this woman’s work

You are browsing the archives from 2004 November.

I’m writing this from my laptop while sitting on our couch watching the baby bang around her toys. Yes, that’s right; we broke down and got an airport. That means I’m wireless. That means I no longer have to sit in the cold, dark, dank basement typing away while my toes freeze. That also means that there is no special place to go hide (and work) and that I’ve waved good-bye to ergonomic comforts!

The theory is that now I can huddle at the kitchen table and enjoy the boys’ company while I work in the evenings after Madison has gone to sleep. Brett and Noah play mad games of Uno, Squeezed Out (thrift store score — $.50), and Chess in the evenings and I miss them down in my dungeon. Also, this lets me get to Madison when she wakes from her nap without breaking my neck leaping over various stored items in our basement.

I’m not sure how I feel about it. Because our iMac is kinda old, I’m not sure that we can get it onto the wireless network. I certainly don’t want to try cracking it open to install the airport card. That’s best left to braver men, like Brett. So until I have time to unplug the airport, plug the cable into my iMac and send myself all my email addresses, you will not hear from me. I cannot write you. Please write me, if you like, so I can add you to my address book.

Now I need to get off the internet and work on an essay that’s been languishing.

I dislike that last entry so I’m adding a new one straight away.

I have a friend who writes because it’s a sure way (for her) to make money. She’s made a study of the market, she’s applied herself, and she collects the check. She doesn’t even particularly like to write but she knows she’s good at it so she figured it would be a good way to make money and stay home with her family. (As an aside, she is no longer writing because she’s gotten into another aspect of the industry, which she enjoys more.)

My friend has been a great marketing mentor to me. My platitudes get in the way sometimes and her practical point of view has helped me hop down off my high-horse. I like talking to her about it and I like that she respects my own art vs. cash struggle even though she doesn’t share it.

One of the things we’ve talked about in the past is a particular writer — very successful — who is, in my opinion, not very good. My friend argues that by being successful, this writer has proven that she’s good. After all, people read this writer, she makes a lot of money, and her books are pleasant. (I’m not naming her here because if I were her and I googled myself and happened to find this conversation, it would make me sad. Suffice to say that she’s well and unhappily aware that she is the subject of these kinds of conversations.)

“Who are you to say she isn’t an artist?” my friend said to me. “Do you dislike her just because so many other people like her so much?”

Good question. I am a snob about books. (Ask my mother.) But I’ve been thinking about this a lot. What makes a writer good to me? I need to know this because I struggle all of the time with what little success I’ve had. It’s not just that old Groucho Marx thinking (you know, that anything I am able to do must by definition not be worth doing kinda like the club he would not join because they would have him). Sometimes I look at a thing I’ve written — that people like — and I can’t be proud of it.

This week I read three books right in a row (and sometimes simultaneously — one book in the living room and one at the kitchen table and one in the bedroom). Two were very good. One was fiction lite. What made the fiction lite book fiction lite? What made the other two so much better?

The lite book was an easy read, enjoyable, moved quickly, had lots of nice similes and metaphors. More people are likely to read it because it’s pretty easy to fit into a busy life.

The other two were more dense, more difficult, required more attention and had lots of nice similies and metaphors. Less people are likely to read them — at least nowadays, they may have been popular in their time — because they are more demanding.

But is the lite book a lite book by virtue of its ease? Yes, in part, I think. The lite book was fun but forgettable. The prose moved quickly but slipped away quickly, too. I might vaguely remember the plot but there was nothing in the book that made me stop and stare off into the middle distance to contemplate a thought. There was not one line I re-read for the pure joy of it.

I don’t want to disparage fiction-lite because there’s certainly a place for it. It’s nice to have a quick, easy read and many of those kinds of books can be life-changing or inspiring. And it’s not easy to write like that (although those who can seem to do it with alarming speed and productivity). But for me, most of the time I’d rather be challenged in my reading.

This entry isn’t coming along well either. Damn. It’s just that it scares me to think that I’m only good enough to write lite when I want to write complicated. And then I wonder if giving in and being happy with lite would be selling-out or accepting my limitations?

Well, I’ll finish off by quoting from one of the books I read, At Mrs Lippincote’s by Elizabeth Taylor:
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I have this blessing that’s really kind of a curse, which is that there’s a huge social support system for pretty much every little piece of my life. I have my central friends — women who have been a part of my life since Noah was a lap-baby — but then there are all of these opportunities to make other friends and I don’t have enough time for the friends I have!

Let’s see, there is:
–sisterhood at synagogue (I would love to strengthen my Jewish community experience);
–the unschooling support group (it would be nice to have some unschooling support but being unschoolers, their support group is actually a monthly gab-fest and I don’t have the time or energy for more of those);
–the adoption support group (I don’t feel like I need anything there but I like to keep an eye on ‘em in case an issue comes up for which I need some help);
–the transracial family support group (same thing, could be useful in the future).

