Moments I Fell In Love With My Husband All Over Again

Most people know that I've loved my husband Joe since the moment I first saw him twenty years ago, and there are some terrific constants that make him easy to keep on loving. He's honest and loving and over-the-top ridiculous about a lot things, which include shutting off light switches while I'm still in the room, but also include making a big deal out of loving me. I really enjoy people who make a big deal out of me because, well, I'm kind of a big deal.

But aside from all of that, my favorite thing about being married to Joe is that over time, there are little moments that make me fall in love with him all over again, right then and there, and the fluttery feeling in my chest, the one that makes me giggle and cover my face like I did when I was fourteen, strikes me almost unexpectedly. In honor of the fact that one of those moments occurred recently, I decided to share a few here.

1. A few anniversaries ago, he bought a leather-bound journal. In it, he will periodically write me love letters and then leave the journal on my nightstand or pillow to read. He doesn't do it all the time, but here and there so that down the road I will have a book filled with all the reasons he loves me.

2. I love to psychoanalyze. One of my favorite questions to consider lately is, "What is your favorite font and why?" I asked Joe. "Oh," he said, thinking. "I'm not sure what it's called. It starts with a G. Garamond." I almost fell over. "That's my favorite!" I exclaimed. His face filled with teasing as he winked and said, "And that's why we're so in love." (*giggle*)

3. He once caught my vomit in his hands. I was seven months pregnant with Joey and in the hospital with kidney stones. Overwhelmed by the pain and the fear that something was wrong with Joey (I didn't know at first what was wrong), I shouted, "I'm going to be sick!" We'd been left waiting too long and there was nothing in the room for me to use and I couldn't get up. Joe dove in front of me, fingers laced together and said, "Just do it. I've got you."

4. We were at JC Penney's buying lamps. The ones I wanted--really beautiful ones with Victorian shades and wrought iron roses up the bases--were labeled as buy one, get one for a dollar. At the register, the cashier tried to tell us the sale had ended the day before. Joe leaned one elbow on the counter, looked her square in the eye and said very calmly and with not a little bit of charisma, "Now, I used to work in retail. So I know you have to honor that sign that's still posted over there." The woman all but melted, and so did I. In that moment I wished I worked in retail, too, so I could tell him something was on sale.

5. The time Joey asked him to read out loud to the class instead of me, and he did it with voices and expression and every little face in the classroom was open-mouthed and awestruck with the magic of my husband the storyteller.

6. The day he taught Noah to read. Noah was two.

7. When Max was a newborn and I found out I couldn't breastfeed, I lay in bed in hours and cried. And not a lovely, delicate, "Oh, my, boo-hoo," but a gross-nasty, snot-covered, choking orchestra of sobs. Joe finally came into the room and pressed his forehead to mine, put his arms around me, snot and all, and said nothing. It didn't erase the pain, but it made me able to breathe again. It made the crying stop.

8. When he wears the Dr. Seuss pajama pants that Noah picked out.

9. When, after a parent-teacher conference, I was all set to talk shop, and I began with, "I didn't like that at all!" and he responded with, "I know! Why are her teeth so small?!"

10. Once, I was in a terrible mood in the middle of a date night, which I realize is a bad time to be in a terrible mood, and so Joe began echoing all my negativity by expressing hatred over everything we passed. "Look at that stop light! Why is it so red? That's stupid," and "What's up with that building? It's too ugly to exist," and concluding with, "What's with that guy walking? Get a car, moron!" These are not things he'd typically say; his goal was to make me laugh, and he succeeded.

11. When he didn't like a new rule at our sons' school which really was a bit of nonsense, he turned to me and said firmly, "I reject that policy." 

12. When I bought Divergent to watch with my nieces, Joe downloaded it to his tablet and read the whole series. He also read Twilight, just so we could talk about it.

13. He has a firm belief that pajama pants should not be worn in public, not even to Wegmans.

14. Once he came home from work, and where his dress shirt was open at the neck, I spied writing on his undershirt. I realized he'd worn a Metallica t-shirt to work under his dress clothes.

15. The first time I bought him clothes, they included a few shirts of a brand I noticed he wore a lot. "Brandini." When he opened them up, he smiled, held them up the shoulders and said, "I love them! They're my favorite 'brandini.'"

16. When he folds my clothes while doing laundry, he handles them like they're all super delicate. "I don't know what to do with them," he said once. "They're so small, like doll clothes!"

17. Every once in awhile, I turn around to find myself looking at a small, foiled wrapped grape jelly. And it's still just as exciting as it ever was.

Nobody's perfect. I'm not perfect, and I can tell you that my husband is not perfect. But life isn't about perfection. It's about perfect moments and how much they count. I love you, Joe.

Happy Anniversary: I Choose You

There are a lot of different ways my life could have gone. I think about that a lot--I know you're not supposed to, that it's considered, I don't know, ungrateful somehow to give time and energy to wondering how life could be different if you'd just turned left, instead of right, at that one fork in the road that one time.

I've come to a lot of forks. Knives and spoons, too, honestly. And sometimes I like to sit and wonder what I might be like, what anything would be like, if I'd made different choices. I just do.

I wouldn't have been a teacher. I know that for a fact. I don't know that I regret being one, because it's something that I love and that I'm good at, but it has never really felt like a place I actually belong. I've always felt a little bit like a kid playing school in the basement, with my mom's teacher manuals and an old half-used spiral notebook as my official grade book. More times than I can count, I've thought to myself, "I can't believe these kids are actually writing down what I tell them."

Joe and I got married when we were twenty-four years old. Nine years ago today. It was a beautiful wedding, really like a fairytale. At the reception, when the DJ announced us to our guests, "Mr. and Mrs. Joseph...Bielecki!" we descended from a mezzanine on a winding staircase to the theme song from Disney's Beauty and the Beast. I mean, it doesn't get any more fairytale than that. But when I look around at twenty-four-year-olds I know now, I think...Oh my God. I didn't know anything. We didn't know anything! What did we know, except that we'd already loved each other a very long time, and wanted to spend the rest of our lives feeling like we did on that magical day?

If you're thinking this is going to be all about what makes our marriage perfect and what makes one work, I'm sorry to disappoint you, because I really don't know. We are far from perfect. I really don't know how Joe and I have survived real life, and forks in the road, and really, growing up together. And not just for the nine years we've been married, or the ten years we've been together, but since we were kids. I've been calling the same person for nineteen years with my problems. And if you know me, that means Joe has received a LOT of phone calls, everything from "I'm in the ER" to "I accidentally splashed the juice of a Clorox wipe in my eye, do you think I'll go blind?" Everything from, "My heart is broken," to "My parents are going out for dinner without me!" Everything.

I can't speak for all people, especially in a world where most of them don't stay married, but maybe that's what has worked for us. The everything. Because when I look back on my life, every fork, knife, and spoon, there is one constant. One person who ended up beside me no matter what choice I made...and only half the time on purpose. I think that's pretty remarkable. I've made some pretty bad choices, if you want to know. I've made choices that deliberately put me in the opposite direction from Joe, and then turned around just to see him still right by my side. He's not always happy to be there, and I'm not always glad to discover him there. But in the end, the Universe has been pretty clear: it's where we belong.

