relief that it's over.

Except there's the other thing that really, really tries my patience, and that is problems with eating. 

I'm sure the whole underweight, extra doctors, extra pressure issues has made this worse. I don't worry as much now as I used to but I do remember worrying all the time about Nora's weight and then getting very, very frustrated when she would not drink her bottle. A couple of times I had to put her down and walk out of the room because otherwise I just wanted to scream. These days it's all about the solid foods, and sometimes the kids have good meals and sometimes they have crappy meals, and usually I'm okay with it but it is definitely a constant annoyance. I hate mess and I hate wet and slimy things. I hate getting anything wet or slimy on my hands, which is too bad because feeding a toddler is akin to putting a vat of soup into a blender, leaving the top off, and then turning it on. Every meal involves wet slimy things all over me, all over them, and all over the floor, the chairs, the table, and sometimes the wall. It means spoons full of pureed food chucked onto the floor, splattering everywhere. It is really obnoxious. Honestly I would rather change 100 diapers than deal with that.

Plus it's just never easy. Just about every spoonful has to be slipped in while they're distracted with other things. I have to employ 20 different tricks within the span of one meal just to get them to eat anything. It's always a struggle, every single meal.

Today in addition to pureed foods I made the following things for the kids: sausage, blueberry pancakes, toast with cream cheese and preserves, potato and leek soup with tons of cheese and cream, and cheddar bacon muffins (full of fatty goodness). Milo tried all of that and Nora tried none of it. None. At dinner, after having spent the day cleaning the floors, making food, doing dishes, and  pureeing avocados and bananas, we sat down and she took those muffin bits and said "No!" and immediately threw them on the floor. This mirrored lunch behavior (for the toast with cream cheese) and the breakfast behavior (for the pancakes and sausage). Seriously, oh my God, just TRY it. Then it was soup time, and this is soup that both kids love. Except not tonight. Both kids basically have to hold their own spoon and practice feeding themselves these days while I feed them, or else they will turn their heads and refuse to eat. It is a giant, messy, mess. But tonight after throwing the muffins overboard, Nora would not eat a bite of that soup. Instead she got a giant glob onto her spoon and then instead of putting it into her mouth (which she can do, and usually does), she threw the spoon at me, splattering the soup all over my clothes, the floor, and somehow, inexplicably, the wall.

And that is when I lost it, yelling "arrrrrghhhhh!", I mean, a real yell of frustration. And then both kids immediately started screaming and crying in terror, and Milo practically choked on the muffin he'd been happily eating. 

So, to sum up, I am a total asshole, I scared my kids, and I suck at parenting. 

Transitions

Some of my favorite times in the week are Monday mornings and Friday afternoons. After a long weekend with kid-related antics and mishaps, never being able to finish a thought, turning around from folding the laundry to wipe a nose only to re-discover the unfolded laundry hours later, I am thrilled to return to the simultaneous calm and excitement of work. 

By the time Friday afternoon rolls around I'm often already home in my mind, thinking about how we can go outside for a while before dinner, anticipating that delicious moment when I come through the door and Milo and Nora run through the kitchen to see who it is.

Being with the kids is so much fun. They're a crack up. Nora constantly says her own name now, walking around patting herself on the belly crooning little songs to herself that go like this "night night Noona, night night Noona, night night Noona, night night Noona." Then there is the popular variant, "bye bye Noona." Milo is having a lot of fun with two- and three-word phrases. He loves to say "Hi, daddy!" I have to put the exclamation point in there because that's how he says it every single time. Hi, daddy! Holy cow, it's you again, after just 30 seconds! Hi, daddy! Another favorite of Milo's is "where is it?", and both kids are saying "I did it!" 

But I hope it doesn't make me a bad parent to say that the fun parts are only part of it, and frankly, kids in general can be a) a pain in the ass, and b) boring. I mean, they just can. Adult brains are not equipped to handle the degree of repetition that small children inflict on them. Because you know what, after the 800th time of helping them put those two giant lego blocks together and take them apart again, my mind is going to turn into jelly. That's just what it does. The next thing you know I'm softly singing "night night Noona" to myself as I wash up the dinner dishes. And that's part of why Monday mornings are so fun for me. I need to spend some time thinking about conceptual analyses of spatial reasoning tasks, and then when the evening rolls around, I need to read "Goodnight Moon" three times in a row. Each half of me gives more meaning to the other half. And maybe over time this is how I will cobble together my currently fractured mama/professor identity.

