Mommy Always Wins

~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Yesterday I wrote about this horrible dream I had Sunday night.

It left me shaken for some time afterward and I finally fell asleep that night after letting my mind wander through the various cute and funny things my kids had done over the course of the weekend. We'd had a great few days together. I have to say it was the first time probably EVER that I thoroughly enjoyed my kids the entire time when usually, by Sunday night (with two kids by myself for days on end) I would be exhausted and completely ready for a day in the office the next morning.

Normally, my kids go to sleep without much fuss. I want them to have the experience of being brothers in bunk beds, whispering and giggling with each other in the dark, but to a certain extent, you know? If they get too loud or start fighting, it typically takes only one warning and they're out a few minutes later.

Monday night a little voice called out from his bed long after I thought he was asleep.

"Mama? I'm HOT!"

The electric baseboard heating in my apartment is probably from 1972 and has two settings. Antarctica or Arizona. I, apparently, had selected Arizona. I think it was about 93° in there when I opened the door to tend to his cry.

I turned the heat back to Antarctica and checked on Nick. He was sweaty-headed, but sleeping peacefully.

Still affected by my dream the night before, I asked, "You wanna come sleep with Mama?"

Mama's Bed is like the all-time favorite spot in our house right now. A few weeks back I finally set up my second TV in my bedroom. It had been on my dresser for awhile with no real purpose. I wasn't about to pay AT&T for a second U-Verse box considering how little I watched the one we had, but I liked the idea of burrowing under the covers in the midst of the dark Wisconsin winter to watch TV at night.

So just after New Year's I bought an off-off-off brand blu-ray player with wireless Internet capability and connected it to my existing Netflix account. Mama's happier than a pig in poo and my boys are more than willing to put on PJs at 6:30 on a Saturday night so that they can watch episodes of Walking With Dinosaurs or America's Funniest Home Videos while all cuddled up. Plus they have my ex thinking that I have a "Movie Room" in my apartment.

Invited to the Holy Grail of Awesome Places They Have to be Invited to Go and Never Get to Sleep, an excited four-year-old excitedly whispered, "YEAH!"

It was just before 9:00. I had planned to watch a few episodes of Breaking Bad before bed, but a little one-on-one time with one of my favorite little men was suddenly way higher on the good times list.

I had him climb under the covers while I stood in my adjacent bathroom washing my face ("Why do you do that, Mama?") and brushing my teeth ("Hahaha! Momma, you're funny!"). I flipped the switch across the room, leaving nothing on but the bedside lamp. ("Oooh! Its all cozy and dark in here!") And he just kept talking.

Most of the time when he gets into these talk non-stop moods I'm busy trying to do other 20 other things at the same time and the sound of his little voice continuously asking questions and demanding answers drives me slightly batty.

Monday night, his questions were beautiful.

He excitedly told me about his swimming lessons, his friends from school and his favorite Nintendo DS game. He snuggled up with me, his face inches away on my pillow, his pink cheeks slightly chapped from the pool water. He giggled as he asked if we could have McDonald's for dinner the next day, and when I said no he laughed again while asking if we could have Taco Bell instead. His big brown eyes sparkled in the low light as he took in every word I said. I could smell the bubble-mint scent of his toothpaste.

I wanted to memorize the expressions on his face, the roundness of his cheeks and the earnest way he waited for me to answer every question.

Finally, sighing and slightly laughing, I said, "Ah, Will..."

With a huge grin on his face he said, "I'm a funny little dude!"

I laughed. "That you are, buddy!"

"Mama?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

Rolling to face away from me on the pillow he asked, "How bout we finish talking about this in the morning?"

Now really, what could ease my mind better than that?

I had a horrible dream Sunday night.

I often have extremely realistic dreams. I may have dreamt of some small, insignificant thing - sitting on concrete steps in the sun, talking to a friend, for example - but when I wake up it actually takes me a few minutes to shake off the feeling of the sun on my skin, and I'm often disoriented a bit as I work through realizing it didn't really happen.

Not all my dreams are that powerful, but many of them are. So when I dreamt that my son Will died Sunday night it really shook me -- to the point that I got out of bed, snuck into his room and held his warm little hand while he snored away on the top bunk, oblivious to the fact that I stood there in tears, thanking God that he was still breathing.

