While My Boyfriend Was Sleeping

What I write after Joe and Henry go to bed

Hank, Charlie, Geraldine and me

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On 11/11 I got up at 7 a.m., roused by Henry whose new favorite way to wake me up is to throw the sheets off my body and tug at my legs until I fall out of bed.

“Breakfast Mama. Cook eggs Mama. Get up Mama.”

I was in the middle of a reoccurring dream about Ben Affleck and wife Jennifer Garner, which recently replaced my a reoccurring dream about Brad Pitt and former wife Jennifer Aniston.

I pleaded with Henry for another 10 minutes. He granted me 30 seconds before yanking me to my feet.

I sluggishly made my way to the stove. Cooked pancakes, topped them with syrup. Sliced an apple, topped it with peanut butter. I opened the window by my kitchen table to survey the never-changing weather. It was as it always is this time of year: sunny, warm and perfect; a ripe morning for a paddle on the bay.

I slid a plate of pancakes in front of Henry and asked him if he wanted to go kayaking. I might as well have asked him if he wanted to eat birthday cake while flying a rocket ship with a robot as his copilot. YES OF COURSE HE WANTED TO GO KAYAKING.

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The view from here

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Two days before it was scheduled to be shut down, I took Henry to the St. Pete Pier so we could bid farewell to our favorite ailing tourist attraction.

Like most Bay area residents, I’ve known for years that this old landmark would soon be demolished. I also knew that once I had my son I would regret having not made memories with him on the old pier before a slick new pier one day opens in its place.

The fate of the Pier has become a hotly contested subject. I refuse to discuss the pros and cons of its replacement design, The Lens, out of sheer exhaustion. I’m tired of hearing about it. When it comes to CHANGE I’m as much a fan of progress as I am a curmudgeon, so I’ll refrain from offering what would likely be an uneducated opinion.

However, this fact remains true: the Pier’s infrastructure is falling apart, its concrete pilings, if left alone, would crumble into the bay. Studies revealed 10 years ago that the aging destination with its smattering of kitschy gift shops and empty restaurants wouldn’t survive another 20 years of saltwater erosion, never mind an impending economic blow.

When this news became public fodder in 2010, I added the Pier to my biking route. When Henry arrived in 2011, I added it to my running route. Knowing it would close before he’d be old enough to remember it, I decided to take him there often – always by foot or by bike.

Save for a handful of brooding old men drinking coffee and reading the paper, the food court inside the Pier’s dated building was usually vacant in the afternoon. Often it looked like Henry and I were the only people to order an ice cream cone for hours. In order to get the attention of the proprietor of the ice cream stand, I’d have to rap on the freezer doors and shout, “Yoo hoo! Anyone here?”

I once caught the guy asleep in a chair.

I wondered which was crumbling faster: the Pier’s infrastructure or its business.

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The red drug balloon

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It’s the middle of the day, in the middle of the week. I’m without Henry. His grandparents have him for the day so I can work on a magazine story. I’m walking Cubbie, enjoying a break from my computer. The sun is in my eyes. The pug is especially pokey, stopping to sniff every tree trunk and urine-drenched blade of grass.

I’m plagued by things related to the magazine story, none of which I have any control over. I spot someone in the distance riding so slowly on a bicycle I wonder if they’re pedaling at all or miraculously stationary. The strangeness doesn’t stop there. The cyclist is holding a red balloon, stranger still.

As we get nearer I notice that the cyclist is young, a teenager. He looks like he’s 16, but then again I’m a terrible judge of age since I still think I’m 22. Despite this denial I’m old enough to make these three calls: he’s a kid, he should be in school and he’s up to no good.

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The little yard that could

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This is Henry’s little red chair. I’ve got a thing for Adirondack chairs, no? Now my boy can sit in style next to his mother, who when she does sit, likes to sit in style. (Hello Sky Chair.)

The picket fence in the background was something of a neighborhood project. Without the help of family, friends, neighbors and virtual strangers, I’d still be sulking around St. Pete, grumbling about my fugly front yard.

Oh, but I love my house.

Well. Let me rephrase that. I’ve always loved the inside of my house. It’s got a cozy bungalow feel. It’s filled with comfortable furniture, meaningful art, an adorable toddler tyrant, a handsome husband and a fat, happy pug. What more could a gal want?

The front of my house, however, has always been a sore spot. Up until last month it had zero curb appeal. Our lawn was balding. Our once valiant attempt at a vegetable garden had become an angry bed of weeds, littered with bent fragments of metal fencing and forgotten plant markers. Our porch was about as inviting as a parking lot. With the exception of an overly shellacked manatee statue – a gift form my Oma – the entrance to our house was, in fact, off-putting.

We did try to jazz things up. Or rather, well-meaning family gardeners tried to jazz things up.

Two years ago, Oma took pity on us and came over when I was at work to lay down mulch and plant flowers in the sad beds by our front door. Despite diligent watering, her landscaping eventually gave way to weeds. Fed up with these failed attempts at beautification, we decided to let the one thing that wouldn’t die continue to grow – a frail Jacaranda tree in the center of our circular driveway that resembled a stooped-over geriatric.

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Boo who?

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golden globe dresses

I can’t believe how quickly this Boo thing is spreading.

Apparently random neighborhood boo’ings are all the rage. In my neighborhood we’re experiencing a Boo epidemic. Nearly every household within a five block radius has a Boo sign on its front door, including mine. I take partial credit for fanning the fire. I did my part by not breaking the chain. Last Sunday I successfully boo’ed two neighbors.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you’re not alone. Prior to last week, I’d never heard of this tradition trend.