Above is a picture of Milo stuck in a painful conundrum. He wants to stand up, but he can't let go of either ball. But he wants to pick up a ball. But if he picks up a ball, he'll have to stop touching the other ball. Which is not acceptable. Thus he crouches, grappling with the agony of imperfect choices.

When the Cat's Away, the Paternal Grandmother will Dress the Children in Gender-Stereotyped Clothes

16 Months

Today the kids are 16 months old. One day they got into a box so that I could capture their perfect cuteness:

In the book "Your One-Year Old, Wild and Wonderful", there is a theory that small children are in disequilibrium about halfway between 1 and 2, so 18 months can be a challenging time. Children become shy with other people, they get frustrated because there is much that they want to do but cannot, they are clumsy and not in good control of their bodies, and they get cranky from all of these changes. So we are entering these challenging days and I can certainly tell the difference between now and when they were 12 months old. The good news is that by the time they are 2, they are supposed to return to a place of relative equilibrium (for a time, until 2 and a half rolls around). 

I suspect that with twins some of these challenges are magnified because they are always together, butting heads. They sleep together, eat together, play together, cry together, read together, bathe together, run together, and fall together. They fight with each other, for toys and for attention. Because they cannot control their impulses, they are like little wild animals with each other sometimes. But they are also at the point where they play more and more, and do sweet things together. Whatever one does, the other one wants to do as well. They play peek-a-boo with the door and crack each other up. They hand things to one another. Nora will put Cheerios on Milo's tray. Milo will take a ball over to Nora and try to hand it to her over and over again, saying "Noah" each time. They copy each other constantly, so whatever bright idea one has can be seen acted out in stereo. 

One of the first things Milo says when he wakes up from his nap is "Noah?" At one point I had contemplated flying out to my hometown this summer for my high school reunion. Because Jake would have to stay in Madison, I had thought about just taking one child with me and leaving the other with Jake. But now I know I couldn't separate them for a whole week. Even a day would be pretty hard on them. As important as Mama and Daddy are to them, they also need each other.

Once upon a time, Milo used to be a shy little guy. I remember last year in May we took the kids to a picnic and my friend wanted to hold Milo. He started crying hysterically the minute she looked at him. Now, however, he's just the opposite. Milo loves it when new people come to visit, and he's a quite the ham! Milo will run around showing people his toys, playing with his ball and shouting "ball, ball!", and he'll grab books and demand that the visitor read them. He's so outgoing and cheerful these days. 

One thing that is really delightful about Milo right now is his obvious joy at stuff. He can't help but laugh in glee when something exciting is going on. One of his favorite exciting things to do is to run around upstairs. Generally we used to take the kids downstairs as soon as they were changed and we'd spend the entire day downstairs, except for naps and baths. Now we'll let the kids run around upstairs for a little while after they get up, or before their naps, and because this is new and different Milo loves it. As soon as he gets upstairs he starts running back and forth between the rooms, laughing and cracking up, running to the mirror and saying "Mino, Mino", running into the bathroom to lift the toilet lid and shove his hands into the toilet, or empty the cat's water dish, or play with the toilet brush. Both kids are completely destructive forces at this point but Milo's sheer joy about it all is something to behold.

Another thing that Milo just loves is running around outside. Early in the morning he'll start saying "Outside? Outside?" Outside is a whole new world to explore, and there might even be BALLS out there somewhere, you never know! Plus, there are trucks outside, and both kids inexplicably love the sounds of trucks. There are also birds outside, now, and when Milo hears the birds he'll say "tweet tweet?" It is a very sad thing indeed when Milo has to go back inside. That's pretty much the one time when he's guaranteed to lose it completely.

Well, that and diaper changes. Both kids have decided that they don't like to be changed anymore. So we encounter cries and protests many times a day now over that little thing.

