Coronavirus Day 281 — Batteries
And now… my Christmas batteries story.
I’ll never forget the very first time James took me home for Christmas. Everyone called him Jamey back then. They were never talking to me. Twenty-some years later and they’re still only occasionally talking to me. In any case, there were a lot of people and a lot of cousins and a lot of portagee beans.
So, I’m surrounded by all the hubbub of a large family and Grandma Terra is passing out presents to every kid present. Despite being in college, I found out we still qualified and was happily handed a small but weighty little wrapped package with my name on it. To my surprise, it was a pack of AA batteries. I was speechless. Nineteen-year-old me couldn’t think of a single suitable thing to say. Batteries?? This is so weird. Why would I want batteries? Why would someone give me batteries? Am I sure the tag had my name on it? Umm, thank you. So sweet.
Fast forward to now and my hand sweeps across the horizon– The. Gift. Of. Batteries! I really owe Grandma Terra a secondary thank you note and an apology. Shockingly expensive. Always in short supply. A rising star on the latest 2020 No It All Gift Guide for Boys.
P.S. Nate and Jake both got a package of rechargeable batteries in their stockings this year. Nate was so excited he immediately ripped them open and plugged in the charger. Genius, Grandma Terra. Genius.
Coronavirus Day 279 — Landfill
Last weekend I decided it was time to round-up all of our old timey electronics and cords and take them off to the nearest e-cycling site. This has been something I’ve been meaning to get around to for awhile. Based on what we put into a large moving box, by awhile I mean… my entire adult life. We found my second generation Palm pilot, a little green iPod, two laptops from a previous employer, an iPad with risqué content created by two little boys I know, a Kindle, a digital alarm clock, maybe 50 bad headphones, and 400 unidentifiable cords, plugs, and miscellaneous black doodads. Apparently the fear of identity theft and having once spent $80 for a cord at Best Buy has made us afraid to ever get rid of anything. Ever.
Today Jacob and I took the round trip out to Cold Canyon Landfill where we left our box inside a shipping container with an orange sign that said “electronics.” I’m afraid they’ll either be shipped back to their Chinese birthplace for burial, or the next guy in a truck will swing by, load it up, and attempt to steal our identities from 2001. On the bright side, I decided mandatory face masks will become a permanent part of my landfill repertoire. If only it matched my fluorescent yellow dump vest.
Jacob and I then spent a joyful afternoon together shopping for a Christmas present for Nate. On the downside, ironically I found myself at Best Buy twice today.
Coronavirus Day 277 — Gift Guide for Boys (Ages 9-12)
Twenty twenty will go down in history for oh so many reasons, one of which is… the END OF TOYS. Hard to believe so much joy could be sucked out of one single year. But it’s true. Ages 9 and 11 appear to be the final cusp of lusting after various Nerf guns, which was the final phase of toy ownership prior to man toys, also called electronics. Basically the sequence goes something like: wooden food, super heroes, remote control cars, Pokémon, Legos, more expensive Legos, Nerf guns, bigger Nerf guns, and SCENE.
This year we were going to leave a note for St. Nicholas and spend all our Christmas money on a trip to Germany for the magical markets James and I watched in a Rick Steves’ holiday special two decades ago. Needless to say, that plan went kaput.
Last year’s categories look surprisingly prescient. Good news as I’ve truly been gripped by some sort of holiday paralysis. Probably comes from the fact that I’m convinced it’s April.
Survive
Thrive
Dive
&
Revive
SURVIVE
Still home for the holidays and locked down in a global pandemic— we’re all in survival mode. Wear your mask. Wash your hands. Keep your distance. Let’s make sure we all do in fact survive.
Electronic devices: If your kid’s burned through their iPad, you may have to break down and buy a new one. Headphones on the fritz from too much Zoom school? Now standard issue. Finished Netflix? Consider a subscription to Disney+, Amazon Prime, Hulu, or the awkwardly named Peacock.
Best Buy gift cards: While last year you found yourself feigning interest in spending Saturdays at GameStop, this year you’ve graduated to that magical world of incessant lights and caustic sounds, Best Buy. After they touch every light-up gaming keyboard, cruise by the sunglass display that plays music only you can hear. Bathe in hand sanitizer.
