Not Really Wordless Wednesday: Mugging

No, not THAT kind of mugging (thank goodness)... This kind:

Last Sunday was one of those unseasonably warm days. It was the very end of Spring Break. Ethan had a birthday party to attend on the East side, very near my Mother's place, so we went to see her for a short visit afterward.

After dropping her off in the dining room, then stepping out into the late afternoon sunshine, I had a brainstorm: Ethan and I should go out to dinner; just Mother and Son, enjoying a rare balmy April evening.

I called Dan who was home with Jake and told them they were on their own for dinner, and he was OK with that.

He knew Ethan had been complaining that "Jake got all this time alone with you Mom while I was in basketball camp, and I didn't get any." So we needed this time together.

The Barking Dog Diner, one of my favorite casual local joints, was just two blocks away, and had a slew of outdoor tables.

After we put in our order (I had my usual grilled salmon sandwich on 7-grain bread - the one I had craved constantly during my pregnancy) we had time to kill together sitting around the table.

Ethan was itching to get his hands on my iPhone and play games, but I didn't want to lose him to the screens. I suggested we take advantage of the sunshine and his cuteness and take some photos. Hence the mugging.

Ethan LOVES to pose dramatically, though he often cracks himself up doing it. He has a hard time keeping the "brooding" face on. Goofy is much easier for him.

Altogether? A perfect evening.

Planets

Venus & Jupiter in the sky - so NOT in New York City

Tonight Ethan and I ran a little excursion after dinner. Just the two of us. When we walked out the door it was not quite seven o'clock. These days that means a sky full of light.

Added to the ridiculously unseasonable warmth, us stepping out of a March eve in mere t-shirts, and I was hard pressed to remember it wasn't a languorous summer evening, but yet a school night, and thus we had to execute our errand quickly and hurry home.

Besides, I had promised the upstairs neighbors with whom I had parked Jake that we'd be back within the hour, and I sorely did not want to abuse my favor currency with them, would surely be needing to spend it again soon.

Jake himself was delirious to be upstairs with his "best friends" -- the four year-old sister of a pair of brothers who are Ethan's good school friends, and their white terrier, Mac, with whom Jake is nearly as obsessed as he is with our cat.

Ethan and I were on a mission, because I had failed in my mom-duties today: I was to have picked up a particular book for Ethan, another in the once-seeming-endless Warriors series that we are now close to outflanking.

The latest installment comes out in April, and the one before that will appear in paperback the same day, when we will finally snatch it up. I adamantly refuse to purchase these throwaway books in hardcover, so Ethan is going to have to get over his aversion to the library if he wants to read that last one anytime soon.

We absolutely HAD to go to the bookstore because he had finished the last Warriors book in our possession the day before, and thus we were now in the dreaded state of NOTHING TO READ.

I will not mention again the hundred wonderful books, sitting uncracked in our apartment; forlorn, unbeloved, rejected out of hand. Ethan is a picky reader. But for that he is now these past two years an avid reader, I am eternally grateful. I will forgive the undeserved scorn he heaps upon those poor maligned tomes, for the joy suffusing his being as he greedily devours the chosen volumes.

Ethan is in high, silly spirits as we walk the busy Broadway blocks to our local Barnes & Noble, and I am grumpy, nursing a throbbing elbow that may be a cracked bone or terribly distressed tendon. No way to tell until I visit the doctor, which I have such a deep aversion to doing.

I don't mind doctors and their offices, really I don't, feeling quite at home there from the countless hours spent looking after my elderly parents' health. And I kind of like peering inside my body, the few times I have myself merited scans or x-rays, mysteries revealed in dramatic, if ghostly, black and white.

But it's the time I dread; the time, the time, the time I do not have.

And so Ethan skips and darts around me walking down the street, as much crazed mosquito as boy, as I protectively cradle my elbow and brood.

"Look at all the people out in the evening!" Ethan proclaims with wonderment, and I dive again into pointless regret that we are not living anything like the life I had imagined, filled with evening family strolls and nighttime explorations of the city.

Jacob does not like to leave home all that much, and to be out with Jacob and Ethan together is most often a form of torture. I must steel myself for it. I must have some wealth of resilience in my bones, some stored reserve of calm and good mothering at the ready. There are days when I can and days when I can't and today was decidedly in the inconceivable column, my tanks in the red zone, surely running on fumes.

<^>^<^>

Mission accomplished, book in hand, Ethan and I pushed through the store's glass doors into a city become near night, the sky's blue glow nearly extinguished, the streets bathed in yellow-orange incandescence. 