Milo also loves to look out the window. His crib is near a window and if Milo stands in the corner of his crib, he can pull away the sun-blocking curtain, and then pull away the shade, and watch people going by on the bike path below. This is Milo's favorite crib activity. It's really getting to be a problem now that the sun is setting later and rising earlier. Milo almost never goes to sleep at 7 anymore. Instead he might spend half an hour looking out the window. The kids' wake-up time is supposed to be 7 a.m., but Milo has been getting up earlier and earlier to look out the window. The other day I heard him up at 6 a.m. and sure enough there he was, watching out the window. This 6 a.m. nonsense has got to go, so I've been thinking about moving Milo's crib so that he can no longer reach the window. But I haven't done it yet because he gets so much joy out of this. It seems pretty mean to take that away from him.

Milo has a great sense of humor. He finds all kinds of things funny, like being imitated, any type of food nonsense like spitting, dribbling, or spilling food, peek a boo, and being tickled. The kid loves to be tickled and as soon as I stop he'll say "more". Milo is a physical kid who loves to swing, bounce, be held upside down, be swung around, etc. He is also an affectionate kid who loves to hold and snuggle with his "babies" (soft animal loveys) in the crib. Sometimes he tries to be affectionate with Nora, but she's still not having any of that. Milo still does not like to eat, but he will eat more and more finger foods now, including french toast, bread, muffins, and one time he even ate a soft carrot. 

To be honest Milo is pretty fun to be around these days. I am enjoying him a lot.  

Nora is talkative these days. She likes to keep up a running monologue about everything, and even if she's got nothing else to say, she can fall back on the old standby of identifying herself repeatedly, running around patting herself on the belly saying "Noon-a, Noon-a" over and over again. I have also noticed Nora singing little songs to herself now and then. Nora has figured out the word "no" and can use it correctly, but it has also become her favorite word. "Nora, do you want to go upstairs?" "No?" "Nora, do you want to get your diaper changed?" "No?" If I try to put a spoonful of food in her mouth, she'll turn her head and say "No? No? No?" She always says it like a question.

Nora wants to be held, by me, all the time. It's kind of sweet because she has started to sort of hug me, resting her head on my shoulder for a while, taking comfort in being held. She seems to resent me doing anything that does not involve holding her. Things that present a particular affront to Nora include me doing the dishes or me cooking dinner. She would prefer it if I just held her instead. 

Nora has taken a liking to grown-up cups, and whenever she sees me drinking a glass of water she'll say "Water?" and demand that she has a sip of water. Nora is actually getting pretty good at drinking water, with help, out of a normal cup. She loves it because it's mine, not because it's water or it's a normal cup. I could get out a special cup just for her, and fill it with water, but when presented to her she'll just say "No?" and then look at my cup, and ask "Water?". This fascination with using Mama's cup hasn't extended to showing any interest in what I eat, unfortunately.

Nora can identify her head, hair, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, belly, hands, and feet. The other day I did "head, shoulders, knees and toes" with her about 80 times in a row, and she loved it. Nora likes to learn all of the words for different body parts, and she likes the ritual of touching her head, shoulders, knees and toes. Each time I stopped she'd ask, "More? More?" Anything that involves a song is something that Nora enjoys. She'll chime in when she knows the words. 

Nora has been getting crankier with each passing month -- each update seems to include a reference to Nora being cranky, so I figure this must mean that she is advanced in her development and she has reached the disequilibrium stage a little early. Thus I look forward to her moving out of that stage. Nora is keenly aware of the limitations placed on her, and she strains against them. In the stroller, she tries to lift herself out of her seat and struggles against the safety belt keeping her in. In the car seat, she tries to sit upright or climb out of the seat by herself. Nora wants to do things on her own, and she's getting pretty good at certain things. She can take a spoon and dip it into the yogurt and then put it in her mouth, all by herself. She can extend an arm and wait for me to put the sweater on. She can pull off her shoes. Nora loves being able to do things herself, and I think that the better she gets at these things, the happier she will be. 

