On Raising Twins, Part 27

Raising twins is fucking hard.

The other day I remarked to someone--a well-meaning individual who obviously doesn't know me or my family AT ALL--that my children have started attending a nursery school.

"How nice!" he remarked cheerfully. "Now you'll finally be able to relax a little bit!"

I looked at his wide, open eyes and friendly grin, swallowed my bitter bile, and suppressed the true tale like Valtrex does herpes.

"Yeah!" I chirped. "Great!"

What I didn't tell him was that the nursery school is located in a different neighborhood, a dimension of sight, yes plenty, and sound, even more, but no convenient mass transit from my neighborhood. The subway station has not one but two steep staircases, and isn't all that close to the school or my home anyway. I also didn't tell him that, while my children possess the physical heft of four-year-olds, they are developmentally right on target for their age of two and a half, meaning tantrums, and physical acting-out, and lots of it, and it's all very heavy. One needs a stroller to control such children on a journey like that. Except one needs two strollers, because I. HAVE. TWINS.

Notice I didn't say "one needs a double stroller." I shouldn't even have said "one." There is simply no way for a single person to take two such children on a bus by herself. None. It is physically impossible. With two, it's not physically impossible. Just physically unbearable. So, twice a week, the blessed babysitter and I gamely embark on the Quest of Insanity.

Why would I do this, you ask? Because the school is incredible, and because I live in New York City. Have you ever heard the stories about getting your children into a good preschool in New York City? Go ahead, Google it. I'll wait. Got it? Okay. Now, imagine trying to get TWO SPACES IN THE SAME CLASS. If I had to walk them there on my head, I would do it.

But I don't have to do it on my head. I am lucky; I have the bus. The bus, which is just high enough off the ground that it's nearly impossible for a tantruming two-year-old boy, even one the size of a Great Dane, to step up to it smoothly. The bus, which gives us just enough time to pay our fares before lurching off, but not enough time to get our children (hopefully) to a seat while balancing strollers on our forearms. Oh, and on the way back, the walk is uphill.

Come to think, of it, it's all uphill.

The Thin Ice Post

"My boys are scared of the UPS man," I announced one day at lunch.

"Is he black?" asked my black friend.*

"As a matter of fact, he is, but that's not why they're scared of him," I replied.

"Are you sure?"

"Well, they see black people every day in our rather integrated neighborhood. They love the FreshDirect guys, one of whom is black. Oh, and there was the black cop the other day parked on the corner--they were in awe of him and his cop car."

"Plus, don't they have a crush on Sally?" asked my white friend.

"Yeah, they love Sally. They tell me she's a lady with a 'gina."

Sally nodded.

The mystery continued until I got home. Then, the case began to crack when Sage greeted me at the door.

"The P-yous-S man, little bit scary," he told me in earnest. "I don't like his hat."

"He was wearing a big rain hat," the babysitter told me.

The hat! The HAT! Of course.

The next day, we passed some kind of behatted male guard. Who was white.

"Aaaaah! Aaaah! P-yous-S man!" Thyme screamed.

Shortly thereafter, we passed a hat-free black man.

"Is that a UPS man?" I asked them.

"That's not a P-yous-S man. That's a regular man," Sage pointed.

I paused for a moment to breathe the deepest sigh of relief I've breathed since my C-section concluded, and then we were on our way.

*Yes, I'm aware of the inherent irony in writing a racial-awareness post and referring to her as "my black friend," but she's into irony and refers to herself that way.

Of Life and Death

One Friday several weeks ago, I headed over to relieve the babysitter and was greeted at the baby gate by Sage.

"Mama! Mama! I have a bee!"

He articulated "bee" with exaggerated cuteness, grinned profoundly, and then handed me a tiny black beetle-like insect.

Startled, my fingers fumbled, and the "bee" scurried across my hands in a little dance. Sage and Thyme giggled with the delight they usually reserve for my aunt's bichon frise. Sage gently held out his tiny fingers and received the insect with astonishing care. My sons, who routinely kick my C-section scar during diaper changes and bash their skulls into my cheekbones, had fingers of gossamer when it came to this tiny little friend. I put aside my Urban Bitch desire for a hermetically-sealed, germ-free home and allowed The Bee free rein over both my carpet and my children.

The boys played happily with The Bee for a good chunk of time, until we had to venture out for the drive to my parents' house for the weekend. We--at least, I--didn't give the roaming insect another thought, we returned Sunday night, and, Monday morning, we prepped for the sitter's arrival.

Well, you can sort of guess what happened next. Heading through the baby gate, Sage remembered, "Oh, my bee!" and began to look for his friend. We found him, all right--legs up, on his back in the corner, pollinating The Great Flower in the Sky.

"Mama, fix The Bee!" Thyme bellowed. Sage handed me the insect eagerly, patiently waiting for me to revive it.

While I have absolutely no problem discussing penises, 'ginas, potties, pee, and poop with my two-year-olds, I have to say, death really rattles me. At a loss for what to tell them, I mumbled something about Mama needing to bring The Bee upstairs to fix him, hoping they'd forget.

No such luck. That afternoon, meeting me at the baby gate once again, Sage called out, "Mama! Mama fixed The Bee! Can I see it?"

