Usually I'm not one to try and convince anyone to do anything that is not in there nature to do. I am a pretty fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of gal so anyone who tries to push me to do anything is usually faced with an immense amount of apathy or some pretty defensive resistance. For me, things get done when they get done and I have my personal priority system which decides this. In fact, unless I'm travelling, I always seem to have about a gazillion balls flying in the air at once. I suppose I like it this way - either that or I'm a passive masochist.

Nevertheless, for years I've been on a little private mission for everyone I know, many I don't, and an increasing number who probably wish I didn't... to get informed and vote.
Canada's federal election is on June 28th and it is going to a close race. Most people expect there to be a minority government and, without going into an explaination on the electoral system of our country, if this were to happen our government will not be very decisive and therefore, probably not very effective. Of course, this last sentence is debatable for some people will not mind a minority government. There's pros and cons to just about everything.

I could go into the last time the election race was this close in Canada, or how the Rhino party narrowly missed their opportunity to pave Manitoba, and the difference between Joe Clark and the prospective leaders we have today... but I won't.

However, I would like to really, really encourage you to go out and vote. There is too much apathy around voting these days. It's easy to feel like your vote doesn't count, and even easier to make the excuse that if you are not informed, then it is probably more responsible not to vote. But I have to say, if you've got the time to read my boring posts a couple of times a week, you have the time to take a look at the party websites and examine some their platform ideas.

Please try to do more than passively listen to the CBC, watch the debate, or base your decision on one platform idea you hear in passing. Try and look at the ideas and the people behind these ideas. It's too close to leave the voting up to people like me and a handful of Albertan retirees.

I'm not saying that you should vote to avoid a minority government, I'm just telling you to vote - strategically or with your heart.
Vote. Please. Your voice matters.

(and that's my public service announcement for the year - thanks)

I remember watching other parents of young children when I was pregnant. Ah those days, when I had time to "sit and watch" anything....

I would carefully observe and then silently give my incredibly uninformed opinion on whether I would have the particular child I was watching (loud/boisterous/shy/reserved/curly hair/small frame/verbal/physical/etc...), if I would choose to behave the same way with my child, and whether I thought my child would behave the same way toward me.
It's not that I was noticing the flaws in other parents. I was just so eager for any information that I would sit and fantasize what it would be like to be in these other parent's shoes at that particular time. It was a bit of a test scenario for myself.

On many occasions, I noticed the immense amount of time it took for a parent and a toddler to go anywhere - not only do the little guys have incredibly short legs, but they want to stop, touch and have a full discussion on every little thing they pass.

I have to say, Franklin is no exception. I promised myself that whatever happened during the day, I would not d-r-a-g my child anywhere. I would not hold his hand so high and walk so briskly that his little feet would barely touch the ground as he was forced to do some sort of ballet type survival move to keep pace with me. I have decided to use my travelling experiences as training for life with a toddler:

Never put your heart into getting anything done. Obstacles to your itinerary will pop up in the most unexpected places and at the oddest times. You just have to go with the flow and experience everything as it happens.

This served me well in Kosovo and it serves me well now.

Franklin likes to point everything out to me and seems to feel that it is my duty as a Mom to repeat everything back to him. Many times, he will repeat his observation over and over again if I don't acknowledge and enter into the conversation.
Of course, I don't blame him. It's easy to just say, "mmhmm, that's right Franklin", and continue on with my thoughts about whatever I happen to be obsessed with at the moment. (These days it seems to be the organizational culture of the public service - it's my paper that's due in a week and, believe it or not, I'm quite interested. Wow. Could I have found a career for myself? Who would have thought?)

Anyway, back to Franklin...

I love the fact that Franklin is so talkative. I love that he is observant too. I also love the fact that no matter what I have set out to do with him in a day, he will always remind me that it's the experience of being with him that's so fun. The point is not so much the activity that we are set to do, but how we do it (if we get there at all). He's a "live in the moment" kind of kid - like probably all kids his age.
I'm liking this stage a lot, it suits me well.

Franklin is waking up in the 4:30-5:00 AM range a little too frequently for our taste. The coffee doesn't seem to work anymore. Suzette, I now feel your pain and think we need to start a support group. Perhaps Liz could join too?

Job wise, Canada Customs is giving me a hard time. It's hard to explain, but I am starting to think it's all a conspiracy against me in particular. They're all against me, I know it... I know it...

I think the last of Frank's teeth are starting to come in -
the eye teeth both up and down. Why can't he work on one tooth at a time? Why is he such an over-achiever?

Apparently, according to the complex manager, bird seed debris will attract rodents.
Yeah, so my calming and educational bird feeder gift from my mother must either get an attachment to collect the seed or it's gone - and right after I stocked up on 3 bags of extra seed and feel intimately involved in the lives of all the finch in the neighbourhood.

I think Franklin has been scarred for life.
To take liquid out of one of Frank's dolls, D twisted the head off and poured the water out of the torso. Although Franklin used to do this himself many months ago, apparently now its a travesty. Our son has watched his father decapitate his little bath baby. Dolcett would have had such perverse fun with this.

