Never been a fan of "It's a Wonderful Life" . Way too schmaltzy for me (though I do like Jimmy Stuart). But this Christmas I find myself in the boots of George Bailey.

"Dear Father, I'm not a praying man, but if you're up there and you can hear me, show me the way. I'm at the end of my rope. Show me the way, oh God."

My In-Laws (who are dear people who have always treated me with great kindness) invited me over for Christmas. But I'm just not ready for that. I've had Moiya non-stop for rather a long while. And frankly, I have not yet gotten to grieve. When there is a death in the family, one expects to be able to grieve for loss. So Jacq and Moiya went to visit Nana and Pops without Daddy this year. Daddy did some cleaning, some cooking, will write this, and then will take a nap (the ULTIMATE Christmas prezzie).

I don't really like Christmas either.. ex-wife #1 and then ex-wife#2 saw to that. But I was determined that Moiya's Christmas would be good and happy.. not an orgy of self-indulgence.. saw enough of that in other people's families (I still remember with shock, little Max becoming almost apoplectic with frenzy on Christmas morning)... just a happy time. So even though I knew the axe was falling, I've been decorating the house these past few weeks.. and baking (no, I don't bake.. but I try). And Jacq and I made sure we were both here on Christmas morning .

We got up early and let Moiya open her presents. This is the first year she's been interested... but as Daddy only put the prezzies under the tree last night and we've never pushed the whole "Santa" thing... (not really against it, but not for it either.. if she pickes it up at daycare, fine. But I'm not going to push it. Right now Santa is a nobody.. but Snowmen rule!) she was just a sweet little kid in interesting times and amongst pretty wrappings (Daddy does a mean prezzy)... not a rapacious wild-ass monster-child. Moiya still has only a few, simple toys (some idiot at Mamaw's gave her an obscene kiddy make-up kit.. which is currently sitting in the trunk of my car waiting to be made an offering to the wee-folk who live in the woods) and has never been flooded with "things", (I could fit all her toys in a backpack) and so at present is still not a particularly covetous child.

I was so proud of her a few weeks back in WalMart: she noticed a flyer in our cart and asked for it. After I handed it to her, she asked what it was and I told her it was an ad. She thought about it for awhile and then proclaimed "Dat bad. Daddy.. dat yucky" and dropped it. And when her Thomas the Tank Engine video (aka "Baby Bus") hits a stretch of 12 commercials at the end (advertisers to children really, REALLY need to all burn in hell), if I'm out of the room, Moiya will call me back with "Omercials, Daddy! Omercials!!"

Heh. I have not lived in vain. Oh, I know it can't last (Moiya has already told me she sees "omercials" at Mamaw's.. but if it can only last till she has a solid self-image then I am a happy man.

Back to Christmas.. we got books from Aunt Merlean (God bless her.. she cannot afford it and her sweetness and generosity to my baby humbles me) and a cook set from Aunt Marci (well chosen... Daddy ate LOTS of "soup" this morning). From Mummy and Daddy we got a "Baby Bus" (which plays tunes and puffs cool steam), and a Dress-Me-Up Elmo (Elmo was coming, and this at least reinforces the current training goal), and an easel from Crayola which lets her draw on a white board, serves as a desk, and has magnetic letters and numbers. I didn't figure she's like it much... just wanted something to have on hand to try to push her letters. I so want to introduce her to reading.

Imagine my joy as the desk became the favorite activity of Christmas morning. Of course it was labor intensive ("Want to PLAY, Daddy!!!" actually means "Want you to PLAY with ME, Daddy!!") But hell... what is better about Christmas than playing with your kids???

OK.. gonna go lie down now. Critters are fed and there's a fire laid in the wood stove. Mr. Depression is stalking, and I mean to be asleep when he comes calling.

Merry Christmas to all.

And not to be a downer... if you have a spare prayer, us George Baily's would really appreciate it.

Came across Moiya, having gotten into a tool set, "fixing" her baby monitor. This has become one of her favorite games.

All I can say is, deja vu. She's watched Daddy waaaay too much.

And I'm very, very flattered.

We are such a big girl now, and so very proud of the fact. And rightly so. We no longer use our little potty chair. We started using it, and then within a few weeks had discarded it, preferring to pull out the plastic step-stool that Daddy bought for us and climb up onto the big potty. We clean and flush and then carry our stepstool over to the sink where Daddy helps us wash our hands. We climb into the car by ourselves and even fasten our seatbelt by ourselves (we cannot yet release it, thank God).

Last weekend Moiya helped Daddy bring in the groceries by lugging a box of dog biscuits almost as big as she was all the way from the car to the house (about 60 feet). We huffed and puffed (“Dis HEABY, Daddy”) and tripped once or twice. But all my offers of assistance were firmly refuse. “I carry it, Daddy ”.

I admire her more than I can say.

She rarely forgets anything. About three months back, we traveled up a country road to get a better look at some cows. A dog from the farm across the way came out and fussed at us till we left. Two weeks ago I ventured up the same road and Moiya asked “Where dat doggy at, Daddy?”

And God love her, she is a genuinely loving, friendly child, with real empathy. If Daddy is frustrated or upset (or just stumbles into something.. because Daddy is pretty clumsy), he can count on a pair of little arms appearing out of nowhere to hug and to comfort. Last week, Moiya struck up a conversation with an older lady behind us in the checkout line, and then suddenly reached out and gave her a hug. The lady was charmed... though I’ve had to try to explain to Moiya that she can’t just grab strangers passing by in the store (which she has done if she likes the look of them). But still.. friendly is good. Daddy could use that gene. “Me likey hugs!” as Moiya likes to say.

But the really amazing thing.. what really has made life, in all its sometimes hellish aspect, bearable, is her use of language. It was a simple beginning. A month or so ago, Moiya was looking around the living room quizzically, then looked  over at me and said “Where my cup?”

So I told her.

So simple. So utterly profound.

We have real conversations now. Simple ones, but we have them. Some days she tells me which babies were at daycare and which ones were “a home”. (She’s very fond of a baby named “Addy” and for a time, every character in every book we read had to be named “Addy”).  And there are the nacient beginnings of word games. I’m getting better at following her thoughts.. like those optical illusions that you can’t see until you throw your eyes ever-so-slightly out of focus, sometimes Moiya’s speech is clearest when I think beside it rather than at it.

And then sometimes it is crystal clear. When I put up the Christmas lights and decorations (we are having Christmas, dammit) Moiya regarded the tree and then declared "Daddy, dat cool!” And when she and I were making soup and I was fussing over something I was chopping, she laid her hand on my arm and looked at me sternly “Eeeeasy, Daddy! Eeeasy”

I have no idea.

We understand the concept of numbers now, even if we don’t really use them all. If there are multiples of something, Moiya will carefully count “Seben...eight....seben... eight…..... seben!” I’ve tried to convince her to use the others (she does know most of them) but she really likes seven and eight (which is why I fell out of my chair when the lady at the vet’s office asked her last week how old she was and she coolly replied “I two”)

Some nights, Daddy no longer reads Moiya stories. Some nights God smiles and my baby reads them to me. Some things are interesting in translation. The Story “10 Little Ladybugs” (named Addy) gets counted out in sevens and eights. And we are especially fond of the last page, with its “One little ladybug, sitting all alone” . Daddy reads it as “One little ladybug, sitting aaaall alone”. And we like that so much that when Moiya reads it, every pages comes out as “Se-ben buggies, se-se-ben- buggies….. aaall alone”

I was a little confused by “keykuck tap-tap-tap”. And one day I made the connection. Moiya kept picking up a little compass and calling it a “keykuck”. After several days I finally understood that she was seeing the face of it as a clock.. and a clock goes…”tick-tock” (keykuck).

