Mother's Day Sadness and Joy

The weekend began with the death of our furry little cutester, Checkers the mouse.  I awoke early Saturday and found him.  Honestly I was surprised he lasted this long; I feel convinced he had some ailment plaguing him since Christmas.  So I felt the usual mixed emotions of relief that his suffering was over, but also sadness.  John can tell you how attached I was to that little guy.  And then of course there was the question of how to deliver the news to Anne Peyton.  Wait until after dance class to tell her, and hope she won't notice?  And then, take his body away and tell her it went to heaven?  I suspected her reaction would be significantly different than when, as a 3-year-old, she learned of Jackson-the-cat's death.

I erred on the side of honesty and told her the sad news before she even got out of bed.  She began crying immediately, then it turned to sobbing.  She asked to see his body (which I had moved to a little cardboard coffin lined with soft tissues), and I obliged.  The sobbing lasted at least 30 minutes, and she refused to eat breakfast.  As I sat with her in my lap at the dining room table, I cursed myself for taking such a direct approach.  But then, a wonderful thing happened.  She said, between sobs, "mommy, I want to do something special for Checkers". 

We decided that would take the form of drawing a picture.  She asked me to draw him, which I attempted to do, and she printed his name and "birth" date (day we adopted him from the Dumb Friends League).  When I suggested we also include a dash followed by his date of death, she politely declined. 

Then, she asked me to draw pictures of his "cousins", and we shared the task of coloring and naming those 5 mice.  Translation on the names: Snakejewel (!?!?! - AP), Mouseketeer (Lisa), Rubickscube (John), Lulu (Tommy), and Sally (AP). 

During this, she said "mommy, this is making me feel better". (this is where the joy - mommy joy, comes in).

Amazingly, she collected herself and was able to attend dance class without incident.  Brief episodes of grief and tears interspersed her day.  I talked to her about burying him, which of course was not well-received.  Lots of talk about how his soul is in heaven and he left his body here because he no longer needed it, and how Mother Earth needs his body to make the soil rich for the flowers.  Still, resistance.  So we agreed to wait another day to decide.

Later that day, I was privileged to be the guest of my neighbor, Elaine, at the annual Spring Fling brunch at her church.  Her daughter couldn't make it, so she invited me!  The entertainment was a group of now-grandmothers and great-grandmothers who originally started as a PTA singing group years ago.  They sang lots of oldies and I got pretty misty thinking about my own song-loving great-grandmother who died on April 6th.

Mother's Day began with a cup of coffee and newspaper in bed, and then downstairs for a delicious breakfast of pancakes and sausage.  The table was graced with some pink grocery-store flowers which the kids had painstakingly picked out.  My placemat was full of hand-made cards and library books and library DVDs the kids had selected.  I'm not sure where this library idea came from; AP did tell me that on Friday at school, they went around the room and shared what they would be doing for their mothers that weekend.  She related that most of the kids mentioned flowers, but she decided to say that she would going to find some library books & movies for her mommy.  Needless to say, I was very touched.  Here is a list of the titles they selected for me:

• My Mom is a Firefighter
• Mommy Loves
• Big Sister Now
• Young Black Stallion (DVD)
• Peanuts Reunion (DVD)
• Knuffle Bunny (DVD)

After church Anne Peyton announced that she was ready to bury Checkers.  And I can tell you it wasn't a moment too soon!  I had tried to avoid any talk of bad smells but that became increasingly impossible!

We collected petals from most of the flowers & flowering trees in our yard, and she oh-so-painstakingly placed them at the bottom of a hole that John dug amongst the daffodils in the back yard. 

She preferred not to watch while I gently placed C's body atop the bed of flowers, but then she bravely placed the rest of the petals on top of him.  Each of us had a message for Checkers, and a prayer, and then she helped us cover him with dirt.  Tommy, who seemed rather apathetic - even amused - through all of this, had carefully selected a memorial stone and (after a brief dispute over who would place the rock on the grave) handed it to his sister for placing.  Anne Peyton told me "mommy, (she pretty much starts every sentence with "mommy"!), I'm really feeling better now".

Afterwards, we had a lovely hike in Roxborough Park 

(well, most of the loveliness occurred during the first of the too-long 2.2 mile hike; after that, it was eclipsed by whining and frequent pleas for "I want up").  :)  Dinner was at a Sonic drive-in and of course it was capped off by some delicious ice-creamy treats.

Honestly I can't think of a more perfect Mother's Day.  Self-doubt did not disappear when I became a mother; in fact, it is even more insidious because now there is more at stake.  But on this weekend I did feel like a worthy mother.

