Milzzz

Football Sunday

2007-11-04T19:46:00.000-06:00

Hopefully, I'll post a few pictures from our New York trip this past week some time in 2007, but this bit of heartwarming cuteness from a week ago should serve as a nibble.

Lech Lecha/Why Circumcise

2007-11-04T19:22:00.000-06:00

Such a tardy poster, am I. Even this is a couple weeks old, but I figure better late than never since I have had a lot of requests for it. Comments welcome.

A friend’s father was born in the Ukraine in the nineteen-forties. After his birth, a mohel traveled over a hundred war torn miles, primarily on foot, to perform his brit milah. When his son was born in the nineteen-seventies, the Soviet regime prohibited circumcision, like the Greeks, Romans, Spaniards and Nazis before them. When the family arrived in the United States during the first big wave of Soviet Jewish emigration, the first thing they did, before finding work or a place to settle, was ensure that their three year old son was circumcised and entered into the brit.

At a bris I recently attended someone was enquiring why we, as modern and enlightened Jews, continue the seemingly antiquated body modification ritual of circumcision. After all the requisite jokes and innuendos, as well as citing virtues both medical and aesthetic, consensus was reached that we undoubtedly should continue, yet the general reasoning offered was intellectually unsatisfying. Reason aside, the suggestion of overturning the rite of circumcision struck me on a visceral level; this wasn’t a public admission of working on Saturday or a taste for Prosciutto, this was anarchy.

Many educated Jews in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries contended that circumcision was a vestige of clannishness that isolated us from enlightened society, so this person was far from the first Jew in history to question the validity of this act. Personally, I was used to fielding questions regarding the barbarity of circumcision from non-Jews. Since answering, “Because God told us to,” does not hold much weight in a secular argument, I typically reverted to touting the medical benefits, with the World Health Organization now in my corner, as well as religious freedom of expression. Arguing the point of circumcision is sanitation or a reduction in sexually transmitted diseases is like claiming the origin of kashrut is a precautionary measure against trichinosis and bad oysters. It may be a fortuitous side-affect that makes us say, “See how smart and prescient we are!” but it certainly misses the point. If we are not backed up by the central idea of the Torah, that God and Jews are connected through a covenantal relationship, our cultural markers, both real and imagined, will fizzle out completely in a few generations. Circumcision is about the covenant between us and God and, without honoring our side of the bargain, there is no covenant. Without a covenant, no Jews.

Throughout our history, circumcision has been a mark of the Jewish will to survive, its discontinuation a signal of assimilation. During the Babylonian exile, circumcision, Shabbat and Passover became the central rituals of Judaism as you can observe these in the home, without a Temple, without a high priest, heck, without even a rabbi. Unlike Shabbat, circumcision is not an innovation of Judaism. It was prevalent in the ancient Near East and performed by the majority of neighboring tribes, excluding the Philistines. It is still practiced by diverse cultures throughout the world. Muslims do it, Coptic Christians do it, even some Pacific Islanders and isolated Aborigines do it. There are three central anthropological approaches to the rite of circumcision: predominantly, as a sexual male rite of passage from childhood into adulthood; second, for those with a psychoanalytical bent, as an expression of the fear of castration; or, in our case, as a rite of child initiation, the initial male experience which a newborn undergoes. Shifting the practice away from adolescence – the predominant practice in Abraham’s time – and into infancy reposits the emphasis from sexual to spiritual.

Judaism does not neglect ascribing sexual meaning to act of circumcision. In his Guide to the Perplexed, Maimonides states that one of the goals of circumcision is to limit sexual intercourse, to weaken the organ as far as possible and thus cause man to be moderate. What’s a plus for Maimonides is a minus for those with different priorities. I had an acting teacher, not Jewish, who was still harboring resentment against his parents forty-some years later for circumcising him and potentially reducing his coital pleasure. Scientific research supports both sides of the debate, with most stating little or no effect on enjoyment. Having read my share of Philip Roth, I am really not too concerned about the satisfaction or the sexual repleteness of the Jewish male.

Circumcision functions to perfect man’s moral shortcomings not, as Maimonides suggests, by physically counteracting excessive lust but by acting as a mnemonic device, a spiritual prophylactic. Like the mezuzah, tallit and tefillin, obeying one commandment functions as a synecdoche of all the miztvot. The rabbis assert that circumcision is a reminder of self-control at the very root of sin and tell a midrash of King David at the bathhouse, stripped of all religious accoutrements but guarded from sinning by the seal of God’s covenant in his flesh; circumcision as a last minute warning before leaping into sexual sin. Although Rashi claims that Joseph was on the verge of succumbing to Mrs. Potiphar until the image of Jacob appeared before him, I like to think the sign of the covenant was his buzz kill.

Sexual abandon implies abandonment of morals, not just inhibitions. Sexual urges unchecked, or played outside of the contained environment of a healthy relationship, produce loss of self-control. In a culture that rarely leaves anything to the imagination, the control symbolized by circumcision might feel overly restricting or unfairly limiting. Let’s face it, Judaism is all about control, regulating the divide between the sacred and the profane. Not ignoring the yatzer ha’ra – or we would have a celibate class – but channeling it purposefully. Sometimes we feel the fences may be too high or, in the case of the fundamentalist strains of our religion, lack adequate ingress and egress or fail to provide healthy ventilation, but they are there to create boundaries and order in the universe. The commandment to circumcise and the promise that the covenant will continue through Isaac’s progeny follows the blessing of Ishamael to be a wild ass of a man. The inheritors of God’s law are different, not wild, but tame and lawful. We are to evolve beyond our natural state and submit to a higher ideal than survival and base urges.

Circumcision is Abraham and his descendant’s role in the covenant that enables the promise of fertility, of continuation to this very day. The Hebrew term “orlah/foreskin” represents an obstacle to the proper functioning of an organ: Moses calls his stutter the foreskin on his lips, the Israelites in the desert are asked to remove the foreskin of their hearts, Jeremiah’s audience is unable to receive his prophetic message because of the foreskin on their ears. If circumcision and continuation are inextricably linked then, symbolically, the male foreskin is an impediment to God’s plan for us to be a nation apart, to be partners in God’s work. The act obtains its value not from the physical operation but the meaning and feeling behind it.

Other than diminished sexual pleasure, detractors argue for leaving the body how it is. Asked, “If circumcision is so beloved of God, why was the mark of circumcision not given to Adam at his creation?” Rabbi Judah responded, “Almost everything that was created during the six days of creation needs finishing – even man.” A Roman governor asked Rabbi Akiva why Jews are circumcised. He replied that the works of humans are more beautiful than those of God, and compared the respective beauty of loaves of bread to ears of grain, woven garments to stalks of flax. God gives us the raw materials, it is up to us to make something of them. We are partners with God in creation, entrusted with perfecting the world in which God created us. The world was created in seven days, on the eighth day we take over.

When God appears to Abraham in a vision and promises him the land he asks, “O Lord God, how shall I know I am to possess it?” God answers by requesting a series of sacrifices that mirror a royal land-grant treaty. In it, the sacrifices are cut in two – the first brit in this parsha. Cutting animals in Mesopotamian sources warned that the violator of the treaty would be sliced in half, as criminals were. More metaphorically, those who violate a promise are cut in two emotionally: the half that broke the promise and the half that wishes they never did. By not cutting in good faith, one is cut off from the covenant, the land and the people.

In the covenant with Noah God asks nothing of man. With Abraham going forth, humanity is now ready for a reciprocal partnership and God needs a piece of us to make the covenant manifest. It has to be something dramatic and permanent, but something we ultimately do not need to function properly and healthily. Unlike body modification rituals in other cultures, with tattooing on the lower end of the pain scale on a litany of initiation rites too gruesome even to mention, the emphasis is not on proving faith by withstanding pain. Religious debates and medical studies disagree as to the degree of pain felt by a newborn, pain is an unfortunate side-affect, not the central part of the experience. There is no Talmudic objection should parents wish for a local anesthetic, although it is usually not required as a mohel’s extensive training focuses on exactness, speed and minimizing pain. It is heartbreaking listening to cries during routine shots, yet most parents do not hesitate to vaccinate their children since the pain of a needle is much less than the pain of tuberculosis. If I ever have a son I am sure I will be a bloody wreck at his bris, despite anecdotal evidence of babies who barely peep. Like hundreds of generations before me, I will steel myself knowing this spiritual vaccination is the portal through which my child joins an everlasting covenant.

On the subject of children, the birth of Isaac, through whom God’s part in the pact manifests, is foretold in conjunction with the commandment for circumcision. Although Isaac himself has not yet appeared, let’s flash forward to the akedah. The ambiguity of Abraham’s struggle between religious faith and parental love is a topic for next week; today, I am going to propose that Abraham was testing God as much as God was testing him. In Lech Lecha, God promises to make him a mighty nation through this son, in Vayera God sets the ultimate trial because showing is stronger than telling. The outcome of the sacrifice of Isaac is the proof in the covenantal pudding that God is not going to exact an additional price in worship, other than the one to which both parties agreed. To a certain extent, Jewish circumcision replaces the cult of human sacrifice. When your son's foreskin is removed, you should be thanking God that this is all the sacrifice that is demanded.

I think part of what makes circumcision’s detractors vehement is the involvement of blood. Despite our culture’s predilection for violent entertainment and our willingness to go under the knife merely for cosmetic purposes, the notion that blood is the key element in a holy act is anathema to the modern age – it sounds a bit like voodoo. With all our technological and medical progress, we like to dismiss anything that taps into our primal nature as outmoded, a connection which we fancy we have outgrown, as if something primitive holds no truth, or that its truth is somehow embarrassing. An atheist can view blood from merely a scientific perspective, but for those who believe that there is more to life than the syntax of things know in their hearts that the blood in our veins does more than just carry around oxygen and nutrients and remove waste. For the poets and the pious, blood is the ultimate mystical substance and most religious systems acknowledge this. From the sacrifices and Temple purification rituals we no longer perform to family purity laws and not consuming animal blood that we still practice, these rites focus on blood, the essence of life. Even Christianity which, borrowing our bible, overturned all of these practices, recognized the crucial mystical power of blood rituals and placed the Eucharist and the blood of Christ at the center of their faith. The metaphysical importance of blood is summed up simply by Joss Whedon, “It has always got to be blood. Blood is life. It’s what keeps you going. Makes you warm. Makes you hard. Makes you not dead.” Blood brothers, blood oath, signing in blood – these put your heart where your mouth is, open your soul, and seal an unbreakable deal.

A final objection brought up by the provocateur behind this drash was that the exclusion of women was another indication of circumcision’s obsoleteness and, with this, the topic of female circumcision was broached. Frankly, I find the lack of female circumcision in Judaism an expression of divine kindness rather than exclusion. Unlike the male counterpart which, as surgical procedures go, is quite minor and definitely outpatient, female circumcision is excruciating, without any medical benefits and destroys sexual pleasure.

I am sure patriarchy has something to do with this omission, though perhaps not inasmuch that women do not count but in the sense that women do not require a visible sign of the covenant, whether because of the old chestnut that we are closer to God or, staying in the home, we are not in a position necessary to prove it to outsiders. The tangential inclusion via God blessing Sarah so that she shall give rise to nations implies that women enter a covenant through childbirth – a far more bloody affair than circumcision. This would exclude women unable or uninterested in having children and, although childbirth was one of the most spiritual and certainly the most primal experience I have undergone, I can not subscribe to the idea of women as vessels who are only fulfilled and tied to God through their reproductive capacity.

For those who find matrilineal descent or that we all stood at Sinai is not enough, or find the notion that women were keepers of hearth and home anachronistic or offensive, I think creating equality by doing away with male circumcision is not the answer, but rather creating a meaningful ritual that emulates the power, mystery and sentiment of the brit milah, the ultimate expression of our faith in God. When our daughter was born, it was of paramount importance that we held a brit bat for her – not just a naming or a simchat bat, since our joy was not a substitute for entering our child into a covenant, for committing her to the faith of Sarah and Abraham and into a relationship with God.

Limericks Calling

2007-09-27T09:29:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Tony for tuning me into the lyrics as limericks contest and the guy who did all of London Calling. This made my day.

Summer Sabbatical Cessation

2007-09-23T22:18:00.000-05:00

Is my summer sabbatical ceasing? Tune in soon for this and other alliterative adventures of Mila Mommy Magnifica.

Tasty toes

2007-09-23T22:17:00.000-05:00

L'shana tova!

2007-09-23T22:11:00.000-05:00

You looking at me?/Big hair day

2007-08-20T18:55:00.000-05:00

Belated Birthday Beauty

2007-08-20T18:38:00.000-05:00

Mommy's busy, you wanna mess?

2007-08-20T18:36:00.000-05:00

Gone Bloody Fishing

2007-07-16T22:23:00.000-05:00

(Far from) Free Parking

2007-06-20T19:39:00.000-05:00

Our house now has off-street parking! After a two year battle, the private alley is easemented (love that verbification) and we have a parking pad in our yard. We did a one-car gravel pad -- we wanted to lose as little of our yard as possible and liked the removability of gravel for re-sale value, you know, in case the next owner cares about cars and wants to build a garage or expand the pad.

Now our yard is oddly shaped. We are annexing the end of the private alley into our yard. It is our land and no one needs it for ingress or egress. The fencing contractor will build-in a storage bench, two planters and two short benches to turn the space into a conversation pit or, as I like to call it, a make-out nook. We are also fencing in our front yard, along with our three ajoining neighbors (no return between our houses), to keep out the trash and dog crap.

Most of my free time has been spent gardening these past weekends, hence the hush. That, and our Spring Dance Card has been overbooked. Bloody social whirwind. No room to squeeze in so much as a foxtrot on the blog. We are going up to Michigan for a long weekend, so I'll bring Jasper (my computer. Yeah, I named my computer, wanna mess?!) and write up a gob of stuff -- and perhaps post a slew of glossies of a certain baby doll -- to compensate for my recent poor showing. Promises, promises.

Sittable

2007-06-07T10:51:00.000-05:00

Yelena was successfully babysat twice in May, first when we went to see Arcade Fire and, second, when we went to 2 weddings in one day. (Yup, a veritable Niagra of nachas.) She had different babysitters each time and both declared her an easy sit. We were very concerned about bedtime, since our otherwise highly agreeable child is a tiny but mighty sleep warrior. Her first babysitter -- who sits regularly and for a couple decades -- said that, except for one child who puts his head on the stair and points when he's ready for bed, pretty much every kid she's ever babysat makes a fuss over bedtime and Yelena was on the low end of the fuss zone. Ha! Our second babysitter had a very easy time getting her to sleep, perhaps because he's a yoga teacher and probably wore her out. All he did was cuddle her for a couple minutes and she was out.

