My Favorite Day

First of all, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to all the awesome moms I know, and all the ones I don't. Every mother in the world deserves a day of appreciation and pampering, which is probably why the powers-that-be went and made Mother's Day a national holiday and all. 

Since having kids, this is my favorite day of the year. Maybe because I'm a Christmas baby, or maybe absolutely because I'm a narcissist, I really like having a day all about me! And my family puts so much thought into making the day special, which really touches me.

I absolutely love seeing the excitement in my girls as they give me my presents. This year, Sophie woke me up with a Breakfast in Bed Bag, complete with tea and a granola bar.

She also decorated a special photo frame for me. She was very proud of herself, as she should be.

Emma gave me a wonderful gift basket with a picture frame she put together at school, three new nail polishes, and a lime orange foot rub that she made from scratch. (My DIY girl.)

 

Em also made me a card, with a picture of me (not bad, right?) and a beautiful note inside that made me cry. (It references another gift still to come. She knows how to build anticipation!)

And both girls wrote me something special...a letter from Sophie and a poem from Emma.

 

 

Chris would not be outdone, surprising me with a brand new desk. Our old one came with the house, and it's been held together by random staples and lots of prayer for quite awhile. I was totally blown away by the surprise.

Even better than the gift itself is that he worked all day long to put the thing together for me. As he labored away, I told my girls that flowers and candy might be the stuff of fairy tales, but having a guy dedicate an entire day toward building something just for you is true romance. Sophie said, "Mommy, it makes me so happy that Daddy did that for you. It makes me happy that he loves you."

Eight hours later, the masterpiece was complete. Ta da! My hero.

I am full of gratitude for this wonderful family of mine. I sure do dig them a lot, and I'm super glad they feel the same way about me. Long live Mother's Day!

Who Is This Girl?

My daughter - the same one that usually makes us late to school EVERY SINGLE DAY - set her own alarm and was up, dressed, and making her own lunch before I was even out of bed. Normally our mornings consist of me slapping peanut butter on bread and begging, "Emma, please....MOVE!" about 37 times. Early rising and own-meal-making are both unprecedented. Is there an eclipse today? Something-or-other in retrograde? I tried to help out and she actually said to me, "Mommy, go sit down. I want to do this myself." 

I feel like I've fallen down the rabbit hole.

FLORIDA!

We want to Sarasota, Florida over spring break recently and had a great time. Don't be too jealous - it rained quite a bit of the time that we were there. I'm not complaining though. Compared to the weather in Chicago, it was absolutely glorious.

We managed to squeeze in a couple of beach days, and we had so much fun hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa Kitty (a.k.a. Chris's Mom and stepdad) in their beautiful new home. (All those photos below that are taken in front of the plate glass window, with the gorgeous foliage outside? Yeah. That's their living room.)

We also went to Clearwater Marine Aquarium for the day to see Winter the dolphin and her new friend Hope, which was a definite highlight of the trip. Chris and I even got a couple of nights to ourselves! Two yummy dinners alone, acting all like adults and shizz, plus an exquisite evening seeing my beloved Indigo Girls in concert. So. Nice. All in all, an awesome trip with dear family that ended way too soon.

Some photos below. Enjoy!

Happy St. Patrick's Day from Sophie

Translation: I am lucky for my family. My sister cheers me up when I am feeling sad. My Dad always gets me treats. My Mom goes with me on a ride when I am scared. I love when I am lucky.

Sophie: An Author's Tale

My kindergartener has written a story.

She thought up the story at school last week, in collaboration with her class. She decided to write it down today so that, as she explained to me, "You can keep it in your special forever files, Mommy."

She grabbed her notebook paper and headed to her room, where she holed herself away to work. Then she emerged, a little shy to share what she had done, nervous about whether or not I would like it. But in her heart, she knew it was good. It was written on her face, in the shyly proud smile she wore as she read the tale aloud to me.

She is six years old and barely reading. Yet she just put down on paper a fully realized narrative, with a clear story arc and a structured beginning, middle and end.

She is brilliant. (I realize I am biased. But still. She IS.)

She spells phonetically, so here is a translation for anyone confused by some of her words:

I got a magic wand and I had a terrible day. You will never believe what happened first. I turned my mom into a baby. Then I turned my dad into a mouse. It was terrible. All my mom did was cry and scream. All my dad did was crawl. Then I heard a knock on the door. I came running to open the door. It was a wizard. He said, "Have you seen my magic wand?" I said, "Yes. I have a big problem. I turned my mom into a baby. Then I turned my dad into a mouse. Can you fix this?" He said, "Yes." And then everything was back to normal. I never want a magic wand again.

