Merry

Merry Christmas to all! And a happy, hopeful 2009!

Last Christmas, as I mentioned in my earlier post, Sam and I traveled to his parents' for the days preceding Christmas, and then returned home to meet my parents on Christmas day.  It was hectic, but privately we talked tough about how it was all okay because starting in Christmas of '08, when we had this baby, everybody could come see us.  After all, we would have grandbaby leverage, which any physicist can tell you is a force not to be reckoned with in the universe.

And yet, somehow, in spite of all of our silly talk, we've ended up with even more hectic travelin' plans this year, due to a number of circumstances: Sam's mother's health prevents her from traveling; Sam, Allison Clare, and I all got the flu, which combined with bad ice storms kept us from getting to Ohio before Christmas as planned; and my sister is coming to New Jersey with my as-yet-unseen (by me) nephew in tow.  My parents kindly offered to drive out to our house for Christmas, so Sam and I hosted Christmas, and then the next day, all of us departed--Sam and I for his parents' in Ohio, and my parents for their house in NJ where my sister and her family were due to arrive. We drove out to Ohio yesterday, returned today, and we are now home for 11 hours before getting back in the car tomorrow morning to drive to my parents' house, where there will be a big party tomorrow night. 

Complicating our travel plans, Allison Clare has learned to loathe her carseat. I can't blame her; she's her mild and happy self for a while, and then she starts straining against the straps that have her pinned down like a little racecar driver in an uncomfortable position (facing backward and reclining).  I sit in the backseat with her and hand her toys, but our trip out to Ohio got really difficult.  The 4-hour trip took 6 hours, between stopping to feed her, then stopping to change her diaper, etc.  While we were out there, we even considered having her and me fly out to NJ instead of driving, and ended up, instead, making a purchase that represents everything I have learned to accept about parenthood that I theoretically would like to reject: a car DVD player. 

Although (or maybe because) in my adult life I have become a lover of television, I really didn't want Allison Clare to have a relationship with television.  In fact, I wanted to postpone her awareness of the television even as an object until she was older. But a friend--ironically, probably the person in my life who hates television the most--gave her a Baby Mozart DVD as a gift, and she really does love it.  But who loves it even more than Allison Clare?  Sam, of course.  He especially loves the time it buys him, and he's also very interested the visual imagery and adaptation of new media to stimulate her development (insert me wincing here).  Really, since the images are pretty gentle and it's classical music, I don't mind her watching it sometimes, though on principle I haven't used it for babysitting purposes except for the day I had the flu. 

However, six hours of watching your baby writhe and twist against straps you know are uncomfortable, and having to extricate yourself when she reaches desperately with her tiny baby hands and grabs your sweater and tries to pull you toward her, beseeching you with piteous eyes to set her free, will do wonders for jettisoning a principled approach in favor of hard realism.  And actually, I'm not opposed to television in extreme times, such as when a kid is home from school sick, etc. . . . I would have preferred to have believed that simply traveling with my baby was not an extreme situation, but given that reasoning with her doesn't appear to work very well yet, we'll try television, the real opiate of the masses!

Out of the Mouth of the Babe

AC only says one word, but it's kind of an all-purpose word. "Mama" started out as "amamamama" and usually indicated hunger.  Our delight has encouraged her to state it more distinctly, though without any discernible or consistent referent. We prefer to think that it has multiple meanings rather than that it means nothing at all.  It's especially heartwarming when I come into her room after her nap and she reaches up and says, "Mama."  Or "Ma." Or even "mamama." 

Sam is, of course, trying to get her to say "Dada."  He holds her, facing him, her forehead pressing toward his, and he says, "Say, 'dada.'"  She looks at him earnestly and says cheerily in her little baby voice, "Mama."

But the real insult came today, when we realized that she had learned to recognize (not quite to say) the word "kitty."  Holly strolled sleekly into the room, and when I said, "Yes, it's your kitty!" as I always do, Allison Clare looked over at Holly and bounced joyfully.  Later, when Holly walked out of the room, I said, "Where's your kitty?" and AC twisted around to look toward where Holly had gone.  However, when Sam is sitting in the same room and I say, "Where's daddy?," Allison Clare just continues to study the drawstring on my sweatshirt.  