“Keykuck tap-tap-tap” is, as it turns out, the Dr. Seuss book “Mr. Brown can Moo.. Can You?” Which has lots of “tap, tap, tap” and “tick tock” and “moo”. I’ve always loved reading it to her.. and now she reads it back.. sometimes the two of us together. And oh! It is a wonderful thing.

When Moiya was a baby, I used to tell Jacq how very hungry I was for the day when we two could finally talk. And now I am on the border of this Brave New World. And it is stranger and more wonderful than I ever dared to imagine.

At The Other End:

One day I walked into the nursery (damn but I'm going to miss that room) and there were a series of decapitated heads looking at me. Jacq hadn't seen it before tonight and walked in to find them and had the same reaction I did. The cast changes, but the shock does not. Moiya - for reasons we may never know - sometimes stuffs dolls behind her headboard so that only the heads show. It looks like something out of the French Revolution. Moiya seems to think it funny as hell. Daddy finds it creepy.. but fascinating. (Cue Madame DuFarge)

And Daddy has also found that, because Mommy lets Moiya in the bathrrom when she is using the facilities and Daddy does not, Moiya has developed an interest. Daddy was sitting on the john innocently one day when Moiya called out from under the crack at the base of the door "Hi Daddy! I see Daddy!!!"

Creepy doll heads and being spied on in the john. There is just not enough therapy in the world...

But then there is this: One day, a while after Moiya had stopped using her little plastic potty chair (and after Daddy narrowly stopped her from stuffing her "babies" into the big potty) I walked in to the scene at right.

At some point, Moiya had decided that Bear needed to use the potty. And so she she sat him down and thoughfully pulled over her little plastic stepstool, so he could climb down when he was finished.

I love her so much. I just sat down and laughed. Then I thanked God. Then I got the camera.

Then I found the creepy doll heads.

And t hat's my life in a nutshell.

Moiya said today (utterly out of nowhere )

"Daddy like play blocks?"
"Yes, Baby."
"Daddy like Bear?"
"Yes, Baby."
"Daddy like Pops?" (Jacq's Dad)
"Yes, Baby, Daddy likes Pops very much."
"Daddy like mah butt?"
"Wha... wha... WHAT???!!"
(More firmly now.. gleeful even as Daddy's discomfort shows) "Daddy like mah butt! Daddy like mah butt!"

I just had to laugh. As I told Moiya, there's damned little that can still make me laugh in these dark times, but she just had me falling over laughing. Dear God, I thought, puleeeeze don't let her say that in public. The LAST thing I need right now is a visit from social services.

Last week, before the world fell in, Moiya and I were shopping at Target, and her attention was attracted by a nearly life-size little stuffed pony, standing in a plastic corral. At her instruction, I wheeled the cart over so she could pet it. And as she tends to do these days with both her dolls and our cat, Simon, she began to stroke it gently whislt talking to it in a high-pitched tone that resembles the "baby-talk" adults use on kids in the mistaken assumption that it is soothing.

Then the horse moved it's head and whinneyed.

Moiya must have jumped about a foot out of her seat. Thank God she had diapers on or there'd have been a mess for sure. I laughed so hard I had to lean on the cart for support.

Turns out this vile abomination is the BUTTERSCOTCH MY FURREAL PONY (Approximate Retail Price $299.99; Recommended Ages: 4 & up; Available: Fall 2006)

Here's the honest-to-goodness ad copy:

“Mom, can I have a pony?” is a question that parents have heard from little girls for generations. This year, Hasbro’s FURREAL FRIENDS brand gives girls the next best thing! BUTTERSCOTCH MY FURREAL PONY is a life-sized plush miniature pony that loves to be groomed and cared for. BUTTERSCOTCH has many features similar to that of a real pony, including moving eyes, ears and head, soft fur coat and a swishing tail. Through sensors, BUTTERSCOTCH can feel when she is being groomed and will move her head toward you, and may whinny or snort. The more you touch her, the happier she becomes. Just like a real pony, BUTTERSCOTCH loves carrots and can be “fed.” Hold the pretend carrot to her face and she will open her mouth for it, or shake her head “no” if she has had enough. Kids can even sit on BUTTERSCOTCH. With built-in microphones, she can even respond to noises around her. Say something and she’ll turn her head to find you.

Four things:

1) If you buy this unnatural monstrosity for your kid, you need to be slapped. REALLY HARD.

2) You can adopt a real pony from the Bureau of Land Management for less. And do some good besides.

3) The damned mechanical freak sounds like a poorly maintained steam engine: click, wheeze, clatter, click, click, whirr, tap, tap, whiiiine, click, snap. I've seen more convincing (and quieter) automatons from the 1700's when they ran on clockwork springs.

4) Above all, I noted with interest that after Moiya recovered from peeing herself in shock, she was indeed fascinated by the machinery. But before it moved, she offered it genuine care and affection. Which says to me that before it was a machine, imagination made it real. And that the machinery, rather than adding to the reality, destroyed it.

I hate electric toys (except trains) I really do. And I hate adults who don't understand toys. To this day, Moiya's favorite toys (other than Bear, who is real) are her books and her plastic blocks. I read the greatest quote on the net in a discussion thread about why gizmos make bad toys (and I apologise for not getting the source):

"Finally, the best toys are ones you can play with as well. After all, what your kids really want is time with you."

No battery, no micro circuit in the world can do that. Books, blocks, and bears.. they all take imagination. They all take time. They all take attention from someone that loves you.

"May have been the losing side. Still not convinced it was the wrong one."
Malcolm Reynolds -- Firefly

MOROSITY (new word)WARNING.

The defiant tone of the above quote (which like most of Firefly's dialogue I like exceedingly) notwithstanding. Sometimes I have to weep. It is the week's end and it is late. I am tired and bruised and sad beyond telling. I need to weep. You have been warned. Leave now.

Weird day. Went Christmas shopping at Toys R' Us for children I'll probably not see again. Brought back lots of memories, and none of them very nice. Thought of Alex and Spencer, who I loved so very much and who I've not heard from since their mother cut me from the family Beck after assuring me "You'll always be their uncle."

I still have two little cement blocks that they made for my garden with their handprints. I don't know why I keep them, as it makes me sad every time I walk by. Perhaps a masochistic streak. Perhaps, like all exiles, I like to keep bits of happier times as proof that once I had a home and was loved.

Picked up Moiya and we went driving as she insisted on "bye-bye" to see if we could locate any "Moos" (although she has now branched out and also looks for horsies and (Christmas) "lights". And "ol men" which I finally understood to be "snowmen" (though not before confusing a lot of elderly male folk in Kroger one fine day). And by golly Daddy better find some if'n he wants any peace.

And I needed to scope out the surrounding area for real estate up for sale. Moiya doesn't need to know that, of course. But it made driving around looking at Christmas lights all the more sad. Moiya demanded "songs" (it took a while before I deciphered this.. but Daddy gets there in the end) and so, since I had the rental (another story.. I blew the engine on my car last week.. MY what a GLORIOUS week that was) with a working tape deck, I obliged with some Mannheim Steamroller Christmas CDs I'd brought along for the occassion (old Daddy is always thinkin' ahead) :)

Moiya likes the up-tempo stuff ("Dat cool song, Daddy"), so I replayed those tracks a lot. But eventually, we reached the last song of the album, which is Silent Night.

