it’s not about you

via sfgate.com.

Jane Hambleton has dubbed herself the “meanest mom on the planet.”
After finding alcohol in her son’s car, she decided to sell the car and share her 19-year-old’s misdeed with everyone — by placing an ad in the local newspaper.

The ad reads: “OLDS 1999 Intrigue. Totally uncool parents who obviously don’t love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for three weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under front seat. $3,700/offer. Call meanest mom on the planet.”

Hambleton has heard from people besides interested buyers since recently placing the ad in The Des Moines Register.

The 48-year-old from Fort Dodge says she has fielded more than 70 telephone calls from emergency room technicians, nurses, school counselors and even a Georgia man who wanted to congratulate her.

“The ad cost a fortune, but you know what? I’m telling people what happened here,” Hambleton says. “I’m not just gonna put the car for resale when there’s nothing wrong with it, except the driver made a dumb decision.

“It’s overwhelming the number of calls I’ve gotten from people saying ‘Thank you, it’s nice to see a responsible parent.’ So far there are no calls from anyone saying, ‘You’re really strict. You’re real overboard, lady.’”

The only critic is her son, who Hambleton says is “very, very unhappy” with the ad and claims the alcohol was left by a passenger.

Hambleton believes her son but has decided mercy isn’t the best policy in this case. She says she set two rules when she bought the car at Thanksgiving: No booze, and always keep it locked.

The car has been sold, but Hambleton says she will continue the ad for another week — just for the feedback.

On Barack and Hillary:

But what worries me is that he is seen as unifying by his race while she is seen as divisive by her sex.

What worries me is that she is accused of “playing the gender card” when citing the old boys’ club, while he is seen as unifying by citing civil rights confrontations.

What worries me is that male Iowa voters were seen as gender-free when supporting their own, while female voters were seen as biased if they did and disloyal if they didn’t.

What worries me is that reporters ignore Mr. Obama’s dependence on the old — for instance, the frequent campaign comparisons to John F. Kennedy — while not challenging the slander that her progressive policies are part of the Washington status quo.

What worries me is that some women, perhaps especially younger ones, hope to deny or escape the sexual caste system; thus Iowa women over 50 and 60, who disproportionately supported Senator Clinton, proved once again that women are the one group that grows more radical with age.

Gloria Steinem on why “Woman Are Never Front-Runners” via the New York Times.

So why is the sex barrier not taken as seriously as the racial one? The reasons are as pervasive as the air we breathe: because sexism is still confused with nature as racism once was; because anything that affects males is seen as more serious than anything that affects “only” the female half of the human race; because children are still raised mostly by women (to put it mildly) so men especially tend to feel they are regressing to childhood when dealing with a powerful woman; because racism stereotyped black men as more “masculine” for so long that some white men find their presence to be masculinity-affirming (as long as there aren’t too many of them); and because there is still no “right” way to be a woman in public power without being considered a you-know-what.

And I’m mostly better. And on the bright side, I’ve lost eight pounds. While it’s not my diet of choice, hey. It’s the new year. I’ll take it. I’m now back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. And also on the bright side, after taking off two days of work and quarantining me in the bedroom for four days, and accidentally dropping the entire pot of tortellini into the sink, knocking over the strainer and watching ALL but a few pieces of the tortellini go right down the drain, Joshua will never again come home and wonder what I’ve been doing all day.

“How do you do this?” he asked me. “Every day?”

I just laughed. Maniacally, I laughed. At him, too. I hear the tortellini was good.

And in Death Wish news, while closing the door to the flat this morning on my way to take Judah to preschool, Killian fell down the first set of brick stairs in our stairwell. He walked right off - didn’t even pause. I tried to grab him, but my fingers only grazed his hoodie. The kid totally flipped head over heels. He went down face first, his head hitting about the middle step and his body cartwheeled right over him, landing legs-and-butt-first on the landing, before the rest of him came to a stop. Amazingly enough, I think his momentum kept his head from hitting too hard. And as far as I call tell, his only injuries are three bloodied knuckles.

