Author Archives: branch

Twenty-Eight: Brains

Eli and I were driving to the store today, to look for maple leaf-shaped baking pans. Arlo’s 7th birthday is Canada Day and I thought I might make him a cake for the first time in 7 years but like all my ideas, this one is harder to execute than you might expect. Canada Day may as well not be happening at Michaels Craft Store and Winners/Homesense.

Eli said, “It sure is raining.”

I said, “Yup. But, it’s June. It always rains a lot in June. Remember last summer when we left for Ontario and it was raining? And then when we got there, it was SO HOT.”

“Yes, I remember,” Eli said.

I turned left at the corner.

“I have a picture of that day in my head,” Eli continued. “the day we arrived in Ontario.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. And it’s hot in the picture. And there was a car seat just for me in grandma and grandad’s car.”

“Yup.”

“It’s too bad you can’t come in my brain and see the pictures too,” he said.

“It is too bad,” I said.

“The small part of my brain is showing the pictures to the big part of my brain.”

I laughed out loud, even though Eli doesn’t like it when you laugh out loud because he hasn’t figured out yet if you’re laughing with him or at him.

“I’m laughing because it’s a great picture in *my* brain now. Of your big brain and your little brain,” I explained.

“It is kind of funny,” he allowed.

This is one of my favourite pictures (in my brain) of our trip to Ontario last summer.

This is one of my favourite pictures (in my brain) of our trip to Ontario last summer.

Twenty-Seven — Why Are We Here?

Ginger is doing a weekly prompted bloggity thingeroo .. you can participate too, if you want! I am going to answer both prompts because the first one is a very short answer.

Prompt one: Why did you start blogging?
A: I started blogging because I wanted people to read my words.

Prompt two: What is the best decision you ever made?

So much waffling. What IS the best decision I ever made? Moving to this townhouse, to the city of New Westminster, which seemed like an OK decision at the time, actually turned out to be a great decision. Having children was a pretty good decision, but I’m not sure it was the best ever. Career-wise, there haven’t been many great decisions, other than quitting the job with the creepy boss.

I think the best decision I EVER made was to move out on my own when I was 19.

It was 1993 and I had just finished my second year of university. I lived in Burnaby and went to school at UBC, so my bus trip was an hour each way. I spent a lot of time on the bus, scribbling in my journal or listening to my big, yellow Walkman and staring out the window at Hastings, Granville, Broadway, 10th Ave.

I was starting to really resent my overprotective father. While I was in high school, I complained bitterly but never really rebelled against the house rules. But when I got to UBC and started meeting new people, people I hadn’t known for five or ten years already, people who listened to grunge and electronica and folk music instead of top 40, people who wore cut off jeans, tights, combat boots, people who dyed their hair and pierced their faces and had tattoos and wrote poetry and made films…well, I desperately wanted to be a part of it. That life. The life that started with me being able to stay out past 10 pm.

In June, 1993, I blew away all the treaty negotiations. I decided it would be a good idea to celebrate writing my last exam of the year by drinking a lot of vodka and grapefruit juice in Stanley Park with my friend. Obliteratedly drunk I arrived home well before curfew but that didn’t matter as much as the fact that I was dropped off by a strange man in a pickup truck who had rescued my friend and me from the railroad tracks below Gastown. Apparently we had been wandering on and off the tracks, my friend had a hammer, and the guy with the truck –Bill, I think?– took pity on us and drove us home.

Whooee! was I in trouble. And rightly so. I had to go to my brand new part-time job at the cheese shop the next day with a wicked hangover and that was nearly punishment enough. As part of the fallout from the “discussion” that ensued, I declared that I would move out of the house that summer and get my own place. Dad said, “No you can’t.” Having a bit more than a little of his stubborn blood in my own veins, that was all I needed to hear.

In mid-July, my friend Joanna and I moved into our two-bedroom suite in a house at Main and 22nd Street. A month later, Sarah joined us and we were an amazingly big-haired trio of roommates for a year, after which we went through roommates and new apartments for a few years before settling down with our significant others, to whom we are all now married.