Turning west to walk the two short blocks to Riverside and home, the brightest of stars appeared in the overhead sky. Not stars, planets: Venus and Jupiter blazing, blindingly bright in the deep cerulean sky that slices between the highrises, thankfully not obliterated. These two gods are in a much celebrated love fest this March, a conjunction the likes of which will not manifest again until next May.

And yet, while they appear to be quite close, kissing distance on the Ides, they are in fact not truly crossing at all. It's just an artifact of our perspective, the way they look from here on our own dear mudball.

They are in fact deeply distant from each other, Venus lying sunward from us, drawing us in toward the heart of our solar system, while Jupiter circles round us from the outside. To gaze upon Jupiter is to reach out toward the distant galaxies and the universe's noisy edges at the jagged beginning of time.

I do not like that my children are distant planets, each locked into their own distinct orbits, occasionally approaching but never truly crossing paths, both merely circling 'round me, their sun.

How I wish instead they were more like a double star system, like so many of the other twins we know: circling each other, at times closer, at times more distant but always in orbit, one about the other; connected, entwined, hurtling through space as one.

But I must, as ever, resist the siren pull of the "what ifs," of the dark matter that draws me to its crushing embrace.

I must instead stay here, in the now, in the track of my actual sons.

The one who lives on planet Autism.

And the one who does not.

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E is for Ethan

E is for Ethan

Could it be otherwise?

I don't think so, for he is the big "E" in my life.

My firstborn.
 
By one minute.

(Not that he ever lets me or his brother forget it.)

So, for once, this won't be all about autism, though it certainly informs and affects Ethan's life, presses in upon him.  And he likes that not one bit, declaiming with wailing voice, "Why did I have to have a twin brother with autism? Why can't I have a regular brother, like other people?"

And I have no answers for him, no easy solace, no words of comfort, other than to agree that it is indeed hard. But also this rejoinder: that we don't pick the families we are born into, that we all just have to play the hand we're dealt.

And I hold him while he cries. And I remind him of the wonderful things about his brother, while making sure he knows it's OK for it not to be OK.

He is allowed to be mad at, even to hate and resent his brother. He is not allowed to be cruel to him, a line clearly drawn in the sand.

Ethan, the boy, will talk about his feelings. I hope this is something he can retain, that it will survive the rough pitch and tumble of male adolescence, let him grow into a man who will talk about his feelings openly with his closest friends, with the woman he loves.

Ethan, the boy, is passionate. He loves his friends, basketball, computers, and his toys/collections.

His current obsession? Gogo's Crazy Bones. Never heard of them? Then you're probably not living with a 7 to 9 year old right now.

He is of the age of changes. From one minute to the next, quick and quixotic, patterns long stable are shifting, tossed aside as he stretches his "big boy" muscles, both literal and figurative.

Conversations with Ethan are still so often delightful (except when he is going on and on about Basketball players and game stats, and then I am looking for the knitting needles to puncture my eardrums with).

I am still central to his life. And I hold my breath knowing that I will blink and he will be releasing my hand as we walk down the street, moving on into Tweendom; and then beyond.

Looking forward is a little scary; unknown adventures in parenting await. So let me look back for a moment, tell a story from the beginning:

Ethan was newborn, still in the hospital, maybe 2 days old. I was looking at him versus Jake, marveling at how vastly different they were from each other. Not quite night and day, but barely twin-like.

Jacob was a newborn straight out of central casting: a big-headed, Winston Churchill resembling, bald but for tonsure-like blond fringe, classic Gerber baby.

Ethan... not so much so. With his smaller head, fine features, visible and expressive eyebrows, scalp covered in dark but thin and sparse hair, including seeming sideburns (that led us to quip we should have named him Elvis instead) he resembled nothing so much as a miniature middle-aged balding guy. Seriously. But in a cute way.

So that day, when he was sleeping in my arms, I leaned down and whispered in his ear: "I know your secret: you're not really a baby. In reality, you're a tiny forty year-old man, somehow magically transformed into an infant. But don't worry, I won't tell anyone, your secret is safe with me."

As soon as those words were out of my mouth - I swear this is true - still deep asleep, his mouth broke into a giant grin and his eyes popped wide open then rapidly rolled back and forth in a crazy fashion.

This went on for about 5 seconds, a near perfect rendition of a Groucho Marx comedic eye roll. Then his eyes snapped shut, his smile vanished and he was once again, simply, a sleeping newborn.

