removed from shoe rack
dragged to various places
chewed, diseminsoled
She seems just as confused as I was when I arrived home to find this situation.
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Today's Mayhem
10 shoes
removed from shoe rack
dragged to various places
chewed, diseminsoled
She seems just as confused as I was when I arrived home to find this situation.
removed from shoe rack
dragged to various places
chewed, diseminsoled
She seems just as confused as I was when I arrived home to find this situation.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Peanut Challenge!
So Lucy and I are here at her allergist, about to start her peanut challenge!
9:25 am: we are waiting for the peanut paste to arrive; they will put it on her lip and see if she gets a rash.
Anxiety is high.
Stay tuned.
9:30: Peanut paste applied to lower lip area. She's playing a game on the ipad. Concern: she does not like the smell of peanuts.
SO far, so good.
10 am Bad news: hive on lip.
Challenge called off.
Cream on hive; taking Benadryl.
Sigh.
Not a good day.
11 am: we are at Friendly's in Leominster, having consolation french fries and ice cream.
Good things to know:
1) Friendly's in Leominster is still open ....I thought they all closed.
2) Friendly's will serve you french fries and sundaes at 10:30 am.
3) Friendly's has wifi.
So it's been a rough day. In retrospect, I should have paid attention to the signs, including Alice throwing up on my shoes and Lucy waking up with a bloody nose. Both of these events were firsts, and certainly set a tone of crumminess.
But french fries and ice cream (particularly ice cream in clown formation) will cheer up a kid pretty easily.
9:25 am: we are waiting for the peanut paste to arrive; they will put it on her lip and see if she gets a rash.
Anxiety is high.
Stay tuned.
9:30: Peanut paste applied to lower lip area. She's playing a game on the ipad. Concern: she does not like the smell of peanuts.
SO far, so good.
10 am Bad news: hive on lip.
Challenge called off.
Cream on hive; taking Benadryl.
Sigh.
Not a good day.
11 am: we are at Friendly's in Leominster, having consolation french fries and ice cream.
Good things to know:
1) Friendly's in Leominster is still open ....I thought they all closed.
2) Friendly's will serve you french fries and sundaes at 10:30 am.
3) Friendly's has wifi.
So it's been a rough day. In retrospect, I should have paid attention to the signs, including Alice throwing up on my shoes and Lucy waking up with a bloody nose. Both of these events were firsts, and certainly set a tone of crumminess.
But french fries and ice cream (particularly ice cream in clown formation) will cheer up a kid pretty easily.
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
On phobias and parenting
Last Friday, Lucy went in for her blood test to find out if she still has a peanut allergy (which we had discovered she had back in 2009, as per the blog ... see how would we remember *anything* without this blog?). This is something we were supposed to do over a year ago, but what delayed us was the fact that Lucy has a pretty serious needle phobia. Just like me.
Apparently there are several different names for this phobia -- aichmophobia, belonephobia, or enetophobia -- but whatever it is, I have, apparently, passed it along to her, despite my very best efforts not to do so.
My own phobia -- and I must note here, it is difficult for me to write this because I have a hard time talking about the subject (also, trigger warning: if you too have a needle phobia, you might not want to read this) -- dates to when I was in fourth grade and had to have a blood test for mono (I had it). During the blood draw, taken in my pediatrician's office, which I can vividly call up in my memory, the needle broke in my arm. And I passed out. If I think about that memory too much, I can make myself pass out just from thinking about it.
I have to pause here and not re-read the paragraph above.
Suffice it to say, I have never recovered. On the bright side, there is virtually no danger of me ever becoming an intravenous drug user, so, hey, no heroin for me, thanks! On the other hand, there goes my potential career in phlebotomy.
I don't know that I was all that crazy about blood tests and shots before (I seem to recall a general dislike for them), but this fourth-grade experience sent me over the edge. Thankfully, I was a lucky kid, health-wise, and never really had much need for needles. But then one time while I was in college, I was in the hospital, and I was given an IV. This, to me, is the worst kind of needle: the back of the hand kind, where you can see it constantly, and it's just awful. Compounding that situation was the fact that they put that needle in the same arm to which they attached the automatic blood pressure cuff. I don't know if you've experienced this, but when you're in a hospital bed with an automatic blood pressure cuff, it just keeps blowing up every so often (it seemed like every 10 minutes then but I assume it was not actually that often). When this happens, if you're like me, your blood pressure GOES UP, because if you're like me, you have "white coat hypertension," which means seeing a doctor (in a white coat) makes you anxious and your body expresses its anxiety by raising your blood pressure. And in my case, the actual blood pressure CUFF creates this phenomenon. So basically, the arm was getting all puffed up like it does with the blood pressure cuff and then down on my hand, where the IV needle was, I was having this weird sensation because, well, I'm pretty sure that the IV and the blood pressure cuff should not be on the same arm. So basically, the whole IV needle w/ arm cuff fully solidified my needle phobia (and also activated my hospital-room-induced hypertension).
My basic research (thanks Wikipedia!) tells me that there are several kinds of needle phobia, and I think I might have all of them. Seriously. The first is "vasovagal needle phobia: fear [of] the sight, thought, or feeling of needles or needle-like objects." It involves the various physical reactions that I've always had to needles (near panic-attack, blood pressure rise, fainting). Sounds like me. But given my specific history, I suspect my phobia is also associative -- in that it's related to my own bad memories. Both Jake and my dentist have suggested that I may also have what's called a hyperalgesic reaction to needles -- basically, some people have an inherited hypersensitivity to pain, and according to my dentist, I fit this profile.