I had been in an exposition center of some sort. There were hundreds of people milling about, and I was happily setting up some sort of display booth, chatting with the other people setting up around me. I've worked expos like that in real life, back when I was a marketing lackey, and while they used to have an air of excitement about them, it was only to a certain extent. I mean, I was out of the office and all, doing something more fun than sitting at a desk staring at a computer monitor, but it was still work. It still meant standing on my feet for eight hours at a crack, infusing a smile into a conversation about something that I wasn't really all that excited to be talking about.

But in this dream it was different. The expo itself felt like it was going to be more about fun, not work, and I had some really cool giveaways planned for my booth. (Maybe I was at BlogHer? Ha!) I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, sitting on the floor with my shoes off, putting a display together. I had a name tag hanging around my neck on a lanyard, and I was laughing with a woman a few feet away who was struggling to set up a display in her booth as well.

Then I looked up and saw a good friend of mine, her boyfriend and her kids standing there with stunned looks on their faces and I knew something was wrong.

I jumped to my feet and ran over. "What is it?"

Her face was pale. "Its not good. Someone got hurt."

I immediately knew. "Its one of my kids, isn't it?"

I didn't wait for her to reply. She had been standing at an opening to a long walkway that led to another section of the expo center on the other side of the street. I took off running down it in my socks.

I can remember dashing around people who had stopped walking to take in the view from the windows along that walkway. I remember feeling things on the floor under my feet, realizing I wasn't wearing any shoes. I remember my name tag flying out behind me as I ran.

When I reached the other side, there was a ramp that led down to street level, and I almost fell sprinting down it. There, on the sidewalk, just outside the doors was my boss and his wife.

"I'm sorry. He didn't make it," he said, sincerely upset by what he'd seen.

"Its Will, isn't it?" I cried. He only nodded, choking back tears.

"WELL WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?" I shouted at no one in particular, whirling around, trying to figure out where the paramedics were, where the cops were.

There was an ambulance there, parked on the sidewalk. It was dirty but white, and its lights were on but not the siren. There were no windows in the back, just a plain white door and suddenly I realized my baby was inside that ambulance.

A crowd of people stood around, having seen what happened, and one man stepped forward to fill me in.

"Your boy. He was hurt. Someone called 911 and the cops came. The paramedics were down on the ground, helping him. We thought this guy was one of them. He had on a navy blue windbreaker. We thought he was official."

I stared at this man, not seeing his face. I was sobbing.

"This man...he walked up, and picked up your boy's head and looked in his eyes. Then he said, "Nah, he's not worth it." Then he flipped him over and smashed his face into the sidewalk three of four times before anyone could react. He killed him."

I broke down. I fell on my knees on that sidewalk. The man continued, putting his hand on my shoulder.

"He was going to be OK, your boy. No one knows why that man decided he should die."

Suddenly, I had to see him.

People had gathered around me, asking me questions I couldn't answer, offering me water or a hand or a hug. I physically pushed them away and walked steadily to the back of the white ambulance.

Slowly, I opened the back door. The only thing inside was a small boy wrapped in a white blanket. He was swaddled like a tiny baby - the blanket covering everything but the round of his face. He was lying on his side and I rolled him over and picked him up. His face was bashed, swollen and bloody, but I could clearly see that it was my son. I cradled him to my chest, sitting inside the back of the ambulance, rocking with him and sobbing wildly while my heart hurt.

I just couldn't understand WHY.

"WHY?" I shouted. "WHY WOULD SOMEONE DO THAT? HE WAS A WONDERFUL, BEAUTIFUL LITTLE BOY THAT EVERYONE LOVED!" It was so senseless. So wasteful. What sense could anyone find in wanting to end his life?

When I woke up I looked at my phone and saw it was exactly 1 a.m. I laid there for a minute, telling myself it was OK - he was fine - it was just a dream - go back to sleep. Only I knew I had to check and see for myself. So I tiptoed in, his room lit only by the hallway light, to find him sleeping peacefully on his side, one hand stretched out toward me with his fingers slightly curled.

He was snoring lightly as I took his little warm hand in mine and thanked God that it was just a dream.

My children are insane. I've told you this before, but to be a good, imaginative child I think its required that one be off one's rocker just a titch.

A few weeks back I taught myself to crochet.

I know, I know. How very Ethel of me.

I've heard its therapeutic and gives you some sense of purpose and accomplishment as you physically create things. I've also heard that crocheting is like working worry beads - your mind is half engaged on the project, leaving the other half to wander and ponder things, leaving some of your woes behind with each stitch.

