Aurora Borealis

Foster Mulan arrived last week for an almost-6-week visit.  On the plane she sat next to another little girl who was also coming to visit her dad. ‘Tis the season, I guess.

Of note so far:

• She and The Dog are once again fast friends.
• Agent Murphy is mesmerized by her.
• She really tries to be a good big sister, giving Agent Murphy hugs and kisses, putting his bib back on him when he yanks it off, trying to comfort him when he cries…  Her little brother B. back home is very lucky.
• It’s obvious she still doesn’t get nearly enough of the right sort of attention at home.  (Shouldn’t a six-year-old be able to tie her shoes?  Or at least reliably tie the starting knot?)

The poor girl clearly needs glasses.  She had eye surgery back in August and was supposed to have a follow-up a couple of months later.  For some reason, that was canceled.  Now it’s been scheduled for the day she gets back home – and probably only because Mr. Tldz keeps asking Foster Mulan’s mother about the follow-up.  FM has a really hard time with normal sized print.  She eventually told us that at school they had to write her tests bigger so she could take them.  School must have been a big struggle for her all year.  Her need for glasses became obvious to us in the first day or two that she was here – just in the course of the normal interaction of reading stories, etc.  So how could her mother let it go on like this?!?

It is really frustrating having FM here.  On the one hand, she is a really good, sweet kid.  But she is normally encouraged in some bad habits, or at least not encouraged in good ones.  So we do what we can to instill some better habits and a sense of what family life should be like, but we’re left to wonder what the point of it all is if we have influence over her only 6 weeks or so out of the year.  It is so obvious she would be so much better off if she were just with us, but there’s no realistic chance of that happening.  And that, I guess, is the crux of the frustration.  There’s a system at work that treats Mr. Tldz like the “bad” or “at fault” party simply because he’s a man, while Foster Mulan’s mother can do (or not do, as the case may be) whatever she wants with no consequences.  And I guess I struggle with FM’s visits because they, by default, have her mother more involved in our life than she is the rest of the time (which is still too much).  I have nothing good to say about the woman.

Last night we had the opportunity to attend a Mass honoring Fr. Fred, the priest who married us.  He is going off to be an Army chaplain.  He spent a couple of years in the Army before he went to seminary and his dad was career Army.  Now he’s going back as a much-needed chaplain.  I read somewhere that the Army needs 300 priest chaplains and has 90.  Fr. Fred’s parish, of course, and we will miss him.  They did a bang-up job at putting together a wonderful send-off, and I’m glad we were able to be there – two kids in tow.  (Yes, Foster Mulan has been here for a week.  More on that later.)

Fr. Fred gave one of his usual strong homilies.  It’s so nice to hear a priest talk about how much he likes being a priest.  And, as was often the case when he was my pastor, some of his message hit very close to home and was exactly what I needed to hear last night.  I’d been in something of a funk since the night before, and an hour of Eucharistic Adoration yesterday morning as part of IHM’s 40 Hours Devotion (in honor of the parish’s 50th anniversary and the building of our new church) didn’t help; but last night finally hit the reset button for me.

Not surprisingly, the Mass went long, and it really pushed Agent Murphy to his limits, given that it started around his normal bedtime.  We thought he might go to sleep, as is fairly typical for him during Mass.  But a new place provided just enough different stimulation (plus it was really warm in there) that he stayed wide awake.  So we didn’t even try to participate in the reception afterwards.  Fortunately, we got in position to be among the first in the receiving line to greet Fr. Fred.  I gave him a hug and shoved the Agent into his arms and snapped a picture before we hit the road.  Now one day when Agent Murphy is old enough to watch our wedding video and says he doesn’t know that priest, we can tell him that he met him once.

Agent Murphy was definitely over-tired.  Riding in the car usually soothes him, but he shrieked for the first half of our 45-minute trip home before finally falling asleep.  So we had a lazy morning today and skipped prayer vigil so we could all catch up on some sleep.

Poor Agent Murphy is starting to understand that he’s at the doctor’s office and what happens there.  Today he screamed when they put him on the scale to weigh him (18 pounds, 8 ounces; 28.5″).  He used to love the scale, but now he knows what’s coming next.  This time it was 4 needle sticks and 1 oral vaccine.  They tell me next time, at 9 months, there’s only one needle stick.

He used to love the paper on the exam table, too.  He’d wiggle around and make it crinkle, all smiles and happy.  Then he got his first batch of needle sticks.  Now he screams as soon as he’s put on the table.  Poor guy screamed when I put him back on the table to get dressed and go home.  I wish he could understand when I say it’s all over and we’re just getting ready to go home.

Doctor’s office should be in a new, larger location when we go in at 9 months, just 1 mile from (and closer to us!) the current location.

Besides staying with a babysitter for the first time, Agent Murphy also started “solid” foods this weekend – rice cereal.