When Lucy was born, I had needles galore, including a blood transfusion (I had what we'll call a "medically interesting" birthing situation that I won't get into here, but thank god it's over!). It was not a good time, and I pretty much try not to think about it. But one thing I do remember thinking then was that I did NOT want to pass my needle anxiety on to my daughter. Because it really gets in the way (and not just of IV drug abuse). It makes me delay getting my flu shot. It makes me totally freak out when I need to get tested for various things. And it makes it impossible for me to watch a lot of movies & TV shows that feature needles (seriously, it's not just a fear of getting a needle myself -- I can't watch someone *else* get a needle, making all medical TV shows off-limits for me).
So I wanted to stop it. To this end, Jake almost always takes Lucy to her pediatrician and allergist appointments, and even to her dentist appointments. (To date, there have been no needles at Lucy's dentist, but my own sad and terrifying dental history involved many -- far too many -- needles. That's for a future post, though.) I've tried very hard to never talk about my needle fears with her, and also to avoid being present for her needle experiences.
But she's got it anyway. She has to be physically retrained to have a shot or a blood draw. Prior to all medical appointments, she demands to know whether or not it is possible that there will be shots, and even when we say "no shots," she is clearly anxious about going to the doctor. She walks into the exam room and insists "NO SHOTS!" before anyone can even weigh or examine her in any way. And when there is a shot or blood draw, it's really ugly. I see parents of patients in other rooms look with worry and horror towards the closed door of Lucy's exam room, where she is screaming like she's being disemboweled or something worse. After it's over, she almost always says "oh, that wasn't bad at all!" in this incredibly pathetic voice but the lead-up period (even hours or sometimes days before) is just dreadful.
When we talked to the allergist and the pediatrician about the needle phobia, they suggested we get a numbing agent to apply to her arm prior to the blood draw. So we had that this time. It seems to have helped, but still, her anxiety was so high that she was curled up in a ball, crying until they were able to get her calm enough to do it. (I wasn't there, this is as reported by Jake.)
In trying to help her cope with her anxiety, I've been working on quelling my own needle phobia. I even got a flu shot last year, and I now regularly have to get blood draws to manage my thyroid condition, so that has, perhaps helped to desensitize me. But not entirely. Mostly, I talk A LOT to the phlebotomist about how anxious I am, and she uses the tiniest needle, and often calls in the more experienced phlebotomist to actually do the deed so there's no mistakes. But I've realized that being able to talk (or write) rationally about how irrational a phobia is doesn't change the fact that sometimes, our bodies are going to react in ways that we *know* don't make sense. I *know* that the needle isn't going to hurt that much, but still, just thinking about it, I can't stop my body from being terrified. It is confusing to realize that terror can be in the body. That it can just ignore whatever your brain is very rationally saying.
And I feel terrible thinking that I've passed this terrible feeling on to Lucy somehow. I was intrigued, while writing this post, to read that there's some research that suggests that some traumatic memories could be passed down through our DNA! Yikes! Did my needle-phobia pre-date my own experience, or did my own experience create Lucy's? Or are we both super-sensitive to pain? Or is it all a coincidence?
I've discovered another data point. Earlier this summer, I gave Lucy a two-piece bathing suit. She tried it on, and I told her she could go wear it to the pool. She squealed: "but then my belly button would be out!" I was taken aback, as I did not know she had any issues with this. When I queried further, she explained that she didn't like her belly button, and that she didn't want it to be out in the air. I was worried at first, that it was some kind of body-issue thing (of the sort that plagues young girls at ever-younger ages). But it wasn't really a concern about someone *seeing* her belly button. It was that she didn't like how it felt for it to be out in the air. I let it go and gave her the one-piece bathing suit.
But it came up again last week. She was walking by on her way upstairs after a bath, and I heard her muttering "I wish I didn't have a belly button! Why do we even have belly buttons? Why don't they just go away when you don't need them anymore?" She knows that the belly button is where she was once attached to me, and she gets that it was a necessary part of her growth. But since it is no longer needed, why doesn't it just, like get covered up or something? Like the way the plates in your head grow together into your skull after you're all done with the birth canal. And I agree with her: why DO we need belly buttons once we're no longer attached to our mothers?
It turns out, she may have also inherited this belly button issue -- Omphalaphobia -- from me. And I swear I have *never* discussed this with her.
The origin of my own belly button phobia I can absolutely date to the birth of my kid brother, when I was five years old. After I tried (and failed) to sell him to neighbors, and accepted that I was stuck with him, I took a good look and was confused by the belly button thing I saw, which was all scabby and weird looking to me (we were still waiting for that last bit of the umbilical cord to dry up and fall off). Being a five year old at the time, I wanted to know more about it, and I asked. And my father answered. He explained the basic facts of the belly button, but he added his own special detail. That special detail haunts me to this day. My dad claimed (I am *sure* jokingly and I am *assuming* without knowing the effect it would have) that if your belly button became untied, which it might (he said) if you messed with it too much, you would be like a balloon that came untied, and you would *literally* fly around the room until you completed deflated.
I was a five year old with a very vivid imagination and a lot of experience blowing up balloons and then letting them fly around until they deflated. Was he trying to make sure I didn't poke at my baby brother's still-healing belly button? Was he trying to be funny? Was he sleep-deprived and unaware of the consequences of such vivid imagery in the mind of his five-year-old? I wish I knew.
But then (and now) this sounded so completely horrifying that I could not (and cannot to this day) cannot cope with my belly button.
And apparently, neither can Lucy. Thus, onward through the generations, we reproduce ourselves and our phobias, whether we want to or not.
Soon we should know the results of Lucy's blood test. If it tells us that she has no peanut anti-bodies in her blood, then we get to have a PEANUT CHALLENGE at the allergist's office (note: not at all like the Pepsi Challenge). She did this before, for walnuts, and was cleared (which was nice!). Lucy is excited about the prospect of possibly being able to eat ALL the Halloween candy, although in general, she shows no interest in eating peanuts (or in eating much that is beyond her known dietary preferences).
