Franny was looking down her pants before dinner.
“What’s going on in there,” I said. “You growing a penis?”
“No!”
“Wouldn’t that be COOL???”
“MOM. NO!”
Category Archives: Franny
There’s no map and a compass wouldn’t help at all
First things first: thanks for all the comments on my last post. I enjoy dodgy science SOOOO much, don’t you?
Second thing: with regard to my search for a calf’s head for an upcoming recipe, I must say: DUH. Of course no one wants to sell me one. Mad cow disease and all that. I am not interested in using the brains, however. AHEM. So I say to you, if you happen to have a calf’s head laying around that you are not using, I would be appreciative of receiving it for this other thing I’m doing.
Thing number three is Franny. Franny has been off-kilter and insecure for some time now…really since her father moved away a year and a half ago. Makes sense, right? When she opens up about it, she says things like, “I don’t think he really loves me.” I know this age can be very insecure, and she certainly has her moments where she cries that she has no friends or she has the WORST LIFE EVER, but the thing with her father is troubling because it’s a recurring theme.
And when she says it I feel this twinge, not just for her, but also because it echoes how I felt when her father and I were married. I really felt like he was phoning it in most of the time. It also makes me think of being her age and really wanting a father myself, instead of some psycho that my mother married.
What to do with this? I feel cheated. If anyone is going to mess them up, it should be me. There goes my ten year plan to give one of them an eating disorder and make the other one completely mental if she gets anything less than an a-minus on anything. Where’s my justice, universe? Probably behind the entertainment center again.
I thought about what I knew about people who were now adults who’d had surrogate parents in their lives–those people who actually gave a shit. I thought about those moments when adults stepped into my life and did not see me as some kind of alien, but as a kid who needed some care and attention. Someone to worry about them and to say, “I care what happens to you,” with the unspoken “even if it seems like no one else does.”
Then I thought seriously of her sister’s father. P. met Franny when she was two years old, when she used to follow me around at school when I was running errands or picking things up on non-class days. When P. and I got involved, he became a strong presence in her life–another adult who was looking out for her well-being and had a good relationship with her. Then Strudel came and he became her sister’s father, so was significant in another way. Pragmatically and coldly speaking, he is my babydaddy and he is not going anywhere. He is not someone who is going to skate on Franny. This is important. I am not ready for her to learn that even really cool people can skate yet.
The thing about P. is that he has always been super respectful of the fact that Franny has a father already. He and I spent a lot of time figuring out how to negotiate our new family–how would we fit, what were the boundaries? He bosses her sometimes, like any adult might, and teaches her things and they have conversations and he genuinely LIKES children, which is something I found appealing about him. I have always felt that he was a worthy and strong man to be in her life.
“So,” I said on the bus to P. the other morning. “It seems like Franny is kind of losing her father to his other family.”
“Yeah.”
How do you say this to someone?
“Would you…could you be more of a father to her?”
“Yeah, I can,” he said.
I rattled on about how great I thought their relationship was, and how I felt he had never overstepped. I said how I see Franny watching him really care for Strudel, really fathering her, and I could see the longing. A witness to what having a father is like at both houses, and not really feeling it for yourself.
“I don’t know what you can change. Maybe hug her more and tell her you are proud of her and stuff,” I said. I know he is proud of her and he does tell her. “Does this all sound horribly fake?”
“Well,” he said. “You fake it until it becomes real.”
This sounded harsh to me for a second, until I thought about when I met Franny. Jesus Christ, I thought, what was I supposed to do with this baby I had pooped out? I don’t even KNOW you, I wanted to say. Who are you? I kissed her head and hugged her and joggled her and talked to her so she wouldn’t grow up to become Charles Manson, and one day, I won’t say how long it took, it became real. I really did feel like I knew and loved her. P. loves Franny, I know he does. I am hoping that taking it up to the next level is easy, or at least doable.
Fool Me Once
Yesterday SeaFed’s third child was decanted at some sort of modern medical institution. For those playing along at home, only one of those children is mine. For reasons of her own, Franny is in a bit of a funk about gaining a new sibling, and I will confess to you that the gleeful ebullience in the voicemail he left me yesterday made me slightly nauseated. This was followed by a picture of the new baby in my email which has the same giant pumpkin head as the other child. Is it less a case of Tiny Vagina, and more a case of what the medical community refers to as “casaba cabeza.”