I’ve checked him over, head to toe, and while he’s clingy and quiet, I think he’s OK. He didn’t get dragged down any of the steps and I don’t see any bumps or bruises. He cried more out of shock and fear than from injury. Of course, Judah completely freaked out and started crying, too. The girl loves her brother.

That must be one of the worst feelings in life: watching your baby take a bad fall and only being able to watch helplessly from the sidelines. Brent, am I a bad parent if I deny him a skateboard??? I mean, he hasn’t even ASKED yet.

Also, today’s is my mom’s birthday. She would have been 57 years old. Happy Birthday, Momma.

Thought you might want to know.

I’ve been in bed for four days. Joshua has taken two days off of work. I’d like to feel better now, if that’s all right.

Yesterday evening, right before Joshua got home, I had nursed Killian on the couch, and when he was done, he got down and toddled off toward the kids’ room where Judah was playing. I took a moment to drop and close all the mini-blinds in the two front rooms and then followed him back. Guess where he was when I got there?

IN THE TOP BUNK. PLAYING WITH JUDAH.

I totally freaked out. I asked Judah if he got up there by himself and she said no, that she had HELPED him! She knows he’s not allowed to climb the ladder and usually, she lets me know if he’s ever making a break for it. We don’t even allow her to be in the top bunk when he’s around so he won’t want up there as well and be tempted to try. I’m wondering if she went up behind him or pulled him up to the bunk once she was already up (freaky thought for both of them, that way), though I don’t think I can bring myself to ask. I made them both get down and then Judah and I had a talk about how dangerous it is for him to be up there and that if he fell he could get seriously hurt, and that he could even die. To make it worse, the entire floor was strewn with every block they own. That’s not exactly a soft landing pad.

Scary!

We have got to be vigilant with that one, Killian. During the Christmas break, I went to get a haircut and while I was gone, with our entire family at our house, Killian dragged a dining chair over to the Christmas tree, got on it, leaned over to mess with the tree and fell headfirst through the tree to the floor. Once, strapped into his booster seat in the kitchen, while I was cooking dinner, Judah opened the fridge to get something out, and Killian grabbed the handle. When Judah closed the fridge, Killian refused to let go of the handle, and fell over, in his booster in the chair, sideways. Thankfully, his arm that was holding the handle, dragged down the side of the fridge, and in doing so, prevented his head from smacking the floor. We have since put his booster into a sturdier chair.

He’s the climber, and the getting-into-everything boy, the one who sticks his hands in the toilet and tries to breathe his bathwater and climbs on the windows and the bookcase and the dresser and the coffee table and the open dishwasher and stands on the rocking chair and sticks his fingers in the outlets and things in his mouth and boy are we ever in trouble with that one.

Every day that goes by that doesn’t send us to the ER, I’m going to consider a good day.

Right before I went to bed last night I started feeling kind of funny. I woke up this morning not feeling so great at all. I was (and still am) achy, weak, sweaty, nauseous, you name it. Joshua stayed home to take care of the kids and I have pretty much slept all day. I think I picked up whatever Andrew got the day after Christmas. My whole body just hurts and I feel kind of seasick. It almost feels like the first trimester of a pregnancy, having no energy and just trying not to throw up, except that I’m not pregnant. Really. NOT PREGNANT. Don’t get excited.

I tried getting up and getting ready, only to go back to bed shortly after 8 a.m. I slept off and on til noon, when Joshua brought me some soup. I was awake for a couple of hours, and then slept hard again until after five. Joshua came in the bedroom to ask me if I wanted dinner and I told him I had no idea that I could sleep that much. He said, “Oh, I knew you had it in you.”

He’s probably right.

Wednesday, when I dropped Judah off at her preschool, one of the other moms said to me as we were leaving, “You look like you’re getting some rest these days.” I must have looked pretty haggard before, but I thanked her for the compliment. At this rate, I should be glowing by Sunday.

Anyone want to come over and take care of me?