Otherwise, we're still carrying the epi-pen, which means we constantly have a needle (with an auto-injector) with us, no matter where we go. Which means Lucy and I have our greatest fear with us All. The. Time.
Apparently there are several different names for this phobia -- aichmophobia, belonephobia, or enetophobia -- but whatever it is, I have, apparently, passed it along to her, despite my very best efforts not to do so.
My own phobia -- and I must note here, it is difficult for me to write this because I have a hard time talking about the subject (also, trigger warning: if you too have a needle phobia, you might not want to read this) -- dates to when I was in fourth grade and had to have a blood test for mono (I had it). During the blood draw, taken in my pediatrician's office, which I can vividly call up in my memory, the needle broke in my arm. And I passed out. If I think about that memory too much, I can make myself pass out just from thinking about it.
I have to pause here and not re-read the paragraph above.
Suffice it to say, I have never recovered. On the bright side, there is virtually no danger of me ever becoming an intravenous drug user, so, hey, no heroin for me, thanks! On the other hand, there goes my potential career in phlebotomy.
I don't know that I was all that crazy about blood tests and shots before (I seem to recall a general dislike for them), but this fourth-grade experience sent me over the edge. Thankfully, I was a lucky kid, health-wise, and never really had much need for needles. But then one time while I was in college, I was in the hospital, and I was given an IV. This, to me, is the worst kind of needle: the back of the hand kind, where you can see it constantly, and it's just awful. Compounding that situation was the fact that they put that needle in the same arm to which they attached the automatic blood pressure cuff. I don't know if you've experienced this, but when you're in a hospital bed with an automatic blood pressure cuff, it just keeps blowing up every so often (it seemed like every 10 minutes then but I assume it was not actually that often). When this happens, if you're like me, your blood pressure GOES UP, because if you're like me, you have "white coat hypertension," which means seeing a doctor (in a white coat) makes you anxious and your body expresses its anxiety by raising your blood pressure. And in my case, the actual blood pressure CUFF creates this phenomenon. So basically, the arm was getting all puffed up like it does with the blood pressure cuff and then down on my hand, where the IV needle was, I was having this weird sensation because, well, I'm pretty sure that the IV and the blood pressure cuff should not be on the same arm. So basically, the whole IV needle w/ arm cuff fully solidified my needle phobia (and also activated my hospital-room-induced hypertension).
My basic research (thanks Wikipedia!) tells me that there are several kinds of needle phobia, and I think I might have all of them. Seriously. The first is "vasovagal needle phobia: fear [of] the sight, thought, or feeling of needles or needle-like objects." It involves the various physical reactions that I've always had to needles (near panic-attack, blood pressure rise, fainting). Sounds like me. But given my specific history, I suspect my phobia is also associative -- in that it's related to my own bad memories. Both Jake and my dentist have suggested that I may also have what's called a hyperalgesic reaction to needles -- basically, some people have an inherited hypersensitivity to pain, and according to my dentist, I fit this profile.
When Lucy was born, I had needles galore, including a blood transfusion (I had what we'll call a "medically interesting" birthing situation that I won't get into here, but thank god it's over!). It was not a good time, and I pretty much try not to think about it. But one thing I do remember thinking then was that I did NOT want to pass my needle anxiety on to my daughter. Because it really gets in the way (and not just of IV drug abuse). It makes me delay getting my flu shot. It makes me totally freak out when I need to get tested for various things. And it makes it impossible for me to watch a lot of movies & TV shows that feature needles (seriously, it's not just a fear of getting a needle myself -- I can't watch someone *else* get a needle, making all medical TV shows off-limits for me).
So I wanted to stop it. To this end, Jake almost always takes Lucy to her pediatrician and allergist appointments, and even to her dentist appointments. (To date, there have been no needles at Lucy's dentist, but my own sad and terrifying dental history involved many -- far too many -- needles. That's for a future post, though.) I've tried very hard to never talk about my needle fears with her, and also to avoid being present for her needle experiences.
But she's got it anyway. She has to be physically retrained to have a shot or a blood draw. Prior to all medical appointments, she demands to know whether or not it is possible that there will be shots, and even when we say "no shots," she is clearly anxious about going to the doctor. She walks into the exam room and insists "NO SHOTS!" before anyone can even weigh or examine her in any way. And when there is a shot or blood draw, it's really ugly. I see parents of patients in other rooms look with worry and horror towards the closed door of Lucy's exam room, where she is screaming like she's being disemboweled or something worse. After it's over, she almost always says "oh, that wasn't bad at all!" in this incredibly pathetic voice but the lead-up period (even hours or sometimes days before) is just dreadful.
When we talked to the allergist and the pediatrician about the needle phobia, they suggested we get a numbing agent to apply to her arm prior to the blood draw. So we had that this time. It seems to have helped, but still, her anxiety was so high that she was curled up in a ball, crying until they were able to get her calm enough to do it. (I wasn't there, this is as reported by Jake.)
In trying to help her cope with her anxiety, I've been working on quelling my own needle phobia. I even got a flu shot last year, and I now regularly have to get blood draws to manage my thyroid condition, so that has, perhaps helped to desensitize me. But not entirely. Mostly, I talk A LOT to the phlebotomist about how anxious I am, and she uses the tiniest needle, and often calls in the more experienced phlebotomist to actually do the deed so there's no mistakes. But I've realized that being able to talk (or write) rationally about how irrational a phobia is doesn't change the fact that sometimes, our bodies are going to react in ways that we *know* don't make sense. I *know* that the needle isn't going to hurt that much, but still, just thinking about it, I can't stop my body from being terrified. It is confusing to realize that terror can be in the body. That it can just ignore whatever your brain is very rationally saying.