I don't like Silent Night. Don't dislike it either. Just never figured out why it made it into the cannon of classic Christmas songs. But once I heard this rendition I understood. This track is by someone who saw everything in the music that I did not and knew how to sell it. If you haven't heard it, go and get it. Now. It absolutely aches with the sweetness, innocence, and peace of the season. This track is sleeping children in a warm, firelit house on a snowy evening. It is Curier and Ives. It is Christmas as we would all like to remember it from our childhoods.

So here I am, driving around the backroads of the midwest, about to lose my home and looking desperately for another, with a sleepy child, listening to Silent Night as twilight falls. I looked into the rearview to check on Moiya, and all I can see is her sweet, beautiful little face in profile, all rapt attention on the lights as we pass and lit entirely by their twinkling glow. And the juxtaposition of why I'm out there driving around, and the vision of that sweet, dear little face just cut my heart like a knife

And there is a moment at the end of Silent Night where they play the four note theme one last time on a child's toy piano. I have always found it haunting for some reason. It nearly always chokes me up.

This time I had to just pull off the road.

Moiya noticed something amiss and threw out her little arms to comfort me, saying (as she often does these days) "Me hug, Daddy. Me hug!"

Which both made it 100 times worse... and made me realise how very blessed I am.

There's dichotomy for you.

"..I do not regret this journey.. We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of providence, determined still to do our best to the last"

Robert F. Scott, Last message from the doomed expedition to the South Pole, 1912

Had we not rolled these dice,

Had we not taken this chance,

Had we not braved these odds

We would never have known Moiya.

No little arms would ever have encircled my neck in a nightly hug. No little child would ever have kissed my cheek, patted my hand, and called me "Daddy". And so I might just as well never have lived.

I will walk through this hell and I will survive and still I will count myself lucky, for the sake of that one small blessing.

"Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
- Edgar Allan Poe

I'm probably not going to put this well, though God knows I am trying. As I am trying also to not be overly dramatic. Apologies to one and all if I err in either.

This will not be a long entry, though I might amend and polish and add to it later as I often do when my thoughts settle out and clarify in my little brain. And I've got some lovely, funny Moiya stuff to share when I again feel up to it.

My marriage is over, and the happy, warm, safe place I dreamed about for us and for our daughter (and which, like Camelot, *did* exist for a brief shining moment) is gone. I have lost the love of my life and must now abandon this little wooded sanctuary where I came to find peace... where I really truly thought I had found peace. I am lonelier tonight than I can ever remember being, and the thought of never again walking these lovely grounds hand-in-hand with her fills me with deep spasms of grief and despair.

But a little girl hugged my neck tonight and bade me "Daddy no be sad". That helped. And hey.. I'm Irish. I've had the shite kicked out of me before this and regained my footing. And now I've got a special incentive. Jacq and I both have. It will be ok.

I will write more later and post stories and pictures from happier times when I feel up to it. For now my baby girl is quiet and sleep is my good friend. 'Night all.

I'll leave Emily Dickinson to cover my retreat:

Parting

My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,
So.. huge, so.. hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And it's all we need of hell.

#1247
After explaining to your child that the dog isn't allowed in the bathroom because she eats out of the cat's litter box, seeing her storm into the kitchen and yell at the astounded animal "DOGGY! NO EAT MEOW POOP! NO EADIT!!"

#1248
Sitting on the floor of the kitchen, back to the cabinets, after a long and frustrating day, and having your daughter walk in an announce "I eat Daddy" then very gently and delicately, nibble on your nose before running away laughing.

#1249
Riding in the car and having your daughter "read" you stories from her books. (Also when she sings along with the radio).

#1250
On Halloween, looking in the rearview and seeing your baby pretending to be asleep, and then a few miles down the road hear a "Wooooo-ooooooo" ghostie voice. (Also, there's nothing cuter than a kid with their eyes tightly shut and a huge grin on their face).

#1251
Playing silly games on the drive home and suddenly hearing your child say "Daddy, I likey you"

#1252
Still my favorite: Rocking a sleepy, newly-wakened baby and her Bear in the dark of early morning, and having her turn her face to you and smile from time to time before falling back into sleep.

For those friends who are offended by my failure to write, who are impatient at the long gaps in this narrative, or who don't understand why we never do anything or go anywhere, I herewith post our day's events from Friday last. Consider it normal, except that I had rather more time today than usual since I was home sick. Weekends are pretty much the same, except Moiya is home all day, which makes life much more eventful. If it sounds self-pitying and whiney … well, yeah.... pretty much :)

• Midnight: sleep finally comes
• 5 a.m. Moiya wakes and Mommy and Daddy go on duty.
• Make coffee. Take out the dog.
• 6:30 a.m. Mommy goes to work
• 7:00 a.m. (Daddy takes Moiya to daycare to get her away from his germs).
• Daddy can't sleep even with the cold meds Mommy gave him and finally gives up. Chores ensue:
• Clear leaves from pond in attempt to save fish lest they all die. Clear ice from aeration hose for the same reason. (Damn, that water is cold!)
• Plan weekly menu, pull coupons. Prepare grocery list.
• Check email and answer work issues.
• Wash dishes
• Degrease stove (dumb, but seemed like a good idea at the time)
• Clean the "self cleaning" cat box which is overflowing nastiness onto the bathroom floor
• Dust downstairs. When you notice that the piano is fuzzy, it's time.
• Sweep dining room floor which is covered in the alfalfa and pellets the rabbit threw when angry.
• Vacuum bathroom, living room. See note about cat box above.
• Unload dishwasher and run another load
• Put bookshelf up in library (dumb, but also seemed like a good idea at the time. Anything which utilizes electric drills can be very therapeutic. You can look it up if you don't believe me)
• Short nap
• 5:oo p.m. Pick up Moiya
• Play
• Practice potty with daughter-person
• 6:00 p.m. Prepare Moiya’s dinner (with Moiya's help)
• fish sticks
• Green beans seasoned w/ham
• Apple juice
• Orange slices
• Clear away Moiya's dishes, make Mommy and Daddy's dinner:
• Chicken Moraga over whole wheat noodles
• Steamed asparagus
• 7:30 p.m. Put Moiya to bed (read books, change into jammies, and half hour rocking w/general cuddling and silliness)
• 8:00 p.m. Eat dinner and clear away dishes
• Feed and water dog, cats, and rabbit who have been following me around licking their lips
• Unplug kitchen drains which have backed up with wastewater from the dishwasher
• 9:00 p.m. Put dinner  up in the fridge for Jacquelyn.
• Treat septic tank to counteract the chemicals used attempting to unstop the drains.
• 10:00 p.m. Turn in. Sleep does not come
• 2:00 a.m. A tired Jacquelyn. returns home from work. Sleep comes
• Repeat

The frosts have hit, and everything is dead or dying. The woods still have some leaves, since the heat gets trapped there. But they too are falling and the air is filled with crimson and gold with each cold breeze. Unfortunately, a fair percentage of them keep falling into the fish pond, where they have to be retrieved as apparently otherwise they decompose and release tannic acid or some such. The pond is deep, the water bloody cold, and the sleepy fish, flecks of gold barely moving in the murky depths, are unhappy about my intrusion into their cold and silent world..

I did manage to get my new plants into the ground before it froze, including a little Japanese Maple I'd been coveting and which Wal-Mart finally put on sale. Lord knows if

any of them will live through till summer. But I suppose gardening --like raising children -- is a breathtaking act of optimism.

