this woman’s work

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I’d appreciate your thoughts.

1. I’m hearing I should check my bag. There are two reasons this makes me nervous: 1) I’ve lost luggage before making a similar flight (Ohio to Portland) and that terrifies me so reassurance is welcome; 2) I need to bring my laptop because that’s the way my job is. I’m nervous about checking the laptop since I believe that baggage handlers are unkind. Thoughts?

2. I’m relieved to hear that the attendants are likely to help. Also we’re flying through Cincinnati so Brett was saying he think the gates will be pretty close. I’m going to hit up Amber about that stroller offer to see if her stroller is better than our stroller, which it sounds like it is. (As an aside, how lucky am I that some of my favorite bloggers are actually here in my real life world????)

3. I have two diaper bags. One a nice big one that would carry tons of small toys, etc. The other is smaller but is a backpack. I’m hearing you all say the backpack one is the way to go. I could also borrow Brett’s backpack, which is bigger (thinking out loud) but not nearly as cute (like for the wedding when cuteness counts). I’ll pack all three tonight and see which works better.

Madison does have her own seat on the plane.

Thank you all for the flying/hair advice! First I have to tell you that I accidentally gave myself a mullet yesterday. Oops. Brett sorta fixed it and then my hair is pretty curly so now it just looks like a housewife haircut.

Then — in a stunning example of “can you believe it?” — my favorite hairdresser called late last night to say she could squeeze me in next week. I told her that I no longer needed a cut — just repair — but could do with some color help.

Let that be a lesson to me next time I decide that I can work magic with my scissors. (The thing is though that generally I just cut my hair in a bob and then mess with it a little more and it’s so curly that it looks fine if not finished. However this time I got a little too excited about getting rid of that color and cut a bit shorter than was wise.)

But now here’s where I need more advice (and since I rarely ask for advice here is your chance to inundate me!). I’m going to buy lots of little toys and I’m going to wrap them. And I’m going to pack snacks and the Hyland’s tablets (thanks Paige!!) and I’m not going to sweat it if Madison is a handful on the plane (thanks hmbalison!!). Now I need some practical info.

How in the hell does one get a baby, a heavy carseat (Britax marathon — it weighs a ton), a diaper bag and the black drag-along suitcase, (which I will not be checking) off the plane and to the next plane during an hour layover without dropping the baby, missing the plane, or falling apart and going stark raving mad in the middle of the airport? (We’re taking a later flight on the way there — the plane takes off at 7pm so that Madison will sleep at least some of it but the flight back is right smack-dab in the middle of the afternoon.)

Do you think I’ll be able to strap the carseat onto the drag-along suitcase? And I’m planning on bringing the zolowear sling since it’s a little easier to get her in and out than the ellaroo even though the ellaroo would be a HELL of a lot more comfortable. (I’ve been trying to get her on my back with the ellaroo but she’s too fidgety to let me get a handle on that.)

J will be flying with us but I’m not sure what all she’ll be taking so she may be able to help, say, with the diaper bag but I’m not sure.

I know it’s possible and that better women than I do it every damn day with an infant, a preschooler and more luggage but I’m feeling just a tad bit overwhelmed.

My brother said that he would look into maybe coming up that weekend, too, so he could see Madison (and one assumes, me). I would love that so, so much! My sister-in-law made noise about it, too, and my inlaws (who are in Portland right now helping out with the new baby there) also said they were available. But frankly, when it comes right down to it, I’d rather have my brother there. Why, you ask?

–Brother is incredibly charming having inherited that gene from my father. People love him! He’ll make me look good.

–Brother is funny and I will appreciate having someone cracking jokes at me.

–I’ll feel like I have someone on my side even though intellectually I know that there are no sides.

–Brett will feel better than, too, because he’s worried about me out there all by my lonesome.

P.S. that picture is Madison — wasn’t she such a round-headed bean?

Sarah came back and she said more good stuff! Stuff like this:

I can’t think of any specific occasions when it’s embarrassed me, but I do know that, in general terms, I do get pretty embarrassed about the thought of having more money than other people. I feel people are going to think I’m hopelessly materialistic and/or a spoiled brat who has no idea of the harsher realities of life. (Actually, that last is probably true - that it actually is the case, I mean, not that people think it.) … BTW, your post has made me think about my own preconceptions/biases, because I certainly do have them. When I see someone who’s homeless, or on benefits, there is an ugly part of me (and I try not to make it the ruling part) that assumes that it’s their fault, they didn’t work hard enough, they did something wrong, whatever. But I can’t imagine reacting that way to someone who was buying their own home but just wasn’t buying it in a good part of town.

