if not a meteorologist then are you a pediatrician?

Toot-a loo was real sick today. Throw up sick. Limp like a rag doll sick. And in the middle of the vomits, subsequent baths, three year old stressing about her sister being sick, and calling the doctor, canceling our photo appointment, packing the diaper bag to go to the doctor and cleaning up the vomit, I called my mom. I told her what happened. She woke up from her nap and was like a newborn who couldn't hold up her head and then she threw up twice. Then my mom said the following (and I wish I was making this up): "Quick Stella, take off her diaper and check her all over for ticks. What if a tick bit her in her crib?"

Sigh. My reply? "What are you talking about? what ticks? there are no ticks."

Mom: "but something could have bitten her."

Me: "but how would that make her vomit?"

Then I realized this was headed toward her telling me about some dread disease that she heard about in some chain email and so I hung up the phone.

A very alert pediatrician diagnosed her with a uti. "Most doctors would think this is a stomach virus and send you home, and would say I worry too much, but this just doesn't seem like a stomach virus to me. And I always worry about the babies and the uti's" A blood test and a catheterization to get a urine sample proved his suspicion correct. Which is why he is a super doctor. Literally, he is on the list.

But he did not think ticks or any other arachnids were involved.

getting schooled in meteorology

true phone conversation:

Me: I am so excited, I think we are going to get some rain on Friday

Mom (with certainty): no, you are not. I just saw it in the paper.

Me (worried): what?? I just saw it on the news, we are getting some rain from don.

Mom: no, you're not. We are getting it, I saw the map. It is coming here.

Me(relieved): well, yeah, that is where it is making landfall, but we will still get some rain from it.

Mom (totally annoyed and superior): No. You. Won't. There is a map and it show this shape, like a cone....

Me: (pissy and teenagerish) : yes mom, I know. It is the cone of uncertainty. I have lived through two hurricanes. That is where the storm will make landfall, but we will still get rain.

Mom (defensive and huffy): well, all I know is what the paper says, and it says that it is coming here and you are not on the orange map

Me(raised voice): yes, I know we are not on the map. All I know is what I just saw on the news, told to me by Frank Billingsly, who is a certified meteorologist. Are you a certified meteorologist?

Mom: no, are you?

Touche.

heart shaped world

the first words out of my mouth when Tallulah was born were "what is that on her face?" They had handed me this baby covered in blood and grey goup and there was this black mark on her eye. I kept asking about it when they washed her off and no none knew, but someone said, "it might be birth trauma, or it could be a birth mark." The next morning, it appeared to still be there and hadn't faded and everyone was calling it a birthmark. And some people (mom) were already worried that kids were going to make fun of her in school and told me to get it removed. That night, as I was nursing her and she was sleeping, I noticed that it look just like a heart. The room was quiet for the first time that day and I was holding this peaceful girl in my arms, and she had a heart on her face and I thought it was beautiful and I hoped it never ever faded away.

The next day the room was noisy again. The entire family, parents, in-laws, sister and husband were in there when Dr. C______ came in to check on Tallulah. He said he had never seen a birthmark like that in all his years of practice and that it was very unusual, being both under her eye lid and on top if her eye lid. He answered my mom's numerous questions about its removal as best he could and patiently listened to how everyone in my family has a birthmark, but not like that one. The I told him I thought it was kind of cute. He said he was happy to hear that, and the nurses told him how I seemed upset by it, and I told him "well I was, but it looks like..." "a heart," he finished," I think it means she will have a lot of love in her life." And that was where we left it.

The about a month later I ventured out to the grocery store with just Tallulah and the questions began. They usually go like this: "what a beautiful baby... what happened to her eye?" or, "what is wrong with her face?" And I always say, "It is a birthmark. The doctor has never seen one like it and if her eye is closed it looks like a heart." I say it proudly or lovingly and hope to make them see the beauty in it, and sometimes they do. Sometimes, they say nothing.

Until one day, I was at a nail salon. T was asleep. And the lady doing my nails peeked at her and said "what a beautiful birthmark! It looks like a heart." "yes, it does," I said, "thank you."

I have since learned from a lady in the TJ Max check out line that in Spanish, they are called a "lunar." As in "ay mira que lunar hermosita!"

Several African American ladies knew immediately what it was and thought it was beautiful.

My bikini wax lady at the La Paz day spa knew what it was.

And the South African lady security guard at Toy R Us loved it too.

I guess what I am trying to say is that ethnic people always see it as a birthmark. White people think she has a black eye. I am not sure why. Could be that ethnic people have more birthmarks than white folks and recognize it for what it is. Could be that white people view beauty differently than other people and see it as something wrong with her face. Could just be a coincidence. I am not sure, and I don't care, but it is so consistently identified as a birthmark by non-white people that it has got to be something that some anthropologist has an explanation for. Just not this one.

