For L

Though I have been remiss about keeping up on the doings of Otter, tonight I dedicate this space to a new life, about to make an appearance in this world.

My friend is off having a baby tonight. When she woke up this morning she had no idea that today or, at the very latest, tomorrow she'd have a child. Well, she had some idea - being as she was creeping up on 40 weeks, and babies tend to pop out right around that time. But no matter how close you are, the actual transition from oven to mother is a sudden and definitive one. It is a line in the sand - or rather, in concrete. For unlike sand, marks on concrete are permanent, and no wind or tide can erase them.

People always talk about how children will change your life. But while the entire pregnancy is a rite of passage, it is a mostly hypothetical one, bolstered by vague ideas of how your day-to-day existence will be altered by the presence of this creature growing inside you. It can be a time of great stress, or great anticipation, but it's not "real," no matter how real it seems.

And then, either by knife or nature, the "before" is literally rent from the "hereafter." It's not until the moment that this being, suddenly separated from you, enters your life in it's own right, that the true magnitude of what is about to be, what you are to become, suddenly comes into focus before you in undeniable clarity. Yet only in hindsight can you truly process and understand that moment.

So to L, as you embark on what is to be the most challenging journey, know this about your child...

He will be an abyss of need; and an endless source of love.

He will teach you patience beyond measure; and you will learn to recognize your limits.

He will cause you laughter; and make your soul over-run with sorrow.

He will test your boundaries; and make you forget your inhibitions.

He will do all these things and much, much more than you or I can ever imagine.

For he is magical. Don't ever forget that.

Fashionista Diaries Continue

Just a taste of Otter's fashion sense. As one of my friends pointed out, "Oh, she has mommy's sense of style..." This seems so far from the innocent days of skants...

Flower Power

My girl is a fan of all things floral. From pictures and shirts to the flower jacket which she would wear 24/7 given the option (thank you, Aunt Erika), "flow-wa" is king. But nothing beats the real deal, and with the advent of spring, we've found ourselves scoping the neighborhood for blooms that overhang the fence onto the sidewalk (public domain, as far as I'm concerned). Fortunately, living where we do, SB has the benefit of a diverse and aromatic haul...

Happy spring, everyone!

You Must Remember This...

I got my first Otter kiss yesterday, a solid third behind her rubber duck (which has been getting action since Thursday) and the dog.

Yeah, it was way cool.

Early Achievement

The Terrible Twos have arrived with a bang, kick and scream about 6 months early. The most common victim of this new milestone is our long-suffering dog, whose daily regimen of being assaulted with hugs and being force fed various bits Otter finds on the floor (some of it even edible) has been augmented by pokes, smacks and the occasional wheeled toy hit and run.

Attempts at curtailing this barrage of abuse are generally met with kicking, punching and screaming (and that's just MY reaction ;) ). As I searched for a more workable solution, I've run across the gamut of suggestions, everything from Dr. Happy's advice that involved mirroring SB's feelings in Toddlerese, along with some clapping and growling, to Internet boards offering everything from loving hugs and pretending to cry to beating your child with a staff in the name of the Lord. I wish I was kidding.

The dog concedes his defeat before the abuse with a characteristically morose outlook, fleeing when the barrage becomes to intense. Such is his lot, balanced somewhat by nighttime bed privileges and mealtime snacks courtesy of the Otter.

As for me, I'm trying to lovingly acknowledge her emotions while dodging and weaving, holding down the legs with all my might, and starting to research boarding schools.

The Bonds That Tie

A relationship between a parent and child is a forever thing. Regardless of age or distance, the bonds that tie exist, both in their ability to connect and restrain.

For a parent, it is the hope that if we do it half right, our children will grow up to be good people, able to face life's challenges with grace and bravery; that they will find passion in their lives, will not repeat our mistakes, and that the mistakes they are bound to make won't scar them too permanently or deeply.

For the child, there is a tether stretching back through time and generations, connecting us those that came before us, stretching to its maximum capacity on occasion, but holding us back from ever revoking our past completely.

This bond can be a thing of beauty, or an instrument of oppression, and as we stumble along, sometimes blindly, all we can do is hope that we are making the right decisions, nurturing this chord which connects the past to the future.

Chris Martin sings,

Lights will guide you home,

And ignite your bones,

And I will try to fix you.

And these words make me cry every time I hear them, because they are beautiful and true, and they remind me that I am a mother, trying to raise my child in the best way I know how; and that I am also a daughter, and there is someone out there that has wished all that I wish for Otter, for me. And that this connection is forever.

Potty Mouth

Apparently, I was potty trained with ease and at an incredibly early age. By 18 months (as my mother's oft-fuzzy memory serves her) I was peeing and pooping into a potty with wild abandon, and, to hear her tell it, enjoying every minute of it. And, being parent to an only child, my mom has little else to compare this experience to, other than that of her friends, who's lazy, slacker children ran around in all states of incontinence well into their second and sometimes even (heaven forbid) third years.

Unwilling to play grandmother to such a slothy kid, my mother's single-minded mission in life has become to get her peeing in the potty ASAP. A mission which she plans to accomplish from 3ooo miles away by asking everyone who's ever borne a kid for advice on what I can be doing better to hurry this potty training thing the f up.

Each of our conversations now begins or ends with some tale from the streets of one child or another and their pooping habits, along with helpful pointers on what their guardians did to accomplish the Herculean task. "I asked _________ (fill in the name) what (s)he did, and they __________ (fill in helpful hint)."

"That's great mom. I've heard about _______." In fact, we've probably at least attempted some version thereof.

Here are the problems:

Otter is 18 months old, and apparently not the potty prodigy that I was. Her interest in the potty is limited to shoving her dolls into it, taking it apart, or inverting the basin over her face in an attempt to drink (?) from it.

She refuses to sit on it for more than 30 seconds at a time, and I see no way to rectify this short of tying her down to the toilet, which I'm told is illegal.

That helpful potty book we got? SB's mostly exclusively interested in the last page, where Elmo gets his big kid underwear (a current obsession). and much less so in how he got to that elevated state.

The desire to be dry and clean so vital for one to have a stake in going in a potty vs. the convenience of pooping right in your pants? Otter cares not...

So we're left with little to do but wait for nature to take its course and SB to come around to the idea of peeing like a big girl. I can live with this. My mom, having a bit more trouble.

"I really can't do this any more," I told her during our last potty stand-off. "I'm not worried. We have plenty of time."

"That's all relative," came the curt reply. "Some people are ok with their 5-year-olds running around in diapers."