When I was in college, my family had two dogs, Sam and Morgan. Sam was awesome and Morgan had issues. Anyway, I came home one afternoon to a house empty of everyone except Sam and Morgan, so it was my job to take them outside. We always had to take our dogs out on leashes back then since we didn't have a fenced yard. I hooked them both up, pushed open the screen door, and went to rest my foot on the top step leading down to the patio so the dogs could run past me and I could hold open the door.

The only thing was, I had completely forgotten that my parents were having the patio redone, and that the back steps which had been there my entire life were simply...gone. And not yet replaced. When I went to lean on that top step to let the dogs go by, I found myself falling out the back door, down, down, down, completely unable to stop the fall in any way, until I crashed on the concrete below, the dogs landed on top of me, and the door slammed shut above my head. (The dogs, bless their hearts, dashed madly away because doing their business was of greater importance than my well-being.)

They call it falling in love because it's just like that...it's unexpected, it's out of control. It's unbelievable! When it's happening, you think, "Oh my God! There's nothing to catch me!" but you can't help it. When Joe and I were first dating, he sent me these song lyrics: "we didn't know, we didn't even try...one minute there was road beneath us, the next just sky." 

Our lives have not continued on in that way, because just like that day with my dogs, eventually every fall ends. You land. And, if you're like me, you land on concrete and everything else lands on top of you. In the great scope of my life, it wasn't two dogs, but two children (and another one coming!). I think a lot of people hit the pavement and look around and say, "This doesn't feel as good as the falling part," and that's when they get up and walk away. It's probably never that simple, but in the end, I think the reason why I'm still married to Joe, who hasn't sent me meaningful song lyrics in years, is not because of the falling, but because of the choices. Because I choose him, and will continue to choose him. After nineteen years, I'm no longer surprised to look up and see that he's still there beside me, even when I've followed a path I thought was mine alone. Now, I expect him to be there, because it wouldn't feel right without him.

I have loved Joe through high school, when he broke my heart more than once. I have loved Joe through buying houses, and decorating them, which no one ever told me would cause arguing and disagreement, but it did. I have loved him through new jobs, and old jobs, and no jobs, and living in different cities. He has loved me through kidney stones and thirty-six hour labor and emergency c-sections. I love him every time he tries to surprise me, even though I hate surprises. He loves me despite who I am in the morning, which is something not quite human and feeds on despair and anger.

I think that, as we enter our tenth year of marriage, a milestone, a trophy of sorts, it makes perfect sense that our lives are about to change, AGAIN. And is it like this for everybody, where it can never just be a small change? I'm returning to work after two years off, and we're having a surprise baby after deciding we were out of our baby years. This is so not how I saw things working out...a phrase that makes me laugh because it reminds me of nearly every important thing that's ever happened to me, including the very night I met Joe for the first time. I had smoothed back my hair, put on my swagger, and gone to put the moves on him, Mary Pat style, when he abruptly turned to my friend and started dancing with her.

Maybe that's why I never mind spending time thinking about how different my life could have turned out. Maybe I'd be a professional writer. Maybe I'd live in England. Maybe I wouldn't be germophobic, or so quick to say no to everybody. But I also know that no matter what my life's choices are, they always seem to keep me with Joe.

Happy Anniversary, Joe Bielecki. I chose you all those years ago, and for every moment of every day, past and future, I'll choose you again. You are, in every way, my soul mate.

Panic Room

When you're married, there are days when you run out of fingers to count the ways the other person annoys you. There are also times, however, when a heavenly light shines down on him from above and opera music sings in your ears because you realize you're just that lucky to have found the right person for you.

This morning I woke in a panic because of a terrible dream I'd had. I won't get into too many details, but it was one of those vivid ones that feels like it's lasted for hours. I will say that in it, myself and my fictional dream family were being stalked and attacked by a vicious man and woman team who hoped to ultimately bury us alive.

Some people dream about rainbows and unicorns, I think.

Anyway, when I woke up, I ran up the stairs to check on my children.

"What's wrong?" Noah asked. He was already awake, but thoroughly confused by my sudden onslaught of tight hugs and hundreds of kisses.

"I just had a bad dream," I said. "I just wanted to see you."

He didn't look reassured or pleased. He looked completely bothered.

Anyway, it was too early for anyone to be out of bed, so I went back downstairs where I found my husband awake. Apparently, my antics had awakened the whole house.

"I had a bad dream," I said, pulling the covers back up to my chin, and from there I proceeded to relate each terrifying second of the story that had played out in my subconscious.

"That sounds really cool," he commented. "You should write that down."

Ugh. That's not the moment where angels sang. No heavenly lights yet.

"The thing is," I went on, "I've decided we should have a panic room."

"Yes."

I never expected him to agree so quickly. I really thought the costs of such a project would be an immediate deterrent. What does it even involve? Lots of steel, I imagine. Locks that work even in the event of a power outage.

Still, Joe's fast support was a big deal. Buoyed, my plan began to take shape in my mind. "We could build it upstairs off the baby's room."

"How would it get air?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe a window? Or a vent?"

"Seems flawed. A point of weakness."

I ignored him. "But then if it's upstairs, and there's a nuclear bomb, the whole thing would be wiped out. Maybe it should be in the basement."

"Yes."

"With a secret trapdoor from our bedroom down into the room."

"Don't stop there!" he said, his face becoming animated. I could tell my excitement for safety had become contagious. "We should install a fire pole from the boys' room all the way down into the panic room. No time wasted!"

"Oh, no!" I cried. "How would we get the baby down? I'm already down here! I'd have to run upstairs and somehow manage to slide down the pole with the baby?"

Joe waved this away. "Nobody gets to use the panic room unless they can slide down the pole themselves."

I whirled to look at him in horror. Before I could speak, he gave me a pointed look and said, "Right. Because that's where the conversation got ridiculous."

Cue angels.

Bye-Bye, Baby

I have avoided blogging in the last few weeks because I've begun my fourth month of my third pregnancy and it is following the pattern of my first pregnancy, which is to say, I'm a little crazy. I don't really trust myself to communicate the written word properly right now, and even if I'm feeling verbose I have nothing very nice to say. So as you can see, blogging seems like a bad idea.

But here I am. I'm going to preface today's story with a warning, which is that I know my husband Joe is going to be really unhappy with me for sharing this, but I'm pretty fired up about it and also, it's been my first moment of clear and normal thinking in quite some time. So. Without further ado (though it's definitely MUCH ado about nothing...)...

For quite some time, I have been plagued with the judgmental opinions of friends and outsiders because we have made the choice to send our children to a private, Catholic elementary school. If you are like the folks who have a problem with this, you are probably clutching your chest, gasping out, "My God, woman! What are you thinking?!" And the hard part for me is, for some inexplicable reason, it's okay for you to react that way to my choice, but it's not okay for me to feel offended by it.

