Dread overhead

Bubby and his mamaMegan called Tuesday night to ask a few questions about Bubby. And his rash. Another in a long line of ailments that have plagued the little guy since around Halloween. Ailments that can be, for the most part, chalked up to the germapalooza Bubby faces with Mom being a teacher and him being enrolled in daycare -- a double whammy of germ-catching probabilities.

First it was -- or so the pediatrician thought -- asthma, which turned out to be just a bad cold. Then Bubby ended up with H1N1. That cleared up a bit ... until the second coming of the flu threw him for a loop. Then the little pink dots of roseola made an appearance (although the doctors apparently call it something a little more fancy nowadays). Then, after months of the yuck, Bubby finally seemed himself again.

Until last night. When little pink dots appeared again all over Bubby's chest.

"I was just settling into thinking things were back to normal," Megan said. "Then I saw the rash and got this feeling in the pit of my stomach. I thought, 'You've got to be kidding me!' Is this what parenting's like, Mom?"

(Bubby's 19 months old and we're just now having this conversation ... ?)

"Uh, yeah, Megan," I told her. "Welcome to parenting. That dread never goes away."

"That's what that sick feeling is? That's dread?"

"Yep, and it never, ever, ever goes away. You'll be living with it for the rest of your life."

She laughed. And so did I ... just so she wouldn't feel stupid when she realized how serious I was. I proceeded to point out to her all the moments of dread I've had just in the past two weeks, all related to one thing or another I've faced as a parent. Dread, dread, dread. And my kids are grown, hurtling faster than I ever imagined they would toward the 30-years-old mark.

She, on the other hand, has a little one, with more surely to come. And as long as you have a child -- which, once you have one, will be the rest of your life, one hopes -- you have dread overhead. It begins with worries about delivering a healthy baby, getting him past the point of SIDS, feeding him correctly, keeping him safe in the world around him. Then he grows, his world expands and a plethora of dreadful possibilities keep Mom awake at night.

Some moms may think -- moms of youngsters, that is -- the age of 18 is some magical year that means Mom will no longer worry, no longer dread. It's not true. At what age might a mom say to herself, "Okay, my kid's old enough now that I don't have to care what happens to him"? Doesn't happen. In fact, I've found the dread increases as one's power and influence (Mom's power and influence) decreases.

So yes, Megan, that sick feeling in the pit of your stomach -- that dread -- will remain with you for the rest of your life.

That's not to say the dread is overwhelming, though. Parenting comes with a host of stronger, happier emotions, too, welcome feelings that also reside in the pit of your stomach, wrap around your heart, stretch from your toes to your hair follicles, and ooze from every pore.

But that dread is always lurking. Maybe it's a fail-safe measure to ensure Mom deeply appreciates and savors the warm fuzzies, knowing the cold pricklies may bear their burrs unannounced at any time.

As soon as I hung up the phone from scaring the bejeezus out of Megan, I realized that THAT -- dread -- is the difference between parenting and grandparenting. It's the lack of dread. Grandmas don't have to worry, to fear ... to dread ... what will become of her grandchildren. That's Mom's job. Grandma's job description demands loving, spoiling, hugging, rocking, adoring the little one. Nary a mention of dread.

Grandmahood, I've learned, is a dread-free zone -- a zone in which I'm oh-so happy to have arrived!

Today's question:

What are you currently dreading?

My answer: I'm dreading going to small claims court because Renewal By Andersen owes me money. But I'm going to; it's my current "feel the fear and do it anyway" moment. (ugh!)

5 things I'll never write about

I read a lot of blogs. I didn't used to, but since becoming a blogger, I'm interested in what other folks are blogging about, where they get their ideas, how they express the little -- and big -- things in life in a way that intrigues readers day after day. My RSS reader feeds me a steady diet of food for thought.

Lately, some of that food has been pretty foreign to me. Not foreign in the sense that I'm reading posts in Chinese or Swahilian (is that the correct word?). Just foreign in the sense that I've read a lot of posts of late on topics that I, myself, cannot imagine writing about.

I admire folks who have the guts to let it all hang out, especially if they can let it all hang out and elicit a chuckle at the same time. I sometimes even enjoy reading the posts of such folks, even if I'm slightly horrified, deeply depressed or uncomfortably embarrassed by and/or for the blogger. But I personally can't write like that. I'm not that kind of a blogger. I'm not that kind of a person.

So just to let you all know -- in case you're looking for something a little dirty or depressing deeper, a little more raunchy revealing in the blogs you frequent -- there are five things you'll never read about here on Grandma's Briefs. Feel free to unsubscribe or remove me from your favorites or vow to never again visit www.grandmasbriefs.com if this admission reveals to you that I'm just not your kind of gal, your kind of blogger. I understand.

Here, all based on posts I've recently read (and often, in all honesty, even chuckled about and read through to the end), are the Five Things I Will Never Write About.

1. Sex with my husband. (Is it anyone's business? I don't think so.)

2. Play-by-play of a pap smear, mammogram or Brazilian wax. (I'm not humorous enough to make such posts good reads for anyone.)

3. Masturbation. ('Nuff said.)

4. Chronic complaints of my chronic disease/disability. (Does whining, complaining, sounding like a hypochondriac begging for pity focusing on it make it any better? Not for me.)

