At Death's Door

Day Two of hacking cough and fever that has kept her out of school, Lola calls me around lunch-time, while I'm at work:

Lo: I'm dying. Come home. How long before I can take more medicine?

TR: Let's see, I gave you Mucinex at 8, so right about now. 

Lo: What else can I take? That stuff didn't work at all. I'm coughing so hard my head's gonna explode. My throat is killing me. I need Tylenol. 

TR: Then try Dayquil. It has Tylenol in it. Are you in the kitchen?

Lo: No, I'm in your bed, watching The Price is Right. 

TR: Ok, go down to the kitchen and look on the top shelf of the cabinet I keep the med---

Lo: HOLD ON! It's the Final Showcase Showdown. I'll call you back. 

I Hate the Water

After about ten minutes of Lola trying to get me to "see" how sweet her fat little troll of a dog Tebow is:

TR: I feel like I'm at the pool with my four-year-old. 'Look, Mom. Watch. Hey, watch. Mom, Mom, watch this. Watch this, Mom....'

Lo: Like you ever took me swimming.

HalLOween 2012

I cannot get excited about anything that happens in air that's below 69 degrees. 70 is barely tolerable. Winter is something I suffer, and if I had the means to fly South, you can bet Moses' sandals I would. So when we had the annual neighborhood Halloween cul-de-sac party on Sunday, right in front of my house, I put on fur boots, pulled the drawstring on my hoodie as tight as I could, and took a carton of Publix fried chicken out there where they'd set up card tables full of Rice Krispy Treats and frank-n-beans.

I did a quick cul-de-loop of hello's and said, "See you guys in March," before I headed back inside to watch more SVU. I did not stop to exclaim over little Suzy's Jasmine costume or to scold the teen I saw stealing beer from the cooler. Suzy was gonna be just as cute without my saying so, and that older kid would still turn out to be a sociopath just like his father.

Lola, who I'd swear was not my daughter if I had not witnessed her birth myself, isn't bothered by the cold. This can probably be explained by tracing her lineage back to the Caledonians, whom the Roman historian Tacitus deemed red-headed and large-limbed. No doubt, they also liked candy. And they trick-or-treated barefoot in the snow. She had two costumes this year, a revival of 2011's morph suit for the party and the mail-ordered zombie lenses that were delivered just. in. time. on Tuesday.

Last night, I got home around 9 pm.  I had a late appointment at The Conley Center, after which I stopped at Publix to get Lola waffles and ice cream. Lo met me at the door, super excited. She'd spent two hours, she said, organizing (what was left of) her loot from Wednesday night. She had weighed and counted it, and separated it by kind and color. Meanwhile, I was thinking, the kitchen is splattered with Gordita sauce, her bedroom looks like an episode of Hoarders, and the dogs haven't been out to pee since sundown. She ushered me into Georgia's old room, which is now the 'room we stick stuff in' and warned me not to dare let anyone or anything else in.

I don't think I've ever seen her look so proud.

Suddenly Shy

Lola thought it was really funny to walk around with her red sweatpants pulled up under her armpits and the drawstring tied around her neck. Until I started following her with the camera. This week, she's been all about her "flabs." Last night, she did 100 sit-ups and forced me to poke her abdominals every hour and comment on her progress. As she performed this feat, she looked like an old tin wind-up toy someone ran over with a Buick. Still, it was more exercise than she's done in over 12 years combined--and that's including about 6 softball seasons and 8 lacrosse. She's not called Slola for nothing.

Sunday Lolarchives, from Aug 2007

So that you know, Biggy was the nickname for Lola's father when I was writing the other blog.

I came home on Friday and found Lola playing with a new Tech Deck set. She looked at me with  pseudo-shame and said, "Don't judge." For those of you who missed this trend, Tech Decks are tiny skateboards, or "fingerboards," that you can do tricks with. Lola and her friends used to collect them back when she was in first or second grade, so I was surprised to see that 1) she had regressed, and 2) she had actually talked her father into wasting his money on this.

