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| My New Weight Routine--What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger | | Date Created: Apr 26, 2007, 02:28 PM |
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Would you believe I didn't even ask John to pose for this picture? I thought his outfit was funny so I wanted to take a picture and this is what he gave me. Nice. But there is a huge reason to celebrate John today. The last couple of days he has been going to the bathroom when he needs to as opposed to when I make him sit there. (I'll leave out a description of the celebratory pilates moves he likes to do directly following a successful number-two BEFORE he puts his undies back on.) This boy is potty-trained!!!
The only negative part of this scenario is that to reward him for his valiant efforts, my mom let him pick out a present at Wal-Mart. He picked out this really cool batting machine that feeds balls to a hanging stick where you can hit them with your bat. And it makes all kinds of sounds, such as, "Batter batter swing!" and "Home run!" All of the boys love it. John can hit the ball far and high. James can hit it after a few tries. George swings his bat and his entire body into the machine which makes the ball fall off and he thinks it's a hit. So the problem is that they played with it for literally two hours yesterday and now it's broken. The arm that raises the balls up to the stick comes up about a quarter of an inch short of the stick, so the ball can't hook on to the stick where you hit it from. So this morning I took the whole thing apart. I replaced the batteries. I unscrewed the parts that aren't supposed to be unscrewed. I figured out if one spring were twisted just so, it might work. But I tried two sets of pliers and I couldn't get a good grip on it to twist it. Don't let yourself imagine me enjoying this puttering at a workbench in a clean garage with the garage door open and the birds twittering outside. No. Imagine me on the floor in my pajamas making several trips to the cluttered garage for different size screwdrivers and pliers. Now imagine three antsy boys hanging over me trying to "fix" it themselves and also trying to play with it a little bit just in case it's working even though it wasn't ten seconds before. Now imagine me telling them to please go away so I can work on it. Now imagine them going in the next room where they tackle each other and cry because someone hurt someone's head. Now imagine their coming back to check on my progress. Now imagine me losing my temper. I finally realized it simply can't be fixed. And I don't think it's a defective toy. I think it's simply that these boys are too damned rough. They mess up and break every toy they own. This one just took less time than most to be be beat out of operating form. I am so sick of them ruining their things. Almost all of the outdoor toys have been broken somehow or else require new batteries every time they want to play with them. The batteries are a terrible situation in themselves. Whoever invented electronic toys should be punished by an angry mob of stressed-out moms and dads. While I had batteries out trying to figure out the baseball machine, the boys were reminded of their firetrucks which haven't had working batteries in months. Fine, I said, give me a minute and I'll put new batteries in. Only one of the three firetrucks, however, would even hold batteries anymore. The little spring mechanisms that hold the batteries tightly in place had been broken from the boys taking batteries in and out of them, even though they know they're not supposed to play with batteries. You can imagine how well they took the news that their trucks would never work again because they had played too rough with them and played with the battery parts. And you can imagine how sensitive I was in the telling of this news to them since I was in such a good mood from having worked on not fixing the baseball machine for 45 minutes. Somehow I pried myself away from the screaming mimis to finally get dressed. I was literally up there three minutes when George came upstairs fussing that James had taken all of his truck tires. I'd told the boys the last few days NOT TO TAKE THE TIRES OFF THEIR TRUCKS because they would lose them and not have enough tires for the trucks to actually roll. Downstairs James admitted he'd taken George's tires because he couldn't find his own tires and would I help him. No, I said, because I told you not to take the tires off in the first place for this very reason. Well, you know well they take words such as, "reason, too bad, I told you so." Then before I can get back upstairs to put a clean shirt on, Georgie is fussing about the damn firetruck again that doesn't work. I looked inside the place where the battery goes and there was battery acid powder stuff all over it that had not been there twenty minutes before. I TOLD YOU NOT TO PLAY WITH BATTERIES! By this point I am so angry. It's not just that constantly replacing batteries is annoying or that playing with the batteries breaks the toys, but playing with batteries is dangerous! I was so pissed I cannot put words to it. So I took everyone upstairs and put them in time-out so I could get myself back together. They screamed. They threw things at the door. I tried to call Will, but somehow he was smart and didn't answer. So I sat on the floor staring out the window for about five minutes, took the chance to finish getting dressed, and then collected all of the firetrucks and threw them in the trash. Don't scoff at my meanness--if I'd had one ounce less of self-control I would have thrown them away in front of the boys. See, I do have a heart.
