But tonight, it's Cheese

I owed Rachel a birthday; I was flat on my back with the flu on hers, and felt worse about that than I felt awful for being sick. I think it mattered less to her: she was hitting the magical 14, which meant I had to allow her to date, because, after all, I had allowed Alex to start dating. She went out with the kid named Cheese once (with Char’s dad as chaperone, which I still think is funny as hell) but since then it’s been one thing after another (part of it her own fault) and she hasn’t been out with him since.

When she approached me the other day, I assumed it was going to be to ask me to drive her and Gouda-boy to a movie or McDonald’s or something on Friday. I was fully prepared to say yes, as long as it was someplace acceptable. I hate the idea of her dating, but I’m bending to the inevitable, and it helps that this kid’s parents are at least as protective as we are. For the most part, he’s not going out without supervision, either. They’re satisfied that I insist on driving them where they want to go, and they’re fine with Alex and Stephanie tagging along. So like it or not, when she asked I was going to say yes.

But, she wasn’t asking for a ride; my daughter asked me out on a date. She wanted to collect on her birthday, when I promised to make it up to her. This meant I had to ditch the wife, but fortunately she had other plans anyway.

Now, my daughter’s idea of a good time is shopping. She loves the damned mall, and I knew that’s where we were headed. I hate the damned mall, but I hate shopping in general, and she knows it. She tried reaching for some sort of compromise (though I wasn’t going to balk; this was her date, if she wanted to walk the damned mall, I was going to do it and not whine once) and suggested a movie (at the mall theater) and dinner (at the mall food court.)

My daughter is a cheap date, it seems. She wanted to see Gnomeo and Juliet (something she’d never get Alex or Cheese to go to, I think) but one of us (sorry) misread the movie listing and we got there 20 minutes after it started. So what to do?

Walk the damned mall, then have dinner, and then catch a later show.

I did not mind the whole shopping experience as much as I thought I would. Rachel, for whatever reason, is a window shopper; wandering around looking at crap gives her a bigger thrill than actually buying anything, which did surprise me. At first I thought she was resisting the call of the $150 shoes because she thought it would come out of her own wallet, but even after I told her I'd spend $X on whatever the hell she wanted, she still just shopped without getting anything.

Her logic, which I appreciate, is that just because it’s not her money, that doesn’t mean she wants to waste it. Those shoes were “cute” but not "long term cute", whatever that means. Those shoes wouldn’t match anything and she needs to cull through her closet and get rid of a few old outfits before adding to it. She pointed out things Kevin would like, things Alex would like, and I realized that half the time when she does go shopping with Char or with friends, what she comes home with is typically for one of her brothers. She doesn’t wait for special occasions; she just likes to give gifts.

After an hour and a half, I actually wanted her to want something; hell, I was itching to crack open my wallet and get her whatever the hell she wanted, but we headed for the food court with her just about laughing at me because I “just don’t get it.”

No, but then I’m not a 14 year old girl and if I need something from the mall, I do anything I can to get Char to go get it for me. I almost understand it, though, when she and Char head for the mall together and come home with nothing. Rachel, without her brothers around, in a setting that’s not so focused on her, yet is focused on her, opens up. She talks. I heard more about her friends, what she’s doing in school, what interests her and what bothers her, even more about Cheese than I care to know, than I typically get in two weeks of conversation at home. Char knows how to connect to each of the kids in ways that work best; with Rachel, it’s wandering around the mall, supposedly looking at “not long term cute” shoes.

When we stopped at the food court she was approached by a cluster of girls her age (they walk in clusters, right? It seems rude to say they walk in herds) who wanted to know if she had decided if she was going out for track or softball, and when she said she still wasn’t sure, they tried hard to talk her into track. I sat back and just listened; I didn’t know she was considering school sports at all, and I certainly had no idea she had blown the P.E. teacher away with her time on the quarter mile run and had been told to seriously consider it.