I have preconceptions, too. Even after working in a shelter and knowing better, I fight a lot of my worst preconceptions pretty much everyday. And then adopting, that whole process of vetting potential adoption situations — ugh — tons *more* opportunities to figure out what a prejudiced person I am.

Sarah’s right in that there’s no way for me to know what those awkward moments stood for. I put my own money-angst into them and decided that the glance away was shameful instead of just a glance. Was I right? Was I wrong? Probably both — sometimes one and sometimes the other. I used to see wealthy people and assume that they 1) had never been poor; 2) that they could not appreciate my life; 3) that they secretly thought what I then thought, which is that I was a failure.

And then there’s the social plight of those better off than their friends. There’s a lot of privilege-guilt out there and I can think of one social situation where afterwards my friend said, “I’m really embarrassed that I’ve been talking about XYZ and I didn’t know how you were struggling.” She was horrifed. Had I thought she was bragging? Had I thought she was insensitive? She drove home that day banging her head on the steering wheel and then called the minute she walked in the door to apologize. Not that she had to apologize because she hadn’t done anything wrong but have a larger bank account.

(I have to add here that Brett and I aren’t struggling anymore. I feel like I’m writing these under false-pretenses so I need to repeat that we’re fine now.)

I’m putting my favorite bread recipe below the cut in honor of the brand new bread machine I got for eight bucks at a garage sale on Sunday. When I say brand new, I mean that the free yeast packets were still packed in its shiny bread pan. But it’s not brand new because the people were carting it around since 1998. Now it’s in my house and my eight bucks are in theirs and everyone is happy.

I’m getting more anxious about our visit to Madison’s extended birth family. I can’t get into the one hairdresser I trust so I’m thinking of just hacking at my hair with kitchen shears. For some reason I have more faith in this approach than in finding a new hairdresser. Also, I’m growing my color out, which means that my hair is three colors (burnt, sad, formerly-dyed orange — the color to which all dyes revert; sad, mousy brown; and dynamic streaks of white, which I love but are not fashionable and to which certain family members of my own who shall remain nameless react in horror). So I need to find a rinse to make myself wedding-presentable.

I’m also worried about the flight. You know, rambunctious toddler and a very, very small space. And seatbelts. And carseats. And boredom. I’m taking the advice of one of my friends and buying 1.2 million small toys at thrift stores to dangle in front of her and thus distract from the hell, which is cross-country flight.

I am worried about my hair and the flight to save myself worrying about the actual visit. I can buy a rinse for my hair, I can buy 1.2 million small toys but I cannot buy a damn thing to guarantee that the visit will be lovely. But I’ve decided that I’m looking forward to after the visit, thus ridding myself of those pesky hopes and expectations. Just think of the stories I’ll have then! And the pictures! (I don’t know if the stories and pictures will be good or bad but I know I’ll have plenty of both.)

Look beyond the cut for the super duper bread recipe.
(more…)

But if I did like Tom Cruise, I sure wouldn’t now. Whatta jerk.

It has been a quarter-century since Tom Cruise was a bit player - and Brooke Shields the star - in the angst-filled teen romance movie “Endless Love.”

Now, both are in their 40s and have gone their separate ways: Cruise to box-office stardom and evangelizing for Scientology, and Shields to television sitcom and Broadway success, as well as motherhood and a new book about her battle with postpartum depression.

But in an exclusive interview to be aired Thursday on “Access Hollywood,” Cruise tells host Billy Bush that Shields was misguided when she took the anti-depressant Paxil to fight her depression after giving birth to daughter Rowan - which Shields recounts in her memoir, “Down Came the Rain”

Cruise, who zealously preaches the Church of Scientology’s hatred of all mind-altering drugs, tells Bush: “Here is a woman, and I care about Brooke Shields because I think she is an incredibly talented woman. You look at, where has her career gone?”

I didn’t know that Shields’ career was in trouble. She’s currently starring in the London production of “Chicago.” Her PR rep didn’t return my call.

The 42-year-old Cruise sat down with Bush - for interviews to be broadcast all this week - as part of a surprising publicity campaign hyping his romance with 26-year-old starlet Katie Holmes.

