In Which I Am Filled With Complicated Feelings

This year, I sent a holiday card to my old friend P.  Being a courteous person - we haven't really been in touch these last three years - he sent back an email: moved to the Big City, still working as big-business lawyer, dogs, looking for a house, newly engaged to be married, all is lovely and well.

I don't know if the friendship will stay alive, although I'd like it to, because I don't even know what to say.  "I'm still nursing, we renovated the entire house but it's a wreck because we have kids, and I have no idea where I'll be living in a year"?  "What on earth do you do all day?"  (This question could go both ways.)

And yet, we've stayed in touch through living on different continents, doing widely varied things, living totally different lives.  Why is it different now?

Because I'm a housewife, and I feel that my work all day is both desultory and insignificant.  I wander around with the kids, I try to entertain one while the other naps, and I make dinner.  Occasionally there is applesauce. We live like we're broke, so that we can be financially responsible. (Being an adult is no fun.)  Tatoe's deeply inconvenient morning nap prevents me from ever going anywhere. Yes, it will eventually change, but it's been eight months of this now.  Plus, it's winter, so I'm depressed and stuck indoors.  (It is very cold here and Tatoe is still wee.)


It makes me so sad to feel like I've already lost the substance of this friendship.  It makes me even sadder to wonder where the substance of my life went.

(Into the children, no doubt.)

Friendship, Part 5, Or: People I Wish I Liked

Do you ever meet people (in person, that is) and you... want to like them, but something is just not right for a friendship or, indeed, any degree of real intimacy?  Especially in Small Town USA here, I often meet people and think, not that they could be my friends, but that I wish I could want to be friends with them.  (In other words, I wish they were themselves, but without one or more completely objectionable traits.)

The latest crop includes, but is not limited to:

1) A wide array of One True Way people.  Evangelical vegans.  Homeschoolers who believe- and tell you!- that no child could get a decent education at a public school, and besides, it'll damage the little darlings.  Evangelizing Christians.  Evangelizing anyone.  I have examined my life choices, thank you, and while they may not all be optimal, they are mine.

2) People with Deep Personal Stuff that they have made, and are making, no effort to sort out.  Untreated severe eating disorders.  Anxiety.  Depression.  Not people who have sought treatment and it wasn't effective; not people who are working through different options.  People who literally won't leave the house for half a year in case they might catch a cold.

3) People who say one thing and do the exact opposite.  And then are puzzled about the results.  As in, "I am really bored!  I really want to work!" And then not applying for a single job.  What... did you think was going to happen?  Or people who really want their child to sleep through the night but give them milk and cookies at 3 AM every night. That's precisely the opposite of how to get the desired result.

4) People for whom no amount of 'proof' is ever enough.  See also: all the rabid Hillary haters, vaccine deniers, and antiscientific nuts who think turmeric cures arthritis.

5) Everyone who truly believes a woman should never have the right to choose an abortion. (Edit: just people who think NEVER.  Not the life or health of the pregnant person, not an ectopic, not incest or rape, not fatal birth defects.  I have one strongly anti-choice not-close friend but she also believes that access to birth control and social services and food stamps and stopping POC being killed on the streets is part of being against abortion.)

FMB: Friendship (3); Or, Don't Be My Friend, Addendum; Also, Bug Feelings

Let me add to the list:

• Child wears stupid amber necklace to mystically help with teething.
• Person who categorically hates dogs.
• Child is named something ridiculous and totally made-up or ethnically inappropriate; e.g. the child named "Rylanta" I once met.  Or Trygve.  Just.  Don't; this is neither Norway, nor a commercial for intestinal disorders.
• Loathes the South in all its incarnations.

Of course, this is all completely theoretical, since I don't have any friends here, anyways.  

****

On a similar but related note, Bug has been out of his fucking mind since we got to Mountain Town.  Every time we walk in the door to our new place, it takes less than five minutes for the screaming hitting tantrums to start again.  I'm sure it will get better, but I'm seriously considering locking myself in the closet with a bottle of wine.  

And on that note, some good things:

1) There is a winery in this state that sells quite affordable, amusingly-named wine.

2) Perhaps my latest allergic-ish reaction was not to wine, but instead to... I have no idea. 3) At the Walmart Grocery today (open 24 hours! I needed more rice milk, and a garment rack, because the closet rack collapsed) Tatoe was sitting in the cart with scraped-up knees and a bottle of wine, and I had an amusing conversation with two other women about just how many glasses of wine we all felt we needed at the end of the day.  One of them had six children; I suggested an entire bottle.  The other one had two, but said she'd take the whole bottle if offered. 

4) The local botanic-ish gardens feature a large children's play area with its own hose and bucket and collection of water-holding instruments.  (Next time, I need to put swimsuits on, though.)

FMB: Friendship (1)

When I inevitably leave Cold City (just as it was getting good!  academia, you suck!) I am considering making a checklist for potential friends.  (Dr. S suggests that it should have just one item: "Are your children up to date on vaccinations per the CDC's schedule?")  This could weed out all the racist, illogical, unscientific moms!  Or it could end with me sitting sad and alone in my house.  Anyhow!

