Before I was a mother, I never realized that being a mother was such a physical thing. A nerd from birth, I was never much aware of having a physical self… I mean, I knew that I had big eyes and bigger feet, and I knew that it felt nice to put jeans on right after shaving my legs but mostly I was pretty much a floating head, aware that I had a lot of hair to deal with but not much else.

But once you’re a mother it’s not just thinking and talking anymore. Your very body provides comfort and energy for all these other people, and right now I’m more aware than ever that I have a physical self. I mean obviously there’s the very physical act that leads to getting pregnant*, and of course being pregnant and then giving birth are intensely physical experiences – but pregnancy is so surreal and then there’s all this talk of getting your body back when it’s over that I didn’t realize that you really don’t get your body back. Not while your children are little. Since Graham was born I’ve been intensely aware of how important this body is. I’m sure it’s partly the boobie feeding, because damn those breastfeeding fanatics for being right about the love and the magic and the cute snuggling loving lovey boobie love, but there’s more than just that.

I’m constantly holding, soothing, petting someone. We’ll be outside and suddenly someone grabs my fingers and pulls me along. Or I’ll be sitting at the dining room table in my cotton nightgown, Graham curled against my chest and slurping loudly on my bare shoulder, with my hair wrapped up in his fist. And then Nicolaus will climb up my legs like a ladder and crawl into my lap because he just thought of fifteen reasons why he really, really needs to be in my lap like right away. And Kevin comes home and asks me to rub his feet. Even the dog, at the end of the day when I’m alone for a little while after the boys are asleep, comes over to me and presses the top of his skull into my hand.

I have a flabby belly. My face is breaking out, and I have no time for makeup, and my arms will always be weird and skinny but that doesn’t matter when you’re a mother. Contact with my skin is in high demand these days, and it’s a nice feeling – a new kind of body image that has nothing to do with the latest issue of Glamour. Screw the do’s and don’ts – this here is prime real estate.

* physically placing an order through a catalog.

Our weekend ruled the earth. With mighty jaws and razor sharp teeth.

Q: Will you and daddy ever not be married anymore?
A: No, Daddy and I will be married forever.
(He's been asking this a lot lately, and it dawned on me today that he isn't asking out of anxiety over us splitting up… he's wondering if I might be available at some point.)

Q: Why is Graham safer turned that way in the carseat but I'm safe turned the other way?
A: Hm. Excellent question!

Q: Is gravity underground? Why does gravity work and pull things down?
A: Shit. I knew I shouldn't have majored in art.

Q: What if somebody didn't have a car and we had to let them borrow our car every day?
A: Uhh…
Q: That would be very nice.
A: Except then we wouldn't have a car to drive.
Q: No, they're just BORROWING it. They would bring it back.
A: Wait, have you been talking to Uncle James?

Q: Are we liquid inside? Or solid? Why do we have a spine? What if we didn't have a spine? Does Graham have a spine already? Then why does he flop over like that in the carseat?
A: Hey, how about a cookie!
Q: Yay!
A: Whew.

My mom was talking to me over delicious chips and queso about my brother Tony who, while not a stoner, has stunned everyone by holding a job for nearly two solid weeks. He got a job at a sandwich shop, which impressed me a great deal. This is a kid that once almost starved to death because my mom left town for a week and there was no food in the house. Except that the kitchen was stocked FULL of food, but you see, there was no food in the house that was already made and sitting on a plate for him. Telling Tony to make a sandwich is like telling me to construct an airplane. Or iron a shirt. But when you iron this side, you’re putting creases into the other side! It’s NOT possible.

Still, the sandwich people hired Tony. And even more impressive, they kept him. Even though he overslept for work on the second day, by the end of last week they told him that he was the hardest worker on their crew. What? Are they somehow mistaking his slow, eyes-down, haphazard workstyle for some type of tai-chi, methodical, zen sandwich master approach? You fools! He’s not looking down because he’s thinking about sandwiches! He’s looking down because while you were talking to him about sandwiches, he fell asleep.

