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.

Entrepreneur

Overheard around 10 pm, between Lola and her father:

Greg: Hey, do you have any candy?

Lola: I might. But I'm not gonna GIVE you any.

Greg: I was planning to pay you. What do you have?

Lola: M&M's, Hershey's Kisses, Rollos, Swedish Fish, and those things that have the caramel inside and chocolate on the outside...oh, yeah--Werthers!

Greg: I'll give you a dollar for the M&M's.

Lola: A dollar! I'd rather eat 'em myself. It'll cost you 2.



Afternoon:

Lola: We have a new vending machine at school with "healthy" snacks in it. It has apple juice, orange juice, Powerade, and some weird lemon water. There were only six lemon waters, so everyone was fighting over it. Of course, I got one. It cost a dollar. I sold it for two.

Open House

A home at the end of our street is for sale. Tragic story that I won't exploit here. Sunday is Open House Day, as everyone who's ever seen a brick knows. Yesterday morning:

Lo: I can't WAIT for 2-5!

TR: Why? What's going on from 2 until 5?

Lo: Open House. I'm gonna be a stalker. I'm going to put up a lawn chair in Austin's yard and watch everyone who comes and goes.

TR: The point of that?

Lo: There are AT LEAST 8 little kids in the neighborhood now, who all play together. We don't need any more elementary school kids. I need another 7th grader.

TR: How do you think watching the comings and goings will facilitate getting one?

Lo: If I see any old people, or couples with younger children, I'll ride my go-kart up and down the street the whole time they're there.

TR: Go with God.

From the Lolarchives

She was about seven when this took place. <----Click link.

Geniuss

This morning, after I fixed Lo's waffles, I left her at the breakfast table and went to take a shower. When I came back downstairs, I found this note on the counter in the sunroom.

"Hey, Genius," I said, "you forgot to put the cap back on the marker." Then a half-beat later, I noticed the spelling and made yet another mental note to go get myself a brain scan. I didn't bother to ask her what it was about, because Lo tells me she's a genius about ten times a day. I figured it was just a variation on the theme. Later, we were on the way to her early-morning Math help session, because Genius is having trouble with Geometry, and she asked me what I use my iPad for at work. I told her I check my Conley Center email on it and look at Pinterest. She then launched into her routine lecture about what a waste it is for me to even have one, because I don't use it enough or properly, and how selfish I am not to let her play on it. This, too, I hear at least ten times per, so I tuned her out.

I got the iPad for graduation in May, and I don't want anyone's grubby fingers on it. I've been generous with my laptop for the past few years and, as a result, it's the color of Cheetos and so crumb-encrusted I have to hammer the 'return' key. I have very few things in the world that are mine alone, and this has been a complaint for a long, long time--since I reached, then passed, the age where I thought I could finally have have a nice bed spread or my own underwear. NO ONE has the password to my iPad, except for Georgia. Giving it to her is like giving it to myself. And the password is something NO ONE would figure out in a million years. Just ask Georgia.

So...I dropped Lo off at school, hit Duncan Donuts for coffee, and headed to my counseling office. When I got here, I took out my iPad and set it up on my desk. Here is what I saw:

And where my wallpaper was the Apple-supplied Tiki motif last night when I went to bed, it had been changed to this:

Mamoo Also Has Tattoos

Mamoo's birthday was Wednesday, the 12th, so we met last night to do the family dinner at Taco Tsunami on "The Square." As I mentioned before, Lola spent the weekend with her grandmother, so they were coming together. When we (her father and I) arrived, Georgia (sister, 23) was already there, holding a bright pink birdhouse. It was sprinkled with glue-gunned silk flowers and had a flamingo dancing on the front porch. She and Sadie (sister, 25) had found that treasure at an art festival in Augusta on Saturday, and it easily trumped the pelican-themed resin necklace I'd purchased for my mother here at an Atlanta festival on the same day. Georgia and Sadie live by the rule "Go big or go home," and on the rare occasions I forget that, I regret that. Glitter-paint fuschia background notwithstanding, my little pendant paled in comparison. If Eddie's Trick Shop next-door had been open, I'd have snuck over and bought my mother a tu-tu.

We grabbed a table and wondered why Mamoo was late, because she and Lola are usually quite punctual when there's a menu. I was trying to figure out whether Mom's route would require any left turns, because that could add significant time to the trip. In a bit, Greg's cell phone rang and he reported that Mamoo was having difficulty finding a parking spot but was in the area. About ten minutes later, Lola came into the restaurant alone, looking like a combination of cat-who-ate-the-canary and someone-who'd-seen-a-ghost. Before we could even ask, she answered, "I can't tell you."

"What happened...where's Mamoo?" I insisted.

"Really. I can't say." The color was slowly crawling back into her face.

"Did Mamoo hit somebody's car? Did you call the police?"

"No, she's coming. She'll be here in a minute."

Right about then, Mamoo beelined it through the door, glaring at Lola, silently warning her not to talk. I made a mental note to ask if she was off her meds. "What did you DO?" I demanded. "Did you traumatize my child?" She looked at Lola as if to determine whether or not she had.

"It was bad," she told us. Lola nodded in agreement. Mom continued, "I asked her if y'all ever use that word, and she just laughed."

"What word? Did you drop the F bomb?" I turned to Lo, who raised one eyebrow.

"I had already circled the square once--"

"No, you hadn't," Lola interrupted. "It was the first time around."

"OK, but I was almost all the way around and couldn't find a spot. A group of people were in the street, rolling up tents from some event earlier today. They had cones blocking most of the lanes, but not the turn lane. I figured it was all right to go on through to turn---"

Lo again: "She was motioning for you to stop. She kept waving you away."