Currents: Sophie

Current Books:
She's reading, she's reading! She can officially read now, although she doesn't seem to realize it. If you ask her if she can read, she'll answer No. But she can. She loves reading all the books that are assigned from school. She reads them aloud to us, and then we sign a form and send it back to her teacher. She got a lot of early reader books for Christmas, and she still loves to be read to as well. Currently, we are reading the chapter book Tangled, from the movie.

Current Music:
She just asked yesterday if I could put "Gangnam Style" on my ipod, so she's a little late to that party. She and Emma both love "What Does The Fox Say." Have you heard that song and/or seen the video? Oh my. There must be some sort of subliminal message audible only to kids, because the girls go nuts over it and I just don't get it. Although Glee covered it, so maybe the song's appeal is less about age and more about my (lack of) coolness factor. Other current favorites: "Demons" and "Forget You."

Current TV/Film: 
TV shows: Sofia the First. Like, at the top. But also: Peppa Pig, Strawberry Shortcake, Powerpuff Girls. Movies: Frozen, Neverending Story, Little Mermaid 3, Aquamarine, and "The Harry Potter movie where she writes blood on the wall and that guy forgets stuff, except not the part where Ron throws up slugs." She's talking about Chamber of Secrets, and though I love me some Harry Potter, I rue the day she saw the slug bit because since then, she has been deathly afraid of vomiting. It's a full-fledged phobia, so the fact that she listed that as one of her favorite movies is rather ironic.

Current Shame-Inducing Guilty Pleasure:
Same damn thing as last time I wrote a post like this about Sophie...almost two years ago. She picks her nose and then delicately puts her finger in her mouth and eats it. I have tried everything I can think of - short of out-and-out shaming - to get her to stop. I don't want to embarrass her, that doesn't feel right. But we have talked about it and talked about it and talked about it, and I think at this point it's going to take one or several of her peers calling her out about it before the behavior disappears.

Current Other Pleasures:
She loves board games and playing pretend. She's just starting to get into play dates with other friends from school. She really enjoys swim lessons and gymnastics. She loves to snuggle and hug, is very quick to give and receive affection. She adores sneaking downstairs early in the morning on weekends and snatching the ipad, then creeping back upstairs and watching Strawberry Shortcake and My Little Pony to her heart's content while the rest of us sleep in. This morning she woke me at 6:30am because she was too excited about Taco Night to sleep, so apparently pre-planned dinners bring her pleasure as well. Honestly, she's a generally happy kid who gets pleasure out of almost everything around her.

Current Color:
Purple or pink.

Current Fetish:
Sophie lives to change her mind, particularly over food. For years, she ate 2-3 Gogurts a day. She loved them, to the point of obsession. Now, she won't touch them. Why, you might ask? "I just don't like them anymore." We went to Panda Express recently and Sophie ordered her usual, the same meal she's been eating from that restaurant for three years. But this time, she took a bite and declared she hated it. We will make all her favorites for dinner, and sometimes she devours it. Other times, she won't touch the food. She has been known to actually change her mind mid-meal. She'll eat half a hot dog or taco and then label it "disgusting" (one of her favorite words) and ask if she can have a piece of cheese instead. It. Drives. Us. Mad.

Current Outfit: 
Right now she is in her princess robe because she just got out of the shower.

Current Drink:
We are back to near-constant orange juice. She used to drink Crystal Lite lemonade, but doesn't like it anymore. (See Current Fetish.) She will drink Capri Sun lemonade and slushies, but will not touch milk for any bribe in the world and will only drink water out of a water fountain. She does, however, love fruit smoothies. Both girls have them every day for breakfast. Sophie's favorite combo is banana, strawberry, blackberry, blueberry, raspberry and mango.

Current Wish List:

1. To be able to do absolutely everything that Emma gets to do at the exact same time that Emma gets to do it.
2. To see a shooting star.
3. To get a puppy.
4. To go swimming in Florida "in a real pool OUTSIDE where it is warm and not winter."
5. For her hair to be long, or at least long enough to wear a ponytail. (She wore small ponytails to school recently and it looked so damn cute, and then the kids in her class - "even my friends, Mommy, even my friends!" - made fun of her "short little baby ponytails" and she won't wear them again. Peer pressure rocks, doesn't it?)

Current Triumph:
She recently mastered a "fast cartwheel," which she is excited about. She is highly skilled at tying shoes, takes her own showers, and can make her own toast and waffles in the morning. For a six-year-old, these are big things.

She is also very proud to be writing whole sentences and even whole stories at school. They have the kids write phonetically, so sometimes her writing is a challenge to read. But it's fun to try and figure out the thought processes behind how and why she spells words certain ways. Often times, her version of the word makes much more sense than how it is actually spelled. Plus, Chris and I get a kick out of seeing if we can decode all of her writing. It's like our own little mystery quest or something.

