of diapers and relatives

hey kids!

So, tomorrow I embark on a journey to my home away from home - my beloved little college town in the mountains of Virginia. But instead of going to see friends and revisit my old haunts and eat as much of my old favorite food as is physically possible in the matter of a couple of days (my favorite food places there are either sandwich places, or the place that mixes lots of unhealthy things in your frozen yogurt - but it's still yogurt so you feel healthy! How can one little place have several better sandwich places than the big place I live in now? It's just not right.)
Where was I? Oh yeah, instead of it being all me, me, me this weekend, I will be going for the purpose of seeing my brother get married. (But you can bet that in between the 2 breakfasts, 1 lunch, and 2 dinners that are already planned for me, I'll be finding a time to stuff down some multi-toppinged yogurt.)

Now, this is my baby brother. Do any of you out there know what I mean? My sister was my little sister. She tagged along after me, spied on me, told on me, and we generally tried to drive each other as crazy as possible. But my brother was the baby. I didn't compete with him like I did with my sister* - I cared for him. I taught him how to swing a baseball bat, how to identify who is a boy and who is a "gir", I picked him up out of his crib and carried him down the stairs in his dinosaur pajamas, and I changed that boy's diapers. And I wanted to make sure I announced that to the world, because nothing makes him more uncomfortable than for me to make a reference to changing his diapers. (This is why I do it.)
Oh, and once, when I was driving around my sister and her friend and their little 7th grade boyfriends, and those little 4-foot tall boys started making fun of my brother? I was instantly transformed from the extremely cool 16-year-old that I was into a very uncool adult mama-bear type when I pulled the car over on the side of a road, slowly turned around, barely containing my rage, and told those boys to get out and walk. I think it was the giggling of the girls that drove me over the edge.

*We did compete some when he got older... like the time he thought that just because he had grown taller than me while I was away at college meant that he could beat me at a game of around the world. One thing I must not have taught him was how to lose graciously.

Anyway, let's get back to this diapers thing. (Because that would make him happy - and I want to make him happy during his wedding week.) I don't think I actually changed his diapers that much, because I only had to do it when I was babysitting, and half the time when I was babysitting? I made my sister do it. Well, less than half the time really - I was nice. I only got her to do it when they were the stinky kind. And I really didn't even have to make her do it, I just had to ask (/order) and she went to work. I realize now that she must have been 5 or 6 years old, but hey, she was always good at that stuff! And she LOVED babies and anything to do with babies. She would have been perfectly happy lovin' on babies all day long, while I much preferred to be on the couch watching cartoons. And which one of us now has their own baby's diapers to change and needed the practice anyway? She does! I hope she appreciates the preparation I gave her.

At some point in my life I gained a little perspective on these diaper changing memories and realized, "wait a minute... if I was changing his diapers... then I couldn't have been more than 8 or 9 years old..." When I asked my mom if she was indeed leaving me in charge of my younger siblings at this age, she responded with, "Well, you were very mature for your age."
If that's true, I must be making it up for it now.

Let's take a look and see. I got the honor of organizing old photos that my parents found for the ole' rehearsal dinner slide show, so I have some recently scanned in family portraits here:



Why yes, I do look mature. No white paint-splattered jeans for me - I've grown beyond fashion. Just dress me in some sensible blue, please. And make sure my Izod shirt is extra tight.

What about at this age?



I don't know.... matching bows in the hair doesn't much convey maturity... maybe it could say, "I'm organized and color coordinated." But most likely it says, "My mommy does my hair."
Well, we all lived.

Believe it or not, none of this is what I meant to get to when beginning this post. "But how can somehow write so much about nothing?", you ask. I know, I'm talented. And you probably stopped reading long ago, anyway.

Here's what I was getting to: As excited as I am about seeing my extended family this weekend at the wedding (and I am excited about that), there are a few things I'd like not to be said to me this weekend. Or rather, a few things that I'd like not said again.

Here are some examples:

1) Aunt: "I pray every night that you'll find a good man!"
This one was actually wouldn't have been so bad, if it had not been shouted from a considerable distance. (And if she had not had such a look of desperation.)

2) Uncle: "So, how are things going up there?"
me: Start rambling excitedly on how busy work is, and how I get to help sue the tobacco companies and see all their hidden paperwork, and what an exciting place D.C. is, trips I am taking, etc.
Uncle: (cutting me off, rather abruptly) "mmhm, but what else is going on up there? They got them any boys up there in Virginy? Because, you're not so young anymore, you know. No, (low whistling sound), you're getting up there!"
I was 22, maybe 23. This was nearly 10 years ago. Not good.

3) Aunt, to my cousin, her son, who is my age: "What about Drew for Jennifer?"
cousin: "No, mom, he has a girlfriend."
Aunt: "Well what about Ethan?"
cousin: "He just got engaged."
Aunt: "What about Tom then?"
cousin: "No, that's a bad idea. He's not so good."
Aunt: "Hmm. Well. It's too bad you two are cousins."
cousin (horrified): "Mom!"
Aunt: "Well I'm just saying, I'd love to have Jennifer for a daughter-in-law. If she wasn't already my niece."
cousin, again: "Mom!"
Aunt: "What? I'm just saying that you're both great catches. Tell Jennifer she's a great catch. Tell her."
cousin walks away in disgust.
She brought it back up again later that night, and it just continued to decline from there.