For the record, I am.

Anyway, that's not really the point of this blog. The point is that my husband and I made the choice we thought was best for our family (which, by the by, makes it nobody's business to judge, since they aren't actually IN our family and can't possibly be in a position to make any sort of call on what is best for us or our children), and are quite happy with it. Both of our children love school and do very well.  Upon Joey starting kindergarten, and even when he was in preschool, I, as a burned out, angry teacher who only wanted to be a stay-at-home mom, had sworn I wouldn't be an active, involved "school parent." But you know what? I love our school so much I haven't been able to help it. And I think my kids are happier and more successful because of it. There's nothing quite like a kid who knows his parents and his teachers are all on the same page.

So here I am, going along all hunky-dory like, but feeling kind of sad because I know next year things will be a little different. I won't be a stay-at-home mom anymore. If that's not a hard enough change, I'm having a baby in October, which will make being present at my kids' school any day for any reason nearly impossible (for a lot of reasons I won't get into here; just take my word for it). So I'm sad. And while Noah has been at Joey's school this year, it's only been for preschool, so I also know I have to register my baby boy for kindergarten. That's kind of a big deal, you know? I can't help but look at him and see those round cheeks and remember his funny, leggy run from before he was even two years old. I can still picture him with the baby curls that invited strangers at stores to tell me how beautiful my daughter was (Hello, first haircut!), and hear his tiny voice calling, "Mama!" from his cribby when he woke. And he's starting kindergarten? How did that happen?

Well, I registered him. And it was pretty painless, but then I had to go a step further. I had to sign him up to take the BUS. Ugh, the bus! I hated taking the bus when I was a kid. HATED it. Remember those horrifying moments when the bus driver (formally named "Bus Driver" every time) would pull off the road because someone was in trouble? The loud brake would shout, "KSSHHHHHT!" and Bus Driver would--wait for it-- get up and stand in the aisle. For several long moments I couldn't even concentrate on who was in trouble for what because I was so shocked that the bus driver was anything more than a floating head in a rearview mirror. He had arms and legs and wore jeans. My goodness. So shocking.

These memories haunt me, so that signing Joey up for the bus back when he was in kindergarten was tough enough, but now my baby Noah? Well, I'm going to tell you, I delayed the process. I know, it's not bad. Nothing traumatic happened to Joey yet (well, there were a few incidents I'm not happy about but I don't think he's permanently scarred), and next year Noah won't even have to do this rite of passage alone. He'll have his protective older brother to show him the way.

Then recently, a friend and fellow mom happened to mention the bus situation to me, since our sons will be starting kindergarten together next year. "Just a head's up," she said. "There's a new policy for the bussing." Oh, that's just super. But it prompted to get on top of things and call the bus garage to refresh myself on what documentation was needed and when was a good time to come in and take care of the bus paperwork. And then I found out my friend was right. Do you know what they told me? "Joey's all set, but Noah you'll have to sign up at the district office. You have to register him for kindergarten."

What?

"No, no," I said. "You're mistaken. My children are already registered at their school. I just need the bus."

"No, no," they said back to me. "It's standard policy. He has to be registered to start school with the school district before he can sign up for the bus."

Does this seem odd to anyone else? That I have to register my child for school in two separate places? And one of them at a school which he will not attend? Like, ever? Okay, so I'm irritated to say the least. But I call and make an appointment (oh, yeah, because you can't just go when it's convenient for you, no, you have to call a number nobody answers most of the time, until you reach someone, and then they tell you when you can come) because they've got me in a tough position, don't they? I've made this choice, this shocking choice, to not send my children to public school, and on top of it, I need a bus.

The appointment was for this morning. Just to remind you, I'm already annoyed, right? Well, I started gathering together the papers I needed. Proof of residency, driver's license. And since I was "registering" Noah for kindergarten, I also needed his original birth certificate. Annoying, but no problem! I know just where we keep that. I headed to our special Safe Place For Important Documents, opened it up, and found...Joey's birth certificate. Our marriage certificate. A letter from my mom from when I was young about how I'm beautiful and she loves me best. The newspaper announcement from our wedding. But Noah's birth certificate? Totally not there.

I decide not to panic. I go through the files again and again, but it's just not there. I take a deep breath. I go through all our mail and miscellany. Nope. I think hard. When was the last time we needed it? We went to Canada last summer, but it would have been with Joey's. No, no. And then I remembered. Last January, Joe needed it to sign Noah up for baseball at the town. Joe had it last.

Joe was on his way to a big meeting, but I knew it hadn't started yet. I called him. "Did you use Noah's birth certificate to sign him up for baseball?" I asked.

"Yes."

I took a deep breath. A wife never wants to sound accusational, but I knew that was the last time we saw the birth certificate. But also...remember how I said that since I'm pregnant, nothing I ever say comes out nice? Yeah.

"Do you happen to know where that went?" I asked then. But since I'm pregnant and I have perception...issues, it probably came out like, "Well where the hell is it NOW? I need it!" (Although I swear I don't remember sounding that way.)

But then Joe got all snooty. Ever the patient and loving husband, he suddenly decided to point out that maybe I have this slight (slight) tendency to lose things. Maybe I'm a little scatterbrained. But this? Our child's birth certificate? I had this really strong feeling I didn't lose it. In fact, I felt positive I hadn't seen it since I'd handed it to Joe the night he signed Noah up for baseball.

"I can only think of three things," he said finally. "It's either in the file where it belongs, I gave it to you and who knows what, or it's with the mail in the kitchen." (Do you like how he slipped that one about it being my fault in the middle of two other, more innocuous things?)

Of course, I'd already checked all those places ten times.

"Thank you," I said politely, and we had an amicable hangup. (Sure we did.)

Well, in these sorts of situations, there's only one thing to do. Pray to St. Anthony, the finder of lost things. And after much scrambling about, guess where good ol' Tony led me? Straight to Joe's winter coat. And guess what I found in the inside breast pocket?

Noah's birth certificate.

BOOYAH!

So, as I said in the beginning, after much ado about nothing, I headed to the district office and went through needless paperwork to sign away my child's babyhood. Thank you, town, thank you, husband, for making an already heart-pinching process more memorable. I assure you, I'll never forget this one.

On Having More Children

This is for all those annoying people who find it humorous to nudge Joe and me in social situations (a little too hard, always, as they prepare to love their own joke) and say too loudly, "Why don't you have another baby?" I mean, seriously. What is wrong with people? Even worse are the people who respond to my polite, "Probably not," with, "Don't you want to try for a girl?" Ew. I really don't like that expression. Try for a girl? Like...it's just rolling the dice? Because if I don't get a girl, I still have a whole person, you know. I'm not going to fling my hands up and cheerfully say, "Whoopsie! Roll again!"

So, to all those people, I'm going to go ahead and share the reasons that my husband and I have for deciding our two boys were enough for us.

