It's 10 o'clock. Have you seen my 12 year old?

I had been warned for years, and had been expecting it. I knew viscerally and in every capacity that yes, it was BOUND to happen and likely SOON.

So why, when my 12-year old son up and got all hormonal on me, was I so flippin' shocked?

Maybe because I anticipated a slooowwwww slide into puberty, like that of his older brother.

Maybe because I was hopelessly-- if not freakishly-- in denial.

Maybe because I underestimated the lure of technology and teen-hood.

Whatever the case, my handsome, witty, charming, intelligent, wonderful, soulful, thoughtful and thought-provoking, well-spoken, humorous 12-year old son has been bitten by the sharp eye-teeth of puppy love. Clearly, a boy so enchanting as to be described with no less than ten adjectives in one sentence by his very own mother is clearly worthy of the attention of the young ladies.

Girls. I'm not certain 11- and 12-year olds even qualify as "young ladies" yet.

And one particular girl has captured his attention so thoroughly that he has developed a second love, a partner in facilitating his flirtatious affair: his cell phone.

My quick-learning (11 adjectives) son learned (rather quickly) how to use all the features of his new constant companion. How to set new ring tones; how to change the wallpaper; how to record his own alert saying, "You have a text message" sounding like the 90s version of "You've got mail."

He has also learned that when this goes off 100 times in as many minutes, he will get heckled by his siblings.

Relentlessly.

My son has taken to needing his privacy at all hours of the day and night. His usual post on the couch or recliner lies empty. He no longer plays X-box with the veracity of his stepbrother. Instead, my prepubescent is like a terrier, cutting a repetitive path about the yard: he paces the back lawn, exits through the side gate, cuts across the front yard, heads down the front walk, turns up the driveway, meanders around to the side yard, goes back to the side gate, and re-enters the backyard-- all while deep in cell-phone bliss.

I suppose I should take solace in the fact that while he is all-consumed with his first "girlfriend," the extent of their relationship (beyond the cell phone) amounts to playing basketball on the blacktop after school, for about 30 minutes (when her parents pick her up). His buddies are there, her girlfriends are there, three school monitors are there. I don't fear the hanky-panky. In fact, I find the innocence of their mutual interest charming in that can't-take-my-eyes-off-that-traffic-accident sort of way.

I'm just not ready for the sudden "loss" of my son to his own internal need to grow toward independence. And yet, as I write this, this same son informs me that he has found a long-lost "collector's item" in his sister's room. (A Pokémon stuffed animal.)

I am grateful for the mild reassurance this statement offers.

For a whole 30 seconds anyway, when our conversation is interrupted by the alert "You've got a text message" chirp from his pants pocket, and I watch him dart out the back door.

American Idol Cupcakes

American Idol Cupcakes
Originally uploaded by SweetToothFairy

These are the kinds of cupcakes I aspire to. Gen, you should have had these last night!

Olbermann on Clinton: Understanding who matters

In a tricky primary season filled with tricky definitions of tricky counting procedures, Keith Olbermann predicts Clinton's next steps.

Dear 1983: Thank you for synthesizers & synthetic fibers

The weekend is over, your gas tank is empty, your inbox is full. Dinnertime is around the corner, you have no meal planned, and dosing the kids with Benedryl and dropping them in front of the electronic babysitter is sounding better and better.

DO NOT DESPAIR! All you need is some INSPIRATION! Something to pull you out of your rut, yank you back into reality. For your Monday afternoon pleasure, I offer you passion, so you CAN make it happen, baby.

Go now, hear the music. Close your eyes, feel the rhythm. And then answer the uber question: Lip syncing or what? And where can I get me some of those leg warmers?

cross-posted to centralvalleymoms.com

The Tell-Tale Laundry Room

TRUE! Disorganized, very, very dreadfully disorganized I had been and am; but why will you say I am lazy? The slovenliness had sharpened my senses, not destroyed, not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute…

To wit: I awaken with a start from a deep, deep sleep.

I lay awake, listening. I hear it. Something… no? Perhaps not. I lay back down. My mind drifts back to the comfort of my dreams, visiting places that exist only in the quiet, charmed recesses of my sleepy imagination.

And there is was again. A thumping.