After her friends left I asked her about it. Was she leaning towards one over the other, or did she not want to commit because she didn’t want to join a team at all? She does want to join a team but she doesn’t want to play softball—she’d rather play baseball, but not on the school team because she likes those boys and doesn’t want to show them up (yes, I laughed)—but she’s not sure she’d really be any good on the track team. She can jog, but she doesn’t like the short, hard runs. So, what’s the point?

No one has ever told her about cross country track, I guess. They’ve been focusing on sprints and the quarter mile in P.E. and it didn’t occur to her that on a track team, there are positions for long distance runners. But, she hasn’t trained for that. The first tryouts (for next year’s 9th grade team) are in a couple of weeks, is it even possible to get ready for that?

Rachel is in good shape; while she’s not training in TKD every day anymore, she still trains and she still works out. I don’t think she’ll have a problem even if the tryouts were tomorrow. I said that if she was remotely interested, she needed to go for it. If she wants help training over the next couple of weeks, I can help with that. Running is one thing I do well enough to be of use to her.

What I didn’t realize, though, was that in saying that, I obligated myself to go back into the bowels of the mall to get running shoes. Long term cute running shoes. But at least they weren’t $150.

And the movie—cute. Not something I’d go to on my own, but perfect for an evening out with my daughter.

Yo Daddy so mean...

Instead of skiing, Char and I have spent the weekend baby wrangling. Erin and Miko have been taking the older kids out to ski and snowboard, and we've been playing in the snow right outside the condo with Travis and Thad; Thad has no clue what he's expected to do out there and Travis only wants to be outside in 10 minute spurts, so it's been a lot of in and out and in and out. Because we're not as mean as Mom, we also haven't been making Travis take both the naps he usually put down for every day, and Erin wonders why he's falling asleep at night so easily for us when he usually fights her tooth and nail.

We're also keeping all the kids with us at night so Erin and Miko can have some kidless time; they're tired. Erin is about to lose her mind keeping up with a toddler and a 10 month old, and Toni has noticed how much attention her brothers get and it pisses her off, so she acts accordingly. There's just not enough Mom to go around; Erin needs a break. All our kids are old enough to keep Toni and Travis entertained in the evenings, and with Mom in another condo, there's no one to pry the baby away from Char. So it's been win-win all weekend. we get the grandkids, Erin and Miko get some down time.

Tomorrow they're heading for home and taking our brood with them, then depositing them at home with their grandfather. That wasn't part of our original plans, but Brad called last night needing a place to crash for a few days while he waits for a new furnace to be installed, and he offered to watch the kids while we took a few days to ski. We're not idiots, we took him up on it. I think Rachel may go over to Erin's to get away from her brothers for a day or two, and that's fine.

Miko reports that Rachel has stuck with Erin nearly the whole time they're skiing, and a lot of what they talked about was what a hardass I can be. Erin can empathize; I was far stricter with her than I have been with Alex and Rachel, mostly because when Erin came to live with us I was clueless about parenting a teenager, much less a teenage girl who had already tripped over a couple of speed bumps. All Rachel knows is that I'm a mean son of a bitch and I never let her do anything fun, which isn't fair at all because Alex gets to do everything.

Erin pointed out to her that she actually has it easier; when Erin was sixteen, I made her wait an entire year before I'd let her go out with Miko. He hung around the house like a love sick puppy, but I was stubborn; they weren't allowed on an actual date until she was nearly seventeen and he had been hanging around the house for nearly a year. Even then, I was an SOB about her curfew, and Miko was just scared enough of me he always had her home early. It put a crimp in their dating style.

I'm hoping that Erin can make Rachel see that I'm not being a punitive asshole; there are reasons why I am strict. I know it seems to her that Alex gets to do everything he wants, but she doesn't stop to think that I'm only relaxing with him as he gets a little older and more mature--and I'm still the one who drives him and Stephanie to where they want to go. I still require him to let me know where he'll be if they walk away from where I drop them off, who they'll be with, and he knows what will happen if he doesn't answer his phone if I call. She doesn't see that most of their "dates" consist of them watching a movie here at home, or taking Tank to the park. She doesn't stop to think that Alex makes deliberate efforts at growing up: he has a job, he pushes himself to do well in school, he's learning to not roll his eyes and talk back.