1. Joey and Noah are as perfect as two kids can get. We feel so lucky to have had such great kids, we  don't feel it's fair to monopolize the Universe by adding another perfect child to our family.

2. Money. We currently have negative dollars. I mean, we're not dressing the kids in brown grocery bags yet, but don't be surprised if that's what you see in a few months. Maybe some cardboard box shoes, too.

3. Joey is seven, Noah is almost five. We have reached that comfortable point where our children are big enough to have earned us our freedom. I don't mean I'm taking off for a global cruise and leaving Joey in charge, just that they are independent enough that I can leave them with a babysitter any old time, or have them stay overnight at my mom's without worrying. (Much.)

4. I probably would not survive an additional person needing me in the middle of the night. Perhaps if Noah had EVER slept through the night, it would be a different situation. I'd also like to add that his sleep issues are not because I'm stupid or inept. I'm pretty hardcore about sleep, as I myself need more than normal people. However, it is has been a learning experience for me as I've come to accept Noah is a person who A) is different from me, B) needs less sleep than anyone I've ever heard of, and C) doesn't conform. On that last note, I'm a big enough person to point out that one day (though not now, or any time in the next twenty years) that will serve him well and make him awesome.

5. Joe would not survive me not surviving an additional person not sleeping in the middle of the night.

6. We are thirty-three years old. If we had another baby, we would be fifty-one when s/he graduated from high school. Unacceptable. My own parents were much older than everyone else's and I felt like an outcast. I won't inflict that on my child.

7. Babies make me nervous. Nay. Scratch that. Never mind. Yes. Babies make me very, very nervous. They are small, they are helpless, and they cannot verbalize their needs. What a nightmare. Also, I never really overcame my fear of their wobbly, vulnerable heads.

8. I hate potty-training. Nothing good about it.

9. Joey and Noah would have to share a room. I had to share a room with my sister and it made her hate and resent me. My brother also hated and resented me, but it was because I was not a boy. That hardly seems fair so I'm moving on. When I was born, baby number three and a BIG surprise to my parents, who were super content with their one boy and one girl in their adequately built three-bedroom house, my mother put me in the bathroom. I will not inflict that on my child. (It's unclear, btw, how long that lasted. She gets all vague and sketchy when you ask her point blank.)

10. There is no guaranteeing I would have a girl, and I don't even know that I would want one. I'm a lot of work, and I certainly don't think I could handle another me. Also, maybe Noah would be really scarred. He's quite content to be the baby of the family, and both children are old enough at this point to be insanely cognizant of the goings on involved with pregnancy and new babies. Unlike Joey, who was unsuspecting at age two when Noah arrived, both boys would see their lives changing, and they will remember it forever. I don't want to scar them!

11. I do not enjoy being pregnant. I've also been working on a top-secret recipe/experiment for permanently removing stretch marks after the birth of a second child. If I had a third, all bets would be off and I'd have to start all over again with my ground-breaking work.

12. I've used up all my time off at work. I simply cannot have another baby.

I'll wrap this up like a middle schooler writing an essay. In conclusion, as you can see, there are many reasons Joe and I have decided--firmly--not to have another child. So to all those people with their smug smirks and light social laughter, kiss off.

And anyway, none of it even matters. Because as much as we all love to make plans and think things are in our control, God points and laughs at us and then fills our lives with special blessings we never thought we'd have. SURPRISE!!!!!

Non-Negotiable

My mother bought me this really fantastic hair straightener for Christmas. I used to faithfully straighten my hair every day, until one day I realized that stepping out of the shower and just being ready is actually way easier. Who knew? So I gave up straightening my hair for many, many years.

Until my mother bought me this present. I must admit, it's pretty amazing. It doesn't take me very long--which is saying something, since my hair is pretty thick (I've actually been told by snarky hair dressers that I'd just better WARN them on the phone next time because my hair is "unreasonably thick," as if I have any control over that), and it doesn't make my hair all large and in charge, either.

Well, today, time wasn't on my side and I didn't have time even for the super fabulous quick straightening, and I wore my hair curly. I must tell you, each time I passed by my own reflection it was like seeing an old friend I'd been missing. And oddly, I felt relieved. Like for a little while there, I hadn't quite been my real self, and now I am again.

The more I thought about it, the more reflective I became about when exactly I became definitively me. Waaay back when Joe and I first got engaged, a friend of mine and I were discussing the various ups and downs of embarking on a new life with another person, and she quite wisely said, "You just have to be really clear about what you decide are you non-negotiables." My response was quick (if naive), "That he love me, take care of me, not leave me or cheat on me or hurt me," and she sort of laughed and rolled her eyes and said, "Well, aren't those everyone's non-negotiables? What are yours?" But for me, at that time in my life, those were it. I'd actually been in a place where they weren't glaringly obvious to another person, and I figured I would never need much more than that, so as long as Joe could be counted upon to be, you know, a decent human, we'd be all good. And since I'd already known Joe at that point for ten years, I felt pretty confident I knew what I was getting into.

Lucky for me.

Because quite honestly, if you asked me today, I bet I could brainstorm a whole shiny new list of what my non-negotiables are. Topping the list would be do NOT roll your eyes at me and do NOT move things from where I put them. Ridiculous? Yes. Negotiable? No.

So what happened between then and now? The obvious answer (and the cliche one) is life. Life happened. More specifically? Let's see if I can outline a few of the more glaring specifics that have changed me into the curly-haired person I was so relieved to see in the mirror this morning.

1. Children. Children are messy and annoying and dealing with them alone totally sucks. Dealing with them with another thinking human is, like...impossibly hard. Imagine: I have one idea of how to handle Noah singing "Video Killed the Radio Star" at 2 am, and my husband--what is he thinking?--has the audacity to have a different one. The moral of the story: Nobody can predict their child will have an affinity for singing vintage rock songs in the middle of the night.

2. Mail. Young people really don't understand about mail. My older sister was completely in love with it. The affair began when my parents first subscribed to TV Guide, and it only became more passionate from there. For this reason, I wrongly predicted that one day receiving my own mail would be a magical and satisfying experience. How wrong I was! Mail brings bills and other kinds of bad news. It is a reminder of everything you have to do but don't want to do. It contains advertisements for things you want to buy, but your bank just sent you a letter saying you can't afford to. Sometimes, it contains random letters you suspect might carry illness. (At least if you're me.) And then these envelopes, these harborers of evil, pile up and up in a really inconvenient place in your home. Because half are for you and half are for another person and some are for now and some are for later. You create a system for managing it all, and then the other person, the person who was only meant to love you and take care of you and never hurt you (non-negotiably), comes along and moves the system to a different place. A secret place. It might be the garbage. It might be the cupboard. It doesn't matter. It was moved. Moral of the story: My sister is weird and mail is bad.