And I feel terrible thinking that I've passed this terrible feeling on to Lucy somehow. I was intrigued, while writing this post, to read that there's some research that suggests that some traumatic memories could be passed down through our DNA! Yikes! Did my needle-phobia pre-date my own experience, or did my own experience create Lucy's? Or are we both super-sensitive to pain? Or is it all a coincidence?
I've discovered another data point. Earlier this summer, I gave Lucy a two-piece bathing suit. She tried it on, and I told her she could go wear it to the pool. She squealed: "but then my belly button would be out!" I was taken aback, as I did not know she had any issues with this. When I queried further, she explained that she didn't like her belly button, and that she didn't want it to be out in the air. I was worried at first, that it was some kind of body-issue thing (of the sort that plagues young girls at ever-younger ages). But it wasn't really a concern about someone *seeing* her belly button. It was that she didn't like how it felt for it to be out in the air. I let it go and gave her the one-piece bathing suit.
But it came up again last week. She was walking by on her way upstairs after a bath, and I heard her muttering "I wish I didn't have a belly button! Why do we even have belly buttons? Why don't they just go away when you don't need them anymore?" She knows that the belly button is where she was once attached to me, and she gets that it was a necessary part of her growth. But since it is no longer needed, why doesn't it just, like get covered up or something? Like the way the plates in your head grow together into your skull after you're all done with the birth canal. And I agree with her: why DO we need belly buttons once we're no longer attached to our mothers?
It turns out, she may have also inherited this belly button issue -- Omphalaphobia -- from me. And I swear I have *never* discussed this with her.
The origin of my own belly button phobia I can absolutely date to the birth of my kid brother, when I was five years old. After I tried (and failed) to sell him to neighbors, and accepted that I was stuck with him, I took a good look and was confused by the belly button thing I saw, which was all scabby and weird looking to me (we were still waiting for that last bit of the umbilical cord to dry up and fall off). Being a five year old at the time, I wanted to know more about it, and I asked. And my father answered. He explained the basic facts of the belly button, but he added his own special detail. That special detail haunts me to this day. My dad claimed (I am *sure* jokingly and I am *assuming* without knowing the effect it would have) that if your belly button became untied, which it might (he said) if you messed with it too much, you would be like a balloon that came untied, and you would *literally* fly around the room until you completed deflated.
I was a five year old with a very vivid imagination and a lot of experience blowing up balloons and then letting them fly around until they deflated. Was he trying to make sure I didn't poke at my baby brother's still-healing belly button? Was he trying to be funny? Was he sleep-deprived and unaware of the consequences of such vivid imagery in the mind of his five-year-old? I wish I knew.
But then (and now) this sounded so completely horrifying that I could not (and cannot to this day) cannot cope with my belly button.
And apparently, neither can Lucy. Thus, onward through the generations, we reproduce ourselves and our phobias, whether we want to or not.
Soon we should know the results of Lucy's blood test. If it tells us that she has no peanut anti-bodies in her blood, then we get to have a PEANUT CHALLENGE at the allergist's office (note: not at all like the Pepsi Challenge). She did this before, for walnuts, and was cleared (which was nice!). Lucy is excited about the prospect of possibly being able to eat ALL the Halloween candy, although in general, she shows no interest in eating peanuts (or in eating much that is beyond her known dietary preferences).
Otherwise, we're still carrying the epi-pen, which means we constantly have a needle (with an auto-injector) with us, no matter where we go. Which means Lucy and I have our greatest fear with us All. The. Time.
Monday, September 1, 2014
Happy House-iversary
Hey! It's the anniversary -- 8 years! -- of when we moved into our house!
Check us out in our younger days here: http://thischarmingoldhouse.blogspot.com/2006/09/welcome-to-our-bloghouse.html
Apparently I haven't been doing a very good job of marking our house-iversary lately, since the last mention of this was our one-year: http://thischarmingoldhouse.blogspot.com/2007/08/one-year-house-anniverary.html
And here we are today:
Left to right that's Bridget, Lucy, Alice, and Jake. Note: not pictured: Norbert (fish), Ned (hermit crab), Ted (hermit crab). Lucy wanted to bring them down for the family photo op, but relented when I shared my concern about how Alice might react.
Ah yes, Alice. She's awesome, and we're delighted to share our home with this fuzzy, friendly beast. We've discovered a few things about her:
Happy Labor Day, Happy September, and Happy Anniversary, 83 Durant!
Check us out in our younger days here: http://thischarmingoldhouse.blogspot.com/2006/09/welcome-to-our-bloghouse.html
Apparently I haven't been doing a very good job of marking our house-iversary lately, since the last mention of this was our one-year: http://thischarmingoldhouse.blogspot.com/2007/08/one-year-house-anniverary.html
And here we are today:
Left to right that's Bridget, Lucy, Alice, and Jake. Note: not pictured: Norbert (fish), Ned (hermit crab), Ted (hermit crab). Lucy wanted to bring them down for the family photo op, but relented when I shared my concern about how Alice might react.
Ah yes, Alice. She's awesome, and we're delighted to share our home with this fuzzy, friendly beast. We've discovered a few things about her:
- She does not like the colonial man statue that is in the yard of a neighbor down the street. Prepare to be barked at, statue.
- She does not like it when someone arrives home after the family (and she) has gone to bed. Prepare to be barked at, intruder.
- She would like to eat any crayons or colored pencils made available to her. Nom.
- She would like to CHASE ALL THE BIRDS. Also, butterflies, or most flying things.
- She is a hesitant swimmer, but when cajoled & encouraged, will fetch a stick from the river.
