EdithEmily and I are in Seattle now.
She's asleep on Grandma Janet's chest, rocking.
Kenneth took us out for sushi the night before we left, two nights ago. Edie sat in the high chair while the elderly waitress hovered, making sure she didn't tip forward and bump her head on the edge of the glass table top. She brought a paper crane, a plastic dipping bowl. When Edie dropped one bowl, she brought another, and another. I offered Edie some pickled ginger, yuk.
We fed her mashed avocado from the avocado rolls.
We did not feed her wasabi, or sake, but enjoyed these things for ourselves.
Salmon, seared tuna, pickled radish, spider roll heaven.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
I think I've become overly dependent on italics to put the stress in my writer voice. Is there a better way to emphasize a word? Is there a way to write it so that no emphasis is necessary? If it seems like I am being a bit overly scrutinitical, it's because I just got rejected by www.tutor.com. I do not meet the minimum requirements to be an online tutor. And that is after I lied about having an associate's degree. Sure, it's probably just that you need a PC and I'm using Kenneth's Macbook, but it brings up all these fresh feelings of loserliness. I'm not schooled enough, I'm not focused enough, not dedicated enough, not interested enough to get a job.
Today we met some more kids at the park. There were six of them, four girls and two boys. There was a white van parked on the street that they kept glancing at, so I assumed it was their parent or guardian. I asked the oldest girl, after she'd reprimanded one of the boys for asking me when Edie and I would be getting off the swing ("Tyler! Be nice!"), if they were all siblings. She laughed and said, um, Yeah, we're all family. Then she and another girl pretended to be sisters. You know sometimes white people can't tell black people apart. That's what she thought, maybe. I just can't tell people apart, period. Especially without my glasses, I can't even tell if people have faces or are composed of watercolored dots. So they pretended to be related while I slowly connected the watercolor dots: they were part of an afterschool program, they'd been driven here in the white van. Their caregiver was sitting in the van, talking on the phone. Tyler asked me to push his friend Kimmy on the swing, and I said no, because I had to watch my baby. He offered to watch my baby for me while I pushed. So he got off the swing and stood in front of Edie with his arms crossed, literally watching her sit in the sand, while I pushed Kimmy on the swing. Kimmy began to pump her legs like Tyler had shown her, so I went back to the baby. The two older girls came over, still pretending to be sisters. They talked to me about my baby. Tia was confused when I told her that Edie is 8 months old.
"I thought that babies had to be at least 9 months old."
I explained that first they grow inside the mother for 9 months, and when they are born the count starts over. So Edie's actually been a living creature for 17 months. The counting is funky from the start anyways, since weeks pregnant begins with the first day of last period. That's not when Edie started! I didn't try and explain the last part.
I did tell them about having her at home, in a tub full of warm water. The oldest girl said, "Really? That's tight!"
They asked why I didn't "get" to have my baby in a hospital, like normal moms. I told them it was my choice, because women have been having babies since before there were hospitals, so I figured I could do without the hospital. Later I thought about my other reason for having E at home. It's the same reason I got pregnant in the first place. There was a point when I just decided to be an animal. Not in the uncivilized sense of the word, but to quit resisting my instincts. It seems like we humans have gotten ourselves into quite a pickle because of our efforts to separate ourselves from the rest of the natural world. We are a pretty nifty species, with our language and reflective tendencies, but we are still made of animal. At least that's the way I see it. So if a cat can find a dark corner and suddenly...Kittens! and if a cow can drop a calf with minimal involvement from Farmer John, I reason that a woman doesn't have to be any different. She can curl up in a dark corner and calf an infant along with the rest of the natural world. It worked for me and the Wee One.
And if a lady can get paid to drive kids to the park where they supervise each other while she talks on the phone then I can just as well get myself a job hanging out with kids while they play and come up with interesting questions. As long as they don't require the use of a PC.
Today we met some more kids at the park. There were six of them, four girls and two boys. There was a white van parked on the street that they kept glancing at, so I assumed it was their parent or guardian. I asked the oldest girl, after she'd reprimanded one of the boys for asking me when Edie and I would be getting off the swing ("Tyler! Be nice!"), if they were all siblings. She laughed and said, um, Yeah, we're all family. Then she and another girl pretended to be sisters. You know sometimes white people can't tell black people apart. That's what she thought, maybe. I just can't tell people apart, period. Especially without my glasses, I can't even tell if people have faces or are composed of watercolored dots. So they pretended to be related while I slowly connected the watercolor dots: they were part of an afterschool program, they'd been driven here in the white van. Their caregiver was sitting in the van, talking on the phone. Tyler asked me to push his friend Kimmy on the swing, and I said no, because I had to watch my baby. He offered to watch my baby for me while I pushed. So he got off the swing and stood in front of Edie with his arms crossed, literally watching her sit in the sand, while I pushed Kimmy on the swing. Kimmy began to pump her legs like Tyler had shown her, so I went back to the baby. The two older girls came over, still pretending to be sisters. They talked to me about my baby. Tia was confused when I told her that Edie is 8 months old.
