We were running late, but I didn’t feel stressed. Even as we hit our third inexplicable clot of traffic and the clock shoved closer to the start of Graham’s class, I felt the kind of calm of someone who knows that really the day is going well, the house at home is fairly clean, and one missed clay class a childhood does not make.

It’s creepy to realize how much of reality is just the exact mix of chemicals that happen to be squishing together in your brain that day. Because a week ago my female hormones would have rammed into my whatever else is in there and it all would have been powerful enough to light up an actual light on my car’s dashboard which would have flashed: CHECK TIME – YOU SUCK.

And I would’ve driven the same speed but the drive would have felt faster, more hurried, and more awful. Sometimes it feels like I live in one of those frenzied traffic reports they yell over the sound of a news radio chopper. OVER ON THE NORTH SIDE WE HAVE AN EAST BOUND PARENT WHO IS STILL CLEANING UP AFTER IN AN EARLIER INCIDENT INVOLVING AN OVERTURNED CUP OF MILK IN THE BACKSEAT OF HER VEHICLE. CONGESTION IN BOTH CHILDREN, EXPECT DELAYS AS THEY DECIDE WHETHER TO WEAR FALL SHOES OR SANDALS OR MAYBE BALLET SLIPPERS THAT DON’T EVEN FIT.

Those weeks are long. But not this week. This week I’m having an easier time zooming out, backing up from the intense focus on all of my stupid minute-by-minute tragedies. Which doesn’t mean that I don’t suck – I do. But this week, even as I run late and mess things up and end up at Arby’s, I’m noticing the fiery trees that line the suburban streets. Their leaves look like paper. And even through my filthy windshield, the sky is a chalky blue, and in the backseat my boys are warning me about activating the warp engines.

I’m not proud of how much I enjoy their Star Trek chatter. It truly warms my heart. “There,” Kevin says, “Are you happy? You finally have friends.”
He’s right! Man. It makes me wish I’d had kids sooner. Like – if I’d gotten pregnant at 14, then Nicolaus could have watched Star Trek with me every day during my freshman year of college. It would’ve been SO FUN.

Anyway, it’s a decent week so far. I’m making an effort not to slip into a funk, and to remember the many ways that I do not suck. I need a motivational poster to constantly remind myself: You might be a lame mom, but you’re the best mom they have. Besides, it’s not like they know any better.

Right this second I’m sitting at a neighborhood coffee shop which offers free babysitting in their fancy enclosed play area while you sit and work. It’s a really neat place – for $7 you can use their wireless internet and legally ignore your children for two hours. The boys like it, but I know it’s lame. We should have gone to the park today, or to a museum, or to the library even though the library has no more books on account of my children checked them all out last week.

So I’m sitting and instead of working on fixing my web site or catching up on etsy feedback, I’m blogging and sort of spying on my children. I’m also apparently using the word blog as a verb with a straight face. Disturbing.

There are times when I’m tempted to compare them. Like when I have to drag Nicolaus into the hair cut place, where he watches darkly and scrutinizes every teeny snip because he already told the girl that he is growing his hair out, so this had better not be a serious cut. And then it’s done! So we start to leave, and then I have to physically drag a screaming Graham out while he begs for a haircut.

Or when I order pizza.
Graham: White sauce, every topping except olives.
Nicolaus: Red sauce, extra olives only

Or when the day begins. Every day since he was born Nicolaus has run into our room and begged us to get up! Start the day! Let’s go! Let’s eat! OMG! GET UP GET UP GET UP. I wonder what that does to a kid, to have to work so hard to get his basic needs met like that. You know, like psychologically.

Graham comes to our bed at sunrise too. He shuffles in quietly, climbs up next to me and whispers, “I needa blankit.”

“Do you want to get up and have breakfast?”

“No.” He says, and he yawns and falls back asleep.

Their fundamental vibes are so different. Nicolaus is a PC, he makes things needlessly difficult and crashes a lot. He wears muted colors. He has a great work ethic, and only cost us $47 if you count the $20 I paid to get a private room at the hospital when he was born. Graham is a Mac: he is silly and makes everything simple and cute, but he cost like $8000.

So I’m spying on them. Graham is playing by himself, running with their little shopping cart and goofing around with all of the pretend food. From what I can tell Nicolaus has befriended another boy about his age and is pressuring that kid into joining him on a serious mission. They’re both having $3.50 worth of fun I think. I know I am.