It started when I came across a basket filled to the brim on my front stoop. The contents of the basket were impressive. This was no run-of-the-mill trick-or-treat loot. My secret Boo fairy had tailored the contents to my kid’s liking. Buried under tissue paper was a children’s Halloween board book, a Halloween Koosh ball, fruit snacks, a heap of Teddy Grahams (Hank’s favorite) and a healthy amount of chocolate bars (my favorite).

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On track

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Something I think about all the time:

My neighbor has a step-daughter who’s a few years older than I am. I met her a couple years ago at a party. She’s funny, in her 30s, the mother of a six-year-old, and currently recovering from a kidney transplant.

After spending more than a year on dialysis waiting for a donor, she found her match this summer.  She knows very little about the donor, other than the fact that he or she lost their life shortly before saving hers.

She had surgery in May. Her body accepted the organ as if it had always been there, as if it’s had her name on it for years.

Whenever I see my neighbor, I ask how she’s feeling. Each time I get a better, more cheerful answer.

The first time I inquired, he said, “She’s doing well. We were all worried for so long. It’s a terrible thing to see your children sick.”

I told him I couldn’t fathom it, that I would be a basket case if anything happened to Henry.

To which he replied, “That’s why we should all laugh and eat ice cream every day.”

 

My eggs, in one basket

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My neighbor’s urban chickens are always running their beaks. After two years I finally got an omelet to show for it.

Last week, a 12-year-old boy knocked on my door holding a small container of brown eggs.

“They were laid today,” he said, handing over the loot, still speckled with black feathers and bird crap.

“Thanks,” I said. “I was in the mood for a good scrambly.”

He scurried away before I could ask him if his goose lays any golden eggs.

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Pregnancy Confession No. 10

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[I underestimated the 4th trimester.]

I have a big, dumb confession to make.

I (foolishly) thought I would write a screenplay on my maternity leave.

I (foolishly) assumed not working would free up more time for writing. I figured I would spend my days in a glowy haze writing as Henry slept. I pictured myself perched contently at the computer knocking off scenes during uninterrupted stretches of newborn sleep.

I pictured Henry waking from his afternoon slumber, myself sailing from computer to baby like a modern-day Donna Reed. I pictured myself tending to my motherly duties — nursing, diapering, rocking, singing and cooing to my little lamb — as if these things are as predictably routine as brushing your teeth.

Silly rabbit.

I underestimated the fourth trimester; this period I’m in now: the early weeks and months of motherhood, of baby development.

The first time I heard someone mention the fourth trimester I was newly pregnant and blissfully naive.

“Fourth trimester?” I choked. “There’s a FOURTH trimester?”

I was filled in by a woman in my neighborhood who had just given birth to her first baby, a hairy boy who at the time was nestled in a purple wrap tied elaborately across her chest; a baby barnacle clinging to his mother’s bosom.

“Yeah,” she said wearily. “The baby adjusting to life outside the womb. You adjusting to the baby.”

Oh yes. The fourth trimester. Cute.

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Party of four on a Friday night

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Today my kid turns one month old.

I still can’t wrap my brain around it.

We have a one-month old.

He easily weighs over 10 pounds, eats like a champ, rocks three-month-old onesies and as of yesterday, drinks from BOTTLES.

A ONE-MONTH OLD.

And guess what?

We’re still cheerful people, enjoying adequate amounts of sleep and comfortable periods of normalcy.

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A fine line between writing and living

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There’s something to be said for not writing.

This. Coming from a writer.

Shut-ins who function as writers may disagree with me, but I sense there’s a fine line between writing and living.

I say this as I watch the home-schooled boy, who lives across the street from my house, ride his scooter around and around my circular driveway.

He’s about 10 or 11 and incapable of exploring our neighborhood on foot. He’s glued to his scooter. When other boys his age are tied to their desks at school, this boy is outside, tearing around Coffee Pot Bayou on an aluminum scooter.

I think he loves my driveway because it has a slight slope and provides a thrilling change in elevation on an otherwise flat ride.

He has no idea I’m watching him from my office window.

Sometimes I wonder what he’s thinking, as if I forget what it’s like to be a daydreaming kid.

I have not forgotten what it’s like to be a daydreaming kid.

It’s clouds and Popsicle sticks. Big words in poetry books. Splices of sunlight and windburned cheeks. Ankle socks and white Keds. Ease and perpetual un-worry.

Sometimes in moments of anxiety or frustration I lose sight of these things, but the flicker of memories is always there like a tingly bundle of neurons tucked inside a lock box, stored somewhere in my head for safe keeping, at my disposal whenever I need to pull from it.

As a kid, all that concerned me were the things I could see and feel in fleeting windows of time, marked by what I had studied that day in school, by what my mother had packed in my Igloo lunchbox, by what chapters I had read in a particular Judy Blume book, by what boy had captured my attention, by the pop song lyrics stuck in my head. The taste of red Kool-Aid.

I used to ride a scooter too. Around and around my parent’s driveway. It was purple. Skidding up and down the driveway, I would get lost for hours in my head, making up stories ruled by the forces of magic and imagination, not realizing at the time how these daydreams would shape me, how well these fantasies would serve me, how material things could never eclipse my capacity to think, how in my head I would always have everything I’d ever need.

Remember in the Shawshank Redemption when Andy locks himself in the jail library and blasts Mozart over the PA system? Remember how he says there are places in the world that aren’t made of stone? That no one can ever take away how you feel when you listen to music; that it will always be yours wherever you are?

This is how I feel about storytelling.

Even when I’m not doing it.

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