1) Do you make things?  Anything?  Dinner?  Jam?  Tote bags?  Drawings, writing, glitter glue art?

2) Do you use PubMed?
2a) Do you look things up?  Facts, that is?
2b) Do you use something other than Wikipedia for it?

3) Have you ever freaked out based on a single study reported in the media?
(As distinct from thinking about it and maybe not buying LA rice any more.)

4) Do you drink tap water?

5) Do your children go to public school?

6) Do you have a nanny?
6a) Do you have a job?*

7) Do you regularly see any quack 'medical' practitioners such as naturopaths, homeopaths, and the like?
7a) Do you believe that salt lamps produce negative ions?
7b) Have you ever eaten your own placenta?
7c) Do you think the body needs help, in the form of periodic weird diets, to 'cleanse' 'environmental toxins'? 
7d) True or false: Natural supplements are always good for you.


8a) Do you think vaccines cause autism?
8b) Do you think thimoseral causes autism?

9) Have your children had their shots?

Alternatively, I could put an ad in the local paper: "Housewife with fancy science PhD, Bernina sewing machine, large garden, DeWalt router seeks other bored yet interesting stay-at-home parents to hang out with.  Unvaccinated children need not apply."


Anyone else have probing questions to suggest?  Come on.  You know you want to.

* Some persons with a nanny but no job may still qualify.  :)

FMB: On Friendship (4)

An unfortunate encounter with a new-faculty-spouse-in-town reminded me that  I have a reflexive revulsion for persons too stupid or irresponsible to vaccinate their damn children, and years of listening to idiots have pushed me towards the belief that there is only one right choice!  Delayed is better than not at all but the reasoning is idiotic.  Not only do I not want my children - particularly the baby - around unvaccinated children, but I see the issue as a litmus test for social responsibility, passing acquaintance with the scientific method, and general intelligence.

This person failed.

In Which I Get What I Want (Kind Of)

We are moving this summer, to a lovely little mountain town in Virginia.*  It's very close to P's mother, in fact; she and I have a kind of aunt-like friendship that is in fine form.  It's only two hours from my parents and sister.  It's close to a number of wonderful parks.  We can probably rent a house from Mountain U. for a year.

Once we move there, I'll probably manage to be delighted.  Right now, however, not so much.

First, it's a one-year job, and Dr. S can interview again for their TT job.  Normally this is a sucker bet, but this place has actually hired two one-year-faculty in recent years, and the next college over, Old South U.,  is also hiring for the same thing next year.  Having the teaching experience will help Dr. S when he applies for jobs ALL OVER AGAIN, even if Mountain U. doesn't hire him, which, let's be honest, I wouldn't bet more than a dollar on.***

And then there's moving.  Selling a house.  Cleaning and packing up a house full of small children.  Money (the one-year salary is crap).  Moving again. It's a small town; can I find a job?  (Quick survey says: ha, ha.)

Anyhow, it's what we're doing, so I'd best learn to be happy about it.

* Formerly known for possessing a famous stuffed horse.  I'm told it's since been buried. 
** MU and OSU both ran failed searches.  Mountain U. was looking for an analytical chemist - everyone pause for a hearty laugh here!-  and the results were- I quote - "so depressing we didn't even make anyone an offer."  They have since revised the criteria to reflect REALITY.  Also, two of the faculty in Mountain U.'s department actually called the dean to see if they could keep Dr. S, so I think they're serious about the intent.  The practice remains, as ever, uncertain.
*** I am the most pessimistic of all the world's natural pessimists.  

In-Laws, Relationships, Encore

Thank you all for your kind commentary. I and the in-laws do, in fact, have a lovely detente, or perhaps entente, in which we do, in fact, mostly talk about His Royal Munchkinousness.

Dr. S and I agree in practice about what we should do, but I think that in principle they should behave like the adults they are, and he thinks that we won't, and therefore we should make accomodations because he would like to see them, you know, sometimes. I think that long jumps and short piers.... well, you get the idea.

Dr. S is the one who gets almost all of their critical annoyingness; occasionally my MIL will say something and I usually say "That's nice." As Darcy says, the more irritating they are, the less we listen anyways. Alas, it makes it no less irritating.

C is another problem. We've known each other for fifteen years. I suppose in many ways our relationship has cooled over the years. I don't want to lose out on the friendship, but I'm struggling to learn what its new direction will be. If we could just get together and bake cookies once a week it would be much, much easier.

Enough depressingness!

Coming soon(ish): Why MDs Are Idiots (Like Everyone Else On Earth), Or, Drugs in Pregnancy, Again, Yes It IS My Favorite Soapbox.

FMB: Friendship (2)

I think Dr. S is entirely correct.  I read some random blogger's post today about should she get her 1-year-old vaccinated for the flu before they go on a plane (in case you have been living under a rock, the answer is YES, EIGHTEEN TWENTY CHILDREN HAVE DIED OF IT ALREADY) and I became incoherent with rage.  And I'm never ever reading that blog again! 

Idiots.