I am dying to know if they still have lice, but not enough to, like, ask. You know? I guess I will find out when Franny comes back on Monday.
So things were a little wacky over here last night, and both of my girls ended up falling asleep in my bed while I stayed up and watched new Big Love. My girls are still fairly small and Franny is about as thin as a sheet of paper right now, so I slid in beside them with Strudel in the middle.
Of course Strudel spent half the night kicking me and the other half crowding me, with a little intermittant blanket hogging thrown in for variety. Feet up in my ribcage reminded me of being pregnant with her, when her primary occupations were kicking, drinking her own pee, and killing off the competition.
Finally, around 4:30, Strudel crept over to Franny’s side of the bed, which was immediately deemed COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE. Sometimes Franny reminds me how much bullshit I put up with unquestioningly, and then I remember that Franny is a lot of the reason I learned how to put up with booshit. Twist.
“STRUDEL,” Franny stage-hissed. “MOVE OVER.” “STRU. DEL. MOOOOVE!”
Of course Strudel could sleep through a café full of Northface jacket-wearing Seattleites fighting over the last vegan, gluten-free, sustainably-sourced croissant in the pastry case.
“OW!” Strudel said finally, half-asleep.
“OUT FRANNY,” I said. Franny sniffled and stumped off to her own bed and Strudel oozed back over to my side of the bed, where she stayed until my alarm went off at six, leaving Nietzsche at least half of my queen-sized bed.
And no one learned ANYTHING.
In Other News
This fucking guy is cracking me up today. Do stick around for the comments section. I posted that I thought it was satire, and I want to believe, I do. Speaking of no one learned anything, all this young hombre is going to conclude from this little crusade is that The Internet is Mean. which, well, duh.
News I Have News Pay Attention OK
I started a new group blog over at The Queen’s Scullery. Check it out, Victorian nerdery ahoy. You are invited, if you want to be.
Life without wheat is going okay. We made a run at this a year ago, and sort of backslid on it. In theory, Franny’s father is taking this more seriously now after the hospital thing. In reality, there are cracks in the system, of course. Franny saw pics of my English pudding that I made for Christmas, and she said she had some at her dad’s house, but said it did not look as nice as mine.
“Really? Pudding?” I said. “Did you get a stomach ache?”
“No,” she said.
“That’s good.”
“Oh, there’s something else though, Mom. The other day he was trying to talk me into eating this granola bar thing. He said, ‘Come on, a little won’t hurt.”
“Well,” P. said. “Every time anyone tries to talk you into eating wheat, offer to kick them in the nuts first, so they can be in pain with you.”
“If it is a lady, offer an eye poke,” I said.
Franny spends a fair amount of time now mourning her departure from gluten. She sighs over things she cannot eat, and we are finding the balance between making substitutes, like gluten-free scones (bleah) and just eating other things. She was bonkers over some shrimp and spaghetti squash I made, because it was “just like noodles” as if we do not have soba and rice noodles on the regular.
I am very excited to get back into our regular non-holiday routine tomorrow, which includes me being done working my second job. Yeah!
Franny’s Back
And she brought…wait for it….LICE. This is like blowing your nose now. I suspect the timing of her return has to do with a social engagement last night that SeaFed let slip.
“Did you know that back in a long time ago you could buy a whole BAG of CANDY for a penny? I wish I could live then. Except I wouldn’t be alive now. And I would not have a fish hat. Okay, never mind.”
Yes, have some moar candy from your stocking. Wheat-free child is HYPER.
Cloudy with a 90% Chance of Inverted Umbrellas
Is it really countdown? Is Christmas really almost here? This winter does not make any sense, really. I’m glad it’s the solstice, that’s for sure.
I am grateful for two things right now. One is all the kerfuffle at my house about Christmas Steve, who is COMING FOR SURE this year. Strudel flipped the fuck out the other night when she was overly tired and kicked the ladder to Franny’s loft bed from behind and it made a terrible cracking noise. Her father sighed and said he could fix it, but it is permanently attached now, apparently.
Strudel is very nervous and is making suggestions to stave him off. Perhaps if she is really good for the next couple of days he will not come?