My First Week as a SAHM

SAHM=Stay at Home Mom, for those who weren't familiar with that acronym. :)

On Feb. 22 I received a not unexpected and not completely unwelcome phone call from my manager at HP, telling me I had been impacted by the latest of many rounds of layoffs since EDS had been purchased by HP over a year ago.  Although my paychecks would continue for 60 days, I was relieved of my responsibilities and would receive a 3 month severance after April 23.  Funny, that will be 18 years almost to the day (4/22/1992 was my first day at the Pontiac Customer Assistance Center in Michigan). 

After some weepiness -the kind I always experience at the end of anything (John jokes I would be teary after being freed from a concentration camp) and whenever people say nice things to me (as they often do when you are leaving), I began to enjoy my liberation.  We needed to provide 3 weeks' notice to our daycare providers so in effect I had 3 weeks of "Lisa time" which I enjoyed thoroughly by going to a 1.5-hr power yoga class every day, taking Midas on daily walks, doing some organizing around the house, meeting and friends, and, hmmmm, I don't have much else to show for that time.  I'm still shocked at how little I actually got done.  But I surely did enjoy it!

March 11 was the kids' last official day at Marilyn & Jerry's (of course I was quite emotional for that too),

and March 15 started my first official week as a SAHM. It went amazingly well! Here is a rundown:

Monday, 3/15:  We picked up my car from the "hospital" (after a $800 head gasket repair, ugh, at least I still have a paycheck coming in) and went to Mr. Biggs, an indoor entertainment center near our house.  It opens at 11am and we were among the first ones there.  Not a busy time so we mostly had the place to ourselves.  Played in the foam ball pit, the "Little Bigg Town", and played a few video games.  Tommy wanted a gun game to my dismay, and AP was happy with anything that involved animals.  They did try to drive cars around a toy track as well.    Back at home, Tommy tried for a nap but it didn't work, so I set the kids up with the easel and paints out on the deck.  After producing two masterpieces each we played in the back yard for awhile (thank goodness most of the week was beautiful pre-spring weather) and headed off early to the pool to play for a bit prior to swim lessons at 5:15.

Tuesday, 3/16:  Tommy and I had his "I'm a Big Kid Now" class at one of the local Rec Centers from 9-10:30 and unfortunately I had not made any plans for Anne Peyton (older siblings not permitted to accompany us).  So I parked her in front of the PBS station at home.  I hate doing it but have to admit it makes things easier, and the REAL benefit is John working from home so I can do things like that in a pinch.

Wednesday, 3/17: St. Patty's Day!   We dropped AP off at her Kendallvue Preschool class (8:15-10:45) and Tommy and I headed off to the gym for a yoga class.  He hates going to the gym's nursery without AP but he choked back his anxiety and very bravely went inside so that I had less stress to sweat out in yoga.  John picked up AP from class while Tommy and I hit the craft & grocery stores to prepare for St Pat's Day.  I had the kids make a "Pot of Gold" craft consisting of painting a tiny terra cotta pot black, painting small rocks gold, and then putting colored pipe cleaners together to make a rainbow. 

They loved it and it bought me a little time to put the corned beef and cabbage in the crock pot, then get showered up.  Again Tommy tried to nap (and he really does try! which is ok by me) and then the 3 of us piled in the car to drive down to the Cherry Cricket pub where the bagpipe bands were supposed to begin playing at 3pm.  I was really anxious about this excursion because my experiences with it in years past include hoards of drunken people.  But arriving that early allowed us to roam the bar easily and have good views of the pipes, drums & dancers.  At first the kids stood there horrified, with hands on ears, but after some acclimation time they seemed to enjoy themselves.  Tommy told me the drums were his fave, and AP of course liked the Highland dancers with the pretty red dresses.

Afterwards, we had a dinner which was as green as it could possibly be.  

Thursday, 3/18: Marilyn had done a unit on dinosaurs so the kids were full of dinosaur-talk, so we decided to visit Dinosaur Ridge which is very close to our house. 

 You used to be able to drive along the hogback and ooh-and-aah over the fossilized dino footprints there, but now they have turned it into part of the museum and there is a guided tour.  This turned out well, because it was interesting and because the kids could actually get out and touch the footprints.  Tommy cracked me up when, after viewing and touching some of the fossils, he asked me (in his sing-songy voice and with hand language included) "mommy, where are the fossils?"

Friday, 3/19:  It's so nice being able to bring AP home from preschool and just be together ( as opposed to rushing her over to Marilyn & Jerry's).  Here's a picture from lunch that day.  That night, we had one of our monthly pizza parties with some of the daycare families.  It was a nice reunion after the kids' first week apart.