1. Back at the beginning of my recent cluster of apocalyptic novels, I wanted to re-read Douglas Coupland’s Girlfriend in a Coma. I knew I’d read it the first time from our library, so I went there confidently—and they didn’t have it. It wasn’t just checked out, it was gone. And furthermore, NONE of the libraries in the whole library system had it. They still had OTHER Douglas Coupland books, just not that one. So what I did was, I ordered a used hardcover in good condition and with a dustjacket. I read it, and then I donated it to the library so they’d have a copy.

Our library has a perpetual-book-sale room. They have good deals ($1 for a hardcover Harry Potter, 3/$1 paperback Magic Treehouse, etc.). I had some extra time today, so I went there to browse. Hey, here’s another hardcover copy of Girlfriend in a Coma! Maybe I’ll buy it and keep it for myself. …Hey, here’s my own little “Donation” post-it note inside.

2. I remembered this out of the blue the other day. I used to work in a plant nursery. There were two girls I worked with sometimes; they were best friends and very opinionated, and very proud of the way they expressed those opinions (i.e., loudly, aggressively, stridently, argumentatively, and repeatedly). They used to badger people about wearing deodorant: “You don’t need it! You only think you need it because you’ve gotten your body dependent on it! If you stopped using it, there’d be a brief adjustment period of smelliness, and then after that you’d never need deodorant again!” They really PUSHED it. “Have you stopped using deodorant yet? Come on, just try it! Seriously, I haven’t used it for YEARS, and you’d never know it!”

It’s a sweet little testament to human courtesy (or perhaps just a mark of how awkward such situations are) that no one ever said, “But…I DO know it. The whole room smells like your armpits. I deliberately work as far away from you as possible.” Because oh my DEAR. A person might find grounds to argue that they liked the natural smell of hard-working human armpit; we all have different preferences in such matters. But there was no grounds for arguing that the smell had disappeared after the discontinuation of deodorant.

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I’ve mentioned before that my dad was a minister when I was growing up. Do these stories seem to you to be crying out for accompanying sermons, or is that a holdover from my formative years? We could write a good one about the donated book: about how sometimes you notice something missing in someone’s life, and so you try to show them what it is—but they’re not ready to receive it. You can’t know why (maybe they’re not ready, maybe they don’t recognize it for what it is, maybe you’re not the right one to show them); all you can do is offer. And maybe someone ELSE will end up taking what you offered, without you ever knowing they received it. Or, we could write one about the deodorant: about how people go around telling themselves/others that they don’t need something in their lives, when everyone who gets near them can clearly tell they do, and all we can do is hope one day they’ll discover that need. (The sermons, they WRITE THEMSELVES!)

OR we could write the opposite, about how sometimes people keep offering you something you genuinely don’t want or need in your life, and it’s because it’s something THEY want/need in THEIR lives. Or we could write about how people might go around proclaiming confidently what they believe to be true and trying to get you to live the same way they do, and how there’s no polite way to inform them that the reason you’re not doing so is that what they’re saying doesn’t seem to be true. (The BEST kind of anecdote is the one you can use to make LOTS of points!)

I am baking tonight for Twin Birthdays (two desserts for their birthday party plus two desserts for classroom treats = a lot of eggs, flour, and sugar), and I must be a little distracted because I put three eggs into the cookies instead of two, so then I had to go back and figure out what half-again of 3/4ths cup sugar was, and anyway do you want to come over for some cookies? Because we have half-again as many of them as I’d thought we would. I’m not entirely sure the proportions of the ingredients are correct, though.

I have the radio on in the kitchen, and the DJ just told me something that a wise man once told her, and it turned out the wise man in question was Jesus. And anyone might quote Jesus, of course, especially anyone in support of only judging other people ONLY IF you yourself are completely perfect, and dealing with all your own issues before worrying about someone else’s issues, and not judging others because God fully intends to use the meticulousness of your own personal judginess as a guideline for how meticulously he should judge you—but she went with the milder line of Jesus always being there for us. She ASSURED us that God (she switched to God halfway through, so she’s comfortable with the trinity concept) was ALWAYS there for us, NO MATTER WHAT. Then, without switching tone of voice or starting a new paragraph, she said she also wanted to tell us about Dove chocolate—rich, smooth, Dove chocolate, made with quality ingredients, for all your special occasions, Dove chocolate. Did I huff too much flour (have you any idea what the STREET VALUE of this flour is??) or did this really happen? It’s not a religious radio station—just your basic “all the hits of the 80’s, 90’s, and today.” Apparently late at night things get a little more Jesus/chocolate. I’m more familiar with the morning show.