I cannot believe how far she has come in less than a year. Below is just one sample of something she wrote...check it out, Aunt Cara! (Click on the image to make it bigger.)

Translation: One of the best days is when I went to Indiana Beach. It has rides. We went on water rides, roller coasters and a real fast ride. We went into the water and we splashed each other. After, we watched fireworks. I love going to Indiana Beach!

  
Current Bane Of Her Existence:

1. Chapped lips. 
2. The unfairness of life. (Her very favorite phrase is, "That's not fair!" Used once a day, easily.) 
3. Anyone throwing up anywhere near her, within hearing or sight, ever. It absolutely terrifies her. If it happens in a movie or show, we must shut it off immediately. I did not realize how much throwing up happens in "family" movies until now. I'm guessing because most kids find gross things funny? I don't know, but it makes my kid borderline catatonic. She starts shaking, turns totally white, and hides her face and covers her ears. A lot of times, she literally goes and hides. It's an intense reaction, although slowly, by small increments, it is getting better.
4. Her stupid damn skin rashes that she keeps getting. 
5. Her tonsils, which are so swollen that she's had cold-like symptoms for two months.
6. Everyone always thinking she's a boy because she has short hair. Just a short list of the people we've encountered who have called her "little buddy" or otherwise flat out referred to her with male pronouns: two teachers, the grocery clerk, several kids at school, our UPS guy, and the receptionist at our doctor's office.

Current Celebrity Crush: 
Probably The Tooth Fairy and Cee Lo Green

Current Indulgence:
Stealing anything she can from the pantry and eating it on the sly. Oddly, this behavior has never occurred to Emma, but Sophie is all over that sneaky stuff. So far she's stolen candy, Oreos, fruit roll ups and Pringles. She also has a new habit of hiding things she doesn't want to eat in strange places. Ask Chris sometime about the squished-sandwich-under-the-sink episode.

Current Excitement: 
She's lost her first two teeth, and another is loose. This causes BIG excitement around here. She's also very excited to be learning new things. She comes home from school every day with new tales to tell. She sings us songs from music, details the fun games she plays in gym, and reviews the stories she is comparing and contrasting in class...always with a huge smile on her face.

She's at 19 marbles in her marble jar, which means just one away from a reward. Hence, all afternoon today, she kept pausing at whatever she was doing and declaring dramatically, "I wish I could get just one more marble." When I reminded her that marbles are earned by good behavior, she responded, "Yeah, I know. But that will take too long."

Current Mood:
On the whole, she is a sweet, slightly reticent, warm, sunny little girl. She can also be stubborn and moody and prone to tears, of course. But she is our little lovebug, throwing out frequent declarations of "I love you" and telling us all the time that we are the best mommy/daddy/sister in the whole wide world. Her smile lights up any room she is in, and she completes our family in ways I could have never ever dreamed.

Currents: Emma

Current Books:
At school, they are reading Lois Lowry's Number the Stars. At home, Emma is reading the 5th Harry Potter book. She goes through phases with reading...sometimes reading nothing, other times jumping around from book to book to book. She loves to go to the library, plus she has a lot of books at home she has yet to read, so I think she suffers from the same thing I do: A feeling of so many books, so little time. One of her challenges is focusing on just one book at a time; she likes to read two or three simultaneously, which I don't get. But hey, she's reading! All is well. (Yes, that's an intentional HP nod.)

Current Music:
Well, she has her own ipod. (Yes, we caved...although she bought it with her own money and we made her save up for a year and a half.) She has a lot of artists on there, mostly pop music. She's recently downloaded songs from all the judges on The Voice - Adam, Blake (yes, she digs some country!) and Adam...although Cee Lo is her favorite. Around Christmastime, she would happily listen to Cee Lo's version of "The Grinch" on repeat for hours.

Current TV/Film:
She doesn't watch nearly as much TV as she used to. She enjoys watching old episodes of Modern Family, and she's pumped for the new season of The Voice. We are all sad to see Disney's Good Luck, Charlie go. (I admit that I might be the saddest.) She still gets sucked into cartoon shows that her little sis watches, although she denies she likes them.

For movies, both the girls loved The Lego Movie, and especially Frozen. They've seen it twice and know the words to all the songs. She got all eight Harry Potter movies for Christmas and is excited to watch the ones she hasn't seen. (We have a rule: can't watch the movie until you've read the book. THIS SHOULD BE A RULE FOR LIFE. In my opinion.) Other recent family-night movies we've seen that she's really liked: Secondhand Lions, Alaska, The Rookie and School of Rock. Oddly enough, we tried to watch Hugo for family movie night last Friday, and she informed me that she "just isn't really a movie person" and played with her sister for three hours instead. Mixed emotions on that one.