And I’d love to find an in real life writing group. Meanwhile, I can’t keep track of my much beloved friends as much as I’d like plus Noah has a social life that is threatening to become disconnected from my own. That’s how it is as kids get big — they start making their own friends, darnit, without any consideration for their mothers who have to at least get along. Fortunately, most of his friends are children of my friends so this is good. And one of these women is going to get her regular weekly open house playdate going again so I can see all of my friends at once while Noah visits with his.

If I can, I try to consolidate my social life by bringing people from one part of it to the central part of it. I’m always trying to fix my friends up with each other. This works pretty well although back when I was a teenager, I’d get unhappy if they liked each other better than they liked me. I’m much more tolerant of that nowadays. If they like each other, great; I can kill two birds with one stone by doing tag-team visits.

I have nice friends. They’re interesting, they’re opinionated and they’re smart. Whenever we have a group get-together, I am a little amazed by my social riches. All these incredible women and I get to have them in my life. Fabulous! Now if I could just make room for more…

How cute is this set? That’ll be our first night’s gift. I think I’d eventually like to get the Shabbat and Passover sets, too.

Noah is getting harder to buy for nowadays. His interests are more specific and expensive. Since we celebrate both holidays and then his birthday is just about a month after Christmas, it’s an awful lot of challenging shopping to do. And then, too, the grandparents want advice on what to get him.

Some people have asked if we’re going to celebrate Kwanzaa now and I said that we have enough December holidays for the time being. Besides, Kwanzaa means nothing to Madison’s birth family so it’s not like we’re stinting on her heritage. If either of the kids decide they’d like to try on celebrating it, we’ll revisit it then but for now, we’ll stick to the two we already have.

I’ve had a couple of nasty right-wing oriented comments on my entries. I finally banned one guy’s IP from commenting but generally I don’t like to do that. I welcome opposing points of view here but this particular one (in the entry below) was so clearly flame-bait that I just banned the guy.

I wouldn’t go to a conservative blog and rant and rave at anyone because it’s rude and not very helpful. Even if they wrote that “bedwtting liberal up-bringing” will result in deserved ass-kicking of children on their own blog, well, that’s why browsers have buttons that allow us to leave such sites. (And let the record show that I have never felt that my conservative friends’ kids deserve to have their asses kicked. Quite the contrary but then I’m a LIBERAL and that means that I spend all of this time defending diversity and supporting freedom of speech, often putting me on the side of nasty folks like Mr. Galt. Ironic, eh?)

So let me just say, I welcome conservative commentary here if it’s polite and meant to further discourse. ‘Cuz ain’t that what America’s all about???

My friend B was trying to get Madison to take a couple of steps on Saturday. Madison is adept at cruising and she’s started letting go and standing long enough for us to go, “Oh my gosh! She’s standing! Quick! Come see!”

Well, Madison wasn’t interested in walking on Saturday but today I stood her up then let go of her hands then put my arms back out and said, “Come here, Madison!” And her little face lit up and she took two steps before dropping to all fours. I didn’t believe it the first time — I figured it could have been a controlled stagger/fall — so I stood her back up and she did it again. I think this counts for the baby book but am not sure since I coached her pretty strongly.

She was exactly 7.5 months as of yesterday. So B, does this count?

And here’s a picture of the two kids after Noah has placed a collander on her head for a hat. I think she pulls it off nicely.

See, when I leave this little room — the one with the space heater and this handy computer — my real life begins again. And my real life is currently one full of snot and tears. Sadly, Madison is sick. I thought she was sick before when she had the sniffles but now she is really and truly mired in her first major cold; she’s blowing snot bubbles and she’s blowing ‘em on me.

I have my own immunity problems. This weekend I was down and out with some kind of yuck-o thing that had all my joints aching and so I was hoping to get a little bit of extra sleep but extra sleep is just not compatible with a sick baby. Even when Brett offers to get up with her, this isn’t the treat it first appears.

Example of Brett so-called getting up with the baby.

(Baby beings to snuffle in a precursor of wakefulness. I lie still in hopes she’ll settle back down. Baby begins to root then to sputter, then cough, then whine.)
Me in a groggy whisper: Brett, Brett, honey. The baby’s hungry.
Brett: grunt.
(Baby — still whining — tries to latch onto my elbow)
Me: Honey? You said you’d get the bottle. Brett, the baby’s hungry.
Brett: grunt.
(Baby, finding no comfort at my elbow, begins a desperate keening noise)
Me: Brett! BRETT! Wake up! You said you’d feed the baby! Oh forget it! (Reaches over to mix bottle quickly, baby is now wailing)
Brett: Wha-? Huh? Oh honey (seeing baby is now being fed in the crook of my arm) Why didn’t you wake me up?