I finished The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, and I continued to like it. I would recommend it. But considering how many times someone else has recommended a book, and I’ve gotten the book and within one page (“DEAR GOD, WHAT IS THIS FRESH HELL?”) have wondered how two people can be so different and still like each other, I will not be at all hurt and confused if you don’t like it. I’d say give it a chapter or two, but not much more: it was by the end of the first chapter that I thought it was wonderful.

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I emailed the Girl Scouts just to make sure I was right that if a camp session no longer showed up as available, that meant it was full: I was worried that I was going through all this stress and then it would turn out I’d just misunderstood. And I got such a helpful email in return, it nearly brought tears to my eyes. Many of the other emails I’ve sent to summer activities asking for more information have made it WORSE (Me: “Will you be posting the 2013 information soon?” Them: “It’s already on there!” Me: “…”), but this one not only answered my question but volunteered information that was ADDITIONALLY HELPFUL. And the happy thing is that it’s not that the camp session was full, it’s that only two girls had signed up for it so they had to cancel it. So I didn’t mess it up: if I HAD signed up for it months ago, it still would have been canceled, and meanwhile Elizabeth would have had months of thinking she was going to her first choice, followed by finding out she wasn’t. So! That is nice!

AND, the person who emailed said they were combining the camp Elizabeth wanted with two others that she also liked the sound of! It’s for grades 2-5, but I had my mind changed completely on that issue by Amanda‘s comment that a going-into-middle-school Girl Scout is likely to be a different sort than the middle school girls I’m imagining. (A new source of stress has stepped into the gap, because the camp is listed as only grades 4-5, even though the person I’m emailed with is assuring me it will be grades 2-5. But let’s not dwell on it! Let’s assume everything will be fine!)

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I’d decided NOT to break the school rule and send a treat in with the twins for their birthday. But after FOUR MORE CHILDREN in their classes brought in cupcakes for their birthdays, the twins were distraught about it rather than calm and accepting, and I was getting distraught as well. I couldn’t think of ANY WAY to contact the teachers about it, though, without sounding accusatory: “Since you’re letting OTHER children break the rule, I PRESUME it’s okay for MY children to break it TOO.” And I definitely didn’t want to give the children the “If everyone else it breaking a rule, it’s okay for you to break it” idea. And I didn’t want to put the teacher in an awkward situation. And I didn’t want to just show up with the treats. I felt stuck. I needed to ask what the situation was, but how to ask it in a way that shows I didn’t LIE when I signed the form saying I’d thoroughly read and understood the handbook, and that shows I would never be asking to have the rule broken for me if I hadn’t had evidence that the rule wasn’t being used—and that shows I wouldn’t be at all upset if the rule WERE enforced?

What I did was, I gave up. There was no way to communicate that I knew the rule AND not sound either accusatory or as if I were asking for special permission to break a rule (which might make the teacher feel forced to say no: she might feel she can let it pass if someone just brings in the cupcakes, but can’t explicitly say “Yes, I give permission for you to break the rule”). So this is what I wrote to each teacher: “Dear Mrs. _____, Child’s Name wanted me to ask if it would be all right for her/him to bring in a birthday treat on Tuesday for the class. –Swistle Thistle.” My hope was that this format allowed the teacher to comfortably say either yes or no, and that by putting the question in the child’s mouth I was avoiding completely the issue of whether I knew about the rule or not. Both teachers replied that of COURSE it was fine for them to bring in a birthday treat. I am trying to be happy (yay, I managed the email! yay, the twins are happy! yay, I found a way to handle the situation!) rather than annoyed (WHY DO WE HAVE THIS UNENFORCED RULE THAT MAKES LIFE DIFFICULT AND UNHAPPY?).

Henry had strong opinions about his birthday cake this year, and those plans changed repeatedly. Sample plan: “A two-layer round lemon cake with green vanilla icing in between the layers, and blue lemon icing on top with ‘You are 6!’ in green vanilla icing and dots of purple lemon icing around the edges!” I’m pretty willing to mess around with stuff like this. I won’t/can’t do much decoration artwork, but I’m willing to spoon a batch of frosting into four bowls and stir in different flavors/colors we already have on hand.

Every time we discussed it, it was a different cake he had in mind. When I told him it was time to make his final decision, he said he wanted a vanilla rectangle cake (yay, rectangle! the easiest!) with chocolate frosting, and then a big green vanilla 6, and then dots of purple lemon frosting surrounding the 6. Easy enough.

When the cake was cooling, though, Henry expressed surprise that it was vanilla, not lemon. I reminded him that he’d made his final decision, and now it was too late for changes. He was okay with it. (If he’d been very upset, I probably would have baked another cake since I’d bought both cake mixes before I knew what he’d decide, but he seemed more like a kindergartner who’d lost track of his most recent decision.)

I noticed at his birthday party that he didn’t eat much cake, but we were having cake before the presents and he was VERY EAGER to get to the presents. Also, I don’t think he particularly likes cake: he’ll eat it, but he doesn’t go nuts for it.

Then, yesterday, and this will seem unconnected at first, I offered him a hard candy from a box of See’s Little Pops, and he chose vanilla, saying it was his favorite flavor. Then as he was eating it, he kept complaining mildly that it didn’t really TASTE like anything. I said that was how vanilla WAS, and please stop complaining about a nice treat.

(Are you starting to form a theory? I was still completely sans-theory at this point.)

Then, today, he was telling me about a cake they’d made at kindergarten. He said it was a lemon cake. Then he whapped his forehead in frustration and said, “I mean VANILLA. URG. I always get those words mixed up!”

Me: *FINALLY GETTING IT.*

Those two words DO have a lot of sounds in common. And OMG, “vanilla” cake is YELLOW, just like lemon cake. And he kept switching his cake choice from lemon to vanilla and back again, sometimes during the same description. And he was surprised when I made him a vanilla cake when he thought he’d been clear about wanting lemon.

Me: “Henry! Were you disappointed in the taste of your birthday cake?” Henry: “Yes”—but in a matter-of-fact way, not whiny or self-pityingly or resentfully or “FINALLY YOU GET IT” or anything. Just like, “I am not startled by that complete non sequitur of a question, and the answer is affirmative. Now ask me my favorite color.”

Anyway, I have a lemon cake in the oven.

You may have noticed I have been a bit of a Tangle of Stress recently. OMG allowances!! OMG music lessons!! OMG pianos!! OMG guinea pigs!! I’ll bet if I kept track on a calendar, I’d find I was ALWAYS a mess this time of year—and by “this time of year” I mean “right before school lets out.” The children’s summer looms before me, MENACINGLY.

I try to sign them up for stuff, and it sends me nearly over the edge to try to plan it. It’s like, if I sign Edward up for this one-week day camp he wants to do, and I sign Elizabeth up for this other one-week day camp she wants to do, and then Henry is in day-camp all summer because otherwise life is intolerable, and then swimming lessons are offered in four 2-week sessions and they can’t take a session if they’ll miss a week so it makes the most sense to do two weeks of day camp in a row but it would be more fun to spread the camps out a bit, and then archery lessons are only offered the first and third weeks of July, and then Elizabeth wants to do a Girl Scouts sleep-away camp and I don’t know if I can’t stand that but on the other hand I don’t want to squash her independence/bravery just because I’M scared, and both older boys are doing swim team, and I need to make sure I’m not signing myself up to drive three children three different directions at the same time, then SOLVE FOR X.

And summer activities have almost universally poor information. I read through it again and again, thinking “I am an adult with a reasonable level of education, and I am the exact target audience of this pamphlet. I should be able to understand where this gymnastics camp is located, what time of day it takes place, how to sign up, how much it costs, whether children have to already be taking lessons there in order to participate in the summer program, and what level of previous gymnastics experience is required.” BUT NO. Perhaps when the children are older, I will start a new career of Writing Camp Pamphlets. I know very little about Selling A Camp (which seems to be the current emphasis of such pamphlets), but I DO know WHO WHAT WHEN WHERE WHY HOW.