- She LOVES ALL THE DOGS AND WANTS TO PLAY WITH THEM. She is learning how to accept "no" for an answer from certain dogs.
- She's not great at stairs.
- She hates and/or is terrified by the car. She does *not* want to ride in the car, despite the fact that we've taken her to several awesome places that she has loved. She doesn't even want to go out the gate by the driveway, because it is near the car.
- She love love love loves Lucy. And the feeling is mutual.
Happy Labor Day, Happy September, and Happy Anniversary, 83 Durant!
Sunday, August 24, 2014
Biker/Maker Weekend
Jake was off at D2R2 this weekend (as he has done in previous years), so Lucy and I had some serious making to do. In the realm of kitchen-making, I made hummus (some for a gathering of crafters, some in individual portions for work this week!) and a house-favorite pear cake. But there was a much more important mission. That mission: JET PACK!
Lucy proposed that what she really needs for back-to-school is a jet pack. This seemed perfectly reasonable to me, so we got into it.
Here's the thing: we have a lot of crafting supplies. A lot of rather random crafting supplies. Plus, some pretty good imaginations, and a pretty good stock of recyclables like cardboard boxes and such. So here is the jet pack that we put together:
Items included a "naturebox" delivery box (nice!), red solo cups (this is America), rick-rack trim that my mother salvaged years ago, straws, Q-tips, felt circles that I got online (from a company that makes felt and used to sell boxes of their random scraps), random foam from the recycling box, paint samples from the hardware store, glitter glue, tissue paper, and....well I think that's most of it. The straps were from some canvas ribbon that was once on a present.
As we dug through the box of scraps and supplies, I found an old umbrella -- well, the fabric from an old umbrella -- and Lucy thought it would make a great parachute. So then the quest was to make a parachute to go with the jet pack, since our family is all about safety, and clearly if you're going to have a jetpack, you ought to have a parachute in case of an emergency.
This is what Lucy came up with:
As you can see, she felt that making a parachute dress was the best way to go. I agree. She put that all together herself by cutting and taping. Later on, I cam back and did some sewing for her, but the design is all hers. Below is the final version, with all sewing and glue-gunning done by me, but all design, direction, and vision provided by Lucy:
As you can see, she also created a remote control (popsicle stick, cardboard, stickers) and we made an emergency on/off button cuff (felt, elastic, glue gun). Overall, a very successful maker day.
Also, we did some beading (fixed a necklace, made a couple bracelets) and some paper craft (a few cards out of an old biology textbook) with our crafter lady friends in the evening.
And Jake's bike ride was a success, too. Hooray!
Also, Alice seems OK with her jet-packed sister.
Lucy proposed that what she really needs for back-to-school is a jet pack. This seemed perfectly reasonable to me, so we got into it.
Here's the thing: we have a lot of crafting supplies. A lot of rather random crafting supplies. Plus, some pretty good imaginations, and a pretty good stock of recyclables like cardboard boxes and such. So here is the jet pack that we put together:
As we dug through the box of scraps and supplies, I found an old umbrella -- well, the fabric from an old umbrella -- and Lucy thought it would make a great parachute. So then the quest was to make a parachute to go with the jet pack, since our family is all about safety, and clearly if you're going to have a jetpack, you ought to have a parachute in case of an emergency.
This is what Lucy came up with:
Also, we did some beading (fixed a necklace, made a couple bracelets) and some paper craft (a few cards out of an old biology textbook) with our crafter lady friends in the evening.
And Jake's bike ride was a success, too. Hooray!
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Some thoughts on worldly matters
Warning: this post does not feature any discussion or images of the house, the child, or the dog (with one exception of a passing mention of Lucy). If you are looking for those things, you might just want to skip this post.
The news has been hitting a bit close to home lately. Jim Foley, the journalist who was working to tell the world about Syria (and whose murder is now the news story), was in the MFA program at UMass Amherst at the same time that I was in the PhD program. I can't say that I knew him, but he was friends with my friends, and we were in the same orbit so to speak. I can't even process what's happened to him, a man my age, who lost his life doing work for the world, work for humanity and justice. I keep having to turn off the radio, especially when Lucy is around.
I'm also feeling a bit reluctant to engage in any news or social media right now, because it seems that the ice bucket challenge is everywhere. If you've been deprived of the Facebooks, Twitter, or all major news networks, you perhaps don't know that a lot of people are dumping buckets of ice water over their heads in order to raise money for ALS. I know I should be glad about it. But I have a really hard time watching this meme take over the internets, even when my friends are doing it, and I know that they mean well.
If you're reading this, you probably know me, and if you know me, you probably know that my father died as a result of ALS. In fact, it was ten years ago this past July that he died. My awareness of ALS could not possibly be made more aware. And I just don't know what to do with all the giddy, gleeful ice-dumping that's happening right now. I *know* that it's something that was started by someone who is personally dealing with ALS, and I can definitely imagine that among his family and friends, this activity was a way to have fun, a way to seek out and make some kind of meaning in a disease that robs a person and their family of everything. Lord knows there's a lot less fun-having happening when you're dealing with ALS.