Current Pleasures: 
Emma loves learning new skills, and she particularly loves learning them on her own. For months now, her main obsession has been making things out of duct tape. Pocket lockers, wallets, purses, bags, notebooks, folders, etc. She has gotten very good, and she briefly tried to make a business of it. She was all geared up to sell things on her Youtube channel and everything. Her business aspirations ran smack dab into reality when she came home from school with 17 wallet orders and we had to explain about supply and demand. Once she realized she had to buy the materials to make those things for everyone, and that she wouldn't really come out ahead, she changed course. For now, she's focusing on making instructional videos. (I think she's working out a new entrepreneurial approach in her head, though. I sense a round 2 in the works.)

She is now moving on to baking and cooking. For Valentine's Day, she made us all cupcakes. This was a big deal to her. She found the recipe and wrote up an ingredients list, and then Chris helped her shop and supervised her in the kitchen. She was so damn proud of herself, although there were tears when things didn't go her way. All in all, she seemed to enjoy it because this weekend, she wants to make us a surprise dinner.

Most recently, she asked for crocheting supplies. I have no idea where she is getting all this domestic craftiness from, but it is definitely not me.

Current Color:
"Blue, black, and any darkish color...oh, and hot pink."

Current Links:
Youtube and Instagram. She loves to watch how-to videos about crafting and baking on Youtube, and there is one site in particular where she gets all her duct tape ideas. And she loves posting Instagram pictures and videos for her friends. Of course, her account is private, and followers must be approved before accepted. Frankly, Chris and I are still finding our sea legs on how to monitor her Internet usage. I am nostalgic for when I was a kid and no one had to worry about this stuff. The vastness of the Internet is still hard for me to wrap my brain around, which makes it all the more challenging when tasked with explaining the potentially harmful aspects of the Internet to a nine-year-old.

Her Instagram profile photo is the one below, with the accompanying caption: "Me and my sister!" Seeing that made me happy. The first comment on the pic below was a "friend" of hers from school who wrote, "THAT'S A GIRL???" (For everyone who wonders why Sophie wants to grow her hair out...Exhibit A.) Emma wrote back: "Excuse me, but don't talk that way about my sister." That made me very happy, indeed.

Current Fetish:
She continues to have weird quirks where clothes are concerned, especially pants. They can't be denim, must be a soft knit of some kind, preferably leggings, no odd stitching in the legs or crotch, tight against her skin, tight against her ankles, not too long, ABSOLUTELY NO TAGS. She has also developed some annoying habits that she's trying to break. It used to be chewing on the skin of her fingers. The behavior became so frequent that all her fingers were red and puffy; they looked disfigured. It's gotten better, but I'm actually concerned she may have done some lasting damage. Now, she licks her hands. She looks like a reptile when she does it; the visual is very odd. When questioned, her answer is that she licks them because the skin is dry and chapped. (Oh, this winter...don't. get. me. started.) And she is absolutely convinced that lotion makes it worse. So the new rule is, if I catch her doing it twice in a row, she must use lotion. Yes, lotion is now a threat and punishment in my house.

Current Outfit:
Multi-striped leggings, oversize t-shirt with peace signs, giraffe socks, cheetah-print sneakers.

Current Drink:
Grape juice at school. Soda whenever we are weak and say yes (which isn't often). Water (yay!). Green tea still, sometimes. Kiddie cocktails at restaurants. A fruit smoothie almost every day.

Current Wish List:

1.  Crocheting supplies
2.  A refrigerator in her room. (See addendum at bottom of this post.)
3. Sleepovers with her friends every single weekend.
4. Learning karate, ice skating, cooking, basketball, baseball and ballet, while continuing to do swimming, gymnastics, girl scouts, and SWAT (after-school tech group). Honestly, if we were independently wealthy she would do it all and somehow clone herself to make it happen.
5. The ability to make her sister apparate and disapparate at will.
6. Unlimited ipod time, no restrictions.
7. No bed time.
8. 10:00am start time for school.
9. Her own phone.

Current Triumph:
She just taught herself all of "Ode to Joy" on the recorder and was pretty proud to play it for us and friends last weekend. She takes great pride in each new craft she creates. She is trying hard to master a flip flop in gymnastics; she can do it with her teacher spotting her, but not yet on her own. She has gotten all A's in school this year.

She just came home from school today all excited because her band Music 5 (Em and four friends...hence the name) performed Bruno Mars' song "Grenade" in gym class for all the fourth graders. She was glowing when she told me. She said she felt "throwing-up-nervous" beforehand, but it went really well and everyone clapped and her gym teachers said that Music 5 can take the stage anytime. I really wish I could have seen that.

