It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

I love October. I would love it more this year if it was not a) fraught with mini-disasters and b) not so damn jam-packed. Before the week is out I hope to have the annual Scary Movies You Might Have Missed feature, and a short expose on the dangers of home improvement. Till then, enjoy Kid #4 (eaten by Mr. Halloween), Kid #5 (saving the galaxy) and Pete & Wilson, who would take their show on the road if they weren't so busy sleeping.

That's Not a Candygram

One of the most difficult things about raising kids when the two parents have vastly different religious views is how you balance talking about religion. In my perfect world, my kids wouldn't be indoctrinated into any religion, but instead just be taught morals and ethics detached from any religious bells and whistles until they're old enough and discerning enough to be introduced the spectrum of religious beliefs that different people around the world have, say around age 10-12. I want my kids to be kind to others, to share what they have, to stand up for those weaker than them, to be responsible and take care of the earth, to help those who need help. I want them to do this because it's the right thing, not because some invisible friend says they'll go to hell if they don't.

Unfortunately, this is not my perfect world. And because circumstances dictate that my kids attend a Catholic school, it has become a constant battle to separate out the positive messages from what I see as the destructive ideology and to explain why said destructive ideology is destructive in terms that an 11-year-old and a 5-year-old can understand.  I fear I am not threading the gauntlet well, and have ended up with an 11-year-old who rolls his eyes and uses air quotes every time he utters the word "jesus" and a 5-year-old who is bewildered that Mommy is not praising "Jesus."

On the one hand, I don't want to inculcate my kids with my sometimes overly vehement aversion to Christianity, on the other hand, I think a lot of Christianity the way it's practiced by "christians" is poisonous and needs to be called out as such. Misogyny, homophobia, intolerance, racism, and sick ideas about sex are  some of the things I find offensive in Christianity. But instead of saving these conversations until they're old enough to understand the complexities and to be able to discuss it, I'm forced by circumstance to daily walk a tightrope about when to just let something go and when to break out the flow charts explaining why Mom is having an aneurysm. It's so tiring and so needless that it really just sometimes breaks my heart.

To make it more complicated, there are apparently all kinds of "jump-for-jesus" dog whistles that those of who are un-initiated miss. For instance, the 5-year-old has been talking for weeks about the "girl who got her arm bitten off by the shark and got right back in the water!" He asked me, and I told him, yes, I had heard the story. I asked where he heard it, and he told me they were talking about it in class. I found this an odd thing to be teaching kindergartners, but I didn't think that much about it. But he kept talking about it. Seems they're really hammering this little parable home.

So today I catch an article about the movie about the girl, and it turns out it's a "Christian" movie about how Jesus was using a shark to test her family's faith or something.

In the words of the Slate article:

Hamilton's family were evangelical Christians who understood what had happened to Bethany as a personal and providential test of faith, and also saw it as an opportunity to testify to the wider world.

I find that a really obscenely  inappropriate message for a 5-year-old. "Hey, you know your buddy Jesus? Better be careful or he'll send a shark to bite your arm off just make sure you still believe in him!" WTF?

Seems when one of these "Christian" movies come out, religious schools go into promotional overdrive, telling little tie-in stories to encourage kids to beg their parents to go see the movie. We went through that whole bullshit before when I refused to let my then 12-year-old daughter see the torture-porn Mel Gibson was peddling in Passion of the Christ with a gaggle of little fundie girls she knew. That was a knock-down drag-out fight at the time. But in a few months, those same girls were telling her that her mom was working for the devil because she wrote horror books, and that was the end of my daughter's flirtation with religion, without me having to say a word.

I'm not making a big deal of it with the small child. I'm biting my tongue and skirting the edges. He's trying to learn how to read, and he doesn't need Mommy stomping around cursing. But I did tell him that if there was a Jesus, he certainly wouldn't be sending sharks to attack children. I try and tell myself that if I keep trying to be a better example of compassion (even though dog knows I fail miserably often enough when things like this make me screaming mad), the kids are going to come to their own conclusions without me inserting my sometimes very bitter opinions.  It doesn't always work, but I'll keep on trying.

Adventures in Parenting

The S/O is not coming home tonight because, as he put it, "Your car is in still in pieces." While that sounds alarming, I'm hoping the mechanics have found the faulty backing-up lights switch and can wave a magic wand over the air compressor. I can probably survive a Louisiana summer without air conditioning because I'm from hearty pioneer stock, but I fear my pasty little children might melt and slip under the seats like so much goo.