I personally think D is, at this moment, taking out the recycling because he knows that if I do it I will get upset at the state of our plastics. I have a rule - Must. Recycle. CLEAN. Plastic. I'm not sure D follows this rule.

I spent my lunch hour talking to co-workers about my brief flirtation with joining a convent and as a result, got absolutely no studying done today. I really need to get a move on in the studying department.
Really. Really. Really. Really.
I'm not kidding. Distance education does not become me. I need a distance dominatrix. I need a dominant for my submissive.

That reminds me, has anyone seen Secretary? I swear, it has got to be one of the most romantic movies I have seen since Harold and Maude.


The Green Party has been excluded from the English CBC televised debate tonight. As a result, it's as boring and superficial as hell. Yet, Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe has such a cute accent (a cross between a Newfie and a Quebecois) that I'll watch anyway.

They, as in, child experts and other's like them with credentials or not, have always told me that infants and toddlers will primarily participate in parallel play until the age of 3 or so. However, most Moms and Dads I talk to, as well as the daycare, have noticed that this is not completely true. I certainly remember Franklin playing peek-a-boo through a mail-box with another child when he was 12 or 13 months old. He would also initiate a chasing game at the daycare centre in which another child would know exactly what he wanted to do and they would bounce all over the place, giggling the entire time.

These days I notice a lot of writing in which toddlers are apparently not developmentally capable of feeling empathy for others. Apparently, the "terrible twos/threes" are a period of intense self-absorbtion in which the feelings of others can not be taken into account. Now, although I know at least a few adults that seem to be underdeveloped in the empathy area and over-developed in the self-absorption area, Franklin is most definitely capable of thinking about other people besides himself.
D and I have both noticed that Franklin will get upset if he knows someone has lost something, or is sad for whatever reason - emotional or physical. He's even sensitive to a picture of a car crash (of course, I think he may feel that cars and trains have feelings too as he holds a special place in his heart for Bertie the Bus).

In fact, although he loves to be surprised by a sudden "boo!" from around the corner, he is very sensitive to another person's suffering. I know this isn't just Franklin, other Moms and Dads have talked about this too.

What's the point of all this?
Well, I know it's a completely obvious concept to make up your own mind when it comes to your own child. However, when you are not in the thick of the development in question, I think it is easy to label a child as "just in one of those stages". I've found that most of the time, those "stages" not only over-generalize, but are many times, just plain wrong. I am starting to get annoyed when someone lazily dismisses a child's behaviour for a "stage" instead of trying to figure out if something else could be wrong. Are they tired? Hungary? In pain? Abused at home? They don't have the ability to tell us these things verbally so shouldn't we be paying closer attention?
I know the kids I see at the play ground are really none of my business but when I see a certain young toddler over and over again, in the same frantic, yet withdrawn state... shouldn't I being asking these questions?

So, can you believe this? Franklin's at daycare yesterday, playing in the sandbox at the end of the day. He's almost home free in the accident department... when he gets clocked in the head by a swinging bucket.

Where on his head, you concerned internet comrades ask?

Right on the bulls-eye, the centre of his forehead, on the already tender, bluish/brown bruise.

sigh

It's a battle out there for this little guy. Swinging plastic and stationary slides... they are all land mines waiting to strike.
Of course, this feeling couldn't be my over-sensitive queasiness whenever I look closely at his head...

On a different note,
A friend of mine signed up for a community garden plot in the city on my enthusiastic recommendation. Both of us have been waiting patiently on the list for about a year - pretty much since we moved to this townhouse.
Today my friend gleefully told me how great his plot was and how fortunate it was assigned to him so close to his apartment.

wait a minute...

Have you noticed any dirtyolive blog posts about my amazing spinach growth? My beautiful tomatoes? My excitement for potential pumpkin development?

yeah... I haven't noticed that either.

So, I've never been known for being above acts of "down and dirty" to get what I need.
Exactly, whose garden do I have to weed to get a patch of my own in this city?

No sooner does the little Frankster gleefully reunite with his beloved friends at daycare than he trips on a mat, sends his little body careening through the air, and makes contact with the wooden slide and the centre of his forehead.

Meanwhile, in "happy work land", I'm on the phone with a very confused woman in Westport, Connecticut and I see my message light turn on. I get a sinking feeling...

I hang up. I am just reaching to check my message when D calls.

"Hey Smookums! What's happening?" - I say.
(Actually, I don't , I have no idea why I am writing that I call him Smookums. I just am. So there. Sorry D)
"Franklin has fallen at daycare and has hurt himself. He's fallen off a 10 foot cliff and is lying in a pool of his own drool while his eyes dilate to the ninth degree. The daycare thought you might want to take him to a clinic or something." - D says.
(Actually, he doesn't, that's just what I basically hear while the words Franklin... fall... head.... clinic... poke into the stream of panicked thoughts that have sent my over-active imagination reeling).

"Okay, I'm heading right there" - I murmur, in shock and horror, as I hear a fire engine drive through campus.