I took it all remarkably well (pat, pat), surprising Eli who thought I 'd be a neurotic mess. I spend time away from Yelena and I spend sufficient time with Eli after Yelena's bedtime, but it was great fun to actually go out with my husband and not have to worry about the diaper bag, swearing or drinking.

Not being held hostage

2007-06-06T23:38:00.000-05:00

Still kicking, all's well, et cetera. Busy metaphor mixing butterfly will report again soon.

Way overdue

2007-05-18T20:40:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow night Eli and I are going out *gasp* together to have dinner and see Arcade Fire. Yelena will have her first past-bedtime babysitter. I'll report back on how she and I did. I'm not worried about Eli.

Cicada Romesco

2007-05-10T22:44:00.000-05:00

Flurry of brown eyed cuteness below, as promised. Not all my promises are empty.

I just made a scrumptious Romesco sauce to accompany the surfeit of of ramps I bought for tomorrow. (Love them wild and crazy leeks.) Now, there are as many recipes for Romesco as there are Catalan grannies, but I seem to have struck a happy medium in preparation time. Of course, I roasted the peppers, but I didn't bother roasting the garlic or tomatoes, just skinned and half-assedly seeded the latter. I did fry the bread in olive oil which was, oh my God, an insanely delicious thing to do with bread. In fact, when the sauce was complete, I fried up another piece of bread in the remaining oil to sop up the sauce clinging to the blade of the food processor. Eli was mercifully asleep and didn't witness this act of sheer gluttony.

Speaking of cooking seasonal delicacies, I keep coming across recipes for cooking the 17 year cicadas that are about to rise like winged zombies and take over Chicago at the end of the month. Apparently, the boy cicadas don't have enough fat to be worth eating, and one should remove the wings and legs -- not inedible, just not tasty -- from the girls for a crunchy treat. Man, this is one time I'm glad I keep a kosher home. When we were digging up along the deck to plant some clematis, I came across what I swear were some cicada nymphs, although Eli disagreed. I know they're allegedly not harmful, but I smashed those little buggers into a pulp with my shovel. I'm not a squemish girlie girl -- I even talk to my happy earth worms while gardening -- but cicadas really creep me out.

This post is pretty much procrastination, as I've a looming deadline.

All the better to chase the kitties

2007-05-10T22:41:00.000-05:00

Full Yelena Asana 1

2007-05-10T22:40:00.000-05:00

Hair bandtastic

2007-05-10T22:37:00.000-05:00

Yelena was having a big hair day. Combined with the leopard print bib was a photo op I couldn't miss.

Bilateral bling

2007-05-10T22:32:00.000-05:00

While working on her bilateral skills last week, Yelena donned three necklaces all by herself.

CI Induced Vortex

2007-05-08T23:29:00.000-05:00

Nope, not sucked into a black hole in the blogosphere, just stuck in the springtime capital improvement zone. I'm trying to finish staining the deck before this weekend's flurry of company (Eli b-day party, a bridal shower I'm co-hosting), deal with the infernal ongoing mishigos of the private alley, write a (paid, woohoo!) article for a friend, squeeze some dancing in, and take care of my bambina.

On the topic of the lovely Yelena, she is well and adorable. I have some pics, but the camera is 2 flights down and I ain't going to get it just now. She's starting to crawl for bits on her own and can hold herself up in quadraped for extended periods of time. She is also transitioning into and out of positions more smoothly, including pulling herself up on stationary objects. She's been able to pull up on people, doing all the work, for a very long time, but something about furniture has eluded her. After experimenting a lot, I found a little sensory input on her hands -- just touching them lightly so she doesn't lift up a hand while pushing with her legs -- does the trick. Go Lele! She also lives to work on standing and practice walking, so the motivation is all there, which is great, since often children with motor planning difficulties get frustrated and don't want to work. She is still a snuggly delightful little koala, without the unpleasant eucalyptus odor, as always.

I promise to be more amusing in the near future or, at the very least, shower you with cuteness, but assurance that we all breathe must suffice for now.

Fromage!

2007-04-25T22:36:00.000-05:00

A Swinging Affair

2007-04-25T22:35:00.000-05:00

Yelena spends a lot of time swinging. She needs the input and she loves it. She's really cute when she does it, especially stripped to her diaper in PT, but it's rather difficult to get an even half-way decent picture of her in motion. I could attribute it to the camera, but it's probably my fault for not having the patience to take dozens of pictures.

High Def Opiate

2007-04-18T21:15:00.001-05:00

We have now had our new television for a month. It’s pretty bad ass. Now, bad ass isn’t a term I throw around often or loosely; typical adjectives of praise in my lexicon include brilliant, beautiful, delicious, funky. But our basement is now the site of 56 inches of high definition bad ass.

Let me explain this TV. Those of you who know me, know I am not what one would call a TV person. I wasn’t allowed to watch much TV as a child. If it wasn’t on PBS or a movie we all watched together, forget it. (I managed to negotiate for Silver Spoons to avoid ostracization as the only girl in LBUSD not following the trials and tribulations of Ricky Schroder. [I cringe in retrospect; I never even thought he was cute, I was a blonde-loving lemming.] This privilege later morphed into 2 hours of TV per week. Of course, when my parents weren’t around I gulped down MTV and anything else with prurient content I could find, but we’ll discuss that another time.) In college I was too busy studying, working, practicing, acting and drinking to imbibe much pop culture – other than deconstructing Next Generation on Saturday afternoons with a ragtag group of English Ph.D. students I fell in with. There was a brief period of a few years when I lived with my then boyfriend and, courtesy of Nick at Night, caught up on an obscene amount of what I missed as a child and watched a tremendous number of British mysteries. When I moved out, no TV for 5 years.

During those 5 years I probably averaged 8-10 movies a month. I was within a 20 minute walk of both the Landmark and the Music Box, and would catch a Sunday classic matinee every week and just about every worthwhile new release or revival. When I moved in with Eli, my movie pace slowed down but it was still at a decent clip. We watched more movies at home and got sucked into a few shows. When we moved to our house, a dish wasn’t an option due to the massive silver maples and we opted not to get cable, using old fashioned bunny ears for the Oscars and the World Series.

I do hate TV. I hate commercials. I hate the way TV preys on the weak and exhausted and gobbles up evenings at a time so days become indistinguishable. Most of the stuff on TV is complete and utter crap. However, I am not one of those people who think TV is universally evil and movies virtuous. Amongst the muck there are a few gems. At its best, TV can be well-acted, well-written and thrilling. It is an actor’s dream. The potential for character development from show-to-show and season-to-season mirrors life much more than a 120 minute movie ever can. And with the beauty of Netflix or Tivo or whatever new fangled technology is out there, one can consciously and conscientiously choose one’s show and watch without the fucking commercials.

Going to dance class or the gym is pretty much the only time I get out of the house without Yelena. (We do take her with us to friends’ homes and out to dinner and have company over often, so I am only a partial lame ass social recluse.) I kept putting off Eli on the new TV purchase, not wanting to be one of those people with a gargantuan, always running TV as the centerpiece of their home, the locus of all family activity. I finally capitulated, realizing my movie going hiatus wasn't just a factor of Yelena's infancy. And I'm darned glad I did. There’s surround sound. I can read the credits. I can see the zits on actors' foreheads. (My God, don't they get paid enough to afford a dermatologist?) And no one’s cell phone is going off. It’s so bad ass.

Bad ass brings me to my Jack Bauer obsession. Watching 24 is like a bag of Chips Ahoy. You know you should be eating something nutritious. Heck, if it’s cookies you’re after it doesn’t take all that long to whip up a batch of home made or skedaddle to the bakery. Yet, you open that box and rip open that baggie with your teeth and can’t stop. You can eat them processed cookies with the skim milk of a few good performances, and that entire bag goes so yummy in the tummy and then you feel that slick coating of fat on your teeth and bloating in the gut and ask yourself, “How did I get here?.”

Some of the subplots are ludicrous. Some of the acting sucks. (Some of it is fabulous, but I am on a rampage here, don’t try to stop me.) Questions arise: how can someone as smart as Jack Bauer have a daughter that stupid? How the fuck did he get from one end of LA to the other in 10 minutes?! After school it would take me ½ an hour to get from one end of Long Beach to the other and that was the eighties. People do things totally out of character merely to service the plot. The body count is ridiculous, the torture gratuitous. And yet, and yet, I can’t stop. It’s got a hook. That whole real time thing sucks you in like an anteater’s shnoz. Dinner is eaten in front of the TV and all semblance of bedtime trodden.

We’ve only watched a couple seasons and I’ve enforced a temporary lock-down. We will watch the rest of them *sigh* but I need a break. I’ve started having Jack Bauer dreams. Now, I’ve always liked Kiefer Sutherland as an actor, but he never made my top 50 sexy list. See Ricky Shroder above: blondes rarely do it for me. Before 24, there was something about his menacing vampiric characters that I find attractive when I’m ovulating, but his lips are too thin and his nose too cropped for my taste – although the combination lends to making his angel’s kiss even more leonine than his father’s. Roar. If I didn’t know either of them and celebrity weren’t a factor, and I met Kiefer and Eli at a party I would probably hit on Eli. But the insidiousness of the show – and, frankly, his utter believability in implausible imaginary circumstance -- has made him into a towering figure of sexiness in my subconscious.

Last night I dreamt I was helping him out – along with the wire tapping help of my friend who, in real life, works for Mayor Daley – and made out with Jack Bauer at the end. About a week ago I dreamed I was having dinner with Sutherlands both Kiefer and Donald at Frenchy’s restaurant in Long Beach. Kiefer excused himself to the loo and Donald questioned my intentions toward his son. I told Donald that he needn’t worry, since I intended to marry a Jew and, if Kiefer were serious about me it would take him at least a year to convert, so I wouldn't let him rush into things. In the interstices of dream and awake I thought to myself, “Donald, I’d much rather have you!”

Out of Egypt

2007-04-09T21:46:00.000-05:00

From slavery in Egypt to slavery in the kitchen. The irony is thick. The upside is that I would probably never clean, let alone clean out, the fridge if it weren't for this ancient festival of spring cleaning. Grumble, grumble.

Call me a bitter herb, but I'm blaming Passover, and Passover preparation, for not blogging recently. I've been too weak to post. How these freaks on Atkins can get anything done is beyond me. Carbs -- of the complex and simple sort, I'm not so picky -- are my friends. One can only stretch potatoes and cardboard so far. At what point in halacha did some sadistic cabal of ascetic rabbis decide that matzah should be a friggin' cracker? I mean, lavash is pretty flat, cooks for fewer than 18 minutes and is yummy. Filo? Tortilla? C'mon rabbi dudes. I can guarantee the ancient Israelites did not flee Mitzrayim with a box of nasty crackers.

It's bloody cold here. It's really inexcusable.

Adding to our afflictions culinary and temperate, Yelena and I have been ill. We are both better, thanks for asking, but it was a bit of rough going on Saturday. She went to sleep Friday cheerful, woke up at 3 a.m. a little fleece radiator. I had been a bit under the weather for the previous few days so it was considerate of her to wait until the weekend so Daddy could look after us. (Daddy who grounded me and prevented me from attending my final dance classes of the session -- 12 weeks working on the level 3 dance and I'll never know how it ends. Waaaa! [Well, I can get the notes from someone, but that makes it seem less tragic and I'm after a little sympathy here.]) Beaucoup de cuddling and fluids later, her fever broke and her appetite returned today -- it is just so sad seeing my little sweetie all pathetic and sick.

Eli doesn't think the 2 pictures I posted the other day are representative of Yelena's cuteness, so I promise to take a few smiley ones in the next couple of days.

All Dressed Up & Not at All Excited to Go

2007-04-05T20:31:00.000-05:00

Thought bubble: you expect me to smile for matzah?

She looked adorable in her Seder finery, she just refused to smile for, let alone look at, the camera during her brief photo op.

Princessa of Pout

2007-04-05T20:25:00.000-05:00

Tulipomania

2007-03-25T08:50:00.001-05:00

My tulips are starting to come up!

Those Feisty Ides

2007-03-15T23:00:00.000-05:00

I managed to make it through today without any blatant backstabbings, well, at least any readily apparent backstabbings and that's good enough for me. It's much easier to avoid coups and mutinies outside the office, away from the theatre folk and no longer on any synagogue committees. Despina did have a murderous gleam in her eye but I managed to quell it with a packet of ocean fish & tuna in broth. If only the Romans were so appeasable.

I've been a quiet type lately, haven't I? How peculiar. I wish I could report momentous goings on but we've just been mucking about. The wee one is adorable and is transitioning to sit up on her own -- and loves showing off this new skill -- on her right side and almost on her left. I asked Evette if we were "normal" parents with a "typical" child (I'm waxing all quotalicious) would we even notice or care that she always sat up on one side. She said that many children do one-sided skills (always roll to one side, always stand with their the same leg first, etc.) and their parents never notice, but this can really affect coordination later on. Yelena may be taking an eon to master these skills, but her form is impeccable. Tortoises of the world unite! She is also finally staying in quadraped for a while and doing much assisted crawling, but she would much rather butt scoot or practice walking. Her receptive language is growing and she's vocalizing more in play, with a few additional words which she uses intermittently. Before swim last week, one of her classmates toddled up to her in the locker room and Yelena looked at her and, with a huge smile, said, "Hi!" Such a charmer.

I'll post some pictures in the near future.

We had a neurologist appointment Monday, but I am so not in the mood to write about it. It will have to wait.

We are terrible Jews and negligent parents and did not end up taking Yelena to any Purim festivities. I didn't want to deal with the late bedtime Erev Purim and, when it came time to take her Sunday morning to the family Megillah reading I decided to make waffles instead. Baaaaad Mommy, selfish Mommy.

Self-sufficiency is the name of the game for the adults around here this week. Eli fixed our leaky disposal and I fixed the pop-up drain in the upstairs loo. I now know what a clevis rod is. As I gathered up our tax documents to send to the accountant it occurred to me that I have underwritten $50 million loans, I could probably handle our measly tax return. And I did. All filed. All happy.

We also bought a to-be delivered TV. It's big. Not Lawrence of Arabia sunrise big, but pretty friggin' big. Eli wanted bigger, but I capped him at 56". It's the JVC rear projection thingie with lots of pixels and other good stuff. It will be refreshing not to squint at subtitles or credits.

Because we don't have enough to do, we've started watching 24. Netflix can't keep up with our jonesing.

Hail Caesar.

