Fa la la la la. Where are the freakin’ flamingos?
December 23, 2009
Hi! Hey! How are all of you?
We’re doing better here, adjusting and healing and refraining from killing each other a solid 90% of the time. In particular, Aura has been a real trooper, exhibiting surprisingly massive amounts of patience while I help my mother get around. We had to change up the holiday plans a bit, but we’re trying to squeeze in stuff too important and photo-friendly for her to miss, such as cookie baking and the annual peppermint-stick-ice-cream run. Basically, anything that will propel her along the rocky yet delicious road to childhood obesity.
Apparently, making peppermint bark was one tradition we could have skipped. It seems to inspire surliness.
Oh, and Zoo Lights, our local zoo’s holiday extravaganza. Actually, much like the sad little budget-strapped zoo itself, the event is perpetually shabby and downtrodden. Yet it is this consistency that makes it so much of a tradition. When you know ahead of time that at least half of the light displays will be burnt out and the giant inflatable snow globes will be malfunctioning, you can hand over your $5 cheerily, your expectations so low that they can never be squashed. Also, Zoo Lights is an excellent time to wear fake fur. TOTALLY freaks out the downy reindeer babies with whom you can pose for another five bucks.
All that being said, it might have been wise for Mommy to check the temperature outside before we headed for the zoo. Turns out maybe our expectations could have been a little lower, if only they hadn’t been completely and utterly frozen like the rest of our bodies. Seriously, nothing mars a Zoo Lights experience like 10 degrees. And it was as if only irrational anger could warm me enough to survive. As we raced by the empty outdoor animal exhibits, I became furious that the ANIMALS were not there but instead undoubtedly warm in their little ANIMAL BEDS AND CAVES AND NESTS and whatnot. Whenever we were able to duck into a building where animals were cozily ensconced behind glass, it was all I could do not to kick the windows. And they KNEW it. The lemurs practically snickered when we stopped to look at them, their sneers eerily reflected by the half-lit snowman behind us. Also, Adam swears he heard a river otter chuckle. Truth be told, I wouldn’t put it past them. They’re smarmy little suckers, those otters.
The saving grace, in Aura’s opinion, was the rides.
I’m a little fuzzy on why there are rides at Zoo Lights, but there they are. Four, to be exact: A merry-go-round made up of strange bedfellows (witness demonic bunny above), a rickety train, mini-motorcycles, and a preschooler-size Tilt-a-Whirl. After taking a spin on the Bunny from Hell, Aura decided it was time for the Tilt-a-Whirl. Since even squinting at any ride that rotates makes Adam nauseous, I was nominated to be Aura’s ridemate.
Let me tell you: There is NOTHING more fun than whirling around and around and then around again in ten-degree weather in the world’s smallest ride car, except perhaps having your fingernails removed, or waterboarding. Yet I laughed, because Aura was laughing, her princess-gloved hands spinning the wheel at warp speed. And a short time later, when I threw up discreetly behind an unfortunate three-legged Rudolph, I still thought it was all worth it.
Brief Life Interruption
December 15, 2009
Life has recently become…insane. Let’s see: A mother with a just-broken hip, two months of her rehab at our place, another cold (Aura), and another inner-ear infection (moi; remind me never to blog about an illness ever again, since apparently Fate feels compelled to snicker and re-infect me). I’ll be back soon, once I get more than four hours of sleep and take a break from my increasingly detailed plan to murder my mother’s also newly moved cat. (Hint: He meets a bad end by both hot oil and flames. It’s positively medieval, I tell you.)
I was walking Aura into preschool (or as I prefer to think of it, Two-and-a-Half Hours of Heaven) the other morning when the director popped out of her office to say hello to the children entering the building.
“Good morning, Evan!” she called. “How are you?”
Evan said he was good.
“Good morning, Madison!” she said next. “And how are you?”
Not surprisingly, Madison was also good.
We were up next. ”Good morning, Aura!” The director smiled. “How are you this morning?”
“I’m well!” chirped Aura.
The director’s face momentarily contorted in confusion. Then she beamed with understanding. “Oh!” she said. “You’re wow? Well, isn’t that great?”
I leaned in, aiming for what I hope came across as a conspiratorial tone and not a creepy-stage-mother tone. “No,” I explained. “She’s well.”
“Ah,” the director replied. “Of course!” Then she disappeared into her office. And maybe she closed the door.
Okay. Get the eye-rolling and derisive snorts out of your system. Go ahead. I’ll wait. (As long as you snort well. I don’t suffer readers who snort good.)
Needless to say, neither does Aura. It makes her kind of lip-curly.
Now that you’re done, I’d like to hop up on my Grammar Soapbox for just a sec. Yes, I was an English major in college. Yes, I am a writer by trade. And yes, perhaps I am the teeniest bit compulsive about my child speaking correctly. But I ask you: So what? Didn’t we just finish up eight years of making fun of a president who couldn’t conjugate his way out of a paper bag? Doesn’t the rash of best-selling books and popular Web sites about proper punctuation tell us anything?
Now I’m not saying I’m perfect. (I mean, I am. But it seems immodest to admit that here.) However, I see absolutely nothing wrong with trying to raise children to speak correctly, even if they do it while behaving like cretins most of the time. Once in a while, it feels…nice to use a word with its original definition in mind, instead of some modern mixed-meaning bastardization. Even the loudest snorter among you has to agree that there is something adorably impressive in hearing a child say difficult instead of hard, or entire instead of whole, in a sweet, reedy little voice.
As you can see, fishing in a tutu is difficult. Especially with an entire pool of fish to catch.
Don’t even get me started on yeah. While it doesn’t bother me in the least to hear an adult say yeah, hearing my 40-inch angel say it makes me kind of mildly homicidal. I can’t offer an eloquent explanation for this. I think my aggravation stems from the fact that English is often so dumbed down, so lowest-common-denominatorish. Kids growing up today don’t have a freakin’ chance. Look at that damn Dora the Explorer. I want to launch myself across the living room and strangle that navel-baring, animal-befriending little bugger every time she yells yeah, which is an average of 67 times per episode, if I’m not mistaken. (Perfect people rarely are, you know.)
And so Aura says she’s “well” when asked her current condition. She’s been trained in other adverbs, too, though the -ly rule and its exceptions can be tricky devils, often resulting in directives to “Run fastly, Mommy!” But then recently, when I did a particularly admirable job answering her pop quiz on Santa Claus and the snacks that must be left for him on Christmas Eve, she told me I was correct, not right. I tell you, she got the BIGGEST cookie. It was like each and every one of those chocolate chips was a testament to our shared appreciation for the literal.
Well, then. The bulk of this post is complete. So let me share the conversation Adam and I had last night.
Adam: Want to order a pizza tonight?
Kate: YEAH!
Adam: Onions, peppers, broccoli?
Kate: RIGHT!
Adam: I’m so hungry that I think I might…
Kate: …eat the WHOLE thing!
Man. This language thing is hard.