Sometimes I have the opportunity to do things with Nora when Milo is still asleep or with Jake, like give her a bath or take her outside, just the two of us. During those times, Nora is like a different baby. She is more easygoing and more cheerful, and I realize that as much as the two of them need each other, they need time apart too. Nora just wants my attention, nothing more. She is such a happy girl when she has me all to herself. It's a delight to be able to give that to her, and to have the time to listen to her little conversations and watch her run around without having one eye simultaneously on Milo. Every single day, it seems, Nora learns more and more words and can talk about more and more things. It's so cool to actually be able to talk to her, and to have her start up a conversation by mentioning something I wouldn't have thought of. Oh, you hear a car? Oh, you said bye bye to the kitty earlier today? Oh, you want to eat / have a bath / go night night? These developments are awesome, it makes me enjoy each month more than the last. I can't wait to find out what she's going to learn next.

Then and Now

For weeks before this trip I've been fantasizing about the sleep, the sleeping, the snoozing, the napping, and all of the sleep I'd be doing. And, of course, about 10 minutes after saying goodbye to Jake and the kids I've just been missing them. I've been furtively watching other people's babies, looking at strollers and car seats everywhere around me, watching as moms hold their toddlers in their arms, maybe watching just a bit too long, wondering if maybe I could hold that baby for a while. Missing the heft of Milo as I lift him out of the crib, his soft cheek still warm from sleep. Missing the weight of Nora's head on my chest as she snuggles up against me.

Every time I hear a newborn crying I really really want to hold that baby and soothe her. I wonder if this ever goes away, or is it just a permanent change brought by motherhood? Will I still feel that longing in 20 years? When my children are too big to want to be held, will I miss that feeling of a baby's head resting on my shoulder?

The last time that this particular conference was held in this particular city, San Diego, the city where I attended grad school, was 5 years ago. It is weird to be back here now. 5 years ago my dissertation was due to my committee right around the same time that I had to give a talk for this conference. I was angry about a whole bunch of dissertation-related shenanigans I'd been dealing with. I gave my talk, which went well, and the next day I attended a symposium in which the discussant, in his talk, referenced my talk from the day before but attributed it to my advisor and not to me. I was mad about that, too. I was pretty much fed up with it all and after the symposium I got in my car and drove up the 5 to my apartment and I had the windows down and it was sunny and my favorite song came on, and I suddenly realized that I could choose to let go of my frustration and anger. I could just choose to stop it. So I did.

I turned in my dissertation and that weekend I took the day off and went to the wild animal park with my friend. It was the first day off I'd had since Christmas Day. I knew that I was leaving in a few weeks to move to the midwest. I knew I was going to be saying good-bye to San Diego permanently. I knew that everything was going to change, and boy did it. 5 years isn't that long but I can barely remember what it was like to be that person from April 2004. Now I have a mortgage and a husband and two kids and a job and two cats and I look about 15 years older. 

Back then I never noticed a baby crying. I never saw strollers or car seats. But now, even as I return to the city I used to call home, even as I attend talks and meetings and meet old friends for drinks or dinner, doing all of the same things I used to do back then, I am so changed. It's like the very cells of my body have been rearranged so that I cannot go anywhere without feeling the Nora- and Milo-sized holes in my heart.

Oh, and inexplicably, I woke up at 6 a.m. today. Sigh.

What's This? Airplane.

I'm heading into two conference trips and the rest of the family is sick. Jake is sick, Nora is sick, and Milo is sick. Nora is the farthest along and her poor face is a constant river of snot. It must be a drag to not be able to blow your nose. So far, I am not sick.

I'm going to San Diego for 3 days and then I come back for 4 days and then I go to D.C. for 2 and a half days. During these 2 trips I have to give 3 talks and serve as a mentor on an "approaching tenure" panel. Hah ha ha ha ha. I don't really know what I'll tell people. Uh...don't have twins when you're approaching tenure? That ought to cover it.

These spring conferences are ones that I attend every year. I skipped them last year because I couldn't leave the babies, and this year returning to my habit of attending them makes me feel like I'm back. Like I'm back to the old me, or back to my life or something. It's a new and changed life, but it is nice that some big pieces of my old life are still there, just in a new form.