“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe there will be less naughty child stink waves coming from the house.”
Perhaps we could hang a sign on the door explaining that they hadn’t really been THAT naughty, and could he skip our house this year?
“I dunno, man. You cannot get between Steve and his sock beer,” I said, slightly apologetically.
Franny had more questions about him as we were out on errands last weekend.
“what does he DO?” Franny asked.
“Not much. He enjoys his beer in the summer, and scotch in the winter. He has a string of ex-wives all over the country and children he never sees, and he does not pay child support.”
“Mom,” Franny said quietly. “Is Christmas Steve my dad?”
“What? No, honey. No.”
What do I do with this?
As always, I am still trying to think of a present. I am considering something that might ooze through the wrapping and smell, like raw chicken breasts, but the girls enjoy having something, even if it is crappy, which it invariably is.
The other thing I am grateful for is that SeaFed called me on Friday night after getting Franny back and bumbled and did not make any sense, but eventually came around to the fact that he wanted to return Frannie a week early during Xmas break. Originally he told me he wanted to keep her from school ending through the return to school (the 3rd). My last correspondence with him in regards to that was that I objected to it, but at some point, what can you do? Could I go snatch her back? Have a screaming fit? I did not hear back.
Unfortunately, Franny has spent a month fretting about being away from me for so long, and not spending any part of Christmas with us, which I get. I am still encouraging her to advocate for herself, and she did speak to her dad about this more than once. With my help she came up with a plan to remind him we had always split breaks in the past. I save all my calendars showing how she is with us most of the time, and I offered to photocopy last Christmas for her, which she took to him.
So things have been changing since SeaFed abruptly called me a year and a half ago and told me he was moving away. Franny has settled with me. It is her place and we are her people. She refers to her father’s other children as her “half” siblings, but Strudel is her sister. Now that her stepmother is about to pop sprog again, Franny has asked me more than once, I am not planning on having any more children, RIGHT?
I feel conflicted about this. There is a part of me that wants to say, “Of course, victory, this was inevitable. Of course, I am her mother,” I think 75% of parenting is just showing up. The other 25% is the work, but man, that showing up goes a loooong way.
In other news, I have planned my Christmas meal. I bought many, many animals at Central Market yesterday. The checker watched a duck, a rabbit, some fish, and some beef suet go by.
“You have every member of the animal kingdom here,” he commented.
“You know what they say,” I said.
“No?”
“The cuter the face, the better the taste,” I said.
“I have never heard that,” he said.
“Well, that is because I made it up.”
“I’m blogging that,” he said.
“Okay, link me.”
Gracious What Fresh Rabbit Hole is This
Hello! Thank you for your email inquiries regarding my new cooking blog thing. I appreciate the effort many of you have gone through to create a sort of “application,” which was not necessary, but very nice. We are always so busy I really do want this to be a fun and undaunting project. I will reply to you via email this week. Busy or not, I NEED this project. I am very excite.
I went to Vancouver last weekend. If Canada was a girl, I would take her behind the gym and get her ass pregnant.
In other news, I have a very sick child who has a gluten flare-up plus a flu bug. I spent all day at the Childrens’ Hospital yesterday getting tests and x-rays. Franny is fine, but I am looking forward to getting that final rubber stamp that says “X is wrong with your kid.” Not that it will stop grandparents from stuffing her full of sugar cookies late on a Sunday night. I am thinking of going with “ATTENTION WELL-MEANING FAMILY: Franny is allergic to wheat and will DROP DEAD if you give her a piece of chocolate cake.” The reality is that she misses school, I miss work, and I resent the fuck out of everyone who is not taking this shit seriously, you can die in a fucking fire while I sit up with my kid who is twisting and holding her guts at 2 a.m.
TL;DR: I am busy and you will be hearing from me shortly, all of you, if I do not combust.
xoxo, have a good day/fuck off and die (depending on who you are)
October is for Birthdays
Franny had the day off on her birthday, coincidentally, and the girls woke up and IMMEDIATELY started bickering, so it was time for Enforced Death March. Franny was shocked at the notion that we could walk all the way to Gasworks, but it really only took about an hour.
Lego girl head earring birthday present that I picked up at Brickcon.
Franny and her Auntie Morgan.
