Party Time! Excellent!

One of Oscar's longest-running complaints about our lives is that we don't host enough parties. We have a modest-sized home, but one that boasts a very large backyard and a lovely pool that we have spent entirely too much money renovating. Oscar seems to think those are reasons enough to have an endless stream of people over to our house for food, fun, and some good, old-fashioned drunken debauchery. I, personally, feel that unless that endless stream of people is willing to clean my toilets prior to their arrival (which could only be accomplished with the aid of time travel, I suspect), the parties have to wait until I can muster up the enthusiasm to bleach-bomb my house.

Sadly, it looks as though I'm about to be outnumbered in the "to party or not to party" debate. While swimming with Turtle this evening, he casually asked if we could have some people over this weekend. I asked him what he had in mind, thinking that maybe he wanted to invite some of his new friends from school to come over and go swimming. Apparently, I think too small.

His recited a guest list of ten people he wanted to invite, most of whom are related to him in some way. Then he requested that we serve broccoli and guacamole and hamburgers and hot dogs. And he said that everyone should come over on Saturday evening, so we could swim and have food and play together. Finally, he decided that ten people was not sufficient and that ideally, he'd like to have sixteen people come over and he requested that Oscar and I please invite six of our friends, because he really wants to meet new people.

For the past couple of years, I've been worried that Turtle was going to turn out to be a serial killer, at worst, or a sniper in the military, at best, given his endless fascination with guns (and more recently, rocket launchers.) Apparently, my worrying has been in vain, as it appears he is leaning more towards a career in event planning. I'm not sure that I'm feeling as relieved as I should be.

I Think I Might Be Indecisive, But I Can't Decide For Sure

So, here's the conundrum:

I never really intended this blog to be solely about my kid. However. Turtle has started school, and OMGWHOA! I all of a sudden have THE most HILARIOUS stories. And yet, most of them involve some sort of visual or auditory component. (The tone in his voice when he starts whipping attitude at me is something to be heard to be believed. It's like he's 5 going on 30.)

So...do I update regularly with all sorts of "you had to be there" stories about Turtle's adventures in school? Or do I update sporadically with some random thoughts about various subjects interspersed with only the most easily translatable stories about my kid?

Hmmmmmm......

Sights Set On New Adventures

Yesterday, I walked onto the campus of our local elementary school and met the woman who is going to be responsible for Turtle for 6.5 hours every week day for the next 9 months. Tomorrow, I will make sure Turtle gets up, puts his clothes on, eats his breakfast and gets ready to walk onto that same campus as a brand new kindergartener.

His teacher is a lovely young woman, newly married, who looks like she might be about 12 years old. She also looks like the woman who has styled my hair for the last, oh, decade or so, and whose breasts my son used to reach for when I would bring him to one of my appointments. I really hope Turtle never goes into a fugue state and starts reliving moments from his past while he’s in Mrs. C’s class. That could get awkward.

The classroom is nice. Little labels mark every surface with words like “painting” and “table”. His teacher’s desk sits in the back with a calendar resting upon it, marking off blocks of time for PE and art class. Turtle didn’t waste too much time on those kinds of details. He was busy exploring the room for the kind of trouble he could get into, his eyes lighting up when they found the dry erase boards in the back.

We asked his teacher the kinds of questions you want to ask when you’re sending your baby off to be with people you don’t know. The playground is monitored so he’s safe, right? Where does he need to be when the bell rings so we can teach him what to do? Will there be someone to help him open up his applesauce container at lunchtime? He sometimes has trouble with that.

I didn’t ask the questions that his teacher wouldn’t be able to answer. Will he find friends on the playground or will the other kids see that he can be a sensitive kid sometimes and bully him? Will he remember to use his inside voice and keep his hands to himself or will I need to make a few trips to the principal’s office to gently remind him that he can’t roughhouse with everyone the way he does with Daddy? Will you see what an amazing, loving, intelligent, precious kid he is and realize what a precious gift it is that we’re sharing him with you?

I thought that when I took a job and said goodbye to being a stay-at-home mom I had already done the bulk of the “letting go” that needs to happen when you send your baby off to school for the first time. After all, as it is, Turtle is with a babysitter for even longer now than he will be in school every day. What’s the difference if he’s going to school or going to the babysitter’s house?

There is a big difference, apparently.

I got a little teary when I got the letter from his teacher with the school supplies she was requesting portioned off into lists denoting “wants” vs. “needs.” I got a little more teary when I went shopping with Mama Jo for those same school supplies. Last night, I was proud that I made it through the Open House without crying. Tomorrow, I will be bringing a box of tissues for Turtle’s classroom and another one, maybe two, for myself.

Tomorrow is a big day.

My Latest Obsession

It was recently brought to my attention that I have neglected my blog for a period of time that is getting perilously close to a year. Who knew?

It's hard to sum up 10 months of life in a few paragraphs, so I'm not even going to try. Instead, I just have one thing to say:

Are you watching Man vs. Food on the Travel Channel????

I only discovered this show in the last couple of weeks, but it has quickly become my favorite way to spend a half hour for several reasons. First, the host reminds me of Oscar. Not because of any kind of physical resemblance, but because Oscar has the same a-dork-able way about him and his capacity for fitting food into his belly is somewhat legendary. Secondly, I love to travel, and the idea of discovering a new locale through its regional cuisine is, I feel, one of the BEST ideas ever conceived EVER. But most importantly, watching Adam Richman chow down in some of the most amazing restaurants across this nation makes me feel as though a trip through the Taco Bell drive-thru is just cheating myself, and both my pocketbook and my waistline appreciate THAT.

As a bonus, while watching Man vs. Food is an entertaining experience in its own right, watching Oscar watch Man vs. Food is.....well....it kind of defies description. Kind of like walking through a house to find a priest in one room in solemn prayer and your brother in another room watching porn. Because Oscar's relationship to food is so passionate, he mostly looks upon Adam's culinary journeys as the ultimate religious experience. But every once in a while, it seems like he's about 5 seconds away from stripping down and rubbing a sandwich all over his body in an orgy of culinary lust. I almost feel like he should watch the episodes alone, late at night, with the lights off and a sock and some lotion close at hand.

So while it's not an excuse for neglecting my little corner of the blogosphere, can you see why maybe I have been spending more time enjoying my real life lately? I mean, you guys are great, but I don't get to see your "O" face when you see a plate of homemade pickles flit across your screens, you know?