My MAIN-main fret right now is Girl Scout camp. It’s Elizabeth’s first year, but does she want to do day camp? No. How about the 4-day sleep-away camp? No. She wants to do SEVEN-DAY SLEEP-AWAY CAMP. And partly because of fretting and partly because of oblivious newbieness, I didn’t seriously look into signing her up until now, when it turns out we are past the sign-up date and will have to pay a $20 late-registration fee, AND all the camps she most wanted are full. So now I am also trying to solve for Y: “Well, there’s one 7-day one for her age group, but it’s the last one in August, and she was hoping for June or July, and so was I because I wanted to get the camp counselors before they were burned out. Or here’s another option, but it’s for grades 2-5 so she’d be in with girls about to go into 6th grade? That doesn’t seem right. Well, what about this one? Right time, 2nd and 3rd graders, 7-days! Oh, it’s horse camp. Here’s another one, but that’s at the place that’s four hours away. This one seems PERFECT!!–oh, it’s full.” What my lying-awake brain wants me to do is go back in time and sign up for it when she could have had her first choice.

I am thinking of getting a guinea pig. Henry’s preschool classroom had a guinea pig, and it was a DOLL. My friend who had a son in Henry’s class got a guinea pig because of that experience, and her guinea pig is ALSO a doll. When my friend watches TV, she’ll get the guinea pig and snuggle it. (She puts a towel under it. Evidently guinea pigs are of the “peeing any old time without seeming to notice it” category of animal.)

I have two main concerns:

1. Another of my friends had guinea pigs, and it was a disaster. Something like the first one dying quickly, and being replaced with one that turned out to be pregnant, and then tumors and mites and multiple expensive trips to the vet, ending in the guinea pigs being expensively put to sleep, etc. I don’t remember all the details; I mostly remember her saying “NEVER AGAIN.”

2. We have cats.

Elizabeth happened to be working on a Brownies badge that had to do with pet care, so as part of that we researched guinea pigs. According to what we found, guinea pigs can theoretically co-exist with cats; there were even photos of a cat cuddling with a guinea pig. But it looks like actual experience varies (duh), and I’m worried we’d end up with the cats, like, sitting on top of the guinea pig’s cage and the guinea pig stressed/terrorized/squealing.

Or maybe it would be great. We have cats and fish, after all, and they co-exist better than peacefully: the cats LOVE to “watch Fish TV,” and I think it significantly improves their indoor-cat existence, and the fish don’t seem to care at all. Not that I think I could necessarily pick up on a fish’s mood. But fish seem to communicate stress by swimming weird and/or floating dead in the tank, and they’re not doing either of those things. And, AND, we found some fish information that SUGGESTED riling up the fish to keep them from being bored, and it seems like having a cat periodically thud against the side of the tank fits that bill excellently.

I have my eye on a guinea pig at the animal shelter. One thing I like about her is that I’d read that guinea pigs are generally happier with guinea-pig company, but she’s at the shelter because she doesn’t get along with other guinea pigs, and I’d prefer to start with just one guinea pig.

I am wondering if you have any experience with guinea pigs, especially if it’s guinea pig + cat experience.

I just changed my BlogHer profile because I no longer have kids in the 3-5 age group: Henry turned 6 this past Friday. I find I’m most riveted by the ages of my eldest and my youngest: I can’t believe he’s 14! I can’t believe he’s 6! Henry will start FIRST GRADE in three months, and Rob will start HIGH SCHOOL.

The caboose child is particularly poignant/weird because there are so many things to say goodbye to. Getting rid of the baby clothes, and then the exersaucer and baby swing, and then the crib, and then most of the toys—ack. It’s part painful, part awesome: I do enjoy getting rid of Henry’s too-small clothes instead of storing them in boxes, but it can be a little challenging to get rid of a particular t-shirt or whatever. Some of it I hand down to my niece and nephew, which is pleasing. And I have one box labeled “Baby Clothes I Can’t Bear to Part With” to handle a few things: the pink/blue hats with ears the twins wore when they were newborns, the Baby Dior side-snap onesie I found in a mixed-lot of side-snap onesies at a consignment shop when I was expecting Rob, etc.

I feel a little bit like I’m only as young as my youngest child, and that as Henry gets older I’m finally Really Aging. When I had a newborn and/or a toddler, I felt like I must still be pretty young; I feel the same when I see other women with newborns and toddlers. But if my youngest is 6, well. And that’s going to get weirder every year.

I find I’m getting some of the same half-delusional nostalgia that I disliked hearing about when I was deep in the Very Little Kid stage. I see a woman out with a cute-talking toddler and a tiny squeezy baby, and I know to only THINK the “This is the BEST TIME” thought instead of saying it; I say it only with LOVE-EYES. I hope I can continue to remember to silently channel that feeling into giving affectionate/tolerant looks to the parents struggling with the tantruming toddler and the screaming baby. Because it’s only sort of the Best Time, and also it’s the Worst Time.

