I uh, don't know how to tell you this...but I may have VBS, it's pretty contagious.

It's summer vacation here (wait, wasn't it May a minute ago?) right, well, anyway, moving right along... On the last day of school I brought my daughter home in tears. The idea of spending 2 months at home with me instead of at school with her friends and teacher was just too awful for her to bear.

Adam and I have no friends (fine, maybe a couple, but seriously not a lot.) While we like to get out and have grown-up fun once in a while, for the most part we tend to stay home alone, content with each others company and/or a good book. Were it not for the demands of parenting, I think I would probably live all alone and go for days or weeks at a time without any human interaction whatsoever. Adam likes people, but he's too lazy to bother leaving the house unless he has to work. When we are forced into social situations outside of our comfort zones we are inevitably the most awkward couple in the room. I loose the power of speech and sit there fidgeting in a corner until I force myself to say something I think is funny, but it turns out that after a few hours of sullen-looking silence my hysterical commentary comes off as sarcastic and bitchy and completely inappropriate. Adam, on the other hand, can't shut the fuck up to save his life. He starts to babble incessantly and is unable to detect the subtle social cues that would indicate to a normal person that the party to whom he is speaking has no interest whatsoever the the subject matter that he refuses to drop, no matter how many times they might try to politely change the subject. Alcohol helps. A lot. It helps me anyway, actually it just makes Adam talk louder.

All of this would seem to indicate that our anti-social tendencies far outweigh our honest desire to make friends. How is it then, that the two of us combined have created the most outgoing, friendly, social butterfly of a child on earth? Skylar loves people. People are absolutely crucial to her happiness on a day to day basis. She wants friends over every single day, she adores school and organized activities and she just sucks at playing quietly by herself. While all of my school report cards said " needs to participate more in class" Skylar's report cards say "needs to remember to give the other children a chance to speak" The kid thrives on company and structured activities, which, given my aforementioned general suckyness in those departments, I am simply not able to provide her with for 2 long months.

The obvious solution is summer camp. Yay! Summer camp with the friends and the games and the crafts and so on and so forth, whoo hoo! Except I'm still out of a job and summer camp is blindingly expensive, so scratch that idea. If only there was something like camp...but free.

Thus we arrive at my decision to send her to Vacation Bible School. VBS as the cool Christians call it. VBS where children play games and sing songs and make friends and are cheerfully brainwashed by Faith. I'm not an atheist, nor am I vehemently anti-christian, but I really don't have much use for organized religion as a whole. (I'm not a bigot. I think they're all equally bullshit) That being said, I do believe in spirituality and I respect every persons right to believe whatever they like. I just wish more people would put an honest effort into deciding what that is, instead of unquestioningly following their parents religion because it's the only one they know. I want my children to be free to ask questions and be given thoughtful answers. I do not want people telling them that THIS is the only right answer and you'd better get on board with it or you're going to hell. So I was nervous about sending Skylar to a place where she would be on her own with kids who have been going to church all their lives and adults who feel called upon to spread their faith like a VD to anyone they possibly can.

I wish there were more options around here. I wish I could send her to Hebrew school one week and Buddhist camp the next to balance out her theological education, but I really can't. Around here all the churches have different names, but they all preach pretty much the same dogma. Yet another drawback to small town life.

But it's free!

So I sent her off to VBS to learn about "Joseph's Journey to Egypt" Which, hey! I saw the musical! Donny Osmond kicked ass! How bad could it be? And she loved it. And apparently she had no problem with being the only kid there whose knowledge of the Bible was less than sub-par. And she came home every day singing about being a Child of God (That part bothered me a bit but damn those songs were catchy!)

The last day arrived and we all got ready to attend the show/presentation/sneak attack church service that night. The kids were adorable in their Egyptian make-up and the brainwashing songs were upbeat. Then there was a prayer. All through the hall people bowed their heads and fell silent as Adam showed Eden how to close her eyes and fold her hands. She looked around at all the quiet adults with their eyes shut, grabbed the hand of the little girl sitting beside her and yelled "Come on! It's our turn to hide!"