But we had shared a moment; and I knew, I knew.

Here he is, then:

Ethan, 5 minutes old

And now:

Ethan 8 years old

Being the mother of Grouch Marx, reincarnate, isn't always easy; but it's never dull, often highly entertaining, and always deeply rewarding.

E is for Ethan...

Energetic, enthusiastic, enchanting, exhausting, extraordinary, eminently lovable.

My son.

This post has been inspired by and linked up to Jenny Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday writing meme. And now, of course, "E" is one of my very favorite letters. Bet you can guess the others.

I'm also linking this post up to Maxabella's I'm grateful for...  because I am eternally grateful for my son, Ethan.


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Happy New Year (from George, Christopher, Gracie and Jake)

Happy New Year, everyone!!!!

2010 bit our butts big time.

(Was reminded of just how much when I combed through the year for my 2010 "best of" wrap-up post)

(Would everybody please just stop dying, already?)

Here's to a terrific 2011 for one and all!

(Raising my virtual glass of champagne to clink with you all.)

(And as long as it's virtual? Make it Pol Roget Cuvée Sir Winston Churchill, please.)

(In actuality, we had Martinelli Sparkling Cider.)

(And it was just me and the husband playing Monopoly with a very hyper, over-tired Ethan at the stroke of midnight.  Jake had fallen dead asleep on the rocking chair at 10 PM, and I'd been able to sleep-walk him to bed.)

(Ethan was winning, of course.)

(And all sugared up.)

(It was so very fun to put him to bed at 12:30.)

(The words "please, darling, just shut up and go to sleep" might have crossed my lips at about 12:55)

(But I would never say that, so it must have been more like: "If you don't stop giggling and calling me George, you will lose all screen time for the rest of the weekend.  I love you, now go to sleep.")

(I might have told him if he continued to call me "George" and his father "Christopher" I was going to start calling him "Gracie."  This might have been unwise, as it provoked yet another giggling fit, even though the reference was lost on him.)

(Ethan is going through a bit of a "class clown" phase.  Please let it just be a phase.)

(Ethan, balancing on the knife edge of funny/annoying ALWAYS pushes it too far and tips into pure annoyance.)

(He finally fell asleep.)

(If Jacob wakes him up early - as he inevitably does - Ethan is going to be just so much *fun* in the morning.)

(Sigh)

Say Goodnight, Gracie.

Goodnight.

And Happy New Year, my friends, Happy New Year to you all.


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The Conversationalist

Ethan, himself

The other night, Ethan was all wonderful and full of surprises.

Early in the evening we were looking for a book for him to read as he had finished “The Strange Case of the Origami Yoda” and was ready to move on.

We have about a thousand books in our apartment, but he tends to reject a lot of books out of hand, as either "boring" or "too scary to read at night."  So it is often tough to come up with something he is willing to read, if it’s not a Pokemon Adventure book, that is.

I spotted a book I had bought some time ago thinking it might be helpful to him, but he had shunned it for years. It’s a story written by a (then) 8 year old girl about her autistic brother, called “All About My Brother.”

I handed it to him with a casual “How about this one?" fully expecting scathing rejection. It had pictures and was written by a GIRL (cooties!) but he said "cool" and took it.  And readers, he read it!

And afterward he said "Mom, maybe we should write a book together about Jake."

You could have blown me over with a feather.  Lately his statements about Jacob usually begin with "Do you know why Jacob is the most annoying brother in the world, and why I hate him?"

I recovered quickly “Sure, Ethan I would really like that." And felt more than a little glowy for a while.

A little later that same evening, we had this conversation, out of the blue:

E: "Mom? Maybe I’ll get married in my 20’s"

Me: (not sure where this is coming from or leading to) "Umm, OK."

E: "My late 20’s."

Me: "Um, OK."

E: "Then I can have kids in my early 30’s and you’ll still be young enough to help take care of them."

Me: (oh, a plan) "…OK."

E: "Like when I’m 30 you’ll be (brow furrowed in mathly concentration)… 72.  That’s not too old, right?"

Me: "No, not at all."

E: "You’ll still be alive then right?  Promise?"
(Oh how I wish I could make that promise, but I’m a realist)

Me: "I would certainly hope so honey, I plan on it.  I want to be.  I really would love to be a Grandma to your kids.  But you know I can’t promise these kinds of things, right?"

E: "Yeah...  (pause)  Can I have a cookie?"