1. Me at my desk, working on a drawing of Buddha, trying not to be distracted by very loud fart noises coming from the small child standing behind me.

(motorboat spit noises followed by “HAAA!”)

(more of same)

“Graham.”

(more.)

“Graham?”

“(prolonged spit-fart noise) HAAA!!”

“What are you doing?”

“I AM YELLING HA. HA!”

“No I mean that toot noise. What is that?”

“THAT NOISE IS ME ‘PITTING.”

“I know, but why. Why are you spitting?”

“BECAUSE I LIKE TO. I LIKE TO DO THAT. SO I’M DOING THAT ‘PIT NOIIIIISE.”

2. In the living room. Nicolaus is in tears.
“GRAHAM. Did you knock over Nicolaus’ blocks?”

“Yeah,” he sounds sad about it.

“Why did you do that?”

“Cos I was being MEAN to him.”

“Why were you being mean?”

“Because,” His voice now sounds impatient with my stupidity, “I was knocking over his building.”

“If I let you get down are you going to do that anymore?”

“Yeah,” he sighs sadly, “I am.”

3. Bathroom. Four minutes after bedtime. I lean into the bathroom doorway to see what in the heck Graham is doing out of bed. He is standing at the bathroom sink with the water running.

“I’m just washing my underwear.”

“Oh, did you have a tinkle accident?”

“Yeah I did. And I also tinkled in my bed.”

“Aw, how did that happen?” It was rhetorical. Meaning, how did that happen ten seconds after you went to the bathroom.

“With my wiener.”

OMMMMMMMMmmmmmm

I want to write about poop. Well, really I don’t – that’s disgusting – but my life involves a lot of poop these days and since this is intended to document this time in our life it would be dishonest to ignore the poopcentric nature of having young kids. Although, maybe it isn’t this way for everyone. In fact, now I’m thinking almost definitely not because otherwise those “What to expect” books would’ve included like eight chapters each about poop.

Poop stinks. It smells really bad and sometimes you can’t tell where it is, like a fire engine with sirens that are coming from everywhere and you can’t figure out if you need to move out of the way or not. Only instead of sirens, it’s a smell like poop and oh my GOD there it is.

When Nicolaus was younger, he was considerate enough to be constipated throughout toddlerhood. Not Graham. Graham personally contributed his weight in poop-filled diapers to the local landfill every day for almost three years. It was gross and continuous and really made me hesitate to ever try potty training him.

But now that the potty era has dawned in the land of Graham, his system is all Woah WTF OMG etc. The poor kid is so absolutely determined not to have this sort of accident that he will sit on the toilet forever. At first I was such a good mom about it. I’d sit by his side and cheer him on. I’d supply books and activities. I’d tell the story of the Three Bears and drag it out for thirty minutes with textured character development and foreshadow, just so he wouldn’t get bored. But honestly, I don’t have a great attention span. As the 2-hour poop event became a nightly thing and I found myself giving a more abridged version of the three bears: Once upon a time there were three bears! Mamabeardaddybearbabybear! Porridge! They left. Then Goldilocks came! Too hot! Too cold! Just right! Chair – too high, too low, just right! And so on!

Which he didn’t seem to mind, but still. Pretty lame on my part. Then I got him all set up, said some cheerful words, wished him well, handed him a pen and some paper to draw on and then said “Oh! I’ll be right back!”

Then I didn’t come right back. I folded laundry and helped Nicolaus type a story about Star Trek and did some other things, and called, “Graham, you doing okay in there?”

“Yeahhhhh. But I’m! not! finished!”

I cruise back by to check on him just in time to applaud a successful poop and to help him get down and wipe and flush and everything.

Basically it’s like an airline pilot, right? All the hard work is at the beginning and the end of the process. The rest is just me waiting and being nearby in case something terrible happens. Like if the airplane falls off the toilet somehow and hits its head on the floor the pilot is there to come running to hug the airplane and everything and help the airplane get back up on the potty.

Anyway, thanks to my own lameness he is gaining great independence at this thing. I’m giving him juice to help get things moving again, and in the meantime he is weirdly content to sit and wait patiently for the great event.

And oh when the event comes, how we celebrate! First, he invites us all to check out his creation. Then he tells us what it resembles. So far this week, he has produced a man with two legs and no arms, a bird, a tiny little rectangle, Jupiter, and a machine that makes motorcycles or maybe trucks. Then I put him in the bath because he just spent thirty loosely-supervised minutes drawing all over his arms and legs with a pen.