Last Thursday one of his lizards died, and he was so sad about it at work that they told him to go home. Not in a mean way, but in a we-understand way. I’m not trying to belittle the very genuine bond one can have with a pet lizard, but dude. They gave him a day of bereavement leave for a pet LIZARD. I see a great future for him at this company, assuming that they don’t go out of business on account of all of their employees working less than my brother Tony who I love so very much but wow. Working less hard than Tony? All of your dang muscles would atrophy. You might stop breathing. That can’t be good for company morale.

So anyway, my mom and I were having yummy lunch and she was telling me about the hours he’s working and so on, and Nicolaus tugs my sleeve and says what sounds like, “Mama, I’m your ‘ittle parasaurolophus.”

I had to interrupt my mom. “Wait. Nicolaus, what did you just say?”

I’m just your ittle parasaurolophus. And I have a huge CRUST. And I have a knife!” He waved my butter knife at me, “Does it ‘ook ‘ike your ‘ittle parasaurolophus is going to CUT his play-doh?

Question: Why can a kid who can’t say the word “music” – he calls it muse-kit – effortlessly pronounce “parasaurolophus” and “anemone”?

Follow up question: Dude. If you can say words like parasaurolophus and know what they mean, why can’t you sometimes like, oh I don’t know… NOT poop in your pants?

Nicolaus! He is being re-potty trained this week. I know I’ve never said anything before, but I think it’s time for me to confess that I don’t really enjoy potty training. I am never, ever going to potty train Graham. He can wear diapers forever… you know they make them in adult sizes now. I called my mom to ask her how she potty trained my turbo-charged brother James and she admitted to sending him to daycare and letting them do it. My mom is a genius. Next time: Day care. Totally. In fact, my current goal is simply to train him to the point that I can tell the preschool “Oh yes, absolutely” when they ask if he’s potty trained. Then I’ll let them finish the job. They’re much better at all this supportive, cognitive development, raising kids type of stuff than I am.

After a shaky start to the week, he’s doing pretty great. We set up two jars, a happy face jar and a sad face jar. At the start of the day, the sad jar is full of conversation hearts. Every time he uses the potty, we move a heart over to the happy jar. Every time he has an accident, we move one back to the sad jar. He is very concerned about why the sad face jar is sad. “And did he USED to be happy?”

Crap, I don’t know kid – it’s just a jar. There is no backstory.

Graham! Slept ten hours straight last night, woke up to eat, and has now been asleep for an additional two hours. At four months old, he now sleeps more than his brother ever has.

Nicolaus! has theories as to why the dinosaurs all died. Tyrannosaurus Rexes smoked too much, and smoking too much can kill you. They just didn’t know that, so they all died. All the other dinosaurs fell down too hard and it killed them because “Dinosaurs are very fragile, you know?”

Graham! Whined all day yesterday, unless I was feeding him. So if you ordered Nerdy Baby ABC cards and you were wondering where in the fuck your order is, it’s sitting on my dining room table waiting for me to take my boobs out of someone’s mouth long enough to drive to the post office.

Nicolaus!Has questions.
Why can my bones walk?
Why can atoms walk?
Why are we this color?
What is glue made out of?
What’s inside computers? How do they work?
How do alligators breathe? Do they have ungs or gills?
Do carnivores eat their own babies?

You can walk because you have muscles, atoms can walk because atoms stick together to make muscles that you use to walk, we’re this color because people come in all different colors, glue is made of plastic and water I think but I’m not sure, and. Computers have chips and processers and wires and. Um. Fuck if I know! Alligators have lungs, their noses are on top so they can breathe while they swim. NO carnivores never ever eat their own babies. I swear.

Graham! Thinks it’s funny when we cough, and sometimes he sticks out his tongue and pretends to cough back. Did you just die from how cute that is? Sorry.

