Archive for December, 2008

Thrown Caution (To Dec. Winds)

Monday, December 29th, 2008

I finished my novel. I mean writing it. Let the editing begin, but I finished it. Four years, two moves, one break-up, one Big Love, one engagement on a rock, one beachy wedding and one baby later, I finished the f*****. I mean, my joy-project. If I wasn’t down with the cold/flu for the second time this holiday season, I’d split a split of more-than-marginal champagne with my husband. Instead, I’m going to limp to the bathroom and hold a towel wide as my husband hands me my son from their bath. I never thought I’d finish it, then bam, right when I’m sick, I do just that. In fact, since I’ve been sick and lying in agony in the king sized bed forever dominating our living room, surrounded by passed-out, blissed-out cats keeping my limbs pinned under the covers, I’ve been living, breathing, dreaming and writing my novel, COMPLETING COMPLETING COMPLETING. I think I’ve gone a little (more) mad. I think I’m happy. I think I need a roasted chicken sandwich from Pit Fire after my son is asleep. Want to know how It ends? It ends on a beach. Happy frikkin New Year! Now back to work.

Food baby
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Ornament Alley

Sunday, December 14th, 2008

Because T’s been walking since he was 11 months old, we’ve modified our Christmas tree this year to fit on top of the piano, the keys of which we encourage him to tinkle as he toddles to and from the living room, the back of which he can’t reach. Yet. S fixated on a live tree from Target. Somehow, it wasn’t until we got it home that we discovered the needles are of the blood-drawing variety. I wore oven mitts to help hang the lights. Tucked in his high chair, T practiced the finger foods thing while S and I decorated, using select ornaments from the Xmas Box due to lack of tree mass.

Brace for favs (it’s late–I’m up–insomnia brought on by getting barfed on by T right before we put him in bed–he won’t throw up in his bed, will he? Jimi Hendrix style? I worry, I worry…Bring on the eggnog…):

Oh! A penguin straight from the Galapagos Isles, delivered by bro and sis-in-law who went Darwinian for a week last year. He’s been sitting on a bathroom shelf just waiting for his first tree hanging (the ornament, not my bro-in-law). Little guy! Little Galapagotic wonder. Galapagos penguins breed three times a year and predators include sharks and fishing nets. I love him. (More eggnog, plzzzz…)

Galapagos Penguin!

My sis-in-law reported disturbing tales of massive Galapagos Islands underfunding and poaching and I hope I am able to litter the sacred volcanic landscape with my footprints before the whole archipelago is completely ravaged and the wildlife poached to extinction, including the Galapagos penguin and the Blue Footed Booby. Which brings me to the seahorse from Bloodsister:

seahorse from bloodsister!

As everyone knows, male seahorses carry the “fry” (babies), possibly 200 fry at a time. Pregnant for two or three weeks. Then intense, color-draining labor. It’s a wonderful world. Enter mousie:

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For an Xmas boutique in Honolulu. I created 5 mice, sold one—to a stately looking woman-psychiatrist the chick in a mumu next to me (selling Xmas leis!!!) knew. I’ve given the other mousies away over the years, but kept this one to remind me, I suppose, of that other life I lived so long ago in the tropics (I could have used that psychiatrist in a big way then). There are, in fact, Boobies on Kaui. I’ve seen them. En masse.

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S and I had known each other barely a year when we picked this up on Martha’s Vineyard. We rode bikes by beaches that made me think of “Jaws” and we hunted for James Taylor in Edgartown. It was post Labor Day. The island was preparing to shut down. The two elderly spinstery ladies who sold us the sailboat ornament said they chopped wood for cash during the no-tourist Winter months. Island life. A far cry from Honolulu. Or the gritty Galapagos. Martha’s Vineyard hosts the little known Red Footed Falcon, which has caused “justifiable excitement” island-wide. The hero in my children’s novel sports the tail of a Great White Shark. Rumless eggnog is still potent, in its quiet way. And now, a final couplet:

To bed, to bed! I leave you with my 71 year old mo-in-law
standing on her head.

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Oh yes—and the tree.
Nighty night—better you than me!
(wait, I take that back)

hallelujah
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Pre-Winter Beach Break

Friday, December 5th, 2008

The day after Thanksgiving the family visited a minus tide at my infamous beach. The light was wild at 4:30p.m.—like stepping into a special world of candlelit glass, water and rocks glossy from the glow, people illuminated dazzlingly one second and with a brief turn in sudden deep silhouette the next. Magic hour. When drama like sister-meltdowns, barfing babies and the death of a family dog in a scant pocket of 24 confusing, emotional hours is simply unimaginable…

When gazing at the horizon is all the thanks you ever need (to give or receive).

Minus tide in SB

Respite.

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Hollywood Called…

Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008

So I asked a teething-related question of one of the younger Drs. Sears on the CBS hit show “The Doctors”, while T expressed himself. On TV. Here we are in a photo, goofy and giddy in Hollywood.

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You can view the clip here:

The Drs. Clip

Truthfully? I have no idea if “The Doctors” is a hit show, only that it’s lasted long enough for our episode to air. That hunky ex-“The Bachelor” doctor hosts and SAYS MY NAME. T enjoyed the sound boom waving over his head during the taping. And everyone was extra nice to him because the sound boom guy and the camera guy had kids too.

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It’s funny how we’re introduced as “via home video”. That’s not my son’s bed we’re sitting on, not our shelves, our books. We’re deep in a labryinthine Hollywood studio, in one of the rooms of a faux house that was so neat and tidy I wanted to move in. Ah, well. Truthfully? Although the studio was fascinating and decorated in Miami glass and the Green Room was stocked in bottled water, bagels and chocolates and furnished like a better-end hotel room, the location was across the street from unpleasant, typical Hollywood grunge.

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That’s it for Hollywood for us—about two seconds of fame. Perhaps 14 minutes and 58 seconds are still waiting for us somewhere. Perhaps T and I will be the first mother-son team to climb some snowy, formidable mountain, or the first to stamp red Mars dust from our special planet-exploring shoes. Hm. Probably not.

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You, too, can be on the CBS hit show “The Doctors”. They need “real people” to ask questions of Dr. Lisa, the gorgeous OB on the show. Apparently she’s very famous in OB circles. I turned down the opportunity to ask her a question via home video in my faux Hollywood living room. Truthfully? I don’t want my 15 minutes of fame to include asking Dr. Lisa questions about my intimate areas. Nor do I want my son to have tape on me when he’s old enough to know the meaning of the word “blackmail”. Say he wants his buds to come over, but doesn’t want to clean his room before they arrive. Ah, but mom, he’ll tell my stipulating self. I’ve got the clip of you and Dr. Liiiiiiisa on my super-compact- nano-granno-spaceage-computer! he’ll say, brandishing the blackmail. One press of my spaceage button, mom, he’ll say, and you’re all over the In. Ter. Net.

Oh, noooooooooo, Dr. Lisa, noooooooo. I won’t be asking.

So goodbye Hollywood! We’re back in the real world of colds, no lipstick and baby food smeared on the duvet.

But it was fun while it lasted.
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