Natalie's Sleeping Haiku

Ten minutes rocking
Ten nursing, only to find
Pooping precludes sleep

Loud and clear.

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Either that or imitation exposes our every flaw.

"No, Natalie! GO AWAY!"

I froze and a chill went through my heart when I heard Grace's forceful command to her sister this morning. The tone was worse than the words themselves. It was annoyed, dismissive, as though Grace intended to hurt Natalie's feelings to deter her from being close by.

The worst part was that I know exactly where she learned it. There is no day care, no TV's in our house to blame when this happens. I had been putting Natalie down for a nap with orders for Grace to leave us alone so that Natalie could get to sleep. I turned on the digital videos we have of Grace as a baby on the computer and told her not to come into Natalie's room.

When she came in, asking for something or other that wasn't a) and emergency or b) helping put Natalie to sleep, and after my whispered deterrents hadn't worked, I said in an annoyed, dismissive voice, "Go AWAY, Grace." It worked.

Too well, apparently.

But before we beat ourselves up over this moment of heartbreak, a counter example: two days ago while we were on our evening walk, I told Grace she was a sweetie. "And," I continued, "Natalie, you're a sweetie, too."

As I put the girls in their car seats later this morning, I heard Grace's voice right as I closed Natalie's door: "Natalie, you're a sweetie!"

Flattering or not, our children reflect us. Perhaps children are one of God's ways of exposing our best and worst to ourselves in hopes we can capitalize on the good and address the bad. Today, I learned both lessons loud and clear.

I will sit by the door.

"You will sit by the door, Mommy," Grace commands me as I kiss her goodnight. She says this every night, and we usually comply in some fashion. Sometimes I respond with, "I will put Natalie to bed/check on Natalie/do the dishes and then come sit by the door, 'kay?" and, of course, upon my return, she's snoozing away.

Lots of times, Scott is the one sitting by the door while I put Natalie down or check email or do dishes. Scott is pretty much always on Grace duty when he's home. If by chance she wakes up in the middle of the night, he's on it. If she needs to have an ow-y kissed, he does it. (How do you speel "ow-y?") I think of it as penance for all those long sleepless months when Grace just wouldn't have anyone but Mommy.

But tonight Scott is out watching Mike play at the Gypsy Lounge and so I got to sit by the door for a bit. These really are precious times. I think of the way Grace longs for closeness with us and I am beginning to really realize that this will end all too soon. Sometimes it can be suffocating: "Mommy nurse! Up, Mommy, up! You sit by the door, Mommy," etc. But I know this strange mother-daughter relationship is evolving like all mother-daughter relationships do. I also hear her insist, "Gracie do it myself!" and "No, Mommy, I want Daddy do it," more and more often. And I recognize that my role is partly to respond to her requests, and partly to encourage her to grow on her own.

How will this drama unfold at age 15? My father-in-law has insightfully noted that there will likely be a clash of wills heading our way, since Grace and Mommy are both so, well, strong-willed, let's say. We agreed the other night that age 2 and age 15 will probably be the toughest.

But if it is true that Grace and I are on a crash-course for disaster in 13 years, (and I agree that it is likely), how can I use her desire for my companionship, approval, and attention to strengthen our relationship now? I don't mean "strengthen" in the sense that I need to do more for her. Good God, is that even possible?! I mean "strengthen" in the healthiest way--that I want us on super-solid footing in preparation for those turbulent years.

I want her to know that I will "sit by the door" by being present during a tough time in her life, but that Mom also has other interests and needs besides her children. I want to "nurse her" by inviting affection from her when she needs to reconnect, long after she is weaned, but also that there are other people in our lives that will want my affection, and hers. And I hope that these years of intensity and high-investment parenting will pay off down the road: that my daughters will know how to communicate their needs in their relationships, and will be confident that they are worthy of those needs being met--not only by me, but also by the other people they choose to walk with in life.

Dad and Laura.

My father and my gay sister's partner finally have something in common: they have asked me not to blog about them. C'mon! How can I resist? That's almost like daring me to do it.

I will write one paragraph about each of them. After this, they can each repeat their request to not appear in my blog if they still feel that way. I will honor it.

My dad was raised on a farm in rural Iowa as the oldest of 6 kids. You know, up at 5:00, milking cows, his mom made his clothes, up hill both ways in the snow kind of thing. He is now a sophisticated and savvy investment banker in San Francisco, listens to opera, and can't start his day without the Financial Times. He is currently either meeting with his architect to plan the remodel of my parents' wine country home, on a plane to Germany to meet new potential clients, having a beer at the hot SOMA brewery my brother works at, or blasting Hawaiian music as he heads over one of the Bay Area's five bridges in his BMW. He is the first to compliment the amazing job his parents did raising their kids, but it is common knowledge that the farm was run as a dictatorship (however benevolent) and the kids were beaten with a switch if they misbehaved. Even so, Dad took the best from his parents and magnified it as our father. He may still be a Republican, but you might also mistake him for a sensative new-age guy when you see him listening to his kids' problems, having a tickle fight with his granddaughter, or reading a novel on religious tolerance during the Inquisition in India. Clearly, the man has come a long way.

But he still cries upon hearing old blue-grassy church music, especially "I'll Fly Away," and old harvest hymns like "Come Labor On," and "We Plow the Fields and Scatter the Good Seed on the Ground." You can take the boy out of the farm, but you can't take the farm out of the boy. And I would never want to.

Laura: My sister-in-law was also one of 6 kids in a family without a lot of money. She grew up in a coastal suburb, the daughter of teachers. My dad was motivated by a poor childhood to change his circumstances, and he has: he put himself through college and law school, started his own business, and sent all three of his own kids to college when he was the first of his family to even go at all. His ability to change his circumstances, as opposed to accepting the hand he was dealt, at many different points in his life is an inspiration to me. Laura's childhood motivated her to want to change the world. She's a social worker who works for a Washington watch-dog group that moniters health care and poverty issues. One goal of her organization is to collect and present data that will encourage government to change its approach to healthcare, particularly in regards to children below the poverty line. She chooses a lifestyle that is as low an impact on the environment as possible: she and my sister have one car. She is a vegetarian. She eats little dairy. Her thoughfulness is astounding. Ask her what she thinks about any problem in your life and she will simultaneously affirm your efforts and encourage you to be even better. She has a bum knee and bad ankles after years of gymnastics but still makes it a priority to get out and about in nature as much as humanly possible. She has 7 nieces and nephews and lavishes her attention on each one as if they were the only child who has ever done anything as cute as spit up or get an A in math. And at the end of a long, hard season of research and reporting, after months and months of thoughtfulness towards the world and the environment, the woman loves a good day at the spa. Her motto might as well be: "Love the earth; love each other; love yourself." And we love her for it.

Wow, after re-reading this post, it's clear that my dad and his daughter-in-law actually have a lot in common, underneath the surface.