rainy day contentment

After dropping Frances off at school this morning, I told Gabriel we had to stop by Sandy's house to return some books. I don't want to, he said. Oh, you can stay in the car, I'm just going to drop them off.

But I don't like the car.

Ah, I thought. So that's how it's going to be. I didn't say anything. Then I heard Gabriel twist in his seat and kick the car door.

I don't like the Prius, I don't like the station wagon, and I don't like taking Didi to school.

Still, I kept silent.

...Mama? Where are we going after that?
The Rec Center.
I don't like it! I don't like the Rec Center!

At this point he broke down in sobs and begged me to take him home. I leaned an elbow into the spot where the car door meets the window and rested my heavy head in my palm, feeling as if an ice cream scoop had scraped my insides empty of will as I listened to his pitiful, twisted up wailing. After a moment, I asked him if he was feeling sad and grouchy today. Between sniffles and sobs, he managed to say yes.

And then a few minutes later, in a desperate act of self-control, I heard a much calmer, almost reasonable voice from the backseat urge, Please let's go home, Mama.
 
I had no idea whether or not complying with his request was the right thing, but lacked the inclination or strength to fight him on it. So I resolved to do some yoga during his nap and turned the car towards our house. The boy immediately felt better. After an enlivening peanut butter sandwich, I suggested we do some cleaning. His enthusiastic dusting would have made Martha Stewart proud, and we mopped the kitchen floor cleaner than it's been in months. Gabriel played with tinker toys while I responded to email. We listened to music and watched the rain outside. The morning was miraculously restful and productive.

Then at 11:15 I noticed the clock and it hit me: we were missing his first 'On the Go' class that I had signed him up for weeks ago. Parachutes, balls, slides! We had both been so excited for the class to start. And it was happening right now, without us. How could I have forgotten? My first impulse was to slip on Gabriel's jacket and herd him to the car so we could catch some of it...but of course he objected. And when I thought about it, I objected too. Why introduce rushed car seat-buckling and other kids' runny noses into our beautiful quiet morning?

My fallback mode is 'on the go.' The three mornings each week I spend with Gabriel are usually passed at the Rec Center, or running errands, or meeting up with friends. It was surprising to realize just how unusual a day like today is. Maybe Gabriel had had enough of being on the go. Maybe I had too. Maybe some part of me conveniently "forgot" our new class because we were both in need of some restorative time at home.

The day only got better. Frances had an early dismissal from school. After she came home, I put Gabriel down for a late nap, which resulted in an all-too-rare stretch of exclusive time with my daughter. Without Gabriel around to match behavior-for-behavior in a mad grab for attention, Frances proved an utterly delightful companion. We read lots of Pippi Longstocking, then I explained I was going to do some yoga. She opted to join me downstairs, reading and drawing while I luxuriated in movement gloriously unencumbered by small children. Forty minutes of ujjayi breathing later, with that delectable sense of increased space between my bones and increased calm in my momentarily wide chest, we headed to the kitchen.

I endeavored to cook with dried fava beans for the first time this afternoon. While Frances and I talked, I slipped off their purplish gray skins, tossing them onto the counter in a pile that resembled a strange tangle of insect husks. (The gray-green industrial prison hue of the pureed favas inspired little confidence, but tasted great, and I think might even please children when hidden between slices of bread or inside tortillas). The persistent rain only served to make the kitchen cozier, and the earthy smell of lentil soup simmering seemed to reach out and gently touch my face each time I lifted the pot lid to stir. I felt present to Frances and everything around me.

