On Her 60th

My next door neighbor’s mother is visiting her. My neighbor is about my age and has two young children also. Her mother lives in Argentina, so when she visits, she visits. I think she’s here for a month, total.

Last weekend the weather was mostly nice and we spent plenty of time outside. Leo and Ellie are good at playing independently in the back yard, with minimal interference from me for good little chunks of time. It’s those little spaces of freedom that allow me the luxury to daydream. And spy on my neighbors of course.

So there was my neighbor (I’ll call her “N.”) going shopping with her mother. They boarded the shiny black SUV parked in the driveway, giddy, giggling and chatting, a day of retail opportunity and mother-daughter bonding stretched out in front of them. Hours later they returned home with overflowing bags from the farmer’s market, fresh kale and apples and boxes of bulk items from Costco too. I imagined days and nights of side by side cooking, and more chatting.

There were bags from clothing stores too. A Children’s Place, Gap Kids. They’d gone to the mall. Of course they had. Grandma was visiting. They were kid-free too. N.’s husband had apparently opted to give her the gift of a break from the children, to enjoy her mother’s company, untethered.

Later in the afternoon they would gather outside for an evening meal. This time it was the whole family. N’s husband, the two small boys and of course, N’s mother. Wine glasses and bottles of red were carried on trays, outside to the deck. The grill was fired up and soon the air was filled with the intoxicating aroma of steak on a late summer night. And I don’t even particularly like steak.

For many years after my mother died, the favorite picture I had of the two of us together was an image so mundane that it’s almost laughable, really. My stepfather took it. I actually think it was a "test shot" for one of his new cameras. We are standing in the dining room of her old Craftsman bungalow in Portland. I am about 25, which made my mother 47. She would be dead in three years. We are peering at the entertainment section of the Sunday Oregonian, trying to decide which movie to see. The day is stretched out in front of us, nothing we had to do except of course, decide on a movie and oh yes, where to go after for coffee? It was something so simple and easy and taken for granted. Like grocery shopping or trip to the mall.

It’s a nothing photo, really. And when my mother was alive, I wouldn’t have given it a second glance. But with her gone? It stood framed on a prominent bookshelf for many years. During one of our many moves it was packed away and I haven’t been able to find it.

What I grew to love about that photo was how ordinary it was. It was just a day. A lazy Sunday spent with my mom, a day like so many. Who would think they would ever end? Or at least, that they wouldn’t last for a very long time?

What more is there to say? Watching N. with her mom, I contemplate a visit from my mom now and what that would be like. She would hardly recognize my life now. There is very little time for contemplation of anything, certainly not much room for movies or coffee spots or leisurely shopping trips. In spite of all that, I think she’d be both surprised and pleased with what fills up the spaces now.

And yes, of course it’s impossibly tempting to romanticize that visit she never got to take, to gloss over the missed shopping trips that would surely be free of conflict or disagreements or sour moods. But such is the “luxury” of grief and loss. In your mind, when you’re imagining how things could have been? You can have the story play out exactly as you want it.

I miss her more, this time of year. I always do. The season is changing. The milestones of another school year and all the excitement and emotion that brings, is upon us. It’s in the fall, too, that I’m reminded of her last visit to New York, eleven years ago this November. It was seven months before she died, four months before anyone even knew she was sick. We spent a whirlwind long weekend together and unknowingly packed every minute in as if it would be our last “trip” together which of course I now marvel at and am so grateful for. She took me shopping at Macy’s where she bought me my first “grownup” winter coat, we ate Indian food twice, closed down several museums, sampled pickles on the Lower East Side and walked until our feet throbbed. I was in my honeymoon phase with New York. I was living my dream and couldn’t wait to share it with her. And all of that feels like it was a hundred years ago, another lifetime, truly.

