Stretch Life Out

 There are several shows that revolve around having many, many children.  There’s the one with 14 kids–boring.  There’s the one with 18–exhausting and loud and boring.  Then we have the most memorable “Jon & Kate Plus 8.”  For some reason this family is fascinating to the American people.  This particular family can’t teach us much except that if you have 6 or more kids you are guaranteed your own reality show and an obscene amount of publicity.  I first took a glimpse at the show a couple of years ago to see what all the hubub was about.  I caught the episode where Kate exposed her extremely stretched out stomach to the camera.  It was gross and I never tuned in again, until a couple of weeks ago where it was very unmemorable.  I don’t understand what’s wrong with you people.  What makes this family so great to watch?

Jon & Kate take the kids to an amusement park.  The kids cry and argue about which shoes to where.  Kate gives up the arguement because with 8 kids it’s just not worth it.  The kids have breakfast in the car.  The kids cry some more on the way to the amusement park.  They go on rides.  No one gets lost.  Jon & Kate look as though they are at boot camp versus a happy, go-lucky day with the family going on rides.  Jon & Kate do not act like a couple.  They go home and the kids cry some more.  The end.  Of that episode.  Oooh, I can’t wait ’till next week when they do something else completely mundane.

Next, Jon & Kate separate from their marriage.  This becomes a “Paris Hilton in jail” kind of media circus that is the top news story before something much more important like the thousands of people who just DIED in an earthquake on the other side of the world.  I’d tell you where, but there was a commercial break.  Why is this anti-couple so damn important?!  They broke up.  Whoopty-doo.  Thousands of Americans divorce every year (or is it every day–does it really matter?), but for some boring reason these two guys matter enough to be breaking news.  If anything, the media is encouraging them to f*** up for our sheer amusement.  “Oh no, Kate got her period, better call Fox News!”

Now the we have the famous show where we watch Kate take her 8 to the beach soon after plastic surgery for that really gross stomach.  Everyone thinks she looks great.  Wow.  Groundbreaking entertainment.  Jon is elsewhere philandering with who knows who.  Some woman.  And he’s not complaining about being without 8.  Really?  I can see why someone might get “separated” for an escape.  It’s the only way to take a vacation without paying for childcare.  He just fooled around to seal the deal.  Kate’s just pissed she didn’t think of it first.

I was watching the news this morning, well, “Showbiz Tonight,” and for some reason Jon’s philandering is all they can talk about.  Jon is not in show business and he never will be with that beer belly, short stature, and no acting ability whatsoever.  Okay, whatever, I don’t produce the “news.”  Anyway, what the hell is the appeal of this guy?  So far I have heard of at least three woman Jon has had on the side.  He’s not particularly attractive.  He’s not talented in anything.  Hmm, does he have a big shlong?  Probably not, so I think it’s because he’s a television reality star.  If they actually watched the show, they’d see that he’s kind of lazy, let’s Kate do most of the work, Jon moans a lot about doing stuff, had 8 kids with his wife then repeatedly CHEATED on her.  This wasn’t “just a slip.”  Come on ladies, this guy’s a loser.  Plus, all of his new flings look kinda like his future x-wife, but not quite so “used.”  Coincidence?

Now Kate might get her own talk show.  Does she want to talk to real celebrities?  What are her kids going to do?  Be in the band in the corner?  Who’s going to take care of them?  Maybe Kate has found her own way of escaping her children, except a talk show has just as much responsibility.  She likes the responsibility but doesn’t want to deal with bedtime?  She has a taste of the negative limelight television has to offer and wants it to get worse and keep going?  Maybe these people should be on T.V. 24 hours a day like that one Jim Carrey movie and call it “24:  Jon & Kate Plus 8 Boring All The Time.”  This is not the least bit interesting.  Kate’s show will be cancelled before the premiere.  Hard-working mothers all over the country will spill out into the streets wailing uncontrollably in protest of her neglecting her children.  Some will be injured, many will die . . . from boredom.

If I had my own show where I was legally allowed to exploit my children and spouse, I might think I was special too.  Maybe even occasionally entertaining.  Occasionally.  But I don’t have a show, and I’m not special.  Jon & Kate Plus 8 is special, I guess, but not to me.  Theyre eSPECIALly oblivious to the fact that they are like everybody else and seriously need to get over themselves.  I just don’t care about their troubles and neither should you.  We have our own struggles to deal with.  This is just another story of a broken family in America.  A sad story a lot of people have without having a show and legions of fans making fun of them and curious about their every move, not at all thinking about the children.

I haven’t felt like blogging in a while because no one incident would take up a whole page, so I’ll give you the gist of it.  (You know, I’ve never had to actually spell the word ”gist” before.  I’ve said it a hundred times, but never had to write it and had to look it up in the dictionary.  Weird, huh?)  April showers bring:  police. 