My eyes pop open. I wait. I strain with the effort to decipher sound past that of my blood coursing through my veins, but I can’t. So I climb out of bed, checking on all the sleeping children in their various states of snoozy drool. All safe.

Back to bed I go, calming myself with thoughts of the next day’s work. The kitchen to clean; beds to make; the scrubbing that lay ahead.

When I had made an end to thoughts of these labours, it was four o'clock -- still dark as midnight. I lay with my eyes closed, coaxing sleep to visit me again. My partner wakes, noting my state, and asks of my sleep.

And then I heard it again. My head ached, and I fancied a ringing in my ears; but no. Again it sounded. Faster, constant. I tell my partner that I am fine, with all the reassurances I can muster. The ringing became more distinct : I talked more freely to get rid of the feeling: but it continued and gained definitiveness -- until, at length, I found that the noise was NOT within my ears.

Thump-thump.

Thump-thump.

It was A LOW, DULL, QUICK SOUND -- MUCH SUCH A SOUND AS A WATCH MAKES WHEN ENVELOPED IN COTTON. I gasped for breath, and yet my partner heard it not. I could hear it beneath me, through the floorboards. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. I talked more quickly, more vehemently but the noise steadily increased.

Alas I could take it no longer! I ran from the bedroom, the thumping increasing. The vile washing machine was calling out, calling to me, reminding me of its week-long neglect. It pounded against the door of the laundry room, crying out for attention.

"Villains!" I shrieked at the washer and dryer, "dissemble no more! I admit the deed! I am lazy! I have ignored you for a week and it felt GREAT! GREAT, DO YOU HEAR?!?!”

I wrenched open the laundry room door to a stale, dirty clothes-filled silence.

“Meow,” said the cat.

Gabby's Birthday Cake

IMG_0359
Originally uploaded by stephen_dana

I was pretty proud of this effort, until my sister's only comment was, "Those roses could sink a ship." Then I strangled her.

Sanctuary! Sanctuary! SANCTUARY!!

Seven o’clock a.m. I sit on my bed, my laptop before me. I attempt to cull my thoughts into some cohesive semblance of communication. I have things to say, and I want to say them. I want to be witty and evoke a connection through my writing, and my laptop-- like a good therapist-- waits for me to begin. I tap out a few words. We smile at each other, my laptop and I, smile in that knowing way of old girlfriends. I begin telling her a story—something silly that happened the other day-- and rapidly get caught up in the telling. Soon the screen and keyboard are lost to the vision unfolding in my mind’s eye. And as I paint the story in further detail, as I float deeper into my story’s journey-- WHAM! An explosion of sound and fury rips me from my netherworldGoodmorninghellohowareyoublahblahblah…

…in bursts the first child of my day-- let’s call her HappyPants-- fully intent on telling stories of her own design. Interrupting and oblivious of my intense laptop communion, HappyPants speaks to me outright about everything and nothing all at the same time. I stare at her, face frozen in a strained smile that poorly shrouds my roaring brain. My internal screaming becomes a barrier (OHMYGAWD STOP TALKING I’LL LOSE EVERTHING I WAS JUST ABOUT TO WRITE) as I try with all my might to care about the flippant conversation. I sense my beet red face and shallow, rapid breathing is giving me away. Eventually HappyPants finishes her morning monologue and exits. Leaving the door wide open.

My eye twitches.

I close it behind her.

I sit. I attempt to commune with the laptop once again. Where were we? Ahhh yes, dear friend, we were just about to-- ENTER Groggy Slowpoke in search of socks. In search of clean clothing. Do we have soap? Where do we keep the milk? Groggy trudges out again in a cloud of his own confusion, and is immediately followed by HappyPants and my Heterosexual Life Partner. My previous conversation with HappyPants replays before my eyes, and I watch HLP navigate the conversation much more adroitly than my previous attempt. HappyPants turns on the desktop computer and proceeds to print out school work while checking out MySpace. HLP is interested in continuing the conversation, but now HappyPants is lost in a digital world of her own. She has stopped talking.

Blessed silence. Three whole seconds worth.

The distractions resume. Enter Grumpy Mumbler, just waking up, wanting attention but not conversation. He flops down on the bed, causing a minor earthquake in my world. Mumbler is followed by Slowpoke, still on his quest for socks. To my left there is a loud slurp of coffee followed by a rumbling amongst all about what is read in the paper, about what is happening at school, about what time we are leaving, about that funny thing that happened in that movie—did it go like this? NO! Wait, it was like that and then hahaha…and suddenly a horrendous screeching, grinding noise fills the room.