So all is dark and cold and bleak as Innisfree shuts down. I still have not had a chance to get the gazebo down, so what used to shelter us from the summer sun now impedes the delivery of what little sun remains. The deck is covered in wet, sodden leaves which will need to be swept off soon. The big perennials have come indoors, though they aren't happy about it. The annuals are all dead. Almost.

As I look out into the gloom, I spy one, solitary petunia, still blooming... one single bright spot of summer remaining in the darkening landscape. So I pad out in stocking feet, camera in hand, to enjoy, to salute, and to celebrate one last little hurrah.

When she isn't being insane.

Last week I lost my glasses and had to depend on my daughter to find them for me (which she did.. the trouble with wireframes is that once you remove them they become invisible). This week I lost my keys. It's a house rule that I have to lose either the glasses or the keys once a day. Since Moiya knew that we needed the keys to go bye-bye, she immediately went and looked on the baker's rack where I keep them and, not finding them there, kept gabbling something at me which I eventually understood to be "pockets". When I told her that I'd already checked my pockets, she came over and patted me down to be sure (since Daddy is obviously too dim-witted for her to accept his assurances).

Last week, with no warning at all, she pointed out the car window and said "Look Daddy.. moon!" I started to explain that the moon wasn't out yet (and concealing my surprise that she knew the word "moon") when I noticed the barely discernable sliver of a moon right where she had said it was. This was in the same trip where she kept whining and crying and complaining about EVERYTHING I did or tried to do for her. And when I was about to blow my stack in frustration, I suddenly thought I caught a twinkle in the eye I could see in the rearview and had a nasty suspicion. "Baby.. are you faking Daddy out?" And the tears immediately vanished behind a huge grin. (This does NOT bode well for Daddy's future peace of mind. )

When we don't know the words, we figure out ways around with words we do know. We have trouble with cool and cold. So Moiya points to her food and asks me "hot done now?"

But the one that left me utterly speechless was when she was playing with my stuff (which she does constantly). She pointed to my phone and said "Daddy phone?" I said that yes, it was. Then she pointed to my MP3 player and asked "Dat got Bach innit?" (which of course it does)

At the other end of the intelligence spectrum, Moiya is now fascinated by her navel, and wants to see everyone else's "button" as well. A few days back she demanded to "see Daddy butt." I declined to oblige. I blame this on Mommy, as I do the occasion when, after I heard a loud report from her trousers and asked "Baby, did you just yuck (we now make a distinction between eww and yuck). "Nope" she said proudly "I farted!"

Tired and running on empty. So many precious memories to record, share, save. I jot notes to myself like a crazy person, lest I forget (though what eventually gets written is such a pale, pale simulacrum of our daily life.. still it does get written).

But I'm just tired now. Time is always short, and if I must slight something, I'd rather it be this blog than my daughter

So here's pics. The stories will come later as Daddy can manage.

Couldn't get Moiya to wear the headdress I made for her costume, so I put it on Bear, hoping that I could spark a little jealousy. When that failed, I decided to hell with it and took a pic of Bear and just Photoshopped it on Moiya's head.

I've come down with some vile bug. Jacq has the baby with her to show her off in costume at work and I'm going to bed now. G'night.

Actually, I though Bear look rather fetching...

Yesterday, I gave Moiya a first piggyback ride. It was a little modified from the traditional "upright in the saddle" because Moiya is unsteady, and Daddy is little and of advanced years and back bad. And out of nowhere amidst shrieks and giggles, from atop my back I heard "Daddy fun." Twice.

A man could happily kill for a memory like that.

Now of course, a little while later she was screaming at me as thought I was a baby-eating demon because I'd given her a time out. And awhile after that she (unintentionally) head butted me in the mouth so hard that I'm still having trouble talking around it today.

But still. For a little while, Daddy fun :)

In other notes and news, Hettie bunny is recovering from surgery. Last week I noticed one nipple sticking out like something out of "Alien". The vet diagnosed hormone-related tumors, so zip went the nipple and her other female-bits to the tune of $340. This week we're keeping watch, waiting for test results and trying to persuade Hettie that the yogurt the vet wants her to eat is better than alfalfa (no sale there). A bit pricey for our "free" rabbit. All the animals have special this and special that, and boy does it add up. But family is family and a bunny Daddy's gotta do what a bunny Daddy's gotta do.

I don't think Hettie considers me fun, though.

Well, it's that time of year again. Moiya still doesn't get that she's going to get to wear a costume (though we always have to stop and inspect all the Halloween decorations for sale each time we visit the store) .

So she still has no opinion on what to be. She's been a Princess.. and she's a little old for cutesy critter costumes. So this year we're going to be a ballerina.

Couldn't find the fabrics locally, so last weekend we had an adventure and Moiya and I went to Baer Fabrics. For those of you from outside Louisville, it's a huge, nationally known 3-story fabric emporium where I used to work a quarter of a century of so ago (now there's something that gives me pause). And since it's in downtown L'ville, it was an exciting trip to a whole new area with way fewer trees and way more cars than we're used to (and virtually no Moos, as Moiya discovered to her dismay).

I had planned on pinks and whites, but Moiya picked out blue fabric and could not be dissuaded. So blue it shall be....

There are so many moments I wish I could capture and hold forever. Yes, there are pictures. Yes, there are videos. But the moments that I most treasure and the ones I most desperately want to hang on to, are the tiny, quiet, sweet little private moments. There is no witness. I cannot get a camera, nor use one without either spoiling or removing myself from the very moment I ache to capture.

I don't have a good memory for events. Facts, yes. Events, no. And so as the flood of sweet moments flows past me like water, I scrabble desperately ( and futilely) to hold on. That's one of the reasons I take time out, when so little time is to be had, and write this. I want to remember this. I want to help my daughter remember this. And remember me. This is the greatest adventure, the greatest event that has ever or will ever happen to me. And I want to remember it ALL.

Moment #1
Last weekend, Moiya awoke from her nap (as sometimes happens) before she was really ready to. I went up to the nursery when she squalled, but she just lay in her crib and stared at me. I asked if she wanted to get up/down/eat/play to no effect. She just stared at me and whimpered at bit.

I wake up like that sometimes. It reminded me a lot of the way my Dad used to wake up from a nap. His habit was to come home from work, and take a nap before dinner. It was my job to awaken him when dinner was ready, and this was no job for sissies. Dad woke up from these naps like a Viet Nam vet having flashbacks, eyes wild and staring, utterly NOT in the same plane of existence as the rest of us.

So I know how wakefulness sometimes needs to be snuck up on. I picked Moiya up (Bear resolutely clutched in one little fist) with a soft blanket and her pillow, and settled us into the rocking chair in her room. To my happy surprise, instead of kicking the slats out of me (as she usually does), Moiya snuggled into me, let me wrap her and bear up in the blanket, and we rocked.

We rocked for a good 30 - 40 minutes that afternoon, with no sounds but the creaking of the rocking chair and the purring of the ever-present/ever-content Simon nearby. And every once in awhile, as with the earlier post of us watching TV, Moiya would raise her head, look me in the eye, and give me just the most beautiful smile before snuggling back down.

No words. Just the smile. Over and over.

Moment #2
Not so much a moment as an evolving ritual. Each evening, as we arrive home, one of our first chores is to take out the goggy so she can eww. Moiya helps by grabbing Bear, and her rocks. At this point in time, the rocks are housed in an ornamental watering can. Periodically, we take them all out and arrange them. But mostly we carry the watering can ("bukkit") around.