Or maybe that's just my friend and I overanalyzing the scarves we're making in the work cafeteria. Whichev.

Anyway, I set out a few weeks ago to make a giant comfy scarf for myself. My sons have seen me working on it, and Nick's even sat with me a few times, mesmerized as my fingers looped and pulled the yarn. I may just have him convinced that magic's involved but either way, they're both impressed I actually made something.


So Sunday afternoon I took my kids out in the dreary cold January rain so that I could get some needles from the craft store with which to weave in the loose ends of my completed scarf. After that quick trip we stopped at the grocery store.

As we pulled into the parking lot, the following wisdom flowed from my eldest child's amazing little brain:

Nick: "So Mom. I know what we can do. We should get, like, a whole messa yarn. Like a WHOLE WHOLE BUNCH. And we could all - you know - we could all - what's that called?"

Me: "Uh, crochet?"

Nick: "Yeah. CROCHET - a whole bunch all together. And then your piece can get sewed to my piece and then we'll sew those onto Will's piece. And we'll have one big giant piece that we can sew into like, pants and a coat all together. For all of us to be all cozy in outside at the same time."

Me: "You mean like a snowsuit?"

Nick (eyes wide): "YEAH! A snowsuit! And we'd all go into it together so that if we go sledding then all we need are boots!"

Me: "Wow. A crocheted group snowsuit?" {Regretsy flashed to mind} "That'd be...awesome, Nick." {Awkward Family Photos flashed to mind}

Nick: "Yeah! And we could get one of those...wood things?"

Me: "Wood...wood things? What?"

Nick: "You know - that are like loooong sleds?"

Me: "Uh, a toboggan?"

Nick: "YEAH! A big long toboggan so we can all go sledding on it together."

Me: "In our crocheted family snowsuit?"

Nick: "YEAH!"

Me: {thinking that some mother probably tried making something like this back in the 70s} "So if we're all in this snowsuit together, how are we going to fit in the car? How will we buckle our seat belts?"

Nick: "We don't. We'd haveta walk. Or, you know, put it on at the sledding hill, DUH."

Me: "Watch your mouth little man! What if someone has to go potty?" {trying to get him to see the impracticalities of a group crocheted snowsuit}

Nick (shrugs): "We could put a potty in there somewhere."

Will: "Yeah. The potty goes behind you, Mom!"

Me: "Lovely. Just how exactly am I supposed to be able to sit on the toboggan with a potty in my pants?"

Both: "Hee! Potty in your pants!"

Me: "Hee! Potty in my pants!"

Nick: "Or we could just hold it."

Me: "Yeah, I think that's the wiser option."

By this point we're dashing through the puddles in the parking lot. I needed literally FOUR ITEMS.

So I don't need a cart, right?

Moms? NEVER THINK THAT. Just get the damn cart anyway, even if your kids are like 16.

At this point, my kids are still stuck on the idea of the family-sized crocheted snowsuit and I'm cursing Dr. Seuss, who seems in some way responsible.
 Will: "I GET TO GO IN THE MIDDLE!"

Me: {wait, wha???}

Nick: "NO. I DO. It goes by age, dummy. First Mom, then me, THEN you. You're on the end."

Me: "Don't call your brother dummy."

Will: "NOOOOO! We take TURNS in the middle. DUMMY."

We get to the deli counter. The ancient old ladies behind the counter are s l o o o o w w w and unorganized. There also seems to be some disagreement as to just who's turn it is to shave more ham.

Nick: "Nuh uh!"

Will: "Uh huh!"

Nick: "Nuh uh!"

Will: "Uh HUH!"

Nick: "NUH UH!"

Will: "UH HUH!"

Me: "OK, OK! You both get turns being in the middle of the imaginary crocheted family snowsuit! Knock it off!"

After nearly 10 minutes of this I'm still at the deli counter, a bickering kid in each hand, attempting to put distance between them.

Gertie and Dot there, behind the counter, are getting heated. The woman in line in front of me gives up and accepts the .16 pounds of ham that is left, favoring a husband who's possibly irritated over a lunch meat shortage over the insanity that is the argument between my ridiculous children and the plastic-gloved face-slap that's becoming imminent behind the counter.

They ask for my order. My arms are being pulled from their sockets by two little ape children who are now "Uh huh-ing" and "Nuh-uh-ing" over exactly how the pretend family crocheted snowsuit will close - buttons or zippers.