Just give her some wings

2007-02-28T11:19:00.000-06:00

Yelena had her 18 month check-up yesterday. Her ears are still looking good, as is the rest of her. She weighed in at 25 pounds and nary an ounce and is just shy of 31 inches. She is around the 50th% for both -- a bit over for weight and a bit under for height. Her head was 48 centimeters, moving her up to the 95th%. That's one big head on one medium body. With her feet finally growing out of the 6-12 month socks (her 6-12 shoes still fit) she looks like a Boticelli cherub, all cute round head.

Last night, after searching 15 minutes for a parking space after dance classes, I came in to find Yelena already asleep. Daddy wasn't even trying -- just holding the fort until I returned -- but managed to get her down in 20 minutes. Go Daddy!

And now for something completely adorable

2007-02-26T23:25:00.000-06:00

The only thing cuter than Yelena in a hat is Yelena in my hat.

No whiskers on kittens or warm woolen mittens here

2007-02-26T23:24:00.000-06:00

I need a good gripe.

About a decade ago, during the dark Luddite ages before I owned a proper ice cream maker, I once made granita. I think it was coffee granita. Every few hours I opened up the freezer, took out the baking pan and scraped away at the layers of ice. Shoveling the walk yesterday was just like that, except on a grand, aerobic scale. Under the wet dog pee slushie, the ice had ice. There were only a couple inches, but it was damn heavy. Stupid snow.
People are crappy drivers in the snow. I have adopted Tony's advice of what to do when another car is coming the opposite way down a narrow street. I swing over into their lane heading straight at them, forcing them to move their frigging SUV over. It works. And I like to see the terrified looks on their faces, "Oh my God, I'm going to hit the Camry if I don't actually learn how to control this gas guzzling behemoth." Stupid SUV drivers.
I can't wait until the damn municipal election is over. Everyday we average 3 phone calls and 6 pieces of literature. Stupid aldermen.
Couldn't they just have given Scorsese a lifetime achievement award, rather than naming The Departed the best picture of the year? At least it's better than much of the winning crap in recent years. (Crash, Chicago [yeah, I love a dance musical where you can't see any of the actors dance -- oh wait, that's because they can't dance], Titanic, Forrest Gump, suck suck suck.) The divine Helen Mirren and Forrest Whitaker are 2 of my favorite actors, so there was happiness there. The Oscars are mostly an excuse to order from Pizza Bubamara (no one makes a pizza like the Bosnians), pick up a tart from Bittersweet, hang out and get tipsy on champers. I even had a wee hang-over this morning. Stupid Oscars.
I make fun of the goyim for having Christmas decorations out before Thanksgiving. Can we make a new rule? No Passover shit in the stores until after Purim. The Jewel on Howard has already converted an aisle into Kosher for Passover. Bloody hell, I haven't even made my hamentashen yet. Stupid Passover. Stupid greedy mashgiach mafia.
Theo is moaning right now as he tries to hump Cherubino. With his mouth on Cheru's neck, his castrated nether regions only reach midway down Cheru's back. Stupid orange tabby.

I feel so much better now.

Leopardine

2007-02-22T22:06:00.000-06:00

Four boxes of clothes arrived from Auntie Michele today. I couldn't wait to put Yelena in the leopard snow suit. When I was taking the pictures I said, "A leopard says rawr," and each time Yelena answered, "Aawr." The second picture captures her mid-roar.

Snow days

2007-02-21T20:57:00.000-06:00

All thawed out here. Last week I became one of those people for whom I have nothing but contempt. Yes, I am one of those selfish bastards who barricaded a parking space. According to Chicago ordinance it is legal, if not ethical. I was going to the opera last Tuesday. After shoveling a foot or so of snow away from the car I just couldn't deal with coming home at midnight and searching for a space, blocks away, and then carrying Yelena there the following morning. (As soon as this weather is finished, we're paving the private alley and the parking search shall be a thing of the past.) When it drops below 10 and the snow reaches higher than a pair of go-go boots I am allowed to rationalize.

Freaky orange tabby. I am typing this while waiting for Eli to get back from yoga. I just squeezed lemon for our dinner (pasta with tuna packed in olive oil, kalamata olives, capers, garlic and said lemon) and Theo is in a citrus induced madness. I must have gotten some on my fleece as he is licking it obsessively. You think he'd be into the tuna, mais non. I could hire him out for a lemony exfoliation treatment and earn enough to put him on the Prozac he so desperately needs. Oh, it tickles!

Mishpatim 007

2007-02-21T20:54:00.000-06:00

The Torah related mischief I was up to last week:

In the interest of full disclosure, I spoke on Mishpatim a couple years ago. When Paul told me last week he had a cancellation I had a difficult time refusing him since, when I had his job, he was my get out of jail free speaker and I owe him big time. I will admit that I considered giving the same talk verbatim; probably 75% of you weren’t here that day and the remaining quarter have either completely forgotten it or were in a Kiddush club induced haze at the time. Although two years is a millisecond compared to the eternity of the Torah, I continue to change and, one can only hope, evolve. Major lifecycle events are obvious catalysts for personal change. But time’s arrow works in more subtle ways, as small things – books, movies, conversations, epiphanies during sleepless nights – also have great affect.

Sometimes one of these ideas or incidents gets stuck on shuffle repeat in my mind. As I mentioned last time around, once Moses ascends Mt. Sinai the Torah undergoes a major genre switch, like changing the channel from HBO to CSPAN. So, do not worry, I plan on addressing the dry legal stuff, but first allow me to wax anecdotal.

I live in, officially, the most diverse ZIP code in the United States. (Obviously, outside the eruv.) Sure, a big factor in our move was that we wanted a relatively affordable house with a yard in a lakefront neighborhood, but we also value heterogeneity. I want my kids playing with children from diverse backgrounds. This does not detract from our Jewish identity, but enhances it. As a diaspora people, the local flavors and philosophies absorbed throughout history meld with our values to create our rich cultural Jewish heritage. Living in an insular community does not make the world a smaller place, it just narrows our view of it.

The downside to living in East Rogers is that it is a shlep to my very few friends who stay home with their children and, although I have not been called shy since I was ten, I typically am not one to initiate friendships, call me old-fashioned, but I need someone else to make the first move. I had heard the myth of the neighborhood park as watering hole and my husband, no doubt feeling I was in need of some socialization last summer, frequently suggested that I go to the park and meet some other stay-at-home moms.

One afternoon, as the barrage of missiles on Northern Israel was winding down, we went over to Pottawatomie Park, a block from our house, to play and meet Daddy after work. I was pushing Yelena on a swing and a tall woman wearing a headscarf was pushing a cute little girl in a lavender dress a couple swings down. She was friendly and spoke to me, typical maternal chitchat. She asked my daughter’s name and, when I asked her in return, she told me, “Maryam. It’s Arabic for Miriam.” I almost said, “I know. My Hebrew name’s Miriam,” but I stopped myself and just smiled. Although we continued to talk, I froze.

I had known immediately from her hijab that she was Arabic. I dance to Arabic music and I have Arab and Muslim friends – friendships which do not contradict my commitment to Israel, thank you very much – admittedly, both my friends and the dance form are pretty secular. In the park, I was wearing an ancient concert t-shirt, basketball shorts and sandals. Compared to Britney Spears or some of the bat mitzvah girls, I was dressed rather modestly. Practicing tzniut, I was certainly not. Yet this woman in a headscarf was willing to overlook that and initiate conversation, which was more than any of the frum women at Indian Boundary Park ever did. Here we were, two first time mothers waiting for our husbands to come home from work, probably both a little lonely and hungry for adult contact. She was friendly and articulate. If she had been, say, Asian or African-American I doubt I would have refused her overtures. I could justify my reticence by the politically charged times and my desire not to get into it, but if it were that simple I would not still reflect on it. Was I upset that I, never one for self-censoring, hesitated from outing myself as a Jew? Warmer, but what I think still bothers me about my behavior was my assumption regarding how she would react She stepped outside her cultural boundaries in search of a universal connection whereas I simply shut down.

The mishpatim of this parsha are not theoretical legislation, externally imposed from outside the narrative, they are an integral part of the story of the Jewish people. The Exodus was not just the escape from the arbitrary and unjust institution of slavery, but the constant exodus into a righteous way of life. The litany of laws, the sefer ha’brit, do not merely delineate parameters for a just and equitable society, to avoid and resolve sticky situations. We follow these rules to become holier.

Interspersed among legislation regarding slavery, lest the Israelites repeat the mistakes of their Egyptian captors, and criminal and civil law, there is a subset of laws describing how to treat marginalized members of society: the widow and orphan, the stranger, and one’s personal enemy. All the laws in Mishpatim deal with how we are to conduct ourselves in order not to be bad, but these rules offer specific instructions in how to be good. Some mitzot are the bare minimum, following them diligently is a bit like being a B student, you care enough to do the work but are not willing to put forth extra effort. Some commandments are straightforward: don’t eat pig, don’t plow the corners of your field, don’t gather wood on Shabbat. Other commandments are abstract and require improvisation.

The most comprehensible of these four laws is the injunction not to abuse a widow or orphan. Orphans, and widows back in the unfortunate days when women were not socially independent, are alone in the world and lack status and power. Outside the umbrella of a family unit, they are unprotected and defenseless. They may appear to have no one to notice or avenge their maltreatment, but God assures us that although the orphan and the widow may be without the protection of man they are under the protection of God. In wronging them one wrongs God as well. Mistreating someone vulnerable, like a child or the sick, is vile and inexcusable. Yet it is not sufficient to refrain from abusing the widow and the orphan, one must actively help them. Abravanel states that whoever sees a person afflicted and does not help them is accounted an afflictor, those who have the power to protest or take action and do not are an accessory to a crime.

Unless you are completely heartless, the orphan and the widow are inherently sympathetic characters. But what about those with whom we do not naturally empathize, people we simply do not like or those who are strange to us? Rabbi Elezer the Great points out that thirty-six times the Torah directs us in the treatment of the stranger. This mitzvot is phrased both positively and negatively, addressing the message to the optimist and pessimist alike. Thirty-six times is more than any other mitzvot, including all the laws on kashrut. Yet how much more do many Jews obsess over hecshures than consider the welfare of the stranger? Now, I am not advocating eating traffe, I am suggesting that we are more inclined to follow these commandments because they are explicit. Putting ourselves in the position of the stranger, walking the proverbial mile in another’s moccasins, requires personal adjustment, a lot more demanding mentally and emotionally than minding a checklist of what not to eat.

These commandments remind us that the Israelites’ experience of slavery forms the core of our moral obligations to other people, Jews and non-Jews alike. We were strangers in the land of Egypt and we know the feelings of the stranger. Jews have all too often felt the pain of being far from home and having no champion. Nachama Leibowtiz suggests that the Torah reiterates this commandment so often to prevent us from acting out on any feelings of humiliation over our bondage and exile, thus mistreating others because we have been mistreated. As former slaves we must empathize with those who are now in a tight place, rather than feel claustrophobia and shame in identification with them. God redeemed us from slavery and we learn holiness from God’s example; we have responsibility toward all victims.

This mitzvot is also a preventative measure against xenophobia and prejudice. Many commentators employ this directive to ensure fair conduct toward converts. In a lawsuit between a convert and a born Israelite, one is not to assume wrong on account of idolatrous origins. The Talmud states that, “Should a proselyte come to study Torah do not say to him, ‘The mouth that has consumed forbidden meats… has the audacity to study Torah given from the mouth of the Almighty.’” Converts to Judaism are likened to newborn children, at conversion their souls are renewed as perfect. Reading the Torah and prophetic writings, we see that the Israelites have participated in their fair share of idol worship as well, but God does not hold that perpetually against them.

Through showing compassion to those who are displaced on any scale we merit the compassion of God. How Jews treat the stranger has far reaching implications, from the personal to the political, from the smallest gesture to public policy. This mitzvah goes further and encourages us to reserve judgment on things that we find unfamiliar, not just people, but ideas or experiences we find strange or threatening. We are to give the benefit of the doubt, to imaginatively put ourselves in the position of others. As long as we do not violate other mitzvot, we can follow this most frequently repeated commandment and keep an open mind.

It is difficult to keep an open mind toward someone who has wronged you or with whom you do not see eye to eye. Inserted in the middle of the section dealing with the proper administration of justice are two incongruous mitzvot that spell out how to behave toward one’s enemy. Just as we are prohibited from perverting justice for the needy, Cassuto implores us not to pervert justice against one’s enemy. As with the orphan and the stranger, avoiding evil alone is not enough; doing good demands we lend an enemy a helping hand. These mitzvot direct a person to return an enemy’s animal that has gone astray and, if the animal of an enemy is struggling under its burden, to help release it. On one level, these laws ensure that an animal, an innocent party, does not suffer for the wrongs of its owner. Back in my days of apartment dwelling, my horrid downstairs neighbors played the crappiest garage music late at night, but when their locked-out cat showed up at our doorstep mewing, I still returned him to his owners.

On a higher level, these mitzvot have the potential to initiate a transformation in behavior. Sometimes the smallest gesture triggers a change of heart. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks points out that the Aramaic translation of “you shall surely release his burden” is “you shall let go of the hate you have in your heart toward him.” The physical act of releasing the beast’s burden leads to the psychological act of letting go the burden of animosity. Temporarily uniting in a common purpose with someone you dislike shows there is potential for cooperation on other issues and a chance at reconciliation, like Guy Pearce and Russell Crowe in L.A. Confidential.

As the proverb goes, “If your enemy is hungry, give him bread, if thirsty, give him water to drink.” These two commandments acknowledge the difficulty of “not hating your brother in your heart,” but give direction in how to overcome a grudge and open one’s mind. Jews do not have two codes of behavior: one for our friend and one for our enemy; one for the Jew and one for the stranger. Ethical behavior is the application of consistent standards to all equally and equitably.

I wish I had a satisfying resolution to my story, that Yelena and Maryam stack blocks together in an idyllic vision of the daughters of Isaac and Ishmael, while their mothers sip tea – perhaps peaceably debating centuries of contention or politely avoiding the subject altogether. I have seen Maryam and her mother at a distance a few times since then and have always felt a twinge of something, maybe regret, a multi-layered regret conflating so many personal and political emotions. I guess the true test of my following these mitzvot is what I do if Yelena and Maryam ever find themselves sitting next to each other on the swings.

Yelena's Amazing Therapeutic Adventures

2007-02-08T23:20:00.000-06:00

This is the time of year I usually slip off to California for a week since, as you can surmise from the post below, I begin to go a little stir crazy. My blood just isn't made for this unrelenting single degree torment. Even though I will eventually need a vacation or I will be checked into a sanitorium, Yelena and I need to stick around Chicago for the next few months and keep up a steady routine of therapy. OT seems to be going really well and her therapist told me she has made tremendous strides since her evaluation, which was about 6 weeks ago. PT progress steadily (slow for the average baby, but big leaps for her). She has sat up entirely on her own on the right side with verbal cueing, which is a huge milestone. Her cross-reaching is fabulous and she is actually trying to transit down. Some days she can stay on her hands and knees for a bit and do some assisted crawling, and even a tiny bit on her own, other days it seems more difficult. She is pivoting on her tushie quite willfully and is doing some butt-scooting, which is a mixed bag. It's good that she is learning that she can self-locomote, but Evette really wants her to be able to crawl. ST is still nebulous. Yelena will chat the whole drive over there and in the waiting room but, as soon as she sees Shannon, does not make a peep until we're back in the car. She talks during PT and OT, so the irony is thick. Even silently, she is working on receptive language so it's not a complete loss and she is responding well to the nuk brush and chewy tube.

We're doing OT, PT and ST through Children's Memorial, with all the therapists certified though Early Intervention, so we can continue to see them once the EI stuff is all sorted out. It's a damned good thing we didn't wait for EI to set everything up since, after calling the first week of December, we finally had the at home evaluation a couple weeks ago and the Developmental Therapist isn't even coming for her first meeting until next Tuesday. EI once was a free program but, now that our tax dollars are being diverted elsewhere (ahem), it's income based and we have to pay the maximum amount, which is $200. They first bill our insurance and EI covers everything else. If we were only doing one therapy, it wouldn't be worth it, but our share of 3-4 therapies is much higher than $200, so it's a good deal. Plus, the coordinator told us, EI typically doesn't start billing for a few months.

The EI home evalution was awful and I couldn't bring myself to re-live it by reporting about it any sooner. Yelena did fine -- as fine as you can with 4 therapists and a social worker watching your every move -- but I didn't. After all the evaluations at Children's and the neurologist and the pediatrician, I had just hit the point where I could not deal with one more person telling me what's wrong with my daughter. And then I had to deal with the annoying developmental therapist, who will not be Yelena's DT, with her cat allergies and generic Tiffany heart bracelet, "Well, she'll be getting cognitive work through the occupational and speech therapy, so you probably don't want to do developmental, too."

"Do you think developmental will help?"

"Well, you're already taking her to so much."

"Yes, but will it help?"

"I'm not sure you want to take her to another thing."

"Please answer yes or no, do you think will she benefit from developmental therapy?"

"Yes, but..."

"Then we're doing it." The neurologist said specifically that he wants her receive DT. It was like this woman had decided I was the kind of mother who didn't want to go to any more trouble than necessary. As if we weren't going to do everything in our power to help our child. Bitch. It's one thing to have these evaluations in a clinical setting, but having them in your home with strangers looking over your DVDs and obsessing over the cat hairs woven into the rumpus room sofa is too invasive.

Thankfully, all that is over. Yelena's OT said that listening to these people talk about x percentage and y percentage delay will just make you crazy and take the focus off what matters, and that's the day to day progress. And Yelena is the hardest working baby I know. It's very difficult to see kids in Yelena's music class or wherever to go from wobbily standing to fully walking in a few weeks without even a thought, while she tries so hard and is barely moving. And I see the looks on parents' faces when they look at Yelena like she is deficient. Even if they try to hide it behind kindness (and not all of them do, mind you), I see the pity, the judgment, the smug satisfaction that their kid is normal, or just relief that their child doesn't have special needs. (Years of acting training has made me pretty proficient in reading faces, so don't even try to convince I'm imagining it.) It hurts that none of them want to have Yelena join their children's playgroups, as if her brain disorder were contagious.

This may suck, but Yelena is still the sweetest, loveliest and most fascinating little person I've ever met. It's going to take a while, maybe years, but I am convinced she will catch up to all these annoying statistics and leave them in the dust.

Freezing Association

2007-02-08T22:45:00.000-06:00

This crazy cold is making the rest of my household sleepy and me listless and a little freaky. No one is up to play with me and I can't quite bring myself to start a new book or do something useful, and I certainly can't muster up the energy to get ready for bed, so I'm going to post, rather than read every NYT and Guardian article or surf Friendster. (Thanks to Tony for sending me a link last week to someone we knew in college who was both crazy and majorly closeted. It turns out he is now out but just as insane. Well, at least we know his sexual orientation wasn't causing his insanity, he is just now a little more free to be his crazy-assed self. The point, if there ever were a point, is, Tony, you forced me to return to the socially obsolete network that is Friendster, look around at profiles and then realize that I am not searching in cloaked anonymity and now am outed as someone who has nothing better to do at 1 a.m. than look at profiles of erstwhile friends and acquaintances. I have much better things to do, but instead I surf and lurk and watch Buffy in French. Which is, oh my God, beyond hilarious.)

All's clear

2007-02-07T12:53:00.000-06:00

There is officially no more fluid in Yelena's ears. Thus, no ear tubes. Yay.

Go Bears!

2007-02-04T21:49:00.000-06:00

Even Yelena's cheering couldn't help.

Brideshead Revisited Revisited

2007-02-03T23:25:00.000-06:00

Reading Brideshead Revisited was a bit odd. I hadn't read it before but I saw the mini-series when it first aired in America on Great Performances, not Masterpiece Theatre, mind you, at a very tender age. It was a highly formative experience. Retrospective kudos to my parents for letting me, although it probably damaged me for life, sparking Anglophilia and yearning for the mysteries of adulthood. While other kids were watching Silver Spoons, I was learning about homosexuality, Roman Catholicism, alcoholism and adultery. For years after, my father did a creepy imitation of Kurt lisping the word, "pus," and I wanted to name a bear Aloysius.

I think I must have watched it again in high school, as I could not read the novel without hearing Jeremy Irons, Anthony Andrews, Claire Bloom, John Gielgud, et. al. uttering the lines. Down to every inflection. Typically, reading something after I've seen it dramatized is a dreadful experience, but I have to say I found Charles Ryder as played by Jeremy Irons infinitely more sympathetic than how Waugh wrote him. (And what's with the Brits naming boys Evelyn?) I also don't remember all the Divine Grace bit at the end being so heavy handed, but perhaps it flew right over my secular Jewish head.

I found the Et In Arcadia Ego half much more appealing. The nostalgia for university days was quite contagious and I think a number of beautifully written truths were contained within. I also found that Charles' love (that dare not speak its name) for Sebastian was much more vivid and poignant than Charles' love for Julia in the second half, which rang very hollow and like a lost soul looking for an echo of past love. I also enjoyed the rapturous descriptions of meals, keeping in mind that it was written in 1944 and that no one in England had had anything delightful to eat in years.

It will be peculiar discussing BR tomorrow with a bunch of Jews. I think -- and this is one of the points made in the novel itself -- if one is secular it is easy to dismiss the inherent religiosity of the faith. But how can one of faith, albeit a different faith, dismiss it without being hypocritical? From an anthropologic or literary perspective, how dissimilar is the catechism from yigdal? (Yes, Talmud is inherently more interactive, and thorough, but that's why the study part of Judaism is much easier than the prayer/faith part.)

Shifting gears, I haven't been reading as much as I like, or books that I would particularly recommend these past few months, so I won't bother with a complete litany. I loved Michael Malone's The Last Noel, never mind I predicted how it would end, I still had tears cascading down my face when I finished it at 3:00 a.m., after picking it up the prior day (I typically only read once everyone else is in bed). There's Murakami's latest story collection, Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman; I had read about a third of the stories elsewhere, but they're certainly worth re-reading. I didn't really care for Sarah Waters' The Nightwatch; I think critics admired its historical accuracy and backwards chronology, but a little style and research a great book doth not make. Yehoshua's A Woman in Jerusalem was worth a read, but my least favorite of his books. Oh, and I truly enjoyed Mieville's Perdido Street Station, great SF.

Town Called Malice

2007-02-01T23:41:00.000-06:00

Don't get me wrong, I love Chicago. I think it's such a fabulous city that, if it were only a little warmer or a little more topographically diverse nearby, everyone would want to live here. I'm praying for the 2016 Olympics, I'm pushing for Obama '08 (I'm an early and true believer, as I worked for him in his Senate primary against the Illinois Democratic machine -- if he can beat that, he can beat anything.) and the miniscule part of me that actually gives a hoot-and-a-half about football is rooting for the Bears this Sunday. But sometimes I feel I truly live in a secondary city, the third coast.

I feel this way whenever a movie plays first in New York and Los Angeles. Sure, it'll eventually show up here, unlike if I lived in, say, Butte or Memphis, but I hate not being primary. This second-class status hurts especially this week. Monday through Wednesday Paul Weller played 3 shows in NYC and this weekend he'll do 3 in LA -- dedicating the first night of each set to The Jam, the best band to never make in in America. He hasn't performed this material in over 20 years. Growl. If I weren't a nursing mother and if Yelena weren't in therapy a few days a week, don't think I wouldn't have jumped on Jet Blue and flown out. Shit, I would have flown to NYC last weekend and LA this.

A little shampoo is a dangerous thing

2007-01-29T23:11:00.000-06:00

Sorry about the post fast. This little tidbit of benign parental sadism should tide you over until I finish reading Brideshead Revisited for book group.

Another earful

2007-01-26T12:24:00.000-06:00

My poor little bambina has another ear infection. I have been concerned about ongoing fluid in her ears since December. Her last infection resolved quickly, but a tympanogram in mid-December showed that she still had some fluid: it wasn't flat, but it was more foothill than Mt. Everest. The audiologist said it was probably residual from the ear infection and to postpone her audiology exam for a month. Two weeks ago, Yelena and I visited Ari and he had his audiologist check her out. She passed the hearing screening, but her tympanogram was still not spiky and Ari said she did have fluid in her ears. I was just going to bring it up at her 18 month check-up but Monday night she woke up crabby and, when I was cuddling her, she kept digging her thumb around in her ear. She's doing better now, but am sick of all this fluid and made an appointment with an ENT doctor for when she's completed this course of antibiotic and am thinking ear tubes to help drain her tiny little ears. She passed the hearing screening, but the fluid could still be dulling her hearing or even affecting her balance. At this point, even if ear tubes were to help only 5-10% it'd be worth it.

Snotty

2007-01-16T22:00:00.000-06:00

My least favorite aspect of parenting is aspirating. It's really awful. You know you have to do this invasive procedure, first the saline and then the slurping of snot, so your child can breathe better, avoid festering mucus triggering an ear infection and not wake herself up in the night with a burble of snot -- but it just causes misery. Like vaccinations. They're just too young to understand the nasty needle is nothing compared to tuberculosis. Unlike most kids, Yelena doesn't mind me wipping her nose and even welcomes the warm washcloth, she just wails the second the drops go in her nose and sobs for a few minutes after the lines of goo are sucked out. Today the only thing that distracted her afterwards was going on the bouncy ball while listening the Jimmy Smith's The Cat. Thank God for Jimmy Smith.

Last Wednesday in music class a girl, who must have been making up from another class, was covered in nasal secretions. You know, the lava trickle of technicolor snot running between the crusted crags of booggers all down her face. Because it is just our luck, she seemed to like Yelena and kept waddling up to her. I thought, "Oh shit. We're in for it." Unfortunately, I am clarvoyant and Yelena had a very rough night of it Thursday and has been a bit congested ever since. I, too, have been just a bit out of sorts and now Eli is as well. Nothing dramatic, able to make it through the day and all, just not enough energy to go see the midnight showing of the Buffy musical Saturday night or muster the energy to sit through Die Fledermaus tonight. And last night I was out of it enough that when I was cleaning my Stack splint it fell down the drain. I even took out the sink trap (Super hero ID: Handy Girl. Or, perhaps: Klutz Girl?) but it had already gone to swim with the gators. Ugh.

Sleep now.

Music Together

2007-01-07T11:05:00.000-06:00

Finding a music class up to Yelena's parents' exacting standards in this here mega-major city has been more challenging than one might think. When she was about 6 months, we started her at the Suzuki-Orff school. She enjoyed it, it had a good pedagogic foundation and the teacher was very good at engaging the children. Next session, we were reminded of the first precept of education: it's all about the teacher. The new teacher was so terrible -- all fake bubbly and mispronouncing words that rhymed or screwing up the order of words in songs so they no longer rhymed -- that Eli physically couldn't bring himself to go after a few classes. There was also a father in the class whose sense of rhythm and pitch were so abstract, and always fortissimo, that it took all my restraint not to beat him over the head with an egg shaker while Eli strangled him with a scarf. I switched to a weekday. This teacher wasn't annoying, but she seemed to have a perpetual headcold. I have been told on more than one occasion that I sing like a Muppet (in tune, no oomph), but compared to her I am Renee Flemming. Also, I was sick of driving down to West Town.

Next we tried Wiggleworms at Old Town School of Folk Music. It was ok and for the right parent and child I would recommend it, depending on the teacher. Yelena enjoyed it, but I thought the teacher was way too lenient with the parents, allowing them to kibbitz too much and participate too little. The other problem is that when we made up classes with other teachers, they sang totally different songs. At this age, the point of a weekly class is to build some familiarity and routine, not throw the babies for a loop. Wiggleworms doesn't seem to have any system behind it other than to play guitar and have the kids move around -- which is fun, but I like something a little more formal. There were also way too many children in the class and it was always crowded and too chaotic.

I tried to get her into a Kindermusik class, but at two different places they had stopped teaching the 6-18 month class and at a third the weekday class was full for the entire year.

Finally, I decided to check out Music Together. Yelena started at Music Together of Lincoln Square in December and we are both very happy. The teacher is engaging without being fake or irritating and she has a lovely singing voice. One of the things I love is that the class is for all ages under 4; it's a more natural way to learn, operating under the theory that older kids learn from teaching younger ones and the younger ones learn from watching the older ones. (Also helpful if you have more than one little one.) This also works well for Yelena, since she's not the only kid who isn't walking. I'm not sure if she's self-conscious about it, but I get concerned. There is definitely a method, including a book on how to foster musical development, and the course materials included sheet music and a CD which is, surprisingly, one of the least irritating children's CDs I've ever heard. And there are songs in minor keys and time signatures other than 4/4! (There is even a song in 7/8. No, not Sting's.) Each 10 week session, there is a new CD and book, so we should get a pretty decent repertoire in a couple years. The class size is also reasonable, about 5-7 kids, and the other parents are friendly and involved, not like the Trixie horrors at that Gymboree class I checked out.

Half-Yelena-asana, Variation 2

2007-01-05T13:22:00.000-06:00

With those funny but less than flattering images below, I thought I'd post another for a more balanced picture, so to speak.