So with the dog pulling at the leash and ever-mindful of escaping cats, I hold the door for Moiya, Bear, and her watering can full of rocks.

Goggy ("What name?""Wicker""Oh") paces the front yard looking, by whatever criteria dogs have, for the perfect place to poop. Usually Moiya points to the front porch stoop and instructs "Sit 'ere, Daddy." And then says "I sit 'ere " as she settled down next to me. Today she said "I lap" (a new word) and climbed into my lap.

And so we pass the time in companionable peace. She asks about the planes passing overhead. She asks about the cars going past (bonus: today there were fire trucks!). We investigate the leaves which are beginning to fall. We watch the goggy poop ("Googy almos' done?")

We watch the world go by from our front porch. Sometimes I get hugs just out of nowhere.

And when Goggy is done, we gather up Bear, we gather up our rocks, and go inside to start dinner.

Dear lord... I thought females were already contrary enough. Now we have a new word, "nu-huh". It's half "Nu-uh" and "Uh-huh" and I can't tell if it means no or yes.

And we've picked up on Mommy and Daddy's hedge word. Last bath night when I asked Moiya if she was ready to get out of the tub, she said "almos". Twenty minutes later as the suds vanished and my daughter turned into a prune, we were still "almos, Daddy".

On the other hand, tonight when I made her fish sticks for dinner, she took a bite and proclaimed "Daddy, I LIKE it!

Finally something for Daddy to hold on to.

Vocab is expanding so quickly now that I can’t keep track. Every day brings a host of new works and new uses for words. Some retain the vocalizations of whomever she’s learned them from (at daycare I would guess). The other day I picked out a dress for Moiya to wear and she looked it up and down approvingly and proclaimed“Niiice!” with the same inflection a denizen of New Jersey might use in admiration of a passing female.

And in a perfect example of karma, anything she encounters which she dislikes or is disappointed by is met with a heartfelt “Oh
maaaaaan!!” in so exactly the same tone I used 40 some years ago to my parents that it just makes me laugh.

And increasingly, sentences are being used. And with them, new conceptions of space and identity. The other afternoon we were cruising around looking for Moos. Fortunately there’s no shortage of cows in our area (and horses, which are also – apparently –
moos). Moiya usually can spot them before I do (me having to attend to mundane things like staying on the bloody road) even if they are only tiny specs on a far-away hill. I had pointed out some cows out the left-hand window when Moiya spotted some closer in on the right.“This side. Look this side there. Seeum? Seeum, Daddy?”

So we pulled over and looked out the other “side” of the car, whilst I marveled at seeing her.. self.. unfolding in front of me.

Last night took the cake. The previous day she’d asked about the bagboy at Kroger. In the past Moiya has always enquired about people going past with a “what dat?” (Occassionally I've answered "Good question")
This time she pointed at the kid, looked at me and asked “What he name?”

Details, as I always tell my students, are unimportant. But the underlying concept is everything. And the conceptual shift in that one sentence staggered me then and does so still.

And the bag boy was amused, so a win-win all around.

And we were on a roll. Last night we were taking our bubble bath. We’d done all the usual amusements: splashing, pouring water into containers, blowing bubbles into the air, using the squirting fish toy to soak Daddy, and washing Daddy’s forearms. Then Moiya starting sticking her little foam alphabet letters to the side of the tub. She stuck up .. an “N” I think.. and asked “Dat C?” I told her it was an “N”. And we continued in that way for some time until we had a string of 5 or 6 letters.

At which point Moiya sat back, pointed to it and said proudly“Make name, Daddy.”

It’s sometimes hard to talk to somebody right after they take your breath away.

But Daddy recovered, bundled his wet baby up and went up to the nursery where Simon, as usual, was waiting patiently on the footstool to be petted. Moiya exclaimed “Meow-meow!” and ran over and started rather wetly petting the kitty.

Then she turned to me and asked “What it name, Daddy?”

More shortness of breath.

Snippet from NewsMax.com
NEW YORK -- The average American home now has more television sets than people. That threshold was crossed within the past two years, according to Nielsen Media Research. There are 2.73 TV sets in the typical home and 2.55 people, the researchers said.

....Half of American homes have three or more TVs, and only 19 percent have just one, Nielsen said. In 1975, 57 percent of homes had only a single set and 11 percent had three or more, the company said.

David and Teresa Leon of Schenectady, N.Y. and their four-year-old twins have seven sets, plus an eighth they haven't set up yet. They include TVs in both the parents' and kids' bedrooms, the family and living rooms and one in the kitchen that is usually turned to a news station. "No one ever sits down for more than a few seconds in this house," said Teresa, a stenographer. "This way you can watch TV while you're moving from room to room, folding laundry or taking care of the kids."

In the average home, a television set is turned on for more than a third of the day - eight hours, 14 minutes, Nielsen said...

Jacq's reaction to my reading that quote to her was "Wow.. we really ARE weird, aren't we?"

An interesting thought cropped up the other monrning (well.. to us at least). Jacq and I had been watching a show the night before and had remarked to one another how terribly (and deliberately) 70s the style and plot were. Then this morning I said something derisive about having come of age in the sixties. Jacq (always better at math) poited out that I was only seven when the 60s began. "Okay.. So half sixties and half seventies. Doesn't matter.. They both sucked."

Then I thought about it. "But then so did the 80s... And the 90s" And as I thought about it further, I realised that the only decade I didn't really have an opinion about was this one.. Which is odd, given the political climate and my personal beliefs. And as I sat and wondered what was diffferent - what could have left me without an overarching feeling for the decade, it dawned on me.

We don't have TV.

I'm always amused at the incredulous looks I get from people when I say that. Occassionally someone will ask breathlessly who I think the next "American Idol" is going to be or "who is gonna get voted off the island next week?" And when I say I don't know, they nod knowingly and say "Yeah.. it's a tough call, isn't it ?" To which I reply "No. It's just that I don't know what the hell you're talking about."

I probably should remember conversatons like that when I wonder why I have no friends.

No, I'm not a latter-day Ludditte (it would hardly be condusive to my currrent occupasion). And yeah, we have a TV.. We just don't get broadcast channels or cable, and we opted not to plump for satellite. It wasn't meant as a statement, protest, or posture. We couldn't afford it for awhile, and then when we could, discovered that we hadn't missed it sufficiently to justify the expense. The wi-fi and high speed net access are a vital part of our lives. But not the TV. I have vast content at my fingertips already via the Web. I get far better news covereage from around the globe via it than I ever got from the television. And on the rare occassion I decide some series show would be worth seeing, I can have Blockbuster deliever it to my house via DVD more often than not. We watch what we want, just what we want, when we want, and don't really care about what the rest of America is doing. Television in this house is a deliberate act, rather than a habit. And I honestly can't remember the last time I saw a commercial, though I do recall that on the occassion it looked bizarre to me.. almost surreal.

Which I think is why Jacq and I have no real sense of the decade. I'm convinced that our images of ourselves are an amalgam of our television memories. Think about it - think of a decade from the sixties onward, and try to bring it to mind. Like as not it's going to raise images of the television shows popular at the time. When I was in theatre, we reckoned time not in days or weeks, but by which production we were working on at the time. I think television provides the frame of reference for our decades.. defines our sense of style and sense of self.

And since we haven't really seen any television for several years, for us, this decade is just.. well, just a number. We have no "group identity". We're just... us.

Odd that.

Secondarily, I am absolutely stunned by the statement in the aforemention article "This way you can watch TV while you're moving from room to room, folding laundry or taking care of the kids." Um.. So.. your time for introspection, thought, and general reflection would be...? No wonder we are such a collectively shallow and easily led people. We're so afraid of silence and so unused to thought that we substitute a constant stream of babble to drown thinking out.

And BTW.. don't fool yourself, Mrs. Leon. If you are watching TV, you aren't "taking care of the kids". Sorry babe... If they don't have your attention, you might as well not be there for all the impact you're having.

As I write this, I've looking at my coffee mug, which has a quote from Lao Tsu on it:

In dwelling, live close to the ground.
In thinking, keep to the simple.
In conflict, be fair and generous.
In governing, don't try to control.
In work, do what you enjoy.
In family life, be completely present.

Yesterday, Moiya hollared at me to watch her ^[1], and I looked in the rearview mirror in time to see her duck her head down behind Bear, waggle his paws and say "HELLO!"

But lest you get the idea that living with our angel is a constant source of amusement (and because I hope she'll be reading this at some future point), so far this morning, Moiya has scattered an entire box of dryer sheets around the house, set off the CO² alarms, and emptied half the dog's water dish onto the kitchen floor and the other half into the dog's dish of (rather expensive) dog food.

She's at the age where she's just smart enough and accomplished enough to be given a little autonomy, and just dumb enough to need to be duct-taped and thrown into the closet.

She's already been good enough to have used her potty (and cleaned herself up) twice today. So dumb old Daddy will no doubt again turn his back and the cats will end up shaved or burst into flames.

^[1]For some time now, Moiya has been saying something that sounds alarmingly like what is euphemistically referred to as the "F word". As nearly as we can tell, it isn't (though if it is, I'm planning to blame it on her Uncle Steven. Given the things he's taught his son Jake, I should be able to get away with it). The first time my baby girl called out "F**!! F** me, Daddy!" I nearly drove the car off the road. And of course, there was the time she very deliberately sat on Bear's face in the nursery and proclaimed grandly "F** Bear!" Just about the time I was beginning to think that there would not be enough therapy in the world to help me cope, I finally figured out (I think) that it's a corruption of "watch". Tough to tell with that pacifier in the way, so I'm going on context.

"Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the cocks!
You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Smite flat the thick rotundity o' the world!"
King Lear Act 3, Scene 2

I keep hearing from relations about the drought they are having. All I can say is that they can come and take away as much of this damned rain as they want. We've had 10 inches in the past 24 hours. Our front lawn is awash, and there are deep cuts in tne ground over the hillsides where rivulettes of water have worn furrows. For the past two days, the rain has come down without ceasing, in great, gushing sheets of water. I like rain, but this is just ridiculous. You can see in the picture at left that the willow in our front yard is standing in it's own little pond.

The streets are awash, as the storm sewers fail to keep pace with the massive runoff. The hummingbird feeder is empty, having been scoured by the pelting rain. I don't dare go into the basement . Please God, don't let the septict tank back up from the saturation of the ground .

On the up side, we have a fairy ring in the front yard, just outside (and almost exactly bracketing) our bedroom. YardGuy keeps removing the toadstools each week, and a few days later they're back. They can go from little blips to monsters the size of your outstretched palm in 48 hours. And while I know the circle isn't really a meeting place for the wee folk. it still has an air of the magical about it, as so much here does. The other night I took Wicker out, and there was a huge old toad, sitting inside the circle, utterly unperturbed by either man or dog.

At the lower end of the blessing spectrum, I took advantage of a break in the relentless dowpour Saturday to take Wicker out and discovered that my fish pond (which I assumed would be full of lovely rainwater) was instead very nearly gone, reduced to a few gallons of dirty water with a dozen very confused fish.

We've gotten so much water, so quickly, that the vast hydrostatic pressure from the water in the upper portions of the yard, and from the terraced hillside, pushed its way through the clay with enough force to actually heave the pond liner up - rocks, 350 gallons of water, fish, fountain and all - and dump most of it out. The entire pond looked like a half-deflated balloon, more covex than concave.

So I stood out in the pelting rain and dug into the mulch and the mud with my fingers in order to get at the edge of the pond liner, hacked off a piece of old garden hose and fed it down into the muck to try to siphon off some of the water (which came shooting out like a fountain). When last I checked, the liner had gone down considerably, so I added new water for the fish and treated it. Hopefully the worst is past.. But I'm leaving the siphon in just in case.

Poor fish.. they were pretty much into hibernation from the chill, dozing peacefully on the pond bottom when suddenly it came heaving up at them. The way they run at my approach now, I think they blame me.

On another up side, whislt I was squelching through the mud down by the woods with the end of the siphon and pulling my feet out of sodden mole tunnels (note to self: KILL that !@#$!@ mole) I could not help but notice that despite the lateness of the season, there is much in bloom. Through the chill and the fog I saw masses of Baby's Breath and tiny little orange wildflowers (species unknown.. can anybody help here?) no bigger than the tip of my pinkie. There were thousands of them scattered around the woods.. you can just make them out in the picture at left. I got as good a closeup as my little digital would allow.

I love it here. There's just always, always something to see when I remember to look. Why would anyone want to live surrounded by the merely man-made?

The seasons have definately changed. The wet never did let up this year, and consequently for the first time I can remember, the grass never has slacked off its growth as it usually does in August. Good this I didn't plant a vegetable garden this year, as I'm sure I'd have lost the tomatoes to rot. As it is I'm losing the roses to blackspot. All the flower beds are covered in thousands of tiny little mushrooms (see the posting on our Fairy Ring). But the mornings are getting colder, so the fungus won't be a problem much longer. Usually now when I take Wicker out in the early morning, the woods are shrouded in fog, the familiar old trees becoming suddenly mistrustful and mysterious.

Usually I love this time of year.There's something about Fall that makes me feel alive in ways that Summer never has.
But this year, something is different. For the first time ever, the fading of Summer is filling me with dread. I am like my daughter at bedtime, raging against the dying of the light. Maybe it is that I left so much undone from this summer, so many projects unfinished or never begun. Maybe it is my growing sense of my own mortality. There must, after all, one day come a "last summer" for me. The though never really bothered me before.. but I've never been so content with life before, nor had so much to lose (I am haunted by the thought that I will never see my daughter grown and that time will lead her to call another man "daddy". See "projects unfinished"' above).

Jacq says I'm just being silly. And probaby she's right. Or maybe I just need my medication increased. :)

But it feels like MacBeth's three witches are right: "Something wicked this way comes."

We had to go to Home Depot to replace the hose caddy from the front flower bed. After finding one I could live with (and afford.. remember when things made out of plastic were cheap?) I lifted it into the cart, where Moiya regarded the input hose for a moment, then pointed to it and said “hose”. Now 'hose' I understand. She once pointed to the hose hanging out of the old caddy and asked “what dat?” and I had told her. I only told her once, but increasingly (and frighteningly) once is enough. But when I strapped the thing into the trunk and secured it with a couple of bungee cords, Moiya pointed to them and asked “rope?” I have NO idea where that came from.

And later, while I was holding on my lap and we were rocking, she pointed to a small growth under my chin and asked “bite?”. I told her no, it wasn’t a bite (hurt). She looked at it for a moment and asked again “mole?”

I have NO idea.