Poor dada.

Best-Laid Plans

I had big plans for this weekend, with a carefully laid out schedule to maximize use of independent playtimes and naptimes so that I could finish cleaning the house, get my parents' guestroom ready, pack our things for our Monday-Wednesday trip to Sam's family's, make cranberry nut bread for Christmas morning breakfast, and do some advance turkey work.  I was even hoping to find some time to make my late grandfather's favorite oatmeal raisin cookies.  Overly ambitious? Perhaps, but I was looking forward to the cheery bustle of holiday preparations.  

I got more housework done in the early morning than I'd even planned, but then I noticed I was feeling some ominous aches, and after moping around the house with Allison Clare in tow for a while, I realized we were in trouble.  I napped during her afternoon nap, bidding farewell to my oatmeal-raisin cookie hopes and even the cranberry nut bread.  When she woke up, I was a shivery, achy mess, and Sam stepped in for a while.  Finally overcome by a sense of responsibility, I went downstairs to try to endure the rest of the day but lasted only an hour and a half--during which time my infant watched her Baby Mozart video for the second time in one day, to her great delight.  The DVD has a "repeat play" setting, and it started up for a third time, but I just couldn't take the mommy guilt and attempted feebly to keep her occupied for a while.

Thankfully, Sam felt my forehead and sent me up to bed, where I lay in the dark hearing faint sounds of them making their way though AC's late-afternoon and evening routines, which I usually direct.  I responded to one request for a clean (Sam-sized) t-shirt to be tossed down the stairs, but I asked no questions, and no explanation has been volunteered, except that after AC was in bed, Sam said he was going downstairs "to clean up our messes."  Good soul.

He also took over the turkey, my plans for which I'm almost embarrassed about.  You see, last Christmas, we spent Christmas Eve with his family in Ohio and met my parents back at our house on Christmas day.  I had to pull together a turkey dinner in 4 hours, and it was pretty hectic, especially when we arrived home to find the bird had not thawed according to plan.  There was what has now become an historic incident of snappage at my mom and some imperious commands to Sam, and neither of them enjoyed seven-months-pregnant stressed-out holiday me.  So I decided this year that besides not being pregnant, I would roast the turkey and make the gravy ahead of time, serving it on a platter that way instead of doing it all on Christmas day (we're coming back a night early this year, but hoping to go to our church's candlelight service--little time for food prep).  I fear it may seem a little like fast food or leftovers, but we've found the gravy to be really, really good--maybe even better--when browned again while the turkey reheats in it (she said lamely).  The main thing is that I want to thoroughly enjoy Allison Clare's first Christmas.

So my poor husband kept Allison Clare placated, brought me glasses of orange juice, trudged with the turkey breasts (another shortcut) up from the basement freezer, supervised their thawing, and returned them in the roasting pan to the fridge.  One of the funny things about Sam is that he is easily made grumpy by small inconveniences in life, but when push comes to shove, he is absolutely solid and reliable.  He ended up having to bear the brunt of my many plans for the weekend, but he seems to be holding up admirably.

And as for me, I'm blogging from bed, but I don't think I've ever been sick in bed for more than a day (a fact I smugly credit to my childhood diet of tons of fresh fruits and vegetables), and this is only my second bout of the flu in the past ten or eleven years, so I'm hoping for better things tomorrow . . . maybe even resumption of my roasting and baking intentions?

Remote Desktop and the Exam Panopticon

So, it's pretty rare that I blog about technology.  For those topics, you'll have to see The Other Dr. F--or, as I've encouraged my students to call him, The Old Dr. F. But I have to say that technology is making the exam I am giving right this very minute into the most fun I have ever had giving an exam. 