The printer has jammed.

As the crew leaps forward to assess the problem, I sneak out with my laptop and hide in my inner sanctum.

Silence.

I smile at my friend and get back to my story. The details. The emotions. I snicker at my creativity. I get lost in my brilliance. We fly, we soar, we come to a crashing halt when someone pounds on the bathroom door.

“Mom? Are you in there?”

I close the laptop. I flush. In a home with six children, there is no sanctuary.

BONUS QUESTION: For ten extra points, define R.S.V.P. Then do it.

I take the blame.

My bad.

My ego, though healthy and large, is not too all-encompassing to recognize when I eff something up, and take responsibility for it. And I effed this one up but good.

I planned my kid’s 5^th birthday party with the speed of a cheetah, the grace of a gazelle, and ended up making a baboon out of myself. You see, for all my mania and effort, my daughter’s party was worse than poorly attended. Put another way—thank GAWD for family. Because without them, it would have been me, my daughter, and two dogs.

I acknowledge that not passing out maps with the invitation was a very poor choice. Yes, people could Google or MapQuest the address, but a good host would have provided general directions. Clearly, my mistake.

I acknowledge that could have planned the event further out, so that people could properly reserve the day on their calendars. Very poor planning on my part.

Finally, had I been a truly responsible host, I would have verified that the day of the party did not coincide with any other major event (INSERT the Clovis Rodeo HERE.) Truly horrible mistake. My head is bruised from all the forehead slapping.

AND yet…

While I am most willing and able to fall upon the sword, as it were, I cannot take ALL of the blame here. Blame, like credit, belongs where it is due, and some of the blame for the horrendous attendance must rest squarely on the shoulders of the uncultured swine that birthed the some-twenty invitees who did not respond to the invitation in any way.

No I am not bitter.

…Okay, yes I am.

And when I say uncultured swine, if you yourself have ignored the little line at the bottom of the invitation that reads, “R.S.V.P.,” then include yourself in that insult.

Because that one tiny line is enough for inhabitants of ANY OTHER CITY IN THE WORLD to know how best to deal with an invitation.

Any city, that is, but Fresno. And why do I pick on Fresno? Because virtually EVERYONE I know who is NOT from here, has had this same issue since moving here: Invitees in this area simply do not R.S.V.P. for parties or events in this town.

I have heard it over and over again: "We invited 50 people. Nobody R.S.V.P.'d, can you believe it?" "I think it's the way people do things here. They just don't respond."

As many of the inhabitants I’ve met since relocating here almost 8 years ago are kind people who would not willingly or knowingly be rude or hurtful, I can only presume that of the some 20+ events we’ve held, the several hundred invitees simply do not understand how to respond to an invitation.

PRINT FOR YOUR USE:

• R.S.V.P. is an abbreviation for Répondez s'il vous plait. That’s FRENCH, Fresno, and at the bottom of an invitation it means “RESPOND, please.” NOT “Regrets only,” NOT “IGNORE this little blurb HERE”, but respond.
  
  As in “WILL YOU ATTEND THE PARTY OR NOT?”

• The name after the R.S.V.P. is the person you respond TO, and phone number is the number you call for said response.
• It is perfectly reasonable to leave a message on an answering machine, or with anyone who picks up the phone.
  
  The message you leave answers the question, “WILL YOU ATTEND THE PARTY OR NOT?”

It’s not just that we, the party throwers, want to know if your precious little imp will grace our home with his manic behavior or not and if not, oh how downtrodden we will be—GAWD no. It isn’t about giving you or anyone a guilt trip. It's not completely about you. Rather, knowing if you will attend is about US-- our planning, so we know how much food to prepare; how many gift bags to ready; and how many children we will have to entertain.

For those that understand R.S.V.P. AND make use of it, thank you. Thank you for continuing to be kind and respectful and courteous to hosts everywhere. It really is important and does mean something to the person going to all the effort to host an event to know simply whether or not you’ll be there.

And for those otherwise: BE CULTURED. You are now officially in the know, there are no excuses. RESPOND. Please.

REDEMPTION!