Category: Uncategorized

Date: 9/15/04
To: Emily
From: Jenny
Subj: Water works

Hi Cousin. How are you? I’ve got quite a busy day at work today. We have interviews solid until 1 p.m. but I am hoping one will go short so I can get a pumping break! Joshua didn’t eat for beans this a.m. so I am pretty full. Old lefty is about to EXPLODE.

I also have to pee. Yikes! I could be dripping fluid from everywhere pretty soon.

Editor’s note: We used to talk about normal things… I swear.

Let me preface this post by saying matter-of-factly that I am a wimp. I’m not tough, or strong, or stoic. I’m wimpy! I don’t like pain. I don’t have a high pain “tolerance” or “threshold”. That being said, I’ve had two c-sections and an appendectomy, so I have experienced real, unexaggerated, “this-just-hurts” pain.

I experienced some of that variety this past Saturday night. I had just put Sophie to bed, and I was coming down the stairs at our house and somehow instead of catching the doorknob (we have a door that closes off the 2nd floor of our house. Very useful with children.), I caught the door frame and somehow, in some flukey way, a splinter rammed itself under the fingernail of my left index finger.

I screamed bloody murder. It hurt so bad. I stood there paralyzed, trying to figure out what hurt so bad and what had happened to me, while Bobby stood on the other side of the door yelling, “What’s wrong, what happened?” I was still paralyzed by the pain so he whipped the door open and saw me standing there holding my hand like an idiot. He gingerly took my hand and examined the damage.

“Oh geez,” he said, “it got you good.”
“What’s wrong, what’s wrong what’s wrong, mama?” Joshua asked as he circled me curiously.

Part of the splinter was sticking out above my nail bed. Bobby quickly ascertained that we would need some tweezers, so he and Joshua headed to Walgreen’s. By this time it was about 9:30 p.m. so they had to hustle. They returned with tweezers and a very large Hershey bar for me. I’d been icing my finger as best I could to numb it up for the extraction, but it hurt too bad to put the ice on top of the nail. I braced myself as Bobby got ready to use the tweezers. Joshua watched with great interest and wonder as Bobby got started. Gingerly he grasped the end of the splinter between the tweezers. I took a deep breath. He pulled…and it broke off. The tip of the splinter broke off and the rest of it remained embedded under my nail. Undeterred, Bobby kept digging. It hurt so bad. I cried some more. Joshua paced nervously.

“I’m gonna have to go back to Walgreen’s and get sharper tweezers.” Sharper tweezers?? Why didn’t he come home with the sharpest pair in the first place? There was no time to argue. It was 9:50. My finger hurt like hell.

“GO!” I said.

I went to the freezer and got a big ice pack. I went back to the table and took off a big hunk of that Hershey bar.

Bobby came back. He had “sharper” tweezers, all right. They were basically tweezers with two needles on the ends. I gave him my left hand and held the ice pack between my teeth. It hurt so bad I knew I was going to need to bite down. He started digging. I started biting. My finger started bleeding.

And then….”Got it.”

Relief! I mean it still hurt, but the lessening of pain was immediate. And there was no huge splinter under my nail anymore!

“Thank you!” I sighed as I rested my forehead on the table. “I feel like I just birthed a third child.”

By this time it was 10:30. My husband-turned-surgeon, curious three-year-old and I were all exhausted. My finger still throbbed so I took three ibuprofen, a Tylenol PM, and an additional huge hunk of Hershey bar and fell into bed.

So here’s what I learned: Make sure to get the doorknob on the first try, make sure to get the sharpest pair of tweezers the store has available, and of course Hershey bars fix everything. Oh wait, I already knew that – but who knew my husband was so good with a pair of tweezers? With two kiddos, I gotta believe that skill is going to come in handy again one day.

Intellectually I know that it’s a good thing my daughter is so inquisitive… but sometimes it still drives me nuts.

For example, every night when we’re reading a book before bed, she has to ask me about 29 questions about what’s happening on each and every page of the book before we can move on.

The worst part is that she knows what’s going on, she is just stalling, trying to make story time last as long as humanly possible. This gets on my every last nerve, because by this time, all I want to do is go to bed.

Go with me, if you will, to Kate’s room on any given night (a room, I might add, painted in “Bonita Berry,” otherwise known as the color of Dora’s shirt). Tonight we’re reading “Olivia,” one of our favorites.

This is how it goes.

Me: This is Olivia. She is good at lots of things.
Kate: What’s she doing, Mommy?
Me: She’s singing. She is very good at wearing people out. She even wears herself out.
Kate: Why is she laying down?
Me: Because she wore herself out. Olivia has a little brother named Ian. He is always copying.
Kate: Why is she all grown up?
Me: She’s not, she’s just wearing her mommy’s make-up.
Kate: Why is Ian always copying?
Me: Because he wants to be like Olivia. Sometimes Ian just won’t leave her alone, so Olivia has to be firm.
Kate: Why does she have to be firm?
Me: Because Ian won’t leave her alone. Olivia lives with her mother, her father, her brother, her dog, Perry, and Edwin the cat. (Here I point to each character because I already know she’s going to ask me which one is which, even though it is blatantly obvious).
Me: In the morning, after she gets up, and moves the cat…
Kate: Why does she move the cat?
Me: Because he’s in her way. And brushes her teeth, and combs her ears, and moves the cat,
Kate: Combs her ears! That’s silly.
Me: Olivia gets dressed. She has to try on everything.
Kate: Mommy, why is she wearing that dress?
Me: I don’t know!
Me: On sunny days… (at this point we usually get through a page or two, so I will spare you the details. I’m guessing half of you could recite it anyway). When her mother sees she’s had enough, they go home.
Kate: Why is she pink?
Me: That’s what happens if you don’t wear sunscreen.
Kate: I want to be pink.
Me: Then don’t wear sunscreen. On rainy days, Olivia likes to go the museum. She heads straight for her favorite painting.
Kate: Mommy, it’s PICTURE. Why isn’t Ian paying attention?
Me: Because he’s bored. Art museums are boring. (Ok, I don’t really say that.) Olivia looks at it for a long time. What could she be thinking?
Kate: Mommy, why is Ian so small?
Me: Because he’s far away. But there is one picture (I like to mess with her)…
Kate: It’s PAINTING.
Me: … that Olivia just doesn’t get. “I could do that in about five minutes,” she says to her mother. As soon as she gets home she gives it a try.
Kate: Let’s see if it looks the same (flipping back and forth). Nope, this one’s got red in it.
Me: Time out.
Kate: Why did she get time out?
Me: Because she painted on the walls. After a nice bath, and a nice dinner, it’s time for bed. But of course Olivia’s not at all sleepy… When they’re finished reading, Olivia’s mother gives her a kiss and says, “You know, you really wear me out. But I love you anyway.” And Olivia gives her a kiss back and says, “I love you anyway, too.”

We’re finally done. It’s just shy of midnight.

Ugh. If you think this is bad, you should see us trying to decide which of the 101 Dalmations is which. That is really fun.

And the best thing she’s learned from Olivia? Negotiating about how many books to read each night. Up until this book came along, she thought “Thou shall read only one book per night” was one of the Ten Commandments. Now we play “Let’s Make a Deal.”

Kate, you really wear me out. But I love you anyway.