A couple of weeks ago some people from the birth to 3 program came to watch Milo & Nora eat and play. Their doctor referred them for potential eating issues, but as it turns out they are normal enough that they don't qualify for services. I think this is probably a good thing. One bonus is that the therapists watched them for about an hour and then wrote up a very detailed report about them. The report was nice and reassuring. Both kids were evaluated to be at or above their age level in every area (fine motor, gross motor, receptive language, expressive language, sensorimotor, social and cognitive skills). Both kids demonstrated expressive language skills at the 18-21 month range, which isn't too shabby. The report also mentioned how clear their speech is and how they are unusually easy to understand. So, way to go kids.

They're not always perfectly easy to understand, especially when it comes to deciphering "help" from "up", but I think they're pretty clear in general. Nora in particular will mimic everything we say now. She likes to walk around saying "All right!" She'll constantly ask "what's this?" and then repeat whatever I say. I can no longer keep track of how many words they have because they're learning new ones every day now. What's this? Belt. What's this? Button. What's this? Light. What's this? Outside. Then the next time we encounter the object, they know the word for it, after having only heard it once before! That's amazing to me. I know that when I was learning French or Japanese my recall was nowhere near that good.

I have a lot of mixed feelings about leaving, especially since the kids and poor Jake are sick. Jake is dreading it because he has to deal with his mother while I'm gone, but I think he'll manage. Milo will be okay as long as Jake is there. Milo adores Jake intensely. It's Nora I'm most worried about, but I think that once she clues into the fact that I'm not around, she'll be okay. I hope.

Untitled

Me: I'm pretty nervous about leaving the kids next week, especially with Nora being so clingy these days.

Universe: Oh, you're nervous? Let me make it a little easier for you.

Nora: Ah-choo! Aaaaaaa, why can't I breathe? Whaaaaaa!

Me: How is this easier?

Universe: Oh, did I say easier? I meant ridiculously harder.

So, it looks like Nora has a cold. I'm holding out hope that she's actually teething 80 bajillion teeth at once, which is making her stuffed up, and Jake did helpfully point out that she's constantly got her entire hand shoved into her gaping maw. But frankly she's been chewing on her hand for a good year now and all she has to show for it are two measly teeth.

Last night was one of those nights in which she woke up every half hour or hour, crying because she couldn't breathe. My mind raced to various strange things as I sat in bed, unable to fall back asleep, waiting for the next time she would wake up and cry. Jake had mentioned that the Romans actually had plumbed toilets. It got me thinking about diapers. What did people do for diapers in the days before waterproofed material like rubber pants? Did they just use cloth that got wet all the time and had to be immediately changed? Did they use something naturally absorbent like wool? What about oilcloth? That's sort of waterproof, right? When did oilcloth come onto the scene? How did people fasten diapers before pins? 

It got me thinking about what a pain everything must have been in the time before you had something as simple as, say, a waterproof raincoat. When you came in from the rain, you couldn't take a hot shower. Instead you'd have to build a fire to warm up. What a pain.

That got me thinking about what people 2,000 years in the future might think about our lives now. If you think about facebook and twitter and blogs and instant messaging and texting, we're in contact with each other all the time. Some people have pretty involved relationships with people they have never even met in the flesh. In the future people will probably have devices in their heads that allow them to constantly access information about everybody and everything instantly. They'll have the option to have everybody else's voices streaming in their heads, 24/7. It'll be a life of constant contact with all of humanity. They'll think back on our lives and wonder at how isolated we were. How did anybody exist without being in touch with everybody else at all times? How alone we must have been!

The hours rambled by and then it was time to get up, and go to work and by the time my class rolled around this evening, I was already done for. I was so tired that I was stupid. Tonight we talked about situated cognition and it involves some ideas that are hard for graduate students to accept. They didn't like the idea that knowledge is contextually bound. I showed them an example of dairy packers in a plant solving problems in ways that were structured by their experiences packing cases of milk. "How is this different from expert novice studies in information processing?", one person asked, kind of belligerently, I thought. "Uh...how is it like the expert novice studies?" His question was a non-sequitur, which are the hardest ones to deal with.