"I thought that babies had to be at least 9 months old."
I explained that first they grow inside the mother for 9 months, and when they are born the count starts over. So Edie's actually been a living creature for 17 months. The counting is funky from the start anyways, since weeks pregnant begins with the first day of last period. That's not when Edie started! I didn't try and explain the last part.
I did tell them about having her at home, in a tub full of warm water. The oldest girl said, "Really? That's tight!"
They asked why I didn't "get" to have my baby in a hospital, like normal moms. I told them it was my choice, because women have been having babies since before there were hospitals, so I figured I could do without the hospital. Later I thought about my other reason for having E at home. It's the same reason I got pregnant in the first place. There was a point when I just decided to be an animal. Not in the uncivilized sense of the word, but to quit resisting my instincts. It seems like we humans have gotten ourselves into quite a pickle because of our efforts to separate ourselves from the rest of the natural world. We are a pretty nifty species, with our language and reflective tendencies, but we are still made of animal. At least that's the way I see it. So if a cat can find a dark corner and suddenly...Kittens! and if a cow can drop a calf with minimal involvement from Farmer John, I reason that a woman doesn't have to be any different. She can curl up in a dark corner and calf an infant along with the rest of the natural world. It worked for me and the Wee One.
And if a lady can get paid to drive kids to the park where they supervise each other while she talks on the phone then I can just as well get myself a job hanging out with kids while they play and come up with interesting questions. As long as they don't require the use of a PC.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Holy Tomato
This morning we awoke with a shared vision. Just an old habit resurfacing.
"Let's go out to coffee."
Which was a pretty uneventful prospect, in St. John's. It was a matter of strapping on the baby, grabbing Travel Scrabble and a dictionary, and hiking up to either Anna Banana's or Ladybug Cafe, depending on how far we felt like walking and whether Jinx followed us or not (Anna Banana's wins the prize for Most Outdoor Pet Dishes, hands down). Sometimes, for a special treat, we'd get in the ... car ... and, um, drive... to the Little Red Bike Cafe. We actually rode our bikes there once, but I had this person living in my belly who got upset about knees banging on the wall. Kenneth refused to park the car anywhere near the cafe, being a diehard fan of biking and being also completely mortified to be seen driving there.
Here, the coffee outing is a completely different story. The only walking distance coffee is at the Starbucks inside of Vons, which just doesn't offer that relaxed coffee house atmosphere we crave. So we do the next best thing. Wait. The next best thing might be to stay home and brew up a pot of carbon-print free joe, but that also doesn't offer that relaxed coffee house atmosphere. Not relaxed in the slightest. :) So we Google and we Mapquest and we set off for the nearest hit returned after typing FairTrade ShadeGrown FreeRange HormoneFree WildCaught Etcetera.
The Conservatory for Coffee and Tea looked the most promising, its website decorated with the latte art we so took for granted in Stumptown.
I'd never been to Culver City before. Venice BLVD was closed. Some runners were having a marathon, apparently. So we jigsawed around this block and that block until, waiting at the light to cross Venice again, having mistakenly thought that we'd avoided the blockadence and would be able to turn left, Kenneth spotted a Wee Mouse as it ran under our car. Kenneth, being the guy that he is, showed some Concern for the fate of the creature. He revved and rocked the car a bit to scare the mouse out from under impending death while I squinted out the window to see if it ran. Kenneth spotted it again, this time hiding beside the wheel of a jeep behind us. Under the jeep. I stuck my head out the window and peered at the mouse several times. The Tough Guy in the Jeep stared at me. I didn't try and explain because he wouldn't have heard me. Kenneth rolled forward so that Jeep Guy might roll forward and scare off the mouse. Finally he did. The mouse tried to run in front of the back wheel and hopped back just in time not to be crushed. But then the light turned Green. Jeep Guy honked viciously at us, not knowing about the Wee Mouse or the Peril it was in, just that some lady kept staring at him out her window. We went, he went, and I don't know where the mouse went.