Rechargeable batteries and a battery organizer: Tomorrow I promise to share my one Christmas battery story. Until then, invest in some environmentally friendly batteries and this ingenious organizer. I can’t wait for the boys to unwrap it and give it back to me to use in our junk drawer.
Face wash: You may not have anticipated that this Christmas you’d be the mom of tweenagers, but it’s true. And your sons will undoubtedly be shocked when you tell them finding the perfect haircare products is a lifelong project. They’re still inconvenienced by the existence of both shampoo and conditioner. They’re also highly concerned about the origin of pimples, when you get them, and what to do about it. Head their concerns off at the pass and intro them to the benefits of a faithfully executed skincare routine.
THRIVE
Build a PC: I happen to know at least three people who think this is a great and fun idea and have successfully embarked on this ambitious and expensive project. This appeals to creative types like my eldest who has champagne tastes and sardine means. I recommend a site called pcpartpicker.com for compatibility, plus gift cards for Best Buy, plus a promissory note signed in your husband’s blood that he will oversee and complete this endeavor. All the cool kids pick the clear case and the lighted keyboard with rainbow lights.
Doorway chin-up bar: James got this for our laundry room door and well, it’s basically genius. No screws. Multiple handles. Good for challenging your weakling zombie zoom schoolboys. Note for the blog history books: This is the first time in my life I’ve been able to do an actual pull-up. I can do two. Bragging rights not included.
Ukulele hook: As luck would have it, fourth grade music class involves ukulele lessons with Mr. Kuch. While Nate got his first ukulele back when he was three and it was called his orange “guitar,” he’s now big enough to read music and play semi-real songs. He plays a convincing rendition of Jingle Bells and a less recognizable version of Yellow Submarine. This hook means his assigned instrument may actually survive to be turned back in at the end of the Zoom school year.
Bonsai and a bonsai tool kit: JJ has proven himself a reliable plant owner as evidenced by his truly remarkable caretaking of six lavender plants. Encourage your anime, green-thumbed enthusiast to embrace the meditative properties of bonsai while also feeding your own obsession with all things miniature.
DIVE
Chopsticks: Dive into… another $100 worth of sushi. While it may be true that sushi is “hand food” in Japan, having some reusable chopsticks while dining at home for 269 days and counting may be the thing that keeps us from devolving into belligerent peasants who eat with their fists. Also good for princely lunches of Trader Joe’s soup dumplings and Thai shrimp gyoza.
Hooded swim towels: Like last year’s bath towels, the boys swimming towels have become little capelets that no longer cover their tween backsides. Hoods are key as they protect against the age-old towel dragging elementary school crowd. Name personalization seems like a worthy splurge as we double down on independence building skills like public locker rooms and play dates. Or a future of some such things at some point we hope in the foreseeable future fingers and toes crossed.
REVIVE
Solo soccer trainer: Last year was so easy to find the right gifts for Sporty Spice. The world is geared toward presents for athletes. Especially Premier League Anglophiles. Here’s one more way to get him outside beyond his daily sprint to the chicken coop.
Books: And for your japanophile offspring with an insatiable hunger for Manga books and can still read after months of Zoom school, I recommend the My Hero Academia, Dr. Stone, and Attack of the Titans series. Seem to go through ’em like seaweed chips. We’re also three books into a great series about orphaned Chinese monk brothers with Cantonese animal names who are expert kung fu warriors called The Five Ancestors. Gripping.
Jacob’s Christmas list via text message:
Nate’s Christmas list was just repeatedly saying “nothing” into the world.
Coronavirus Day 246 — Jinx
We’ve spent most of the pandemic playing pick-up soccer with our All Star buddies on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Since the Pacheco goals are being held hostage, we transitioned to the Cal Poly turf fields. It’s quite the workout on full-sized fields.
Every week brings a new adventure. It’s amazing what can happen to you out in the screen-free world. The great unknown.
The first week, Eli-with-the-hat got knocked down by his mom and couldn’t get up. Unfortunately, it turned out he broke his arm. Fortunately, it was his own mom. So you know– It’s taboo to take out someone else’s kid, but your own? Totally fine! Happens all the time. So Eli-with-the-hat became Eli-with-the-cast.
The next week I was told there was a squirrel head covered in yellow jackets, in the middle of the field. I did my best not to make eye contact. The student “field monitor” removed it with his long-handled dust pan while also talking on his cell phone. Impressive.