But considering the history. <------ (Click on history, Mom.)

Snippets

I thought I'd share some brief highlights of conversations from the past few days.

Tuesday night, Sadie (my oldest) was in town, hanging out with Georgia (my middle daughter, middle child of first-batch kids, eternal middle child even if I'd had a dozen more), so all us girls went to dinner at Little Bangkok, next to my office. This was a real treat for me, mostly because it meant I didn't have to sit next to Lola at dinner.

Lola to Sadie: Think you got enough rice?

*****

Lola: I hate rice.

TR: What's not to like?

Lola: It doesn't have any taste.

Sadie: It tastes like rice.

*****

Georgia: I've been doing a lot of emotional eating this week. I'm going to see how fat I can get before my date on Sunday.

********************

Yesterday, after school:

Lola: I CAN'T BELIEVE MRS. B DIDN'T GET FIRED LAST YEAR! I even did terrible on the Science portion of the CRCT just so she'd look bad. I did that for the upcoming 6th graders, to spare them. She was SUPPOSED to get fired, but they couldn't find anyone to replace her.

TR: How did you manage to get all this super-classified information?

Lola: I have, like, FIVE friends whose moms work in the front office!

TR: Mmm.

Lola: We NEVER did labs in Mrs. B's class. This year we've already done four labs. Two on bugs and one on cabbage. Cabbage juice.

TR: What do you do with cabbage juice?

Lola: Smell it.

********************

While watching Abby and Brittany, the show about the conjoined twins who are now teaching 5th graders:

Lola: Do you think she always has a crick in her neck?

TR: (Silence)

Lola: Do you think they always had to take two tests or just one?

TR: (Silence)

Lola: What if one of them wants to go to the mall but the other one wants to go to the park?

TR: (Silence)

Lola: Do you think they think the same thoughts at the same time?

TR: (Silence)

And it went on and on. I only got to hear about half the show.

********************

Last night:

Greg (her father): Lola's such a liar.

TR: How's that? (as if I didn't know)

Greg: This morning, when I was dropping her off at school, she told me she needed eleven dollars for a book. I told her I only had six. So then she said I could just give her a dollar for a donut. Turns out the book was only ten dollars.

Lola: I rounded up.

I Take What I Can Get

For about two weeks, Lola has been working on a book for her Language Arts class. The assignment was designed to help them learn all aspects of writing a story--figures of speech, active voice, rising and falling action, etc. etc. etc. She was given a rubric, and I was tasked with making sure she followed it exactly. It's probably important for you to understand that she gets $100 from her father if she gets all A's. Not that she wouldn't be every bit as conscientious...yeah, whatever. Each day, she's come home, slammed her thousand-pound book bag on the counter and informed me, "You've got homework."

I've gone over and over her epic tale about a Viking named Thor and his best friend, Erik, who happens to be Thor's beard. Our discussions have included an argument over whether shaving cream coming out of a bottle sounds more like fwaaaaap or pffffffffft, and a heated debate regarding the best Viking names. All I really want to do in the evenings is catch up on Boardwalk Empire and watch SVU reruns, so I prefer it when she has Math homework. She wouldn't dream of asking me for help with that.

Thursday night was the final revision. She opened the manuscript on the laptop, handed me the rubric and a pencil, and instructed me to find and note the page numbers for the different types of characterization while I was proofreading. Then she left me alone in my room. I started with the title page, where she'd put a period after the title. REALLY?? I scrolled to the next page:

Let me tell you, even though she'd used two different tenses, I was incredibly touched. To tears. This was so unlike her, this tender, thoughtful side.

When she came back upstairs a little while later, I patted the bed beside me and she sat down. I stared deeply into her big amber eyes:

TR:  Lola, that was so sweet of you to dedicate your book to me. I didn't expect that. I'm truly honored.

Lo: (Looking at me as though I'd coughed up a duck) You do realize that we were REQUIRED to do a dedication, right? I mean it's right there on the rubric.

Silence...

Silence...

TR: You couldn't just let me have that?

Lo: Huh, believe what you want.