And now, despite some reservations, I'm going to share a little about churchy stuff. I fear alienating some of you - but please, just stick with me. This part is kind of interesting. Last Sunday, I attended a Lenten Bible study group at our relatively new church. I was late ('on the go' often translates into late for me) but the circle of people gathered graciously found me an extra chair. The reading was from John, the story of Jesus bringing Lazarus back from the dead. I heard it read aloud twice, and then read it aloud once myself. We talked about what struck us most in the story, and with a few others' help I began to think about it in a new way. I imagined Lazarus, bound in cloth from head to toe, unable to see or to use his hands to feel, responding to Jesus, who called to him from outside his tomb: Lazarus, come out. For the first time, I truly considered the courage and faith required to walk blindly forward like that. Come out. A man named Joe sitting across the table locked eyes with me for a moment. Yes, he said, it's like God is saying it to me too: Joe. Come out.

So often I feel clueless about where I'm going - in parenting, in my work, in the greater community - so I suppose it isn't surprising how that reflection on Lazarus has stayed with me. Meagan. Come out. After a rainy day like today, marked by small gestures and peaceful intimacy, I am feeling a momentary comfort with blindness. Sometimes you have to stay in to come out.

a dormouse and his hazelnut

That's me. Can't you tell? All that black hair is a dead giveaway! Gabriel produced this in Vieques, and I was so inordinately moved that I saved it for display on the art line back home. It was one of his first faces.

Not a week later, Gabriel drew this picture of his big sister. Before the Mama portrait, there had only been endless rounds of abstract wheeled vehicles. Now he's onto arms, hands, smiles, legs. Not just a face, but a body to go with it! Big changes are afoot, I tell you. (Which doubtless are related to his lack of emotional equilibrium of late; in our experience grumpiness usually heralds a leap...unfortunately we always forget this mid-grump, before the walking, jumping, or reading commences).

These days it's all about books, stories, drawing, and elaborate imaginative play. Gabriel begs to go to the library so that we can find books featuring images that echo and give form to whatever is filling his mind at the moment. Our favorite right now is How Animals Work. It features endless pages of gorgeous nature photography and startling images including an airborne flying squirrel, vultures gathered around bloody prey, and a "very sad" hammerhead shark. I do believe the winner though - out of all the breathtaking and noble creatures documented - is hands-down a hibernating dormouse, curled up in its snug nest next to a single hazelnut. You never know when you will wake up in need of a midwinter snack. The hazelnut is about half its size. Frances and Gabriel will gaze contentedly for long silent minutes at the slumbering dormouse. 

We love the dormouse. Really, who doesn't identify at some level with this tiny fragile creature and his hoarded treasure? 

And when Gabriel loves something, or even finds it mildly intriguing, it is instantly incorporated into his imaginative games and narratives. Spend an hour with this kid and you will understand the power of play therapy and other such techniques for communicating with children about what is most important to them. 

Before Frances was writing her own stories, I used to transcribe them for her. I posted at least one that I remember (scroll down to the bottom to read about Dister Lister), but I had never tried with Gabriel. But just before dinner tonight, inspired by his outlandish storytelling, developmental grands jetés in representational art, and often surprising emotional intelligence, I sat down with my growing boy and the laptop. Here, dear readers, is a story about a dormouse.

G: Once upon a time there was a dormouse. And he was afraid.

M: What was he afraid of?

G: He was afraid of his friends.

M: Why?

G: Because, he was afraid. And he crawled right through his burrow.

M: Were the friends scary?

G: Yeah. They were pretending to be a lion so he crawled right into his burrow and they didn’t come, they stayed for just a minute. Then more friends came, and they didn’t act like lions. They were nice. And then the other friends - the baby naked mole rat* and the baby mole rat’s friends - they came. And the dormouse’s friends stopped being and acting like a lion.

M: What did they do instead?

G: They had lunch. Peanut butter.

M: And jelly?

G: Yes! ...Can I have some peanut butter and jelly right now for dinner?

Fin.

*perhaps the world's ugliest animal...but when Mike observed this as we were looking at photos in the animal book tonight, Gabriel became very protective and explained with great feeling that "he's NOT ugly, Papa. He's NAKED."

oedipal schmedipal

I can get so irritated and restless when I find myself dealing with the kind of boring, predictable problems that other people have and talk about in the next cubicle or in line at the grocery store. A leaky roof, unexpected car trouble, sinus infections. I'm not sure why. Do I think I'm above it, too special for the tragedies - both miniature and large-scale - that afflict us all? Or maybe I think that eating organic beets and giving to local charities should act as a magical shield, deflecting all the bad stuff the world inevitably throws our way?