Some things I do know the origins of; it’s just nice to see them taking root. Moiya often surprises clerks when they hand over the receipt by saying “Thanks you. Bye bye”. Sometimes she even says it to me. We often forget where Bear has wandered off to. The other day she looked around and asked “Where Bear?” I pointed him out on the other side of the room and she said “Oh! Thank you, Daddy” before charging off. A few days ago I sneezed (it’s that time of year again) and was shocked to hear “Bless ‘oo, Daddy” from the other room.

But some things.. well they're all Moiya

This morning, Moiya had thrown a paper towel on the floor and I asked here to pick it up and throw it into the trash. Usually she is happy to help, but this morning she refused. So I asked again with greater firmness. Moiya realized she’d painted herself into a corner: I wan't going to let it go and it wasn't worth a big battle, but she also couldn’t acquiesce without losing face.

So after some thought she announced grandly “Bear do it” and walked Bear over to the offending paper. “I help Bear.” And the two of them walked the paper to the kitchen and into the waiting trash can.

When Moiya and I straggled in from the rain this afternoon and got dried off, she indicated that she wanted to watch a little TV. I was mildly surprised - I usually pop something into the DVD while she's having dinner, but otherwise Moiya doesn't pay it a lot of attention. So I  began the sometimes laborious process of discerning her viewing preferences.

"Do you want to watch Baby (Einstein)?"
"No!"
"Do you want to watch Baby Bach?"
"No!"
"Do you want to watch Bear?"
"No!"
"Do you want to watch dancers?"
"Eyeeaaaaah!"

So I popped in Riverdance and started to head for the kitchen to get a little bowl of crushed ice (I think I've mentioned this recent mania). Moiya pointed to the floor in front of the TV. "Sit, Daddy. Daddy lap"

Daddy doesn't need to be invited twice.

And so we passed a pleasant time before dinner, sitting on the living room carpet, with Moiya wriggling occassionally to ensure she  was snuggled in good and close, munching bits  of crushed ice whilst the storm beat down outside and we stayed dry inside, with a dozing dog on one side of us and a purring cat on the other. From time to time Moiya's little feet would start trying to tap out the rythmn of the dance. And every now and then we'd just turn around and grin and one another for no very good reason.

We're big into babies now. There's a couple of tinies at the daycare and Moiya always wants to help take care of them. In itself, this is nothing new - we always want to help with whatever task is at hand (except taking laundry out of the drier.. Nooooo interest there despite my best efforts). Moiya helps me put on my shoes and socks and belt. She helps me with the kitchen trash can. But she really has gotten into this baby thing. All of her stuffed animals are now her "babies". The doll bed Mom got Moiya for her birthday gets used constantly for tucking in. We dress bear, read to him, change his diaper and feed him (interestingly, in a reverse twist, Bear now possesses the "healing kiss" -- yesterday Moiya banged her knee and  when I bent to kiss it, got urged away so that Bear could kiss it instead ^[1]. What really cracks me up though is her takiing over our nighttime rituals and adapting them for her babies. Rather than reading to her at night whilst we rock, now my job is to hold the chair steady as she hauls her little butt and the favored toy (usually Bear or Munny^[2] ) into it, and then bringing over a series of books for her to read to her 'baby'. The hysterical part is watching her do a really very good impersonation of me reading the books, even down to character voices.^[3]

We've learned other things from Daddy as well. I was trying to get Moiya to do something she objected to a few days ago and she turned around and shook her finger sternly at me, saying in a Most Serious Voice "NO, Daddy! (S)Top it! Top it now, Daddy!"

And it's new words every day. Literally every day. "almost" "heaby" (heavy), "socks" "here ya go" "awake", "rain". Sometimes we recombine them into new forms. Moiya has inherited my passion for chewing ice (like Wicker.. Every time I open the freezer door, they both come running for handouts. Yesterday Moiya dropped her piece and tried to swipe the dogs') One day she regarded the puddle left by the melting ice on her tray, then looked up at me and pronounced it to be "ice juice".

 Interestingly, we often use the same words for opposites concepts. Rather I should say that the concepts themselves are still broad in her mind, so no distinction is yet needed. So that "heavy" can mean that an object is physically heavy, or just awkward to carry. Hot means any extreme of temperature, hot or cold. "Bite" has expanded from insect bites to now include any type of injury. Our bestiary has expanded in the last two days to include "Moos" (sometimes Moiya and I drive the back roads for a half-hour or so after work to take in the sights -- it's a pleasant time to share thoughts and "gigis" (cookies or crackers) as we drive  -- and she especially likes it if there are Moos)^[4] . And yet pretty much everything else is either a goggy, a meow, or a bear. We argued at length one day as to whether or not a monkey is a bear. And all large birds are ducks. As of Saturday smaller ones were being classed as "buggies" along with the houseflies.

Every single day, something new. Moiya can climb into our car seat now after huffing and puffling, and oh! she is so proud of the fact that her little face just shines.  Sometimes we help Daddy with the seatbelt, though this morning we asked Bear to fasten it for us.  Bear continues to grow into his vast potential even as Moiya does hers.  When Bear wanders off (as he does from time to time) Moiya no longer goes looking for him, but stands and calls for him and waits for him to answer. Maybe she knows something we don't. I occassionally overhear her correcting Bear about something ("No Bear.. top it!"). Last week Jacquelyn asked me "Do you think bear gets up and walks around at night?"

I honestly don’t know. His feet are awfully dirty though.

Footnotes (yes, foornotes. Shut up):

We have discovered rocks. In a big way.  No warning given, one day she just spied a rock (our driveway is crushed rock) yelped “ROCK! DADDY.. ROCK!!” and went pelting after it. Now we have boxes of the damned things (I forbad her to keep leaving them all over the carpet). We have two large rocks on the front porch that she greets as we enter the house (“Hi Rock.. Bye Rock.. Night-night”) Part of any trip anywhere has to include in its planning time spent wandering the driveway, looking for rocks to pick up, examine, fuss over, and retain (Daddy is useful for holding our rocks). And apparently when Daddy wasn't paying attention, we learned to count, as when I told Moiya we had enough rocks she replied without so much as looking up "One more rock, Daddy."

We had one small incident where she put one in her mouth and tried to chew it, but thus far my personal favorite moment has been Moiya collecting rocks for Bear and trying to get his paws to hold on to them.

Touchstone
Pronunciation: 't&ch-"stOn
Function: noun
1 : a black siliceous stone related to flint and formerly used to test the purity of gold and silver by the streak left on the stone when rubbed by the metal
2 : a test or criterion for determining the quality or genuineness of a thing

Well, I’ve had my first colonoscopy. Despite all the grisly tales people tended to enjoy telling me beforehand, it wasn’t especially bad. Even the “preparation” the night before was probably harder on Jacq than on my (we only have one bathroom). Though I will have to admit that after something like 40 hours of no food and 12 hours without fluids, I’d have eaten one of our cats if I thought I could have caught it.

I was actually more afraid of the results than anything, coming as I do from a long, long line of men who die of cancer. And I admit that while I was lying on the gurney, I kept seeing Dad on his. But then they gave me some really good drugs. I can remember telling one of my nurses that I had “come for the drugs and stayed for the dancing.” And after that, I don’t remember a thing.

Actually, the true terror of the week was a class I had to teach the day before. I’d rather have had two colonoscopies. At one point I offered my colleague James $50 to punch me in the face as hard as he could so I could get to go home. (He pondered this and said “Hmm… win-win!” ..which has bothered me ever since).