BEE BOOP BEE BOOP APPLESAUCE DISPENSING DEVICE
Here Comes the Karma Truck
So. Things are going pretty well. Franny had her birthday and things have been fairly patched up around here…UNTIL. On Sunday Franny went out to practice devotional WASPishness with her father’s side of the family (tennis lessons) and I let Strudel watch a movie on her own, upstairs.
I heard some tiny elephant stamplings and didn’t think much of it, since Strudel does not have much of an attention span for TV and movies. I thought maybe she was taking breaks and coming back for more. What she WAS doing was breaking into the mints I bought Franny as part of her birthday present, and bolted about half of them in the time it takes to say, “Why did I not just buy a purse dog?”
Franny came home from rich white people church and went to her mints, and was very disappointed. She showed me the evidence and I tried to decide how to administer consequences. Strudel copped to doing it and I said, “Don’t steal from anyone. It makes people SAD AND ANGRY TO BE STOLEN FROM, right Franny?” Franny nodded slowly and I could see the wheels turning.
Tonight at dinner Strudel told us that the two youngest boys in her preschool class are looting her lunch for fruit every day. “They steal my BANANA every DAY!” she finished.
“And HOW does that FEEL?” I said, for what felt like the 50th time this week. “Did you feel SAD and ANGRY?” She nodded forlornly. “Well, that is how your sister felt when you stole her mints yesterday.” Again, the LOOK. Ohhhh.
Presumably if this trend continues a gang of wild weasels will come and nibble these fruit gafflers’ ears off, and then the weasels will be run down by an express bus, and so on.
IT IS IMPORTANT FOR YOU TO KNOW THAT I AM THE FIRST HIT ON GOOGLE FOR “FUCK YEAH CAPS LOCK!!!” Monkey chow out.
Showdown at the AA Ranch
So, yesterday I wrote about trouble with Franny and about how she is nicking things around the house and around her dad’s house. I appreciate all the feedback I got about that and regarding math, thank you. I will tell you what happened and then I will answer some of your questions or otherwise respond. I know, I know, two posts in two days? Do I have a fever or something? Maybe.
Yesterday morning I gave Franny a notice: “We are going to talk about yesterday when I get home.” She had a worried look and nodded, and was awkward as I was leaving for work.
I came home and she plowed ahead, telling me about her day and filling the space with words galore, a behavior I recognize in myself when I am nervous about something. I sat down to stretch before running and gave her a serious look.
“So, I think you know why I was so upset yesterday.”
She nodded. And I waited. One of the best things I learned from my college mentor was to wait and give things breathing room in the form of silence. You’re not judging, yelling, questioning, accusing–just staring calmly, waiting. My mentor taught me this in the context of teaching, since that was my plan before I ended up with this little perp who was sitting across from me almost nine years later. I’m sure it wouldn’t work for everyone.
Franny said, barely audibly, “I’m sorry,” and I kind of teased it out of her what for. She did cop to the chocolate swiping, and she did cop to taking the homeopathic pellets. I did not yell and without going into the complete transcript I will tell you I firmly tried to convey:
1. Stealing is wrong, period.
2. It feels bad to be stolen from.
3. It feels bad to be lied to about it, especially when that lie is “I came in to give you a hug” as a cover for candy-gaffling.
4. I thanked her for coming clean and told her I would not punish her this time, since I did not want her to think that being honest was a bad move.
5. How had she felt over the past 24 hours when she knew I was upset about the missing things? The answer was bad–bad in her head, and bad in her stomach.
I told her if she did not want to feel bad, and if she wanted to do the right thing, she should NOT STEAL. Let’s not have to have these horrible confessional conversations. We talked a little bit about real consequences, like people losing trust for her, and outside ones, like being caught, fined, not allowed in stores, and people who steal big things or steal repeatedly can end up in jail. I reminded her that she can and should spend her own money and treat herself, and that it is okay to WANT things.
I told her that in the end it was her choice what she was going to do with her life, and what kind of person she would be, and that I prefer that she be a person who does not steal.
What will I do next time, assuming there is one, or assuming I catch her? I don’t know. Again, I am loathe to accuse her falsely or to punish her for confessing.