I'm gradually getting better about this. I've lived on this good earth for thirty-three years, and with every passing day I accumulate more intimate experience with clogged toilets and back pain. The first incident that knocked me off my special stool was my dad's cancer diagnosis. I remember thinking then that this was the sort of ill fortune other people suffered - not us. Fifteen years later, the reality of death and taxes and all the rest of it has continued to slowly seep into my thick skull. I'm not exempt. I am other people.

And we other people-types have kids who pass through an Oedipal stage of development. Mama's boys and daddy's girls. What off-putting, icky expressions! But the alignments are undeniable in our house right now. Gabriel's intense preference for me and increasing separation anxiety only serves to reinforce them - though Frances is gaga for her papa, with or without Gabriel's help. I came down the stairs this morning to find her comfortably curled into the orange chair in the kitchen, chatting with Mike while he made coffee. I said good morning to them both, and in response Frances said, Mama, I'm SO hungry, will you make me my oatmeal right now? I asked why she hadn't asked Mike to make it for her, and she told me that they had been having such an interesting talk, she didn't want to. She'd rather I do it.

I see.

The morning before, I woke up and found her awake in her room. We snuggled into her bed together. Nice, right? She stared at the ceiling a moment, then asked me why was it that on her fourth birthday, which had fallen on a different day from her birthday party, I hadn't sung Happy Birthday to her? Why did I only sing it at the party? And also, why had I packed green grapes in her lunch yesterday, when I know she only likes red grapes because she's told me a million times she ONLY likes red grapes. Don't I ever listen?

And on and on. Sass when I ask her to help out, complaints when she discovers what's for dinner, and rage over the time Gabriel and I spend together while she is at school. But do you see what I mean? This is boring! Mother-daughter tension is an age-old problem that other people have. How in the world have I fallen into this? I didn't write this script. I do not want this part. And yet, I take the bait, and snip snap right back at her.

I have been so discouraged by the state of our relationship, and the seeming immovability of our childrens' parental preferences, that I tried something different today. When Frances came home from school complaining relentlessly, I told her she could not begin a sentence with I don't like, I don't want to, But I can't, or I hate. If she did, she'd have to go to her room for five minutes.

I sent Frances to her room six times in a row, and was met with screaming protests and rivers of tears each time. But after the sixth time, she came downstairs very quietly. She told me she was ready to behave better now, and that she would like some private time to herself.

Per her instructions, we set up her play tent in the living room. She scurried inside with some drawing materials and then placed a couch cushion in front to serve as a door. After about ten minutes, she created the "privisy" sign and mail slot below, explaining to me and Gabriel that she did not want to speak to anyone just now, but we could leave her messages in the mail slot if we wanted.

Her manners were impeccable throughout all this. A little while after she had established the new communication system, she emerged from the tent and wandered into the kitchen, where I was noisily blending sesame peanut sauce for dinner. When she appeared, I stopped. Frances was uncharacteristically quiet, transformed from an exasperated adolescent-in-training to a heart-breakingly small and vulnerable five year old girl.

Mama, she said, I feel lonely for you guys. Would you send me some mail?

It was one of those knee-buckling moments, when tenderness sweeps through you with such force that it is hard to stand. I nodded yes, and she turned and headed back into her tent without a word. 

So yeah, we're having some Oedipal troubles around here. But today, I knew in my heart that Frances and I were on the same team. Our detente served as a happy reminder: it's called the Oedipal Stage. This too shall pass.

Before I go, a brief report on some other growing things in our kitchen that are beautifully and blessedly uncomplicated: the seedlings. The array of little green and purple plants that are growing with visible exuberance beneath the shop lights Mike has hung from PVC pipes are a source of inspiration - a delicate promise of flowers and fruit to come.