Another holiday season approaches (pumpkins and ghost are cropping up in the windows and yards of my suburban neighborhood), which is always sweet and at the same time, bittersweet. And of course, her birthday. This week she would be sixty. She didn’t even get to turn fifty. So many mundane weekends we didn’t get to spend together, going to the movies, meeting for coffee after, to discuss. All those idealized mother-daughter shopping trips never taken. I can just imagine her buying clothes for her grandchildren. Her grandchildren.

Yes, it is what it is. It should get easier with every passing year and in a way, it does. But it still doesn’t feel any more fair. It never will. Life can be so sweet, life is so precious, but nobody ever said it was fair.

My mom, Eleanor, Japan, 1995 (photo by Rick Regan)

And so today, more than other days, I’m daydreaming of the mundane and what a gift it is. And I’m thinking of a life merely only half lived, and of two little lives my mom never had the pleasure of meeting.

Pumpkin picking, fall, 2009

Happy Birthday, Mom.

Living the Hayride

As regular readers here know, Leo pretty much lives for Hayrides.

Well ladies and gentleman I give you:

The First Hayride of The Season.

Seriously, is he in his element or what?

Yesterday we spent part of the day here. This was merely a prelude to the serious picking that we’ll do when we go to my absolute favorite apple pumpkin picking spot in a few weeks when Grandma comes to visit.

Leo and friend.

Ellie was lukewarm about the whole hayride thing. She did enjoy picking apples.

After the hayride, Leo was very excited about the baby pigs. We talked about Wilbur and Charlotte's Web (he watched the old version aka the one I grew up with of course over summer break and fell in love with it).


He seemed to be fascinated by real, live oinking!

Ellie feigned interest in the animals briefly, but then informed us she was “just going to stand over here and eat her chips.”

Oh, Ellie.

Spoke Too Soon (Alternatively Titled Speech Delays Blow, and Other Obvious Observations)

Well, today was the first day since school started thirteen days ago that I had to carry a kicking and flailing and generally extremely uncooperative Leo to the bus’ door.

There were definitely no over the ecstatic shoulder grins today. Sigh.

It all started after breakfast which, after dozens of nags, he finally ate. He then leaped from the couch and began construction of one of his infamous “Hayrides”—the material for this one was the couch cushions. Fine. I had bigger fish to fry, namely convincing Ellie to dressed.

But then Leo started saying something. It sounded like: Diddy-Boo. I know. I had no clue what he was saying, and I’m usually pretty good at figuring his language out, often by context. Ellie is really the expert though. I’d say a good ninety-five percent of the time she knows exactly what Leo is saying (this still fascinates, mystifies and provides me with an endless source of entertainment).

But this morning, even Ellie was no help. With raised eyebrows, she shrugged her little shoulders, said “I’dunno” and turned her attention back to the "The Backyardigans."

That’s when Leo took off and started rifling through drawers. First the kitchen junk drawer. Then my desk drawer. I still had no idea what he was after.

Then the bus came. I’m sure you know how that one went over.

Sufficed to say that Leo managed to pull the front of my shirt down with his kicking and carrying on and I ended up flashing the old lingerie to Leo’s bus driver and both bus aides.

And it isn’t even Friday.

This was not behavioral. It wasn't that he didn't want to get on the bus. He just wanted to communicate something and he couldn't. Actually, he could, it was my problem that I couldn't figure out what that thing was. I see and feel his frustration, and truthfully, he's a very patient, good sport about it most of the time. Unless of course, he happens to have to get on the bus at that moment of frustration. I can't say that I really blame him.

See?

The Long Walk Across the Grass and the Pretty, Big Bed

Have you ever had the thought when you watched a small event unfold, I am going to Remember This? This is momentous.

I could almost hear the shutter in my mind click this morning, as I watched Leo puff up his little red fleece clad shoulders, weighed down by his bulky blue backpack. He marched (a bit wobbly-that darn backpack) down the front steps of our house and across the large swath of dewy grass, looked over his shoulder at Ellie and me, not once, but twice, with a grin reserved only for water slides and wiggling puppies.

He had walked from the house all the way to the bus all by himself and oh was he proud.