3. Modern literature. I have one name for you: Jodi Picoult. Reading Jodi Picoult, or any other writers who have subscribed to using her kind of endings, is akin, in my humble belief, to a person offering you a basket of freshly baked cookies. "They're still warm," the person might say. You're elated.You heart soars. Warm cookies? you think. How delightful! Calories? I don't mind spending them on freshly baked cookies! You reach in, take a cookie, and bring it to your mouth. You bite. And then, more than anything, you want to spit the cookie back out. Those were not chocolate chips. They were raisins. Oatmeal raisin cookies are my equivalent to Jodi Picoult books.

4. Owning a dog. I understand that Joe and I did things a little backward. The way most people do it is they get the dog before they have the children. Joe and I messed up. We had the babies first. Babies are hard! Babies are trouble! Babies do not sleep and then they grow up and sing "Video Killed the Radio Star" at 2 am. I actually rolled my eyes and laughed at people who owned dogs but had no children. But now? Now I see the usefulness of their choice. How much more patient I could have been with someone who isn't human if I didn't actually already care for and nurture small humans. Now, all I keep thinking about is, "I have to clean up your mess and you're not even a person. This blows." No moral here, as far as I can see. But I may not be seeing things in the clearest light since I've been up at 2 am for almost five years listening to rock songs.

I became a teacher because I was done with college. I became a wife. I became a mom. I own a house. I have an SUV that seriously hates me. I hate cold weather and I live in a place that has miserable weather for at least eight months of the year.

But when I looked in the mirror this morning, and saw my own old face surrounded by curly hair, I smiled and walked on, humming a certain Buggles song under my breath as I went. Behind my eyes a slide show played, showing me an array similar to the following.

Choosing Daddy

With Joey as Star Student this week, a few complications arose to slightly shift the fam dynam. (Family dynamic--not yet sure if I like my abbreviation.) As I mentioned before, there was the whole question of "Who do you most want to be like when you grow up?" which caused Joey a bit of moral struggle: does he choose his father, which makes the most sense, or does he choose me, to whom he is most loyal? In the end, as I shared in another post, I had to let him know the truth: I know his life's aspirations are not to be a stay-at-home mom and love the color purple (which, as it turns out, is all he knows about me).

Today, the last day of the days, Joey was to invite his parents in and have one of them read the class a story. Now, that does come across a bit like a setup, where the child will be forced to choose. Really, I think the child is just meant to invite in the parent who will read, but it once again came down to the issue of hurt feelings for our sensitive little dude. But he made no bones about one thing: Daddy would read.

Every single night at bedtime in our house, children are cuddled close and read a story. I have been reading to them both since infancy, or if you count it, in utero. As time has passed and Noah has grown, it had become a divided event. I go with Joey and we read whatever chapter of whatever novel he's on, and my husband reads to Noah. Noah is very insistent that his dad read to him, and Joey prefers me at bedtime. I'm not sure how their preferences came to be so firm-lined, but it probably has something to do with routine and the way things have always worked out.

But this time, Joey was clear. Daddy would read to the class.

I don't want to say my feelings were hurt, because they weren't. I might have had an inkling that the choice was the wrong one, since after all, I'm the English teacher, the writer, the reader...I'm totally the best choice, right? But I completely understood that it would special for Joey to have this moment with his father. I also have a firm belief that fathers should read to their sons, should be seen reading by their sons, and should just all-around be actively involved in the readers their children grow to be. So I didn't argue with Joey's choice and I won't say my feelings were hurt.

Joey chose Zathura, a beautifully written and illustrated Chris Van Allsburg book I bought for teaching years ago (see? my book!). Joey loves this story, but because of its length his dad hesitated. "Won't that take up a lot of time, Joey?" my husband asked. Joey shrugged. "I can pick anything I want!" he declared. "And I want this."

And so it was.

We arrived at his classroom, "Right on time!" or so the teacher said, and the presentation area was made to accommodate us. The children were seated angelically on the floor (because they really are a nice class) before the teacher's rocking chair, a student chair, and a blank cushioned office chair.

"Who gets the rocker, Joey?" asked Joey's teacher.

"My DAD," said Joey, gesturing to the wooden chair with flourish. And just the way his voice carried the word--DAD--I felt his pride and thrill well up inside my own heart. Mommy comes to class often enough. But this was DAD. Dad left work. Dad, his baseball coach. Dad, his at-home science teacher (yes, they blow things up often). Dad, his protector. Dad...his most cherished friend.

"Really?" asked the teacher. "You're going to give this dinky old chair to your mom?"

I laughed like a good sport, knowing I could get emotional at any second because this whole event is a big deal to me even though it's fairly run-of-the-mill for everyone else involved (I mentioned in the previously mentioned previous post that every kid gets his shot at Star Student--it's not like it's earned). Any moment where I'm meant to reflect on how much I love either of my children causes me to well up and have heart palpitations; it's a combination of fierce motherly protectiveness and crazy, over-the-moon love. So I laughed at the teacher, at Joey, at the moment, and sat in the dinky old chair while my husband sat on Joey's other side in the rocking chair.

The children leaned forward eagerly as he held up Joey's chosen book. "Have you kids ever heard of the story Zathura?" he asked them.

Some said yes, some shrugged. It was clear they wanted him to just begin. And begin he did.

With wide eyes and a voice suddenly filled with magic, my husband brought the pages of the book alive for everyone present. Not a practiced teacher, he didn't show them the pictures until he was finished reading each page. (Reading upside down so kids can see the pictures the whole time is a difficult thing to learn.) Once, he even forgot to show the picture at all. It didn't matter--his reading was so captivating the kids barely noticed. With each page I watched their rapt faces change from surprise to awe to wonder--they loved it.

And I loved watching my husband.

At some point, Joey rose from his chair and tucked his arm around his dad's. He leaned on Big Joe's shoulder, adding appropriate comments that helped his father explain the more science-fictiony parts of the story.

For me, being pregnant and having a baby was more than emotional. It forged something inside me that made me possessive and desperate to earn the love my children gave so freely. It sounds like a contradiction, and it is...almost. But I never ever thought I'd feel so good watching Joey get so much from his father's presence, his father's love, or his father's, well, magic. I'm so proud to be married to a man who has all of those things, and has already begun to imprint them on our children.

When You Can't Reach Your Husband and Think He Might Be Dead

I'm going to start this off by being very clear that I don't think I am an expert on marriage and relationships. Like most people, I make a lot of mistakes and only learn from them sometimes. I think that, for me, it stems from the fact that in a marriage, there's very little you can hide about your personality from someone else. It's super hard to pretend to you're not flawed when someone hears you fart in your sleep, has caught you shaving weird parts of your body, and has, at some time or another, on purpose or by accident, walked in on you going to the bathroom. Because of that, it tends to be what I call the natural imperfections, our humanness, that leads to the mistakes made in relationships. And since as humans we are all unique, it is our unique flaws that seem to show up as issues most often.

For me, there is my insanity, I know. Though I'm mostly perfect, it does happen--infrequently, barely noticeably--that I get a teeny tiny bit overly nervous or anxious about the well-being of the people I love.