And can you see it? Gabriel and I planted these together on Monday afternoon, and already, a zinnia seedling is shouldering its way into the light!

iguana afternoons

In the eighties, my sister and I traveled in style. Claiming either the back or the way back of our family's minivan - a baby blue Dodge Caravan with wood paneling - we'd beg our mother to play a Debbie Gibson tape bought with precious allowance money at the mall instead of the oldies station while the world slid by on our way to a piano lesson or a girl scout meeting. In those days we lived in pastel-hued South Florida, where little lizards and enormous cockroaches populated our everyday landscape and an enduring hibiscus bloomed by the back door.

Our tenure in Fort Lauderdale, which happened to overlap with a sizable chunk of my childhood, seems strange to me now. I'm a nail biter, I get sea sick, I'm positively pale. Me, a Floridian? By 1990 we'd moved north, where I've remained every since, and my connections to that singular state and formative chapter in my life have only been revived in recent years thanks to Facebook.

But last week I found myself once again with my sister in a cavernous minivan, riding past palm trees and brilliant bouganvilla, and a tether that normally hangs slack was pulled taut. A continuity emerged. Yes, I remember sitting on sandy towels on the way back from the beach in the minivan, tasting salt in the stray ropes of hair that swing down and plaster themselves to my face, in all the heat and heaviness of the afternoon.

I had forgotten. But these sensory memories during our trip quietly linked the person I am now to the person I was then, and the family I am growing now to the family I was growing up in. Truth be told, besides the flora, Vieques, a small island off the coast of Puerto Rico, is not much like Fort Lauderdale. It is a lot less developed - wild even - which might explain its extraordinary, abundant fauna. Not so many iguanas were joining us to bask poolside when I was a kid. Nor were there roosters roaming free, herding chickens and crowing lustily at all hours,nor wild horses sauntering down narrow streets,

 nor silvery angel fish grazing our legs, gleaming in the sun that filtered down through clear blue water to illuminate the sandy bottom.

Maybe it was just the fact of being together, of navigating our days and cleaning up our meals, sharing the frustrations and surprises and little jokes. My dad's absence was felt, as it always is when I am with my mother and sister; this time it was persistent, yet gentle. It's not so often in our adult lives that my sister and I get to settle into more than two or three days together. It's nice to be reminded of who you are.

And it's damn nice to do it in the Caribbean.

 

And what of the children? From this distance, they look lovely, don't they? We had our moments. All kinds of moments, just like we do in regular life, but really, who could throw a tantrum when the sunset over the ocean is so glorious? A toddler, that's who. Gabriel, unsure of what the heck was going on in this so-called "vacation house" that had no toys in it whatsoever and ran by no discernible schedule he was familiar with, fell into tantrums if ever I left his sight or if someone else threatened to usurp our very special relationship by doing awful things like offering to wipe his nose or get him a glass of water.

NO!!!! MAMA DO IT!!!!

Mama did it, mostly, but then one night we escaped to a bioluminescent bay. My mother, sister, and brother-in-law went the night before, then very kindly offered to babysit for us so we too could kayak in the evening to a special spot filled with strange teeny tiny creatures that illuminate when the water is agitated. To be alone with Mike at night, to spin and kick and punch the magic water to great greenish glowing effects, to see the moon high overhead and delight in our surroundings...it was a gift. 

There were many gifts! A shopping trip followed by tropical drinks at a charming bar with my mother and sister, my brother-in-law's astounding facility with our rental minivan which was quite literally falling apart (at one point a sliding door fell off - this never happened to our Dodge Caravan), a week-long hiatus from hair washing, the sight of my naked kids moving gracefully in their beautiful brown bodies, reading a novel in three days!, and taking long, luxurious swims in the Caribbean.