5. Details on the wacky, weird, effed-up family interactions that take place -- on my side of the family tree, on Jim's, or within our immediate nest. (Yeah, sometimes they can be funny, touching, revealing. And sometimes I'll allude to them. But you'll never get details. Sorry. Effed-up or not, they're family, loved ones, folks I don't want to alienate, folks who don't deserve their dirty laundry to be flapping in the wind for all 10 of my readers to see.)

There you have it. I'd love for you to stick around, but if I'm not what you're looking for, I understand your need to move on. And hey, I can even recommend some blogs that offer such posts. They're often quite funny/touching/sad/horrifyingly hilarious ... and continue to show up on my RSS reader.

You just won't find that here. I'm not that kind of blogger.

Today's question:

What's one (non-intrusive, relatively impersonal) thing that most people don't know about you?

The cheese on my pizza

var linkwithin_site_id = 103414; When I first learned I'd be a grandma, I knew my new grandbaby would take possession of huge chunks of my heart. 

I also knew the baby would command my reserves of physical energy -- for hugging and rocking and playing and dancing and ... Well, you get the picture.

What I didn't know was how much of my mind the grandbaby would take over, how much of my thought process would be consumed by the little one. But since Bubby's arrival in the summer of 2008, I think about him all the time.

I never expected this. I was never told by other grandmas about the mind-jacking the little munchkins perform. I never read about it in any books of grandmother tips/advice/lore I consulted.

But Bubby is always on my mind. Always.

When I hear a song on the radio, I imagine bopping around with Bubby. When I cook up some sweets or try out a new recipe, I wonder if Bubby would like it. When I'm at the craft store, I seek out crafty things he might want to do. When I'm out and about, I see things I'd like to point out to him: the deer, fox, squirrels, dogs in the neighborhood; the great big truck (he loves trucks!) that just drove by; the loud airplane overhead; the sweet and squishy Valentines Day stuffed animals in the stores.

I think of him all the time.

I'm not crazy. Honest. I do think of other things. I work, I read, I sing, I write, I engage in a few not-so-grandmotherly activities (I'm talking shots and such here, folks -- get your mind out of the gutter). I do have room in my little peabrain for thoughts other than those of Bubby.

But, like I said, Bubby is always on my mind -- just not always top of mind. He's always right there, sometimes just below the surface of more pressing thoughts, waving and saying "Hey Grandma (or Graya)! I'll just be over here, smiling and dancing and playing my harmonica while I wait for you to come out and play."

(Okay, I admit, I do sound a little crazy.)

I've tried to think of an analogy for the way Bubby has taken up residence in my mind. A way to express how he's sometimes the only thing I'm thinking about; other times he just makes whatever else I'm thinking about more interesting ... or at least more manageable. But I suck at analogies -- and metaphors and similes and all those other "writerly" things that a writer should know -- and the only thing I could come up with is cheesy. Literally.

Here's my analogy: Bubby is the cheese on my pizza. Sometimes he's the only thing, the most important thing, the tastiest thing on my mind and in my life. My cheese pizza.

Other times I have a topping or two -- an idea or two, an experience or two ... say, a ham and pineapple sort of life, enhanced by the cheese. I love the ham, I love the pineapple, but it's made even better by the cheese on top of it.

And during the very best of times, I have a meat-lovers supreme pizza with extra onion and green pepper (hold the mushrooms). Lots of flavor, lots of good things going on. Mmmm. mmmm, mmmm. But most important of all, those supreme pizzas demand extra cheese. The topping that tops all others. The special addition that makes it the best pizza ever. Loads of ooey, gooey cheese.

Now that's what I'm talking about!

Yep, silly analogy or not, Bubby -- who makes everything more palatable, more enjoyable, more knock-me-down-filled-to-the-brim-with-love -- is definitely the cheese on my pizza!

Today's question:

What's YOUR favorite kind of pizza?

Fave photo of the week

"Here, bunny, bunny, bunny."

Today's question:

What movie can you not believe everyone didn't love?

My answer: I love After Hours, a 1985 dark (dark) comedy directed by Martin Scorsese, yet everyone I recommend it to just says "meh...". If you've seen it, let me know what you think -- as well as what movie YOU loved that others, surprisingly, didn't.

The Saturday Post

The other night as I chopped vegies for a salad for dinner, the red onion was surprisingly sweet. Not in terms of taste, but in terms of what I found as I sliced the onion.

See for yourself:

 

Aren't those sweet? After one slice revealed a precious heart in the middle, I sliced ... and sliced ... and sliced. I sliced far more onion than Jim and I would ever eat on one salad, and every single slice had a heart (or two or three) embedded in the center.

I took pictures, of course, and wondered if anyone has created a website dedicated to food that looks like something else.

Sure enough. One quick google and there it is: MOFA: The Museum of Food Anomalies, "An online exhibition of the Art of Regular Food Gone Horribly Wrong."

Some of the MOFA wonders include a "happy-on-the-inside" pepper, a smiling calzone, an "Edvard Munch Honeycomb," the requisite Virgin Mary banana chip, and -- my favorite -- Happy Beer. Check it out.

Soon the museum will also include my sweet little red onion hearts -- perfect for Valentine's Day.

Eat your heart out!