Newness

Today I spent an hour working one of my all time favorite piano pieces from the movie Amelie. Let me pause here a moment to mention that I do not play the piano, cannot read music and cannot carry a tune but I am on a personal quest to learn this song even if it takes me the rest of my life. YouTube has a version that has been dumbed down enough for even the likes of me to follow. With the laptop perched on the piano and an earbud in my ear, I watched the solitary fingers of the phantom piano player over and over and over while listening to the notes and then I began play. While plunking along I can actually feel my brain sparking up in dark, quiet regions, probably the same regions built up like the Hulk in the brain of my musician husband. My fingers creep around on the keys like crabs on a hot, sandy beach. They are not nimble and elegant. They are clunky and awkward but the reward of actually playing a series of notes and creating this amazing melody on my own is such a thrill. I am, for now, hooked on this and will continue to torture those around me in my efforts to prevail.

I rearranged my son’s room while he was in school this afternoon. As a child I always loved coming home to a setting such as this when my mom, finally fed up to here and here and here with my clutter and chaos, took charge and somehow made me feel like we had actually moved to a completely different house. All of my toys would seem almost new again and, oooooh, look at my bed over therrrrreeeee! But W is kind of a control freak, like me. He likes his things just so. He warns us to not touch his monster trucks or disturb the circle of cars he has made the whole length of the couch. I tried to showcase his toys in a way he’d really appreciate the new arrangement (but for the love of jeebus why does just about every boy toy have to be 3” long?). I prayed that he wouldn’t totally spaz out and refuse to re-enter his domain. It was a possibility. It has happened before. I was, however, pleasantly surprised when he came into his room after school, gasped and said, “It’s great!” His lovely dimples were the ultimate proof.

We All Live In A Yellow Submarine

In our household I try to make an effort to speak kindly, to add lilts in my voice to convey friendliness and interest because W is always listening and learning. When my nerves are frayed and I’m about to pack my bags and take advantage of one of those Southwest Airlines “Wanna get away?” promos I really have to make the effort to be nice. I grit my teeth and say the second thing that comes to mind, not the first because the first is cranky, mean, ugly. I have noticed lately since the little fam has been cohabitating in such close and frequent proximity that the Hubs has been expressing himself sweetly and adding the lilt, too, and no longer sounding like his interrupted, mildly interested self. I listen to him talking to W and smile to myself knowing we are all trying our best in this new and unfamiliar situation of constant family-ness. Score one for the home team.

On a daily basis I am entertained by W’s three-year-old dialogue and imagination. His little brain is currently being fed by his all time favorite movie Yellow Submarine. He started watching it on YouTube this summer and then Santa brought him a discontinued copy via Russia (totally pirated and copied it seems). He will watch it three times a day if I allow and there are many random moments where he breaks out in to a Beatles tune from the soundtrack. One recent morning on the way to school and while waiting at a light I hear a small voice in the backseat sing, “All the lonely people. Where do they all come from?” Was very poignant since it’s a corner where the homeless hang and people are waiting on the bus. He usually can’t go from one room to the other without a the soundtrack sung at the top of his lungs…All You Need Is Wub (complete with his hand shaped like a gun minus the trigger and waving around like in the film), Yellow Submarine and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Cwub Band. He still sings Bad To The Bone, too, and it goes something like this…

“On the day I was born, a saw gadder ‘round, gage a white window, joy they bound, dista bow, see da (something, something), they could tell right away-yah I was bad to da bone, bbbbbbbaaauud…” and so on. It’s quite funny. Thank jeebus he’s forgotten about Who Let The Dogs Out. Loathe that song

His curiosities are what leave me completely in stitches. And he won’t let you get away without answering him. Interrogations usually go something like this…

“Mommy, do cats pee outside…yes or no?”
“Mommy, are cookies treats…yes or no?”

So you have to answer or the questioning never ends. The other day this was asked…

Him: “Mommy, what’s guff?”
Me: “Hmmmm…it means attitude” (I know! Lame answer but he caught me off guard.)
Him: “It means you’re wild.” (He has said in the past that Gogo, his grandma, gives him guff. Yep, she’s pretty wild.)

Good times in the Chaos household. It’s dang cold out today which really confuses things since it was in the 80’s on Sunday. Tonight’s menu is my favorite turkey chili recipe with unsweetened chocolate and cinnamon. Yes, it totally rules. The last batch of peanut butter “thigh thickening” cookies are in the oven, too. It smells like Mrs. Field’s up in here. Oh, and I’m on day 5 of the “no alcohol allowed” wagon ride. Yippee! Am going to totally blow it when I fall off on Jan. 11th at a formal little dinner we’re attending. Oh yes, I am.