Friday morning, gathering items for the beach, I noticed a new tranquility in our group. We were a content pile of overlapping soft brown limbs driving to the beach. The children had finally settled in, acquired a new peacefulness, and we endured nary a tantrum the entire day. I felt so good in my skin, and they did too. That day we saw fish, a stingray, and a starfish, we built a sand castle, found delicate sea fans on the shore, and had the best lemonade ever. 

We made rum drinks and dinner, watched the sunset, and ate ice cream. I felt just right. In the morning, packing up the last bits before our flight, I put off getting dressed as long as I could. The very thought of corduroy pants made me want to cry. To willingly return to gray March days, just when we'd found our groove here?

After a very long and blessedly hitchless travel day, during which Gabriel's mounting enthusiastic anticipation of his reunion with all his trucks and books spread like a happy contagion, I walked into my kitchen. It was about 6:30 and the evening light shone gently through the windows. The warm pink walls gathered around me, the soft brown floor came up to meet me, and I fell into a physical sensation not unlike a sweeping embrace that took me unawares, though my arms were laden and my mind hurtling towards dinner: we were home. I thought of Madeline's return from her dalliance with the circus gypsies:

The best part of a voyage--by plane,

By ship,

Or train--

Is when the trip is over and you are

Home again.

Indeed. Now it is spring, and yesterday I planted peas. In corduroys and a sweater. And I felt just right.

preparing for a brief, sun-drenched hiatus from blogging

Dear friends,

There is a lot on my mind. Sleep eludes me of late. I am mid-way through Meghan O'Rourke's New Yorker article on her mother's death, and I have been wanting to tell you about the resonances with my own father's death. It happens to be a sensitive season for me, this painfully slow lead up to spring. When March 22nd rolls around, as it does every year, my mind will involuntarily slide past all the nearly fifteen-year-old moments of our last days together. His delicate gray-white pallor, the way I asked for a hug in Spanish when I said goodnight, the loose soft skin of his hands. The intensity of grief lessens over time and becomes easier to bear. But the absurdity of someone you love disappearing - someone who was so fully present, in every way - never seems to abate.

But I can't really get into it, because another absurdity is fast approaching this family, and well before March 22nd. This one is the good kind of ridiculous. A tropical vacation kind of ridiculous! This Saturday my mother is whisking all of us, and my beautifully pregnant sister, and her husband, off to the isle of Vieques. We are going to laze around in the sunshine (as far as lazing around with two little ones is possible) for an entire week to celebrate her 60th birthday. Can it really be?

Before that happens I will finish an article on perinatal depression (for this magazine, on whose homepage you can see a sweet photo of F &G for an article I wrote), take Gabriel to the doctor for the second time this week (ear infection today), figure out what to pack, go to work in Baltimore, go to a Ladysmith Black Mambazo concert tonight with an extraordinary pal, spend time with a family full of dear friends visiting from Lancaster (Jill: this is not additional stress! I can't wait to see you), find my flip flops, and write this blog post while I make dinner. Sauteeing vegetables need so little attention, really. It totally works.

I just couldn't leave you all with Gabriel at his most infuriating and this muddled mama wringing her hands. Of course I rarely tell you about improvements in the problems I report on here. Right now Gabriel is pretending to be a chick hatching out of his egg, asking periodically to be toweled off because he is all wet and his feathers are sticking together. He's doped up on Children's Tylenol and the ear infection is a distant memory. He's happy! The tantrums persist, but not with the ferocity of a few days ago. In short, I see the light.

If you have any beach reading recommendations, advice for air travel with children, tales from Puerto Rican travels past, or items to add to my to-do list that I have forgotten thus far, please share! I'll miss connecting with you all here, and promise to give a non-gloating report with minimal tropical paradise-type photos when I return.

Gotta go, dinner's ready.

xo
Meagan

love and hate on a thursday afternoon

Last week I received emails from two people asking me to apply for two different social work jobs. Both of them were appealing; one was very full-time, and in Baltimore. I gave this some thought, and came up with a few reassuring conclusions: there are indeed jobs out there I could be passionate about and engaged in, at last I am establishing some connections around here, and finally, I'm not ready to leave my family for fifty or sixty hours a week. Not even close, I explained to my mom. And miss all this? It might be right someday, but that day isn't coming very soon.