He gave a final wave to us, right before he climbed the steps of the little orange bus. He was only across the yard, but he looked so … old.

Leo has been walking to the bus by himself (across the grass) for about a week now. The first time it happened by accident. Last year I always walked him right to the bus’ door (often with a still pajama clad or sometimes half clothed Ellie still in my arms). I clung to the fear of his oft-unpredictable nature and curiosity and predilection for running straight into the street. Sometimes it’s so hard to let go.

But one morning last week in the clamor of hurry-up-the-bus-is-here-and-where-are-Ellie’s-shoes-and-Leo-let-me-wipe-off-your-face, Leo made it down the front steps by himself. And so I stood there and watched him and well, yup, sure enough he was just fine. He made it to the bus, all by himself. Good for him. I know it’s not much when I explain it all out, but it just felt like a milestone.

Speaking of milestones, I give you:

Big Girl Bed Occupant.

I’m a big believer of keep them in the crib until they climb out (hi Leo, who decided to take a flying leap out of the crib when I was 38 weeks pregnant with Ellie and give me a small heart attack. Too Much Change!).

Ellie never did climb or fall out of the crib. She never even tried. But bed times were starting to take a loooong time. Questions about a “big bed” started coming. Since there was already a big bed in her room (Ellie’s room is our old guest room) it was impossible to make any excuses. I admit to being a little teary when I put her in the crib on Friday night for what (I thought) would be the last time.

Saturday afternoon Erin set up the bed rail and a giddy Ellie asked to go to bed at 7 p.m. After three hours and thirty different trips into her room to answer questions and requests, Ellie was back in her crib (she was given repeated warnings that this would be the consequence).

Sunday night was better. There were only a handful of requests, she settled down in the new, big bed fairly quickly, and slept through the night. She’s suddenly intent on “making her bed pretty.” All the animals must be positioned just the right way, the Princess pillow under her head just so, the covers tucked. That takes a while, but is not nearly as challenging as running up and down the stairs at 9:00 and 9:30 and 10 p.m. to the calls of a crib-bound little girl screaming "MAAA-MEEE!"

And the pretty bed? Not sure where she learned that one but it definitely wasn’t from me.

I Can Tell You How To Get To Sesame Place

We went to Sesame Place at the end of August. For those uninitiated, Sesame Place is Sesame Street's version of Disneyland, but on a much smaller scale. With water rides. In other words, the dream come true of any child under seven.


Probably the most un-Sesame Place-like picture a person could manage to take. Here's Ellie checking out a forklift. At Sesame Place, I assure you.

It’s so odd to think back to that time, less than a month ago, because it was heavily summer and now it’s unequivocally fall. I’m not sure if it’s because our summer was so relentless and unforgiving and just flipping hot, but I can’t recall a year like this one, where autumn came on like a switch, when the calendar turned to September.

I don’t have many pictures. We were too busy having a lot of fun. And getting very wet (hence the no camera thing).

What I wish I had a picture of is Leo riding his first water slide ALL BY HIMSELF! I’m not sure who I am more proud of, Leo for doing it or myself for letting him!

One of my favorite parts of the whole day was sitting at the bottom of the water slide where Leo shot out of the tube, sporting a smile that could electrify a small town. In a foot of water (under a blaring hot sun and sweating through a 97-degree day) Ellie sat in my lap and she and I splashed and snuggled and waited for her ebullient brother to appear.

Probably no shock to hear that our delicate flower Ellie was not a huge fan of the water (she was fine in the baby pool next to the the water slide area). But please, no water on the head or in the eyes or pouring out of the gigantic Count's water pail (can't say I blame her on that one). Erin bought her a little pink coral necklace at one of the gift shops, which she wore with pride as though she’d been given the Hope Diamond. As we floated along Big Bird’s Rambling River Ellie instructed me to “not get her necklace wet.”