On our next visit, a mama deer came running in a panic, through the parked cars. As we approached the field, a Bambi ran through the opening in the gate onto the big expanse of basketball courts. She slammed into the fence and started circling the enclosure. Nowhere to run. As we neared, she finally started making her way back toward the opening where she’d come in. The kids come running from the field and I have to call them off as they excitedly run toward a head-on Bambi Bambino collision. The Bambi comes running directly at us, through the opening, and escapes into the parking lot. Disaster averted.
What more could possibly happen? On our next visit the kids find a giant dead tarantula behind the soccer goal. It’s in several pieces.
This Thursday we had a great game under the lights. It’s now just the kids, the dads, and me. We call it “recess” and it really is the highlight of our week. The sunsets. The coaching. The chitchatting. The competition.
I was excited to see Eli had his cast off and exclaimed in recognition, “You got your cast off!”
Why does it feel like I just jinxed him? Oh 2020.
Coronavirus Day 244 — Tooth Fairy Overtime
Teeth have been falling out of Jacob’s head left and right, top and bottom. I don’t really remember this being a big part of sixth grade? He lost one of his lower teeth a few weeks ago, then the matching one on the other side fell out on the third. His look became very gopher. And then yesterday another upper tooth just fell right out with zero warning. I’m confident the Tooth Fairy responsibly wears a teeny tiny little mask when she visits.
Today we’re driving home after an exceptionally perfect morning of warm lemon scones with honey butter and an outdoor table in the sunshine, when the subject of wisdom teeth comes up. There were a lot of questions around why they’re called wisdom teeth and what they’re for and why you have to get them taken out. Coincidentally, we have our first orthodontist consultation on Monday. The boys were noticeably intrigued by the idea of missing school and subsisting on smoothies and mashed potatoes.
As I’m explaining how the surgery works I say something about how they knock you out.
And Nate asks, “With what, a stick?”
P.S.
According to Jake, we were all laughing so loudly that I missed the part where Nate said confused, “What?… A rock?”
Coronavirus Day 237 — The Longest Week
Saturday: It’s Halloween. As usual, we need groceries. I get into my car and head down to Trader Joe’s… la la la… right into a Trump Truck Train. There are flags. With guns. Long beards. Instead of our beautiful backroad, I’ve driven into the parking lot of a Monster Truck Rally. I feel physically ill. When I get home, I donate more money.
Monday: It’s a quiet work day of deep thought and strategic reflection. Haven’t had a Zoom-free day in months… almost eight to be exact.
Tuesday: A blissful half day planned. Incredibly grateful to have the day off to vote. I’ve already turned in my mail-in ballot and didn’t get selected to work the polls so, wellness it is. Workout. Socially-distanced coffee with a friend. A service at the spa. Doing my best to spend my money locally with our distressed small business customers.
We have soccer that evening. Six-year-old Xavi seems close to tears during most of the game. Tears seem close to the surface for most of us.
We watch the news. Nate notices so many things about the maps, the percentages, the numbers. His engagement is heartening. He falls asleep on the couch.
I toss and turn all night. Tortured by images of maps and states. Red and blue. Percentages. Counties. Stripes. Nebraska.
Wednesday: We wake-up. I’m so tired. More of the same. I snap at the boys. I knew it was going to take days, possibly longer– they’d prepared us for it. No one can concentrate. The workday drags. People in the know are hopeful. I’m nauseously optimistic.
Thursday: It’s a balmy evening at the expansive college turf fields. Over the peaks, the sunset is stunning. We run. We play. We soak up the only glimpse we have of our pre-pandemic life.
Friday: We’re still tired. We refresh our phones for answers. Nothing. For lunch I eat leftover meatloaf with maple syrup ketchup sauce. It’s a homey tribute to one of my most favorite states– Pennsylvania.
Saturday: I have a morning fitness class. Of course, during the fifteen minutes I’m in the car, I miss it. It’s done. The relief and hope are overwhelming. The end to four years of exhausting chaos.
I can’t wait to sleep soundly tonight.
Coronavirus Day 226 — Tolerance
Recently Nate was like, “Remember when you thought I couldn’t feel pain?”
