Hi there! I’m sick. How are you?
The fever makes the words move when I’m not looking. They run off the page and go screebling up the walls like Martians. So, until I get my marbles back, here are a few pictures from our Vineyard vacation.
If you click a thumbnail image, it will take you to a larger view of the photo. You can leave general comments here, but I think you can also leave comments on the individual photo pages if you so desire.
Enjoy!
It must have been around 1999 when we took Annie and Ben and Lisa over to Martha’s Vineyard for the day. We bopped around Vineyard Haven for a little while, then took a cab to Oak Bluffs to ride the carousel.
The Flying Horses Carousel has been in operation since the late 1800s. It claims to be the oldest operating platform carousel in the nation, but I’ve noticed that they all claim that. I wasn’t around then, so I can’t say. The important thing is that Sarah had been riding the Flying Horses since she was a little girl.
This is the first carousel that I had ever ridden that included a ring grab. The ring machine arm is in easy reach. You can grab ring after ring, but they’re all steel. Towards the end of the ride, the operator puts the one and only brass ring into the chute, and one lucky rider grabs it and gets a free ride.
Native Islanders have perfected the multiple grab technique. I once saw Jeremy get six rings on one pass. Sarah was no slouch, either, but she had never caught the brass ring… until that day. She whooped with laughter and held it up. I think Ben took a picture. We all filed off the carousel, but she stayed on to collect her free ride with the next group of riders.
Under the cover of the crowd, I went to the concession stand and bought a souvenir brass ring, with a purple ribbon (her favorite color, of course). By the time she was off the ride, I had hidden it safely away in my pocket.
On the ferry ride home, we rode right up front in the bow of the boat. She noticed the tears in my eyes and asked me what was wrong.
“Nothing; I’m just so happy.” She started to tear up too, and gave me a big hug. I said, “I feel as if I’m the one who caught the brass ring. I’m so lucky to have found you.” Then I pulled the crumpled paper bag out of my pocket. “I bought you a present…”
The summer that Nate turned one, the weather was brutally hot. We took him to the mall fairly often, to escape the heat in their air conditioning. The food court had a big, fancy carousel, and after one of our lunches, I suggested that we take Nate on it. “No,” said Sarah. “I want his first carousel ride to be the Flying Horses.” Sure enough, it was; later that summer, we sailed over, and she took him on his first ride. He wasn’t sure what to make of it all, being so young, but he didn’t seem to mind.
Last month, my mother and I rented a house on the Vineyard for a week. It was her first time there, and I was overjoyed to be playing tour guide once more. Early in the week, we spent the day in Oak Bluffs, and of course, we had to ride the Flying Horses.
“Nate, do you remember the Flying Horses?”
“No…”
“This is the first carousel you ever rode. Your mama took you when you were just one.”
At first, he wanted an outside horse, but the inside horses are lower and much less scary, so we switched to an inside horse. I belted him in, and pointed out the ring machine. I wasn’t sure he would be able to manage it, but I held him tight, and by durn if he didn’t get a ring every time around. I was so proud as he stacked them up, six, seven, and ah, God, Sarah should have been here for this. I hid my tears from him as best I could, but he felt me sobbing. “Why are you laughing, daddy?”
“Because I’m so happy! You’re doing a great job.”
Usually I let him see me cry, but I didn’t want to spoil his moment. I managed to wipe my eyes with my shirt and put on a smile, just before he turned to show me what he had in his hand.
The brass ring.
It was almost midnight on Christmas Eve, 2002. Sarah and I were at her parents’ house. The party was over, and I had eaten far too many cookies, as usual. I was lying on the floor like a beached whale, watching the end of Holiday Inn, also as usual.
When the movie ended, we made up the pull-out couch in the office and crawled in. I snuggled close and wrapped my arm around her. I whispered in her ear, “Merry Christmas, honey.”
Then my eyes snapped open. “Oh, my God. You’re pregnant!”
“Now, honey,” she said. “Even if I am, it’s too early to tell. And it might take us a while. I don’t want you to get your hopes up.” But I just knew.
A few days later, we went to CVS to buy a pregnancy test. I picked up a single pack. Sarah said, “They’re cheaper if you buy three.”
I smiled. “We don’t need three. We don’t even need one. I already know you’re pregnant.” She laughed, and we bought the single pack.
Seven months later, and she was as big as a house. We were going sailing with Sarah’s parents. We were in the dinghy, on our way out to the boat, when I was struck by the same cosmic lightning that had hit me on Christmas Eve. “We’re having a girl,” I said.
Sarah turned and looked at me. She peered into my eyes.
“Baloney,” she said.
Happy birthday, Nathaniel.
The latest craze at day care: Perler Beads. They’re just the right size to fit up Nate’s nose, but aside from that, they’re actually pretty cool. They are little plastic beads that come in all different colors. You arrange them on a pegboard in pretty patterns (or completely at random, if you’re Nate). Then you cover them with wax paper and heat them with an iron. They melt a bit, fuse together, and presto, you’ve got a nice little suncatcher or what-have-you. Just hit the link above if you’re having trouble visualizing it. The kids love them, and they are super good for honing fine motor control.
Anyway, the day care center’s petty cash has been a bit low lately, so I’ve been subsidizing vast quantities of Perler Beads for Nate’s classroom. On our most recent trip to the crafts store, Nate asked if we could get some for our house. Why not? They’re cheap. We got the basic bucket starter kit, complete with simple geometric shape pegboards.
As soon as we got home from the store, he was frantic to try them out. I set him up with a cup of beads and a heart-shaped pegboard. He quickly put beads around the perimeter and asked me to iron them. Down to the basement I went, pleased that I knew exactly where the iron was, even though I had never used it. And that brings me to the title of this post, because I have a question for Sarah:
What in hell is this gunk on the iron?
Please don’t tell me you actually tried to use it to make a grilled cheese sandwich. I was totally kidding when I suggested that.
Scene: Nate’s bedroom. Nate is playing with his cars. Dad is unsuccessfully trying to get Nate to put his pajamas on.
Nate: Hey daddy, do you know what (unintelligible) is?
Dad: Um, what? Do I know what what is?
Nate: (unintelligible)! Do you know what (unintelligible) is?
Dad: Did you say Hannah Montana? Do I know what Hannah Montana is?
Nate: No! Not Hannah Montana! I’ll just tell you. It’s pink.
Dad: What’s pink?
Nate: (unintelligible)!
Dad: Okay, it’s pink. But what is it?
Nate (shouting): It’s pink!
Dad begins to laugh uncontrollably.
Nate: Oh, wait a minute, I forgot. It’s not pink.
I finally figured out that he was saying (or trying to say) anaranjado, which is (apparently) the Spanish word for the color orange. Ah well, I expect his pronunciation is better than mine is.
Nate has been really into saying “no” the past couple of months. If I ask him to do something, he can’t help but violently oppose it, no matter how much he might actually want to do it. This is frustrating to both of us, although I must admit to taking a perverse delight in occasionally interrupting a tantrum to tell him that I think he should have dessert. The horrified look in his eyes as he hears himself screaming NOOO is simply delicious.
The parenting books call it “asserting one’s individuality,” but I have my own private (and less socially acceptable) name for it. A perfectly normal stage of development, but we’ve been screaming at each other a bit more than I would like, these days.
Nate spent the other night at Jennifer’s house, so I could go out with some friends after work. On my way home, I stopped to get my hair cut. I sat in the chair, and the stylist put a neck strip and cutting cape on me, to keep the trimmings out of my clothes. This particular cutting cape was brown: an important detail, as we shall see.
Snip snip, buzz buzz, and then she asked me to look down, so she could work on the back of my neck. I looked down and recoiled in horror; the trimmings in my lap were pure white. I remembered seeing brown hair in the mirror when I combed it that morning. Clearly, all my hair had turned white during the day, and no one had told me. I kept my head angled down, because I didn’t really want any scalp lacerations, but I peered up at the mirror to see my newly white hair.
The neck strip was pretty tight, and with my head bent down, I saw that I had an enormous double chin. Good grief, white hair and heavily overweight? I suddenly looked 20 years older. Or ten years older, if I don’t lay off the Oreos.
When she was done cutting, I lifted my head up, and my appearance was back to normal. It took me another day or so to figure out that the lapful of white hair was due to the fact that I couldn’t see my brown hair against the brown cutting cape.
When I was a kid, my mom gave me the classic mother’s curse: “I hope you have a kid just like you.” I took her seriously. I didn’t think I’d ever want to have kids, but I realized that I might, and with that realization came another, more sobering one: I would be an adult someday. I vowed to myself that I would never, ever forget what it was like to be a kid.
On my way home from my foray into the future at Supercuts, it all came slamming back. I’ve forgotten a lot, but I suddenly remembered, with perfect clarity, the searing frustration of being a small child. I felt as if I had absolutely no control over anything.
Now that I’m a parent, my childhood memories are valuable intel: an insight into the mind of my own child. Control is like crack to a little kid. And the easiest way for Nate to exert control over a situation is to say no. He knows I can’t force him to eat, or use the toilet, or go to sleep. And the more I want him to do something, the more he enjoys saying no.
The answer hit me like a ton of bricks: Let the Wookiee win. It won’t hurt him to skip a meal, or stay up late once in a while.
It worked like a charm. The hourly fights have tapered off to the occasional tantrum every few days. He was confused at first. He asked how much dinner he would have to eat in order to earn dessert, and I told him, “Just eat as much as you want.” Now, we decide before dinner whether or not there will be dessert, purely on my whim. We average dessert two nights a week. He can skip dinner and go straight to dessert if he wants, but he knows from bitter experience that when the meal is over, it’s over, and if he is still hungry at bedtime, I will laugh at him.
No more begging him to eat one more grape. No more screaming at meal time. And damn if he isn’t eating a pretty healthy dinner most nights.
I know this is a touchy topic, so I want to be clear: this is not meant to be advice. I don’t know your kid. I am blessed with a child who eats a lot of different things, some of them good for him. If you are having problems getting your kid to eat, you have my sympathy. That is not one of our problems. He just has a wicked sweet tooth, and he enjoys saying no to me.
I guess “pick your battles” is a pretty basic parenting lesson. It’s taken me a while to learn it, but by golly, it’s working.
It seems like just yesterday that we helped Sarah’s parents strip everything off their boat in preparation for the end of summer last year. The pictures are still on my digital camera. The S2 logo is usually covered with canvas. She looks so naked without her dodger. We put the boathooks in the sail locker and stowed all the cushions in the attic.
Nate helped, of course. Mostly he helped eat all the grapes, but he was quite efficient. And he climbed up and down the companionway. I hovered over him, nervously. He had just turned three, and he was pretty surefooted, for three. But that’s not terribly surefooted, from an adult perspective—especially around the water.
From the minute he could walk, he loved to run. I would always chase after him, yelling “run on the grass, please!” because I knew it would hurt less when he took the inevitable header. Of course he had his share of skinned knees and bumped noses, but he never let it slow him down.
Blink, and you’ll miss it. Fall, winter, spring, nine months gone, just like that. Now he’s almost four; the snow is forgotten, we have to wear sunscreen again, and the boat is back in the water. We were headed down to the boatyard over Memorial Day weekend to load her up. I went to the House of Grous to pick Nate up from his sleepover. He burst out of the front door and fairly flew across the lawn, laughing with joy. Not one false step. I had to stop and think: when did this happen? When did he stop being a toddler? When was the first time he was able to open the car door by himself? When did I stop having to hold his hand on the stairs? When did he learn to zip his own jacket, to button a button, to pour milk on his cereal?
We got to the boat, and true to form, he had to go up and down the companionway a hundred times. I swear he’s part cat; when he’s in, he wants to be out, and when he’s out, he wants to be in. But this is a steep ladder, and he makes it look easy. He can do it by himself. Naturally, he thinks he can do everything by himself. But in this case, he really can do it by himself.
This time, he ate all the watermelon. He’s a good helper.
When he was ten weeks old, we took him to Salt Marsh Pottery to have his handprints and footprints cast in ceramic (and decorated with impressions of a starfish, a scallop shell, and a seahorse). It’s hanging on an earthquake-proof Ook in the hallway. Sarah said that in the event of a fire, assuming we could all get out safely, she would want to save the wedding album and the baby print tile.
Every so often, I’ll hold him up so we can see how much bigger his hands are now. It’s hard to believe he was ever that small.
Last night he lay down in the bathtub and stretched out. For the first time, his toes touched at one end and his fingers touched at the other end. He’s growing, right before my eyes. I can almost see him getting taller.
Oh, am I ever tired of Richard Scarry.
Nate has asked me to read Cars and Trucks and Things That Go
Luckily, Richard Scarry books are so episodic and disjointed to begin with that Nate doesn’t usually notice when I skip a page, or ten, or half the book. Nighty night.
The good news is that he also likes some of my favorite books. My dad bought him a copy of Many Moons,
A while back, his preschool did a fairy-tale theme week, so I got out Volume I of Journeys Through Bookland. This is a leather-bound, ten-volume set that belonged to Sarah’s dad. These are real books; I had to impress upon Nate that they were very old and fragile, and that we both had to be extra careful.
That day’s theme was Jack and the Beanstalk, so I flipped through until I found it. Turns out that our version is just a bit darker than the one they read at school. For one thing, there were a lot more people who “got dead” in our version. It’s also about three times longer than his usual fare. We did make it through, but it’s not part of the regular rotation. We’ll come back to it soon enough.
I can’t wait.
Nate is a big fan of the Disney/Pixar movie Cars. He called the toys to him, and they came: in birthday party goodie bags, from the Grouses, from his grandparents. I don’t even know where they all came from, but he’s amassed a pretty decent collection. Plastic and die-cast, he carries them everywhere.
On Friday, one of his classmates brought a really big Lightning McQueen toy to school. The toy is probably about a foot long, with moving eyes, and a bunch of sound effects: low-fidelity recordings of Owen Wilson’s voice, saying “Ka-chow!” and “I… am Lightning McQueen.” Nate’s toys are all Hot Wheels style: tiny by comparison. O, the jealousy.
So on Saturday, Nate and I went to “the big toy store” to get “the big Lightning McQueen.” He won’t be little forever, so I’m happy to indulge him while his biggest and best dreams still only cost twenty bucks.
We brought the big Lightning McQueen to his friend Peter’s house for a sleepover on Saturday night. The boys put a lot of miles on that car that night. Somehow they knew that one is not supposed to sleep at a sleepover. When I picked him up on Sunday morning, he was at least three hours short of sleep.
I had a hard time getting him strapped into his car seat, because he didn’t want to let go of his Lightning McQueen. We got on the highway and headed south, on our way to Sarah’s parents’ house and then to church. He flapped and flailed in the back seat, babbling about all the fun he had had with Peter, until suddenly the maple syrup wore off and he fell silent.
I looked in the rearview mirror. He was simply stunned with exhaustion, staring out the window with enormous eyes. The sun came out from behind the clouds and wrapped him in an ethereal glow. His beauty took my breath away.
I reached back and touched his ankle.
“I love you so much, Nate.”
“I… am Lightning McQueen.”
I have tinnitus. Some folks have it bad, but it’s mild in my case. A faint, high-pitched ringing in the ears, is all; mostly I don’t even notice it, except when it’s completely quiet. I sleep with a fan on, so it’s never completely quiet. No big deal.
I’ve slept with a fan on since I was in high school. Right now it’s the HEPA filter; during the winter it’s the humidifier. When it gets really hot it’ll be the air conditioner. Doesn’t matter, as long as it’s broad-spectrum. Sometimes when fans get old they’ll start to heterodyne, and you can hear a kind of thrumming pattern in the noise as it comes in and out of phase. That keeps me awake; time to get a new fan.
Now, it’s well documented that white noise can produce auditory hallucinations. So can sleep deprivation. Put them both together and that spells trouble. When Nate was born, of course we had a baby monitor. Those first few months, the sleep deprivation was hell on earth. He’d wake up hungry or wet every two or three hours. After a couple of weeks, I was so desperate for sleep, so afraid that he was going to wake up, that I would listen to the fan and hear him screaming all the time, even when he was sound asleep. I eventually trained myself to control the hallucinations, kind of like lucid dreaming. If I could make the scream hold the same pitch and volume for ten seconds without taking a breath, there was a good chance it wasn’t really Nate and I could go back to sleep.
Recently, I had my buddy Tom replace my bathroom ceiling and exhaust fan, which is a story in itself. He demonstrated the new fan for me. “WHISPER QUIET, MY ASS,” he yelled. “I’D HATE TO SEE THE NEXT LOUDEST MODEL.”
Last Sunday, you may recall, was Mother’s Day. As I’m sure you can imagine, it was a rough weekend. Nate’s classmates made Mother’s Day cards for all their moms, but Nate made one for me instead. I couldn’t really look at it without crying. He sensed that I was fragile, and true to form for three and a half, he moved in for the kill. I thought it was bad when he tried to throw his Apple Cinnamon oatmeal on the floor, but it only got worse from there. I was ready to fashion a size 4T straitjacket out of gaffer’s tape just to get ten seconds of peace. I would set him up with a video and go upstairs to pee; the moment I shut the bathroom door, he’d start calling me. “Daaaaaaddy… daaaaaaddy…” He just couldn’t leave me alone.
I finally got him to go down for a nap on Sunday afternoon, and I decided I would take a long, hot shower to try to work some of the knots out of my neck and shoulders. I cranked up the WHISPER QUIET exhaust fan and turned on the water, half expecting Nate to wake up and demand my attention. When he stayed asleep, I gave a little prayer of thanks to Morpheus. I stayed in the shower for half an hour and used all the hot water. It was lovely.
When I got out of the shower, I looked in the mirror, and thought, damn it, Sarah. You should be here. Never mind Mother’s Day; it is so your turn to watch him.
And clear as life, through the sound of the fan, I heard the front door open, and Sarah’s voice call, “Marco!”
I burst into tears. Polo, honey. Here I am.
She sounded so happy.