When I moved out I didn’t have any real plan, other than I would work at my job selling cheese and pay my rent and tuition and for food and drinks. Jobs came and went, tuition got paid, albeit more slowly than it had when Dad was paying it, and it took me an extra couple of years to get the credits to graduate, but I did. Eventually.

I learned how to survive; how to cook, clean, give notice on an apartment, quit a job, look for a new one, accept the kindness of strangers, be good to my friends, manage money (eventually..this was a very steep learning curve), maintain the relationships I needed to maintain and release the rest.

What I experienced living on my own made me into the person I am today; someone who understands that ordinary people make mistakes and deserve forgiveness and second, third, fourth chances, myself included. Someone who isn’t scared of smelly people, who sees something interesting in every conversation. Someone who has at least seen how the other half lives and knows how close she came to that poverty line, how close she was to crossing it.

I was young and stupid and lucky. I could easily have ended up on the other side of that line. If my parents hadn’t forgiven me, mellowed, held their tongues, invited me for dinner every few weeks, helped me move. If my friends hadn’t lent me money or fed me booze when I needed it, if, to start with, I hadn’t been young and white and educated, with all the privilege that those afford a person.

God watches over drunks and idiots; double-plus if you are both?

The most important thing I learned was that the real world is indeed a dangerous, wonderful place, and that I could handle it.

And the place where I hold all those lessons; the practical ones like how to budget and the people ones like how to talk to people on the bus, is the place I will draw from when my kids are out in the world and I’m scared for them. The world is a dangerous, wonderful place, and they can handle it.

Twenty-Six — Keeping Track

Once upon a time, I gave each of my children a container of fish crackers and each was happy. I blogged about this in passing and a commenter said, “JUST YOU WAIT someday they will count the crackers to make sure they each have the same amount.” In general, harbingers of doom don’t do it for me, as I am not one to acknowledge someone’s rightness until well past the date the rightness occurred, so you telling me “JUST YOU WAIT” about anything basically makes me want to ignore you. Since becoming a parent, however, I have noticed that it’s sensible to file the warnings away. Odds are, someday I will need them, like the safety pins I keep in my wallet.

Lo, behold, I am remembering the warning now.

The past few weeks have been exciting because we had Grandma and Grandad staying with us. This was good on many levels; extra hands around the house so I could have a shower and grocery shop and not have to take a surly five year old with me, extra feet to walk the kid to school and back again. People to talk to and drink coffee with and drink beer with. People I like in my house! So good, on so many levels.

For Eli, it was good on an extra level: Treats. We went out for lunch. We went out for ice cream. We went to Costco and got fries after shopping. Two extra levels, I should say; the level where you get extra treats and then THEN! the level where you tell your older brother, who is at school all day, all about the extra treats you got.

This has awakened quite a rivalry between the children. Not something I think wouldn’t/doesn’t otherwise exist, but something that was dormant, like mould. Slugs? Shingles? Shingles. Now, even though Grandma and Grandad have gone home, Arlo still greets his brother after school with WHAT DID YOU DO TODAY? WHAT DID YOU GET? WHAT DID YOU GET ME?

Today was Fun Day (formerly known as Sports Day? No longer.) at Arlo’s school. He got to go to twelve different stations in the school, make a bead bracelet, eat a Freezie, hang out with his friends, and then had hot lunch which was pizza, lemonade and ice cream for dessert.

Today was Eli’s last day of preschool. I was volunteering at Arlo’s school so I couldn’t be at preschool for the final moments, when the door opens and the children sing “Goodbye my friends goodbye” with their mothers and fathers present and everyone sniffles. I couldn’t be there because I was helping make bead bracelets, a task which gets harder the closer you get to the hot lunch because no one can focus to save their goddamn life. ANYWAY I decided that for a treat I would take Eli to McDonald’s for a Happy Meal.

So: Arlo got a Freezie, pizza, lemonade, ice cream, a morning spent running around with his friends and an afternoon watching Ice Age. Eli got cheese pizza at school and a Happy Meal after.