Yesterday, Judah had a REALLY rough day. I’m not exactly sure what was going on with her, but everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING, was sending her into fits of angry tears.

I picked her up from preschool yesterday, and usually, all the children are sitting on the front steps together singing a song while waiting for all the parents to arrive. When I walked up, I couldn’t see Judah, who is usually right in the middle of everyone with a huge grin on her face.

I heard her call my name but I couldn’t see her and I thought maybe something had happened. Her teachers told me that she refused to put her shoes on and that she was still inside, and that they weren’t making a big deal out of it. Confused, I went upstairs to see what was going on when Judah melted down. Apparently she didn’t want to leave her first day back to preschool. Which doesn’t surprise me, because when I dropped her off that morning, she wouldn’t even give me hugs and kisses good-bye. I think she’s four going on fourteen.

When we got home, all the way through lunch and afterward, it was the same thing. Everything sent her over the edge. I kept sending her to her room and making her sit in my comfy chair until she would calm down, only to have her melt down all over again at the next injustice of the world - Killian wanting to do what HE wanted and not what SHE wanted.

I finally made her go lie down on my bed and gave her an afghan as some covers, which, of course, she immediately threw on the floor to spite me. She screamed at me for about 20 minutes through the door, and when she finally calmed down, I went in to talk to her. I tried to ask her what was going on and why so was crying and so upset. She kept saying she just wanted to play, or just wanted to read that book, or whatever, and I told her I didn’t understand why she was crying about it all.

After a while, I told her I wanted to her lie down on my bed and rest, and maybe take a nap, and that while she did it, I wanted her to talk to Jesus and tell him how she was feeling and ask him to help her have a happy heart.

At that she began to cry again and I asked her what was wrong, and she said she couldn’t talk to Jesus because she couldn’t see the sky. I told her that she could talk to Jesus no matter where she was, and that God was everywhere. She then said that God didn’t live here and so she couldn’t talk to him. I asked her where God lived and she said, whimpering,

“God lives in Texas.”

Classic. Yeah, so I don’t really have a response for that.

So I told her again that I wanted her to talk to God, and she said she didn’t want to. So I said that was fine, and she could lie there and just listen for God to talk to her. At this I left the room and went in the kids’ room to play with Killian. After about 15 or 20 minutes, I heard her calling me. I went in to see what she needed, and she turned to me and said,

“God’s not saying anything to me.”

Judah attends a home-based Spanish immersion preschool two days a week, for those of you that didn’t know. As a result, she has replaced several of her English words with Spanish and now will ONLY use the Spanish version of each word. If I forget and use the English word, I am immediately reprimanded. The list is:

agua
leche
gracias/no, gracias
de nada
por favor
uno
dos
tres
cuatro
cinco
diez
dame besos
dame abrazos

zapatos is a so-so

Her preschool also uses a lot of songs as a teaching and transition method. They have a song they sing when they pick up things to put a space back together, when they transition from indoors to out and vice versa, when they wash their hands, and lot of other songs as well. She is constantly singing in Spanish. Half the time, I have no idea what she is singing - she is learning the way she learned English - by repeating the words she does know, mixed with making up words for the words she can’t remember.

Luckily, I know enough Spanish to be able to converse with her and give her commands and instructions and talk and read to her. And she pretty much knows what I’m saying - lots of pointing and exaggerated displays of motioning helps, too.

Joshua, however… not so much. We’ve purchased Spanish and bilingual books through Scholastic Book Clubs for her and she loves to have us read them to her. It’s always a hoot (yes, i just said “a hoot”) to listen to my husband attempt to read to her in Spanish. He stumbles through each sentence, reading Spanish with a French accent. Which, you know, go figure. I speak what little German I know with a Spanish accent, and I’m sure I’ll do that with my French I’m going to learn, so hey.

Her preschool resumes from Christmas Break, starting tomorrow. That’s the only way I got her to go to bed with no fuss tonight. So if you speak Spanish, and would like to conduct a Spanish-only relationship with her, that’s fine by me. The more reinforcement, the better.

Hasta manana!