"If situated theorists think that learning is enculturation into a practice, and we need to make classroom practice more authentic, who gets to decide what is authentic?" another asked. "Uh...hmm." I said. That's sort of more of a policy question than a learning theory question. I was too tired, and they were rebelling against the material.

And so it goes, and so it goes. And tonight since I got home Nora has already woken twice, and I hear her waking again. She is very stuffed up, and I'm worried about leaving her, especially if she is sick. If any of my co-authors could present this paper next week I would consider canceling my trip, but none of them are there that day, so I have to do it. I hope that Nora is on the mend by the time I leave, and that Milo doesn't get it (but he will). Selfishly, I hope that I don't get sick, because I've been looking forward to this trip for months. There's nothing like a nasty cold to ruin a good night's sleep, and the highlight of this trip is going to be the sleeping.

I can hear fate laughing as I say this.

Weekend

I've learned a lesson: If you spill a giant tub of yogurt all over the floor, don't say "oh shit" in front of your 15-month old unless you want to hear that phrase tossed back at you another 50 times throughout the evening.

This weekend we went to the Children's Museum for an hour. Nora walked all over creation, and Milo stood still, transfixed by the giant rube goldberg machine with a cue ball. He probably could have watched that thing all day.

On Saturday it got up to 50 and we spent some time in the park, walking all over the field and getting delightfully muddy. On Sunday we woke up to a snow-covered landscape. Is this April, or is it February? Tomorrow we have a high of 34 and it is supposed to snow all day. San Diego can't come soon enough.

The kids are entering a really challenging phase. They whine and complain all the time, and they also fight with each other. There are nice parts between them, like when Milo says "Noona" and then hands something to Nora, like a ball or a toy. He'll specifically walk over to her to give her something. But mostly it's just fighting over stuff. When Nora gets upset she will get down on her hands and knees and bang her head on the floor, repeatedly. Or else she'll stand against the wall and bang her head on the wall over and over again. Or else she'll take her hands, grasp them together to make a giant fist, and then bang herself in the forehead over and over again. Is this normal? It doesn't seem normal. I have a memory of my grandfather doing the same thing once he became (mentally) ill. He had a big bruise on his forehead. One time my grandmother and I went shopping and we came home behind this giant truck that spewed out a bunch of smoke. When we got home, Grandmom told the story about the truck spewing smoke and Grandpop said "I shouldn't have let you drive to the store. I should have done it myself." Then he started banging himself on the head. This is the image I flash to when I see Nora doing that. Is she going to turn out to be mentally ill, or is this just a normal (but weird) toddler thing to do?

Nora loves being held and she loves talking. She will spontaneously hug me. When we were at the children's museum, she would go up to random people and just stare at them, sometimes saying "hi". So...she doesn't seem autistic.

This morning I went to the Y instead of running outside due to the snow. The nice thing about returning to the dreaded treadmill after weeks of running outside is that you can really see your progress. When I started in January, I was reeeeally slow. Now my cruising speed is .7 mph faster than when I started, and it's pretty easy, and my maximum cruising speed (that I can maintain for at least 5 minutes) is 1.2 mph faster than when I started. That feels great. I have lost 10 lbs since Christmas and that has helped with running. I have another 5 to go, in a perfect world, but we will see if that happens given that my body is not going to return to what it used to be. I have a lot of extra weird wrinkly skin around my belly that is not going anywhere.  I also have diastasis recti, which doesn't seem to be getting any better, and the exercises I've gotten off the internet don't seem to have helped. Maybe it is time to visit a PT?  When I am on my back and I look at my belly or touch it and feel that giant gulf in the middle, the gulf that didn't used to be a gulf, I feel weird and lightheaded and creeped out like maybe I am going to faint. 

But other than having a destroyed stomach, I feel stronger and fitter and I have more energy and verve. This is a good thing because I need that energy now more than ever. Toddler wrangling is tiring business, but just look at these cuties:

A Room of One's Own

Good: So there might be a solution in sight to the childcare issue for fall...I am hopeful and excited.

