A short musing on life

This morning at the breakfast table, Alexander was making faces and growling at Zoë.

Zoë said, "And this is exactly why eating breakfast with you is not always pleasant, Alexander."

Alexander pouted and said, "Zoë, that hurts my feelings!"

And I thought to myself: This. This is a perfect example of how difficult it is to be kind. 

Who was in the right here and who was in the wrong? 

Alexander wasn't targeting Zoë with the faces he was pulling and the growlings he was making. He was simply being...weird. But the sounds and faces were making Zoë feel uncomfortable (and in all honesty they were rather unpleasant), so she expressed her discomfort in what I thought was a rather eloquent, calm, and patient manner. Still, Alexander felt slighted.

So Zoë felt Alexander was being unkind by being an unpleasant breakfast companion (growling and making faces) while Alexander felt Zoë was being unkind by calling him out for being unpleasant (because his unpleasantness wasn't directed at her; it simply was). 

Now, could she have simply tolerated his behaviour? Certainly. 

Doesn't he deserve to exercise his face muscles, his vocal cords, his personhood?

Oh, but doesn't she also deserve to have a pleasant breakfast experience?

If this anecdote from my breakfast table—a quibble over such inconsequential, unimportant matters—is so complicated, imagine how complicated life is. In a word: very. Life is very complicated and it can be so hard to suss out who is in the right, who is in the wrong, who deserves our trust, who doesn't. It's hard to understand the motives behind everyone's actions, it's hard to know—and impossible to meet—everyone's expectations, especially when fairness and kindness come into play.

99 days

It's strange for me to see all my friends posting back to school pictures when today was our 51st day of school. 

It's even stranger for me to see all my friends posting about being "empty nesters" during the school day, having sent their entire brood off to school. This is not only because we're rather entrenched homeschoolers now, and it's not only because I can't personally imagine sending my kids off to school in the middle of a pandemic, but because we're suddenly "starting over."

Alexander would be eligible for preschool this year (if preschool were a thing I was enthusiastic about (I wasn't ever entirely enthusiastic about it even when we weren't homeschooling)), so my house could have also been empty. Instead it's full of children all day, every day...

...and I'm busy counting down the days until we completely rewind the clock of independence. 

I don't mind having the kids around—I like 'em—but I have to admit it would be nice to have a break from the chaos every once in a while.

Yesterday I took them off to the pool again—which isn't a break from the cyclone of chaos that they are, mind you; it's simply moving the cyclone of chaos to another location—and when we came home they were still, you know, being their wonderful chaotic selves...in spite of having spent enough time in the water and sun to have worn anybody out. 

(As Grandpa keeps reminding me, I should lower my expectations; there's really no magical exchange that takes place at the park or the pool. The kids run around acting wild and then they just...stay that way. There's no such thing as wearing kids out. Not really.)

The internet

I had a Zoom meeting today with a party who shall remain nameless, but with whom I am required to work professionally. It was a rather pointless meeting overall; I feel like I walked away with about the same amount of knowledge as I had going into the meeting. I'm sure we'll work together just fine, even though it felt like we both wanted to drop the Southern phrasal guillotine "Bless your heart!" on each other.

The meeting was short—about twenty minutes long—and about halfway through, the other party asked me, "Do you have access to the internet?"

I hesitated before answering her question because...we were currently using the internet to communicate.

"Yes..." I said. 

"Have you read it?" she asked.

"Have I...read...the internet?" I asked to make sure I had heard her correctly.

Back floats and diving

We finally made it to the pool again today (after suffering through more rainy days than we would have liked) and got some good playing in, along with a decent amount of swimming practice.

Alexander has been a rather reluctant back floater. He's good at it; he just refuses to hold his float for any considerable length of time. He'd much rather be diving under the water (he spends as much time as possible with his face under the water). Today I suggested the kids have a back float contest and...I'm not saying that Alexander is competitive, or anything, but...those words were magic. He floated for forever, just humming happily to himself. 

He ended up getting fourth place (beating Rachel), but in all honesty it was a rather pointless competition since these kids of mine can float for practically forever. Still, it was exciting to see Alexander hold a back float for so long!

Here's a picture of me trying to convince him to work on his back float while he kept stubbornly sinking under the water...

Digital grandparents

We were doing a video call with my mom when my dad entered the room.

"Oh, look! It's Grandpa!" my mom said. 

Now, I can't remember when or why my kids started calling him Bumpa. One of them wasn't able to pronounce Grandpa, I think. And then they all just started calling him Bumpa. I think it stuck because my mom goes by Naanii, so Bumpa seemed like a logical companionship to that name, whereas Andrew's dad, who was also called Bumpa for a time, morphed back into Grandpa when the child who couldn't say Grandpa learned to say Grandpa (because we still called Karen Grandma, so it was always Grandma and Grandpa). 

Long story short: My kids consider my dad to be Bumpa, not Grandpa.

The youngest children are particularly strict about this distinction, so Alexander said, "You know his name is not Grandpa! His name is Bumpa! But I have another grandpa that is on my dad's..."

At this point I melted, thinking that Alexander was going to say "side of the family," a rather complicated concept for such a little guy to make—knowing which relatives belong to which parent. 

But, no.

"...phone!" Alexander finished. 

He has another grandpa on his dad's...phone. 

It was a hilarious way for him to distinguish where he "keeps" his grandparents. Like, Mom has the "Naanii & Bumpa App" on her phone and Dad has the "Grandpa App" on his phone and we can just ring them up whenever we want to, immediately providing an indulging, admiring audience for whom he can perform his every whim. 