As an aside, what did I get during this same time period? I got to stand for two hours without so much as a bathroom break or drink of water, helping small children thread beads onto yarn that frayed and refused to be threaded upon, and do you see me complaining?

Oh, you do? OK.

Anyway, I would call it even between the kids, but that didn’t stop Arlo from “It’s not fair”ing all over the place after school.

To help even the score, he went to his friend’s house after school and this friend has a rather enormous supply of junk food, so when we came to pick him up he was surrounded by empty cookie bags, chocolate smeared all over his face.

Eli says no fair because he got no cookies. Arlo says no fair, because he still has no toy and Eli got a toy with the Happy Meal.

It is a good thing they’re cute.

Tooth finally dropped out this morning.

Tooth finally dropped out this morning.

Twenty-Five

There are those days when your face feels like an avalanche. Bright smiles and happy eyes (smizing!) start the day and then, several hours later, you find yourself recounting the afternoon’s events to your partner and feeling rather like you might be taking down every tree and sweet meadow flower in your path. SNOW IS COMING DOWN ON YOU MOTHERFUCKERS.

“This morning,” I said to Saint Aardvark, “this morning they were great. They put on their rubber boots and raincoats and got their umbrellas and went out at 8 am to walk around the courtyard. I heard them, counting snails and marvelling at how green the trees were in the rain.”

Saint Aardvark smiled and nodded.

“It was so lovely, I was crafting sentimental blog posts in my head,” I added. “But now? Those posts are gone. My head is a pile of dead leaves, the posts are COMPOST. The WORMS are eating them.”

“Great things come from dead things,” said Saint Aardvark.

Onward, Friday; Fun Day, rain, last day of preschool, and all.

Twenty-Four — The Petting Farm

Prologue:

The Queen’s Park Petting Farm, near noon on a weekday. It is quiet and damp after a rainfall. Children frolic in the nearby waterpark, the ice cream stand is open, parents stand nearby with towels over their arms.

A lop-eared rabbit hears a noise. “Oh shit. Here they come. HIIIIDDDDDDE.”
The black rabbit, brown rabbit, and grey rabbit obediently cover themselves with hay.

***

Fifty screaming six year olds enter the petting farm. The gate slams behind them. Three sheep run as best they can for the “Animal Rest Area.”

“GOATS GOATS GOATS!” screams a boy with a bowl haircut.
“GOATS! I LOVE GOATS!” screams another boy.

They run at a goat, who bleats at them and runs to the Animal Rest Area.

“IT WENT IN THERE!” screams the boy.
“LET’S CHASE IT!” screams the other.

They are stymied by the fence. The goat looks on from the far side of the enclosure.

“AVERY! LOOK AT THE BBUUUUUUUUUNNNNIES!” screams a girl.

Five other girls run to the screaming girl, who has her face pressed up against the rabbit cage.

“BUNNIES AWWW BUNNIES AWWWW BUNNIES!” they shriek.

They turn and see the juvenile ducks being taken out of their enclosure by a park worker.
One girl pounds on the window. “Don’t do that!” says the park worker.
The girl stops but the shrieking–OH GOD THE SHRIEKING–continues and the last duckling refuses to go to the exit, instead walking back and forth close to the window, quacking constantly and adding to the cacophony.

The baby chickens in the adjacent enclosure look on nervously.

A group of boys sees the peacock enclosure and moves, like a large, cellular mass, towards it. The boys are making a low roaring noise. The peacock sits up straight.

“SQUAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWK!” says the peacock. The boys stop short. One of them turns to me, fear-stuttering, “Excuse me exx-exx-exxcuse me, WHAT IS THAT?”
“It’s a peacock,” I say. “I guess it wants you to go away.”
They do.

Arlo’s grade one class did a field trip to the petting farm a few weeks ago. He told me they participated in the young farmers program and saw a lot of goats. I had assumed this means you get a briefing on how to interact with animals? Like, for example, don’t yell at them? God, I hope so. I hope my son’s class was not running around yelling at goats. Next year, I promise I will volunteer for all the field trips so at least I will have some authority to yell at idiots not to yell at goats.