There are a bunch of things I haven’t had to do for a long time, and I don’t miss any of them:

• I haven’t had to deal with a diaper blowout, or pull a onesie down over someone’s torso to avoid getting something unspeakable in someone’s hair.
• I haven’t had to deal with ANY diapers, in fact.
• I haven’t had to clean barf off the many surfaces of a crib.
• I haven’t had to give anyone a bath.
• I haven’t had to give anyone a bath and then immediately afterward deal with a diaper blow-out and spit-up in the hair.
• I haven’t woken up in an exhausted stupor to the sound of a baby starting to cry in the middle of the night, or at 4:30 a.m.
• I haven’t been awake in the night with a baby who won’t go to sleep, feeling like I’m losing my mind.
• I haven’t had to do much more at bedtimes than three sets of teeth and one set of stories; everyone does their own pajamas and pottying and climbing into bed and turning off the lights.
• I haven’t had to worry about whether the coffee/wine I’m drinking or the food I’m eating or the medicine I’m taking will affect a child.
• I haven’t felt Ruined Naptime Despair.
• I haven’t had to worry about electrical sockets or wires or tiny things on the floor.
• I haven’t had to wonder if it’s an ear infection or is it teeth or is it crabbiness or is it indigestion or is it a virus or is it a diaper pin or WHAT.
• I haven’t had to feel like if I looked away for ONE SECOND there would be a disaster.
• And I hardly EVER have that “NO ONE TOUCH ME EVER AGAIN” feeling.

I’m at the stage where every school day involves a chunk of time where I am alone in the house or alone to run errands. And I can leave the house by myself sometimes even when the children are home. I can make appointments without also needing to figure out a babysitter. And do you know, my big kids get themselves up in the morning, put themselves through the shower, get themselves dressed, make their own lunches, gather up their own stuff, and present themselves to the school bus? Imagine that!

It’s not, though, that THIS is the Best Time. I DO sometimes miss the littler-kid stage and the littler-kid issues. Some days I feel like I am really happy that one of my biggest fears is College Costs rather than SIDS. On the other hand, my biggest fear isn’t College Costs: it’s that the child will do something that results in his whole life being destroyed/over. So. I’m not sure that’s an improvement, per se. And there’s this dawning realization that for all my “I’ll be so relieved when we’re past the SIDS window” and “I’ll be so relieved when everyone in the house can have the age 3+ toys,” there is ALWAYS more to worry about.

Plus, you know how as soon as a baby/child outgrows something difficult, there’s a fresh difficult thing right after it? So that ANY time you’re thinking, “Things will be better as soon as he/she is past this stage,” it ALWAYS turns out to be a complete trade-off, with new bad parts taking the place of the old bad parts, and, luckily, new good parts taking the place of the old good parts? THAT keeps going, TOO. Yay, we’re done with the tantruming; crud, now it’s whining. Yay, we’re done with the whining; crud, now it’s backtalk. Oh, sad, I just realized he doesn’t smell like a baby anymore; yay, he can be trusted to stand next to the car for a minute while I load groceries! Oh, sad, I can’t really carry him anymore; yay, he’s going to school and I have less of that cyclical “This isn’t a year, it’s just one long 8,760-hour DAY THAT NEVER ENDS” feeling.

I am looking for that excellent blend of reassurance and information that I think of as one of the best parts of the blogging world. Sure, I suppose I could ask all my local friends and acquaintances one by one what they know about X, but that would take ages—and, statistically speaking, few of them would have any information. OR, I can ask HERE and have instant access to THE GREATEST MINDS OF OUR GENERATION (please resist madness/starving/hysteria kthanx).

Okay! So do you remember when I wrote about children and instruments? After that, with my mind tidied and bolstered from the aforementioned reassurance/information, I signed both Rob and William up for piano lessons. Ahhh, the relief of TAKING ACTION after months of fretting! Why didn’t I do this MUCH SOONER?

…And that’s right about the time the panic set in. Wait: WE HAVE NO PIANO. How will they PRACTICE?