My husband and I went grocery shopping (it’s been six hours, I know) and missed a few calls from our son.  By the time we called him back–panic–he had called the cops terrified that we were shot dead in a gutter somewhere.  What had he been watching?  Well, he’s not watching it anymore I can tell you that!  We were embarassed and horrified to say the least.  We got home and the cops were still there, I gave my son a big hug, I felt stupid in front of a cop . . . again, and naturally sent the kids to bed early.  Now, when we want to run errands in peace, we leave our older son still in charge but leave his little sister in charge of the phone to make sure he doesn’t call the police again.  (Obviously unless there is a “real” emergency.)  I think we’ve been out to dinner once since.  And it was while they were in school.  Oh, and my youngest kid turned eight.

May:  Mother’s Day.  I got breakfast and some cute crafts from my kids that they made in school.  I don’t recall anything funny happening.  I did get scolded for soaking dishes, though.  It was my day “off.”

End of May:  Sixth grade camp with my son.  We meet up with the rest of the sixth graders at the school waiting to go on the bus.  Then we received a laminated card to wear like a necklace AT ALL TIMES.  We waited some more.  Oh, then we waited even more.  Then we waited a little longer and dragged our baggage to cars where people said “Squeeze it in and hopefully you’ll find it when we get to the camp that is two hours away.”  Then we waited again. 

Then we are squeezed onto a bus where my son doesn’t know anybody and we can’t even sit next to each other.  Before we leave the school, the principal tells us, “Remember the car that has your baggage.  You will use the same car when we leave camp in two and a half days.”  Oh great.  Thank goodness for my twelve-year-old’s memory or we would’ve been screwed.

Camp Whitcomb Mason:  (I found out where we were going a week before departing.  They kept the name of the camp a state secret all year–very helpful guys!)  We get off the bus and are told, ”The name of your cabin is on your tag.  Find your cabin!!” 

Um, that isn’t helpful for several reasons:  1) I’ve never been here before.  2) The map we were given is reminisent of a child’s drawing containing point A and point B and one line.  3)  The camp is not in a line, not even a child’s example of a line.  4) It was cold and raining and we were forced to drag our heavy baggage around with us until we found our cabin.  5) Some of the cabins are hidden under heavy trees, steel, and an immigration wall.  My feet are wet already.

6) There is no smoking or drinking.  We meet up at the main building and waited some more . . . in the rain.  Then we waited even longer in heavier rain.  Who’s in charge?  No one’s in charge.  I am in a cabin with girls, for obvious reasons, and I don’t know their names or who they are.  I know them by numbers.  It’s kind of like prison.  I especially remember #11.  That’s all I’m sayin’.  More waiting and more rain and finally we play musical chairs in the main dining hall of our side of the camp. 

Yes, there are two sides.  My kid’s friends, of course, are on the other side.  We are on Friendship side.  It’s not friendly.  The James side is the camp for the rich and famous.  Over there, you don’t have to walk to the bathroom using a flashlight, it smells nicer, chaperones get their own bathroom, and it looks like where characters from “Different Strokes” would stay if they were forced to go to camp.  Our side, well, characters from “Good Times” (where good times never happened) would be content with it and not complain.  At least they probably had a lot of socks.  Even poor people manage to have plenty of socks.

I, however, neither poor nor rich brought the recommended amount listed on the sheet that displayed what we can and cannot bring.  It was three pairs.  I brought four–the pair I was wearing, the pair I changed into during “free time the very first day,” a pair for the next day, and a pair to go home in.  This was not enough.  I suffered.  By the second day, my feet were turning into fish and I desperately wanted to put a fresh pair of socks on but only had one pair left.  I felt very high-maintence. 

To make matters worse, I noticed my son did not bring his new pair of shoes, the ones without holes in them.  He said, “I know.  I changed my mind at the last minute.”  This means he does not have a back-up pair of shoes.  This means I don’t have a back-up pair of shoes.  I’m a mom.  He can’t suffer.  I brought “Now ‘n’ Laters,” licorice bites, and fruit-flavored tootsie rolls (just in case he didn’t eat the typical cafeteria food.  What?  I didn’t say I was a super mom.), and now I have to give him my shoes from last summer that are no longer white and you have to physically tie them.  There’s no velcro here!  This is a challenge enough for him, but there is NO way in the firey depths of Hell I was giving him my warm, toasty socks that I had been hoarding for the next morning (You’d think I was starving and dreaming up a nice, juicy steak to keep my feet warm.).  Kids need to learn the value of good packing.  However he did bring soap.  He didn’t use it, but he brought it . . . “just in case.”  Just in case I made him use it, presumably.