He did amazingly well with eating from a spoon.  He actually leans forward to get the spoon and really seems to get the idea.  His attention span for that eating process is about 1 teaspoon of cereal (with 1 tablespoon of water – so very runny stuff.)  We are pleasantly surprised at how well this went.  We’ll see what happens when we introduce something with more flavor this week – sweet potatoes!

Agent Murphy is so good about new things.  He takes everything in stride.  Even teething doesn’t cause him to fuss too much.  He must be the best agent at the Baby Investigative Bureau (B.I.B.).

My birthday was yesterday, but Mr. Tldz and I went out for dinner on Saturday.  (The restaurant isn’t open on Sundays.)  Yummy Thai food from Phuket.  Leftovers for lunch today.  It was a leisurely meal with no baby in tow.  Yep, it was a big day for Agent Murphy’s half-birthday – he stayed with a babysitter for the first time.  His Aunty M. was nice enough to come over for the evening, and apparently he comported himself well.

Even though it was a day early, I got to open my presents when we got home – Alton Brown’s kitchen manual for organizing our own recipes and kitchen notes and Joseph and Chico.  An authorized biography of the pope for children written from the perspective of a cat he used to own – how cool is that?!?  A quick glance at it suggests it will be a lot of fun and well worth reading.

Yesterday, we enjoyed sweet tea – our first batch of sun tea of the year.  That went along with leftovers for lunch – green tomato pie and barbcued green beans.  Gosh, you’d think I was a Southerner or something!  Then it was homemade pizza for dinner, followed by chess pie.  We also made an egg custard pie for the week, so we’ll be able to compare and contrast the pretty similar recipes.

All in all, a lovely weekend.

So there’s been a story all over the news about a young mother who died at our local trauma center and then had her wedding and engagement rings stolen – by the hospital social worker type who was responsible for looking after her belongings.  They guy has turned himself in, but the rings haven’t been found yet.  And the news tonight reported that according to the hospital, this loser is still employed there.  Um, hello, HR Department?  Get your act together and fire the bum.  Just one more reason to be skeptical about how this hospital is run.  Really good trauma care, but beyond that…

What an awful thing to do to a grieving family.  Really, we can be ugly to each other.

UPDATE: Good news – the “alleged” thief told the police where to find the rings, and they have been found at a local pawn shop.

In recent weeks, I’ve had niggling thoughs about not having started Agent Murphy’s baby book.  For whatever reason, this afternoon I picked it up and looked at it.  This evening I spent some time picking Mr. Tldz’s brain and started to fill out the basic information.  We need to work on the month-by-month milestones, but at least there’s some information in there now – two whole days before the kiddo’s 6-month birthday.  (6 months!)  I hope that means I’ve avoided complete slacker mother status.

Agent Murphy had his post-op appointment with the surgeon’s nurse practitioner.  Happy to report his toe is healing nicely.  But the whole thing was an exercise in frustration.  We arrived at 11:00 for our 11:15 appointment.  At 11:50, we still hadn’t been called back to an exam room so I said something.  We were taken to a room a few minutes later and were finally seen at about 12:05.  And the “seeing” involved literally about a minute of her looking at his toe.  She could have done what she did in the waiting room for heaven’s sake!

Agent Murphy was a very good boy, but he was reaching the limits of his patience…

We go back in 6 months so they can check for any bone remnant.

C came over with E today.  E’s older brother stayed home with his uncle.  Last time they had a play date, they just looked at each other.  Today they did a little more, but to say they played with each other would be a bit generous.  E is 8 months old to Agent Murphy’s not quite 6 months, but Agent Murphy is bigger.  And perhaps the more dominant one.  He reached over to touch E first, and since Agent Murphy wasn’t wearing any socks of his own, he tried to pull E’s socks off.  Agent Murphy scooted and wiggled all over his mat while E mostly sat there, more interested in watching me than anything else.  Agent Murphy has to learn about sharing.  He took E’s toys and didn’t want to give them back.  It’s good he has a friend to practice with.

The Dog was quite interested in all the goings on and had to be repeatedly reminded to go on her couch and leave the boys be.

I’m supposed to be napping, but I’m not tired.  So I thought I’d tell you that my friend E and his mommy came over today.  I went to his house once and now he came to mine.  He got on my mat with me, but he didn’t really play.  He just sat there.  He sits up really good.  I have to learn to do that.  I moved around a lot.  I got on my tummy, so E’s mommy put him on his tummy.  He cried, so I tried to show him the elephant ear that crinkles.  It’s my favorite part.  But he didn’t care.  He had some fun toys with him and I played with them. He tried to take one back and I cried.  Mommy and Daddy told me about sharing.  So he’s supposed to let me have his toys, right?

I’m glad I have a friend.  And then he went home.