Current Bane Of Her Existence:
The ISATs at school. They start next week, and she has a lot of anxiety over them. Also...me, honestly. I think I'm a bane of her existence. We butt heads a lot, and she does not like being told what to do. Cleaning her room, taking a shower, conditioning and brushing her hair, cutting her nails, doing her chores, not being late to school...all these reminders are on a constant loop coming out of my mouth, and she is not very appreciative of my input. :) We have been talking quite a lot about Responsibility in our house lately. So probably, more than anything, the concept of Responsibility bugs the shit out of Emma right now.

Current Celebrity Crush:
She loves this girl Allison who is in all her duct tape Youtube videos. I don't think she's a celebrity to many people, but she sure is to Emma. Yesterday, Emma told me that her friend J is going to take her to New York for her birthday because Allison will be at a craft show there and they want to meet her. When I asked who was paying for this trip, Emma replied, "Well, J's Mom, of course. It's my birthday present." Last year, J got Emma an outfit from Justice. That's quite an upgrade. When I pointed out the discrepancy, Emma retorted, "Yes, but my next birthday is double-digits, so I'll be getting extra special presents." I better start saving right away, I guess. Hell, it seems I should have started saving two years ago.

Current Indulgence:
I hate to sound repetitive but really, it's duct tape. Those suckers cost $4.99 a roll! Major indulgence indeed.

Current Excitement:
Emma is always excited about everything. Here are just a few things that are generating excitement at the moment:

1. Her marble reward. (Every twenty marbles she earns, she gets a reward. This time she got a sleepover with Mommy and Daddy. I thought her head was gonna explode. Sophie, on the other hand, burst into tears. Ah, sibling jealousy.)
2. Her friend's book club that starts this Thursday. (Super cute - her girlfriend sent an invite and everything. Fourth graders starting their own book club? I love it.) 
3. To see her Grandma and her cousins this weekend. 
4. To share all her newest creations with us. 
5. To visit her Grandpa and Grandma Kitty in Florida next month.
6. For her whole class to take a field trip to Mommy's work and see our new show.  
7. Auditioning for the solo in her Spring chorus program.
8. Her birthday. In June. She usually starts talking about it right after Christmas, so we are already two months into discussions.

Current Mood:
Changes daily. Euphoric, generous, defiant, caring, sweet, hostile, sunny, enthusiastic, engaged. Overall...delightful. Even during the dark periods. Emma is coming into her own, and it is truly awesome to watch.

Addendum (conversation from a couple of weeks ago):

Emma: "Sometimes at night when I am lying in bed, my stomach feels so empty and I know that it is sad, and I want to cry. I hate sadness, it just breaks my heart. Don't you agree?"
Me: "Well, of course. I'm not particularly fond of sadness."
Emma: "Yes! You know what I mean. So...that's why I think we should put a refrigerator in my room."

The land of pretend

Choice phrases currently overheard from the family room, where the girls are playing one of their many random games of pretend:

"Sophie! You're a dog. You don't talk. You drool. Yes, like that. Except not so much, that's disgusting! Gross. Use better judgment, please."
"I'm sorry, Miss Lady. I said kiss the pillow, not the doll. That's five points from Gryffindor."
"I'll take two pieces of sugar and five pieces of chicken, please. And make it snappy."
"Emma! You propped my finger all the way back and it could have broken OFF. I'm not plastic, I have REAL SKIN and you need to be CAREFUL!"
"Close your eyes, count to ten, and then stop breathing so I can give you mouth-to-mouth susta-tation."

And my personal favorite:

"What the heck? Be careful where you wave your legs. You almost kicked me in the vagina, and that's AGAINST THE RULES."

Dreaming of winter...sort of

Emma: "I had the craziest dream last night. It was very cold, like now, with snow and ice everywhere, but I kept thinking it was summer outside and I would run out in shorts and a bathing suit and sunscreen and I would try to jump into the pool, and you would come and get me and scream, 'What are you doing, have you lost your mind?' But I would escape again and again and again and sneak outside and take off all my clothes and roll around in the grass. Except there was no grass, just snow, and my skin would turn red and I was shivering and still I wouldn't come in and finally you called the police and told them I had, like, a mental problem and they took me to the hospital. And I stayed in there for a week and a half and when I got out everyone was so glad because I wore my coat to the car but then I took off all my clothes as soon as we got home and I asked if we could go to the beach and you started crying and I just kept jumping and playing in the snow with no shoes on and later, when everyone was asleep, I ran outside and climbed up the tree where I keep my knife for when robbers come and I killed myself because I was so tired of being cold. The end."

Um...I think this year's winter is getting to everyone in my household just the teensiest bit.

Home is where the heart is

My life is not totally devoid of acting. I tour occasionally with Erasing the Distance - a creative home for which I am incredibly grateful. But other than a few ETD gigs and a staged reading here and there, my acting life has been at a standstill. I haven't been in a full-run stage production in almost three years. In that time, I've been on a total of three theater auditions. To say I'm rusty is putting it mildly. And I tell myself that I'm not ready to get back out there, but the truth is...I miss it. I really really really really miss it.