True confessions: I am shy to the point of phobia. I will not answer phones. I will not often answer doorbells. I will avoid people if I can.. sometimes even people I know. People I don’t know scare the absolute living hell out of me. But God’s little joke has been to always land me in jobs/give me abilities where I have to deal with masses of strangers on a more or less constant basis. So I get sick to my stomach and my hands shake.. each and every day, each and every time. But I’ve worked hard at covering it (they have better drugs now than when I was younger), and it’s a point of pride that most people have no idea that I live in a constant state of terror.  Acting training helped.. if class is a large enough group.. 20 or more.. it’s like being on stage. And stage is easy because it isn’t you. I adopt a persona, recite my lines, and make a getaway before anyone gets wise.  But lately, our class sizes have been getting smaller and smaller. And we’re teaching fewer classes, so sometimes I haven’t seen the material for months. And last Thursday I had a class with two people, and despite lots of preparation I just could not get my head wrapped around the courseware. No place to hide. No way out of the spotlight. And I didn’t know my lines. And I was terrified. Compared to that, the impending colonoscopy wasn’t even on the fear radar. For example, ask a true claustrophobic whether he’d rather get trapped in a closet for six hours or have a camera inserted up his anus and see what he says.

And while I was pacing about waiting for the class to start I went out to my car… where I  found Moiya’s rocks. Moiya’s stupid bloody bits of limestone painstakingly gathered from our driveway, still sitting in my cup holder from the previous weekend.

And it was enough. I put one in my pocket and took it with me into the classroom. The weight of it, the feel of the stone against my palm kept me grounded and reminded me of what was real and what was not. It’s so easy to forget that, isn’t it? But it turns out the fix is an easy one: all you do is get a bit of mud off a riverbottom, let it lie around for a few million years or so till it gets good and hard, bust it up, spread it on your driveway, and wait till the hands of a little girl make it magic.

And so the ugly day passed, and I went home to my girls.

(and the bathroom.. cause the next day was.. y’know.. the camera thing..)

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It has taken years, but I’ve finally gotten hummingbirds to visit. This probably does nothing to you, but it makes me very happy indeed. I’ve been hanging hummingbird feeders out on the deck since I moved into this house, and have never seen a single bloody bird (lots of ants though). This year, Jacquelyn wanted to get plants for the gazebo. So I brought home a hibiscus with big, red blooms. And saw my first hummingbird.

I’m only sorry I’ve not yet been able to share this with Moiya. She’s just now starting to notice the birds at the regular feeders. Hummingbirds are too small and too fast for her notice. But the time will come. Then I can share the flights of bats at twilight, so like that of birds and yet different. And my favorite, the silent singing of the fireflies.

Good times ahead.

This won't mean anything to anyone else, but it amused Jacquelyn and I hugely.. which is reason enough to record it.

When I was hooked up to the monitors at the hospital, waiting to be wheeled into the procedure room, Jacquelyn and I were sitting and talking and I noticed that her eyes kept flitting up to the display screen. It seems that what had captured her interest was the degree to which my blood pressure shifted depending on the topic of conversation. So we began deliberately changing topics to see what effect each had. Jacquelyn swears the following chart is true (and I forgot to ask if this is systolic or diastolic):

People who I perceive as messing with my family seem to be a source of irritation to me. Go figure ;)

Introducing Moiya to the joys of bubble baths. She kept picking up handfuls of bubbles and sticking them on her face, with the result that for most of her bath she lookede like a tiny, naked version of Colonel Sanders.

She's gonna hurt me for this some day. Heh, heh...

I uploaded a Moiya video to Google. You can see it here .

Coming back from the grocery, as I was struggling to hold back the dog and the cats, and get the baby through the door whilst not dropping our purchases, I suddenly heard Moiya behind me (it takes her a bit to get up the front stoop, and it annoys her if I help) say "Daddy! BEAR WOK!!"

Swatting away one of the animals I said "What the.. (get AWAY you bloody cat !) what do you mean, bear..." And then I turned around to find that Moiya had her stuffed bear by the hind legs and was laboriously making him "walk" step-by-step into the house.

So.. so.. I held the door open for him. What else could I do?

Once she was inside she sat back, grinned at me and exclaimed "E didit, Daddy. E didit! "

You just never know about bears.

Addendum - August 15, 2006:

Well, Bear just continues to add to his amazing repertoire of abilities.

Moiya's been "feeding" Bear for some time. Eventually I had to banish him from the high-chair if there was actual food present, because somehow it kept ending up on his nose. But within the past week, Moiya assured me that Bear needed to go "Eww", putting him carefully on her little potty, and then asking for "wipes" after so she could clean his bottom.

Today, I noticed that Bear is now starting to wear Moiya's clothesas well, and Jacq told me that only her timely intervention spared him from having to wear a pull-up diaper all day.

And oh yeah... when Bear is too tired to "wok" now.. he also "ops" making him able to leap over things. And when Moiya wants to get up from her nap, it's now because, I'm assured, "Bear all done night-night."

Quite a Bear.

1. When you have to punish your child, not only does it really hurt you more than it does them, it hurts in ways you never even imagined.
   
   
2. Not only can I recognize my kid based solely on smell, I can even discern the smell of her poop from that of other kids.
   
   
3. I've seen (and cleaned) things that nobody will until my child is old enough to have a gynocologist.
   
   
4. I can spell gynocologist.
   
   
5. It is possible to have intelligent conversations even though you can't quite explain exactly what words were used.
   
   
6. More things can come out of a child than ever went in. And all of them will eventually reach your face.
   
   
7. After awhile, Number 6 won't even make you flinch.
   
   
8. When my daughter first put her arms around my neck as I held her, I suddenly could remember the feel of my arms around my parent's necks as they held me. And that has been the tip of the iceberg
   
   
9. Women don't become confusing and contradictory. They are born that way
   
   
10. I had no idea what love is. Nor fathom how deeply I could lose myself in it.

"'In this life, Elwood, you must be either oh-so-clever or oh-so-pleasant'. Well, for years I tried clever. I recommend pleasant. And you can quote me"
~Elwood P. Dowd in 'Harvey' ~

I want my daughter to be both.

Kissing the Duck

Smart she's got. We had nothing to do with it. But we raised her with animals in hopes that she'd learn empathy early on. And being used to playing with other children from the time she was born hasn't hurt either. When I pick her up from day care, before we can leave she goes to each and every person there, child or adult, and gives them a hug. No one makes her. She just does it. Some of the older boys were a bit diffident at first, but I was amused to note a few weeks back that when she missed one kid he complained until he finally got his hug.

At Mom's apartment complex, one of her neighbors has a ceramic dog and a wooden duck in a dress outside their apartment door. Moiya had to stop every time we passed and pet the dog and give the duck a kiss. Every. Single. Time.

And then, when we were going back to the motel on our last night in St. Louis, Moiya spied a baby in the lobby who tripped and fell just as Moiya looked. I was holding her and couldn't see her expression, but Jacq said her little face just crumpled. "Baby fall!" she exclaimed as we got on the elevator. We assured her that the baby was fine. But back in the room she kept repeating "Baby fall!" Over and over. We only got her calmed down by assuring her that "Baby mamma kiss it and make it better."

And the next morning, as soon as Moiya awoke, she immediately wanted to know again that the baby was ok..

...So grows the tree

It's easy when you can say yes

A few days back Jacq. remarked with wonder how she used to think that the old parental line "This is gonna hurt me more than it will you." was such crap.How things do change, yeah?

I put my daughter to bed tonite with loud tears.. Her behavior was bad and I called her on it.