I was so proud of Leo. He stayed with us very well and listened and didn’t try to run off at all. There was lots of compromising. Ellie was dying to ride the carousel whereas Leo had zero interest. But he was good big brother and ultimately agreed to suffer through the carousel, whining all the way to the giraffe. Probably no one is surprised to learn that he left that carousel with a smile.

At the end of the day, exhausted and slightly water logged, we found the arcade game area.


Are you ready? Because Erin won this:

Sidenote: Just how much crap can you fit on a Maclaren stroller. Answer: See above.

Just for scale purposes, this Cookie Monster is a tad larger than Ellie. And for the record? About six people a day win these giant prizes. We had people stopping us all over the park asking us “how we won that.”


Erin also won (I'm telling you Erin was on fire at that little arcade) Ellie this little guy which she has slept with every night since receiving it.

The final activity was the parade.



These people are not tired at At All. Whatever gave you that idea?

I Love Three. I Hate Three.

Oh, Ellie. Really, what is there to say?

Monday night my three year old almost made me cry. I was tired. I was hungry. She was more tired. Bed time was, well, a disaster.

She told me she didn’t like my skirt. She told me not to touch her. She didn’t want to wear her Pull-Up with the Princesses on it. She wanted to wear one of Leo’s old ones with the robot. Then she didn’t. She wanted books. She didn’t want books. She wanted one particular book that happened to be in the basement playroom which I was not going down two stories to get. Even I was not that desperate.

Oh and my new favorite? "If you don't get me my kitty cat nightgown [just an example, it could be any unrequited request] I'm not going to be your friend!"

Then she wanted Band-Aids. And more Band-Aids.

Last week she called me into her room thirty minutes after “Lights Out” to inform me that there was “a hair in her bed.”

Last night she was concerned she wouldn’t be able to go to sleep because she had the “hook-ups.” I did not have the heart to correct her and was relieved to finally have something to laugh about.

My mistake is, I try to reason with her. She’s three. There is no reason. I need to remember this. I try my best to remain calm when she ruffles me. I remind myself that she’s tired, hungry, fill-in-the-blank.

I think it’s the sass that is truly shocking to me. If I didn’t know any better, I would think she was thirteen years old! The tone of voice. The looks. The little stink eye. Where did she learn this stuff? Ignoring doesn’t seem to be working. I think I need to bring out the bigger guns though I’m not sure what that means.

And then. Then I remember the absolutely mind blowingly adorable things she does and says. She is a big fan of completely non sequitur “Mommy, I love you” announcements (not that there ever has to be a reason to tell someone you love them, of course). Yesterday on the way to school she announced that this album and books “make me very, very happy.”

Lastly, she has taken to spontaneously hugging Leo (and him, her, though truthfully, I’m not sure who instigates it. My hunch is it’s probably Leo, but she tolerates the love, which is a new and heart warming development.)

And I know that even though it doesn’t seem like it sometimes, I know that someday, I will miss three.

The Annual Post-Shot Hug

I was more than grateful that the most tragic news we received at Leo's annual checkup is that he can no longer have scrambled eggs every day (the doctor said it’s not great for his cholesterol). I know, I know: Duh, Mom. I admit I was in deep denial about the scrambled eggs. Hey, Omega 3s, right? Go ahead and accuse me of laziness but sometimes? The promise of scrambled eggs is all I can say to get Leo come downstairs on school day mornings.

But back to the clean bill of health. Call me a catastrophizer, but it’s just a relief when all of Leo’s annual blood work comes back fine. With Down syndrome, there’s always that lingering little fear, that proverbial other shoe. But: thyroid was fine, CBC fine. Sigh.

Now if we could just get Leo to eat something other than scrambled eggs for breakfast.

More good news: For the first time in two years, we officially know how tall Leo is! Last year he refused to be measured. This year, he marched up to the wall and let the nurse get his stats. Let the record show that at age six, Leo is 43 ½ inches tall and weighs 52 pounds. Speaking of weight, this means Leo needs a new car seat. Anyone have any good recs for a seat that will hold him for a few more years? The boosters look so easy to escape from. I need something that will keep him where he’s supposed to be.