True story. Over and over again. And if he does wake up, he stumbles around so much or has to ask me inane questions (”Where’s the bottle? Oh, here it is.”) that it’s really easier for me to do it. I love this man but he is useless as a night-time parent. Unless they need rocking. I need to give him his proper due and say that he’s a fabulous rocker of fussy babies in the middle of the night and that’s a valuable skill for which I am very grateful. But run-of-the-mill caretaking? He’s not so good at that.

Madison is a much better sleeper than Noah was and only wakes once a night most nights but this cold is frustrating and she’s also cutting not one but two teeth. I think she was up four or five times the past few nights. (As an aside, Noah was always up four or five nights for the first three years of his life and now I don’t know how I survived that. Then again, it was only him and I didn’t have a work-at-home job so I guess that’s it.)

I got dressed this morning and then sometime after lunch, I realized we were going to need to skip Noah’s swim lessons and besides I already had snot and tears down the front of my shirt so I just put my pajamas back on. That was a bit of a let-down. Madison did finally take a nap — 3 hours — but could only sleep on my chest since that let her breathe a bit better. I wasted those three hours watching really bad daytime television (remember, we don’t have cable).

And now I’m grouchy and hiding out here in the basement but feeling kinda guilty about it.

Tomorrow — hopefully — will be a better and less snot-infused day. Poor Madison.

I’m posting this on Sunday, which is likely how this is going to have to work for me.

OK, here’s the deal. Every Monday (Sunday) I’m going to post three showtune-ish songs for the enjoyment of my readers. Of course, songs placed here are meant to encourage you to buy the artist’s recording and if you are the copyright holder of the song and do not want it distributed in this way, please let me know ASAP and I’ll remove it.

Speaking of removing files, each Monday (Sunday) when I upload new ones, I’ll delete the old ones. Also, for some reason I don’t understand, these files are binhexed so you’ll need to unpack them. This is annoying because I’d rather they just open nicely in quicktime. If someone can help me figure out why .mac is zipping them up and how to get them unzipped on the site so folks can open them right away with quicktime, I’d be awfully grateful.

I’m using themes because it’ll help me organize my collection and figure out what to share. My focus is going to be showtunes but not necessarily as they are sung in the show. I’ll try to give background on the show as well as the singer and why I’m sharing that particular version (if there is more than one readily available).

Here it goes. The theme for this week is “Songs Sung to Children.”
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Here’s my advice: if everyone likes your baby name, don’t use it. That is if having a unique baby name is important to you. See, here everyone is saying that they love Violet, they love flower names and you know what that tells me? Pretty soon kindergartens across American will be literal gardens of little girls.

When we were thinking of names for Noah, we should have known when every single person (besides my father who thought we should name him Vic) said it was a great name. That was the best indicator we could have had that Noah would go through life with the first initial of his last name tacked on at every roll call.

Now my sister, she named her son Flaviano. You can imagine the reactions that got. (We call him Frankie.) Then when she said she was naming her daughter Lucia, half the people she told — specifically the non-Italian half — just looked puzzled. But that was good because here’s the other truth I have to give you about baby names: once the baby’s here, people tend to like the names they didn’t like before.

Flaviano? We were horrifed! Frankie? Barely better! But he is the cutest little meatball of a Frankie you ever did see and now I love that name. (I always liked Lucia so that one wasn’t a hard sell for me.)

Interestingly, in my oddball friendship community, there are no Madisons because my friends eschew trends. Or at least they try to. (Emma’s mother and I often lament the fact that we didn’t realize that Noah and Emma were on the way up when we hit on ‘em for our kids’ names.) But then within this same small crunchy-granola group, where everyone goes to the same co-op, knows the same midwives, and keeps track of the gossip at the two or three acceptable preschools, we have three children named Indigo. And one named Azure.

This demonstrates the truth of my “well received predicts popularity” theory. While the rest of the world may frown on naming a child for a particular shade of blue, among my people this rates applause. Same goes for Atticus. Although Atticus isn’t popular in my immediate circle, we all know various children named Atticus who are growing up on peace bumperstickers and soy.

(I wouldn’t be surprised to meet a child named after grains like Millet or Quinoa at the playground where Noah takes his homeschool classes, but my daughter may be the only Madison sitting in those baby swings.)

To sum up, if originality is important to you — and I’m not saying it should be — go for the name you love that gets the most blank stares or outright grimaces.

Meagan is also a showtunes addict and we’ve been writing back and forth about it. I think I’m going to start posting three showtunes over the weekend so that Monday will be Music Mondays. I figure if I give myself that much time to do it, it won’t be a hardship. In fact, it’ll be fun!

And also, Brooklyn Mama? Elaine Stritch? If Mart is willing, I would totally take you up on that!!! If you get more info, let me know and then I’ll talk to him and see if he’s willing to host us!