Our First Time Apart

I'm leaving this morning for a conference in Charleston with my favorite colleague so that should be loads of fun. During the day we will be in training for 8 hours, so that might not be a party, BUT, we are free at 5 PM to do whatever we want at night! And we get paid a certain amount for food and incidentals! Yay! Bubba Gump's Shrimp Company here we come!

This will be the first time since Charlie and I met that we will be apart. That first day, June 20, 9 months ago.... we have not been apart for a single night since then. I have left her all day at day care, and with family and babysitters for a few hours here and there. I wonder what it will feel like?

Will I miss her horribly or will I feel free and unencumbered?

And how will she feel? Her grandparents are on their way to babysit for a week. She loves them so much, I kind of doubt she will even notice I'm gone. When they are around, I'm definitely a "second class citizen" around here anyway ;-) I'm interested to see whether she will miss me or not. I kind of hope she doesn't, because I don't want this to be hard on her, but I kind of hope she does, because it would show attachment on her part. Also, who wants to be so replaceable?? Not me!

I'm bringing my computer so I can Skype if she wants to.

Thanks for watching her Opa and Babcia! Have fun!

I'm in a BADDDDDD Mood.

GRRRRR.

Stay outta my way!

I'm cranky, angry. If I could, I would take the world by the scruff of it's neck and SHAKE IT. GRRRR!!!! I would lift my lips and show my sparkling canines and tell the world to eff off.

Which is better than being sad and depressed, but not much.

I don't like Charlie's new teacher. There I said it. Chances she will read this are about one in..... how many blogs are there? A zillion?

She is not warm like Whitney was. She is snotty and has no sense of humor. Although, it appears that C has stopped biting, so I should be grateful for that. And I am. i just wish she was fun and friendly.

When Charlie came home from vacation with beads, she complained to the director that the beads were a choking hazard. Whitney denied this and told me not to take them out until I was ready to take them out. The beads were small, and had large holes in them. Whitney said the state classes she took expressly said they were not chocking hazards and were part of the African American culture.

Ok, whatev. I took them out when they were ready to come out. Only then did the director tell me what the new teacher said about them. I didn't argue I just ok, we won't put beads in her hair again. I asked if the little rubber bands were ok, and the director said yes, "if the kids eat them they'll pass right through."

So yesterday I spent an hour braiding her hair. When I picked her up, her new teacher commented that the elastic bands break. "I found pieces of them all over the floor." She didn't say I shouldn't use them, but she had an annoyed attitude. I counted how many were off: 4. Four rubber bands the size of a dime. "All over the floor"??? Riiiight.

I guess she expected me to undo all the braids that night. Right away. Well, I didn't. I had a hundred other things to do than RE-DO my daughter's hair that I had already spent a lot of time on and gotten express permission from the director to use those rubber bands.

Today when I picked her up, ALL the rubber bands were off. About 20 of them. The teacher wasn't there, she was in someone else's classroom. Am I wrong to be pissed she took them out??? Without asking me??? All that work gone! I bet if she ever had to do braids on a 18 month old she wouldn't have DARED take them out knowing the torture work invigorating challenge that is braids.

So, if I'm not allowed to put in beads, and I'm not allowed to put in rubber bands, how exactly does she expect me to do Charlie's hair? An afro every day???

Doing her hair is part of our bonding time, it's time when I get to take care of her. I enjoy experimenting and learning new ways of doing her hair. I do not want to do an afro everyday.

An afro is for when we don't have time, when we're "uninspired", when we're "lazy", or just to give her hair a break and be totally natural. I like to make her look special and like I cared about her hair.

That's not really why I'm angry though. That's peanuts compared to what REALLY pissed me off. It's work stuff.


Ok, so to counter balance my negativity:
1) I'm grateful Charlie stopped biting in her new classroom.
2) I'm grateful I have a well paid job that is quite secure.

Sometimes I just need to vent and spewing this stuff out into the universe via Internet is strangely satisfying.

Thanks for listening.

Who do you hate today?

My Absence, Charlie's Sick, I think.

Sorry for my slight absence. I've been trying to get annual inspections for work done, end of the month billing done, along with finding childcare for a sick Charlie and rushing home early everyday to care for her.

Actually, she has a fever, but no real other symptoms so I'm not sure this isn't a teething fever (although why that would happen I'm not sure...) but it was quite high for a teething fever (103). Thanks to Motrin, it was controllable for the most part.

I truly know the work/childcare dilemma so many parents lament about. I know it first hand. I was completely torn in two: this is the one day a year I NEED to be at work (people traveled from out of state to be there for the inspections) VS. my sick child. Of course, Charlie won out but it was soooo hard for me to look at my colleagues and tell them I would have to leave int he middle of these annual inspections. They were all gracious (which somehow makes it even worse!) and said we could continue the next day. Which delays everything for them by a day. Because of my sick child. But thank goodness they were as understanding.