Leo is still not a huge fan of being examined but he’s come a long way. He let Dr. K listen to his heart but flat our refused the blood pressure cuff and wouldn’t even consider an ear check. Some things never change.

He also received his flu shot which he was furious about. I have to say, bearing witness to your babies and children get shots is never not a stab to the heart. That little innocent face goes from Blissful to What The Hell Is Going on Here to Why Are You Hurting Me?

Leo has his own special tradition. Hysterical tears for less than a minute, followed by a leap off the exam table to embrace the driver of the needle. He did the same thing at the lab for his blood draw and the poor phlebotomist ducked—she thought Leo was going to take a swing at her. Apparently, this happens a lot. Nope, not Leo. He just needed a hug. It chokes me up every time. It’s as if he can’t fathom someone hurting him on purpose. He has to make a peace offering, ensure everything is OK.

Leo, recovering from his flu shot and showing me one of his latest creations, last week.

Sing It Sister! I Mean, Brother!

Leo is now illustrating “One Was Johnny” too.

Leo has always loved music. He took music classes as an infant and toddler and when he was young it was often the thing that would calm him down when nothing else would (who could forget those few months where, if he cried in the car, all we had to do was bust out with “Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall.”) It was a vocal tranquilizer.

When Leo was eighteen months old we drove from Oregon to New York and he needed music the entire way. "Elmo’s Greatest Hits" could assuage any fussiness. It was magic and I can still remember every lyric of every song. Lucky me!

Today, the “One Was Johnny” obsession continues. The book that houses that song goes with us on nearly every car trip (even if it’s five minutes away to Shop Rite). Thankfully, Leo has branched out to include a few more ditties, in his repertoire. He know bellows “Pierre,” “Chicken Soup With Rice” and “Alligators All Around” with absolute fervor. And thankfully, Ellie is exceedingly accomodating with Leo’s musical demands, er, requests.

In addition to stroking my nostalgia tendencies and eliciting pride for loving something that I did as a young one, an interesting thing has happened along the One Was Johnny way. Leo is really singing. Actually, make that all out belting. Not exactly on key, but he is connecting several words. Believe me, for someone whose speech is limited to two and (at most) three word sentences, this is big. I could watch him in the rear view mirror singing, for a long, long time. He just looks so happy and free.

This started me thinking about how it’s so much easier to learn a song in another language, then a spoken phrase in another language. It’s the reason I can sing in German and Hebrew but don’t ask me to get my way around town in any of those tongues, please. It makes perfect sense, really, that the singing is helping Leo’s language. I’m not sure if it’s because I spent the last ten days straight with my dear boy, or if there truly is a language burst going on. Either way, it’s exciting to see. And hear. Not to be outdone, Ellie is also singing a lot more (if that's possible for someone who was already talking and singing non-stop).

Another little tool that is popular with both kids are Play-A-Sound books. As much as the "bells and whistles" toys and books can grate on me, I do think some have redeeming qualities. I’ve embraced (make that, accepted--mostly) the Princess scariness and in a weak moment at Costco I bought Ellie a Disney Princess book similar to this one. Of course fighting over it ensued and I had to order Leo a Mickey Mouse one and then of course he only wanted the Princess one. Anyway. Singing! More talking! Exciting stuff.

Back in Black...and Pink Glittery Mules

We interrupt this summer vacation to bring you Back to School.
I anticipated tears and a struggle, returning to the old morning rush/nag routine. Most of all I was afraid of the actual getting on the bus, as in, Leo would not want to.

Instead I got a little boy who insisted on wearing his new Batman shirt (it's from an Underoos set and he slept in that shirt last night...ssshhh don't tell), was in love with his new shoes and who jumped right on the bus without looking back. I didn't even get a hug! But you know what? I'll take it.

And Ellie, in her new glittery pink mules (courtesy of an exceedingly successful weekend thrift store trek) began her first day back at Pre-K in style.

More soon. Lots more.