Anyone who's taught a college class can tell you, giving exams is incredibly boring, and Saturday morning sessions make the boredom all the more stifling.  However, I've been teaching in a computer classroom all semester, and the lectern computer has Remote Desktop, an application that allows me to see all of the student computer screens on my own--and to lock them out if they are checking email, logging onto Facebook, shopping, gambling, or looking for dates (nearly all of which I've had at one time or another, though not in this class of mostly very good students).

This software has been useful throughout the semester for seeing whether students are done with an assignment, or scanning to see who has a good answer for each of the questions to share when they're finished writing (especially helpful in another class, where getting participation was excruciating and hearing their answers was often demoralizing--I could locate the one or two students with good answers and make sure to call on them). 

But it's been especially fun today because while students are taking an exam, it's true that I am always curious about what they're writing, whether they think it's hard, etc.  Now I can snoop and find out for  myself!  While sitting here posting to my blog, I can check in intermittently on what they are writing, without actually disturbing their work by peering obviously over their shoulders.  I've been pleased to see that the short-answer question I feared was too hard was answered handily by over two-thirds of the class within the first few minutes of the test, and I've had my suspicions confirmed that one student was less than prepared, as I watched the answers drafted on the screen get revised from specific (and wrong) to vague enough not to say much at all.  Of course, the exams will be graded strictly on what is on the page, not on the process I've witnessed more closely than usual, but it has at least made the experience entertaining.  And, ahem, pedagogically useful I'm sure.

Munch(kin)hausen by Proxy

I know it's kind of weird, especially since we were blindsided by bad news at our first well-child appointment, but I love going to the pediatrician.  I look forward to Allison Clare's pediatrician's appointments for days in advance.  I choose an outfit with the seriousness of a girl before her first date, ensure that it is freshly laundered, and make sure AC has a bath the day before.  The outfit business is especially ridiculous because the first thing they do when showing us to the exam room is tell me to take off her clothes, even before the doctor comes in.  But even knowing this ahead of time, I just make sure to put her in a cute diaper too.

It's partly because I have a little crush on our pediatrician--not a romantic crush obviously as I am happily married and straight, but something more akin to a celebrity crush, where I think, oh, she's so cool, we could totally be friends.  But it's also because the appointments provide official verification of Allison Clare's health and wellbeing, and embarrassingly enough, I have always thrived on the approval communicated in good grades.  I have to admit it: I love when they weigh and compliment Allison Clare.  That her weight is absolutely unremarkable and that their compliments are, I'm sure, quite perfunctory does not diminish my relish of it all in the least.  In fact, our last appointment was during a class of Sam's where his students were giving presentations, and he reminded me of his schedule so that I wouldn't call him breathlessly to relate every detail of the appointment as soon as we left the office.  

And most of all, there is always the thrilling chance that the doctor will tell us something new, or offer some expert interpretation that will decode Allison Clare's behaviors and development, with which I'm of course fascinated.  It's odd to think that she will talk some day and express those things that she surely already feels; her facial expressions are even now so varied and nuanced.  I can't wait to hear her tell us what she is thinking.  Probably that she wants me to stop embarrassing her at her doctor's appointments.

Dispatches from Vanity Fair

So this morning, on a whim, I pulled out some foundation that I had bought for our wedding and daubed it on.  When I stepped back from the mirror, I was almost dismayed to see the pronounced improvement, as it highlighted the obvious need for more radical cosmetic interventions with my advancing age. 

I grew up in New Jersey during a period of time when the mall look had peaked nationwide (later, when the rest of the country was to move on, NJ would remain true to its 1980s commitments).  From there, I went straight to a college that could have originated the lumberjack-grunge look of the 1990s, so I grew out my bangs, stopped wearing makeup, and acquired a number of flannel shirts.  

Having stayed in academia, I never picked the makeup habit back up, even when I graduated from college and started purchasing clothes that actually fit, and required ironing.  When you're young, going without make-up can just seem fresh-faced, but I fear the day has arrived when I can no longer pull it off.  Now I am faced with a choice: continue my low-maintenance ways and accept the compromises of age, or begin what I am certain will become the first steps in an ever-more-complicated routine against the inevitable.  Sigh!