So, total fluke, a company called me in to read last weekend. No monologue required, just sides. I figure, why not? It's a well-respected theater company, I like the roles okay (they were having me read for two - small but still something to sink my teeth into), so I decide to go.

And I gave pretty good reads, I thought. I mean, I was pretty happy with them. (This is saying a lot for me, because that is not my normal reaction.) And they praised me to the nines. Seriously, they told me I was amazing five times. Normally, that would put me on my guard, because frankly, it's weird. Auditors don't usually do that, so when they do, it immediately feels like a kindly-intentioned but badly-executed brush off. But I'd auditioned for this company before, and they hadn't reacted that way to me at all previously. So I thought...okay. I liked what I did, they liked what I did. I feel fairly confident I'll get a callback.

And then...nothing. Not a word.

This is par for the course with acting. I've been doing this professionally for almost 20 years. I know this. In my head. But in my heart? Every single time I don't get a callback, every single time I don't get cast, it hurts. It sort of feels like pouring out your heart to a friend or crush - "I love you and I'm yours, I'm giving you all I have, all of me, THIS IS ALL OF ME, ALL I HAVE, AND I'M OFFERING IT TO YOU" - only to be rejected. Over and over and over again. It's the worst kind of self-flagellation, and yet I do it to myself voluntarily. And to be clear, I don't feel this kind of pain over other acting auditions. Voiceovers? Of course I still care, and I give my best, and there are those rare instances where I lose out and then hear the spot on radio or TV and am like, dammit! Why couldn't that job have been mine? But mostly, I give the read and then move on. Out of sight, out of mind. If I get the gig, great! If not...next, please.

But not with theater. I AM NEVER THAT WAY WITH THEATER.

With theater, I agonize. My nerves go through the roof beforehand, my anxiety goes through the roof afterward. Even though, intellectually, I know not to take it personally...in my heart? In my heart, every time I don't hear back (and this last audition is no exception), I take it as a personal missive sent straight from the heavens. Three simple words, screamed down from on high: You. Can't. Act.

It's gotten worse as I've gotten older, which is part of the reason why I hardly audition anymore. I keep joking that life's too hectic right now, that I'm just letting myself age into the demographic I've been cast in since I was 18 years old (even at ingenue age, I got the middle-aged roles), that when I hit 50 I'm gonna OWN this town. And there's some truth to all of that. (Well, maybe not the last part.) But they are also excuses...just a few of many that I tell myself.

Wanna hear something else pathetic? The audition was Saturday. Today is Thursday. They had callbacks right away, on Sunday night. They told us this. So I've known, with certainty, for five days that they weren't calling me back in. And yet I can't let it go. In my head, I'm still bargaining, against all reason. I'm still justifying, thinking, "Okay, well, maybe they decided to do callbacks this Sunday instead of last Sunday and they'll still call." THIS MAKES NO SENSE. Yet my mind keeps cranking out bizarre rationalizations, refusing to accept the cold, hard truth that they just don't want me. And this is not an anomaly. Every single fucking theater audition I go on, a variation of this plays out. It's exhausting. For someone prone to depression and self-esteem issues anyway? I swear to god, it is so damn exhausting. But it's what I do. (And, I suspect, it's what a lot of actors do. Although I'm sure there are many actors that don't, too. And when I find out who they are, I will drink their blood and breathe in their essence until I become possessed of some of their healthy remove from all this craziness. Ha ha...just joking. Kind of.)

And why only theater? Why can't I distance myself emotionally with theater the way I can with other acting mediums? Well, I know the answer to that one. Theater gigs pay for shit and the rehearsal/performance schedule takes a terrible toll on my family life, but I care about it above any other creative mistress because ever since I did my first play at nine years old, theater stole my heart. And I can work in theater as an administrator, like I do now. That definitely gives me pleasure, and I think I'm really good at it. And of course, I can go see theater, which also gives me great pleasure. But for me, nothing beats being in front of a live audience, among the chaos and the magic, creating something elusive and organic and raw and alive. Nothing. It is one of the purest definitions of "a blessing and a curse" that I've ever encountered in my life.

So. I have another audition next Thursday. (Again, total fluke, fell into my lap.) My confidence is as low as it's ever been, I hate life, hate acting, don't want to humiliate myself any more, can't take one more damn rejection without taking to my bed for a week. And yet...I'll go.

Because home is where the heart is, ya know?

Demons, Saints and Dead Crows

It's amazing to me, the subjects that can come up from listening to the radio...particularly now that the girls are actually paying attention to the lyrics of a song. Imagine Dragons' Demons came on, and Sophie was off to the races. (Note: my sentences often cut off because Sophie is a chronic interrupter who doesn't care for long answers. Oh, the irony that her forever burden is to be saddled with a rambling, inarticulate mother.)