Bad: Before the kids were born I did a lot of work at home. I got more work done at home (by work I mean "real" work, i.e. work that will earn me tenure, i.e. analyzing data and writing for publication) than at the office. At the office, people always interrupt me and bug me for stuff. At the office, I end up stuck in meetings for half the day. Meetings are not conducive to getting "real" work done. Anyway, I had my own office at home. It had a desk and I could sit at the computer and look out the window at the park. It had a reclining chair, and later a futon, and I could get comfortable and read journal articles. I loved that room, as it was all mine. It is important to have a room of one's own.

Jake's own room was in the basement. It also has a desk and a printer and a television and his weights. That was his room. My office was my room.

Then the babies came and Jake started school and started using a laptop and suddenly my office became his office. He doesn't want to spend all of his time in the cold dark basement, so he's co-opted my office. The futon is covered with his books and his papers. His computer is there. Every square inch of the office is covered with stuff. Some mine, some his. My desk is a mess. Jake spends most of his time in that room studying when he's not with the kids.

I used to love that room, my own space. Now I hate it. And I'm kind of resentful because I still want a room of my own.

Good: This morning I got the kids to actually eat some French Toast...with butter AND maple syrup!

Arbitrary Update: This morning Jake started putting his hat and coat on, and Milo looked up from his book and said "bye bye dada!" Sooooo cute. Both kids like to sing "eieio" from the Old MacDonald song, but they get it backwards, saying "ieie". They also like to chime in to the alphabet song. When I get to the part where you sing "now I know my ABC's", they say "know, know" and when I sing "next time won't you sing with me", they sing "me, me, me".

A Room of One's Own

Good: So there might be a solution in sight to the childcare issue for fall...I am hopeful and excited.

Bad: Before the kids were born I did a lot of work at home. I got more work done at home (by work I mean "real" work, i.e. work that will earn me tenure, i.e. analyzing data and writing for publication) than at the office. At the office, people always interrupt me and bug me for stuff. At the office, I end up stuck in meetings for half the day. Meetings are not conducive to getting "real" work done. Anyway, I had my own office at home. It had a desk and I could sit at the computer and look out the window at the park. It had a reclining chair, and later a futon, and I could get comfortable and read journal articles. I loved that room, as it was all mine. It is important to have a room of one's own.

Jake's own room was in the basement. It also has a desk and a printer and a television and his weights. That was his room. My office was my room.

Then the babies came and Jake started school and started using a laptop and suddenly my office became his office. He doesn't want to spend all of his time in the cold dark basement, so he's co-opted my office. The futon is covered with his books and his papers. His computer is there. Every square inch of the office is covered with stuff. Some mine, some his. My desk is a mess. Jake spends most of his time in that room studying when he's not with the kids.

I used to love that room, my own space. Now I hate it. And I'm kind of resentful because I still want a room of my own.

Good: This morning I got the kids to actually eat some French Toast...with butter AND maple syrup!

Arbitrary Update: This morning Jake started putting his hat and coat on, and Milo looked up from his book and said "bye bye dada!"  Sooooo cute.  Both kids like to sing "eieio" from the Old MacDonald song, but they get it backwards, saying "ieie". They also like to chime in to the alphabet song. When I get to the part where you sing "now I know my ABC's", they say "know, know" and when I sing "next time won't you sing with me", they sing "me, me, me". 

Ready for a Vacation

I was going to write something profound about happiness and studies about whether and how much a person's basic happiness levels can change and how that's worked out in my life but...eh. I'm too tired. I'm tired from being up at 3 a.m. with Nora and then getting up early and playing with the kids and then going to work and working an 11-hour day and then walking home in the dark and stopping by the store to get some milk and coming home and feeding the cats and taking out the recycling and eating dinner at 9 p.m.

I'm tired from teaching a 3-hour class tonight, and being observed for the last half of it. Being observed is stressful for me. I'm tired from reading eight thousand different emails from clueless mathematicians at my university who like to pontificate endlessly about their exalted opinions on educational issues based on that one time they visited their son's 7th-grade math classroom. I'm tired of biting my tongue over and over again, because I'm trying to stay polite until after tenure. I'm tired of trying to figure out what to do for Nora & Milo come fall, working through the possibilities again and again like a puzzle that won't come together. I'm tired of laundry and diapers and dishes. 

Like they say on car talk, my ass must be draggin'!