I'm afraid that a wedding will be just the type of thing to bring on this behavior. Especially when it's the wedding of one's baby brother.
Well, wish me luck!

Composition Challenge - Want vs. Need

I've never done one of these composition challenges from Little White Liar before, but seeing as how there's very little compositioning in this one, I think I can handle it.

Here's how it goes:
Make a list of 5-10 things you want. Make them things you personally want for you (no Miss America "World Peace" shenanigans). Then think of one thing you need. You can't already have it, because really, who do you think you are? Just rubbing your self-contentment in everyone's gaping life-holes.

I want:

1) A personal assistant to come organize all of my crap in these moving boxes for me. And even though there appears to be nowhere for it to possibly go, she (or he, yes I think maybe he...) will magically find the room for it. You know that huge bin that's full of nothing but photographs? You can start with that. Don't forget the captions when you put them in books.

2) For Coca-Cola to be good for me.

3) To be able to slow down time. (Especially the aging process.)

4) The gift of teleportation. Because I have a large percentage of my friends living far away, and it would really be more convenient for me this way - if I could just pop in on them whenever I want to - even if it's just for an afternoon. I'd also need for them to be able to use this gift too, so that they can come see me, and so that we can actually get together more than two at a time. And now that my sister and niece are moving away, I want this more than ever. How am I supposed to give the world the gift of molding this young girl into another me if I'm not around? So one of you smart people get started on this invention, ok?
I read this same idea over here, and even though it's very copy-worthy, I have actually expressed this wish before. If I hadn't of already thought of it, I probably would have copied it anyway. (Brilliant minds, they think alike.)

5. The perfect living arrangement. That somehow won't threaten me with bankruptcy.

6. Fewer regrets.

7. A job that seems worth all the time I put into it.

8. A sense of direction. (And I don't just mean direction in my life, although that would be a good one, too - I mean I don't want to get lost in my own home town. Or my own neighborhood. Or in my own workplace.)

9. To be able to sing. Really really well.

10. Longer falls and springs and shorter summers. (I sweat a lot. It's not pretty.)

I need:

1) purpose

ball o' stress

I've been trying to make a big decision this week, and as a result I've been feeling a wee bit tense. In fact, if it weren't for my friend the tylenol p.m., I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have slept at all Sunday night. The question is: where to live next? To continue to rent, or to step into the adult world of ownership. To lapse back into the college house with the big front porch and the tight living quarters, or to have my own neat little space. To never have time to myself or to always have time to myself. To have to move again in a year (and I hate moving), or to feel trapped into one place. To live on the cheap and always have money to buy crappy food or a pretty dress, or a spur of the moment plane ticket just cause I want to, or to be so poor that I might have to sometimes pretend not to be hungry when I go out to eat (as if anyone would believe that).
On one hand I have people telling me there will never be a better time to buy, and on the other I have more than one friend telling me that they're afraid I'll be sad and lonely on my own. I kinda thought I'd like to be on my own... but wait - would I be? Do they know better than I do?
It's a tough life for the indecisive.

So after a night of mind-racing thought processes on this, of pretty much making up my mind that I was going to go with the group house, I talked it over Monday with my favorite co-worker. I told her how I would have to rent a storage unit, because there would be VERY little space for me in this house, and my other worries over it - and the buying, too. She gave it some serious thought, and then asked me this question: "These girls you could live with? They know other people?"
"Yes. I think they would be fun to live with."
"Then, I think you should live with them. Then you find a husband. Because then they have people (here you spread your fingers out and mash together repeatedly, to represent people coming together) - you know, and more people, and then you find husband! You have better chance find husband this way. You find him then you go buy!."
ah. Yes. That should have been my first thought. A year to find a husband among their friends to buy me a house - isn't that maybe just a little bit much to count on? Not to mention a lot of pressure for one year.

She has expressed confusion about my friends and family on more than one occasion, by the way. It goes like this: "Back in China, we introduce my sister someone we think is nice. Then she and that boy marry. We always do like that. I don't understand why your parents not find husband for you??!" Genuine confusion. Anyway. The weird thing is, instead of thinking, "Ah, yes, this would be a nice social opportunity!" it was shortly after that that I made up my mind I was going to buy and be on my own! This "do the oppostite of what someone tells you to do" mentality I have really can't always be good for me. But that's another problem.
So yeah, I was just as sure I would buy as I had been that I would rent the night before. Until my dad fired some questions at me that night and scared me back into indecision. Where I still remain. At this point, my brain has reached it's maximum attendance level, and is seeking refuge by looking for other things with which to occupy itself. For example: "hmm... I'm in a wedding in 3 weeks, how am I going to wear my hair? If I try to do it myself it will be a summer frizz-ball, maybe I should do some internet searches for salons in the area! Yes, that sounds like the best way to use my time!"
I have been told by coaches and teachers from my youth that I was an oddly highly focused child. What happened?