Sophie: "What is a demon?"
Me: "Well, I guess a demon is something that haunts you, that causes you regret or"
S: "What is a saint?"
M: "Um...well, the word is often used to describe someone who"
S: "Why does he say there is a beast inside? Inside where? Inside his house?"
M: "I think he means inside himself, like"
S: "Inside his BODY? WHY? How did that happen? Like in the movie where the mom and girl switch bodies? Did he switch bodies with a demon?"
M: "Well, I"
S: "And why is he hot? Is it summertime? Oooh...is he the sun?"
M: "Well, that's a good thought, but I think he might be referring to"
S: "What does 'kingdom come' mean?"
M: "Oh, my. Well. It's a religious term, I guess, referring to what happens when someone dies, like if they see the kingdom"
S: "Crows are so beautiful when they die."
M: "Um...what?"
S:  "When a crow dies, then all the other crows make a circle around the dead crow and feel very sad about him being dead."
M: "Really? That is beaut"
S: "And then they fly away and the dead crow is eaten and that's the circle of life and it is very natural and no one can do anything about it. You can't fight it, Mom. You can't fight the circle of life."
M: [speechless]
S: "I think a demon is a bad monster, and he is telling someone to not get burned by the demon, which is him, or they will have to see the king in the kingdom and ask for medicine."
M: "Uh, I think you are probably right."
S: "Not probably. I AM right. Because you just have to listen to the words, Mommy. The words tell you the story, that's what my teacher says. I'm not making this up."
M: "Well, thank you for letting me know"
S: "Mom, stop talking! I can't hear the music!!"

Survival instinct

Clearly, my kindergartener is a genius.

Vexing tornado of wrath

Emma had another epic meltdown about pants. Yes, you read that right...I said pants.

She is fanatical about what she wears. The texture, the feel, the length, the exact right balance of tightness and looseness. She has very specific needs when it comes to clothing, mysterious, ever-changing needs that are impossible to completely identify or meet.

I have tried to be accommodating, up to a point. When I was little, I had no choice at all in what I wore. We didn't have much money, and my parents put me in whatever they could afford. I hated a lot of it, and I'm sure I voiced that opinion. But I didn't dare dream of refusing to wear something. I started working when I was 11, and from that moment on I bought my own clothes. I loved the freedom of choosing what I wanted within my own budget, and to a certain extent, I wanted to extend that freedom of choice to my daughters. Emma is her own person with her own preferences, and - to a reasonable degree - I want to respect and foster that.

Also, I am not without sympathy to her clothing dilemma. A lot of her odd clothing requirements are less about preference and more about comfort. She is very sensitive to the feel of the clothes she wears, and I don't want her to be uncomfortable. So I have listened to her laundry list of wishes and tried very hard to buy her things I think she will like. But pleasing Emma is not that straightforward. The main problem she and I have is that she will try things on and declare she likes them, and we take the tags off and keep them, and then they are washed and she puts them on and decides she loathes them and they can never touch her skin ever ever again and we've just wasted precious money and time.

So, after many times of the above scenario and lots of lecturing and angry words about gratitude and wastefulness and personal responsibility, she has lost the privilege of picking out what she wears until she can stand by, and accept the consequences of, her choices. The only clothes currently in her dresser are ones she has already tried on and approved. I'm not forcing her to wear mohair long johns or wool pants suits. (I admit though...the thought has crossed my mind.) Of course, she has since changed her mind about many of these same clothes, deciding she no longer "likes" them, after we were no longer able to return them. And she resents the loss of control, which is fueling her anger. So right now, it kinda goes like this in our house: I choose, she wears, and every single day is a battle.

Today, it was over skinny black pants that I bought her right before Christmas. I do a lot of shopping at the thrift store...not only for the obvious reason of cost, but also because pre-worn clothes are softer and tend to be more appealing for Emma texture-wise. She tried the pants on and said she liked them, but they were too loose in the waist. Santa brought her a belt for Christmas that she loves, so problem solved, right?

The minute she put on the pants, she went ballistic. Sample utterings this morning included: "They are killing me!" "Oh my god, these pants, THESE PANTS!" "The bottoms bunch up and I look like a freak." "They are itchy and awful." "They hurt, they hurt, they hurt!" "WHY are you doing this to me????!"

She whined. She screamed. She walked like a robot, refusing to bend her legs because, apparently, the pants are so awful that they rendered her knees useless. She rolled her eyes, growled, moaned. She said several rude things, which earned her a bedtime right after dinner this evening. All told, it was a temper tantrum. An impressive show of will in a two-year-old. But a nine-year-old? The word ridiculous kept springing to mind.