So since dad is gone, mom is charge of homework. And wouldn't you know it, there's religion homework. I'm double excused from religion homework because of the whole, you know, religion thing. But I got out the kid's homework and glanced at something about "Apollo Creed." That's quite exciting. I was imagining a whole shoebox diorama featuring Carl Weathers. Unfortunately on closer inspection, it said "Apostle's Creed," which, disappointingly, has nothing to do with Carl Weathers.

I am still considering ditching this whole "apostle's" thing and writing an Ode to Apollo Creed with matching patriotic diorama anyway, because that sounds way more fun, and I am a terrible parent.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Carpool

So once a week, I get to drive the kiddies to school. Well, not so much "get to" as "have to." The S/O plays "volleyball" one night a week and stays in town at the apartment that night. I know, suspicious, huh? Well, I guess he's really playing volleyball, because the next day he's basically a sack of jello, whining about his "rotator cuff." Besides, if a girl ever got a gander at the "Star Wars Suite" the apartment has become, she would run screaming the other way.

Anyway, my one day of morning driving duty, the alarm goes off and I get up at 6 AM, walk the dogs, get the kidlets dressed, and leave the house by 6:50. I have it timed perfectly so that I arrive at school exactly at 7:04, which is the minute before you can drop your munchkins off for breakfast. This gives them plenty of time before the bell rings at 7:35.

For some unknown reason, this week the alarm was set for talk radio. Talk radio will not wake me up. I hear talking and I just incorporate it into whatever nonsensical dream I happen to be having. This particular morning, I did happen to hear the phrase "seven o'clock" and one of the more alert people who live inside my head said, "Put down that octopus, I think you're late."

I sprang up, knocking the dog into the cat (they try to occupy the same space on my feet). They crashed into the other dog, who is old and cranky and yelled at them to get off her lawn. I yanked my two sleeping offspring out of their beds -- well, out of one of their beds and out of my bed: the five-year-old still always ends up sleeping with me. He is a ninja of middle-of-the-night bed roulette.

Within 9 minutes I had them dressed, with hot little toaster waffles in their hands. I, of course, was not dressed. Now came the calculation. If I left at that second, I reasoned I had 25 minutes to make what is normally a 15 minute drive. I could stop and get dressed, wasting valuable time trying to disentangle something out of either the laundry basket of unfolded clothes or the bottom of my closet (not recommended for amateurs), or I could trust that I'd make it to the carpool line before they locked the gates. Piece of cake, I thought. Lesson one, don't make important decisions if you've been awake for less than 10 minutes and are stimulant-free.

You see, between my house and the school, there are four school zones and 5 stoplights. If it's before 7:00, speed zones are not yet enforced, and there's very little traffic. Once you hit 7:00, it's a bit like stepping on an anthill. My brain was not thinking that far ahead.

So I pulled my little darlings down the steps and shoved them into the spymobile, clad only in a nightgown. And it's not the kind of nightgown that can pass as a summer dress or something. It's clearly a nightgown. I am also not wearing a bra, because who wears a bra to sleep? I haven't been able to get away with going braless since I was 12. Yes, I was that girl in your sixth-grade class. The only other thing I'm wearing, by the sheer fact that they'd been in the kitchen doorway, is a pair of lavender moccasins. If I'd left the shoes elsewhere I would have been barefoot too.

4 minutes in when I'm stuck at the first light behind a school bus, kid #4 tells me he forgot his belt. That'll be a demerit if it gets noticed, but I tell him to blouse out his shirt like a pirate and hope for the best. I'm not going back.

6 minutes in, I am stuck behind another school bus, and kid #5 throws the remains of his waffle at my head. I asked him why, and with perfect sincerity, he explains, "I was finished with it."

9 minutes in, I've come to the high school zone. Regardless of the trust his superiors have in him, the cop "directing" traffic is not particularly competent at that particular task. He seems to tell two cars in opposing lanes to go at the same time, which confuses them, which seems to confuse him, so he gestures at them more vehemently to go. Neither is willing. It's a standstill game of chicken. I'm unsure  how this is resolved, as I'm looking in the rearview mirror attempting to extract the waffle bits from my hair.

15 minutes in, I'm finally leaving the high school zone, and into my buffer time.

17 minutes in, and I'm stuck at the light, because the chicken in front of me did not understand that yellow means to SPEED UP OR I'M GOING TO BE LATE.

20 minutes in, and I'm at the university, which houses the lab school. The rent-a-cops that man the crosswalk at the lab school are not nearly as competent as the cop at the high school intersection. Which is to say that they randomly wander into traffic and their idea of helping the girl trying to push her bicycle through the crosswalk  is to approach gingerly and somehow become entangled with the bike itself, falling to the ground in a mass of ill-fitting polyester pants and bent spokes, then laying there looking helpless.