We passed SONY STUDIOS which is the size of a town. The Conservatory for Coffee and Tea was closed. We drove around some more and found Venice Grind and right next to it...
A FARMER'S MARKET!
Where there was a bucket of free gerbera daisies for the kids. It had a sign reading "Kids Pick One Free" and Kenneth helped Edie pick a pink one. She chewed on it until it ended up behind my ear instead. She kept a little green bit of it in her mouth for a long time though, which I found later. We sampled the wares. They were all delicious. We found the Heirloom Tomato guy, who was so nice he let us sample a melon from the next stand over. It was his personal melon, not for sale! He just wanted to share! Farmer's Market people are great people. We also saw the same guy selling dragonfruit that we'd seen at the El Segundo farmer's market. We split a dragonfruit from his stand for breakfast and now I believe in aliens. It's what would happen if you took the sourness out of a kiwi, replacing it with purple sorbet but keeping the seeds, and poured it into the perfectly hollow center of a spiky pink rubber football. Or something like that. There was a little girl exiting Heirloom Tomato Heaven with her mother, and she'd pulled a big yellow Pineapple tomato out of the bag and her mom had to stop her from eating it right there. In this land of processed kid foods that aren't really foods but brightly wrapped bits of science experiments aggressively marketed until some of our nation's young will only eat food from a box or can, and only if it's a certain kind of box or can, it is so refreshing to witness a kid trying to sneak a tomato before dinner.
I made bruschetta from my two little heirlooms...but next time I'm going to sneak one before we get home.
"Let's go out to coffee."
Which was a pretty uneventful prospect, in St. John's. It was a matter of strapping on the baby, grabbing Travel Scrabble and a dictionary, and hiking up to either Anna Banana's or Ladybug Cafe, depending on how far we felt like walking and whether Jinx followed us or not (Anna Banana's wins the prize for Most Outdoor Pet Dishes, hands down). Sometimes, for a special treat, we'd get in the ... car ... and, um, drive... to the Little Red Bike Cafe. We actually rode our bikes there once, but I had this person living in my belly who got upset about knees banging on the wall. Kenneth refused to park the car anywhere near the cafe, being a diehard fan of biking and being also completely mortified to be seen driving there.
Here, the coffee outing is a completely different story. The only walking distance coffee is at the Starbucks inside of Vons, which just doesn't offer that relaxed coffee house atmosphere we crave. So we do the next best thing. Wait. The next best thing might be to stay home and brew up a pot of carbon-print free joe, but that also doesn't offer that relaxed coffee house atmosphere. Not relaxed in the slightest. :) So we Google and we Mapquest and we set off for the nearest hit returned after typing FairTrade ShadeGrown FreeRange HormoneFree WildCaught Etcetera.
The Conservatory for Coffee and Tea looked the most promising, its website decorated with the latte art we so took for granted in Stumptown.
I'd never been to Culver City before. Venice BLVD was closed. Some runners were having a marathon, apparently. So we jigsawed around this block and that block until, waiting at the light to cross Venice again, having mistakenly thought that we'd avoided the blockadence and would be able to turn left, Kenneth spotted a Wee Mouse as it ran under our car. Kenneth, being the guy that he is, showed some Concern for the fate of the creature. He revved and rocked the car a bit to scare the mouse out from under impending death while I squinted out the window to see if it ran. Kenneth spotted it again, this time hiding beside the wheel of a jeep behind us. Under the jeep. I stuck my head out the window and peered at the mouse several times. The Tough Guy in the Jeep stared at me. I didn't try and explain because he wouldn't have heard me. Kenneth rolled forward so that Jeep Guy might roll forward and scare off the mouse. Finally he did. The mouse tried to run in front of the back wheel and hopped back just in time not to be crushed. But then the light turned Green. Jeep Guy honked viciously at us, not knowing about the Wee Mouse or the Peril it was in, just that some lady kept staring at him out her window. We went, he went, and I don't know where the mouse went.
We passed SONY STUDIOS which is the size of a town. The Conservatory for Coffee and Tea was closed. We drove around some more and found Venice Grind and right next to it...
A FARMER'S MARKET!