Yelena had her first speech therapy session on Tuesday. (Starting next week, she has OT Mondays, ST Tuesdays, music class Wednesdays, PT Thursdays and swim Fridays. She is the hardest working baby in show biz.) It seemed to go well, but it was a little nebulous since, so far, I pretty much do most of the things with her already that we covered. I did get a few more tips and hopefully will get more. Yelena seemed to like the therapist and enjoy the games. The therapist thinks she'll do well and was impressed by Yelena's absorption in her and everything they did. She said that often children with motor planning problems become disengaged very young, but that Yelena doesn't show any sign of that. Not that I needed vindication, but I am super glad that I practiced my modified attachment parenting style and ignored everyone who told me I was spoiling her or too attentive by engaging her constantly. (Yeah, plopping my baby in front of the TV or ignoring her cues would certainly have helped her brain disorder. Of course, some of those critics probably blamed her lack of mobility on my parenting. Shame on them.) The ST said that she's a huge observer, we just need to get her to be more of a participator.

Teeth, teeth and more teeth

2007-01-05T13:12:00.000-06:00

In the past few days, Yelena's two upper molars cut as did her remaining bottom front tooth. The lower right molar is burgeoning under the gum, as it has been for weeks. Ouchie. She's been taking it in stride, although she's gnawing on everything like a puppy. Here she is showing her teeth and snacking on a platypus.

Happy New Year

2007-01-05T13:10:00.000-06:00

At our pre-nuptial dinner Dennis, who as far as I am concerned is the Grand Vizier of Cool, said that he was happy I was marrying a cool guy. And Eli, by all outwards appearances, is pretty cool. He plays guitar, looks good in tight shirts and wears groovy glasses. He's also a few years younger than me, which gives his relative (to me) cool factor an extra boost. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to present to you my very cool husband at 10:30 on New Year's Eve.

Yes, Eli pooped out well before the stroke of midnight, like an 8 year old waiting up for Santa. (An 8 year old yeshiva bucher on Shavuot doesn't have the same ring.) Tony was sick and had to be up to do a radio show at 6 a.m., so I released them at around 11 and spent the transition into 2007 rubbing noses with Cheru and watching Young Frankenstein, which I did not find as funny as when I was 8. The true sign of me teetering on the perch is that I didn't really mind the collective fink out. Eric had made a butternut squash ravioli so divine that I will never be able to eat anyone else's and I made ice cream out of Vosges candy bars, so a kiss at midnight would have paled in comparison. I wouldn't have minded another few rounds of cards and some champers, though.

R.I.P. Godfather

2006-12-26T23:36:00.000-06:00

Is it just me, or did the NYT obituary of James Brown seem way too short? Looks like they vamped it up to 2 pages now.

Yelena L. Jackson

2006-12-26T23:33:00.000-06:00

I leave Yelena alone with the boys for a few hours and see what they do? I don't have the energy to photoshop the thought bubble, "Get the motha f-----g hat of my motha f-----g head!" but I am sure that's what she was thinking.

OT

2006-12-23T13:00:00.000-06:00

One of the advantages to not touch typing is that having a finger splint doesn't really slow me down too much. As a violinist (let's hope this injury doesn't make me all erstwhily) I am used to alternate fingerings. But the bugger does hurt, thanks for the flowers. (Ahem.)

Thursday, Yelena had her occupational therapy evaluation. Of all the varied therapists and doctors she's seen, I felt the OT therapist instantly got her. When asked if she liked the water and I replied that she loved swimming, the main therapist asked, "When she is in the water does she come alive, and act as if that is her natural element?" Apparently, the pressure of the water gives children with motor planning (MP) difficulties a better sense of their body in space and helps them with body mapping, which the OTs instantly realized is one of her challenges. She also said she sees a 5 year old boy with coordination issues, similar to Yelena, who has been doing great with OT and is the star of his swim team, where he is the youngest kid and already placing with the backstroke! She also asked if Yelena loved music, saying that children with MP problems are typically very responsive to music. When Yelena bent forward into her ultra-flexible pose that we like to call Yelena asana, that everyone else thinks is either just adorable (which it is!) or that she's tired (which is only sometimes), the OT said that Yelena likes to look at things laterally, too, and that looking at things from different angles helps put things together visually for her. (My daughter, the cubist.) Of course, they noticed how social she was and that she was more into people than things, and didn't make it sound like an example of passivity, but of curiosity.

Until OT starts proper in January (stupid holidays), we were given some exercises, including drumming and listening to some drumming CDs. We are also supposed to keep up with the vestibular system stimulation; the OT said Yelena's craving of the bouncing means she really needs it and, along with the jumping, spinning and flying/landing on hands games we play, will further help with her body mapping. Another assignment she loved is playing with river rocks (I still have a ton from our wedding); apparently, their cool smooth texture is stimulating and she was great at finding the toys I hid amongst them. She is also, under adult supervision, supposed to play with dried beans -- their texture and weight supposedly is perfect for working with fine motor skills. (Sometimes her pincer grasp is perfect, sometimes too lateral -- it goes with her MP difficulty of isolating her index finger for pointing.) Finally, she is supposed to engage in messy play. Eli has put me on sole detail for this one -- his inner neat freak emerges the second her hand gets into the yogurt. Last night, the sight of her covered in ravioli stuffing, veggies and yogurt -- even after I wiped a layer off -- nearly did him in. She sure looked cute, covered in goo, but I did go and wash my hands and her spoon handle a few times and had to wrap a paper towel over my splint. Fortunately, the therapist suggested this only a dinner time before her bath -- although I've always let her hand scoop some oatmeal at breakfast. That stuff is paste.

Excellent

2006-12-23T12:24:00.000-06:00

This is the other picture I took that I wanted on our holiday cards, but Eli convinced me that the one we ended up using was a little less Mr. Burns.

Sticky Wicket

2006-12-20T21:13:00.000-06:00

Bloody hell, I have a mallet finger. The tendon may have snapped completely or only part way, the x-ray only shows my bones, which are fracture free. To heal correctly, the splint is angled upwards and I have to wear the sucker for 6 weeks. I typically heal quickly, so I am hoping by 4 weeks it looks all pointy again. I'm making an appointment with an orthopedist just to double-check the damned thing. Now there's an upside to having been way too busy to play violin these past few months -- I'd be really pissed if I were on a musical roll. Now I just have to avoid wacking or scratching Yelena with the splint.

Update

2006-12-19T22:57:00.000-06:00

The Yelena dumpling is doing well, as snuggly and cute as ever. We've gotten more accustomed to her hazily diagnosed status and we have a better idea of what's going on. What I failed to explicitly mention is that all her delays are directly related to her issues with motor planning, which stem from whatever is wired differently in her brain. (I will snap at the next parent who tells me I'm lucky that she's not moving yet; yeah, she's really lucky she has to work her tushie off doing things that are involuntary for your kid.) Her motor planning issues explain the idiosyncratic nature of her skills (e.g. she can kiss different parts of our face on command but can't point them out on herself). Per the neurologist, worst case scenario her receptive language is only about 20% delayed, whereas the speech therapist she saw today doesn't think it's delayed -- it's difficult to determine because of her scattered expressive language skills. We can see her trying to move her mouth to form consonants but her inability to get some of them out is connected to the motor planning problems. The speech therapist was pretty confident that therapy would help, so we're looking forward to that starting.

Yesterday, she went in for an audiology evaluation, just to ensure hearing is intact. Although her infection is cleared up, she still has some fluid behind her eardrums and the audiologist didn't want to do the test because if there were any signs of reduced hearing it would probably be from the fluid and not actual loss. (The graph of the movement of her eardrum wasn't flat, but it wasn't all spiky; she estimated 40% fluidy.) The audiologist's opinion was that Yelena seemed to hear ok and that there was no reason to wait for speech therapy, she'll just do the test in a month when everything should be drained. Since neither her pediatrician nor neurologist noticed the bit of fluid (the audiologist said something snide about them not trained to look in ears properly) we might have our ENT friend take a peek-a-boo periodically in her ears.

Tomorrow we have an intake visit with Early Intervention. In the interim, we are scheduling ST and OT through Children's Memorial, where Yelena does her PT, since Lord of Bureaucracy only knows when EI will get everything in line. Even at Children's, they didn't have slots for evaluations until late January/February, but Evette pulled some strings and Yelena has her OT evaluation this week, as well. In other good news, Evette has EI certification, so Yelena can keep seeing her even when EI enters the picture. I think they would miss each other very much, since Evette tells Yelena that she could play with her all day and that her hour always goes by too quickly. Everyone loves my love bunny.

Queen Klutz

2006-12-19T22:48:00.000-06:00

My posting is impeded as I jammed my finger. How? In the highly athletic pursuit of moving a blanket off my leg. Yup, my left middle finger is at a weird angle because it collided with my thigh. I taped it to my ring finger until I can get to buy a splint tomorrow. If it still looks funky, I guess I'll make a doctor's appointment. It's more irritating than anything, and slightly amusing to see my first joint jauntily bent. I don't have a primary care physician so now I'm going to have to go through the hassle of finding one if it doesn't get better. Grumble.

Baby Belly Dancer: or, Tangled up in Blues

2006-12-08T16:04:00.000-06:00

Neurologist

2006-12-07T19:33:00.000-06:00

After seeing a highly qualified neurologist, it has been determined that our lovely Yelena has a congenital brain disorder. In the doctor’s words, she is a complex case as her developmental delays are idiosyncratic (in some instances, she can perform advanced tasks without having mastered the basics). Because she is very engaged (great eye contact; highly social, affectionate and responsive; no behavior or sensory issues), has had no regression and we got an early diagnosis, it is hoped that with proper therapeutic intervention she will be completely mainstreamed by kindergarten, at the latest. Yelena has been working hard in physical therapy for the past few months and we are looking forward to working with her in speech and developmental therapy.

At this time, no MRI nor blood work has been ordered as it would not change her therapeutic course. It is more important to us and her doctors that she progresses rather than go through excruciating and exhausting tests merely to give a precise name to her condition, or to discern whether its causes are genetic or a fluke in the prenatal development of her central nervous system.

We appreciate the continued support of our friends and family at this time. Because you are all good people, we know we can count on your discretion and compassion in discussing this matter as well as you continuing to treat Yelena as the delightful, complete person she is. Although no parent would choose or foresee these hurdles, we could not love our little sweetie any more and we are determined to ensure her happiness and emotional well-being while we overcome these challenges.

Post poor

2006-11-28T22:43:00.001-06:00

Yeah, so, I've been busy.

We had a peaceful Thanksgiving weekend here in Chicago. I like seeing family and all but I loathe traveling this time of year and, after the past four years of either driving in the snow or dealing with overcrowded airports, it was lovely to drive a couple miles to Tony and Eric's place, have a relaxing meal and then spend the rest of the weekend doing just about nothing.

Well, nothing except dance rehearsals. The student show is this coming Sunday and I've been busy with that. I am only doing one dance in the show (a drum solo) -- I was going to do 2 or 3, but I have a kid and can't really make Eli take care of her every night and all weekend. I am in class with women who are literally rehearsing every weekday and twice on Saturdays and Sundays, in addition to taking a couple classes. If I were childless, I'd be doing it too.

It's good that I'm not, since I'm already missing out a few events because of it, and Hugo just announced a last minute trip to Chicago this weekend and now I'll actually be able to see him.

Yelena's ear infection seems to be clearing up and she's been more vocal. After she was diagnosed, I fell prey to some little buggery bug. I haven't been icky enough to call in sick -- if I had a job where I could call in sick -- but my voice is only just now returning to not sounding like a prepubescent boy when I sing about itsy-bitsy spiders and noble dukes of York.

Finally, Yelena got herself some baby legs. I know you're thinking, "What kind of freak puts their baby in leg warmers?" and I'll answer, a smart freaky momma. It's been unseasonally balmy here but, let me tell you, soon it is going to be crazy frigid. When children are carried out to the car, their pants legs ride up leaving their sweet baby calves exposed. Yelena will be spared this indignity as the baby legs will keep her pants down and her legs toasty, but not too toasty as I can remove them easily in the car. They're perfect for after swim class and, since they're one size, when she's being potty trained (which is bound to happen some year) she won't have to be pulling up and down her pants all the time. This is the best darned purchase I've made in a long time.

Got milk?

2006-11-28T22:34:00.000-06:00

Once again showing her utter disregard, nay disdain, for the natural progression of developmental milestones, today Yelena drank all by herself from an adult cup. I was giving her milk and she put her hands on the cup and started tilting up, taking a sip, and tilting down so I let her have a go. Aside from the milk mustache, she didn't make much of a mess and drank a few ounces all by herself, with Mommy hovering nearby with one hand poised to catch a potentially flying cup and the other on the trigger of the camera.

Coming up rosy

2006-11-13T23:51:00.000-06:00

Despite the ear infection, the past week has been good, both macro and micro. The election results, well, yay! I just found out that our synagogue just performed its first gay marriage, a month ahead of the decision of the conservative movement (I love a progressive rebellion). Jet Blue starts flying Chicago to Long Beach direct ($89-109 each way, baby) in January. The curb to the private alley will be cut on Thursday. Yelena is willingly rolling on to her tummy, granted, with some bribery, and is starting some proto-cruising. Our mortgage escrow was reduced, which was a pleasant surprise. I even sold some stuff on ebay. I hope Lady Fortune doesn't flip-flop any time soon.

An earful of gunk

2006-11-13T23:25:00.000-06:00

Yelena had her 15 month checkup today. Poor little lamb has her first ear infection! We had no idea, since she wasn’t exhibiting any of the classic signs. Well, last Thursday she did wake up in the middle of the night and started wailing when I tried to put her back to bed, but I thought it was because of a bad dream or a tooth. It turns out, it might have been that, too, since her lower right premolar is visibly cutting. (She was unhappy every time I tried to put her back in her crib, finally gave up and took her into the guest bedroom with me so I could sleep. She's slept fine every night since then, so I assumed it was just an anomaly.) Her appetite has waned a bit, but she’s been nursing and drinking with gusto, hasn't pulled her ears and has not been cranky, so who knew? She’s on antibiotics now and Dr. Ramadan suspects that she’ll go back to talking more once she’s recovered.

She weighed in at 24 lbs. 7 oz., 30" tall and 47.5 cm. head; still in the 75th, 50th and 90th percentiles, respectively. Let's hear it for consistency. The doctor asked if she's had a temper tantrum yet, since they typically start at 15 months. I had to laugh. The closest she's come is a raspberry or a grunt. Sweetie!