It was good to know those things last week. But today I hit a wall. If you read my last post, you might have already seen the looming shadow of this particular wall of dirty, gritty, solid bricks. I slammed into it this afternoon after a day of tantrums. I thought to myself: full time? Yes. I'll take it. Right now, please. Sixty hours a week spent with rational adults who only ask once, who get into and out of cars without assistance or coaxing, who zip their own coats, who have learned to refrain from bursting into tears if it's time to go and they don't want to, who say please and thank you without prompts, and who don't pee in their pants? Not much, anyway? In a flash I saw myself re-oriented to working, complete with urgency, deadlines, full-time child care, and a robust sense of independent adult identity. As I hung limply over the car door in the school parking lot, watching Gabriel put on his screw-you-world toddler show (in this act, refusing to get in his seat) and Frances yelping over a stuck coat zipper and tangled backpack strap, that alternate universe looked pretty darn good.

We grumpy three came home. The children hurled demands in my direction. I gritted my teeth, reminded them of their manners, and stewed. As I made dinner, they began some elaborate pretend game with tinker toys near my feet in the kitchen that erupted into low level conflict every few minutes. My inner simmer began to bubble more violently. What was I doing hanging out with these irritating small people, anyway? Then Frances began to tap my arm insistently, and said: pause button.

That's most often used in our house to indicate a break in the pretend game, as in, "pause button. We're not alligators right now, we're just Frances and Gabriel. Mama, what do alligators really eat?" before getting an answer, then jumping back in the game with both feet. Or all four, as the case may be.

I stopped chopping garlic and turned toward the source of the tapping, which was a small person who weighs in at forty-two pounds and has almost embarrassingly wide, ardent eyes when in the heat of pretending. She repeated: Pause button, Mama. Mama, we're doing a talent show and there are 7,000 people in the audience!! Isn't that a lot? 7,000 people are watching us right now!

Then she burst back onto the talent show stage, and I began to listen to her play the MC, the performers, the encouraging director/partner to Gabriel (or whatever his stage name was), who was utterly oblivious to the 7,000 people before him and yet pretty happy to go along for the ride. Get this. I felt a new wave of irritation towards these children of mine - because it is impossible to stay mad at them.

I had been getting attached to being pissed off, because it kept the normally open, breezy doorway between us tightly shut. It allowed me to embrace the idea of leaving those irrational, adorable, crazy-making kids and finding some professional certainty and path to follow. Full disclosure here: I received my first official rejection a couple of days ago, for an article I submitted to a magazine I like very much. I've been tentatively trying on this writer identity of late. Sometimes it feels great. Sometimes it's more like selecting a pair of jeans that look just right on the rack, only to discover in the cruel fluorescent dressing room light that they cannot under any circumstances be coaxed past my hips. Forget about zipping them up.

So my funk isn't entirely due to annoying kid behaviors (though the tantrums haven't helped). I still work two days a week, with a very lovely group of dedicated people. I am grateful for the learning I have been able to do, not to mention the flexibility of the job. But the fact of it does not settle my stirred-up feeling that ebbs and flows but never quite goes away: what shall I do? Who shall I be?

The only known part of the equation is my family. I can't fool myself. I am called to spend a lot more than breakfast and bath time with my babies. Love and hate are part of all intimate relationships, right? Taking care of small children is a particularly intense experience of intimacy; I must cycle through love and hate countless times a day. This morning my heart melted into a puddle watching Gabriel play. This afternoon I could have killed him.

In my old job, I did my best to walk with the poor. I shared their feelings with them; I tolerated their painful inner lives so that they might learn to do the same. It's not so different now. I walk with the small. Sponge that I am, I share their feelings with them. On a good day, I can tolerate and contain all those extremes of emotion, and hopefully that will help them learn that it is safe to feel it all, to let the world in. They won't break. On a bad day, I need a little help remembering that despite uncertainty, frustration, loneliness, and shaky confidence, neither will I.

a chapter on tantrums, in which our sensitive boy loses his grip

Mama, watch this.