And that's when I heard it. Nick had looped around behind my back and belted his little brother across the face. Because...

Nick: "BUTTONS JUST DON'T MAKE SENSE, MOM!"

Duh.

Quite obviously, I write about my children here a lot.

My youngest, Will, has often been a great source of blog fodder. Time and time and time again. And again. And time again some more and more and more. Seriously, the kid provides me with hours of entertainment daily. I swear he's some old man reincarnated in a small boy's body. He's hilarious and fearless and sometimes just completely strange.

Take for instance his newest request for breakfast.


Mayonnaise on white bread.

Back in the days of learning to use the toaster, Nick, the older boy, found a love for toast with peanut butter and honey. I mean, who doesn't love that, right? Pure awesome. Plus Nick could make it on his own which meant he wanted to eat it for every meal of the day.

Will on the other hand decided that peanut butter and honey toast was not quite unique enough for his tastes. One morning, after hemming and hawing about whether he wanted cereal or a bagel for 10 minutes and me nearly losing my stuffing over the fact that he should just pick something already for the love of Pete he sat upright like he'd had the best idea ever and declared, "I'll have mayonnaise bread!"

Surely, I thought, he wasn't actually going to eat the mayonnaise bread. I thought it'd be one of those things that kids say they want but when they see it on their plate they're all, "Well, I really didn't want that." Except that he ate his "white-on-white open-faced sandwich" happily.

Then asked for it again the next day.

Hey, if we're not dawdling or arguing in the morning? Have at 'er.

I see all these goofy quirks about my son and love every single one of them. I never want him to lose sight of how great it is to be who you truly are - to live life the way that suits you. I never want him to stop saying things like, "That's unbelievable!" or "Holy NUTS!" I never want him to stop being fearless when nose to nose with bees or while at the top of a sledding hill.

I never want him to change, yet I know he will.

One day he'll be in middle school and he'll let some bully make him feel awkward about something and he'll decide to be less of whatever that something is. He'll have a girl in his social studies class that he'll want to impress, so he'll be a little less enthusiastic or outgoing so as to seem cooler. He'll get to high school and decide that maybe the golf team is nerdy and he'd rather go out for football. It breaks my heart to think these things but I know some version of them will be true.

I know that all I can really do is make him feel loved, every day, for being exactly who he is. I can let him know that in my home he's always encouraged to be his silly, quirky, amazingly smart little self.

And hopefully, when he grows up and gets past that high school stage of life, he'll realize that if I loved him for being himself that maybe there's someone else in this world for him that will love him for who he is, too.

And maybe just knowing that will give him the confidence to go back to living life the way he sees fit.

I'm telling this story today because it came up with a friend over lunch the other day and its a great example of the events in my life that have made me the type of person I am. Go ahead, laugh. This shit's funny, too.

In the early 90s, when I was a teenager, my family was poor. Really poor. "Come-home-from-school-not-sure-if-the-lights-will-come-on-when-I-flip-the-switch" poor. "Evicted-from-our-run-down-duplex-in-November-homeless-for-the-holidays" poor.

On New Years Day 1994 the Wisconsin Badgers went to Pasedena to win the Rose Bowl. My three brothers, my mom and I were finally back together under our own roof, in a new run down duplex. I remember we all slept on the living room floor that first night, and I remember lying there in the dark with my family, hearing the neighbors cheer as the Badgers clinched the win.

Sometime that year my mom got a job working for what was then called Midwest Express Airlines. Circumstances required her to take whatever job she could get, which meant my 5'6" skinny little thing of a mom was working outside in the Midwestern winter, loading and unloading luggage from planes. NOT easy by any means.

One of the perks of working for the airline, however, was that each year, she and each of her family members would receive one free standby ticket to anywhere Midwest flew. This meant that for the first time EVER, each of us kids would get to fly in an airplane.

I'm fairly certain that was her motivation behind that first trip. The idea that not only could she actually take her kids on a vacation but that we could fly there, too. Because she started in the fall, the trip was hastily planned, and in January 1994 the five of us flew to Washington, DC.

From touch down to take-off, we were there for 26 1/2 hours.

The only things I remember from that DC trip were
1) having a homeless man in the subway call me by name (which he and everyone else could clearly read on the front of my varsity letter jacket) and
2) the only place/thing/landmark we saw was whatever Smithsonian museum has rows and rows and rows of old dresses from presidents wives and such. No monuments. No White House. No historic anythings.