In between the suffering, waiting and freezing with no direction whatsoever, we actually did some stuff.  We walked, we tied-dyed, we sang camp songs, we walked some more, we dug bones out of owl puke, we had smores, then we walked again, we played games a lot while “dads” were on their cell phones pretending to be busy, and then, as shocking as this may sound, we walked and waited some more . . . in cold, evil, unforgiving rain. 

My feet were wet for so long that they itched all night.  My biggest worry?  Ticks.  Ever since I was a kid they find their way up my sleeve or the back of my neck or up my shorts (that was just by walking my dumb dog).  I wore pants and no perfume=no ticks.  This was my only break. 

Still I got to spend quality time with my son and then we waited to get on the damn bus as soon as super humanly possible.  The day we left was, ironically, perfect.  Sunshine and warmth–it was a song out of the sixties.  We had been to war and the government was sending their troops home.  I told my son “Let’s get in line now before everyone else, and when they blow the whistle, we’ll make a run for it!”  We had a lot of fun together.  I’ll never forget racing for that bus.  And you know what?  We got to sit together.

Every day is a new experience, despite the usual suspects of routine.  I have three kids.  Sometimes they get along, other times I have to be a referee stopping some one from biting another’s ear off . . . or standing in another room until it’s already happened.  My kids are pretty typical in their sibling rivalry:  “You called me a name, he wrote on my wall, she hit me, you screamed in my ear, so ‘n’ so farted, she messed up my bed, he smells!”  And my ultimate favorite conclusion to all my kids’ wheelings and dealings:  “MOOOOOOOM!”  I can usually handle the basics of childhood complaints, but as my kids have gotten older (without my consent) they have become more physical and more clever in their insults to each other.  This isn’t two-year-old physical stuff either.  Tasting your sister’s hair is not equivelent to “I’m going to punch you in exactly one hour!”  Yes, they are precise.  And puctual.

My oldest is starting his teenage fret with lots of attitude and lots of sighs.  He sighs more than Charlie Brown.  But picture Charlie Brown as a teenager and with an interest in sex but still thinks it’s gross.  My daughter (the middle one) is “older” than her two brothers, but not always wiser.  She wants to be Gwen Stefani and marry Bruce Willis.  And she acts like she can.  She doesn’t know that Bruce will be older than dirt by the time she feels the need to get married.  My youngest is still searching for his eight-year-old identity.  He likes Legos, Star Wars, and Indiana Jones.  To him, girls are gross but invited several of his grossest friends to his birthday party.  He generally feels picked on and is a part of most of the sibling rivalry that goes on in our house.  Conclusion:  Every one wants his or her own way and will kill he or she to get it.  (A.k.a. I’ll literally kick you down and sweet talk the parents into thinking it’s all your fault.)  This is the life of a parent with in-between kids. 

Today, my husband came home from work expecting to eat fried chicken.  Instead, he saw a look on my face that expressed “escape” almost to the point of tears.  We walk away to have a quick chat, and no foolin’, within thirty seconds my youngest is crying and my daughter is pounding her own fist into her hand.  Sobbing breaks out, we have no idea what just happened, and can’t get a straight answer from any body, or a car loan.  My oldest sits by steadily not saying a word taking skin (the best part) off of his chicken.  Time to separate, get frustrated, and have a glass of wine; preferably two.  Enter joke here:  “How was your day at work hon’?”

I have three very diiferent people living in my house spawned by two people they are exactly alike only accentuated and slightly more annoying and needy.  Although, I did whine a lot about a vacation I had to have or I was going to die.  In any case, like marriages (people you are supposed to know and love forever) it can’t always be perfect.  General things have to be fair, everyone has to have the same amount of attention and the same amount of presents at the exact same time, other wise all you will hear is “How come he gets that?  How come she got a big gift?  Why didn’t you take me?  How come it’s his birthday?”

Parents, it’s not you.  Kids are greedy little people who we love.  Siblings may not always like each other.  Deep down it’s obvious they love one another (a held hand down the stairs, a push of a swing, a favorite toy given, help with a Lego set, and once in a while, an actual “I love you.”) but they don’t always want you to know.  It’s their weapon.  At their bed time they’re actually conspiring against us instead of brushing their teeth.  How else do you think they get their own T.V.?

Do:  Watch a lot of T.V. because what else is there to do?  Dishes and laundry and bills will always be there.

Don’t:  Watch a lot of T.V. because it makes you look like a monkey at the zoo learning sign language.

Once upon a time there lived a single woman who could watch “E.R.” every Thursday as her own personal religion and no one said a thing.  Then she met a guy, married him willingly, and got sucked away from George Clooney and into the arms unwillingly of Captain Picard from “The Next Generation.” However, David Duchovny from the “X-Files” wasn’t so bad–he was a geeky version of Clooney.  When given lemons . . .

I did, however, sneek in a few Hugh Grant movies to help my husband with his guilt after tying me up and taping my eyelids open to force me to watch reruns of “The Twilight Zone” all New Year’s Eve.  Jerk. He thinks Hugh stands for all sappy guys who get the hot chick through no fault of their own.  He feels there is no point and nothing original about:

1. Goofy British guy runs around town like an idiot.

2. Beautiful, unattainable woman notices goofy guy because of his accent.

3. Accent boy dates hot girl briefly then has sex even though only a half hour of screen time has gone by.

4. Goofy British guy does something stupid.

5. Beautiful, unattainable woman sits around eating ice cream and staring at the phone.

6. They both tell each other what idiots they are and fall in love and kiss and preferably happens in front of the world press.

The end.

My husband has no idea what he’s talking about.  I know, because he was once an idiot too.  Well, I use the term was loosely.  The key here is to find a common ground usually with force in finding shows both husband and wife can watch together without whining.  We like cooking shows.  It sounds boring, but Gordan Ramsey can be pretty charismatic.  “Project Runway” has Heidi Klum/”Die Hard” has Bruce Willis–need I say more?

Most of the time we’re lucky to even see each other and have two seconds to talk let alone watch “The Dark Knight” or “Top Chef,” but as a couple you’ve got to do it.  We are part of the television generation since Clooney was on the “Facts Of Life.”  So tell the kids to pick up their rooms (even though they won’t) and snuggle up on the couch like a couple of idiots.

Movies don’t make memories, you do.

“Don’t wish for things, let life evolve.” –Julia Roberts (Says the rich, beautiful, unattainable woman. What the hell does she know?)

Do:  Clean your house as needed, and feed the pets, and bathe the kids, and decorate until you can no longer feel your arms.  For goodness sake employ thoses little rugrats because they can reach into places you can’t, and because they made all the messes in the first place.

Don’t:  Ever walk into a room you don’t know how to walk out of.

Like sands in an hourglass, so are the days of our lives.  Like a house that needs to be cleaned, it never ends.  As a housewife, I am expected to clean.  But I wonder:  am I still a liberated woman while cleaning the toilet?  Will my right to vote be challenged because I consider vacuuming an aerobic exercise?  Should I be taken seriously during a political debate because I do dishes and have occasionally scrubbed poop in the bath tub do to a little one’s accident?  Well, yeah!  Of course!  You think President Obama never changed a poopy diaper?  Well, probably not, but I’m sure his wife did at some point before they became famous.  People still respect her!

I’m tired of feeling like a maid and my husband often reminds me that little fingers are very capable of picking up little Legos, food wrappers, and Barbie shoes.  He says, “We all live here, we should all help take care of it.”  That may be, but it might be even better if a woman with an umbrella would fly down in front of my house and do it for me.

Enter:  Weird characters from T.V.’s past that can get anything done wearing a dress, high heels, red lipstick, and a bottomless bag of Hollywood garage-sale crap.  We introduce:

1. Mary Poppins.  A wave of her hand and some old-fashioned special effects before “blue” screens were invented and we have a spit-spot room complete with live dolls that clean up themselves.

2. June Cleaver. She’s magic enough with perfect beauty-parlored hair at six in the morning, vacuums in heels, is obviously sexually repressed, and everything is spit-spot by 8 A.M.  Maybe it’s her “magic” pearls that makes it look all so easy.  Well that and a few vodka-tonics before Ward gets home . . .

3. Alice.  She doesn’t really count because she wears orthopedic shoes.

4. Samantha.  Witches do seem to get a lot done, don’t they?  No wand, but a twitchy nose can turn you into a frog or get Darren out of whatever mess she got him into in the first place.

5. Donna Reed.  Perfection at its highest scale.  I think she had her own guardian angel, and not that kooky one who can alter space and time just to show her husband that his life is worth living, and that he should fire his uncle immediately for mammoth incompetence.

Sadly, these are not real people.  Most of them are even dead.  The rest of us must trudge along without a flying umbrella, without a twitch, and without a guardian angel.  We deserve a set of real pearls, though.  I wouldn’t wear them while mopping, but maybe once I’d give it a try just to see what the fuss is about.

When there’s work to be done, you can also have much fun, just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.  No it doesn’t.  Cleaning sucks!  I stayed home to care for my children because I’m the only one in the world who can do it “the right way.”  All mothers think that.  After twelve years of being a parent, my back is literally falling apart.  Now some one else gets to vacuum.  (But they won’t do as good of a job.)  Maybe there is justice in a housewife’s world or maybe I just need a valium–spoonful of sugar indeed. 

“Just as there are no little people or unimportant lives, there is no insignificant work.”   –Elena Bonner