Autumn Leaves

2006-11-13T23:12:00.000-06:00

These were taken on that gorgeous 65 degree day last week. We've since raked and our tree has now shed the last of its leaves.

Vayera

2006-11-12T20:56:00.000-06:00

I spend a lot of time thinking about parenting. I imagine you do, too. Even if you don’t have children of your own we all have parents. Whether they met or fell short of our emotional and spiritual needs, they packed our emotional baggage and programmed the patterns that dictate how we live and love. Some of us are luckier than others but, like Tolstoy, I am not so interested in the happy fortunate few because they do not appear in today’s parsha.

Commentaries on Vayera often focus on the charms of hospitality, obedience to God and those terribly naughty people who are not us, rather than examine the dysfunctional dynamics of families who might be us. These stories are sugar-coated when taught in Hebrew school because they are pretty scary in a Grimm fairy tale kind of way: replete with violence, adult situations and explicit sexual material they plunge the deep waters underneath the family romance. There’s a Philip Larkin poem, which I cannot quote fully here due to its use of a particular epithet, about how mum and dad mess you up. The verse continues, “They may not mean to but they do/They fill you with the faults they had/And add some extra just for you.” Throughout this parsha there is a disconnect between parents and children, husbands and wives. Parental mishigos runs the gamut – they love too much and they love too little, they are unable to see when those nearest and dearest need their outstretched hand.

After Abraham haggles with God, it is determined that Lot and his family are the only decent people in all of Sodom and Gomorrah. If Lot is the guy worth saving, is it any wonder the whole place is burned by sulfurous fire? In a previous episode, Lot abandoned Abraham’s westward spiritual journey to go east, to the fertile plains, and chooses to settle in Sodom. The Zohar claims this land was well-watered everywhere and possessed all the luxuries of the world, yet its inhabitants were unwilling to share them with others. Even if he maintains a shadow of his uncle’s righteousness, Lot becomes spoiled by the easy life. Along with its pride and refusal to strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy, Ezekiel claims that the iniquity of Sodom lay in its fullness of bread and abundance of idleness. This is the curse of over-privileged children: with everything handed to them, they never learn how to work; never having to struggle, they can neither grasp the difference between right and wrong nor develop a sense of compassion, the ability to see through another’s eyes.

Lot is lacking in regard, the ability to see and understand what really matters. Throughout millennia, Jews have suffered the fate of Lot, having to pick up and go, leaving behind homes, luxuries and livelihoods. It is our regard for family and God that has sustained us through this long history of exile, carrying within us what matters most. Lot is blind to this, even after being nearly trampled by his neighbors, he dilly-dallies until a divine messenger takes him by the hand and tugs him away.

Lot’s lack of regard is illustrated by two graphic incidents involving his youngest daughters: his voluntary offering of them to pacify the depraved townspeople and their incestuous acts with him following the calcification of their mother. As a woman and a mother, I am totally repulsed by the multitude of commentators who consider prostituting his daughters in lieu of his guests as good hospitality. Yes, offering strangers a safe house is the right thing to do and Miss Manners certainly frowns on handing the company over to a rapacious mob, but Lot seriously bastardizes the concept of women and children first. Even in a culture that undervalues women it is the natural order to put one’s own life on the line to protect one’s family, in fact, it is the primal role of the male in a patriarchal society. What use is a male lion that does not protect his pride from predators? Yet, unprompted, Lot immediately offers to exchange his daughters, treating them as a commodity to barter. He does not even attempt to negotiate or dissuade the Sodomites, let alone try to hide his guests, defend his homestead á la John Wayne or, the mark of an truly exemplary host, offer himself up instead.

Abraham makes a similar selfish blunder twice. Sojourning in foreign lands, he omits his marital status and reports that Sarah is his sister in order to avoid possible endangerment to himself. With Pharaoh, Abraham offers no excuse for putting Sarah in a position that might compromise her fidelity and safety or question the paternity of any future offspring. When Avimelech indignantly cries, “You have done to me things that ought not to be done. What was your purpose in doing this?” Abraham tries to vindicate his error by claiming, “I thought, surely there is no fear of God in this place.” He blames his behavior on the place in which he finds himself, justifying his lack of consideration for a loved one on circumstance, as if love and morality were conditional. Many commentators try to clear our patriarch of lying, pulling a Chinatown defense that she sort of is his sister, but Ramban states that Abraham sinned, his actions were unequivocally wrong.

We will never know if Abraham’s potential sacrifice of Sarah’s virtue had any repercussions on their relationship, although I wonder when Sarah says that God has brought her laughter that her life alone with Abraham was devoid of laughter, her lack not simply barrenness but something else missing. The Torah is explicit regarding the detrimental effects of Lot’s action on his daughters. A new bathroom book recently made its way into our house: How to Self-Destruct: Making the Least of What’s Left of Your Career. I couldn’t help but think of Lot while reading the advice on family, “Ignore your kids. Specifically, dads, ignore your daughters. Nothing will ruin your life like surfing online one day and coming across a gonzo movie starring your little girl. Preparing for that moment, however, takes a lifetime of inattention. It’s best if you stay emotionally distant and start the verbal abuse at a very early age.”

Lot’s lifetime of inattention comes home to roost after he heads to the hills, to mix metaphors, where his daughters violate the ultimate taboo. Although they claim “there is not a man on earth to consort with us,” they did have a layover in Zoar. Later sources report that all the towns of the plain were destroyed and therefore their aim was true. Bereshit Rabbah even alleges that God left the wine in the cave as a divine endorsement of the daughters’ seduction. If God supported this violation of the Noahide laws, then I imagine God would have attached a note to the wine, “By the way, you aren’t the last people on earth. Skip that whole incest thing.” Regardless of what they naively believe, the daughters have a twisted and incomplete sense of morality. They know enough that they must get their father drunk, not that they ought not have sex with him. But I do doubt these stunted women had the power to make a grown man drink wine. At some point, a father should know when to say no. Although Lot does not remember when they lay down or when they rose, he got blindingly drunk two nights in a row. I am reminded of the commercial, “I learned it from watching you.”

Then there is Lot’s wife. The Talmud instructs any who see her to give praise and thanks. Is this because she is a monument to the miracles that God performs, or a memorial that a wicked place that is no more? Viewing her metamorphosis as a mere punishment, a sign that in looking back Lot’s wife shared the sins of Sodom, is an oversimplification implying that she was all bad. The Sanhedrin declared that the people of Sodom do not have a portion in world to come. Targun Yerushalmi states that Lot’s wife will remain a pillar of salt until the time the dead are brought back to life. Although she does not escape she is exempt from the decree of eternal damnation.

Attributing her backwards glance to her willingness to leave physically but not spiritually ignores that she left behind two daughters. I imagine Lot’s wife looks back not longing for hedonism but longing to see her other children behind her, escaping their doom. Perhaps she wonders if she had been a better parent would they have heeded the call to flee. There is the possibility that she chooses her destiny, unable to live with the knowledge that she failed her children. She cannot bear the thought that she won’t see them again or – like Orpheus glancing back at Eurydice – that they might think she no longer loves them in their fallen condition. Witnessing divine destruction is bound to have a transformative effect and, as we know from our Ovid, we transform into our essence – in this case, a preservative. A mother’s role is to care for her family and preserve traditions. Now she will forever be a guidepost reminding others to mind their children, to look forward to their futures as well as to the past. She is eternally stuck until the olam haba as a memorial to her ineffective love.

Hagar also loves ineffectively. Full of pride, she is unable to think of a way out of her predicaments, to stop her blubbering and grow up. She is boastful when pregnant and responds to harshness by running away, like a child rather than one with child. Cast out into the wilderness with Ishmael, she runs out of the supplies with which she was provided and is unable to clear her head enough to forage although water is right in front of her. Fatalistic, she lacks the maternal strengths of resourcefulness and maintaining clarity in life-threatening situations. She is unable to see the well for her tears. Until God literally makes her open her eyes, Hagar would allow herself and her child to die rather than take him by the hand and make her hand strong in his.

Sarah does provide a strong hand and a keen eye in her son’s life and destiny, pushing potential rivalry off the scene. Sarah conceived Ishmael’s conception, but the bond between them is more fairy tale step-parent than surrogate mother. Ishmael is a constant reminder of the sexual past between her husband and another woman. Even if it’s a thing of the past, as long as he is around Abraham has a connection to his baby momma. Sarah’s protective instincts are further aroused when she sees Ishmael and Isaac playing together. Rashi suggests this play had a sexual element to it whereas others believe that Ishmael was just a big bully and not a suitable playmate for Isaac. Another reading is that Ishmael was playing at being Isaac, acting as Abraham’s rightful heir. Even in make believe Sarah will not let this happen.

Sarah is the crucial player in the continuance of the covenant. Even if Abraham has parental feelings for Ishmael, God is clear that it is through Sarah that the promise of numerous offspring and everlasting covenant shall continue. God has a radical feminist moment: women are not interchangeable vessels. Maternity is as important as paternity.

On topics maternal, there is a midrashic tradition fixated on Sarah’s breasts. To prove that Isaac is not some foundling Abraham and Sarah are passing off as their own, or to share God given bounty, Sarah nurses all the noblewomen’s babies at Isaac’s weaning feast with, and I quote, “milk pouring out like two jets of water.” In The Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison describes mother’s milk as a thread of light. Here, too, milk is not just nutrition but an outpouring of love. After waiting nearly a century, Sarah is overflowing with laughter and with milk, is it any wonder she is overzealous in protecting her son? Someone has to be, since Abraham is not.

Isaac is the archetype of the submissive son, living his life overshadowed by his father. A parent seeking to dominate his child is in danger of sacrificing him to parental hopes and plans. There is a Hasidic saying that if your son has a talent to be a baker, don’t ask him to be a doctor; we have seen Dead Poets Society, we know the ending for unbendingly plotting a child’s life. Isaac’s independence is crippled, partly by an overprotective mother but more by a father who values him only inasmuch as he is the fulfillment of God’s promise or a tool for doing God’s will.

Contrary to Rav Zimmerman, when God says to Abraham kill me a son, Abe does not say, “Man, you must be putting me on.” He impassively agrees. All the tractates and midrash, novels and songs have not reconciled me to this story, nor will they ever, as the akedah is purposefully ambiguous. The story, like Abraham’s hand, remains suspended. We will never know if Abraham would have gone through with it, whether his faith overruled his fatherly love, whether he trusted God would come through with the promise of making him a mighty nation through this son, whether he was testing God as much as God was testing him. I am a mother, not a prophet, so if I am to share an iota of Abraham’s faith and obedience I have to believe that God set this trial because showing is stronger than telling. Cue Leonard Cohen, “You who build these altars now/to sacrifice these children/you musn’t do this anymore.” Thus, the binding of Isaac was proof that God is a different kind of god, a moral god who would never exact a price in worship, other than looking out for those we love and accepting the guidance of God’s hand.

Our daughter, the otter

2006-11-06T23:09:00.000-06:00

Finding a tot swim class that doesn't run on Saturdays is quite a chore here in the land-locked Midwest. We finally did, at the Evanston Y, and Yelena is downright thrilled to be back in the water. We joined a class mid-way through and the teacher noticed right away that this wasn't Yelena's first time swimming. After seeing Yelena kick and reach/paddle throughout each mini-lap, the teacher declared that Yelena was a natural. She can't crawl or walk, but my baby was the only kid in a dozen -- and some are almost 3 years -- who consistently kicked and reached. Proof that God divides. Too bad Yelena can't be amphibious. Or at least live somewhere warmer, near a beach.

Our otter is now saying, "Ba-ba," when she wants to nurse. Eli thought this was another of my hallucinations, until she woke us up at 5:20 on Sunday morning yelling, "Ba-ba, ba-ba!" from her crib. She oos, you think she could manage boob or boo-boo, alas, ba-ba it is. We've also gotten a few more "hi's" and I get an occasional, "Ma," or "MMMMMa-ma," but no more "Mo-meee."

Yelena is also exhibiting her first sign of pre-toddler willfullness. Last week she started refusing to grab her spoon. Sometimes, she won't reach for it but if I put it in her hands she will grab it and bring it to her mouth. Not right now. She won't even clasp it, but sits there open-handed, opens her mouth and gives me a look. (She's still grabbing her cup, napkin, sandwich, toys, hair, cats, glasses, so it's not a physical issue, it's a spoon issue.) I know I could just refuse to feed her, but I figure she'll get over it in a few days or weeks and I'd rather not force such a silly issue nor take an hour for breakfast. And she's quite pleasant about it, so I'll let it slide for now.

Exercise your rights

2006-11-06T23:06:00.000-06:00

If you're going to vote tomorrow, and you better be, and you live in Chicago, here is the judicial screenings link. It's very comprehensive. The Chicago Bar Association's list is here.

Base touching and scavanger squirrels

2006-11-02T12:40:00.000-06:00

Yelena had a great time playing with her devoted Gramma last week and I got a lot of non-blogging stuff done, thanks to the visit. I am no longer afraid of going into the laundry/storage room, the office no longer looks like a tornado hit it and I planted some bulbs. Six dozen tulips, forty crocuses and six hydrangeas in the front yard. Bulbs are the ultimate in delayed gratification; all that work and I don't even get a shoot for 4-5 months. Hopefully, they aren't just expensive Netherlandish nibbles for the bastard squirrels. I used to think squirrels were cute, now that I have a garden I know them for the vicious, digging rodents that they are. Allegedly, they like to dig up bulbs, take one bite, and then toss them assunder.

Not much else going on here. I'll put up a few new pics of the adorable one soon, but the camera is downstairs and I need to use Yelena's nap wisely. I'm giving a d'var Torah Shabbat next and, since I can no longer do too much personal stuff during my job, I will probably be blogging lightly until the 11th. Who knows, there is always procrastination, my forte. Last night I put some stuff up on ebay rather than writing about the Akedah, so I might be a postapotamus. This weekend I have double dance class (like double Potions...mmm, Snape) on Saturday, since I'm missing next Tuesday for opera, and Sunday I have a workshop in the afternoon, so I am losing my writing time this weekend to dance to Arabic music. I'm such a good Jewish girl.

Hepatic Lipidosis: Or, Should I Put a Feeding Tube in My Cat?

2006-10-27T00:18:00.000-05:00

I’ve gotten quite a few hits from people searching for information on hepatic lipidosis, so I thought I’d put together one convenient entry for people wanting to read about a specific case to help them decide whether to use a feeding tube to cure this liver disease.

