Sorry I haven't written much lately. I've been kinda busy, what with the nonstop rain making me fucking nuts, getting through Passover week, watching "Project Runway", Mom being here, and spending a lot of time hiding out in the bathroom.
I don't know how it is with other religions, but when you are Jewish, "I'm in the bathroom" is the all purpose, never fails, carte blanche, get-out-of-jail free card for anything.
Help me get this fish bone unstuck from my esophagus. Hurry! I'm losing consciousness.
Can't. I'm still on the toilet.
Oy! Still? Are you okay? Sorry I bothered you. Good luck.
Nothing is more important to my people than a successful bowel movement.
However, that's not why I've been in the bathroom. I just needed some alone time.
When the kids were little, a closed bathroom door was about as much a deterrent to them as a welcome sign and a bag of candy. One of my kids used to beg me to play the "which dinosaur does my poop look like?" game every time I was on the toilet. If I flushed before he could examine it, believe me, there was hell to pay.
"It looked just like a triceratops," I'd tell him, trying not to gag as he quizzed me on the details. Of my poop. Sometimes, he wanted a recap of my dinosaur poop shapes instead of a bedtime story.
Are you listening, Eric Carle? I smell another blockbuster.
I knew he'd grow out of it, but I was still secretly relieved when he did finally stop asking to look at my poops. I imagine these days he'd rather pour hot tar up his nose than discuss my poops, much less examine them and assign them a dinosaur shape. He'd probably gouge out his eyes with an icepick just reading this post.
This is the cross my children bear - having a mom who blogs.
It could be worse. Trust me.
I love my Mom, but sometimes I just gotta run into the bathroom to hide when she's here. I close the bathroom door, stare directly into the mirror over the sink, open my eyes crazy wide, pull my hair straight up from the roots and let go of a big ass silent scream. Try it. It's very therapeutic. Like a bowel movement for the face.
Oh, by the way, my hair looks much better behind my ears. At least that's what Mom told me. At least seventeen times she told me. I spent the weekend ducking and dodging her as she tried to grab me and finger-comb my hair into submission. She caught me and put my hair behind my ears while I was watching TV, or trying to read. She reached over and put my hair behind my ears while I was driving in a rainstorm. She did it yesterday while I was choking on a piece of matza, although in her defense, she might have mistaken my open-mouthed gasping and the international sign for "I am choking" as the international sign for, "Mom, I don't know, should I wear my hair in front of, or behind my ears?"
She asked me every twenty minutes if I was sure I didn't want to have the liver spots on my face removed because, did I know that they can be taken off now and the procedure is very easy. Not that she doesn't think I am beautiful or anything, but really, why don't I get them removed? And then, maybe, put my hair behind my ears?
My house was too cold for her. Also, it was too hot for her.
She took dirty dishes out of my dishwasher, washed them, and stacked them to dry on my kitchen counter so I could have a "nice, clean, empty dishwasher."
She makes a meal out of the food I throw away - scrapings off an old avocado pit, bits of apple hanging on the core, yogurt off the sides of the empty container. I swear to God, she and my sister have the intestines of a feral dog. Mom assured me this morning that the chicken can sit out on the kitchen counter all day because my house is so cold (and that way, the refrigerator is nice and clean and empty, I guess) and I saw Karen pull a half-rotten potato out of my garbage and put it back in the pile of potatoes ready to go into the oven for dinner tonight.
Oy.
This is gonna be a big night for dinosaurs.
Is poop shape recognition just a boy thing?!?! Asking as a mom of a boy who has identified his own poop as a cobra, bow tie, and see-saw of late. (Thankfully he has NOT figured out that he can follow me into the bathroom and identify even more new shapes!) I too find the bathroom a calming respite. How sad.
Posted by: A | 04/05/2010 at 08:19 AM
Your Eric Carle line cracked me up, as did your mom's quick hair fixes. My mom's big thing was to stare very seriously into my eyes while I spoke about politics and then say "You really need bangs to balance your face. Lithuanians have CHINS. Those movie stars have baby chins. You can't go looking at some movie and thinking you can wear your hair like someone who had her chin removed. Remember how cute you looked in high school with bangs? You were POPULAR. Maybe if you weren't so SERIOUS and had some cute bangs you wouldn't be so critical of the world." And after she died, I went back to bangs as I knew it was my bizarrely unbalanced face that made me find fault with George Bush.
Posted by: Claudia | 04/05/2010 at 09:29 AM
poop, poop, everybody poops! one of my best friends is a beautiful, smart and oh so funny jewish girl. this story reminds me of her. she is never shy to share w/me or, i'm assuming, her other girlfriends or family that she has gas or feels like she has to take a major digger. infact i can remember many a road trip to the coast or seattle where while chit-chatting on the way there she would casually roll down the window (all the way), look at me and say quite proudly "i farted".
Posted by: lisa | 05/11/2010 at 09:29 AM
What a story! Weird but interesting. I guess they're are only few people who experienced it and I don't think the religion is a big deal. So, stop worrying now and just focus on your present and future. Good Luck. Thanks.
Posted by: Angela Gregs - How to Stop Worrying | 05/23/2010 at 11:34 AM