She doesn't see anything of that because she's 14 and life is simply unfair when you're 14; but it would be helpful if she stopped to remember what Alex went through at her age.

Nothing I say will convince her that I'm anything but mean and that my attempts to thwart her dating life are personal, but at least with Erin she has a sympathetic ear, and an idea of not only how much stricter I could be, but how much I let up when the time is right.

She hasn't asked yet, but Char and I have made sure that there's nothing pressing scheduled next weekend, so if Cheese asks her out, I'll be available to drive them.

Unless Char and I decide to not go home. Staying here might be tempting.

She needs to come with a universal translator

At nine this morning it was mostly cool out, and Rachel tried to leave the house (headed to watch Alex's swim team tryouts because SETH! was going to be there) in a skin tight t-shirt, barely there shorts, and sandals. Alex and I were both wearing sweatshirts; she wanted to go out half dressed.

I didn't have to say a word; I shook my head and pointed towards her bedroom and she started to stomp off, flinging God, don't chuck a spaz, Dad! at me as she passed me.

I have no idea what that means, and Alex just shrugged.

I'm, like, totally, like, you know, completely out of touch, I guess.

I owe Alex.

In a moment of massive not-paying-attention-to-the-actual-request, I promised Rachel I would take her and several friends to see New Moon after school today. They're 12; I don't just drop kids off at a theater, I suffer through whatever it is they want to see, but when I realized what I had agreed to, I was tempted. Very tempted.

Rachel squealed to Alex that she and her friends were going and he must have seen the look on my face, and told her that Stephanie wanted to see it it, so would she mind if they tagged along? Rachel was all for it; anything is better than squirmy Dad in a theater.

Before they all poured out of the car Alex set the ground rules: he and Stephanie would sit behind them, no talking after the previews were over, no squealing when the shirtless boys showed up on the screen, no going to the bathroom alone, and no talking back if he asked them to pipe down.

Good job.

He has a date tomorrow; they're going out for pizza and are meeting friends there. I think to show my appreciation, I'll pop for the first pizza. I'd pay for the whole thing, but I've seen Alex and his friends eat, and I could go broke.

(This is where I have to admit that moving has turned out to be a good thing all the way around; I actually get to go home until he calls for a ride, rather than finding a place in town to hang out.)

On the Kevin Front: he's not taking ballet anymore. Instead he's taking stage & production dancing, as his teacher thought he would enjoy it more, and it will incorporate some ballet. The kid really likes to dance and she sees a little performer emerging and wants to help him find what he'll both excel at and love. So far, I think she's on the mark. He's sticking with TKD, too, and will probably test for his black belt around his 11th birthday. Yes, I caved on the age issue. TK wants the minumum to be 10, and since this is now TK's school, 10 it is.

Char’s PT routine is not limited to work with her physical therapist and walking in the pool; she does a considerable amount of stretching at home, usually in the evening after the kids have gone to bed or are engrossed in homework or something on TV downstairs. The stretching is not comfortable by any means and is wrought with frustration and frequently tears because it still fucking hurts. It hurts enough that she says most of the time she’d rather give birth to a fifteen pound kid every night than go through it, but she sucks it up and does it anyway.

Some of the stretches require help, but for the most part the help is verbal; after a few minutes she wants to quit, and I have to sit on the floor with her and talk her through it, and sometimes I have to be the bad guy and get pushy about it. For fifteen minutes a day she hates me, but I can live with that.

Yesterday I took Rachel and a couple of her friends shopping, several hours of wandering the mall while they shrieked and giggled and pointed at boys they knew and boys they wanted to know. I followed a reasonable distance behind them, close enough to be right there but far enough back they were able to talk without me listening in and far enough that those boys wouldn’t necessarily guess they had a chaperone. I think Rachel’s friends had expected I would drop them off and pick them up later, but they’re twelve. I don’t care what their parents do, my daughter does not wander around the mall without adult supervision. I trust her; I don’t trust other people. When she hits fourteen, maybe then, but for now she’s stuck, even if she hates it.

Half an hour into their marathon shopping the friends realized having Rachel’s dad hanging back wasn’t such a bad thing, because he was willing to carry all the bags of crap they were accumulating. I didn’t mind, but by the time we got home I was exhausted; physically from carrying all their things for several hours, and mentally from all the gossip, giggling and shrieking.

I admit, I wasn’t in the mood to push Char into stretching beyond what she felt comfortable doing; I knew that a few minutes into it she would want to stop, and I also knew that I’d have to bite my tongue until it bled to keep from snapping at her. I think she knew I didn’t feel like sitting there cheering and jeering her on and she tried to opt out for the night, but not doing it isn’t an option, not now.

We both sucked it up, and we were both glaring at each other. Five minutes into it, right about the point of pain and resistance on her part, and right when I could already feel my temper notch up, we heard the boys in the hallway, and heard Alex say Don’t knock on that door, Kevin. Not right now.

I have to ask Mom something

Not now. If you need something I can get it or Rachel can get it.

I need to talk to Mom!

Char started to get up but I shook my head and peeled myself off the floor.

Later.

But why?

My hand was on the doorknob when I heard Alex saying, through gritted teeth, They’re. Probably. Naked.

Oh. He paused and then asked, Well, how long does that usually take?

I pulled to door open and Alex was standing there holding Kevin up, his hands under his little brother’s armpits, so that they were face level. Kevin looked at me, head to toe and determined I was shirtless but not pants less, and he looked back and Alex and said I guess it doesn’t take very long at all.

Alex shrugged, and he didn’t put Kevin down. My temper waned with the absurdity of Kevin’s size 5 feet dangling at least two feet off the floor, and I had to grit my teeth together to keep from laughing.

Char wasn’t as successful and was lying on the floor snickering, but managed to ask Kevin what he wanted.

I forget now.

Alex turned around, still dangling Kevin from his hands, and walked down the hall into his bedroom. Char was on her back on the floor, grinning, and willing to finish stretching. No complaints from either of us. When she was done I helped her up and she arched an eyebrow suggestively and asked Want to find out how long it takes?

Then Kevin remembered what he wanted.

I’ll humor Char and wear the Speedo in the pool when we’re in there alone; I won’t wear it when there are students around or when our kids are there. Today, however, I left my shorts at home and only had the Speedo in my office, and thought we’d be done before Brad picked the kids up from school and brought them to the dojang.

I was off by about ten minutes. Rachel walked into the pool area to tell us they were there just as I was getting out of the pool. She looked at me, raised an eyebrow, and then asked, “Water cold, Dad?”

Char is still laughing.

One week into the school year and the kids are already snowed under with homework. Except for Kevin. He enjoyed telling the other two that it took him ten minutes to finish his math and vocabulary homework and had the rest of the weekend free to do whatever he wanted. He was less thrilled with the news that, being the only offspring available, he was going to help me clean litter boxes, scoop dog poop, and vacuum. Yes, I will use my children as cheap manual labor.

After church this morning Alex and Rachel sat at the kitchen table with books open in front of them, and it occurred to me (not for the first time) that I am very glad I am no longer in high school or junior high. Those kids have twice as much homework as I ever did, and Char doesn’t remember having to spend hours every weekend on it, either. They were still plugging away at lunchtime and when I forced sandwiches on them (I fail at lunch; Char actually cooks for them on weekends) Rachel said that Alex spent so much time helping her figure out how to order fractions (good thing she didn’t ask me) and drilling her on the composition of cells (I know there’s a nucleus in there somewhere) that he had forgotten he needed to go to the library to get research materials for his own homework.

If I remember right, in 10th grade I was reading books after which I wrote a basic book report. He’s doing a paper on Shakespeare’s sonnets and the vocabulary and etymology of the times.

I honestly don’t even know what “etymology” is and can only spell it because he wrote it down.

He didn’t need to go right then because he has six weeks to get this paper done; I, however, wanted to get him alone. If we’re going to allow him to date, I didn’t see any reason to wait to tell him, but I also did not want to have this discussion around Rachel and Kevin, just in case I was able to steer him onto the subject of girls in general.

The local library apparently is not open on Sundays; we wound up going to a bookstore instead. I think that worked out better for me, since I was able to wait in the attached Starbucks knockoff, where I paid $4 for a damned soft drink. It was also a good place to talk to the kid and pry into his private life. We live in the boonies, far enough that the kids’ friends can’t just show up to hang out. I’d like to know a little bit about the people they hang around with in school, not just the members of the opposite gender that have them drooling.

I started with cell phones; after much deliberation (he does not need to know that his mother basically said “get them their own damned phones already”) he and Rachel will be allowed to get basic cell phones; they can text but they cannot access the Internet with these phones. If I find out they have, the phones go away. When he was sufficiently pleased with that news, I added that we felt he would need to have a phone on him the first time he took a girl out and she was pleading with him to take her home already.

It took a few moments for that to sink in. Fine, he can date, but with limits. No girls that are as much older as the one he tried to sneak past us in May. I’d prefer for now that he stuck to his own age, perhaps a year younger. I’ll grit my teeth and not say anything if she’s a year older. He gets driven to and from these supposed dated by either his mother or myself. No Grandpa, no Dack or TK, no elder siblings of his intended date. If I call his phone while he’s out he’d damn well better answer it. Grades better stay up.

He has no trouble agreeing to everything I want. Now. I expect a backlash when he actually has a girlfriend.

I’m still looking for a graceful way to get out of him what he may or may not have done with the sixteen year old before we found out about her. There was no actual dating but the school they attend is on a sprawl of land with plenty of places for horny teenagers to do what horny teenagers will, and as much as he will protest that it’s none of my business, at his age I think it is. I trust my son, but I was his age once and I know I would have done anything my girlfriend would have agreed to. Alex is not afraid of girls in the least; I wasn’t afraid of my girlfriend but anyone else? Terrified.

Tomorrow after we pick them up from school we’ll go get them the phones, and figure out something for Kevin since this will undoubtedly feel unfair to him (he’s 10; he does not need a cell phone, period.) Alex is trying to be mature about it, all very “well this is good news” when I know inside he’s squealing as much as Rachel did when he passed it along to her. On the ride home he left me with something else to chew on: we’re allowing him to date at 14. Sixteen and a half months from now, Rachel turns 14.

I’m not sure I can be fair in this.

I didn’t want him to trade his convertible in on a new car. It didn’t make sense because we were going to need two cars at some point and I have no issue with him picking something out for me to drive later. He loves that convertible, too, and we’ve had a lot of fun in it, taking long rides while the kids are in school. I was outvoted, though. He doesn’t make unilateral decisions very often, but Rachel keeps pointing out to him that if it had been his little car involved in the accident the outcome would have been very different. He made the decision before I was out of the hospital.

So he’s out right now going through the headache of buying a new car and getting rid of his toy, not because the idea of being in an accident in it bothers him, but because his little girl is afraid every time he gets behind the wheel of it. I don’t know what she’ll do the first time his gets on his motorcycle, but I know we’re not giving those up.

The thing is, as much as he’s loved that car I doubt he’ll have regrets, because that’s just the way he is. I have a feeling he’ll come home in a tank, just to make the kids feel better and I won't hear a complaint until he realizes how bad the gas mileage is.

I could probably go home now, but tonight she wanted me to stick around until she was asleep. Her pain levels have jacked up quite a bit what with the getting in and out of bed and she just doesn’t feel like being alone. I get that. When I’m awake at three in the morning part of it is not wanting to be alone.

As long as she doesn’t try to manage it alone she can get up, and since she can get up they pulled the catheter this morning. She was relieved to be rid of it, mostly because Kevin has taken it upon himself to the collection bag periodically and to inform her that she’s obviously not drinking enough. He announces it in a very serious voice which I find funny as hell, but she’s had enough. She’s coping with the indignities of having to have help and I’m not very sympathetic because I’ve been there and suffered through her telling me to get the hell over myself.