I am trying to lead by example, something that has permeated a lot of my life since having children–I think about my vices, exercise, eating habits, treatment of others, etc. Recently we found a iPhone in the park and returned it that day by making some calls on it. Franny could see how effusively happy the man was when he got it back. Sometimes Strudel tries to walk off with things in stores due to her (and me) forgetting she is holding them and we go right back and pay for it. I don’t know what else I can do, really, but encourage her and have timely conversations, and HOPE. Her father thought that the world was there for the gaffling and the scamming but it is too much effort and too little pay off for me to live like that. I would rather see happy people getting their phones back, honestly.
Speaking of happy, after we talked and took a little break, Franny was utterly thrilled, to the point of skipping to the store. I could tell a weight was off her. I hope to see her like that a lot. I remember being her age and all the weird secrets that were imposed on me by my mother in particular, and self-imposed…I hope she chooses not to live like that. I am trying to do my part and keep my burdens off her, and encourage her to be so completely free like she was yesterday afternoon.
COMMENTS. Thank you for comments. Most will be truncated. You made me laugh and/or think, so thanks.
Brigid Keely said:
Have you ever talked to Franny about your youthful stealing and how your step dad reacted and how it made you feel? Why you stole? You talk to her about a lot of stuff. Do you think she could relate to your childhood?
No, I have not, for a few reasons. The most important reason is that I think she is too much in black/white world right now, and will not be able to look at everything she knows about me and say, well, mom learned her lesson and got better. I remember being her age and learning things about relatives that disturbed me and really tainted my image of them. When she is older and the world becomes greyer I will tell her more involved accounts of my history. For now I think it will be least confusing if I appear to have the moral high ground.
Tyleetwen said:
Do you think she would like those old Multiplication Rock songs?
YES, this is brilliant. THANK YOU. I had her listen to the 0-3s this afternoon. I am going to download them and play them until our ears bleed math.
Jane says:
I think sometimes it’s as much about the challenge and the sneakery as well as the obvious (the sugar).
I felt that too. I did get a little rush when I was a kid. She was taking an awfully large risk sneaking across my creaky floor and FAILED.
Jessica said:
My biggest concern is that (the lying especially) is an ingrained personality trait (that she comes by honestly, as her mother is a liar), and that people will dislike her – which would be a shame because she is at heart a nice kid.
I have encountered kids like this, and to a certain extent I was that kid. You kind of want to shake them and say exactly what you said, but everyone has to choose their path, right? I think one of the greatest unfairnesses in life is the pain of watching people make terrible choices.
M0g0 said:
Stealing… I “stole” sweets, and it was because they were in short supply in my house, and the more sweets were restricted and the more my parents got pissed when I “stole” them, the angrier and sadder I got and the more I “stole” them. I put “stole” in quotes because that’s what my mother used to call it, which always made me feel like a horrible criminal, and because I don’t think in real life you can “steal” food that is available in your own house, even if you are a kid. Frankly, this is one of the big things I want to do differently with my own kids: realize that kids go through a phase where treats are a very big deal and their metabolisms kick up, and not make such things scarce or flip my lid when they get eaten up.
I am wonder if you mean there was, say, a community box of ice cream bars and you would eat them when no one was around. I would get bitched at about this, but my mother would not use the word “stole.” I am okay with Franny eating things that are around the house, but there is a line with Personal Chocolate and such. We all have it.
Anne said:
Somewhere around here I have a lesson on “quick facts” which is tricks for learning multiplication; let me know if you want me to send it to you. I seem to remember it helped us. What it always boils down to is just practice and drill, so you may be already doing plenty fine.
Thank you for the link!
Dorrie said:
Former (or am I?) thief that I am
HEH
Why can’t she nick the cheap stuff, says I, those tubes are $$$.
Seriously.
grasshopper said:
If you’re too soft or squishy or ‘negotiable’ about things, it can make kids feel unsafe, like you’re not really strong enough to be their parent. (I felt that a lot with my parents).
I agree.
Also, maybe she just needs a stash of her own that *you* aren’t allowed to get into? I remember having that battle with my parents – it felt really unfair that they could have secrets but I couldn’t.
Well, I am not going to go out of my way to build her one, but she does have free season on the grocery store on her way home from school and one weekends.
Hi.D said:
I heard a good interview with Po Bronson
Thank you!
Thanks, everyone. I will update. Back to vaginas and me being mental or cooking tomorrow.