Mostly, Sophie and I ignored her. (After many years of trial and error, we have learned in these instances that the less attention paid, the better.) The pants stayed on. I drove her to school, kissed her goodbye, and watched her robot-walk her way through the doors. Battle over, for now. And tomorrow? Once more into the breach, my friends.

I'm not proud to admit this, but her behavior drives me around the bend. I know it shouldn't, that I should let her antics roll right off my back, that she wants a reaction. But oh, dear lord, that is so much easier said than done. I worry about her, about how emotional and prone to anger she is. I worry I'm failing as a mom by not helping her figure out a more effective way to deal with her feelings. I worry because she is ME. She is so much like me, it sometimes takes my breath away. And I know that there are aspects to my personality that are hard to live with...for others, and for me. I don't want that for her. I really, really don't.

Emma can be sweet and kind and generous and gentle and a thousand other amazing things. She can also be a vexing tornado of wrath. And all that said, I adore her. All of her, every single aspect that makes her who she is. Because all the many facets of her personality have mixed together, creating this astounding, complex, amazing person...a person that I feel privileged to have in my life, even in her very worst moments. I love her. I just don't always know how to deal with her.

The polar vortex has nothin' on the tooth fairy

So, remember that last post a couple days ago where Sophie lost her first tooth and was all like, "Oh, Hi blood! Nice to see ya. Let's be friends" and her picture looked like she was being held hostage and trying desperately to send info about her location with her eyes and I predicted that the Tooth Fairy would be visiting us again soon because the ousted tooth's neighbor was leaning at a 45 degree angle and seemed ready to bolt any second?

Well, the whole point of the above rambling paragraph is to preface the use of one of my favorite sentences in the English language: I WAS RIGHT.

It's hard to see the space at the bottom where the two teeth used to be because she was literally clamping her jaw shut with excitement. But trust me...it's there. The space, I mean. Not the teeth. They be gone.

This time there was no muss, no fuss. Sophie asked Chris to pull the tooth out because she thought it was ready to leave. (By this point the tooth was literally lying prone in her mouth, so I think she assessed the situation correctly.) However, just as Chris accepted the challenge, Sophie decided maybe she'd try yanking it out herself. And then..boom. Reach in, pull out, done.

So the tooth fairy came again last night, undeterred by the weather. That's twice now that she's braved the polar vortex, so clearly she's a pretty tough lady. (I think T.P. is a woman, but my daughters think the tooth fairy is a man who looks suspiciously like Dwayne Johnson.) Anyway, polar vortex is, as far as I can tell, just a really cool way of saying that right now it is very, very, very cold. Everywhere. Over 30 states are under some type of danger warning, and the vortex has been messing with the Chicago area pretty impressively. Basically, if you take a foot of snow and throw in record-breaking temps (at our worst, we had a high of -6 degrees - A HIGH - with a -30 wind chill), then you have a polar vortex. Ta-da! School was cancelled for two days, and basically all of Chicagoland shut down Monday. But does the tooth fairy let stupid polar vortexes slow her down? HELL NO. Lady's got a job to do. This, more than anything, is why I'm convinced that Ms. Fairy is a woman.

Here are a couple photos I took of our backyard, right after the snow fell and before true polar vortex hit. The quiet was so deep and profound and peaceful...like the snow had wrapped up the whole world in a thick, comforting, very-very-not-warm blanket.

Mother Nature is so damn cool. I wonder if M-Nat and T-Fairy know each other? I hope so. Cool chicks should totally stick together.

Teeth, blood and fairies...oh my!

Sophie "lost" her first tooth last nigh.

I put lost in quotes because the tooth did not leave of its own volition. It had been loose for awhile, and I think it was ready to come out. But the tooth actually separated from Sophie's mouth only after she tripped and did a face plant into the ground. So the tooth was not really lost; it was ousted.

As is typical in these types of situations, there was blood. If Sophie had injured another body part and even the tiniest drop of blood had been spied, sobbing and hysteria would have insued. But because she was so damn excited to lose her first tooth, the blood became a badge of honor. We rinsed out her mouth with salt water a few times, and that was that. Not a word of complaint.

Tucking her in for bed, I was dismayed to see that she hadn't cleaned up her room. "Sophie, I hope the Tooth Fairy can make it to your bed tonight without tripping. It's dangerous in here."

Sophie replied, "Mommy, the Tooth Fairy flies. You don't have to worry about that. She is very good at her job."

This morning...five dollars! And T.F. even left behind the tooth so it can be placed in Sophie's tooth box, which she has been patiently waiting to use now for over a year.

Sophie was right...that Tooth Fairy is a total professional. And that's a good thing, because the ousted tooth's neighbor is barely hanging on. I think we'll be seeing T.F. again very soon.