My short answer to, “Should I put a feeding tube/peg tube in my cat?” is yes, if you can afford it, have the time and energy to feed the cat through it, and the cat isn’t about to die from their primary disease. The experts say that implementation of a feeding tube has a 70-80% chance of curing hepatic lipidosis/fatty liver. It worked for my kitty and, although it was rough going for the first week or so, it was worth it. I wasn’t ready for my lovely kitty to die, if he could be made well again, and it’s great having the spunky bugger back in full form.

My kitty, Cherubino, was diagnosed with moderate feline lymphoma and inflammatory bowel syndrome. Whether from the stress of the cancer, the stress of the chemo, or the stress of having pills shoved down his throat, Cherubino, an erstwhile glutton, stopped eating. Fat at over 19 lbs. before the cancer, down to 16.5 at the time of the diagnosis of the lymphoma, he was checked into the hospital weighing 10.5 lbs., not so much on death’s doorstep but in death’s foyer. He was severely dehydrated and very much a shadow of his former self. Not grumpy, just pathetic and scrawny.

He received fluids, vitamins and his cancer was checked. The oncologist strongly suspected hepatic lipidosis (later confirmed by cytology and biopsy). Once Cheru was strong enough and his blood counts sufficient for anesthesia, his liver was aspirated to ensure that the lymphoma hadn’t spread. It hadn’t and a feeding tube was put in.

When the oncologist first told me that a feeding tube was basically the only cure – I didn’t think appetite stimulants and syringe feedings would work, since Cheru may have been stressed out by popping the pills -- I was a bit creeped out. After talking to my primary vet about his success with feeding tubes, learning that cats object to this a lot less than an oral tube, realizing it was either this or a dead kitty, I decided to go ahead. Besides, at this point we had spent so much money already, that there was no point of not going all the way.

Cheru had the tube put in on a Friday and came home on Monday. The tube was in for 7 weeks total, although I didn’t feed him through it the last 2 weeks but kept it in for a bit after a round of chemo just to make sure he was continuing to eat on his own. It took him a few weeks to eat on his own again once the tube was in, and then just a little bit, but by 4-5 weeks he was eating full meals on his own.

He never fought the tube feedings. He would let me pick him up and snuggle in my lap as I slowly fed him, often purring once the warmed food started reaching his stomach. He vomited a bit at first (see my tips below) and had a few bouts of diarrhea, which was very embarrassing for him, but after the first couple weeks all that stopped.

I gave Cheru Reglan about ½ hour before each feeding and mixed Denosyl/SAMe in his food once a day. We discontinued the leukeran and prednisone treating his cancer until he started eating on his own again.

Tips for tube feeding at home:

If you haven’t already, buy a bottle of Nature’s Miracle. It removes vomit odors like magic. And buy a huge pack of cat wipes for grooming under the sweater and in case of diarrhea. A clean cat is a happy cat.

GO SLOWLY! The vet techs aren’t kidding. Go slower than you think is slow enough, at least the first few days at home. If you’re using Feline A/D, that stuff smells even worse coming back up than going down. And there is nothing more discouraging than spending 15 minutes feeding your cat only to have to clean up puke minutes later.

If your cat vomits more than once, reduce the amount of the feeding. I figured rather than giving my cat the 90 cc prescribed, having him puke it up, and then having to skip the next feeding, it would be better to keep him at 60 cc for a few feedings and then gradually increase 5-10 cc’s a day.

Flush warm water before and after each feeding and each medicine. You really want to keep the tube from blockages. If it blocks, 1 cc of carbonated beverage should clear it out (I never had to do this.) Also shooting the last cc of water in your syringe really fast help clean everything out.

Get a few extra sweaters/surgical socks from the vet. They will get soiled and unravel and it’s undignified enough for a cat to wear a sweater, let them at least be clean. Wash them by hand, they’ll last longer. Tie them with a hair tie or rubber band at the top, behind the head where they can’t get to it, if your cat is sporting the low rider look. You want to keep that sweater on, so they can’t mess with the tube.

Beg your vet, purchase, or ask any friends in the medical profession to score you as many syringes as possible. I found loading up all the syringes for the next day(s) and putting them in a Ziploc bag in the fridge saved a lot of time every day – versus having to wash and load them three times per day.

Isolate your cat. This way you can cover the furniture with old sheets and towels and not have to clean up cat ick from more than one room. It was difficult for me, as I was used to Cheru having the run of the house, but he really was happier in the guest room away from the other cats. The other cats could tell he was sick and didn’t really want much to do with him, anyway. We visited him throughout the day. At night, we would carry him down to watch a movie with us (plop him in our laps) or I would read in his room. Often, I would sleep part of the night with him in the guest room. Love helps kitties heal.

Person I used to know

2006-10-23T23:53:00.000-05:00

I wasn't even thinking of doing an entry about him on my new blog (yes yes, will be under construction for some time, working on a few other things here, probably shouldn't have even posted about it), but here is the first person to make Crain's 40 Under 40 list who was at my wedding. Yes, techie friends abroad, I know -- well, knew -- Jason Fried. I even almost dated him, but that is an amusing story best told in person. And he is really a ton cuter than his picture.

There's nothing like the 40 Under 40 list to make one feel like an underachiever. (Cue Morrissey: We Hate It When Our Friends [and friends of friends] Become Successful.) Not that it's ever been a particular ambition of mine to make the 40 under 40 list; if it were, I probably wouldn't have left the scintillating world of commercial real estate finance and, perhaps, even applied myself to it. Anyway, I have 6 more years, who knows what I will accomplish? And you nasty little smart asses thinking, "Yeah, if they have a Stay at Home Moms under 40 List," well, you can just, just, just, shut up. Waaaa. It's not easy being green, man.

Bureau of Funny Walks

2006-10-23T23:27:00.000-05:00

The previous post notwithstanding, Yelena is getting much better at pulling up, standing and walking holding on to our hands. Sometimes she looks like she's auditioning for a Monty Python remake: she pulls her right knee up really high before putting her foot down and then puts her left foot down with her knee rather rigid and none of the drama of the right. The hilarity and cuteness must be witnessed to be believed.

Isn't that ponytail the duckiest? And baby's got cheeks.

Action shot

2006-10-23T23:20:00.000-05:00

Alternate titles: Pride goweth before the fall. I can't stand up for falling down. Boom!

Squats and giggles

2006-10-17T14:07:00.000-05:00

I'm a total postapotamus today. I don't need a nap when I sleep until 9.

Yelena is currently on a "Hi," boycott. Oh well, it was cute while it lasted and I'm sure there will be many a repeat performance, just on her schedule, not ours.

She is very much into her own schedule; fortunately, she is very sweet tempered about it, so we can't really mind too much. At physical therapy last week, she was squating down to pick things up and coming back up on her own. Evette was surprised and declared that this skill was more advanced than walking. Damnit, Yelena, haven't you read the book? Don't you know you're supposed to do things in a specific order, like all the other kids?

Speaking of all the other kids, here's an interesting article about TV watching and autism on Slate. I think they're really on to something. (Four hours a day?! For a toddler?) Sure, Yelena may not be mobile but at least she doesn't greet me with a blank stare.

We have a new game. When I ask her, "What does a cow say?" her eyes light up. She has always loved a good moo. Last week I asked her and said, "A cow says... mmm," a few times and each time she squeaked in anticipation, releasing with a giggle fit when I finally uttered the long-awaited moo. It only works so-so with other animal noises. She also cracks up when I sing something really high and then sing it really low. I love my giggle-puss.

Very considerate developments

2006-10-17T13:48:00.000-05:00

My goodness, this is my 300th post. Maybe the network will buy me a Porshe.

The past few nights Yelena has slept over 12 hours. Mon dieu! She's gone to bed at her regular time -- cooing herself to sleep, after some soporific boobie and cuddling -- postponed her 4:00 wake up to 5:45, and then slept until 9:00! She's still taking one nap, but she's pretty much resisting letting it go much more than an hour. Really, I'll gladly swap 20 minutes less of nap for an hour more sleep at night.

She's also been much more into table food. Saturday, at shul, she ate most of my lunch: babaganosh, humus, guacomole, the vinegary tomatoes from the salad, pita, egg salad. Man, she is crazy for babaganosh -- I guess my passion for eggplant was passed to her through my breast milk. This past week she also added beans to her repitoire. They weren't hot, but they were pretty garlicky and oniony. When we went to sushi for my birthday she ate gobs of tofu and eagerly slurped 5 large spoonfuls of my miso before I realized she probably had just consumed her sodium intake for the week. (Other parents give their kids fries, mine likes miso.) She also ate her first gnocchi in homemade tomato sauce and loves the carrot kugel recipe from Marsha. It's been great truly integrating her into dinner time.

Girl's best friend

2006-10-17T13:26:00.000-05:00

Cherubino is very patient with Yelena. She's been grabbing tufts of fur and handfulls of whiskers and he doesn't really seem to mind. Around Yelena, Theo is pretty much the way he is around adults. "Love me, love me, oh my God, I can't handle the love!" I like this picture of them back to back. There are no pictures of Yelena with Despina. Why? Because she always manages to stay just out of arm's reach of our little rugrat.

New blog

2006-10-11T16:19:00.000-05:00

You ever wonder what happened to people you used to know? Of course you do. Depending on your nosiness and free time, I bet you google them whenever you're procrastinating or have a dream about someone you haven't thought of in years. It turns out a lot of people I used to know are up to pretty interesting stuff, so I've decided to blog about them. Perhaps, when they're in the throes of a vanity search, we will reconnect, although that is certainly not the motivation for this exercise. Perhaps they will just sue me for libel. I figure if they're in the public domain with a website, then I am free to reminisce and critique.

I am hoping this will be an interesting project, but I'm going to keep in separate from this blog, since I think most of you are just looking for pictures of Yelena.

Moderately exciting house news

2006-10-09T22:02:00.000-05:00

Last week we finally came to an agreement with the neighbors with whom we share the private alley behind our house. The permit has been released, a surveyor has surveyed, and the curb will be cut sometime, hopefully, soon. (The City has even agreed to remove the immature tree on their side of the sidewalk.) Once we get around to paving the private alley we will have off-street parking and the ability to build a garage. Considering deeded parking goes for at least $20k around here -- and a garage would add at least $40k of value to our house -- them's some good returns.

Not so exciting Mila developments

2006-10-09T21:50:00.000-05:00

If you are squeamish, or wish to avoid overly personal information, just skip this post. Go to the previous one or the subsequent one and don't blame me, or say "gross" or ask "Why is she sharing this?" If you disregard my warning, you only have yourself to blame.

Aunt Flo returned today, the bitch. November 3 would have been two years without the bloody nuisance but, no, she had to come back today with her cramps and her bloating and her messiness. It was bound to happen sooner or later, but I've been hoping for the late late later. We're down to nursing only 3, maybe 4 (with the 4th as a 2 minute security top off at 4:00 a.m.), times within 24 hours so I guess that was a trigger but I am not happy about this development.

And, no, I am not going to try to get pregnant in 2 weeks to avoid this, but don't think the thought hasn't crossed my mind.

Exciting Yelena developments

2006-10-09T21:42:00.000-05:00

Yelena is pretty consistently saying, "Hi," when she first sees one of us. (Sometimes it sounds a bit like "Hiya," which has it's own panache.) It's very cute and friendly of her. Alas, still no repeat of, "Mommy," but she has said, "Yeah," a few times in response to a questions. For the record, the questions were things like, "Do you want boobie?" and "Do you want a cookie?" Who wouldn't say, "Yeah" to those?

In the past few days she's been pulling herself up on her wagon, passing back and forth from my hands to the wagon and back again, pivoting out to the side of me holding only one hand, and taken a few baby steps while still holding on. Progress, slow and steady.

After much gnawing, the sixth tooth has finally emerged. Four top, two bottom.

One nap gal

2006-10-04T22:43:00.000-05:00

The past couple weeks Yelena has been taking only one nap, from around 11ish to 1ish, give or take a half hour. Since this change, she's been going down at night very easily, sleeping until 8, and waking up cooing and kicking instead of crying.

Today, due to a 1:00 appointment, she went back to her previous nap schedule of a morning nap and a short afternoon nap. Doom. It took bloody forever to put her down tonight. She just wasn't having it. She gained a half-hour this afternoon, but lost an hour and a half at bedtime. Although she was sleepy by 3, with this negative sum sleep it would have been better if I had just kept her awake in the afternoon.

Screw all the sleep experts, with their a baby age x should be getting y amount of naps for z amount of time. When I followed their advice about putting a baby down 15 minutes earlier every night, that failed drastically, too. Gee, I can put my baby down at 8:30 and she'll sleep through the night, or I can put her down at 7:30 and have her wake up 5 times. Like most things in parenting, I am learning that following my instincts and my daughter's cues result in a happier mommy and a happier, well-rested baby.

Operatastic

2006-10-03T23:33:00.000-05:00

Just got back from the first opera of the season to a dark and quiet house. Eli successfully put Yelena to bed, not too much later than her regular bedtime. It's taken fourteen months, but I appear to have some boobie freedom!

The opera was Turandot. Beautiful production, but I've got to ask, is that any way to start a marriage?

We've moved up to Row B, still on the aisle. We just need to put a hit on the people in front of us and we'll have seats for life. I used to have Dress Circle fantasies, but the acoustics in the upper balcony are really the best in the house. I'm so glad I contibuted to the annual fund this year, even if my charity wasn't altogether altruistic.

E.O.C.* Yeah, You Know Me

2006-09-27T22:56:00.000-05:00

*Epitome of Cuteness

Who's your Mommy?

2006-09-26T23:06:00.000-05:00

Been a bit busy here with Rosh Hashanah, but here's a quick tidbit.

Last Thursday morning, Yelena and I were snuggling in bed. I turned my back to her in one of those, "Just give me 10 more minutes of sleep. You can play with Bear, you can play with my hair, you can vocalize all you want, just give me 10 more minutes." After about 15 minutes, I turned around to face her and she said, with an enormous smile, "Mo-meee." Surprised, I asked, "Did you say Mommy?" She replied, "Mo-meee." I gave her a hug and said, "You said Mommy!" "Mo-meee!" with a big grin.

Since then, nothing. A few people have asked her, "Can you say Mommy?" and she shakes her head. Eli reminds me of how she rolled over 3 times, spontaneously, and then didn't do it again for a couple months. I hope this isn't just a teaser like that.

I can't wait to hear another, "Mo-meeee!" but I guess I have no choice.

Confirmation portrait

2006-09-19T23:16:00.000-05:00

This spring, we were in Spain right before Holy Week. In photographers' windows all over the country, we'd see photos depicting a sweet little girl, hands folded in prayer, gazing serenely up at a crucifix. Often, these crucifixes were rather grisly and graphic: tortured expression, blood, nakedness, you name it. As it's not part of my culture, there was something disturbing about the juxtaposition of innocent girl clad in white and the suffering Christ.