“These drugs are dangerous. I have actually helped people come off,” Cruise maintains to Bush. “When you talk about postpartum, you can take people today, women, and what you do is you use vitamins. There is a hormonal thing that is going on, scientifically, you can prove that. But when you talk about emotional, chemical imbalances in people, there is no science behind that. You can use vitamins to help a woman through those things.”

source: Tom to Brooke: Don’t be a Woman of Substance

This whole childcare thing? Not sure where it all is. I still haven’t heard from my sister — not definitively. I still can’t tell if it’s the old “avoid it passively” teenage technique or if it’s truly the “my god I’m so busy I can’t get a chance to breathe” teenage reality. Meanwhile I am banging my head against tables, doors, and any other flat surface.

I live on June 2nd to meet Madison’s extended birth family and I wanted to clear some things off my schedule before then. But it doesn’t look like I’m going to get the chance to do it. See, here’s where I start banging my head. (slam slam slam)

What kills me is that if I’d hired someone through OSU or Columbus State, I would have had childcare now for some weeks. But I thought this would be easier.

I’m giving her until Wednesday and then I’m putting an ad somewhere. That’s a two day extension because she emailed this weekend saying that she still really Really REALLY wanted to do it. Only she didn’t have my number. (And it’s true it’s not listed but you know, our shared father has my number.)

Still, it was a fun interview.

Birth of blogs for parents - The Washington Times: Family Times - May 22, 2005

Dawn Friedman of Columbus, Ohio, is one of the parenting blog pioneers. Her blog, This Woman’s Work (www.thiswomanswork.com), has been online since January 2001. Ms. Friedman has written about her pregnancy losses, her career as a free-lance writer, home-schooling her son, Noah, and the adoption of her daughter, Madison, a year ago.

I am in fine company there (check out that first paragraph!) so go on and read it!

Edited to add: My two other brief mentions
–iBiblio: Women and their Weblogs
–Time: The New Family Album

Missed out on the NYT round-up, darnit. And I missed out on a mention in one of the parenting magazines (either Parents or Parenting, I can’t remember) because I went password protected for awhile there. Double darnit.

If you are my friend and you have more money than I do, don’t worry about it. Seriously. I don’t so you shouldn’t. (That year at the preschool mostly cured me although I have twinges — my friend with the six figure college funds — I own that as my thing. I mean, sheesh, somebody has to be rich and I’d rather it be my friends than Republicans.)

I agree that economic diversity is as important as racial diversity but I tell you, in my world it’s a lot easier to come by so I don’t think about it much. We are not the poorest in my social group; we are not the richest. Our neighborhood is working class on the edge of white collar (literally on the wrong side of the tracks). The homeschooling community is also surprisingly economically diverse (although most people have at least one parent home to homeschool so there is some measure of “choice” involved). I’m not sure that this will be as easy to maintain as my kids grow though. I’ll have to see.

Both Chicagomama and Meagan touched on age, too. These things definitely feel different when you’re economically mobile. I’m in my mid-thirties and Brett’s in his late-thirties so we’re pretty stagnant. I’ve got more room to grow in my career than he does but frankly, I don’t know if I could make more money than I do right now. Part of this whole thing — for me — has been realizing that this is my income bracket (more or less) and so I better get ok with it.

The other thing is that it’s clear that people with money aren’t always comfortable with their money — especially around people without money. There’s certainly a lot of “survivor’s guilt” about it. Even my trust-fund friend much walks around feeling terrible about having so much when people have so little. (I mention her because generally this seems more common in people who grew up without money and now have enough or even a lot.)

I especially liked what Lisa said about the person in her family, “The thing is what she wants is what you and I want. A decent life for her kids, a good night’s sleep, for the 2 year old to be potty trained.” Exactly. I have yet to meet a rich person who does nothing but want to sit around and talk about cleaning her diamonds.

I’ve found that talking about class is harder than talking about race. Why is this?

At shelter, we all decided that class was a greater issue than race for our clients when it came to getting through the system. Simply showing up on the other side of the desk put them in a category that seemed inescapable. Classism is more pervasive, more insidious, and most of us participate in some measure. We internalize these things: If she worked harder, she would get ahead; Rich people are snobs; People get what they deserve; Money is the root of all evil. I think this is why it’s so hard.

I’ve certainly internalized a lot of classism, thus my amusing mix of shame and pride that helped keep my therapist’s kids in college.

Like I said, it’s all easier if we talk about it.