Music has always been a medium through which Eli and I connect. We don't always have the same taste in music (Slayer? Really, Eli? Really?), but we do share a passion for it, and an ability and willingness to be moved by it. Throughout our long relationship we've spoken in lyrics to one another often and made each other mixed tapes (and CDs), usually during some of the more turbulent times.
This is definitely a turbulent time. I made Eli a CD last week, and most of it is angry. It's basically a "how dare you hurt me, how stupid was I to allow you to hurt me, okay I still love you but I'm angry, okay I just still love you. but I'm ANGRY" CD. And he responded with a CD for me, one that I've been listening to for the last few days in my car. I've spent hours in the car lately!
But it seems like every song that comes on the radio is being played exclusively for me and him lately. All these sappy tweeny-bopper pop songs about hurting and getting hurt, about loving and being loved. *sigh*
And I can practically feel Seth rolling his eyes at me right about now. ;)
Anyway, I wanted to go public with this one dedication. Yes, I'm a dork. But we all already knew that, yeah?
This is for you, Eli.
You'll have to click on it to get there.
Friends and family keep asking me what's going on with me and Eli. This is what's going on. He is my husband. I am his wife. We're working on it.
6.29.2009
6.26.2009
Breakfast of champions.
More often than not, breakfast at our house involves lying on the floor in front of the television, watching Boog with a poptart in hand. This well-played scenario is not one I'm particularly proud of, but there it is. I'm not a morning person. (Hell. Come to think of it, I'm not an evening person, either.)
Despite my lack of skillz when it comes to proper nutrition, breakfast is a time I enjoy with Eliot. There's not much better than lying there, cozied up next to a warm little boy, trying to capture the few blissful remaining moments of rest before the day begins in earnest.
And I do love the moments when I am able to observe our son without his awareness of my watching. When he's glued to the television screen, attuned only to the movements and words of the cartoon characters, I breathe him in, trying to memorize him as he is now. I know that these lazy days together will be encroached upon all too soon--by the arrival of a new school year, by the shift in routine back to a more frenzied pace.
The years will pass in a blur. Mornings will soon come when HE is also getting ready for school, when his life will begin to dictate its own schedule rather than conforming to mine. (Then, will I even get a kiss on the cheek before he breezes out the door and into his own day?)
And so I watch him, intently, determined to soak in all his precious little boyness while I can.
What amazes me is that he is such a person. A person! Though he is OF me, he is not me. He has his own quirks, mannerisms, small peculiarities. For instance, he always gets poptart goo all over his right wrist, from using that part of his arm to shove bites into his mouth. His gaze never wavers from the screen as he feels the poptart crumbling and reaches up to propel the resulting debris past his lips. Never his fingers, always his wrist goes up to meet the escaping food and thrust it back into that gaping maw. (He has a big mouth, "generous," his grandmother calls it, a mouth shaped curiously more like Uncle Ethan's than Daddy's.) Inevitably, some crumbs fall on the carpet, and I groan. Inevitably, I will forget to clean that part of his arm and only notice it as I'm loading him in the car to go to daycare. A fruity paste with carpet fuzz and random dirt stuck to it.
Some days those grimy bits stuck to his wrist feel like a badge of my failure as a parent, my inattentiveness. And other days I am able to simply smile at them, taking them as a quintessential sign of toddler-dom (which is all-too quickly giving way to little boy-dom).
For Eliot often talks like a child much older than his 2 years. I love how he requests his breakfast, telling me, "Mom, I want a tart." Never "poptart," always only just "tart." Then he will make sure his pillow is propped up behind him before patting the floor beside him and cocking his head to the side. "You wanna watch too, Momma? You wanna watch too? Cover up?" He searches my face for an answer.
Of course I do, Eliot. Of course I wanna watch too.
I hit "play" on the DVD and snuggle in, both of us under my great-grandmother's quilt, where our day begins.
Despite my lack of skillz when it comes to proper nutrition, breakfast is a time I enjoy with Eliot. There's not much better than lying there, cozied up next to a warm little boy, trying to capture the few blissful remaining moments of rest before the day begins in earnest.
And I do love the moments when I am able to observe our son without his awareness of my watching. When he's glued to the television screen, attuned only to the movements and words of the cartoon characters, I breathe him in, trying to memorize him as he is now. I know that these lazy days together will be encroached upon all too soon--by the arrival of a new school year, by the shift in routine back to a more frenzied pace.
The years will pass in a blur. Mornings will soon come when HE is also getting ready for school, when his life will begin to dictate its own schedule rather than conforming to mine. (Then, will I even get a kiss on the cheek before he breezes out the door and into his own day?)