Yesterday was a regular day in my life. My niece had slept over, my own kids were wild and fun, later in the day I watched my nephew while my sister-in-law ran to the store. We had scrambled eggs for dinner because Joey injured his gums with a lollipop. You know, the usual.

So it didn't occur to me at first, in the midst of all the usual business and, well, whimsy, that I hadn't talked to my husband in awhile. 

He had called just before lunch, I knew, and it had been a bit chaotic, but things had been fine. With the kids making a ruckus I could barely concentrate on what Joe was saying, but I knew if it had been an emergency he would have made that much clear. So, a nice, normal check-in at lunch time.

It is quite normal for Joe to work through dinner. My children have a bit of an early bedtime, too, so sometimes Joe comes home just after that. I don't usually panic about this because I am used to it in Joe's line of work (Hardcore Accounting: watch out for those bad boys). After Joey and Noah were asleep, I distracted myself by reading a new book. I was pretty engrossed, but when I realized it was 8:30 pm and I still hadn't heard from Joe, I started to get nervous.

I called. I emailed. I texted. I repeated. Several times. Nothing.

Long story short, he was fine, had been in important meetings with important people and had then gone out with colleagues to get some dinner and hadn't heard his phone going off. But I was mad. Crazy, off the charts, foaming at the mouth mad. This had never happened before--ultimately ten hours of not knowing if Joe was okay--and I was really scared. I had been close to calling the police and sending them to the bank where Joe works. Worst of all, this morning, when I mentioned I was mad, he didn't apologize. 

He left for work thinking I was just a silly wife who worried too much. This sent me over the edge I think, only exacerbated by the fact that I had to get Joey to golf lessons--something Joe for which had signed him up but for which I had to do the running around--and I was running late (when I'm mad, I like to look REALLY good because it makes me feel more powerful, but putting on makeup set me back ten extra minutes) and then, of all freaking things, the road by the golf course was CLOSED. I had to battle the construction men to get through, and then got into a fight with them about whether or not I could get through later to pick Joey up. Based on that discussion, I don't think they'll mess with me again. 

To make my point, I called Joe about ninety minutes after he'd left for work to "see if he was okay." I know--really it was just to remind him I was still upset. But this time, maybe it was the time or the safe distance away from my insane temper, he did apologize. Heartfelt and all that. Unfortunately, I had just been arguing with the construction guy, so it didn't get Joe very far. I dutifully accepted his apology, but told him I was still angry and would need hourly updates on his safety and okayness. I sent him a text that said, "I love you, asshole." I'm not ashamed. I do love him, plus he is the father of my children and I thought he had been dead, and so it seems like the least I could do.

Finally, I had to dance it out. I turned on some One Direction, a punchy boy band that completely satisfies some ingrained need I have for the presence of a good current boy band in the world, and involved poor innocent Noah in a major dance-a-thon, and then felt better. Clear headed at last, I composed what I think is a very reasonable and proactive email to my husband. I'll copy and paste it for you to read below:

Dear Joe,

I have decided to forgive you, HOWEVER:

1) I don't really.

2) I need the cell phone numbers of Sally*, Francisco, and Geraldo. Possibly Geraldo's wife. 

3) If I can ever NOT get a hold of you again (and have not been informed you will be in a very long meeting with a VIP), I will be texting these people, one by one, by order of previously discussed and agreed-upon importance.

4) If I cannot reach you and cannot determine your whereabouts through the above means, I am alerting the police and sending them to The Bank to search for you.

5) If the police discover you are completely fine and just a massive BOOB, I will embarrass you socially and professionally by sending a male stripper to perform a public lapdance for you. He will be informed ahead of time that he will NOT be paid unless I see a photo via text message of him performing said lapdance for you specifically.

Have a nice day. Can't wait for my hourly alert that you are alive.

Love,

Your DEVOTED Wife

 Is there a moral to the story? It's in there somewhere. In the meantime, I can happily inform you that Joe is, at this moment, alive and well. I just got a text. :)

*Names of Joe's friends/colleagues have been changed to protect their identities. Would YOU want to be associated with him right now?

Seventh Birthday, Eighteen Years, Cool Enough.

Today we took Joey and Noah to the Toronto Science Center (oh, wait it's Canadian: Centre) for Joey's birthday. I won't lie to you. I didn't want to go. Road trips used to be one of my favorite things, but now that I have children I spell ROAD TRIP a-n-x-i-e-t-y. I have daymares about collisions and sudden choking spasms and car sickness and...well, anything that could possibly go wrong.

But Joe really wanted to do it. We've never taken the kids to Canada, or anywhere at all really, and Joey is a bit of a scientist ("when I grow up, Mom, I want to be a scientist with NO girlfriend!"), so I went along with the plan.

It was simple enough, really. Leave early in the morning, get to Toronto around 10 or 11, museum it up, have some food somewhere fun, come home. The first part of the day was great. Joey and I were even selected to go on stage during a science show and assist the presenter. The audience loved me. I mean, us. This is the second time in my life I've been picked to go on stage. It usually happens because I have this thing where I really don't want to be picked (which is weird, right? because it really seems like it would be my niche), and then the presenters think I'll be more entertaining. What with my reluctance and all.

Anyway, all that was a super good time. But then, I started running low on Purell and I was starving and the day was waning, and ultimately, it was just time to go home. The kids were exhausted and so was I, and so we hit the Canadian road. Unfortunately, it was at the height of traffic. We found ourselves lodged in a traffic pack from Toronto almost to Niagara Falls, and then again on the bridge to the US.

Here's the thing. (As Noah would say.) I've said before and I'll say again that being married is one of the hardest things in the world. I love my husband. I've loved him a L-O-O-O-N-G time. Joey actually in the car (because there was nothing but time to chat about the most annoying and mundane topics, from wedgies to Mommy and Daddy's historical relationship), "So how long HAVE you been in love?" There are actually many answers to this question, but Joe and I stick with this one: "We started dating nine years ago, but we've been friends for eighteen." Eighteen years. Eighteen years! Half of them together.

And let me tell you, it is not easy to like someone every day for nine years. Joe is annoying! I know I wax on quite a bit about how wonderful and magical he is, because one of the things this blog is about is counting my blessings and reminding myself of the positive. But for REAL? I knew Joe was annoying about five minutes after I met. For crying out loud, he wore his KEYS on his BELT loop. Who does that? And--UGH!--he swung them around in wide circles when he walked. And he chews too loudly. And he laughs too loudly. And pretty much, if you look up "LOUD" in the dictionary there will be a grainy, black and white photo of Joe there next to it with a caption that reads: NEVER TAKE HIM TO THE MOVIES.

During our insanely long Canadian car ride, it happened that Noah fell asleep. He had been overtired and cranky and I was relieved he was finally getting some rest. He was snoring softly in the back seat when suddenly Joe yelled out, "ARGH!" or something equally stupid and unnecessary. Noah jumped and opened his eyes grumpily. That was it for peace and quiet, I'll tell you.