Where there was a bucket of free gerbera daisies for the kids. It had a sign reading "Kids Pick One Free" and Kenneth helped Edie pick a pink one. She chewed on it until it ended up behind my ear instead. She kept a little green bit of it in her mouth for a long time though, which I found later. We sampled the wares. They were all delicious. We found the Heirloom Tomato guy, who was so nice he let us sample a melon from the next stand over. It was his personal melon, not for sale! He just wanted to share! Farmer's Market people are great people. We also saw the same guy selling dragonfruit that we'd seen at the El Segundo farmer's market. We split a dragonfruit from his stand for breakfast and now I believe in aliens. It's what would happen if you took the sourness out of a kiwi, replacing it with purple sorbet but keeping the seeds, and poured it into the perfectly hollow center of a spiky pink rubber football. Or something like that. There was a little girl exiting Heirloom Tomato Heaven with her mother, and she'd pulled a big yellow Pineapple tomato out of the bag and her mom had to stop her from eating it right there. In this land of processed kid foods that aren't really foods but brightly wrapped bits of science experiments aggressively marketed until some of our nation's young will only eat food from a box or can, and only if it's a certain kind of box or can, it is so refreshing to witness a kid trying to sneak a tomato before dinner.
I made bruschetta from my two little heirlooms...but next time I'm going to sneak one before we get home.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Sing A Longing for St. John's...
oh man. my old neighborhood bookstore, St. John's Booksellers, just sent me an email advertising a SING-ALONG next Sunday. They are going to get together, brew some tea, and sing old folk songs out of a songbook. I don't even necessarily want to go, but the fact that it's there...in Portland. This is the same bookstore we went into to see Nena's chicks in a box, behind the counter. We had to ask to see them - special insider knowledge. Peeping babies for her backyard, as soon as they got old enough. Later she had ducklings. I love St. John's. It is such a special place. Portland is a special place, but St. John's is a really special place.
Here's how much I love it : the St. John's bridge is stuck to my leg, forever.
Here's how much I love it : the St. John's bridge is stuck to my leg, forever.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Monster Baby
I was in the middle of upgrading my baby doll with the scary wall-eye into a suitably weird gift for Maria's graduation when I got pregnant. I made Wall-Eyed Dolly a pair of butterfly wings out of two coat hangers, some yarn and a silk shirt, painted her head to match the wings, painted her arms and legs an alarming shade of Frankenstein Green, and sewed a forest scene scrap of fabric to her torso. While I was working on her, my friend Tara named her Monster Baby.Now I have a Monster Baby of my very own, except that both of her eyes point in the same direction.
Another thing I want you to know is that my Monster Baby is a quick study. After so many pictures were taken of her with the flash on, she began averting her eyes whenever I pointed the camera at her. 
Which, of course, was so darn cute I just took more pictures of her.
politicky-tacky
Kenneth's grandmother told his mother that she overheard somebody calling Sarah Palin, "Caribou Barbie". I wish I'd thought of it myself.
Palin is proud of her daughter's "choice" to keep the baby. Wait. What? So it was her choice? She chose to keep her baby? What was the other choice? Surely it wasn't the A word. Oh....Adoption. Yes, we are all proud of your choice, Bristol.
After watching some of the RNC last night, I've decided that if I were a major television network, I'd offer the Palin/McCain family their very own reality show. Seriously, despite their kooky politics, I just can't get enough of those adorable doe-eyed girls, and Cindy McCain bouncing the latest baby Palin while the world watches is family values to the tenth power. They can all live in a huge white mansion, and the show will be called "The Other White House." It will be more popular than the Osbournes, I predict.
All that comparison of Obama to celebrities like Britney and Paris, and now we have rumours of one Jamie Lynn Spears wishing Bristol Palin a happy, healthy pregnancy. The Palin family has become a media feeding frenzy. Even though I just can't look away from the mess, tonight I will, for just an hour, in order to see what Barack Obama has to say on the O'Reilly Factor. It is not to be missed.
Palin is proud of her daughter's "choice" to keep the baby. Wait. What? So it was her choice? She chose to keep her baby? What was the other choice? Surely it wasn't the A word. Oh....Adoption. Yes, we are all proud of your choice, Bristol.
After watching some of the RNC last night, I've decided that if I were a major television network, I'd offer the Palin/McCain family their very own reality show. Seriously, despite their kooky politics, I just can't get enough of those adorable doe-eyed girls, and Cindy McCain bouncing the latest baby Palin while the world watches is family values to the tenth power. They can all live in a huge white mansion, and the show will be called "The Other White House." It will be more popular than the Osbournes, I predict.
All that comparison of Obama to celebrities like Britney and Paris, and now we have rumours of one Jamie Lynn Spears wishing Bristol Palin a happy, healthy pregnancy. The Palin family has become a media feeding frenzy. Even though I just can't look away from the mess, tonight I will, for just an hour, in order to see what Barack Obama has to say on the O'Reilly Factor. It is not to be missed.
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