“LOOK IT’S POOPING AHAHAHAHAH POOOOOOOOP.”

Look, I know–trust me on this, I know–you can’t stop six year olds talking about poop but could someone at least stop them from piling on the pooping goat and screaming at it? Can you imagine if someone did that to you, you little jerk? Yelled, “YOU’RE POOING IT’S GROSSSSSS!” every time you went to the bathroom?

The kids today were not toddlers, who at least usually have minders nearby to say “don’t chase the chickens” or “don’t eat that, it’s not a Glossette,” but kids older than my own five year old companion, kids who should either know better or if they don’t, have a teacher? or someone? to shut them the hell up? There’s a playground and a giant park where you can yell your brains out and be a jackass. This place is where a bunch of sad animals spend their last summer before they get slaughtered.

Probably. I don’t know. It can’t possibly be the place you take the animals you *like,* so what am I to think.

Epilogue:

Heads ringing, Eli and I left the petting farm. Stuck a donation in the donation box, the screams of children and peacocks echoing behind us.

Twenty-Three

I feel like a zamboni is parked on my sinuses. They don’t hurt but they feel heavy; I can breathe but my nose feels dry and angry, and I can’t keep my eyes open. This morning I thought maybe it was the dropping barometric pressure. Forecast has been calling for rain and then moving the call for rain forward a day at a time for a week now. That sentence made little to no sense. Anyway, now it’s been a day and I think I might have the start of a cold.

I haven’t had a cold in so long! Like, since we had the flu in late February, I haven’t been sick. I feel like this is a record of some kind. I will have to turn the little shingle on my “74 days since the last cold virus” sign. OK yes, I had nausea from the end of January until early June*, but I haven’t had a cold in forever.

I’ll let you know how this all turns out, don’t worry. But now I have to go moan on the couch for a while.

* the nausea has mostly cleared up but I’m still going for the ultrasound in July because if you get an appointment for an ultrasound two months after you call, you go for it. I always welcome an opportunity to see inside my body.

Twenty-Two — Squeaky Bird Two

Squeaky bird went away for a day or so and then, today, came back. I went over to the window with the camera to try to get a picture but then s/he moved to the next tree over. That’s when I realized there are two squeaky birds, talking to each other, constantly, about bird stuff. Did you see that bug? That was a good bug. Remember that worm yesterday? Yes it was amazing. Hey do you have any lip balm? What? Do you have any lip balm? Dude, I’m a bird. Oh yeah, you’re a bird. You’re a bird too. Oh yeah. My beak is dry though. Beak balm. Ha ha ha. Do you think there’s such a thing as beak balm? I don’t know. Hey a crow. Watch out watch out watch out watch ou–

Two things. One: I saw the birds and they are sparrows; brown and boring looking but with a black and white stripey head. Like Bowie in a brown suit.

Two: The two birds remind me of my children, when my children are trying to get my attention.

OK, three things. Three: I figured it out (bear with me, I am at heart a speculative sort, so this is probably not true but WHAT IF IT IS and whoops now I’ve convinced myself it is so don’t give me science or whatever to try to convince me differently) — the birds lost their MOOOOOMMMMM. The birds are sitting in the tree where they last saw her and she’s been, like, eaten by an eagle or something, and they’re waiting for her to come back with their lunch and OMG Stanley where’s mom. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom.

This would be why I am simultaneously in love with and completely irritated by the birds outside my window.

Why, when the window went silent this evening during dinner, instead of feeling relief because the noise had stopped, I felt heartbroken because obviously THE BABIES had given up HOPE.

Now I’m sitting outside, half-listening for them. When I hear a bird chirp, my head swivels the way it does when I hear a baby cry at Costco even though I don’t have a baby a) at all or b) with me. I am not the birds’ mother! I am not a bird, for one thing!

Damn, I could have written this post about Taylor Swift’s song “Twenty-two” but now it’s about birds and dead mothers. There’s always tomorrow.

Twenty-One Gun Salute

For those about to rock: we salute you.
For those about to sleep: we salute you, too.