With all the Grandparents dying lately death must be on his mind.  I forget how with boys just because they're not talking about it doesn't mean it's not sitting there under the surface, hot lava bubbling away.

Later still, he started up a conversation again.

E: “Mom, what’s your favorite flower?”
(Ethan is all about the icebreaker question that comes out of nowhere.)

Me: "Well, I love all flowers so much, so I don’t have just one. But I do love hydrangeas, especially the blue-violet ones, you know that, I’m always pointing them out to you. And peonies, because they smell so lovely.  Also lilacs, definitely lilacs."

E: "How about carnations?"

Me: "They can be pretty, but they're not my favorite."

E: "I like carnations."

Me: "That's fine, we don't have to like the same things.  But Ethan, later on, when you're grown up and you like a girl?  Don't buy her carnations, they're cheap, you'll never impress her that way."
(I'm all full of useful, womanly advice)

E: "How about Daisies? Oh, wait, Daisy is a girl’s name."

Me: "That's true. There are lots of flower names that are girl’s names. Daisy... Lily... Rose... Iris... Heather... Violet..."

E: "Hey that’s a color!"

Me: "But also a flower."

E: "Did they name the color for the flower or the flower for the color?"

Me: "Good question. I would guess the flower was probably named for the color, but it could be the other way around."

E: "What about emerald?"

Me: "You mean the green color?  That's a color named for a gemstone, not a flower."

E: "But is it a name?"

Me: "No.  Well, yes.  It's not really used in English for a name, but in Spanish emerald is Esmeralda and that IS a girl's name"  (I should really shut up now, but I don't, I'm on a roll.)  "There are also lots of girls named for gemstones and jewels: Pearl... Ruby... Opal... Amber..."

E: "Oh! I know amber, there’s an amber Pokemon, it's the amber fossil Pokemon!"
(I love his frames of reference… it always all boils down to Japanimation)

Me: "OK, I didn't know that."
(I think I'm ready to end this conversation now. Bedtime rapidly approaches...)

E: "So what should I name my kids?" (Um, is there something I need to know here?) "How about Daisy and Amber for the girls?"

Me: "Why not?"

E: "Can I name my daughter Venus-Fly-Trap?"

Me: "Um I don’t think that’s a great idea, honey."

E: "Why not, it’s a flower?"

Me: "Well, it’s not a flower, really, more like a carnivorous plant.  Just plain Venus would be better, that’s a Goddess." (Because goodness knows we don't want to give his hypothetical children weird names.)

E: "But it’s a planet."

Me: "That’s right, and the planet is named for the Goddess, the Roman name for the Goddess of love and beauty, whose Greek name is Aphrodite." (Because TMI is my MO.)

E: "What about Jupiter? Boy or Girl?"

Me: "Jupiter is a boy, he's the king of the gods."

E: "I thought that was Zeus!"

Me: "The name Jupiter is Roman, that’s the same God as Zeus to the Greeks.  The Greeks created the pantheon of the Gods and the Romans borrowed them and changed their names." (Someone stop me, please, it's getting late.)

E: "How about Mars?"

Me: "Boy"

E: "Neptune?"

Me: "Boy again, God of the ocean."

E: "I thought that was Poseidon."

Me: "Roman / Greek thing again, honey."

E: "Mercury?  Hey, I know a Mercury!"

Me: "Look, except for Venus, they're all boys, OK?"

E: "That's not fair!"

Me: "I know, probably some ancient boys did the naming, what can I say?"

E: "Well, what about Earth - girl or boy? Can you name a kid Earth?"

Me: "Well, I don’t really know where name came from," (What, me admitting to not knowing something?) "but we always call the planet she, and there's this concept of Mother Earth, so I would say girl. But it's not a name."

(Oops, I had forgotten all about Eartha Kitt. Sorry, Eartha!)

E: "OK, for girls: Venus and Emerald, for the boys: Mohawk and John.  And maybe Uncle."

Me: "Um, honey, how many kids are you planning to have?" (Not that I don’t want to be a Grandma & all…)

E: "Is Rocky a boy or girl name? Can it be a girl’s name as well as a boys’s name? Because that would be awesome. I want to name my girl Rocky."

Me: "Sure" (I'm starting the "just say yes" phase of the evening)

E: "So how’s this: Speed, Lightning… and Jewel"
(He's not even waiting for my answers now, he's on fire, he's on a roll...)

E: "Oh, I know, the boys: Houdini and Marvin" 
(Where does he GET this stuff?)