From there, I let them out and we went outside. My mom had invited us to meet at Atlanta Bread for lunch, and even though I doubted the guys could handle it I wanted so badly to get out of the house and eat something that I couldn't bear to call and cancel. Will and I have been trying to eat more healthy the last few days and it's killing me. I have been so irritable. Food is the only legal vice for me right now besides yucky cigarettes and alcohol. And I try to wait till five o'clock to start drinking. Dear lord I finally understand why people start taking drugs. Anyway, it was too early to leave so I thought we'd play outside for a few minutes. but what do you know? There's dirt in James' shoe. James wants to go inside. George falls down and hurts his knee. James wants to play baseball but he doesn't want me to throw him the ball. He wants to pitch the ball to John, but James throwing a ball looks like someone being attacked by a swarm of bees. The ball doesn't quite go where he wants it to would be another way to put it. And be reminded that John is quite the ball-placement connoisseur and was especially discriminating today. I couldn't throw a ball he was satisfied with to save my life. And believe me, I felt as if it were a life or death situation at that point. And it's hard to throw a breaking ball when George likes to hang out within inches of John's swing and when James is hanging on your leg begging to "go somewhere." Finally I said, fine let's get in the car then. But James decided to make this yet another life and deather. He wanted to bring something. Oh there was his bat. No, says John that's my bat. No, says James, I was playing with that. That's not my right seat. You put me in the wrong seat. That's not the right bat. That's not the right bat. I am sick of you. I did my best just to get them strapped in and pull out the driveway. By now James and I are crying, only I'm not screaming so loud it sounds as if I may puke at any moment. My face is wet! My face is wet!!! I gave him all I could reach in the way of a kleenex which was a paper towel I have no idea what it was doing in my car. That's not a kleenex! That's not a kleenex! All of this is after earlier when I brushed his teeth and he wanted his face washed and I washed it and then no matter how many times I dried it he said his face was wet and to wipe it wipe it wipe it and then I happened to brush the other guys' teeth downstairs because that's where they were James had a meltdown because I'd brushed his teeth upstairs instead. I wanted to brush MY teeth downstairs! I wanted to brush my teeth DOWNSTAIRS! So all of this is to say I was saturated to overflowing with the sound of James' fussing and whining. He screamed as loud as his throat could take the whole ride to Atlanta Bread where we were 15 minutes early. I took the time in the car to apologize to the boys for yelling and screaming and crying but that I was working really hard and doing my best and I needed them to work hard and do their best. And that the fussing and whining really made it hard for me to do my best. "I work hard," James said. "I work hard in my room at my desk." Luckily I was cooled down enough now not to respond. Then I noticed that John had on a different pair of pants than he'd had on. And they were backwards. I said, "Did you change your pants during time-out?" "Yes," he said. "Why?" "They were wet." "From what?" I panicked--had I celebrated the potty-training too soon? "My tears," he said. Oh dear lord. Thank you for making us feel so low-down and guilty that it keeps us from yelling at our kids for another few weeks or so.
We ate lunch and at first it was difficult. James didn't want a pickle in his basket. John had brought his baseball and bat (only because I didn't notice and tell him to leave it in the car) and so James wanted something out of the car. James wanted a toothpick in HIS sandwich. James wanted a napkin. Not that napkin. James wanted a grape. Not that grape. Finally I tried the strategy that I'm never able to try when I'm already stressed to the max, but I was so tired of arguing I was able. I ignored him. And I told my mom to do the same and for the MOST part he was good for the rest of the meal.
The boys were so well-behaved for about three weeks. This past week hasn't been so great. Even Georgie's vivid imagination has turned against me. "Are you a wipe, Momoe?" he asked yesterday. "No," I said. "Cuz you're full of poop!" Then later he told John a spider was crawling on him when there really wasn't. So I don't know if I'm quite ready for this next phase of boy-dom. The spider tricks, the new chorus of "You are pee pee!"
But as of this writing, we're all alive at least in this action-thriller of a day. I think this morning I should have taken the advice James gave George when they were playing with their little castle and James was talking about the dragon:
"Don't open the cage--he might be grumpy." |
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