Even though I'm sure relatives sometimes feel more theoretical than actual to Alexander's young mind, I'm grateful for the technology that allows us to so easily speak with and see each other. I'm sure he has a much better conception of who his grandparents are than I had at that age (because what I had was a disembodied voice on a telephone line; but only ever for a brief hello because long distance charges).

We're really lucky. 

Blood Sugar

It's interesting to me when people mention they have no memories of being very small because I...have so many. My memory really begins in earnest around age three (though I do have a few earlier hazy memories). One of three-year-old memories is my mom testing her blood sugar levels. Oddly enough, I don't remember her being pregnant, per se (I don't think three-year-olds care about their mothers' girths enough to notice things like that), but I do remember her having to monitor her blood sugar levels. They didn't have handheld glucometers back then, so it was a big boxy thing that sat on the table. 

The poking part, however, is pretty much the same.

And I'm so pleased (haha...) to be giving my children the same early childhood memories. 

Alexander was already fascinated by blood. He talks about blood all the time, about how it runs through his veins, about his white blood cells and red blood cells, and what all the different parts of blood do. 

We were watching an episode of The Mysterious Benedict Society a couple of evenings ago and Mr. Benedict (who was out hiking) made a passing remark about needing to stay hydrated. Alexander started rambling about hydration.

"Why is it important to stay hydrated? Can you only stay hydrated with water? You need to stay hydrated when you exercise. But you don't always have to stay hydrated with water. Vampires stay hydrated with bllllloooood!"

The timekeeper

Remember back when Rachel gave Benjamin her old watch? Well, this is a story that happened not too long after that exchange occurred, when the watch was new and exciting (it's still new and exciting for Benjamin, though he has stopped telling everyone the time every few of minutes).

Somehow the watch switched to 24-hour time, which Benjamin found incredibly frustrating (although it's Andrew's preferred format). He asked for help switching it back to 12-hour time, but Andrew didn't know how to do that off the top of his head and we no longer have the user's manual for this particular watch, so Andrew advised Benjamin to experiment—push all the buttons, see what they do—until Andrew could take some focused time to help him figure it out.

Off Benjamin went to push all the buttons, something that should have been thrilling, right?! Pushing all the buttons! No consequences?!

Well, he was a rather solemn child when he returned to Andrew seeking more assistance. All his button pushing had been for naught.

"I'll look up the manual," Andrew told him and soon they had all the information they needed. "It says to toggle between 12-hour and 24-hour time you simply press the start/stop button. Didn't you try that one?"

"No way!" Benjamin said. 

"Well, here. Let's just..." Andrew reached for Benjamin's wrist.

"NO!" Benjamin yelled, pulling his arm away and shielding the watch from Andrew.

"Wha..." Andrew began.

"I don't want to press that button!" Benjamin said, panicked. "We don't know what it will do to everyone!"

"It will...switch your watch from 24-hour time to 12-hour time."

"]That's all?!" Benjamin gasped. "I thought it would...stop time!"

I have to admit: I'm rather impressed by the restraint Benjamin showed those first few days he was a new watch owner and thought we had literally given him the power to stop and start time at will. I can't imagine what he was thinking—all these people walking around with ultimate power and yet...simply carrying on with the status quo. That button must surely be only for Very Important emergency scenarios. 

The watch has lost some of its magic in Benajmin's eyes. He no longer believes he has power over time. He no longer tells us the time every few minutes. But he still wears his watch every day and checks the time frequently. It's still a good watch...it's just not as powerful as he initially thought it was.

A few scattered thoughts

Somehow both a lot and not a lot have been going on at the same time this week. We had a tropical storm come through, which caused a lot of rainy days for us. Fortunately, nothing that caused too much damage (at least at our house). Alexander was bothered by this storm—named Fred—because it would mean three days of no sunshine, which would mean three days of not going to the pool.

In fact, I don't think we made it to the pool at all this week!

Hot stuff!

Last night Rachel made pancakes for dinner and since I can't exactly eat pancakes right now, she was a sweetheart and mixed up some special pancakes for me using almond flour and monk fruit sweetener. Andrew did his best to make a simple syrup from the monk fruit sweetener. 

But here's the thing: 

Erythritol-based crystallized monk fruit sweeteners don't dissolve like regular sugar. So while he made a syrup of sorts, it wasn't quite like actual syrup. It began recrystallizing the minute it stopped boiling, but I decided to try it on my pancakes anyway. 

Here's another thing about monk fruit sweetener:

Evidently, although they don't dissolve well, they do hold heat well. A little too well. 

I figured that the syrup had been sitting out long enough (long enough to recrystallize!) and thought that after I had drizzle/clumped it onto my pancakes that it would be safe enough to consume. Like regular syrup, right?

Hot sugar holds heat. I know this. Syrup gets hot. Hotter than boiling water can. 

But it also cools off. 

Evidently not so with monk fruit sweetener. 

I took a bite of pancake, with my monk fruit sweetener glob on top, stuck it in my mouth and...immediately regretted it.

That stuff was molten lava! 

The roof of my mouth is miserable. 

I have blisters all from the heat (they've been peeling all day; it's absolutely disgusting). 

I left the syrup alone after that. And when it was time to clean up from dinner, the bowl it was in was too hot to handle without a hot-pad! Still!

So be warned! If you're going to make your own monk fruit syrup, use liquid sweetener, not crystal sweetener. Or just busy some at the store pre-made (I think that's our next move).

Rachel's birthday balloons

Rachel has been fourteen for nearly a month now, so I figured I should take down her birthday balloons and record them (finally). 

Alexander drew her a lovely picture of cupcakes on a roof. Then he asked everybody, "But why? Why are the cupcakes on the roof?!" No one knows.