We're going to hell.

.............

P.S. Yes, Adam and Eden. Ha ha ha. Irony.

Classification of Little Old Men.

My year of serving the public as a cashier in a small town convenience store has given me the opportunity to meet a wide variety of human beings and to judge them unfairly for my own amusement.
People generally fall into one of several broad categories- Male, female, kid, geezer etc. Which can be further divided into sub-categories such as hippy, farmer, rich bitch, hot guy, crack-head and so on and so forth. One of the most interesting and diverse groups is the one broadly know as "Little Old Men" I have classified them into six easy groups for people-watchers to spot.

1. Cute.
The Cute Little Old Man is one of my favorite types of customer. Cute Little Old Men have white hair, sparkly eyes and rosy cheeks. They may well have little round bellies that shake when they laugh like bowls full of jelly, but it's not a requirement. They mostly buy milk and lottery scratch tickets. They have adorable nicknames like Jigger, Sonny or Bear. They give change to small, stupid children who can't afford their baggies full of penny candies. They call me Sweetie, Love or even Beautiful. They may well be racist child molesters in private, but they give off an air of old fashioned gentlemanlyness which I find very endearing. They are grandfatherly in a way your own grandfather may never have been. They wink.

2. Angry.
The Angry Old Man has come to your place of business today because he wants to argue. He is an ass-hole, but you're not allowed to refer to him as such because he is over the age of seventy-five. Ass-holes grow up to be Angry Old Men in the same way puppies grow up to be dogs. It's unavoidable. The Angry Old Man is very good at finding reasons to be upset: Perhaps he feels the small jug of milk is ludicrously overpriced in comparison to the larger jug of milk but he doesn't want the larger jug of milk because it will spoil before he can drink it. He will explain this predicament to you loudly and repeatedly, secure in the knowledge that he will be able to carry on being Angry because there's nothing you can possibly do to ameliorate this situation, particularly because he is unvaryingly deaf as a post and unable to hear any solution you might suggest to him. They never call me by any name.

3. Lonely.
The Lonely Old Man is sad. He is quiet when the store is busy, but given the opportunity he will stand at your counter for hours on end talking to you about his youth. You talk to him because you feel bad for him despite the fact that you have an extensive to-do list and talking to Lonely Old Men is not on it because your manager is kind of a jerk like that. They mostly buy chocolate bars. They call me by the name on my name-tag.

4. Dirty.
Dirty Old men must be further divided into literal and figurative sub-groups.
Dirty Old Men (lit.) are old farmers and mechanics so deeply encrusted with dirt that no amount of bathing will ever get them clean again. They stink of manure, gasoline and tobacco. They are generally missing one or more fingers. They communicate mostly by grunts and hand (stump) gestures. Their overalls, shirts and hats are stiffened with sweat and filth to such an extent that they could easily maintain the form of their owners even after having been removed from their bodies. They mostly buy cigarettes and coffee. They call me *slight nod of the head* if they are in a good mood.
Dirty Old Men (fig.) are aging perverts. They mostly buy porno magazines. Sometimes they claim they are too old to climb the stepladder which is required to access the top shelf where such magazines are kept and ask me to climb up for them while they stay below, ogling my ass and giving directions such as "The one on your left...further...further...reach a little further...yeah, that's it Honey." Or asking for a description of the magazine's content, specialty or price, claiming that their eyes are no longer strong enough to read for themselves without acknowledging the fact that if their eyes are that far gone this magazine will do them little to no good anyway. They call me Honey, Baby, Cutie or Sweetheart.

5. Crack-headed Old Men.
They are usually dirty (lit.) They have long, straggly hair that is grey or tobacco yellow. They have red or yellow eyes and teeth rotted by meth. They may not actually be all that old but their faces are made of creased leather so it's hard to tell. They mostly buy penny candies or individual coffee creamers and rolling papers, for all of which they pay with pennies, nickles and the occasional dime. They smell of piss, sweat, pot and failure. They don't call me anything, Thank God.

6. Utterly Bat-Shit Crazy Old Men.
Always entertaining, the UBSCOM can usually be identified by his wild, staring eyes and the smell of goat and vomit. He may well have forgotten one or more important articles of clothing this evening. He will be carrying something- possibly a broken walkie-talkie, possibly a can opener, possibly a human foot. He believes aliens may try to communicate with him via the ATM in the corner. Sometimes they are furtive and paranoid and you feel bad for them, but other times you luck out and get an UBSCOM who has embraced dementia with open arms and he will regale you with stories better than anything you might see on TV. They usually don't bite under the bright lights inside the store. There's no telling what they might buy, but it's possible that they will try to pay with cat food. They call me Susan.

On Raising Heathens

I'm not into religion. I believe in a greater consciousness and a sort of immortal spirit and the interrelated miracles of life in the universe and doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. But I don't go in for mass religion. It's too impersonal for me and too tainted by terribly un-divine human beings. That being said, there are times when I wonder if I should make more of an effort to educate my children.

Times like when we went to a church rummage sale and my then 4 year old asked:
"Is this a jail?" as she gazed around the church hall.
"Of course not." I told her, smiling nervously at the three Mennonite ladies who were selling baked goods. "This is a church."
"Oh" she replied. "What's a church?"

Or when, just before Christmas this year, we were driving past a cemetery and the child, now aged 6, asked:
"What's with all those big lower case 'T's' over in that dying yard?"

Yes, these are the times when I wonder if I've failed her somehow. But then this week we helped to move Adam's parents from their big old farm house and I came across this composition, written by Adam while he attended a Christian School. Brace yourselves folks.
The original is in italics and my commentary is added.

Christian View on Rights

In Canada there are a lot of rights that go against what the Bible teaches. One of the people responsible for two of these rights is "Pierre E. Trudeau". Trudeau changed the B.N.A. Act the Canadian Bill of Rights and Freedoms. This new constitution gave a lot more power to the Courts and Judges. Damn you Trudeau for trying to separate Church and State!
One problem which was against Bible teachings and was legalizing homosexuals. Now, the gays and lesbians are trying to get more rights such as same sex marriages, spouse benefits, maternity leave for 2 men or women who adopt a child. They should not be allowed to adopt. It is emotionally damaging and disturbing to the child. I really don't think I can even begin to cover how wrong this is. Encouraging hatred is emotionally damaging and disturbing to me.
The second was abortion. In my eyes abortion is basically saying have as much sex as you want and don't worry about the baby. We'll just kill it! Abortion should be put up there with murder. It is just like walking up to someone you don't know but have seen and kill them. God probably created diseases like AIDS to stop abortion. Which came first? Disease or abortion? It's a chicken or egg kind of question isn't it?
By allowing too much freedom, we have started worshipping material gods. Money, gold, silver, treasures or any other material possession that is treated and thought of more often than God is a God. People used to be punished by God and probably still are but it is not made known. There is no fear of God. Freedom is never a good thing. Down with Freedom!
Canada should be more harsh with criminal penalties. Criminals are getting off easy because Canada is getting More and more whimpy. Capital punishment should be brought back in. "Those who kill man shall be killed by man." Wait, I thought we were against killing. Didn't the bible say something about not killing? I'm sure it was in there, maybe somewhere near the back?
Honouring your parents doesn't seem to happen too much anymore. The kids think that when they're 18 or 19, it's party time, no respect. Dude, if you can get past 13 you're doing great.
Keep the Sabbath day (or Sunday) Holy. Stores are open, people are shopping, working. Gangs fight, there are killings. This day doesn't seem Holy anymore. There was punishment for these things just a few years ago but they have been lifted. I don't care if you've got kids to feed! It's Sunday, get home and sit on your ass! And you gangsters can just wait until Monday for your killings like everyone else!
In conclusion there should be more respect for what the Bible teaches us.
Adam, Gr. 8

From the mouths of babes.

This, this right here? This is why I'm never sending my kids to Christian School. Things like this make me glad my daughters are ignorant, because they are also innocent. They have crazy values like not hurting other people and being free to enjoy your own life. As they get older I want my daughters to explore beliefs from around the world. I want them to remain open to new ideas but to think about the things they hear before accepting them as facts. I want them to benefit from spirituality, but not to be enslaved by it.

Teaching them these things may take more effort than shipping them off to Sunday School each week, but I think it will be worth it.

When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad, and that is my religion. - Abraham Lincoln

P.S. Adam has evolved, thank God (or whatever) but I'm still opposed to brainwashing children, you know, just in case it should stick.

First Kisses

I was in the first grade. I was playing with some kids in the snowy school yard and one of the other girls told me to lay down so she could make me into a snowball. She rolled me over and over while snowflakes caught in my eyelashes and filled my mouth as I laughed. Suddenly, she stopped and I looked around to find that we had crossed to the other side of the playground and ended up next to another group of kids.

"Josh!" she called out "I brought you another Snow Bunny to kiss!"

Josh came running over as fast as his sodden snow pants would allow and bent down over me. I shoved him. Hard. Then I ran away.

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I was in the fourth grade. There was a club for kids who were "going out" with each other. They called themselves NALA (Not A Loner Anymore) and they met behind a tree every recess to see which couple could hold a kiss for the longest. Someone asked me if I wanted to join.

"No way! I like being a Loner, thanks."

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I was in the ninth grade. I was camping with cadets. There was a boy there that I really liked and he liked me too. He smuggled some booze onto the bus for us and promised me we'd sneak away some night and have a party. We flirted and hugged and he told me I was beautiful and kissed my hand each night before bed. But there were scary MP's and officers around making nuisances of themselves with all of their No Fraternization! and Anyone Found in Possession of Contraband Will Face Criminal Charges and Possibly be Shot! and At No Time is Anyone Ever Allowed to go Anywhere in Groups of Less Than Four! and the opportunities for intimacy were somewhat limited.

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I was sixteen. It was April. Adam and I had met between Christmas and New Years and we'd seen each other a few times since then. First on Valentines Day, then at a mutual friend's birthday and finally for a few one on one visits. He'd stopped by for one such visit and we'd taken a walk down the trail by my house. It was a warm spring day and we were lying on a hill, talking and watching the people who walked by on the trail below us. The shape of the land and the early budding bushes shielded us so that we could see down, but no one could see up, and we were having fun making up stories about the people who passed by us unawares. Adam rolled up over me and I could see that this was it, he was finally going to go in for a kiss. I panicked, just for a second. What am I doing? This is stupid! Holy shit, no one knows I'm out here and I've suddenly noticed that this is not a boy I'm out here with; this is a MAN, He's 18 and he's a lot bigger than me and a hell of a lot stronger and if he wanted to he could...Then I snapped out of it. I felt safe and happy and I wanted him to do it, just hurry up and kiss me already! This is my first kiss and I want to be the KissEE and not the KissER so just hurry up and...and then he kissed me.

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"Guess what happened at school today!"

"What, Goober?"

"A boy from the other class kissed me three times!"

*insert moment of maternal panic for 'Ohmygod, are we HERE already?'and 'You are so not MY kid.' Followed swiftly by 'How freaking cute is she, bragging with that huge smile on her face?'

"Which boy?"

"Uuuumm...Hayden, I think?"

"Is Hayden your boyfriend?"

"No. We were rolling and rolling down the hill and then we stopped and got stuck in a pile at the bottom and then he kissed me once and then we rolled again and we pretended to get stuck again and he kissed me two more times and then he said 'Aah I need a cloth' and went to go wash the kiss off"

*insert moment of jealousy for total romantic awesomeness of that story, except for the part about the cloth, maybe.*

"Isn't that funny, Mommy? I thought boys didn't even LIKE girls! Why do you think he did that?"

*insert Adam returning home from work*

"Daddy! A boy from the other class kissed me three times!"

