My Seriously Amazing Nephew
south of the loop
Best Pre-Marathon Gift Ever
jaq made me promise that if I posted this video, I would say something to excuse away her bad singing. She seems to think that bad parental singing is really sweet. I think that if you have ever been subjected to my Happy Birthday con gusto song, you will know that there isn’t a thing wrong with the tune she holds here.
Incidentally, that tune is from the Sandra Boynton book Your Personal Penguin I got Emmit for his second birthday. jaq sings an unofficial version; you can hear the official version (accompanied by bass hippo) by following the above link if you are so inclined (Davy Jones is pretty good and all, but he lacks Emmit’s charming penguinish wings. If you watch it, watch to the very very end).
[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4159442354928957171]
Proud Aunt
Those of you who know me personally know that I’m not that crazy about kids. It’s not so much that I dislike them as I just don’t know what to do with them. They are foreign, alien things. They make me uncomfortable. And people expect (because I’m a woman?) that I’ll have some maternal instinct, or at least have something to say to the little crumbsnatcher they’ve handed me (because I’m supposed to like to hold kids?).
I still feel uncomfortable around 99.99% of kids, but that 0.01%? He’s pretty stinkin’ cute. And now he walks! I don’t know anything about toddlers, but he looks like he’s pretty steady for just having picked this skill up a day or so ago. My theory is that he’s been walking—secretly, sneakily—for a little bit longer than 48 hours. He’s kind of a stinker like that.
And even if you feel the way I do about kids and have no intention of watching the video, you should read the post anyway: his mamma compares her son’s first steps to her first time smoking pot.
Congrats, Emmit! I can’t wait to see you toddle in person.
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current book: Just started Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus. Between this and The Division Street Princess, I’m going to be able to pepper my conversation with Yiddish expressions!
current music: I can’t get Lady Sovereign’s “Love Me or Hate Me” out of my head. But I just purchased a used copy of Los Super 7’s Heard It On the X, and it looks amazing.
current socks: Polka-dots. Of course.
Avoiding the G-Word*
Christmas Eve conversation instigated by my mother:
Do you still think you don’t want kids?
Yeah.
Why?
Well, I don’t really like them.
You seem to like Emmit.
I do. But he’s different.
It’s different when they’re your own, too!
What’s wrong with your grandkitties?
They are cats, Laura. Not grandkitties. Cats.
But they’re like toddlers! They get into everything, they put everything in their mouths…
You can’t leave a toddler at home by himself all day!!!
See? That’s why I would be a terrible mom!
* grandkids
Oops, I Did It Again
This was my <gulp> eleventh year as a Catholic school girl. I’d like to point out the frequently underappreciated subtleties of this costume. The necklace that Emmit is grabbing is a St. Jude medal (the patron saint of lost causes; I used to always wear a cross, but they are all–yes, all, there are quite a few–at my parents’ house, as is my old class ring). In the top picture, you can just make out the black bra underneath the white shirt, and although you can’t see it in these pictures, I’m wearing boxer shorts underneath the skirt, and I tried to keep the skirt rolled up just high enough that the boxers peeked out. And I’ve apparently spent enough time around knocked up women to have their mannerisms down pat. Two different people asked me if I was really pregnant, and the people who knew I wasn’t kept telling me to stop touching my “belly” because it was creeping them out.
And so, for your amusement, here I am as a knocked up Catholic school girl. (Not as a pregnant Britney Spears, as one partygoer had guessed).
Happy Halloween!
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current book: I just started Paul Auster’s The Book of Illusions on Friday, and I can’t put it down.
current music: Things were pretty quiet today, actually.
current socks: green, brown, and orange stripeys.
Here’s Lookin’ At You, Kid
Start your week off right with pictures of my favorite nephew:
Love, Aunt Bitch
Dear Banana,
One thing you’re going to have to learn about your Aunt Laura is that she’s late with everything (except singing happy birthday; thank God for phones). Late to appointments, late to work, late with birthday cards. I’d love for you to be the exception to that rule, but I’m afraid I’m already going on two weeks late with your birthday card.
Part of my problem with lateness is that I want everything to be perfect. And who has time for perfection? But I want your first birthday card to capture every little thing I love about you from your thin curl of hair to your tiny toes. I want you to know that you are the first crumbsnatcher I’ve ever genuinely liked. I want to tell you all about the story of your mom’s pregnancy and all about the story of your birth. When I read Leo the Late Bloomer to your mamma’s big belly, and when I first felt you kick, and how excited I got every time you made her belly undulate from within. I’d squeal; your mom would laugh; you’d stop moving. Stinker. When you were born, and your head popped out, and I just gasped because in that split second I got it, I understood for the first time ever why people have kids. When I sang you your first happy birthday when you were thirty minutes old. When, for the first twenty-four hours of your life, my eyes teared up like a big ol’ softie every time I looked at you. I just couldn’t believe that you were you.
And I don’t tear up anymore, but it’s still hard to believe that you’re you. That you’re a year old now, and that you have sharp little teeth and can crawl and giggle and smear food all over your face. Happy One-Year-and-Two-Weeks, Emmit. I love you.
And I’ll put that card in the mail to you … soon.
Godzilla Takes Highland Avenue
[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-2013696913284272407&playerMode=embedded]
The Other Problem With Commuting
When you’re running late… you’re an hour away, no matter how you slice it.
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Other tidbits:
- to Dan, whose comment I only just saw thanks to an overzealous spam filter: do not be filled with jealousy over my 334 page style manual, as it includes many corollaries such as “generally follow the Chicago Manual of Style in these circumstances, except when you don’t think you should,” and “Webster’s spelling preferences should be followed in these circumstances, except when they shouldn’t be.”
- MY NEPHEW IS CRAWLING! He’s apparently been crawling, somewhat unenthusiastically, since Monday, but this was not immediately brought to Aunt Laura’s attention. Ahem. Video footage forthcoming.
- Cancer Man (not the X-Files character) has disappeared from his little spot of concrete on Randolph Street between Intelligentsia Coffee and Ann Taylor Loft. I saw him there every morning with a dirty bit of cardboard that said, “Cancer Starved Please Help.” He just sat there, slouching, knees up, head hanging down. He never said anything. I feel like a terrible human being for daring to worry about him, since all I’ve ever done is walk by him. Levinas says this is an ethical conflict I’m not dealing with, but I blame it on the combination of my protective parents (“NEVER talk to strangers and ESPECIALLY never get your wallet out in public”) and my Catholic upbringing (GUILT).
- phone conversation with Nephew’s mamma this afternoon:
me, somewhat surprised and proudly: I have more pictures in my office of Emmit than I do of my cats!
her: Well I should hope so. BECAUSE HE’S A PERSON. [lowering voice to refer to the cat pictures] People will think you’re crazy. Has the guy from Canasta been by your office yet?
* * *
current book: finished The Logic of a Rose on the bus this morning and started Sweet Thursday on the way home tonight. It was recommended by Advisor after I told him I hated Steinbeck, but 22 pages into and I’m not convinced this will change my mind. Except for this lovely (and possibly redemptive) passage, in which a two men tell stories of their old grocer:
They volleyed Lee Chong back and forth, and their memories built virtues that would have surprised him, and cleverness and beauty too. While one told a fine tale of that mercantile Chinaman the other waited impatiently to top the story. Out of their memories there emerged a being scarcely human, a dragon of goodness and an angel of guile. In such a way are gods created.
current music: I haven’t been listening to a very wide variety of tunes lately. Feel free to send me mix CDs.
current socks: gray with blue and white polka dots. With my Keens, of course, so the polka dots peek through.