I resisted the temptation of Photo-shopping a crucifix behind Yelena in this photo. (She was clapping, but looks quite devout.)

Little Cubbie

2006-09-17T23:02:00.000-05:00

Yesterday Yelena went to her very first Cubs game, which also happened to be her first ballgame. Rafi's parents, Marsha and Brian, had extra tickets and we were thrilled to join them. It was a Ferris Bueller sort of day, warm and clear with a breeze, birds soaring in and out of Wrigley Field and, best of all, the Cubs won 4-0. (Perhaps we should have taken our little good luck charm earlier in the season.) She sat and cuddled in our laps the whole game and seemed to really enjoy herself, especially playing with Marsha's score cards and having her first taste of ice cream.

Before and after the game, Yelena had a good time playing Godzilla with Rafi's trains. Since I've been misplacing the camera right and left -- always within our house, I'll have you know -- we didn't bring it, but Marsha has a cute picture of Yelena and Rafi playing here.

Eli thought baseball was a good start, so I came down from making pomegranate sorbet to find Daddy and Yelena watching football together on the TV. No! We'll have to get Chicago Fire tickets next year to indoctrinate her into real football, you know, the kind you actually play with your feet.

If I could nap with the animals

2006-09-14T20:58:00.000-05:00

Today we went on a jog, with the ostensible goal of Yelena taking a nap. Napping ought to have occurred since said Yelena woke up at her regular time this morning (7:30ish), took only an hour nap neither early nor late and was rubbing her eyes when we left. The excitement of getting back on the road must have been too much for her since it was a no go. We went the half-mile or so to Warren Park, which circles a golf course and numerous fields, around the park and up and down the sledding hill and she was still chirping away. We jogged over to Indian Boundary Park and, since she was the Queen of Perk, went to visit the animals.

Upon talking to a loitering zoo volunteer, I discovered that Beth, the geriatric cow (19+ years) died last month, as did the ancient mute swan. No, I did not ask if the former kicked the bucket or the latter sung a mute swan song. Our friendly neighborhood llamas have sojourned to their autumn home at the Farm at the Lincoln Park Zoo. In their place were very two large white goats named Clark and Addison. (The location of Wrigley Field, for you non-Cubs fans out there.) Apparently, the Farm in the Zoo is overrun with goats right now. (Anyone want a pet goat? They're environmentally sound lawn mowers.) I took Yelena out of her stroller and we watched them stretch up on their hind legs to chew the leaves off the trees. They obliged us by saying, “Naaaa,” a lot, which made Yelena smile. Then we played on the swings and watched flocks upon flocks of ducks in the grass, snatching up worms that all the rain must have brought up. She stayed awake all the way home, too, watching all the dogs and squirrels.

Recovery

2006-09-11T22:08:00.000-05:00

I feel less like a reheated turd and my tonsils are returning to normal, even without the tonsilectomy Ari, who is an ENT surgeon, was trying to convince me to have. I used my sick bed as an excuse to re-read the sixth Harry Potter book, thus I am behind schedule on finishing the High Holiday supplemental readings booklet. This bit o' cuteness will just have to tide y'all over until I have a free moment to blog some more.

Sorry to joke about the West Nile, Mom

2006-09-09T11:00:00.000-05:00

Ugh. I am riding the rollercoaster of this flu. My right tonsil has grown to epic proportions. Eli took Yelena to her Suzuki class solo this morning so I could sleep and has forbidden me from going to my dance class this afternoon. Waa. I'm going to join Yelena in her nap now. But, before I go, I want to point out that this Suri Cruise may be cute, but she ain't got nothing (except the powers of Scientology) on my baby.

Hopefully not West Nile

2006-09-07T22:33:00.000-05:00

Just a quickie to let you know we're alive, if not all well. Yelena and I got back from northern Michigan last night (Eli returned Monday). We had a lovely time, but I've been afflicted. In addition to suffering summer cottage bed aches, I am experiencing a headache, sore throat and assorted gastrointenstinal troubles. I've lived through worse, so I imagine I'll be better in a couple days. Except for resisting sleep -- when I need her to sleep more than ever -- the little one is well.

The fifth tooth

2006-08-30T16:09:00.000-05:00

While charting the slow unsteady progress of the mound on the lower right, a tooth popped out on the upper left. I swear, yesterday there wasn't so much as a bump and today -- voila! -- a tooth. I knew from the sudden appearance of drool globs that she was teething, and from her sudden clamping down that a tooth was eminent, I just guessed the wrong one.

On related teething news, yesterday Yelena demonstrated some cognitive powers. (Houston, we have cognition.) In the afternoon she had clamped down while nursing, a big no no around here. (Not so into the nipple pain. Why anyone would pierce them is beyond my imaginative masochism threshold.) When this happens I deny her privilege. I said to her, "Yelena, if you want to bite, bite Bear," and handed her the bear that shares sleeptime with her. So she gnawed on him a little and returned to me with a very wide open mouth. Last night we were nursing and she suddenly released my breast, reached to her other side, yanked Bear around, shoved his paw in her mouth and chewed away for a minute before turning back to me to gently nurse.

Now if I can only get her to understand the word, "In."

Nap time

2006-08-28T16:15:00.000-05:00

Bathing beauty

2006-08-28T15:36:00.000-05:00

I had to post a head shot, lest I get arrested, but here is my slippery seal.

Move over pita

2006-08-23T22:16:00.000-05:00

Today we met Uncle Eric for lunch. Apparently the only thing yummier than veggie booty is veggie booty with a glob of babaganosh.

Channeling Dr. Evil?

2006-08-23T22:09:00.000-05:00

Stand and Deliver

2006-08-22T23:48:00.000-05:00

No major milestones or anecdotes recently. Just much cuteness. Yelena did take a number of steps alternating feet while holding my hands today -- only she took them backwards. Moony.

Although other people seem to think it’s a terrible deficiency, either explicitly stating it or by their squinty eyes and raised brows, Eli and I aren’t too concerned about Yelena’s lack of mobility, except when we second guess ourselves. Everyone has an opinion on this and, boy, they do share it. Fortunately most of my friends, being intelligent people, are of the mindset of when-she’s-ready-to-walk-she’ll-walk and think it’s not a big deal. Everyone else either falls into the squinty eyed “your baby must be totally retarded” camp or the sign of genius camp.

From the former, in addition to implying that my daughter is developmentally deficient, in contrast to their own ‘normal’ crawling child, there is often the implication that my parenting is deficient. Either that I don’t spend enough time working with her on skills or that I spend too much time coddling her, thus preventing her from developing them. If I had a buck for every person who suggests, “Have you tried putting her toys out of reach?” I could afford a chauffeur so she’d never have to move at all. (The answer: she finds something else to do. Like play with the mat or the carpet or her hands or her hair or vocalize or watch the always exciting cat channel. There must really be something wrong with a baby who can entertain herself without crawling up the ceiling.) I actually had a stranger infer that my extended breastfeeding was linked to her not moving. (“She’s not crawling or walking? Are you still breastfeeding? Ahhhh.”)

From the latter, I have heard dozens of stories about how their brother/uncle/friend’s daughter didn’t walk until 16/20/24 months and now they’re a neurosurgeon/concert pianist/head of an Ivy League history department. Of course, I like these better, but am not going to take this anecdotal evidence as a sign of brilliance. Dr. Sears explicitly states that first steps are absolutely no indicator of intelligence later in life. If it were, there’d be a lot more smart people out there, wouldn’t there? Dr. Sears also mentions that babies with easier temperaments tend to be late walkers, and Yelena certainly has an easy temperament.

With all this in mind, Yelena had a physical therapy evaluation yesterday. The pediatrician had mentioned physical therapy as an option (her words were, “I love physical therapists! Even if you don’t need them you go away with all these fun things to do.”) and, since it’s not invasive and we’ve got flex spending we decided to take her in for an evaluation.

In the therapists’ collective opinion, Yelena is a beautiful sitter and a strong stander, she just doesn’t move. No duh. (We’re working on some exercises and going in once a week for four weeks to see what happens.) They stressed that she is developmentally delayed by her immobility, which I didn’t question at the time but should have, since most kids walk between 9 to 16 months. When I asked if there was something “wrong” (and I made the little quotey signs) with her they said I’d have to check with a neurologist to rule anything out. I know they have to say shit like that to cover their backs, but it really bothered me. Part of me got really defensive: nothing is wrong with my child; many of my friends’ children were late walkers and are all bright and well-adjusted – and no one was telling them their children were developmentally delayed. Another part of me got really freaked out: am I so arrogant that I think that there could be nothing wrong with my child?

Unless other triggers arise, I don’t think there is anything wrong. A friend, who was running the office of the premier child developmental specialist in Chicago and seen hundreds of children, reassured me today. She also pointed out that some children are so smart that hitting these milestones are beneath them. Again, I don’t want to use this as a sign of giftedness but, considering Yelena is an incredibly engaged and responsive child, it is a more likely explanation for her atypical behavior than that there is something neurologically wrong. From first-hand experience, I know that gifted children develop at a different pace and don’t necessarily excel in standard settings. I am going to continue to do what I do with my baby, give her love, give her stimulus and respond to her cues. And everyone can just kiss Yelena’s cute baby tushie.

Hunkered down with holy text

2006-08-22T22:30:00.000-05:00

Yelena is asleep, Eli is in Idaho, Theo is howling and I am reading Rabbi Soloveitchik all by my lonesome. Why, oh why, did I agree to re-do the High Holiday reading booklet? I could be reading another Michael Malone book.

Autogiggle

2006-08-17T23:35:00.000-05:00

Yelena cracked herself up today. I was at dance class, but Eli reports that he was playing guitar for her and heard her giggling like crazy. He looked down and she had a stuffed bear between her legs and was kicking her legs, making it move. Its dancing was apparently hysterical to her. We make her laugh, but this was the first time one of us witnessed her humoring herself.

More from the Dept. of Cute

2006-08-16T23:32:00.000-05:00

Dept. of Cute

2006-08-16T23:27:00.000-05:00

Push and shove

2006-08-16T23:00:00.000-05:00

Saturday, Yelena had her first experience as a victim of senseless violence. She was pushed by a 16 month old for no reason other than her mere existence. It was also the first time I ever saw her look angry. Puzzled, startled, scared, even disgust, I've seen, but this was a mixture of all four with a narrowing of the eyes and a modicum of fury.

I was borrowing books from a rabbi (who will go nameless, since it would be vindictive if someone Googled him and read my opinion of his lax parenting skills). We were perusing the shelves, so I put Yelena down in the middle of his office, offered her a toy car and a baseball to play with and she was quite content. Rabbi's toddler grew rapidly bored with yanking sacred texts off the shelves and throwing them aggressively to the ground and toddled over to Yelena. I was keeping the corner of my eye on them (Rabbi wasn't). Other babies and toddlers have been clumsy around her, usually out of interest or even affection, so I thought best not to leave them totally unattended. No other child had ever been mean, though.

We adults were talking when I witnessed toddler hellion suddenly, for no reason whatsoever, push Yelena in the middle of her face: once, twice. Yelena almost lost her balance but caught it and her dark eyes flashed anger. Instinctively, I used my deep-reprimand-the-cats-voice and yelled, "No! Back off! Leave her alone!" I said to Rabbi, "Oh, sorry I yelled at your kid, but Yelena's never been pushed before." He very half-heartedly told his kid to come here and not push. As I picked up Yelena, I asked if his son was a pusher. No, he was usually being pushed around by his three older sisters. I guess he found someone smaller than him to shove around. Bully.

I am still upset by this, because Rabbi didn't offer much in the way of an apology. Maybe he is used to Baby Lord of the Flies, but I'm not and don't really find it acceptable. I'm sure things like this will continue to happen as my daughter gets older -- sometimes in the presence of helpful adults, sometime neglectful adults, sometimes by herself -- but I wasn't expecting it to happen so soon or for another adult to be so blasse about it. It's not that I expected any major action -- the kid is only 16 months, afterall -- but something more than a half-assed rebuke and a quarter-assed apology. Call me over-protective, but I don't think 1 year is old enough to have to start dealing with bullying.

This was also surprising as I typically find parents very watchful and conscientious. In class or playgroup other kids have tried to use her as architecture to pull up on or have been a little too eager in their explorations of her hair or face, but their parents have always intervened or cautioned, "Gentle."

In much cuter interactions, last week in playgroup there was a new 14 month old towhead whose parents are from Germany. He kept toddling up to Yelena, crouching down and giving her really sweet gentle hugs, even snuggling his head on her. Ah, the irony that our little Jewish girl gets cuddled by the German boy and beaten up by the rabbi's kid.

Check up

2006-08-16T22:52:00.000-05:00

I've been too busy reading Michael Malone novels (Uncivil Seasons, Time's Witness and First Lady) to post. Sorry.

The little sweetums had her 1 year check up on Monday. Weighed in at 22 lbs., 6 oz. putting her back near the 75th percentile; almost 29", so just shy of the 50th percentile in height; and 44.75 cm. head circumference, so still a very large 90th percentile head. All else went well, she didn't have an adverse reaction, other than needle tears, to her immunizations (MMR and chicken pox).

Her other top front tooth is visible.

Tubeless

2006-08-13T23:49:00.000-05:00

Cheru got his feeding tube out on Friday! It was in seven weeks, but not used the past two weeks. The vet popped it out, no sedation, no stiches. There's a hole on the side of his stomach. The vet said it would close up in three or so days and, lo, it pretty much has. He's still wearing a sweater until it heals completely, but we're glad to have a cat without any extra piping.

I'm so glad my kitty is alive and well.

Cake vs. champers

2006-08-07T22:36:00.000-05:00

Yelena was rather wary of her first candle. Thank God I do not have a baby pyromaniac. (Yup, that's a Hanukah candle. Bad mother that I am, I forgot to pick up birthday candles or a cute little candle with a "1" on it. Reserve the therapist's couch now. At least I baked the cupcakes myself.)

Yelena was a bit puzzled at first, but ultimately enjoyed about a half of her cupcake. I had imagined a blissed out sugar frenzy, but she took it in stride, possibly because she had a big meal beforehand. She appeared to like the cake part (orange) better than the frosting (cream cheese), but neither 1/10th as much as the few spoonfuls of raspberry sorbet I slipped her the week before.

Yelena, however, adored her first taste of champagne. And her second. And her third. First birthday bubbly was not on the program. But she kept reaching for my flute with her mouth open wide. No bottle, straight from breast to flute. Cheers!