Mom: "Yes, there was a woman holding up her hands, but I didn't know where else to go, so I rolled down my window. She told me I needed to turn around, but there was plenty of room..."

The story went on for a couple more sentences, but I lost track of what was being said. I kept looking at Lola, who appeared to be bracing herself. I knew what was coming, and cut to the chase, asking my mom, "Did you say FU?" A half-nod confirmed. But Lola was about to reveal the worst part:

"She had a baby in a pouch."

"Well, I didn't see THAT," my mother said in her own defense, "and she was just so...so...smug."

"But she had a baby. In a pouch."

By now, Georgia was sunk as low in the booth as she could get, I was circling the ceiling in a dissociative state, and Greg was tallying up the My Family vs. Your Family list he keeps in his head.

Then Lola asked if we could get Queso as an appetizer.

Lolarchives

I've decided that on Sundays I'll post an old link from The Stone's Colossal Dream, so new readers can get caught up and the rest of us can relive the glory.

Here, she was six.

Will Work for Food

Lola is spending the weekend with my mother, Mamoo. They've got a cruise booked for the Thanksgiving holiday, so instead of watching Cops, they're holding a big ol' yard sale to raise money for "excursions." If I've heard Lo use the word "excursions" once, I've heard it a gajillion times. Evidently, excursions are those extracurriculars such as jet-skiing, rock wall-climbing, and snorkeling that you resort to once you get tired of eating and shopping.

The blue jar pictured is Lo's piggy bank for the trip. She doesn't trust herself not to spend the money if she knows how much is in there, so she painted it (ocean-themed) to hide it from herself. Of course, this required a visit to Michael's and me spending my money on spray paint. She's putting most of her allowance away and looking for other sources of income. She actually washed my car one weekend after I'd offered the job to Broke-Jack but he was watching the Godfather marathon. No matter that she can't see it, I have no doubt Lo knows to the penny the amount she has saved. She can tell you how much cash is in my purse right this second, and she hasn't seen me since Friday morning.

I have never been on a cruise, have never wanted to, and am pretty confident my opinion on that will never change. I imagine cruises are like being stuck at The Mall of Georgia, but set adrift in the middle of the ocean. All the food tastes like Ruby Tuesdays, and the decor is Vegas lite. I picture a panorama of Tommy Bahama shirts and Oprah-endorsed Carol Wior Slimsuits. I envision family-style dinner seating with couples who look like Mr. and Mrs. Roper. I'll pass.

The worst part about cruises for me, though, is that they seem so food-centric. Everyone talks about how much there is to eat and how you can eat as often and as much as you want. I'm not a big fan of trough food. Or anything, really, that requires a sneeze guard. Mamoo, however, is Cheerleader A for the Chinese Buffet or Shoney's, and that would make Lola the B. I could be making a giant assumption, but I get the impression that people who love cruises love to eat.

Once, I went to a baby shower for one of my best friends from college. Her mom and aunts were there, and they were a hoot. They told a story about a recent cruise they'd gone on and how much planning and trouble went into buying new wardrobes. It was very important to these ladies that they dress like the divas they were, and crucial that they shine while traveling. They were Old School proper, so none of the flannel pj bottoms or comfy drawstring pants you so often see at the airport. They wore their second-best outfits on the flight down to Florida and saved their very best for the trip home. Only, after a week of chocolate infinity fountain, they couldn't squeeze into their new outfits. They had to wear sweats on the plane and be humiliated.

That shouldn't be a problem for Lola, though, since all of her clothes look like this:

Let's Begin By Name-Calling

Lola is in Chorus. Don't know how that happened, because she is genetically indisposed to carrying a tune. In my opinion, she'd be better suited to playing flugelhorn in the concert band, being that she has the requisite red hair and freckles, as well as the large frame that supports massive volumes of hot air. In any event, they let her in Chorus for the second year. Maybe it's because the child can sell some cheesecake, which is the focus of their fundraising activities each Fall.

I think the combination of her competitive nature and her obsession for sweets is what makes her so successful, or perhaps it's her own special Turf War. We heard the other day that the parents of a younger kid in the neighborhood, a sixth-grade chorus student, had complained to the director that Lo had beaten the girl to the door of every house within the three-mile radius of our subdivision. Said parents argued that it's against the rules to sell to people you don't know. My response on Lola's behalf: You snooze, you lose. If the buyers didn't know her before, they know her now. No one meets Lola and forgets her. Besides, she's lived here for almost 13 years, since before she was old enough to ask "Whassup?"(her first word) to anyone who approached her or passed by us when I had her out in the jogging stroller.

So she sold $425 in cheesecake products and was anticipating huge rewards in the way of prizes and fame. On the morning the money was due, we sat down and figured everything up again, filled out the forms, etc., and had everything ready to go. This was a big deal, because she didn't tell me it was due until 7 a.m. the day of, and I HATE to add anything to my morning routine that already includes making her three frozen waffles with peanut butter and syrup and fixing her lunch. Yes, I know she's old enough to do these things herself, but she's convinced that "You'd do it for Jack" (her 20-yr-old brother), something I cannot deny, so I feel obligated. I do do everything Jack asks me to due to the residual divorce guilt from 17 years ago. Ever since he was three and said, "I know Dad's coming back; you still have two pillows on your bed," I have been at his beck and call. All that to say I squeezed the record-checking in between packing her lunch and looking at Pinterest and did a lot of yelling to make me feel better about it.

Anyway, she left to walk to the bus stop about two minutes ahead of me, and as I gathered my purse and laptop, I noticed she'd left that important giant envelope on the railing by the front door. I grabbed it and ran after her, yelling her name. She jalked back to meet me halfway.

"You're an idiot," I said.

"I might be," she replied. "But I'm your idiot."