Spoke too soon

Apparently, nature decided to let me know how little I really knew about being a mother. She laughed at my inability to occupy my three-year-old, her chortles strong enough to shake the trees. She, in her ancient wisdom, her centuries of rearing species after species without any kind of thanks, decided to unleash her anger, or maybe just her moodiness, by whopping our house with a winter storm.

Wind rocked the windows at almost sixty miles an hour. Rain fell sideways, sloshing out of the gutters and filling our cul-de-sac. Civilization couldn't keep up, and we lost power at nine a.m.

Twenty hours without electricity is a dream to those who still haven't had the lights come back on. But twenty hours without heat, without light, and without Curious George are nineteen-and-a-half too many when you're trapped indoors with your own tiny hurricane.

At least it's hard to see the clutter, hard to see toys scattered about and cheese sauce sticking to the counters when you're living by candlelight. We built Lego houses for hours, read stories, made pancakes, slept an afternoon away. It got cold, colder than our spoiled California bodies are used to, and the baby spent the night cocooned under our covers.

We made it through, and I took my teaching like a tablespoon of castor oil forced down my throat. It was bitter, but it was necessary. I don't need to complain about how hard it is to take care of my preschooler. Because Mother Nature is listening.

Movin' on up

Hopefully I have enough faithful readers to notice that I've been gone from the blog world for awhile. "Awhile" as in a week, which is not a terribly long time, but I've missed this page like I've been gone for a month. There hasn't been any good place for me to vent lately. My husband looks at me like I'm crazy when I walk around the house and narrate my every thought. On a blog, it's considered "humor." In real life, it sounds a hell of a lot like "bitching."

So where have I been these long seven days? Moving. As in packing up every last bit of our lives and stuffing it into brown cardboard boxes marked Fragile. I remember moving when it was just the two of us in college: a few half-filled boxes, an old couch, and the back of a friend's pickup. Now it involves enough so much cardboard I'm afraid we've killed an old-growth forest and an entire 40-ft. semi-truck trailer. And about a dozen extra trips to pick up all the "little stuff" that somehow fills our entire garage. It's amazing. It's overwhelming. And we did it all during Thanksgiving!

It's fun to cook a turkey when you're not quite sure where all the pots and pans are. "You know, I'm not really sure we need mashed potatoes!" It does eliminate the excess. But we managed and somehow turned out a California-proper holiday dinner. Our new kitchen is big enough for more than a couple cooks, and also provides me the unique opportunity to chuck utensils at my husband's head while he sits on the couch watching football instead of helping in said kitchen. Actually, I must clarify that he was a really big help (he was the one who made the mashed potatoes) and he only spent about three plays on the couch, which didn't seem enough for him. Maybe next year he'll be able to watch a whole quarter without having to hear, "Daddy, can I watch Curious George now?"

So I'm back. Busy, but back. Expect lots of humorous descriptions of the moving process. Just don't call it "bitching."