Nicolaus!Wanted to know why duckbill dinosaurs have a huge thing sticking out of the top of their head. I said I didn’t know. Kevin guessed that it had to do with swimming somehow. Nicolaus guessed that it was either for balance because they don’t have long tails or for protection by somehow jabbing or shooting their enemies. They were both wrong, though – we looked it up and found out that the crest of the duckbill (whose real name is parasaurolophus or something like that) is actually pretty controversial. No one is sure what the crest was for, and apparantly dinosaur nerds frequently have knife fights over it. Who knew science was so interesting! What they do know is that the crest – or crust as my son calls it – was 6 feet long (!) and contained airways. So some dinosaur nerds with a big budget made a model of one and pushed air through it and this is the sound it made:
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Hall/2830/para.wav

Pretty neat. So now Nicolaus sometimes turns into a duckbill and calls to me by closing his eyes and making weird alien oboe sounds with his invisible crest. I’m supposed to honk back or it hurts his feelings. Yesterday he met a little girl and told her that they were both duckbills. He stood still for a minute and told her, “I’m just growing my CRUST.”

Graham! Is still asleep. It’s 9:30. He went to bed at 8:30. There are other milestones that I’m sure are wonderful and exciting but they’re all pretty much eclipsed by HE SLEEPS.

Nicolaus! May be going to school soon. We went and talked to the folks at the fancypants private school that we fell in love with almost a year ago. Normally they only have openings in the fall, but they have one student in the 3-6 year old classroom that might be moving away in February. I’m a little torn. It’s a full-time opening. That’s a lot of school for a three year old. But this place is amazing, and I don’t mean amazing in the oh wow, look how much silly academic nonsense my kid can recite to impress all my nonexistant snooty friends. It’s amazing because they respect the kids as individuals, and respect that to kids, play is their work. It’s amazing because when you walk in they have the same peaceful vibe that we try to create here at home. Kids are busy, and free to move from one activity to the next whenever they want to… and also free to spend as much time as they want working on something. If you knew Nicolaus and you walked into this classroom, you would know instantly that he belonged there.

I’ve made enough money over the last two months to pay for a year’s tuition. They may have an opening, like soon. Yikes.

But I worry a little. Will they be okay with him constantly pretending stuff? If he walks in and tells them his name is Sarah today, will they say “Hi Sarah!”?
I hope so. I think they will. They’re pretty awesome. When we went to check it out this week, he didn’t want to leave.

Graham! Wants to sit up. But he really can’t. So whenever you set him down he leeeeeeeeaaans forward and it looks like he’s doing little baby crunches. No more rolling over though, it literally scared the poop out of him.

Nicolaus! Spends at least two hours paintinig every day. He insists on using real watercolors, from a tube because that’s what he sees me doing. I can’t tell him no, you’re just a kid so use kid paints, you know? So if anyone knows of a cheap place to buy little tubes of watercolors that look like the real deal, please tell me.

Kevin! Has a new job. His last job required him to work in a physically and mentally demanding environment where screwing up could mean the evacuation of a highly populated area. The management played obnoxious mind games, and made it a point to punish him for having an art degree. He got along with his coworkers, but didn’t have much in common with them. They were all nice enough, but were all obsessed with sports, hunting, and drinking beer.

This job is different. He has to be on his feet a lot, but it’s not so physcially difficult. And if he screws up, nobody dies. And his supervisor has goofy bumper stickers on his car, and plays pirate music while they work. Not pirated music – no, no. No. PIRATE music. Aye matey, Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum. For real. Kevin, with his “I’m Bona Fide!” bumper sticker, fits in beautifully. Long hours right now so he’s tired, but happy. Yay, new job!

Graham! Thinks his big brother Sarah is the coolest, funniest thing in the world.

Nicolaus! Almost totally ignores his baby brother. It’s amazing.

Mouse! Really stinks after a seizure. Poor dog. First a seizure, now a bath. Which might stress himself out enough to cause a seizure. My dad looks at Mouse and shakes his head and says, “Such an improbable life form.”

Nicolaus! Wears as little as possible to bed, even in the winter, because he likes how the blanket feels against his skin.

Graham! He’s awake now, and Nicolaus is openly resenting the laptop. Time to get dressed and start the day.