And I was like, “Oh yeaaaaaaah…. remember that?”
It was last summer. Right before I got my new car. I went through a phase where I noticed Nate wasn’t responding to pain like most kids. He could be bleeding and he didn’t complain. He always had cuts and bruises and absolutely zero memory of the root cause. His entire torso was covered in poison oak and it wasn’t really a thing.
I started reflecting on times past. Like when he was little and stepped on a spiky petrified chestnut pod and had dozens of inch-long splinters sticking out of the bottom of his foot. I nearly fainted. It looked like the bottom of a pier. He didn’t cry as I pulled never-ending splinters out of his chubby little sole and renamed Alesia’s house Briarfoot Farm. And there was that time I had traipsed him around the Valley Fair Mall for hours while he had a triple-digit fever.
I couldn’t remember any clear times where Nate had cried in pain. Frustration? Sure. Indignation? Most def. Fear? Totally. But pain? Anyone? No one could recall. I mostly remembered kids running into him and then falling backward like they’d hit a brick wall. Toddler Nate had a sturdy build.
Is it possible we’d gone eight years and hadn’t noticed Nate has that rare pain disorder a’la Bruce Willis in Unbreakable? How bad a parent am I?
So I start asking around. Questioning people as their kids come running toward them wailing in pain. Then I ask my brother. And he recounts this story of gashing his shin and not even noticing until his son points out that blood is running into his shoe. He tells me Granddad has similar tales. I’m reminded of the labor and delivery nurse telling me I had a high tolerance for pain.
My research has led to three conclusions: Nate has probably just inherited some familial trait that either involves faulty pain receptors, a higher tolerance for pain, or a combo. When Nate is in fact down for the count, he’s taken a pretty hard hit.
And I’m probably not as bad a parent as I feared… probably.
Coronavirus Day 209 — The Bat Mobile
Sometimes I think that if the Rat Mobile had just held out a little longer, I could have had a kitchen instead of a car. Especially since my car is practically on blocks in the pandemic parking lot that is our driveway. Yeah… first world problems I know.
But then I think about how I most likely would have had to jump start it to flee a wildfire and I hate the idea of my panicky fingers using jumper cables in the middle of the night as a policeman blares warnings at me in my pajamas and flip flops. Oh the anxiety.
I do love how my new-to-me car has a cute little dashboard car graphic that tells me exactly who has taken their seatbelt off before I’ve parked. The back-up camera is a delight. The crystal gear shift is pure Cinderella. And the little Barbie-sized speed limit signs on the heads-up display? So cute. Plus I continue to marvel at the elimination of a gas cap so I don’t have to touch it– genius.
Today we were finishing up our twice weekly soccer “recess” at the Cal Poly turf fields and Jake proudly exclaims, “I’ve come up with the best name for a car dealership!”
“Oh yeah? What is it?”
“Scamborghini,” he says, arms sweeping wide.
“Scamborghini? That sounds like a terrible place to buy a car!”
“Hmmm, maybe…”
“I actually think that’s what we’ll name your first junker car– the Scamborghiiiiiiniiii…. I can see it now.”
Or we can call it the Rat Mobile?
Coronavirus Day 198 — Transitions
Over the past week the unbearably smoky air has cleared, at least temporarily, and it’s beginning to feel like fall. On Monday, James drove home to Merced to help Nonna, Auntie Erin, and Uncle Brett move Papa into his new place. It’s an indescribably hard transition surrounded by, understandably, many emotions.
James described Papa’s new apartment as being a bit like our first place in Mountain View with a small kitchenette, living area, and bedroom. Hopefully without the upstairs neighbor with a drum set. Downstairs, there is a cozy room with a fireplace, a game room, a dining room, and other helpful amenities. While I’m sure it’ll take some time for everyone to settle-in to the change, Papa seems to be doing well. Unlike the rest of us, he got a smart haircut on his second day. It was an optimistic sign they were serving spaghetti, garlic bread, and ice cream on the very first night.
Just like his grandson, Jacob, those are Papa’s absolute favorites.
Coronavirus Day 191 — Staffing
Last night we’re driving home and Jacob points out the Christian’s Mattress Xpress.
“I don’t understand. How can they be family-owned and operated since 1992 and they have like, five stores? How many people do they have in their family?”
I love that you analyze these things.