And so I watch him, intently, determined to soak in all his precious little boyness while I can.
What amazes me is that he is such a person. A person! Though he is OF me, he is not me. He has his own quirks, mannerisms, small peculiarities. For instance, he always gets poptart goo all over his right wrist, from using that part of his arm to shove bites into his mouth. His gaze never wavers from the screen as he feels the poptart crumbling and reaches up to propel the resulting debris past his lips. Never his fingers, always his wrist goes up to meet the escaping food and thrust it back into that gaping maw. (He has a big mouth, "generous," his grandmother calls it, a mouth shaped curiously more like Uncle Ethan's than Daddy's.) Inevitably, some crumbs fall on the carpet, and I groan. Inevitably, I will forget to clean that part of his arm and only notice it as I'm loading him in the car to go to daycare. A fruity paste with carpet fuzz and random dirt stuck to it.
Some days those grimy bits stuck to his wrist feel like a badge of my failure as a parent, my inattentiveness. And other days I am able to simply smile at them, taking them as a quintessential sign of toddler-dom (which is all-too quickly giving way to little boy-dom).
For Eliot often talks like a child much older than his 2 years. I love how he requests his breakfast, telling me, "Mom, I want a tart." Never "poptart," always only just "tart." Then he will make sure his pillow is propped up behind him before patting the floor beside him and cocking his head to the side. "You wanna watch too, Momma? You wanna watch too? Cover up?" He searches my face for an answer.
Of course I do, Eliot. Of course I wanna watch too.
I hit "play" on the DVD and snuggle in, both of us under my great-grandmother's quilt, where our day begins.
6.24.2009
6.22.2009
This is me @ 30.
The journaling card for this one is tucked behind the picture. (You pull on the tab with the date to get to it). Too private to share this time.
"What?" you gasp, "There exists something that Rachel will not broadcast to the Internet?"
Well. Yes.
And it has nothing to do with yeast infections, if that's what you were thinking.
(I have to do some crediting here. The tags and postcard used in this layout are from Jess Gonacha, an artistic genius with whom I am absolutely in love. Check out her etsy shop here, if you're so inclined. And trust me, you should be. And the page underneath everything--it spells out "June," but you probably can't tell from this picture--is the cover of the latest Anthropologie catalog.)
6.21.2009
Say what?
I found this post in my "drafts" folder recently. Apparently I had written it and never hit "publish" for whatever reason. I think it fitting that I share it with you today, in completely random fashion.
This piece was originally written in April 2008. I think it offers a telling glimpse into the life of an instructor of English composition.
Without further ado...
The following is a sample of unintelligible sentences, brought to you by my students. (I only wish I were kidding.)
"They have put the thing that matters least about a person the most important aspect." ( I wholeheartedly agree.)
"Because body image is so important to our self-esteem, when confusion occurs, there can be many effects." (Indeed.)
"Today many women are considered to be lenient and therefore lead to many cases involving the harassment of women." (Whaaaaa?)
Keep in mind that these sentences were constructed by college students, all of whom are native speakers of English.
****
And now, I would like to bring you...greetings from the painfully obvious:
"Advertisements are little slogans or pictures that urge you to buy what they are selling." (Thank goodness someone has finally explained this to me. I always wondered what advertisements are!)
Holy batshit, Robin! If these children are our future, what is to become of this world?
This piece was originally written in April 2008. I think it offers a telling glimpse into the life of an instructor of English composition.
Without further ado...
The following is a sample of unintelligible sentences, brought to you by my students. (I only wish I were kidding.)
"They have put the thing that matters least about a person the most important aspect." ( I wholeheartedly agree.)
"Because body image is so important to our self-esteem, when confusion occurs, there can be many effects." (Indeed.)
"Today many women are considered to be lenient and therefore lead to many cases involving the harassment of women." (Whaaaaa?)
Keep in mind that these sentences were constructed by college students, all of whom are native speakers of English.
****
And now, I would like to bring you...greetings from the painfully obvious:
"Advertisements are little slogans or pictures that urge you to buy what they are selling." (Thank goodness someone has finally explained this to me. I always wondered what advertisements are!)
Holy batshit, Robin! If these children are our future, what is to become of this world?
It is time.
Thanks to my favorite bald man in the world, I have oodles of yummy pictures to scrapbook, so I've been gettin' on it lately. Not to be confused with gettin' it on. That's something different.
6.20.2009
R + K.
"Figuring it out as we go."
Love, love, love this lady.
*hugs*
Also, don't I have the ugliest kitchen floor ever? It reminds me of the institutional tiling in grade school, which totally brings back the smell of kid vomit and that orange sawdust they used to dump on it. So, you know. Not much has changed for me. ;)
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