For those whose children are dotted with red marker –but don’t worry, guys, it’s washable, (except I can smell that it’s smelly felts and smelly felts aren’t washable)– we salute you.
For those whose heads are foggy with lack of sleep and clouds of despair: we salute you.
For those who’ve had to work every day but weekends and the occasional holiday since their children were born, meaning they only get the evening and weekend and holiday behavior, meaning they get the grumpy/tired/hungry/sick children end of the stick: we salute you.
For those who still plan holidays, who still come home on evenings and weekends, who do the job, regardless: we salute you.

For those with hobbies: we salute you.
For those who pay down mortgages: we salute you.
For those who take a deep breath, apologize, and crack a joke: we salute you.
For those who hope for the best: we salute you.

For those who stick around, even when they don’t want to, ESPECIALLY when they don’t want to: we salute you.
For those who write it down: we salute you.
For those who try to teach instead of judge: we salute you.
For those who know how to do the heimlich maneuver: we salute you.
For those who know how to dance like a hip hop video: we salute you.
For those who can cook for other people: we salute you.
For those who know that laundry needs doing, always: we salute you.

For those who sing out loud and squint their eyes and play air guitar: we salute you.
For those who belch the alphabet: we salute you.
For those who smile at strangers: we salute you.
For those who know how to end blog posts: we salute you.

Twenty

Today I bought a VHS tape for ten cents. A VHS tape that most likely cost $19.99 when it was new. The movie? Top Gun. I first saw it in 1986, then several hundred more times in consequent years. Once, I saw it at the IMAX theatre. Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis’s sloppy kiss spit stretched metres long and we all shrank back against our seats in horror.

Yesterday I was thinking about Top Gun because @bigpointguy, my father-in-law, who is staying with us, found Beverly Hills Cop 3 on Netflix and put it on. I wasn’t watching, but the tinny synthesizer music reminded me of Top Gun and I had a moment where I remembered that I didn’t own my favourite teenage movie, and another moment where I felt sad about it.

Today, I was at a garage sale in our neighbourhood and I saw the VHS tape of Top Gun and I said, “Oh, I NEED THAT,” and Arlo said, “Well, you don’t really NEED it, do you? You just WANT it a lot?” I conceded his point and laughed politely with the woman whose house it was, who was chuckling at me being schooled by a nearly seven year old, but privately I was responding, “No, this is a case of need and if you argue with me about it I will write you out of the will.”

Which I don’t have, but I should, otherwise how will they know who to leave all my important VHS tapes to when I die?

Nineteen — A School You Can Walk To (And Back From)

We spent a lot of time at our neighbourhood elementary school today. It’s so good that we live walking distance away, because first thing this morning, someone had to walk Arlo to school (and then come back.) An hour later I had to walk up to accompany Eli to Welcome to Kindergarten, (then back.) Later I walked up to pick up Arlo from school (aaaand then back.) Two hours later, we returned to the school for the Spring Carnival, an occasion which only comes around every eight (at least, based on what I know from chatting with various people) years, like cicada breeding. It is just as noisy, if not noisier than cicada breeding. And then. After standing around in lineups for games and bouncy castles and Sno Cones for two hours, we had to..you guessed it…walk back.

But the walking back is the best part. It is, after all, downhill.

No, the best part is when you win a cake in the Cake Walk, finally, after paying for three kids to do the Cake Walk and losing, but then you win because it’s the end of the night and yesterday the Carnival Committee panicked and asked for more cakes because they didn’t think they had enough, then ended up with way too many cakes and not enough walkers, so five out of twelve cake walkers got a cake. This might be the secret to cake walks. But don’t quote me.

No, actually, the best part is when your creepy neighbour who also has a kid at the school, gets dunked in the dunk tank, which dunking you don’t see because you’re standing in endless game lineups with your child, but two separate people tell you about it because they know you will care.

No, the best part is the cake because it’s cake.

No! The best part is when you get home, realize you logged fifteen kilometres of walking today (plus a 30 minute run after lunch because you were feeling under-exercised somehow?), and sit down to have a nice beer. That is the best part.