You may be looking at me right now with an expression of incomprehension and disbelief, wondering how did this HAPPEN? Who would arrange for piano lessons without having a piano? Who DOES that? But wait! You should hear my side before you wonder if it’s time to up my fish oil or what. Follow my pattern here: I signed Rob up for clarinet lessons, and then after that we acquired a clarinet. I signed William up for trumpet lessons, and then after that we acquired a trumpet. I signed Rob and William up for piano lessons, and then…OH CRAP.

It’s been NORMAL to first consider the lessons, and then acquire the necessary instrument. BUT PIANO IS DIFFERENT. Piano is not in the “Oh, let’s contact Uncle Music [my musical brother, who has made it his personal mission to acquire instruments for my children] and thus acquire this instrument!” category. Even if pianos were FREE, I would not WANT one at this stage of things. *panicked panting*

Okay. So this is where I turn to you. Because for all I know, this is UTTERLY TYPICAL. Maybe almost NO children who take piano lessons have pianos at home! Maybe the piano teacher would be surprised if we DID have a piano! Maybe it is absolutely typical for schools and piano teachers to have…some other solution to this. I’d been thinking, “Oh, they can practice on our keyboard,” but do you know how many keys our keyboard has? THIRTY-SIX. Do you know how many keys a piano has? EIGHTY-EIGHT. This solution is NOT GOING TO WORK.

I am trying to calm myself with thoughts such as: “Okay, okay, everything will be fine. AT WORST, we cancel the piano lessons, cancel the class Rob is taking next school year and find something else for him to take among the remaining scraps of unsigned-up-for classes, and I’ll feel completely embarrassed and foolish in several directions.” (It is not a very helpful thought.)

I am having a week month year life bit of a “Humans are not a very good species, at all” episode. At the grocery store, a stranger in line repeatedly reprimanded Henry, and I wondered what people like that think they’re doing. Like, they obviously don’t see themselves as being startlingly interfering and rude and all up in someone else’s business unwelcome and uninvited, so how DO they see themselves?

It gave me flashbacks to my mother-in-law, who thought she was benevolently helping others lead happier lives—and, if they declined her advice as not being The Obvious Only Right Way For Every Single Person To Live, she rolled her eyes and threw up her hands at their stupidity and ingratitude. In what way does that variety of ovary GROW in a person, and in what way does it continue to thrive?

Then, I was telling the children wearily for the millionth time that it is NOT NICE to mock and tease and make other people mad for fun, and then while I was cooking dinner I was wondering why we bother to tell them this, considering it seems like most people grow up anyway to mock and tease and make other people mad for fun, and at that point there’s no parent to tell them to quit it. All the scornful “Who DOES that??” and “Who THINKS that??” and “Who LIKES that??” and “Who CARES about things like that??” (with the implied answer “Clearly only a STUPID IDIOT”) is wearing me down. OTHER HUMAN BEINGS, THAT’S WHO. And yet it can also be so fun, and so comforting to find others who feel the same way about something, and so bonding in a very human “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” way.

As it wears me down and simultaneously comforts me when _I_ do it (ahem). I can’t believe how many people cut me off, or swerve around me when I’m stopped for a pedestrian, presumably because they thought I was just stopped in the road for no good reason. I can’t believe how many people leave bitchy comments, apparently thinking that’s okay to do. I can’t believe how many people sigh loudly in checkout lines, as if that does anything but bring morale down. I can’t believe how many people enjoy hanging out at websites like People of Walmart, where the only point is to mock and be mean. It’s so reassuring to find other people who feel the same way I do about people who are not living The Obvious Only Right Way For Every Single Person To Live. Who DOES that? Who THINKS that? Who LIKES that? OTHER HUMAN BEINGS, THAT’S WHO.

Also, in giving Rob some lessons in dealing with other humans, I was reminded that there are SO MANY TIMES when another person is acting awful (for example, two people disagree but one of them spins the other’s position insultingly and unfairly and as evidence of poor character, rather than seeing it as a disagreement), and there is NOTHING THAT CAN BE DONE except to go about your business and let them go about theirs. EVEN WHEN THEY ARE COMPLETELY WRONG AND ALSO THINKING MEAN AND UNFAIR THOUGHTS ABOUT YOU. Even if you COULD change that one person’s mind, there are THOUSANDS OR MILLIONS OF OTHERS THINKING THE SAME WAY.