23 minutes in and I have made the turn to the approach, there's one car in the carpool line, and I think I'm going make it. But as I draw closer and the seconds tick off, I realize that the car isn't moving. And the car isn't moving because it's 7:34 and they have already locked the gate.

At this point I actually consider telling the kids school has been cancelled for today and going home. But that would be irresponsible. And it would also mean the kids would have to come home with me. I pull to the front of the school and make the mistake of trying to run my fingers through the tangle of my hair. I have a lot of hair. A lot of hair filled with waffle bits.

I exit the car with as much dignity as I can muster and march the kids up to the steps. Seems that lots of parents are late, an extraordinary amount of parents. Most of them moms dressed for work in business sets and high heels or dads in Polos and dockers. Well, at least the lavender moccasins don't clash with the nightie, which is black with purple flowers. Thinking about it, a lot of my wardrobe is purple and black, and I must go around all day looking like a big bruise.

There's a passel of parents in front of me, so I take a seat on the bench and wait my turn, hoping that I look like someone who's making a bold fashion statement and not an escaped mental patient. I'm slouching slightly to hide that fact that I'm not wearing a bra, and glad that at least the nightie is mid-thigh length. I cross my legs in an attempt to look classy, and nonchalantly run my hand over the owls nest on my head. A piece of soggy waffle falls in my lap. No one sits down next me. Eventually it's my turn.

By way of defense, I explain to the secretary -- loudly -- that my husband didn't set the alarm correctly. The kids don't care, and the fact that they have long since lost the ability to be embarrassed by me should probably worry me more than it does. I chalk it all up as a valuable life lesson to them: do what you need to do withouth worrying too much about what other people think about you, and always set your own damn alarm.

Let the Bodies Hit the Floor

A postcard in the mail has informed me that the season's flu vaccines are in.

Appointments have been made, and due to circumstances beyond my control, I will be the only parent present at the ceremonial bloodletting. I hope the nurses are wearing body armor this year. I don't know how my kids got to be such weenies, but I've come to realize that when the zombies rise, they're going to be all but useless. In attempt to ward off the inevitable wailing and rending of garments, I've promised them breakfast at McDonald's and $5 a piece to spend over the weekend, but I fear that will be totally inadequate.

Maybe for the rest of the week I should secret myself in various locations and jump out ninja-style and poke them with a pin, as to desensitize them. It probably wouldn't work, but it might be amusing.

As for everyone else, if you are in a target group, get the innoculation. As per the CDC, the target group includes:

•Pregnant women
•Household and caregiver contacts of children younger than 6 months of age (e.g. parents, siblings, and child care providers)
•Health care and emergency medical services personnel
•Persons from 6 months to 24 years of age
•People aged 25 to 64 years with medical conditions associated with a higher risk of flu complications (e.g. asthma, diabetes)
 
Even if you're not in a target group, get the shot. I repeat: get innoculated. I could go into all the microbiology hoo-haw (hey, I even have a degree!), but trust me, getting a flu shot is important. Creating a pool of resistance keeps everybody healthier.  There are also people who can't, for legitimate medical reasons, have the flu shot. They are often vulnerable, and depend on an immune population. Also, the life you save may not just be your own, but the life of some poor kid whose parents are too boneheaded to get the innoculation.

Nothing Ever Quiet on the Western Front

The earache is better -- although whether that's due to the medicated drops, laying down with an icebag wrapped to my head ala Marley's ghost, or walking around with with a peeled garlic clove shoved my ear like a hillbilly hearing aid, I am uncertain.

At least it doesn't quite feel like I have a steak knife shoved in the side of my skull any more. Not quite.

But while I was laying down with the icebag desperately trying biofeedback, my mom called and left a voicemail, child #3 called three times, child #1 called three times, the S/O called four times, and the strange old woman who always calls asking, "Is Mary there?" called twice. Turns out that the S/O and child #1 were both calling to tell me to get hold of child #3, who is hysterical about something, but not hysterical enough to relate the cause to them and can only speak to me. Oh, and child #1 called once more to relate that my mother wanted to know why she couldn't get a hold of me.

Child #3 is now not answering the phone, and I am too old to understand how to use the newfangled text messaging. Sigh.

You Can't Escape

I'm working this morning, minding my own business, when I get a phone call from California. It's child number two. He can get half a day off if he writes a short essay. So he's in the bathroom on his cell phone asking for my assistance.

It's either very gratifying or very depressing that even though your child may be a lance corporal in the Marine Corps and is two time zones away, he still needs your help with his homework.

From the Department of Irreparable Damage

The 8-year-old comes from school today and says, "We were playing zombies on the playground and I bit three kids. So only Patrick is left."

On the upside, I don't think he LITERALLY bit them....