E: "Wait, what about middle names?  Flame Daisy for the girl, and Lightning Hank for the boy.  That way they each have one cool name and one normal name and they can decide what they want to be called."

Me: "Good thinking honey, you’re really planning ahead. But, um, don’t you think you need to grow up and go off to college and meet a woman and date her and get married before you start planning on naming your kids?  And then she is going to want some input into this process, too, you know."

E: "Uh, Huh.  How about Jupiter and Pegasus?"

Then it started getting really silly:

E: "Count Dracula?"  (Giggling.)

E: "Hand-cuffs & Underpants!"  (Much Giggling.)

But in the end, he was all sensible about some things.

E: “I know what NOT to name my kid: Evil.  That would be a bad idea.”

(Yes, dear, you are all wise like that.)

Me: "You're right, very bad idea. And now, BEDTIME!  For reals."

And finally you should know that while the earlier conversations took place in the living room, this last one took place in the bathroom, Ethan on the toilet, me perched on the tub next to the sink at the far end, thumbing through a Mimi-Boden catalog (and then frantically writing notes all over the catalog white spaces so I could quote him verbatim as everything he said got funnier and funnier).

Because sometimes it’s spooky in our low-lit bathroom at night and he needs a bit of company.

Because while I like to read on toilet, he prefers to talk.

My son is a conversationalist. 

A bathroom conversationalist. 

I pity his future wife. 

And his future children, my grandchildren: Houdini, Uncle and Venus-Fly-Trap.


(Very long) P.S. on why this post is not like the others and giving credit where credit is due:
I am trying something new with this post.  I am trying to be flat-out funny.  For a long time I have wanted to “lighten up” things around here at The Squashed Bologna.  But it’s been kind of hard to do that, what with all the dying going on.  And then there’s Jake’s autism popping up around every corner.  But since my mother has promised to try to stick around until the boys bar mitzvahs, and with things going well at school for Jake right now, I thought it might be safe to attempt a humor piece.  Well, me being me, I had to stick in some autism and a little death stuff.  But still, for me?  We’re in fluffernutter range here.

And what made me think I could do this, what gave me the courage to step out of my comfort zone? My inspiration totally comes from two of my favorite bloggers, my blogging heroes:  Kris of “Pretty All True” and Adrienne of “No Points for Style.”

These women are writers.  Their blogs have a genuine voice.  And they both are not afraid of deep emotion and fierce thought.  They to go where their hearts, minds and souls take them.  And they are hysterically funny and totally irreverent when they chose to be, which is often.  One post will rip your heart to shreds and the next will have you peeing in your pants in hysterics.  And their willingness to go from one to the other, and of their readers to journey with them from tears to laughter made me think of the possibility: “Why not me, too?”

Kris & Adrienne are often at their funniest when they are “reporting” conversations with their husbands and kids, which is why when Ethan stared down this road the other night I immediately flashed on the idea of turning our conversation into a blog post.

So thank you, ladies, for being my bloggy mentors.  Unless this post totally fails and falls flat on its face.  Then of course, I don’t know you and you don't know me.  Wink, wink.


P.P.S. Disclosure: I have linked to the books mentioned in this post, and I am an Amazon Associate. So if you follow my book links to Amazon and buy them I get a few cents. (Yeah, I hate his politics, but B&N doesn't have this program, and I could use the few cents.)

Wordless Wednesday: Ethan Gets his Day

Ethan, a little miffed at how much attention Jacob has been getting on my blog lately, wants to know where all the pictures of HIM are. 

Yes, I know they are there in last week's Rosh Hashana post, in my Summer's End post, in countless other posts. 

But the one just before this and two before that?  Big pictures of Jake front and center.

Therefore?  In the eyes of my 8 year old son, Ethan?  Jacob is hogging all the attention, which is supposed to be HIS job.  

So here he is: Ethan, in all his glory.

First day of 3rd grade:

Yes, I know he's in clashing prints, Yes, he picked that outfit out himself, and Yes, that's his (unique) fashion sense. Someday you will be paying thousands of dollars for amazing things he's designed, so suck in the judgment.

Talk to the hand:

:

(and yes, he's wearing shorts, thank you, just low riders - skinny boy)

On the bus, mesmerized by his BeyBlade (don't ask!):

I love his secret smile:

And finally, at the Medieval Fair at the Sands Point Castle:

NO, I did not buy that sword for him! Really people, I have SOME sense.

I’m linking up to Wordless Wednesday at Angry Julie Monday.