But things didn't get really bad until we were almost back in the US. Having just broken free of the suffocating traffic, I felt air return to my lungs and relief drip from my hair. Suddenly, I saw a sign. A literal sign. A total game-changer. It said, "Queenston Lewiston Bridge, 2 KM." Now first of all, I have to say that the fact that we Americans don't do the metric system makes me feel ridiculously foolish when traveling out of the country. I feel so...so moronic (and I think I look it, too) when it becomes public knowledge that I don't know the metric system. For example, in the middle of the museum was a fun interactive science setup that measured out three meters, and I unthinkingly blurted, "What's that? Nine feet?" You might say I imagined it, but I swear every Canadian in the room turned and glared at me. And I thought, "I know. You're totally right. I don't even know what our system is CALLED."

Anyway, there was this sign about the Queenston Lewiston Bridge, and in my anxious haste to get home I blurted, "Queenston Lewiston! Let's take that!" Instead of the Peace Bridge, which Joe had been planning on. I hate being a blurter. Are you a blurter? If you are, I'm really sorry. I get you. I feel your pain. There's just no excuse for us.

Joe blurted back, "WHAT?!" and switched off the radio. I slapped both hands over my mouth.

"Never mind," I said, removing my hands and waving them all around, like it would erase the echo of my blurty voice from the air.

"No!" Joe said. "You said it! I heard you! Why did you say that! Queenston Lewiston! Why not the Peace Bridge? What do you know?!"

I began to sweat. This is the sort of choice a driver will throw on you, because it's the sort of choice that never has a good answer. No matter what you ever pick, it never works out. If I insisted Joe take the Queenston Lewiston Bridge, there would be some sort of massive delay and it would be all my fault. But if I said nothing and we took the Peace Bridge as planned, there would be a massive delay and I'd be mad. And we'd been in the car a long time and my bladder was well beyond full and it was crying.

"Well?!" demanded Joe.

"Nope," I said. "I didn't say anything. Forget it. Shhh. Peace Bridge. That's what you feel comfortable with. You're the driver. Go with that."

Joe vigorously slapped the steering wheel with one hand. "No! You think there's something wrong with the Peace Bridge?"

"No," I said. "Do that. The Peace Bridge. Yes."

"But you said Queenston Lewiston."

At this point, the exit for Queenston Lewiston was about to jump up and bite us.

"I didn't say anything."

"Fine! We'll take Queenston Lewiston!" He veered into the left lane and took the exit before I could blink. "And if it goes wrong, well, YOU picked it."

GAH! I was horrified. That was a lot of weight to carry, considering the day I'd had. Road trips and science museums and being called on stage. Who could tolerate all of it?

THEN. As we followed the bend leading up to the Bridge, guess what? Oh, yes. Of course. Inevitable. Stopped traffic a half mile long.

The sun was beating in the windows. The boys were awake and playing some loud game that involved them saying "Poop" and "Toilet" a lot, but had nothing to do with a bathroom break. Joe had alternative rock blaring, which sometimes I like but other times, like now, makes me feel like hammers are banging on the inside of my forehead. This, combined with the poop game in the back seat, combined with Joe's intermittent singing, combined with three hours on the sunny side of the car, made me feel a little...piqued.

"What lane should I get in?" Joe asked.

"Oh, no," I said, shaking my head. "You can't get me to fall for that. I'm not picking."

"Just pick."

"No. I picked the bridge, remember?"

"This lane? Or the one on the right?"

"Not picking," I said, holding strong. Then, for good measure, I added, "Stay in this lane."

"I think the one on the right, but I'm staying here," he said. "You picked it."

Crossing my arms and staring out the window for the next while, I tried to tune out the music and the kids and the Joe. I saw a girl with a filthy car whose windshield wipers were frozen in time across her windshield. Like Miss Havisham had gotten ahold of it. I saw a super young couple in a car with the steering wheel on the right side. It wasn't a mail truck. It was a little white sedan. The guy's hair looked like a brown mop and he had HUGE eyebrows. Later on, they'd get pulled over by the border patrol. There was a van full of Amish people (something that perplexes me; I saw Witness and there were NO vans). A driver with his foot hanging out his window. ("How is THAT comfortable?" asked Joe.) Two RVs, both who had their own personal border officers come out to them in line to be searched.

But the wait was too long. I couldn't stare in silence forever. In the backseat, Noah was making gorilla noises and Joey was doing ridiculous movie impressions of a movie he's never even seen. His impressions were based on Joe's impressions from an earlier conversation. Nirvana was droning on and on and on. Joe was chewing his gum and muttering, "Shoulda switched lanes twenty minutes ago."

As our car rolled painfully slowly up into the next slot, only a few cars away from the big border patrol inquisition, I turned in my seat and faced the boys sharply.

"There can be no silliness when we get up to the toll booth. There will be police waiting there to take you away if they think you're acting weird. So just...Be. Cool."

Both boys immediately stilled. Not a lot can intimidate them, but they are both equally freaked out by the police. And by being taken away. Silence fell into the car at long last.

I was about to give Joe a smug look, when I saw him smooth back the sides of his hair, Fonzy style, with one hand. Then he licked his pinky and index finger before using them to smooth out his eyebrows.

He faced me, all smirk and twinkle, and said, "Am I cool enough?"

I burst out laughing. Eighteen years, annoying as hell, and he still makes me laugh.

I Have the Power

For the first time in...possibly a year, I went out for the evening without my husband and children. I'm not kidding. It's been a REALLY long time. Add that to the fact that Joe's job took him to Pittsburgh from August to March, and you'll start to see that my children have become more than accustomed to having me around. Always. Beck and call. Dependent. Reliant. Expectant.

I was so excited to leave today!

It was just coffee with my sister, but not from Tim Hortons and not in my family room. We went to a real place, a favorite of mine actually in South Buffalo called Caz Coffee, because it's charming and cozy and has a little bookstore in back that features local authors. I had an almond coconut mocha and it was amazing.

When I came home, it wasn't much past the boys' bedtime, and as usual, Noah was singing over the monitor. Joe was lying on the couch. I took in this picture of him and asked cautiously, "Did everything go okay?"

He looked at me, eyebrows raised and said firmly, "No."

Oh.

"It was terrible. They were extremely offended by your absence." I opened my mouth to speak, but Joe put both hands in the air. "I understand that this is the sort of thing I might say as a joke. Let me clarify. I'm not kidding."

"What happened?" I ventured.

Joe let out a miffed exhale that sounded something like, "Kuh!" He continued with, "It's the MOMMY MAGIC. They couldn't understand why you weren't here with your Mommy Magic!" If Joe hadn't been so clearly upset, I would have laughed. As it was, he gave me no room for comment. "Joey called me up twice. Twice! And Noah? Something about dreams? I don't even know. I mean, I already knew they always want YOU to tuck them in, because apparently you're 'the best tucker inner,' but Noah tried to insist that I CALL YOU about the magic. Tell you to come home. He wanted me to call you from his ROOM!"