(I know that people's reasons for not vaccinating their children are more complex than simply being idiots, but frankly, it boils down to: Idiots. Also anyone who takes that stupid, stupid 'vaccine book' at face value is, equally, a moron.) 

More on Gardening, and Metaphorically on Friendship

It turns out that when you round up half the parents (mostly mothers, but the occasional father) of preschool-aged children in a very small town, you get a very motley group.  I did not previously know any full-time waitresses.  Nor magazine editors from the Southernmost Swamp by way of Movieland, USA.  And now I do!  I choose to find it fantastic and delightful instead of really, really surreal.

A friend gave us some spare plants for our garden, and said they were squash, but they turn out to be zucchini instead.  Here, everyone we know: have the gift of zucchini.  We have nine plants of it.

Right of the trellises: Only part of the zucchini.  The trellises are 4 feet tall. Oh, dear.

Someone I know here, probably one of the people I like best, happened to show me her family's prepper stash the other week, including more weapons and ammo than I have seen outside a large gun store.*   NOT what I was expecting.

We drew up a plan for our garden, but some of the plants died, and then there was an incident with tomato plant buying in which we failed to consult each other (there are about 30 now... maybe 40), and then the corn got eaten by crows and we put in more cucumbers, which was probably ill-advised.  And also two of us are pregnant and so the squash patch ended up a little haphazard, and the bunnies ate a couple of them, plus we didn't label which ones were butternut and which ones were cantaloupe.**  Besides - that patty pan squash totally said it was bush-type on the packet, and yet, it is vining up a trellis as we speak.

The bed that is mine, all mine.  Patty pan squash trellis in front. The obsessive block system is in NO WAY reflective of my personality, y'hear?

The person who owns the garden is not someone I would have thought I had a lot in common with.  She's my opposite in terms of personality - and also a warm, loving, generous person who also likes to garden. Sometimes things that aren't what I planned turn out okay!  Sometimes people's lives intersect at strange places and it's still an interesting relationship.

(Sometimes your despair at someone else's strawberry patch leads you to suggest that on Sunday, you could get together, dig up the whole thing, and replant the crowns the RIGHT way.  I swear, it'll grow better this way.  Fertilize!  And add lime, the soil here is CLAY!)

I am now extremely grateful for my slightly desperate, boredom-inspired chatting up of every random stranger in town. My life here growing, although I hope  less like the zucchini (why is it so big?  why did I plant so many?  what was I thinking? I don't even like zucchini!) and more like the cucumbers (in an orderly and directed, yet still organic, fashion).

This last year has been awful in so many different ways and - unexpected bonus child aside - I'm still holding out hope that it's starting to get better.

* The question perhaps arises, how many gun stores have I been in?  Well, they sell guns at Walmart down here.  Plus, a lot of good hiking/camping gear at gun shops.  And if you want a decent pocketknife - yes, I carry that around; yes, it's legal - your local huntin' an' fishin' store is the best bet. 
** When they set fruit I am sure we will be able to tell the difference, so...

Friendship, Part 6: From the Other Side

When I first moved here three years ago, I was very bored and lonely and also floundering in a sea of doubt, uncertainty, and everyone's-job-related woe.

My job-related-whatever continues, but meanwhile, I do have part of a job.  (It pays well enough to be worth the boredom and uncertainty - at least for now.)

It is the season of Floundering New People arriving.  There is an annual Faculty Picnic, to which we are mandatorily invited.  There are new people all over town.

There were two people at Local Music Thing who introduced themselves and their cruising-about cute smiley baby.  (I asked the dude if he was visiting or permanent - there are 40 visiting faculty and 4 TT faculty hired per year - and he replied "I'm a professor."  I nobly resisted the urge to roll my eyes and say "Me too, honey".  He seems a bit of a tool.  His wife is very nice and asked for my phone number.)

Some of this herd of New People are doubtless lovely,* and I might really enjoy knowing them.  But I am so worn out and exhausted from being ill, I have to juggle the schedules of five people and go be On Stage three times a week** and I have no energy for new people.

I'm torn between a desire to be pleasant and friendly, and a feeling that all docking slots are occupied.  I'm sorry, new people.  I don't have time for more friends right now.  Ring back in six months, please.


* Patchouli-scented white lady with dreads, at the library: probably NOT

**If I weren't doing this, I'd be unhappy and bored about my lack of a job, so a net positive, but still takes energy.

Vaccination and Stupidity and Mommy Friends

Oh, good heavens.  The delay-vaccination-because-of-some-quack-book mom?  I thought her child had finally gotten his MMR.  But he hasn't.

Cue RAGE.

Although we haven't (yet) had measles in our county,  I have to wonder if her stupidity is endangering my baby- who is too young to be vaccinated for MMR.  Because, make no mistake about it, this is nothing but stupidity.  It's not based in fact, or research, or even the most tenuous understanding of epidemiology. It's based on the idea that a quack who wrote a book is apparently more informed than 40 years of data and CDC research.  You know, the CDC, that dangerously inexperienced batch of undereducated epidemiologists.  (Do you know how hard it is to get a job at the CDC?)

I think that the morons  people who think vaccines are dangerous suffer from one or more of several patently wrong misconceptions: