kdiddy.org

See that guy up there on the left? Recognize him at all? That’s my son, the guy I’ve often referred to as “the baby” on these here internets. That’s “the baby” at his 13th birthday party on Saturday. Yes. Thirteen. THIRTEEN! For reference, when I first started blogging on LiveJournal back in 2002, he and I looked like this:

He had his party at the Pittsburgh Athletic Association in Oakland. He and his friends had fun but the whole experience was a little weird. The PAA is this very old school institution, established back at the beginning of the 20th century when Pittsburgh was lousy with titans of industry. My grandparents have been members for many years and I spent many special occasions there. It was always very exciting, since most of the time if we were going there, we had to be dressed up. I remember being enamored with the grand lobby and its huge fireplace. Above that fireplace was a huge painting of a Roman bath scene. I can imagine how slick I must have looked trying to sneak peeks of the naked guys. I was also impressed with the ladies room because it had a separate lounge area with some couches and vanity. “Wow! You can pee and then hang out for awhile! So fancy!” Also, I met Mister Rogers there one time when I was maybe four years old and it remains one of my most vivid memories. The building deserves its landmark status for that reason alone, in my opinion. If the club was at all run down back then, I never noticed it.

Since then, membership has declined and the facilities are looking really shabby in places. There are plans for the club to enter into a partnership with a new hotel coming to Oakland across the street, which will help them with repairs and a new revenue stream. One really sad effect of this agreement is that the bowling alley, which is a perfect mid-century time capsule will be demolished to make room for a parking garage.

While the kids were bowling, I remembered that he had his sixth birthday party there back in 2007, when he looked like this:

Because I always like to draw parallels and blah blah blah symbolism, I thought about how I would have (and did) meticulously documented his 2007 birthday, but haven’t been doing much meticulous documentation the last few years. Part of that is because his life is increasingly becoming his own and I want to respect that. But the bigger part is that I’ve let this part of myself (and several other parts) go and it bums me out. I feel comfortable telling you that he’s as challenging and wonderful as ever. He does some things that I’m really proud of and others that I’m not so proud of. But he’s a thoughtful individual and still very much my buddy. I’m pretty pleased with us so far.

I think it’s safe to say that summer 2014 is finally coming to a close. My kid has been in 7th grade for a few weeks and today the weather had that familiar cool crispness to it. I was initially a little sad to see summer go. We had a hectic-at-times summer but a good one. (Highlights are behind the “Read more” via photo essay.)

I’ve been busy with work/tired from being busy with work. I’ve never been comfortable posting too much about my job (any job) but I’m involved in some Big Things. This is simultaneously enthralling (“I’ve always wanted to be involved in Big Things!”) and terrifying. After particularly stressful days, I find myself thinking/saying things like, “I just want to go be a sister wife somewhere and take care of babies and make jam.” I feel terrible about this. For one, it’s not like that line of work is easier. (Plus, I would manage to turn it into The Most High Stakes Sister-Wifeing Ever We’re All Gonna Die Fail Which Is Worse I Don’t Know.) Also, I’ve never even made jam so I have no idea if this would even be a viable option.

The husband has been busy with music. His group, Pittsburgh Track Authority, has been doing really well, along with other related projects that he’s involved with/heading up. They’ve been getting a lot of press coverage, locally and nationally, and they’ve been DJing all over the place. It’s all very exciting.

The kid has been busy hanging out with friends, hanging out with grandparents, etc. I was upset the last week or so of summer vacation because I felt like I had barely seen him and it’s not like he’s going to be looking to spend less time with friends and more time with me as he gets older. I’ve been pushing our Great Race training because it’s 40 or so minutes that are just for us. It’s just unfortunate that we spend them huffing and puffing and figuring out how to avoid running up this one horrible hill by our house.

This was all kind of exacerbated when we went to see Boyhood a few weeks ago, which I loved. Richard Linklater gets a pass from me on certain aspects of movies that would otherwise bother me. I don’t know. He does the meandering-thoughts-and-experiences-of-not-extraordinary-people thing so well. It was very striking to watch a story unfold over time with the same people, especially, of course, the boy at the center of it.

My kid is still very much a kid, but he’s really looking forward to growing up and experiencing all of the failures and successes of becoming an adult. I get that and I don’t immediately tell him to just enjoy being a kid, “because being an adult is so much harder.” I don’t really believe that. Being a kid is easier only in mechanical ways that mostly have to do with money and being a candidate for blame. He seems to really be looking forward to the experiences that he’ll have, though I’ve cautioned him not to set his expectations too high. Parties and whatnot are never as epic as they are in the movies. “You’ll have fun, I promise,” I tell him. “But nobody has the time or energy for a drunken odyssey.”

(more…)

Facebook has a handy little year in review for users. Looking through mine and one that you can generate for InstaGram, I found them a little dissatisfying. They didn’t really seem to capture all that was good and bad and huge about 2013. The big things were included, like my new job, but as I’ve pulled away from the internet more and more, I have less of a record of what has happened. I’m not particularly happy about this. It’s not necessary to document everything. There are, after all, only so many memories that you can truly cherish. But I’ve always liked being able to look back on an ultimately inconsequential moment.

There are also constant hums that I’ve become more aware of this year that are impossible to condense and articulate into a tweet or a stats update or even a blog post. My anxiety about basically everything has been pretty tough to contend with. I have really complicated feelings about key people in my life and I can’t tell if they’re valid or not. My kid is undeniably growing up now and I feel hyper-aware of the time that he still spends in childhood. Any time he cuddles with me or drops the front of tough adolescent that he tries on here and there, I breathe a sigh of relief that I haven’t missed it all yet.

Anyway, neither the Facebook or InstaGram reviews contained any moments from July, and I realized that that month contained one of my favorite nights of this year, one that I think/hope that I’ll always remember. Just in case, I don’t, though…

On July 11th, there was a brief but significant thunderstorm in the very early evening. The power went out and we went through the normal stages of reaction: sitting very still for a minute, sighing when it becomes clear that it wasn’t a momentary outage, pacing carefully.

Since it was still light out, the three of us sat on the porch and admired the pretty, midsummer sunset.

We could hear our neighbors shouting their theories about the power outage at each other. So-and-so a few blocks away still has power. Did a transformer blow? What did Duquesne Light say? Have you seen one of their trucks go by? How much stuff do you have in the freezer?

I wanted a popsicle and got some to cool us all down.

It started to get really dark and we needed some source of light. I gathered an odd assortment of scented candles and clustered them on the porch. They were mostly Christmas-related scents. It was odd to smell cedar and sugar cookies mixed with summer stickiness and rain.

After a few hours, we were getting hungry and frustrated. An alert chimed on my phone letting me know that the Pirates game had finally started after being delayed for the power outage. “We could go to the Pirate game,” I suggested half-jokingly. But the husband pointed out that at least there would be power and we could get something to eat.

“Let’s do it.”

We rushed over to the park and purchased bleacher seats. The crowd was pretty sparse since it was a weeknight and the game was just starting at 11 p.m.

I held our seats as the husband and the kid went to the bathroom. A girl coming up the aisle in a sequined skull shirt caught my eye. I quickly noticed that her date was Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.

The game turned out to be great. The Pirates added one more win to what would ultimately be their best season in 20 years. And the three of us did something spontaneous. We went on a tiny adventure and escaped life for awhile.

I don’t know where to begin. How about, “Hi?” Hi!

When last we spoke, we were stuck in the depths of winter. And now it’s June, my favorite month, and everything is different. I had started to feel weird about this space. There seemed to be only a few of you still checking in and while I wish I could be nonchalant about audience, I can’t. “Know your audience” has been drilled into my brain by every writing instructor I’ve ever had. Not knowing who was still around made me feel odd. Then one day the “visual” editor in WordPress was no longer working and life got really nuts and I thought, “That’s that. Taking a break. Not thinking about it until I think about it.”

I haven’t really missed it here, partially because I really needed a break from being the writer I had become, and partially because I needed to focus on other things. A few weeks ago, a writer who I respect and admire complimented what I had put here, and it got something stirring. It wasn’t ready yet, and I’m not sure that this is really my jump back into this space, but this awkward re-entry seems necessary.

So much has happened, and all of it required my full brain. It seemed like there was no room for immediate reflection, so I didn’t even try. The biggest thing is that I got a big, new job that is really perfect for me. I was really scared, though, to go from the job that I’d had for over 9 years to something completely new. But with each day I realize what a positive thing it is and it’s disarming to see how good things are, to see some really hard work and a lot of difficult years pay off.

My husband and my kid are amazing. I’ve been letting this particularly good patch just ride, maybe snapping the occasional picture or posting the occasional tweet. I’ve always liked being able to read back through time, and it seems like documenting good stuff would be helpful, especially when rough times inevitably return. But I don’t think I’ll regret just living without simultaneously writing a rough draft of a recap in my head.

All of this meandering is to say that if you’re still here, cool. If not, cool. I’ll be tinkering more and more and I hope to hear from you now and then.

Here are some fajitas smothered in cheese that we got in Detroit:

I always look forward to the break that we get from school and work at the end of the year. Nothing all year tops the nearly two weeks that I get to spend mostly at home and with my family. This year, I literally can’t wait. These last few days of the regular routine are excruciating, because I can’t wait to be away from the world for awhile. I need so badly to be in my house with my husband and my son, to see them, to touch them, to reassure myself that, yes, they are here. Yes, they are real.

This is all exacerbated and made more raw by the shooting last week. I still don’t feel as if I’ve come back to a normal thought process since it happened. I still cry a few times a day, quietly and quickly, trying to make sure no one notices. This tragedy has affected all of us, of course, but it’s not mine. I don’t have to live the rest of my life with it as part of my story. Jonna did an excellent job articulating a lot of this.

I also get frustrated with the small actions that we’re encouraged to take: hug your kids tighter, tell them you love them, never take one moment for granted. Yes, of course I will but what about tomorrow? My hugs aren’t bulletproof and my love won’t make this go away. Please fucking tell me that we’re not going to try to just kiss this hurt away because it’s not fucking enough.

* * *

Yesterday, during some polite chatter over lunch, a few people asked me if the kid still believed in Santa Claus. I replied honestly: “He’s on the fence.” I never formally renounced Santa Claus, which isn’t to say that I think that a man literally performs all of those legendary actions. But I do notice (or perceive) a shift at this time of year that seems to be It. He’s asked me a few times if Santa Claus is real. I’ve always asked back, “What do you think?” and he has always replied, “Kinda. Some of the kids at my school don’t think he’s real.”

“The kids at your school are no older than you and they are definitely not any wiser.”

* * *

The other night, after we got our tree up and decorated, we did what we always do and turned off all of lights so that we could see the tree in all of its glory. The three of us cuddled together on the couch and stared up at our handiwork. We lingered a little longer than I think we ever have. It’s so confusing to be this excited at this time of year while also feeling so desperate.

I had a nightmare last night that was obviously my brain working out some of the bigger tangles of my thoughts about Sandy Hook. It was a bizarre but terrifying journey to the darkest depths of possibility, where I did what was awful but necessary, apparently: feel for a second in a hypothetical reality what those parents are feeling. I woke up hating myself for it. I shouldn’t get to entertain those thoughts when others have to endure that living nightmare forever. And who am I to think that I could possibly imagine what they’re feeling? I hate everything about this so much. Even the good moments that come out of it seem to make me sadder ultimately.

* * *

Something that has always always made me tear up is, “Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus.” I think when I was a kid it was comforting to read something so kindly authoritative about something that can be kind of scary when you’re little. Now I love the sentiment and I love the idea of a busy grown-up taking the time to find just the right thing to say to a young reader. Coping with this particular unimaginable fear and sadness at this time of year, it suddenly seems much more poignant and necessary (and makes me sob). It’s comforting to read those words and feel them stretching across time because we now have to figure out how to explain to our children that the intangible things that make life worth living are still very much around, even though we let all of the bad things in far too often, that we still care about them and keep them safe and help them when they’re scared because otherwise the, “eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.”

I am on some like anti-NaBloPoMo business. I am, however, doing a photo-a-day “challenge” (sarcastic air-quotes because it’s not like it’s a triathlon or something) over on yon InstaGram, which I’ve recently become addicted to because oh, hello, 2010. Nice of you to show up.

Backing up just a bit, I would like to inform all of you that I am now 34 years old as of October 31st and am now very mature.

Also on October 31st was Halloween, which was kind of anti-climactic since trick-or-treating was postponed. But having it on Saturday was kind of nice since I didn’t have to rush home from work. My kid went as D.M.C. from Run D.M.C., which a few people actually got, despite the fact that he needs to work on his ability to look hard.

Anyway, moving on… (more…)

Hurricane Sandy is having the side effect of extending Halloween. The city has postponed trick-or-treating to Saturday evening. I can’t say that I’m upset, since I really like Halloween and am happy to be able to fit a few more specific activities in while it’s still technically the season. We haven’t watched many scary movies and our pumpkins are still waiting to be hacked and anthropomorphized. This past Saturday, our neighborhood had the annual parade and the baby debuted his D.M.C. from RUN D.M.C. costume.

Unfortunately, he didn’t win any prizes for his costume. I think it was just too obscure (*coughhipstercough*).

Friday evening, while the baby was at his piano lesson, the husband and I plopped on the couch to unwind. I turned on the TV and was pumped to see that Teen Witch was on. You would think that after nearly 12 years together, there wouldn’t be much that would surprise me about the husband. But I was shocked to learn that he had never seen this masterpiece. But I guess it kind of made sense since, thinking back, all of the girls in my class were always obsessed with that movie and how absurd it was, while all of the boys were fairly ignorant of its existence. I guess something called Teen Witch doesn’t really appeal to boys in their early adolescence? Weird.

At first, the husband was pretty dismissive, but I advised him that he needed to treat this event like the paradigm shift that is. Life can be broken up into to two periods: before Teen Witch and after Teen Witch. There’s just so much wonderful in that movie. Like, where does Louise even find those frumpy clothes to begin with? Why is her little brother…like that? Oh, holy wow, the inappropriate harassment from her English teacher? How Brad is just not quite Tom Cruise but tries so hard to squeeze it out of himself? Remembering how most of the girls gave the side-eye to Louise and Brad’s trip to the abandoned house? NO red flags, Louise? None? And why the hell would you ever take your shoes off in a place like that? The quintessential synchronized dance sequence at the prom? And the kind of completely amazing original soundtrack? And how watching it now I think the whole thing is actually just a metaphor (of course) for teenage drinking and/or drug use?

As we were watching it, I said, “There’s this scene…I can’t remember if it already happened or not. No…wait…here it is. Just so you know? This is the greatest thing ever.” And if you’re familiar with Teen Witch, I think you know that I’m referring to this:

After that final, “Top THAT,” from Polly, the husband and I sat in silence for a moment before he finally whispered, “That was awesome.” Halloween truly is the most magical time of the year.

My kid is a source of many wonderful quotes that range from adorable naivety to developing wisdom to just plain adorable and entertaining. In the past 24 hours, he’s had two that I need to document so that I don’t ever forget them.

The husband’s band was featured in the Tribune-Review on Sunday, so we had a couple copies on the dining room table. Last night, while the baby was doing his homework, he called out to us, “Hey, some guy is planning a comeback in Afghanistan?” The husband and I were both silent for a minute, trying to figure out what he could possibly mean. “What are you talking about, dude?” we asked. “It says here in this newspaper that some guy named Al…Kuh-eee-duh? Is doing something in Afghanistan.”

You know, that guy Al. Al Qaeda. (Note to self: brush up on current events.)

This morning, on the way to the bus stop, the baby and I were talking about the basketball team that he just joined at school. He was excitedly chattering away about the PE teacher who coaches them. “He’ll do this thing where he announces the starting lineup just like at a real basketball game. When I came out, he said, ‘AT 4 FOOT 9, FROM THE BRONX…!'” I chuckled, and the baby continued, “Pfft…I’m barely 4 foot 8!”

I recently lamented on Twitter (twit-mented? lamentweed?):

Literally every weekend for the past month or so has been outstanding. Downside is that they’re making Mondays increasingly brutal. #fb

— kdiddy (@kdiddy) October 14, 2012

This past weekend was similarly excellent, though not because of all of the events going on, but because of the lack of them. For the first time in many weeks, the husband, the baby, and I got to be together from Friday evening all the way to Monday morning.

While the baby was at his piano lesson Friday after school, the husband and I went on a little date to Fuel & Fuddle. We met up with the baby and my mom afterward and then headed to Squirrel Hill to see Samsara, a documentary that I’ve been anticipating for years. I had told the baby going in that this was a different kind of movie: there wasn’t any dialogue or a story, per se, just images of life and the world for the purpose of giving you something to think about.

SAMSARA Teaser from Baraka & Samsara on Vimeo.

He did have a few questions of the, “Where is that? Why are they doing that?” variety during the movie and I tried to get him to save them until after. A film that quiet and atmospheric needs a similarly serene and receptive audience. Overall, however, he handled it amazingly well and even had some really interesting thoughts afterward.

(The fact that a 10-year-old was able to experience it that way should have made the grown people sitting behind us feel that much dumber for talking the whole time and drunkenly getting up and falling down several times. If you’re over the age of say, 15, and you can’t sit still and contemplate life for at least a little bit, you need to just put your eatin’ dress on and stay in the house. We have shit to do out here.)

During our furious discussion of the movie afterward via iMessage, Frank had told me that he felt very grim after seeing it. I can see why, there were some very unpleasant things portrayed. But even the shots of landfills and meat factories didn’t upset me the way that they might normally. I just kept seeing images of chaos and our sometimes precious attempts to impose order on it. It made me feel very serene, like nothing that is happening is somehow surprising or out of turn. Not that we should take that as a reason to be uncaring or cold or seek change where it is needed. But that familiar panic that ordinarily wells up inside of me when I think about all that there is to think about didn’t show up. And it can stay gone, for all I care.

I think this moment is really what did it for me:

Who knows the story of his life and his tattoos? But it seems safe to assume that some chaos, good or bad, led him to mark his body, his method of asserting control where he could. But none of that is relevant here, as he nuzzles his infant daughter. She softly touches his face as the world suddenly becomes very small, a population of 7 billion reduced to 2 in a moment that is repeated over and over again everywhere.

The absence of Big Exciting Things to do this weekend meant that my world got to be wonderfully small for a few days. On Saturday, we went to Trax Farm to re-up on our decorative gourds (motherfuckers). The baby tried to tell us that he was too old for that stuff and after I pieced together the shards of my shattered heart upon hearing of this omen of adolescence, I pushed him into the car with the promise of, “FAMILY TOGETHERNESS AND FUN TIMES GODDAMMIT!” But after we drove past all of the pretty foliage and once we got there and that unmistakeable potpourri of kettle corn and animal poo hit him, he warmed right up.

Earlier in the week, he came up to me and said, “Want to do something together this weekend?” And then I died. He does a ton of stuff with seemingly everyone else in his life, while he and I seem to have a strictly business relationship sometimes. Of course, we have moments of enjoying each other’s company, but I realized that very rarely do he and I ever do anything just the two of us. I was trying to think of something to do and we kept shooting down each other’s suggestions. I thought about trying to find a cooking class, since he often wants to help me cook which is hard to do in our tiny kitchen, but I couldn’t seem to find any that were for kids and parents. Finally, I said, “Do you want to cook something together?” He liked that idea and it seemed like the least stress-inducing option. We wouldn’t have to go anywhere or spend any money, and he had an eye on a recipe for mini deep dish pizzas.