And I read A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick, and it reminded me why I originally formed my theory (since disproven) that I didn’t like books written by men. I don’t want to read a grown man thinking thoughts about a teenaged girl. I don’t want to read how he hates his wife and children. I don’t want to read about how often he thinks about cheating on his wife, or how depressed and burdened and bored he feels by his house and family and job. I especially hate it when Paul recommends books to me and they have these thoughts in them, because then I wonder if he identifies with this point of view or if he just brushed past it the way I do if I read a book where a woman fantasizes about shoes: I don’t relate to that particular aspect, but I don’t really notice it or think it represents All Women.

…Although, actually, that’s a terrible example, because I DO notice it and I then DON’T like the story because I DON’T identify. Well, anyway, that’s pretty much exactly why it got me upset. I felt similarly when Paul and I were first dating and he recommended Robert Heinlein books. Ah, Robert Heinlein. So much talk about how stupid monogamy is and how glorious the human existence could be if women didn’t keep being so ridiculous and jealous over the innocent and healthy joy of a man sleeping around. Maybe not the ideal book recommendation for a new girlfriend.

Things are looking up a bit this morning, though. I have made a batch of fudge, and I’ve started a book I thought I wouldn’t like but so far I like it a LOT: in just the first chapter, I laughed OUT LOUD (and I was the only one home, so it wasn’t even “I want you to know how funny I find this book” laughter) three times and cried once.

(photo from Amazon.com)

EVERYTHING ABOUT this book says I wouldn’t like it (and maybe soon I won’t). It’s exactly the kind of book I tried about a dozen of before completely giving up on the whole Ladies’ Fried Coffee Diner Quilting Club Sisterhood genre. The title falls exactly into that category: The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can Eat. The jacket description does, too: a group of women with cute group nickname meet every week at a diner, “through marriage, children, happiness, and the blues.” I don’t understand why I picked it up or why I checked it out (I think it was partly because it was a group of THREE women, not the OMG ALWAYS group of FOUR), but I did and I did, and it’s cheering me up considerably. (Though also reinforcing things, as one character refuses to acknowledge or accept another character’s second wife. Sigh. Who DOES that??)

We are trying to figure out what to do about the kids and musical instruments. Instruments seem to fall into a category like diets and psychiatric medicine: there never seems to be a point where everyone agrees it’s not working and you can give up. Instead, it’s “He just hasn’t found the right one for him!” and “He just needs to give it more time!”

William first tried clarinet, since he didn’t really care what he tried first and we already had the clarinet Rob chose at that age. It sounded terrible all year, making me re-regret not making Rob keep going with it awhile longer, since Rob made it sound pretty within a week of practicing BUT OH WELL BYGONES. William said he didn’t mind instruments per se, but that the clarinet was not right for him: he didn’t like the sound of it (ORLY??).

So this year he tried trumpet. It’s been “like clarinet, but louder.” After his band concert last week, I asked if his teacher had given the class any feedback on the performance. He said yes, and that she’d had a video of it for them to see. He said, “Unfortunately, the video was really bad quality”—and I said, “Er, I’m not sure that was the fault of the…” just as he said “NO, NOT BECAUSE OF THAT. IT WAS STATIC ON THE RECORDING.” Well. I’m just saying.

Playing an instrument is such a well-rounded thing to do. And I like the idea of them being in band. (Yes, I’ve seen that article!) And it seems like it would be very nice on a college application. But when do we say “This is not only a constant struggle but also a constant torment. He is just Not Musical. Music is just Not His Thing, and that is Just Fine”? Not everyone does art; not everyone dances; not everyone builds furniture; not everyone likes camping; not everyone does well with math; not everyone picks up foreign languages; not everyone has a feel for motors and engines. It seems like music actually falls into THAT category instead: things some people have an aptitude for, and others don’t. We all think our own specialties are crucial for human fulfillment—but we can’t all do everything.

Now Rob is giving it a second shot. He’s starting high school this year, and the school requires a year of either music or art, and he’d prefer music. I tried to persuade him to go back to clarinet (we ENJOYED hearing him practice! ENJOYED it!), but he says it just isn’t his style. So he’s trying keyboard/piano, and we’re going to get him lessons all this summer so he has at least SOME experience before he starts—and also so that if it’s a total bust, maybe there will be time to switch to chorus or art instead.

One thing we’re considering is getting William piano/keyboard lessons TOO. This could perhaps cause some healthy competition. Or it could backfire and make the one who doesn’t do as well give up.