I really did laugh then, because it was pretty absurd. You're probably wondering what this Mommy Magic business is all about. It started three years ago, shortly after Joey began having nightmares--the really serious kind that made him sweaty and shaky and afraid of the dark. I wrote a whole blog about this the other night but then didn't post it--I do that sometimes--but the bottom line, he's a creative kid with a hugely overactive imagination and it all tends to run out of control at bedtime. Especially after a really busy day.

So he's really into superheroes, right? Like he actually believes my older brother is the REAL Superman. So doesn't it make sense that Superman's sister got a few powers of her own? At the time, Joey was three and wouldn't be convinced that his room or his house were truly safe, or that I could know it for sure. I had to calm him down, so I told him that mommies have magical powers. That we have the ability to keep our children safe. Only mommies have these powers, and all of us have different kinds of powers. Just like Superman is different from Green Lantern who is different from Captain America. They're all heroes, but their powers vary.

The cool thing is, I kind of believe it myself. It's always been said that mothers have that extra sense, that innate ability to "just know" when their children need them, or when something is wrong. Stories are told of women who hear their children crying in their minds, or the age-old tale of the mother who lifted the car off her child. You can go ahead and science it all away with talk of adrenaline and endorphins, or even point out the uncanniness of coincidence, but really...there is a magical truth to it. And most importantly, I truly do everything in my power to protect Joey and Noah.

Joey bought into this right away, but of course with time and periodic recurrent nightmares, the magic morphed into something much larger than a mother's sixth sense, something larger than me. I now have X-ray vision, eyes in the back of my head (because I'm a teacher, Noah says), and various magic spells that ward off everything from Voldemort to bad dreams.

It sounds like a huge pain, but of all the parts of our bedtime routine, the magic is the part I mind the least. It seems to provide both boys with an otherwise unattainable peace of mind. It also allows for the most important means to the end of the battle: it gives them the opportunity to communicate to me what is bothering them and to believe that I can fix it. I can't possibly be in Joey's subconscious to control his dreams, but I can listen to what he is afraid of and verbally will the bad thoughts away. And just that, on its own, helps him think good enough thoughts to sleep peacefully.

And of course, since I've been here to do this every night in the recent past, neither boy could fathom I might be absent THIS night. Especially for something so trivial as coffee with my sister.

"I actually dug out Joey's Harry Potter wand from Halloween," Joe said, disbelieving of such a length. "I took it in Noah's room and told him you gave me special permission to use it. And he knew--even in the DARK--that it was a fake. He yelled at me! He said, 'That's just JOEY'S WAND!'"

Just then, Noah called out from upstairs that he needed to use the bathroom. I went upstairs and opened his door. When I poked my head in, his face relaxed into a relieved smile and he said, "Momma. I'm so glad. I've been wanting some of your magic."

There are a lot of things that the boys want only their father for. They love science, doing experiments, visiting museums, and exploring answers to questions in books or online. And they will only do that with their dad. If I even offer to help, they wave me away dismissively and say, "That's okay. I'll just wait for Dad to get home." When it comes to playing superheroes, Dad knows every name, every ability, and all the background information about each one. If I offer to play, too, they say, "You can be Batgirl. She doesn't do much." And one night, despite all my Mommy Magic, Joey admitted sadly, "You probably couldn't punch out a bad guy, Mom. You're not very tough."

And recently, I came into the family room to spend time with my three favorite people, and found that they were intensely involved with some sort of wizardy/sci-fi/batte-rific video game that I definitely did not "get" or care to "get," and I was completely ignored. I thought to myself, "This will only get worse." I'm the only female in a house full of boys who want to do "boy things," and as time goes on I will fit into that picture less and less.

But at least I have this one thing. I can't punch anybody out, but somehow, I make them feel safe. :)

In A Blink

The other night, I sent my husband Joe out to pick up a few things I needed. I'd have gone myself, but I have been laid up at home with kidney stone trouble for a few days and my wonderful hubby is loving (he LOOOOOVES it) that he gets to take extra special care of me. On my list were the usuals, like bread and milk and bottled water, but also, I'd run out of my favorite sunless tanning lotion from last year. I don't use it in winter, because there are times it's just not okay to walk around looking more orange than other people, but as I've recently been to Florida and also have been spending time outside in unseasonably warm weather, I decided I needed to break out the tanner. Only problem? I left the supply grossly low last year (yeah, I'm totally the person who puts the box of cookies back when there's only one left).

Before Joe left, I showed him the bottle, carefully pointing out its identifying color scheme, the brand name, the kind of lotion, etc, to be sure he'd get the right thing. I do this because Joe ALWAYS gets things right when he goes to the store. Of course he does. Always.

Well, it turned out that Wegmans didn't have my special lotion in stock. Joe called me on his cell, and we decided the next best thing would be regular lotion made by the same company who made the tanner. We hung up, Joe finished shopping, and came home after about thirty minutes. We unpacked the bags, put things away, and ate lunch. Later in the day, I felt like trying out the new lotion. I found the bottle in the bathroom, and examined its label. Of all the lotions he could have picked, Joe brought home for his thirty-year-old wife:

ADVANCED ANTI-AGING LOTION
7 EFFECTS IN ONE BOTTLE!

Thank you, honey. You've been looking great, too.

The thing is, Joe and I have definitely been noticing that we don't look the same as when we met anymore. I mean, we met when we were fourteen so I guess that was bound to happen, right? Poor Joe worries about his hairline and his waistline and I've noticed a totally different kind of lines collecting at the edges of my eyes. And just the other day, Joey was commenting on how my hands look "old." He said this with a curl in his lip and one nostril flaring. Isn't it funny how right up until the moment you notice these things have already happened, you assume they won't be happening for a long time? Or maybe not funny at all, as it turns out.

So, it's kind of odd then that I had this moment tonight as we put the boys to bed. I tucked in Noah while Joe said goodnight to Joey in the next room. I'm almost always faster at these things than Joe, because I'm all about no-nonsense. If you give them an inch and all that. Anyway, I closed Noah's door and peeked into Joey's room. My husband was on his knees beside the bed, his elbows resting on the mattress. He was whispering a silly story to Joey, who was giggling. It was probably about farts or poops or burps, or some other stupid boy humor I don't get.

But the moment came when I blinked, and somehow saw my husband objectively. When you've known someone for eighteen years, these moments don't come very often. When they do, they're always startling.

The last bit of daylight came through the bedroom curtains, making Joe's ash blond hair glow. I could only see the back of his head, so evidence of any receding hairline (which is really "all in his head"--haha! get it??) was hidden. In his t-shirt and jeans, the slight widening of his waist that age has brought was erased by shadows and fabric, and the line of his neck and his back reminded me of all the time I spent following him around when we were teenagers. I could have been looking at Joe fifteen years ago.

And it just kind of hit me, as it does when I least expect it. Saying goodnight to our son is the same boy I knew in high school, a boy I swore was positively flawless and who I would love forever. That's Joe Bielecki, and he married me. And that's our son. And somehow, I'm this lucky.