Where Talking Really Leads

I was running errands and Jude was assisting. As we drove, the CD player churned out familar tunes and from the backseat, I could hear Jude singing "I'm bad news. Baby, I'm bad news." Rilo Kiley's Portions for Foxes. I never sat down to analyze the words before letting them stream into Jude's ears. Strange, really, since I am careful about what television I do let him watch.

The words fly through the speakers and into the air in the car, directly into my five-year-old's cerebral cortex. The lyrics: "Talking leads to touching and touching leads to sex. And then there is no mystery left."

Jude asks "What is that?"

And my own cerebral cortex starts into a panic: oh, crap. Not yet. Not the sex talk. I'm not ready.

And then my own voice responding: yes you are. You can handle this. You're a mom. Man up. Woman up. Sex. Sex is what mommies and daddies do when they are in love. Sex is what mommies and daddies do when they are in love.

Okay. I'm ready.

Then Jude asks again. "What is that? What does that mean when there is no mystery left?"

Oh. Okay. No mention of sex. We skipped right over that and delve right into the philosophical aspects of the song. Better still. I can do this.

"Well, Jude. Mystery is when people don't know every single thing about each other. People always want to learn about each other and if you ever managed to learn every single thing about someone, then there would be no mystery left. But I think there is always something to learn."

Jude processed this for a few moments, enough time for me to let my guard down.

In fact, he processed it for the rest of the day and didn't mention it again.

The next morning as we piled into the car for transport to daycare, Jude announced, "I'm mysterious, Mom. You don't know every thing about me."

Oh, okay. I had no idea what he was talking about. Until I remembered our earlier conversation. (Naturally, he remembered. He remembers every thing that ever leaves my lips, whether I want him to or not.)

"Well, I love you and I want to know every thing about you, Jude."

"Well, I'm mysterious. There are things about me no one knows."

And in my heart, I know this is true. It is true of everyone. No matter how much you love and trust someone, it is impossible to convey every thought, every emotion, every nuance of yourself to someone else.

And even though I try very hard not to dwell upon it(about as hard as I try not to begin sentences with conjunctions), I have an image of Jude with secrets he can't tell anyone and it makes me so sad.

Jude's voice pulls me out of the sadness. "Mom, did you know I'm going to be a superhero when I grow up? A superhero and a cop."

Suddenly he is five years old again and I know that I really do want to know everything about him.

I'll Have Seconds, Please

My younger brother, Ryan, used to lament that there are no pictures of him as a baby. This isn't entirely true, though there are considerably less than there are of me. I decided that if I had two children, I would dedicate much time and effort into getting equal numbers of pictures of them. Into treating them equally. Into making everything equal.

I was, of course, out of my mind.

Jeff and I were perfectly happy so out of that happiness we somehow decided, well, okay, let's throw a third person into this mix. So we went out and made a person.

And then there were three, two of whom were delirious from lack of sleep. But between bouts of frustration, we were perfectly happy, delighting in babydom, watching this tiny and amazing person grow and change and evolve and wanting to capture every possible moment with film (okay, in digital mode). With Jude, the constantly moving critter, most picture from his infancy are of him asleep. Asleep was the only time he stopped moving long enough for us to take a picture.

And we were so perfectly happy that we wanted to do it again. So we went out and made another person.

The mistake, of course, was not in having the second child. He is adored and loved, our little Sully. The mistake was our arrogance for thinking that we had already done this, that this time around it would be easier.

Ha.

We were fools.

Having two children is nothing like having one child. Just when you get to learn the nuances of one child, the second child proves to be just different enough to offer a challenge. Sully slept more and moved slightly less, had less of the manic energy that Jude had.

The picture taking at some point dwindled, though did not disappear completely. It isn't a matter of loving one child more than the other. I can honestly say that I love both children immensely, but I love them very differently. How could I not? They are very different little boys.

Very different from one another and very different from every other member of the human race. But their love for us and for each other is unmistakable. Unconditional. I never really understood that before, this feeling of "I'll love you no matter what."

And I can't help but look at Jude and see a tiny me (complete with all my flaws reflecting back at me) and look at Sully and see a tiny Jeff. But they are more than that. They are my family.

Between bouts of unmedicated mental episodes (a kind way of putting the craziness that befalls me sometimes and which I cannot always control), we are happy. But I still need to work on that whole photo thing. Any times the boys stand next to one another, they climb and wrestle and do other boy-ish things that are unsuitable for capturing on camera.

Oh, boys.

I'm headed off to get a picture of my boys, the ones I love equally, though definitely not the same.

No Excuses -- No Good Ones Anyway

I am a lying, lying liar. I don't mean to be. I stare at my gmail account and have assigned myself a "status" that indicates what I am doing RIGHT NOW. Mine says that I am writing. Ninety percent of the time that isn't true. I'm working or playing with the children or just plain watching tv or doing crossword puzzles instead of writing. These aren't bad things, but I can't seem to change my status to something else. I like knowing that every once in a while it will be true and I will be writing.

It has been a hard few months of trial and error. Currently I am sans antidepressants but am on ADD meds, which I thought would automatically make me want to sit and write again. I have to admit that I can concentrate really, really well on watching tv and doing crossword puzzles.

I missed my blog. No one misses talking about herself more than me. I have been mostly incommunicado, steering clear of Facebook and blogging and even much emailing. I've been mostly trying to feel better. I want to be able to tell family and friends that I feel better without being a liar. See, there it is again. Lying. But is it a lie if I pretend I'm doing better mentally than I really am if it comforts those who love me? After all, I'm not unable to get out of bed. I'm functioning, some days even well.

Can one change his or her nature? Are there things that are just hard wired into our brains that simply cannot be changed?

So now that summer is more than half over and I've complained about the sheer heat rising up from the pavement, I will truly make an effort to blog more -- if not for you than for me.

And I am pretty sure that isn't a lie.