But there's something about all the videos (and now the various incarnations including people who have stupid accidents while attempting the ice bucket, and all sorts of celebrities getting in on the game) that makes me really uncomfortable. While my Dad was sick, we were involved with the ALS Association, and they do indeed do a lot to promote research and advocate for people with ALS. It is good that they are getting more money to do this work. I am grateful to those who donate and those who are working on research and support for people with this disease. When my Dad was alive, a member of my parents' group of friends organized a team for the local version of the "Walk to Defeat ALS" in Harrisburg. I came home for that walk, and we all wore team T-shirts and walked as a group, and I suppose that was a good thing. But what I really remember about that day was that my Dad was miserable. It was a warm day, he was uncomfortable in his chair, and had to ride in the rather uncomfortable van we had acquired (at considerable cost and continual frustration) in order to provide occasional transportation for him at a point when he was pretty much constantly house-bound. Out in the world, especially at an event like this, he felt like a spectacle, like everyone was looking at him with either pity or something else he didn't want. That day at the walk, he did not want to be doing this thing that was being done for/with him. And I was torn between feeling that we had to be the dutiful family and thank everyone for putting us through this, and agreeing with my Dad that this whole thing was pretty shitty: the fact that he had this disease, the fact that this disease was definitely going to kill him, and the fact that we apparently needed to raise money to (hopefully someday) stop this disease. Surely, this was too much.
I guess what really bothers me is that we have to resort to this kind of thing -- walk-a-thons, ice buckets, whatever -- to raise money for research that will save someone's life someday. I am reminded of the fact that a few years after my Dad died, I was visiting at home with my Mom and we went to the local CVS to pick up some things she needed. At the checkout, the cashier asked, "would you like to make a donation to ALS?" We were both sort of flabbergasted, as we were not used to hearing anyone talk about ALS in public, and we certainly weren't expecting a solicitation at the moment when we were paying for a prescription. My knee jerk (cranky) reaction was to say "no thanks, we already gave at home" because it certainly felt like we gave enough to that damn disease. Also, the whole wording of "donate to ALS" makes me a bit crazy. Lord knows ALS doesn't need any help doing what it does. Again, I don't want to quibble with CVS's plan to donate money to an organization that does good work. But what struck me then, and strikes me again right now is that CVS, a corporation that makes its money by selling health care supplies to people who have health care needs, was asking that we donate to deal with insufficient funding of health care. We were being asked to donate to help fund ALS research at the checkout in the very drugstore where we had regularly (and recently) purchased supplies (quite expensive supplies!) for my father's ALS: prescriptions for drugs that would not cure him, devices that were intended to help feed, bathe, or otherwise care for him, pads and tools and liquids and sundry unmentionables that become the everyday reality of life with ALS. CVS, in fact, had actually profited from my father's illness. In the moment, I tried to imagine how others would respond to this request. What if you didn't know what ALS was -- would you ask the clerk at the CVS? Would he or she explain it? What would he/she say? Why is this conversation even happening at the checkout of the CVS at all? Why can't I just buy my [insert embarrassing personal care product here] anonymously and leave? Please?
Once something like the ice bucket challenge has virtually taken over social media, it's hard to push back on it without seeming like a killjoy or just someone who's trying to be contrarian. We do get news -- good and bad -- from our social media network, and it *is* helpful (or at the very least, interesting) to see what friends (and friends of friends) are saying about the day's news. But it seems like with things like the ice bucket challenge, there's not a lot of real responding to the problem. People are "challenging" their friends to do the challenge (and their friends are then doing the challenge) but there seems to be a real disconnect about what the challenge is. For one thing, I am baffled by the fact that you are supposed to *either* dump the bucket on your head *or* make a donation to ALS research. Why set it up that way at all? I realize a lot of people are doing both, but it just doesn't make sense: if you want to raise money, why would you give people the option to do the silly/fun thing to get OUT of making the donation? I also don't see how the ice bucket raises awareness of anything other than the ice bucket. Is there some metaphorical meaning in here that I am missing? Perhaps having the bucket of ice dumped on your head gives you that jolt of being awake and somehow you.....what? Understand what is to have ALS? Because I'm pretty sure it doesn't do that. At all.
I was actually spurred to write something about my own relation to ALS and feelings about the bucket challenge after I read an article that came to me through Twitter (yes, thank you social media). I got to M. J. Dinius's article, "On the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and Ferguson" through a tweet from Alison. You should read it: http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2014/08/21/on-the-als-ice-bucket-challenge-and-ferguson/
It's far more eloquent than I can be, and makes many more connections than I'm capable of developing right now. I think you should read it. In fact, if I were going to re-make the ice bucket challenge, I would challenge my network to read that article. And if I were going even further, I'd challenge them to do something after reading it. That something might be to donate to ALS research, or it might be to donate to students and librarians in Ferguson. Or maybe you want to help journalists like Jim Foley do their work. Or maybe you want to go read a bit more about how disability, or race, or class affects people -- real people -- in the real world and start thinking about (and working towards) fixing the inequalities in our world. ALS is only one of the problems. Scientists (with a lot of money) might actually be able to fix that one someday. But there's a lot of other kinds of thinking and working that needs to be done to fix the other problems.
I don't know how dumping a bucket of ice on anyone's head is a way of raising awareness about anything. If you are aware of a disease, it is likely because someone you know has or had it. Maybe that someone you know is someone you really know, like your parent or your child. Maybe that someone you know is just someone everyone "knows" like Michael J. Fox. But I wish that the fact that you know or "know" someone with a disease didn't have to be the reason you wanted there to be a cure for it. I would like to think that if there was someone in front of you who needed help, you wouldn't stop to ask if you knew that person. Maybe you could just help. And then maybe you could get to know that person.
It is clear that the ice bucket challenge is successfully raising a lot of money, but the giddiness, the gleeful videos, they just leave me, well, cold.
The news has been hitting a bit close to home lately. Jim Foley, the journalist who was working to tell the world about Syria (and whose murder is now the news story), was in the MFA program at UMass Amherst at the same time that I was in the PhD program. I can't say that I knew him, but he was friends with my friends, and we were in the same orbit so to speak. I can't even process what's happened to him, a man my age, who lost his life doing work for the world, work for humanity and justice. I keep having to turn off the radio, especially when Lucy is around.
I'm also feeling a bit reluctant to engage in any news or social media right now, because it seems that the ice bucket challenge is everywhere. If you've been deprived of the Facebooks, Twitter, or all major news networks, you perhaps don't know that a lot of people are dumping buckets of ice water over their heads in order to raise money for ALS. I know I should be glad about it. But I have a really hard time watching this meme take over the internets, even when my friends are doing it, and I know that they mean well.
If you're reading this, you probably know me, and if you know me, you probably know that my father died as a result of ALS. In fact, it was ten years ago this past July that he died. My awareness of ALS could not possibly be made more aware. And I just don't know what to do with all the giddy, gleeful ice-dumping that's happening right now. I *know* that it's something that was started by someone who is personally dealing with ALS, and I can definitely imagine that among his family and friends, this activity was a way to have fun, a way to seek out and make some kind of meaning in a disease that robs a person and their family of everything. Lord knows there's a lot less fun-having happening when you're dealing with ALS.
But there's something about all the videos (and now the various incarnations including people who have stupid accidents while attempting the ice bucket, and all sorts of celebrities getting in on the game) that makes me really uncomfortable. While my Dad was sick, we were involved with the ALS Association, and they do indeed do a lot to promote research and advocate for people with ALS. It is good that they are getting more money to do this work. I am grateful to those who donate and those who are working on research and support for people with this disease. When my Dad was alive, a member of my parents' group of friends organized a team for the local version of the "Walk to Defeat ALS" in Harrisburg. I came home for that walk, and we all wore team T-shirts and walked as a group, and I suppose that was a good thing. But what I really remember about that day was that my Dad was miserable. It was a warm day, he was uncomfortable in his chair, and had to ride in the rather uncomfortable van we had acquired (at considerable cost and continual frustration) in order to provide occasional transportation for him at a point when he was pretty much constantly house-bound. Out in the world, especially at an event like this, he felt like a spectacle, like everyone was looking at him with either pity or something else he didn't want. That day at the walk, he did not want to be doing this thing that was being done for/with him. And I was torn between feeling that we had to be the dutiful family and thank everyone for putting us through this, and agreeing with my Dad that this whole thing was pretty shitty: the fact that he had this disease, the fact that this disease was definitely going to kill him, and the fact that we apparently needed to raise money to (hopefully someday) stop this disease. Surely, this was too much.
I guess what really bothers me is that we have to resort to this kind of thing -- walk-a-thons, ice buckets, whatever -- to raise money for research that will save someone's life someday. I am reminded of the fact that a few years after my Dad died, I was visiting at home with my Mom and we went to the local CVS to pick up some things she needed. At the checkout, the cashier asked, "would you like to make a donation to ALS?" We were both sort of flabbergasted, as we were not used to hearing anyone talk about ALS in public, and we certainly weren't expecting a solicitation at the moment when we were paying for a prescription. My knee jerk (cranky) reaction was to say "no thanks, we already gave at home" because it certainly felt like we gave enough to that damn disease. Also, the whole wording of "donate to ALS" makes me a bit crazy. Lord knows ALS doesn't need any help doing what it does. Again, I don't want to quibble with CVS's plan to donate money to an organization that does good work. But what struck me then, and strikes me again right now is that CVS, a corporation that makes its money by selling health care supplies to people who have health care needs, was asking that we donate to deal with insufficient funding of health care. We were being asked to donate to help fund ALS research at the checkout in the very drugstore where we had regularly (and recently) purchased supplies (quite expensive supplies!) for my father's ALS: prescriptions for drugs that would not cure him, devices that were intended to help feed, bathe, or otherwise care for him, pads and tools and liquids and sundry unmentionables that become the everyday reality of life with ALS. CVS, in fact, had actually profited from my father's illness. In the moment, I tried to imagine how others would respond to this request. What if you didn't know what ALS was -- would you ask the clerk at the CVS? Would he or she explain it? What would he/she say? Why is this conversation even happening at the checkout of the CVS at all? Why can't I just buy my [insert embarrassing personal care product here] anonymously and leave? Please?
Once something like the ice bucket challenge has virtually taken over social media, it's hard to push back on it without seeming like a killjoy or just someone who's trying to be contrarian. We do get news -- good and bad -- from our social media network, and it *is* helpful (or at the very least, interesting) to see what friends (and friends of friends) are saying about the day's news. But it seems like with things like the ice bucket challenge, there's not a lot of real responding to the problem. People are "challenging" their friends to do the challenge (and their friends are then doing the challenge) but there seems to be a real disconnect about what the challenge is. For one thing, I am baffled by the fact that you are supposed to *either* dump the bucket on your head *or* make a donation to ALS research. Why set it up that way at all? I realize a lot of people are doing both, but it just doesn't make sense: if you want to raise money, why would you give people the option to do the silly/fun thing to get OUT of making the donation? I also don't see how the ice bucket raises awareness of anything other than the ice bucket. Is there some metaphorical meaning in here that I am missing? Perhaps having the bucket of ice dumped on your head gives you that jolt of being awake and somehow you.....what? Understand what is to have ALS? Because I'm pretty sure it doesn't do that. At all.
I was actually spurred to write something about my own relation to ALS and feelings about the bucket challenge after I read an article that came to me through Twitter (yes, thank you social media). I got to M. J. Dinius's article, "On the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and Ferguson" through a tweet from Alison. You should read it: http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2014/08/21/on-the-als-ice-bucket-challenge-and-ferguson/
It's far more eloquent than I can be, and makes many more connections than I'm capable of developing right now. I think you should read it. In fact, if I were going to re-make the ice bucket challenge, I would challenge my network to read that article. And if I were going even further, I'd challenge them to do something after reading it. That something might be to donate to ALS research, or it might be to donate to students and librarians in Ferguson. Or maybe you want to help journalists like Jim Foley do their work. Or maybe you want to go read a bit more about how disability, or race, or class affects people -- real people -- in the real world and start thinking about (and working towards) fixing the inequalities in our world. ALS is only one of the problems. Scientists (with a lot of money) might actually be able to fix that one someday. But there's a lot of other kinds of thinking and working that needs to be done to fix the other problems.
I don't know how dumping a bucket of ice on anyone's head is a way of raising awareness about anything. If you are aware of a disease, it is likely because someone you know has or had it. Maybe that someone you know is someone you really know, like your parent or your child. Maybe that someone you know is just someone everyone "knows" like Michael J. Fox. But I wish that the fact that you know or "know" someone with a disease didn't have to be the reason you wanted there to be a cure for it. I would like to think that if there was someone in front of you who needed help, you wouldn't stop to ask if you knew that person. Maybe you could just help. And then maybe you could get to know that person.
It is clear that the ice bucket challenge is successfully raising a lot of money, but the giddiness, the gleeful videos, they just leave me, well, cold.
Sunday, August 3, 2014
Go ask Alice
Alice has now been with us for just over a week, and she's fitting right in. We did a hike in Lowell Dracut State Forest today, and a walk on the Vandberg Esplanade, and she thoroughly enjoyed herself. And here she is, all tired out:
I know, right? Ridiculously cute. And curled up so tiny!
Some back story for Alice: She came to us through Canine Commitment of New England, a rescue group we found on Petfinder. She was in a shelter in Tupelo Mississippi since she was a puppy, when she was apparently brought in as a stray. The folks in the shelter asked if the rescue group would bring her up before she got much bigger, thinking she had a better chance of getting adopted as a pup. She's about 5 months old. She's likely part lab, as she has webbed feet. But other than that, we don't have much to go on. She's almost 30 pounds. The head vet at our vet office said she wouldn't get much taller but should/would fill out a bit, likely topping out around 36 or 38 pounds. But we've had random strangers tell us she could make it to 75 pounds! Eek! Is she part great dane? Who knows!
So far it's been a bit chaotic adapting to life with a puppy. Thankfully, she is mostly house-trained, and we've had very few accidents. Also, she's been a good sleeper at night (or maybe we're just too tired to hear her). She stays in the downstairs hallway without protest (although with plenty of barriers keeping her from other areas).
She's a bit rambunctious in the morning, which is a bit frustrating when all you want to do is quietly make a caffeinated beverage and quietly check e-mail and quietly wake up. But we're figuring it out. We've been seeing a lot of our neighborhood in the early morning.
This is my first puppy experience. People keep reminding me that she is still a puppy, and I can't expect grown-up dog behavior. There is a lot of chewing. Do not leave shoes lying about. Do not provoke her with shoelaces. Or the swing of a swingy skirt. All will be chewed.
I was weary of her earlier this week, and complained to our friend Paula (keeper of all dogs). I foolishly compared her to our previous dog, when Paula told us that we didn't have a dog before, we had an animated rug. "Animated rug" is an oddly apt way to describe Carter. I know I have to stop comparing the two, but it's hard to avoid it. Here's a shot of Alice with a toy she inherited from Carter:
That's Big Mean Kitty. She was in pristine shape when Carter received her as a present soon after his arrival here. Carter was never much of a chewer. There's a hole in Big Mean Kitty's side from when our guest, Mackie, chewed him, but we sewed it up, and Carter never inflicted any real damage on Big Mean Kitty. I don't know if you can see it in this picture, but Big Mean Kitty no longer has ears. And I imagine she will soon lose other appendages, too, to the ravages of Alice.
But she's been very sweet, loves people, and moves quite a lot faster then Mr. Carter did. And we're very glad to have a furry creature among us again.
Some back story for Alice: She came to us through Canine Commitment of New England, a rescue group we found on Petfinder. She was in a shelter in Tupelo Mississippi since she was a puppy, when she was apparently brought in as a stray. The folks in the shelter asked if the rescue group would bring her up before she got much bigger, thinking she had a better chance of getting adopted as a pup. She's about 5 months old. She's likely part lab, as she has webbed feet. But other than that, we don't have much to go on. She's almost 30 pounds. The head vet at our vet office said she wouldn't get much taller but should/would fill out a bit, likely topping out around 36 or 38 pounds. But we've had random strangers tell us she could make it to 75 pounds! Eek! Is she part great dane? Who knows!
So far it's been a bit chaotic adapting to life with a puppy. Thankfully, she is mostly house-trained, and we've had very few accidents. Also, she's been a good sleeper at night (or maybe we're just too tired to hear her). She stays in the downstairs hallway without protest (although with plenty of barriers keeping her from other areas).
She's a bit rambunctious in the morning, which is a bit frustrating when all you want to do is quietly make a caffeinated beverage and quietly check e-mail and quietly wake up. But we're figuring it out. We've been seeing a lot of our neighborhood in the early morning.
This is my first puppy experience. People keep reminding me that she is still a puppy, and I can't expect grown-up dog behavior. There is a lot of chewing. Do not leave shoes lying about. Do not provoke her with shoelaces. Or the swing of a swingy skirt. All will be chewed.
I was weary of her earlier this week, and complained to our friend Paula (keeper of all dogs). I foolishly compared her to our previous dog, when Paula told us that we didn't have a dog before, we had an animated rug. "Animated rug" is an oddly apt way to describe Carter. I know I have to stop comparing the two, but it's hard to avoid it. Here's a shot of Alice with a toy she inherited from Carter:
But she's been very sweet, loves people, and moves quite a lot faster then Mr. Carter did. And we're very glad to have a furry creature among us again.
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