So potty training is going pretty well. He got the whole system down perfectly after less than 2 weeks. Then two days later the novelty wore off and he started telling me NO whenever I suggested he might need to go potty at some point, which led to him peeing everywhere. But like most things that are horrifyingly awful before they become easy, it’s a process, not an event.

Well, it’s ten minutes before midnight. My kids are just now asleep, the house is a mess, the money situation is mediocre, orders are slow, and we really need to go to the store one day. But still, I feel pretty great thanks to delusions of satisfactory accomplishment. Over the weekend I finished all of the commissioned artwork and made huge progress on my seven pieces that will go on display next week. The ones with the science and the birds and the broken glass? Very excited. Kevin’s helping me finish them in time for delivery to the gallery this Friday. It’s not a super snooty/prestigious place but still. They are birds! On plexiglass! With broken glass and water and light!

I’m about five years old.

In other news of things that make me jump up and down and flap my arms like a dorky little girl: Physics books for babies!

I’m assembling a bunch of them over the next week or so, and trying to figure out how to price these things. On the one hand, they are labor intensive, hand assembled and glued and everything. Very unique and specific to a niche market of approximately fourteen people. Look:

Plus the people have to have sort of a sense of humor and a money to spend on funny books made by weird people in their own homes.

So. Niche product. Unique, not widely available. Lot of work. Boutiquey. That makes it sound like a $25 item. But cheap labor and mass assembly technology have spoiled us on little activity books for babies: they aren’t supposed to cost more than $10 or so. Half that if you go to Walmart or look on ebay. Damn it all. Have to think about this more.

Meanwhile, the days go on. This week is wonderful, if only in contrast to last week. None of us have been eaten by rhinos or poisoned to death by the hand of a trusted friend. I’m feeling grateful. Tomorrow at the Ard School of Arts and Sciences we’re going to tackle the questions of how do airplanes fly and how do birds fly and why do they both need wings even though airplane wings don’t even flap.

I’ve also been teaching Nicolaus how to sew and, other than forgetting the word “sew” and calling it knitting all the time, he is really good at it. He’s making a little rug, working on patterns with different colors of yarn which might sound boring but he is holy shit! Obsessed with it. He takes it everywhere he goes and works quietly — that’s right, I said quietly — in the back seat while we run errands. He brings it into restaurants, and chooses knitting over checkers, bedtime stories, and nearly everything else. Tonight he seriously knitted himself to sleep. Why didn’t I try this sooner?

While Nicolaus knits, Graham goes to the potty. I’ve only ever seen the horrors of war as portrayed in old movies and books, but I don’t think it’s too sweeping to say that the first week of potty training is exactly as terrible as a real military battle. Maybe except that in potty training nobody dies. But! Follow me here – if instead of bullets they were shooting something nondeadly… like oh, I don’t know… poop and tinkle at each other, it would be exactly the same and the degree of post-traumatic stress syndrome would be no different.

Which I’m assuming that the military would then have to buy their ammunition at the Poop Store, which Graham says is his favorite store because they sell diapers that have already been used. And when you buy the diapers you think they haven’t been used, but then you get home and WHAT? There’s already poop and tinkle inside! And that is SO FUNNY.

So yeah. In Grahamland right now it’s all potty, all the time, but it’s getting easier already. He’s getting the hang of it, and it’s amazing to watch him reason through how this all works. He wants it to work. We have learned that when he said “I need to go” you’d better stop what you are doing and take him immediately. Even if he just went 30 seconds ago and you are on the other side of the store and it’s very inconvenient. Trust me dude. Take him now.

Enough! Enough posting! I’m very tired and they’re all asleep so I’m stupid if I don’t go to sleep.

Plan for tomorrow:
Wake up
Straighten the living room and my work area
Practice reading and math with Nicolaus while Kevin takes Graham to the grocery store
Pack orders
Look up how airplanes and birds fly
Take my kid to his actual class that he is actually registered for, at its actual correct time and day.
Post office
Sonic
Go to the park and exhaust my children, so that they’ll maybe stop staying up past my own bedtime
While they play on the playground, quietly obsess about the little physics books. OMG! They are so nerdy. I want to list them for sale NOW. But they aren’t finished yet. Stupid trip to the park, I could be home right now gluing and trimming and binding and… ah. This is such a better week.