Let me pause here so that you may realize that my mother drug four kids, three of whom were boys, aged 6-16, to the airport, through the airport, from the airport to the hotel (I have NO memory of how that happened, btw), from the hotel to the subway, navigated the subway, got us lost on the subway, got harrassed by homeless men calling me by name on the subway, to the Smithsonian. And not the good one with the dinosaurs and the giant diamond but the shitty Smithsonian with nothing but dresses, only to go back to the hotel via the subway (on which we got lost AGAIN) to go to sleep, get up in the morning and go back to the airport and head back home. Oh, and we of course couldn't afford to park at the airport so we'd taken the city bus. Five people. With luggage. On the bus. The routes of which, let me tell you, my mother navigated no more savvily than the Washington DC subway system, meaning that we took a bus we weren't meant to take and ended up standing in the cold in downtown Milwaukee in front of a bar for 45 minutes waiting for a connecting bus to pick us up and take us closer to our home. Because that first bus had been the wrong one, this meant the stop we eventually got off on was a half mile from our house. Imagine us wheeling our hand-me-down luggage and toting our school backpacks full of clothes in the winter cold. I shudder to think of how pleasant we must have sounded.

We should have just stayed home.

The second trip was a little better. The following summer my mom saved her pennies to take us where every mother worth half their weight in salt wants to take their families to prove they're good parents -- Disney Land. I'm guessing the only reason we went to California and not Florida was probably because Midwest flew to LA and not Orlando. It might just as easily have been because my mom thought it sounded cooler. Whichever.

Prior to the stint working for Midwest, my mom worked for a rental car company at the same airport. This time we were staying for a week and mom was going to work her connections to get us a rental car. A friend of hers worked out a deal that she pay for the lowest cost rental (a Geo Metro) and we'd get a free upgrade. Sweet!

Only the message about the upgrade sorta didn't make it to LA.

This meant that five people, each with a week's worth of luggage, had to cram into a hatchback smaller than a twin sized bed. And then my directionally-challenged mother drove us through LA.


 I don't think I have to tell you we got lost.

But Disney Land! We were going to Disney Land!

Except when your kids are sorta spread far apart in age you can imagine that the younger ones are going to love it oh-so-much-more than the older ones.

I was 16 and one of my brothers 15. The younger two were 8 and 6. This meant that while the older two of us wanted Space Mountain and Not Disney Land, the younger two wanted tea cups and Pirates of the Carribean before it was Pirates of the Carribean circa the awesome Johnny Depp years.

Pretty much all I remember of the Magical Kingdom was tears and frustration. And chasing down Chip and Dale for autographs to make my baby brother happy.

And oh God - the day my mom decided to take us to see the ocean? Lost. In standstill traffic. With motorcyclists whizzing by between the lanes of cars. Mom swearing. Screaming, "WHAT IN THE HELL THAT IS JUST SOOOO DANGEROUS!!!" Little brothers crying. Me asking how we could possibly not find the ocean. My "just drive west" directions not appreciated.

And another day "checking out" Hollywood Boulevard. I took many pictures of stars on the sidewalk. I remember going into a scary-looking candy store and seeing the Capitol Records building from afar. And that's about it. I'm surprised we weren't all maimed or mugged or forced into prostitution.

The best part of that trip? The crappy hotel pool.



I remember all four of us splashing about in a pool not completely unlike the ones outside cheap hotels in the Dells (much like this one). I could swim then lounge on a deck chair with a book while my youngest brothers jumped in 1,000 times with their Donald Duck floaties and my third brother sulked around like a sullen teenage boy. It made us all happy and it was free.

So yes, the family vacations my mother worked so hard for were pretty much a bust. Its not lost on me just how many hours she must have had to work in the cold and snow to be able to do something like that for us, even with free airfare and car rental deals.

Parts of those occassions are funny to me now, looking back. But it taught me that the best of intentions as a parent sometimes don't work out the way you want them to. You may mean well and even believe you're providing your family with something very special and meaningful. But if you have to drag your kids kicking and screaming or are going to lose your sanity in the midst of providing that super awesome cool thing? Its probably not worth it.

Cuz the damned kids are gonna pretty much just love the crappy hotel pool anyway, and you certainly don't have to travel 1700 miles for that.