Picture me, in a bit of a sprint to daycare, thanking the Lord and all his cousins that I can get there in less than 3 minutes.

Franklin is okay. He has a contusion the size of a golf ball on his forehead (this might be a bit of an exaggeration) but there is no concussion. After he introduced a few of his friends at the centre to me, I took him to the clinic on campus where he solemnly told the doctor,
"Doct-ta-teur, shek ears! shek ears!"
I tell you, we have a future otologist on our hands.

He's okay. I think I mentioned that. ...yeah, he's okay.

...he's okay.

I'm exhausted.

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf Heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least:
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee,--and then my state
(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings'.

I remember the way I felt when we first met and I still feel that way after 8 years of enjoying my life with you. When I watch you play with Franklin, read a book or just wash the dishes, my heart skips a beat and I feel warm and wonderful all over again.

I love you D.

I'm at home with Diarrhea Boy today. He isn't allowed to be at daycare with diarrhea - and I completely understand. Besides, he's sleeping so much that it is best that he stays home and gets all the opportunity he needs to rest. He's lost quite a bit of weight with this stomach flu.

Staying home with him is fun. He's not so sick that we have to hang out inside and watch Thomas the Train videos, but he's not so well that he can go crazy at the beach either. Instead, we decided what we would make for dinner, and then headed to Thrifty's to get our supplies. I swear, that grocery store will be the end of my son's humble personality. Every time we go there he gets at least one person coming up to him and telling him what beautiful curls he has.

He's got some pretty cool curls from D that can get quite striking when he's in need of a hair cut. There is no calming them down and even after he's had a hat on it's still all over the place. I hope when he gets older he likes them because short of cutting it down to a buzz, there's nothing he can do about it.
D's mother once told me a story of when D was a child, he tried to perm his hair straight in order to have "normal" hair. It remained straight for about a day - and then, much to his chagrin, bounced right back up again. I'd love to have hair like that, mine's curly, but thin with a large dose of flatness. My hair dresser says if I colour it there will be more body. Can anyone confirm this?

Odd things that I'm not sure how to correct with my son:

Apparently, when I go to the bathroom and sit on the toilet, announcing cheerily that "Mum's going pee or poo poo, or pee and poo poo", it is time to grab the potty seat, pull out the bowl that is designed to catch all the output, and then sit down on the vacant hole. Why does he do this? How to explain that the bowl needs to be in there?

While buying groceries or anything, Franklin is completely well behaved... until check-out time. It's not the waiting in one spot that gets to him, but the check-out people who scan the merchandise. He is very wary of them. Even if he has no interest in the Nasturtiums, once the cashiers gets their paws on our goods he gets upset.
Today, however, he graciously let the hippie guy in the liquor store place the port in a bag for him. Long haired hippies are cool, Thrifty women with dangle ear-rings are not. Mum, take note.

.. and just as an aside, this morning, on the way home from said hippie populated liquor store... Franklin and I saw a beautiful little house up the street, fell in love, went home and discovered is was $269 000.00.

Do you think that's too much? man oh man!

Yes.... so... remember when I was soooo sure that nothing was wrong with Franklin? Remember when I was groaning that I am required to pick him up from daycare at any hint of sickness? Remember when I was insensitive to the fact that sometimes Franklin could use a day at home too?

I was paid back over the weekend.

Just for the record, he was fine last week. He is going through some major teething, but two trips to the doctor and a throat swab ruled out anything that could have been wrong. By Saturday, it was evident that he was perfectly healthy. I can't believe the size of his molars though - I swear they are about the same size as the ones that came out of my mouth a couple of years ago!


Sunday night I gave myself a treat and attended the 10th anniversary fundraising dinner for Lifecycles. I had helped set up the donations for the silent auction and was very eager to hear a couple of the people scheduled to speak. It was also nice to get out and meet people who I have wanted to get to know for a long time. It is one thing to be involved through board membership, but it is another to meet potential new friends who I have more things in common with than a toddler the same age as Franklin.

- of course, I ended up mostly talking to another woman who had a 3 year old child and another on the way. What can I say, I'm a Mom, I talk to Moms about Mom things. My days of taking e and talking about Foucault's history of the soul are on pause for the time being.

Back to what I was talking about...

I came home to finish an assignment and I was not a page into my paper when I heard a strange noise upstairs. Franklin was puking. Bit of beets and tofu dog were everywhere. For the last two days Franklin has had the stomach flu and we have had to be extremely careful what, and how much, goes into his stomach or else it ends up on the floor, on himself, and on us. He squeaks out "Mommy, help me" between hurls. It's heart wrenching.

D stayed home with him today and I returned from work to a smiling and excited little boy. I was so delighted to see him perky again that I got over eager and fed him his favorite - blueberries... a few too many blueberries.

I have just finished cleaning up blueberries and apple sauce off the carpet in his room.

argh.
What a mom I am. First I decide he's not sick, then he gets sick and I feed him too much and make him more sick.

sorry Franklin.