The babysitter and I looked at each other and sighed. "They've been talking about it all day," she informed me. To them, this creature was as real and signficant as a dog or cat. Their first pet. Their first foray into their very own interspecies friendship venture. A contact with nature, with the universe, with life in an unfamiliar, if intriguing, form.

I panicked and did the only thing I could think to do: I lied.

"Listen, boys," I said as I knelt down, looking at their sweet, expectant faces, and trying to smile brightly. "I fixed The Bee, but he had to go home to his family." After some verbal back and forth, this seemed to satisfy them, and they went on to play. For days afterward, they would keep talking about The Bee and how he had to go home to his family. They would ask to see him in the park, and I would tell them that maybe they would.

Ty and I did a later postmortem (pun intended), and discussed how I could have better handled the incident, and age-appropriate ways to explain future such deaths to a two-year-old. "The Bee's all done." "The Bee's gone." "The Bee went to heaven."

I guess I just wanted to continue, as long as possible, the brief, brief moment in a child's life when Mama is magic, her kisses soothe wounds, her medicine makes you better, her food nourishes your hunger, and she injects life where there is none.

Current Statistics

Weight: 124.4 (ok, 124.6 pounds). I.e., holding relatively steady (up .4 pounds since last recorded weigh-in several weeks ago), despite yesterday's mid-afternoon pastry festival. Which, by the way, was worth every calorie. Coconut icing. Coconut. Must be the stress, 'cause it sure isn't the exercise.

Physical status: Showered and dressed, a 50% improvement over yesterday.

Foreign objects on clothes: Mashed-up bits of Trader Joe's "This blueberry walks into a bar..." A marked improvement over yesterday's milk and toddler urine.

Foreign objects on couch: Milk.

Wounds: Scab from toddler scratch on forehead almost gone. Fresh toddler scratch on nose still smarting. Horrible thigh bruise from banging leg into a desk about 40% gone.

Failing at: Home life today--Thyme cried and refused to kiss me out of anger when I told him I had to go do my work. A major fallback from yesterday's failing at work, succeeding at home. In relatively good shape at work today, due to completing a major project way ahead of schedule. Relatively. Other projects still lag, and I won't be able to focus on them due to feeling sad about letting Thyme down.

This is the hardest, hardest balancing act I've ever done. No wonder I'm spent, physically, emotionally, and creatively. I don't care if Jon and Kate cheated on each other with horses; they should both be canonized.

Things to do this year

1. Get DNA test for my twins.

Fresh out of the oven, they looked like two completely different children. Within hours, we started to have trouble telling them apart. It got to the point that we tagged one with a red (non-Kaballah) string when it came time to take off the hospital bracelet. Now, at 2+ years, I'm asked approximately five times a week whether they are identical. It would be nice to know the answer, although it is fun to come up with various different responses, depending on how I feel.

2. Buy new sweatpants.

The babysitter is really, really nice about pretending to ignore the hole in the bum each morning, but one of these days I'll have to take delivery of a UPS package or something. Besides, with two power poopers in her charge, she sees enough rear ends.

3. Go to the dermatologist.

It's time to get an updated quote on how much it would cost to remove all those little red dot things all over my body. And they have free hand cream samples in the waiting room. Plus, skin cancer screening, yada yada yada.

Arabellas everywhere!

Last night I saw Atonement. So as not to spoil too much for anyone who hasn't seen it, all I'll say is, the wicked little girl's play features a character named Arabella!

Then, today...my necklace!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=24247488

And C.S. is BUYING IT FOR ME! Thank you so much, C.S.!

Is this an omen? Do I need to resume writing more seriously?

Melting Shot

Okay, since I finally got a comment on my Marilyn Chambers post (much appreciation directed to my friend at Apathy Lounge), I will now get back to the business of filling in my remaining three readers (one of them is my mom) on what the kids are up to.

Since we at the Trattoria Breve are quite pretentious, we're teaching Sage and Thyme as much as we can about food. We're also teaching them a bit of Italian, but, so far, only the fun words. They know how to both say and pronounce parmigiano, and we recently got them started on extra virgin olive oil. Since they're only half Italian, we have to get the golden green liquid infused into their blood as soon as possible. I just hope it doesn't have the unintended consequence of correcting their adorable version of "Che fa" (loosely translated as, "What are you doing?" or "What do you want?" "Che" is pronounced "kay."). Currently, they say, "Key fa?" And they do it complete with hand gesture--index finger and thumb together, facing up, extended outwards and shaken a few times in rapid succession.

We provided them with some small pieces of ciabatta and their own individual dipping dishes. As I was placing the dipping dishes in front of them, my mind flashed to that Gary Larson "Far Side" (quotes for cartoon names, yes?) cartoon where there's a body on the floor of the kitchen and a puff of smoke or something, alongside an open copy of a book called Recipes for Disaster. Ty was sure the high chairs were going to get a hefty helping of lubrication. We were both pleasantly--and humorously--surprised.

Without batting an eyelash, both boys picked up their little-but-deep Pyrex dipping dishes and proceeded to down the oil in a single gulp. Ty pointed out that they were probably culturally confused; the Italian half embraced the olive oil, but their Anglo half called upon them to do it in shots.

In other news, I'm back on Weight Watchers after 2007's failed attempt. I've lost six pounds and feel significantly better.

I miss my blog.