Gabriel jumped off his bike, walked up to a sturdy oak tree in a neighbor's front yard, and banged his head against it. Stepped back, considered, then banged it again. After the third collision, I asked, How does that feel?

Good, he replied definitively, before the fourth and final slam into the tree. At least he was wearing a helmet. Mike went through a presumably helmet-less head-banging stage as a toddler. I'm sure I dabbled, going by my mother's reports. Being a big kid isn't easy.

And he is a big boy, isn't he? Just one month shy of his third birthday, Gabriel is taller, leaner, diaper-less, comfortable on a bike, smitten with superheroes, and more gaga than ever for dump trucks and all their vehicular relations, from forklifts to log loaders. Which is a good thing, because we will need one of those powerful front end loaders to clean up the emotional wreckage Gabriel is leaving in his wake these days.

What happened to our user-of-words, our sensitive child, our resident master of the I statement? We've seen minor tantrums, but in the past, after a few minutes I would catch his eyes and he'd run into my lap and tell me he feels sad or angry and the episode would end with some peaceful snuggling. I knew this golden time couldn't last. But I didn't know just how disorienting and upsetting it would be for the rest of us to witness Gabriel in the grip of toddler irrationality and high emotions lodged just beneath the surface, always ready to erupt. Every request made of him is a potential tantrum-trigger. Oh, time to put on shoes you say? There's my cue!

Yesterday, he hit Frances. I gave him a time out. He sobbed and screamed and shouted NO! over and over in his room - an unprecedented display that unsettled his mother and sister. After two minutes I walked in. He took one look at me and said: You leave! I want to be alone!! So I left, and he kept on screaming NO. A few minutes later, he quieted down, and I walked back in and sat down in the rocking chair. He looked at me, nose and ears streaming, his face red and wet, his expression utterly bewildered and exhausted. My heart broke for him.

I'm sorry you are feeling so sad, I said. He clenched his fists, became redder still, and yelled: DON'T SAY THOSE WORDS TO ME!

We rarely feel angered or frustrated by this piteous behavior. He seems to be in the grip of a mind-scrambling, emotion-disordering outside force. A relentless, merciless demon is after our angel Gabriel, and it sucks. The tantrums began soon after potty-training; there must be some connection there. Along with life in underwear came a new body awareness for Gabriel, who is alternately delighted, confused, and concerned by his penis.

Today I am emerging from two days of awful sickness, during which I was pretty unavailable to the kids. This morning I was finally able to do things with them again, and after a round of irrational tantrums, Gabriel and I were able to go to the library and read piles of stories, do a little bike riding, then return home with some fresh inspiration: making a spring tree.

We had been so reluctant to dismantle the valentine tree that I saved the stick. So I brought it out, and showed Gabriel how to make tissue paper flowers. He wanted there to be butterflies, so I cut them from paper and used pipe cleaners for antennae. I was pulling out paints to decorate the wings when Gabriel began flying one of them around the room, fluttering his wings against my cheek and landing him gently on my hand.

Be quiet and gentle with him, warned Gabriel. And then: you be the other butterfly. So we fluttered around a little, until Gabriel's butterfly sidled up to mine and said, I have a pretty big penis. What's your penis like, little butterfly?

Oh! Good gracious. I said I didn't have a penis, because I was a girl butterfly. Gabriel said, Well what's your softy called then?

My softy? I won't transcribe the entire conversation, but suffice it to say, it was kind of mind-blowing. We've explained body parts and the differences between girls and boys in the past, but only now does he seem ready to take it all in. Here are our butterflies, grappling with the strange big world together. The tree will be a nice reminder for me: be quiet and gentle with him. I know he will fly through this storm somehow, despite the strong March winds buffeting him this way and that.