"Where?"

"At school."

"That's not what I....never mind."

*insert moment for me giggling uncontrollably and Adam to contemplate' Ohmygod, are we HERE already?' and 'Add 'shotgun' to next shopping list.' *

The moral of the story: My 5 year old has now been kissed by as many men as I have and also her first kiss falls almost exactly 7 years after my own. How fucking sad is that?

You had to be there

Mooch was running around the house all baby commando for a while today and, inevitably, she peed on the floor. I noticed her standing in a wet spot and I asked idiotically: "Uh oh, did you go pee pee on the floor?" (because having kids turns your brain to mush and that kind of drivel really does come out of your mouth no matter how much you try to fight it.) She looked down at her wet socks and then up at me with a confused look on fer face. She made the 'change diaper' hand sign, then bent over in an attempt to look into her own crotch, muttering "dih-ter? dih-ter?" then raised both arms in her 'where?' attitude and grinned a huge grin at me before announcing "all gone!" and doing a happy little stomping dance in her puddle.
People without kids will find this story gross, but if you'd been there you would seriously think it was cute and funny. Well, I did. Sorry.
...
We took the girls tobogganing at the park this afternoon, for some good old fashioned Turn-that-TV-off-and-get-your-snow-pants-on-right-now-because-we-are-going-to-play-outside-and-you're-going-to-have-fun-if-I-have-to-drag-you-out-kicking-and-screaming-dammit! Family togetherness time. Which went really well once the initial hurdle of leaving the house was surmounted. As we headed towards home Goober shouted:
"Look! Boys! There are neighbours out there. Can I play with them, PLEEEEESE?"
There were indeed 3 boys playing in the snow on our street, but they were 4 or 5 houses down from us and on the opposite side of the road.
"You can say hi, but it's time to go home for supper." I answered.
She ran towards them and chatted for a minute and then dragged her feet after us down the block. When we were back in our own yard she sat down in a pile of snow and stared forlornly down the street.
Before we moved here in October, Goober played with the 2 boys next door all the time; hardly a day went by that those boys didn't kick the shit out of our back door to ask me sweetly if Goober would like to come out and play. If they didn't, Goober went to them. The 3 of them, and sometimes the girl from the next house beyond theirs, would play outside for hours at a time, running freely across our combined yards. I trusted their parents and we all knew that if the kids were out of our own sight, they were within each other's, and they were never out of shouting range. They had the freedom to play and explore and it was a beautiful thing.
Since we've moved, Goober has been desperate for playmates. Unfortunately, we live on a corner lot and neither of the houses bordering us contains any kids. Goober begs to bring friends home from school, but the combination of my awkwardness with meeting other parents and the fact that I can't imagine adding another shrieking child to the congestion in this tiny apartment has thus far prevented me from acceding to her requests.
So when I looked down at her, sitting there in the snow, not yelling or whining, but just staring sadly at those boys down the street, I gave in. The distance was beyond my comfort range, and I didn't know their parents at all, and it required crossing the street, and it was beginning to get dark, but I looked at Goober and said:
"You want to go play with those boys don't you?"
She nodded, with tears in her eyes.
"OK, let's go."
She sprang up and beamed at me with a happy yell. I walked her across the street and watched as she ran over to ask if she could play. I stood around feeling dumb for a while, then took a breath and made the decision to give her back a bit of the freedom she was missing so badly. I told her I'd be watching from home and that she was not to go anywhere else, including into the house and that she was not to cross the road by herself. Then I left my daughter unsupervised with strangers for 20 minutes. She was fine. When I came back for her she pouted.
"Not yet! I didn't have any time!" But it was getting dark, and I couldn't see her from home anymore, and I can only handle so much progress in one day.

The differences between mothers and daughters.

When I was a kid I was "quiet". I always hated being described as "quiet." It was never said in a good way, as in "What a wonderful Quiet girl she is!" Instead it was used as though in explanation of a deficiency "Oh, don't mind her, she's just Quiet."