I'll be back with some new posts this weekend.

Have you ever had super important work days be preempted by childcare issues? What did you do?

By the time you read this, I may already be...

at work :-(

Let us all.....

hang our heads....

Maternity leave is officially over.

sniff.

PS Charlie is enjoying the next week at home while her grandparents visit. Lucky.

Melancholic...

Today when I woke up it was 60 degrees and totally foggy...

I felt sad.

The end of summer.

It reminds me strongly of the days in my youth when the first hint of coolness in the air meant the fun was over and it was time to head back to school. I still get that feeling, every fall.

Only this time, it's more true since soon I will be heading back to work. I really don't want to go... I've gotten used to my slow paced days (although chasing Charlie around is not "slow" by any definition) and dread returning. I will miss my time with Charlie, but mostly I will miss not having to be anywhere at any given time, being able to plan my day as I see fit, drinking coffee until 11 AM and staying in my PJs until I start feeling guilty.

I do miss the adult conversation and my colleagues, but I don't really miss the concept of "work".
I know some women who would go nuts without their careers, but I'm not one of them! I could find a hundred things to do in a day that I rather spend my time on than working. I'd rather go antiquing, go to the matinee, go out to lunch with girlfriends, go to the park with Charlie, take the dogs out, travel, work in the garden, read, read, read... watch T.V.

Ok, that last one isn't that great. But the rest are!

We only get one life and to spend 40 hours a week working seems like an awful lot to me.

On the other hand, these past 3 months of leave have been unpaid, and I'm getting nervous watching my bank account dwindle. Of course I knew this time off would eat into my savings, but watching it happen is scary.

Also, I am not taking into consideration most of the rest of the globe, who work way more than that just to survive, plowing fields, doing hard manual labor, carrying water in a bucket on their head 5 miles back to the hut. I need to be grateful I *ONLY* have to work 40 hours at a cushy desk job that pays me well and takes care of me and Charlie.

Still, I have that melancholic feeling of the end of summer...

Blech.


Photo credit to Andre Kertesz: "Melancholic Tulip".

The Sin of Our Generation

"I believe that this could very well be looked back on as the sin of our generation. I look at my parents and ask, where were they during the civil rights movement? I look at my grandparents and ask, what were they doing when the holocaust in Europe was occurring with regard to the Jews, and why didn't they speak up? And when we think of our great, great, great-grandparents, we think how could they have sat by and allowed slavery to exist? And I believe that our children and their children, 40 or 50 years from now, are going to ask me, what did you do while 40 million children became orphans in Africa?"--Rich Stearns, President of World Vision

Home Study

12-11-2008

Today the social worker from the adoption agency drove 2 hours to my house, arriving at 9 am to do my home study. This home study will eventually be presented to an Ethiopian judge and he will decide based on it's contents whether I am fit to parent one of their country's own. I thought it went well. The dogs were calm, the house was clean and looking great (I'd been mopping and dusting and putting out Christmas decorations for days!) I was able to answer all her questions honestly and I think being a social worker also helped us bond over something. She and I both had 3 cups of coffee, but she didn't touch the butter muffins I had bought for her. I wasn't really nervous, I feel this is meant to be. I also think God wants this to happen also because He seems to be smoothing the way. Little things, like finding a parking spot immediately in front of the court house (while it poured torrential rain) when I needed to get my fingerprints done; or bigger things like leading me to this smaller agency (which seems to be very ethical and faster but lesser known than the big agencies), all seem to be His handiwork. I'm becoming more of a believer than before... there is a sense that God already knows my family to be, and I just need to do the footwork to allow them in. Although I'm anxious, I'm not worried. The social worker asked me questions about my family history, my views on parenting (discipline, when I will tell my daughter she was adopted and how, my views on trans racial adoption and being a "conspicuous family", how would I integrate Ethiopian culture into my daughter's life, etc.) I told her I would tell my daughter age appropriately that she was adopted, perhaps explaining that 'mommy went across the ocean to pick you up' and how special that makes her at a young age, and then explain more as she got older. I also told her I don't believe in spanking, and that positive reinforcement seemed to work very well with my dogs (but not to put that in the home study!) She laughed and agreed that there were similarities. I told her I had researched attachment parenting and planned to follow the philosophy. She was pleased to hear that and explained that although the babies in their Ethiopian house are well cared for and sleep with their nannies, there will be some attachment work that needs to be done regardless. I told her I was planning on starting a Meetup.com group for African adoptions as there isn't one in my town yet, as well as listening to ET music, having ET art in the house, and learning to cook *wat* and *injera* (the bread made from their primary grain teff).She took a tour of the house and complimented me on my multicultural decorating style which I told her came from having grown up all over the world. She left after about 2 hours and I immediately called my parents who were waiting to hear how it went. She said she would have the home study written up before I left for the holidays on December 20th so I could review it and make any edits.