So, yesterday I set everything out for us and let him do mostly everything, only helping when he asked me to. “This is so much fun!” he said. And it really was. Plus, those little pizzas were so good. He also helped me to make some applesauce from the bushel of apples that we brought home, which was especially exciting since he got to use the cool apple peeler.

Today, the world is its usual size and its attempts to bring order to everything seem so silly. I can’t wait to get back to my cozy little microcosm.

The husband and I are at an age where we’re attending weddings fairly regularly. We had three this year and have at least one on deck next year. I can’t say that I’m too irritated about it. I really like weddings. In general, everyone is high off of the love fumes of the event and has a great time.

Of course, such blessed events are always so much more special when the marrying couple is dear to your heart. On Saturday, one of the husband’s bandmates, Preslav, married his long-time girlfriend Erin, and we were on hand to witness the union.

An interesting fact about the husband’s band is that all three members have been with their significant others for 12 years and all three initially got together with said significant others within six months of each other in 2000. The husband and I got married in 2006. Adam and Emily got married in 2009. We were thrilled when Preslav and Erin announced last year that they were finally going to make it official in 2012.

While the husband and I have known Preslav and Adam since Jesus was a boy, the better halves hadn’t had much opportunity to get to know each other until Pittsburgh Track Authority really started to take shape. Then Emily, Erin, and I had a chance to interact more often. We had the common bond of being in long (LONG) term relationships from a fairly young age and supporting in every possible way our respective dudes through their musical odysseys. Getting to know all of them better made me realize that this little group of people was pretty special. Musically, I think they’re on the edge of something big. Personally, it’s always so cool to realize that you’ve stumbled upon some folks who get you in ways that you didn’t even know you needed to be understood.

The husband and I arrived at the Mattress Factory about a half hour before everything was supposed to begin bearing a speaker for the DJ and cookies for the reception. We mingled for a bit before finding our seats. The place looked amazing and as the ceremony began I was blown away by how beautiful everything was. Preslav and Erin were gorgeous and their actual ceremony was short enough that I didn’t get a chance to start sobbing inappropriately like I usually do. I watched these two soulmates promise themselves to each other and grinned at how nervously excited they were. Preslav fidgeted with Erin’s hands and Erin let a few tears escape.

The reception was just one of the best I’ve been to. Everything was so relaxed and just felt like a really special party. Preslav and I noted that everyone looked so nice and I commented that it was probably one of the best looking weddings I’ve seen. Our friend Jim was DJing and he’s especially skilled at knowing just what to play. It was so refreshing to be amongst a group of people who weren’t nervous or shy about dancing, but who were just happy to be there celebrating this wonderful event. Dance music nerds have the most fun always.

The cops came by several times to warn us about the noise but I was glad that the music was loud enough to drown out the fact that I was singing along to everything, especially when Jim played one of my favorite songs ever:

I would never claim to be wise about love and relationships. Each one is so different and has its own unique set of challenges that it’s impossible to even glimpse the contents of anyone else’s heart. But I know what it is to be in the presence of the real thing. I can often step away and see it in the husband and I, and I could definitely feel it all around us on Saturday. If I had to take a guess, I’d say that the secret to making love work is to grab that moment and never let go of it, allow it to always be present in plenty and in want, in sickness and health, in good times and bad. If you follow that, you can never go wrong.

Right after Erin and Preslav were presented for the first time as husband and wife, Preslav fumbled for a second and asked Erin which way they were going. Erin replied, “Straight ahead.” We all laughed at the cute blunder. But to me it was the perfect way to take their first married steps.

Straight ahead. And if you get lost, just ask the amazing person walking right beside you.