I knew I didn't fit in, and it didn't bother me. I was an only child and I never longed for siblings, I was perfectly content on my own. At home I was secure and content with my place in the center of my mother's universe but at school I faded at once into obscurity. I would enter role playing games within my mind, they were silent and they would last for days. The words and actions of those around me were simply integrated into the storyline. I would spend recesses alone, pacing around the perimeter of the school grounds, collecting treasures from the bits of childhood detritus that washed constantly out to the perimeter of the playground to become entangled in the fence like flotsam around the edges of a pond. Beating my wings against the bars of my cage.

I once overheard 2 women (my 6 year old mind classified them simply as teachers) discussing whether I might not be a high functioning autistic.

I always felt that I simply didn't belong here, that I was just passing the time until the day when I would find a doorway to Narnia hidden somewhere along that school fence. People would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I would give some dull, rote answer. It was easier than explaining that I didn`t really intend to grow up at all, I was just biding my time until I found my way to Wonderland, Neverland, Terebinthia, Oz, or someplace new, just for me.

I grew up, I realized that this world was pretty amazing in its own right and I started wanting to explore it rather than leave it. Although I still held on to the belief that someday something special would happen to me, to show me what I was meant to do. I was too old for Narnia, but perhaps I could still slip between the standing stones and travel through time, or be abducted by friendly aliens. I made friends, although not very many. I began to be present, rather than zoning out. I learned to share my opinions, rather than simply assuming no one would understand. I learned to be a part of the world, but I never learned to fit in.

Then, when I was 16 I met my first boyfriend, at 17 I was pregnant and at 18 I was a mother, tethered forever to this world by the weight of this person I had brought into it.

My daughter isn't quiet, I don't actually think she's capable of not speaking for more than 20 seconds. Even actuvities that might be considered quiet, like say colouring, are accompanied by a running narative complete with sound effects and periodic senseless screams. She doesn't zone out. From the moment she was born she has been Present. Not only does she actively participate in her environment, she is usually the center of attention. Where I was cripplingly shy, she is recklessly friendly. Where my games were silent and prolonged, her games are noisy and short-lived. Where I would simply accommodate whatever those around me seemed to be doing, she directs everyone around her, making them aware of the role they are to play and the lines they are to say. Where my report cards said 'Needs to be encouraged to participate more' Hers say 'Needs to remember to take turns and let others share the spotlight' Where I was happy to play on my own, she desperately wants kids to play with at all times.

Everyday after school she asks to have friends over. She wants play dates with strangers met 4 minutes ago at the park. I love that making friends is easy for her, but how do I tell her I don't want to have that kid over because the idea of speaking to his mother; with her perfectly styled hair and makeup at 9am on the playground, clutching her Tim Horton's mug in her manicured hand, pushing her 600$ stroller where her baby sleeps wrapped in Baby Gap, makes me feel like I did when I was 6 years old and I had to force myself to interact with people who were so alien from me that I simply have no idea how to relate. And I don't want to feel like that. It has taken me a long time to feel comfortable in my own skin and I hate that it still bothers me to feel judged by others, but I do. For the sake of my outgoing child, I do try. I have learned how to make simple chitchat about the weather, the baby etc. But it's still not something that comes naturally to me.

Not surprisingly I don't have any close Mommy friends. While I was having babies my friends from high school were entering university, our lives and priorities have, understandably, diverged. I still love to get together with them for child-free time occasionally, but sometimes I wish I had a friend with kids. Someone who could relate to me and talk with me about things that actually matter while our kids play together. Someone who finds playgroups nerve wracking and wants more out of life than cooking and keeping house and buying designer clothes.

Will things be easier for Goober? Probably. I am jealous of how easily she makes friends, of how clearly she knows who she is and what she wants. But sometimes I feel a little sad that she isn't a bit more like me. I wonder if she is missing anything by not spending hours quietly looking for fairies under toadstools. I wonder if her imagination will see her through tough times like mine has. I wonder if she will be my friend when she grows up.