Tomorrow we should know more about when we can expect her to be released. I’m amazed at how much better she gets every day, though the pain of PT might set her back a day or two. After we talk to her doctor tomorrow I have to go into work for a little while and put in for a leave of absence. It could be sticky because I haven’t been at this job very long but it’s with the same agency, so theoretically I have enough backlogged vacation and sick days that it shouldn’t be an issue.

The kids need her home. Just visiting for an hour a couple of times a day isn’t cutting it. They’re not sleeping very well, either. I’ve had Kevin in bed with me two nights in a row, and had both Rachel and Alex wandering through the house in the middle of the night. Rachel does not want to discuss with me the things that are bothering her, but she’s talking to Alex. Alex is talking to me, which frankly amazes me when you consider how hard we’ve been butting heads this summer.

The gist of it is that I obviously know nothing about female biology and would be useless to her, so Alex found himself standing in a drugstore with his sister trying to help her figure out what supplies she needed. They could have asked Brad, who was forced to wait by the door, but he too is monumentally stupid and women hide from both of us during “that time.” I don’t know why she thought her 13 year old brother would know more than I do, but he’s convinced they picked out the wrong thing (they did) and before I head home I have to fix it without letting my daughter know that I know. Because she certainly is not going to talk to me about THAT.

Char thinks it’s funny. She told Rachel to talk to me but the mortification is too much to overcome, I guess. Char is also a little upset because this is something she felt like she needed to be there for Rachel. I would have thought either parent would suffice, but again, I am stupid. I’ve determined that the older my kids get, the stupider I will become.

I tend to forget what life looks like through the eyes of a little boy. Alex walk through life these days with a grown-up height of perspective. He’s already six feet tall and aside from the new-teenager hiccups he’s reasonable mature. Rachel is a few inches over five feet and she’s tough. She’s had to be in order to survive two brothers. But Kevin is small for even a ten year old—he’s a long way from hitting five feet and looks at everything from the same height as the average six year old. He has a big heart, though, and he tends to wear it on his sleeve.

I would do well to remember that with better clarity.

We decided that the kids would see her one at a time initially, just to see how it would go. Because Alex has been there, Rachel went in to see her first, and she was fine. Once I was sure she was all right I left the room, because I have been made acutely aware over the couple of days that there are things my daughter needs her mother to talk about with, and that would happen if I was there. Alex went in next because Kevin was otherwise occupied with the automatic faucet in the men’s room, but as soon as he was over his fascination with it I got Alex so his little brother could have some time alone with their mother.

Kevin was excited, he had been all morning and he ran from the waiting room into her room. But once he was in there he stopped so fast that his sneakers chirped against the tile floor. It was what I was afraid of. I’m not sure what he expected to see and we tried to prepare him for seeing his mother bruised, in a cast and a leg brace, and how tired she was going to look but it didn’t sink in. He got one look and froze, and then started to cry.

I had a selfish moment of panic because I wasn’t sure of what to do, make him stay and talk to her or pick him up and take him out. Char knew what to do, though. She asked me to lower the railing on the bed and she coaxed him over, and when he managed to make himself take those last few steps to the bed I lifted him up so that he could stretch out next to her.

I know what that cost her in pain. He barely moved but she’s sore as hell and it’s agony for her to move even the right side of her body. I had to clench my teeth to keep from reminding him to be careful, but she cuddled him close for a while. I don’t know what she said to him to calm him down because I waited in the doorway to give them some privacy. But twenty minutes later he was sitting on the edge of the bed and was happy enough, and she had me get Alex and Rachel.

They stayed for another half an hour before I made them clear out. Again, I am the World’s Meanest Dad. They went home with their grandfather, and Char is sleeping now. She was glad to see them but it wiped her out. We’ll see how she feels later and decide whether or not they can come back today or if they’ll wait until tomorrow.