What I will tell Tallulah is that we live in a big, beautiful heart shaped world that is filled with love and all she has to do is find it.

i spent my afternoon combing through gorilla poop, or how you can tell when imaginary play has gone too far

I was putting the finishing touches on my puttanesca sauce when I was summoned by Nurse Nora to come to the Busyland hospital to treat a patient. I went into the triage unit, which looked kind of like Annabelle's bed, and found a bunny who was wrapped in a blanket. I asked the Nurse what his symptoms were and she told me she didn't know, he just wasn't feeling well. I diagnosed him with fatigue and general malaise and discharged him, making a note in the chart about possible hypochondria. The next patient was a gorilla. Nurse Nora told me that he had swallowed something of his mama's. Now, here is where I went wrong. A normal mom would have said something like "ohh, sorry you feel bad, take this shot" and gone on her merry way. Actually a mom of today would probably be text messaging and not even be playing with her kid, but that is an anti-technology rant for another post. Instead, I said "hmm.... well, two spoons of Castor oil and his mom needs to sift through his poop for the next two days to make sure it passes." Then I went on my merry way, back to my sauce.

Five minutes later, nurse Nora came out with a doctor kit, two plastic cups and two spoons. "Okay. He pooped it out. It was humongous. Now we need to look through it. It is in here." (gesturing to the doctor kit)

Now, I thought about playing my "i am a doctor and this is a nurse's job" card but I knew I would not have street cred with the nurses union if I did this so I did what anyone else would have done in this situation--rolled up my sleeves and started digging.

Turns out, he ate a penny, a ring and a diamond, which goes to show you that apes will eat anything.

so it stands to reason he sees you when you are double fisting cupcakes....

After a bike ride home from the park this morning, I took Tallulah upstairs to put her down for a nap (prospects of sleep being dubious at best) and to give her a bottle. I told Annabelle to stay downstairs while I was trying to put Tallulah down and then I would come downstairs and fix us lunch.

ALN (teasing): "okaaaaaay, but I am going to get into miiiischief."

Me: "what kind of mischief?

ALN: "oh, I'll just spill milk on the floor."

Me: well, I would rather you didn't. Girls who get into mischief frequently get into trouble."

I went upstairs, fed Tallulah, realized a nap was out of the question, due to her giggly smile, and we came downstairs. I could see Annabelle was underneath the dining room table.

Me: well, did you get into mischief?

ALN: no, I am just underneath the table.

Me: what are you doing?

ALN: eating two cupcakes.

Definitely not mischief.

does he see you when you're angry too?

ALN: can I have this cupcake papa?

H: no

Huffy silence.

H: are you pouting, silly goose?

ALN: no santa claus doesn't like it when you do that. I'm just angry.

H: oh, okay. carry on.

there are miles and miles of gulfcoast states

You know that norman rockwell picture where they are going on vacation and on the way over there they are all chipper and happy and on the way back they look deflated and glum? That's us right now. 12 hours and 8 stops later, we are home. It broke down like this and should all be read to the tune of Jenny Dreamed of a Train by John Denver since that is Annabelle's favorite song and what we listened to for at least 6 of the 12 hours:

stop 1: gas in Florida
stop 2: Whataburger in Florida
stop 3: Crackerbarrel in Gulfport where we met some of my friends who were heading where we were coming from for lunch. (this took 2 hours due to bad service, gossiping about my crazy old job and browsing at the cracker barrel store)
stop 4: somewhere in LA to switch drivers. H was falling asleep so we took the first exit we could find. I immediately had a sense of dread, like we were going to get lost in some strange wilderness, live on a pontoon boat and eat crawdads for the rest of our lives and only be sighted once in a while like the ivory billed woodpecker, so this was a quick stop.
stop 5: gas in somewhere in LA large enough to have a starbucks
stop 6: starbucks across the street
stop 7: in LA at a place called Diesels to pee for Annabelle and to feed and change Tallulah. They had alligator heads here that Annabelle was fascinated by, but would not touch and a cookbook called "who's your mama, are you catholic and can you make a roux," which I regret not buying.
stop 8: in Vinton to pee for Annabelle again. Never, under any circumstances, stop at the Chevron in Vinton to pee. I'd rather pee in the Memorial Park port-o-john in the middle of August than at the Chevron in Vinton.

When we crossed the Texas border we were greeted by a sign that said "drive friendly, it's the Texas way" and then another informing us that El Paso was 857 miles away. Then Hyphen's allergies kicked in and he started to sneeze. Despite the sneeze attack, we still played all the Texas songs on our ipod, with lots of begging to return to Jenny.

I'm gonna live here till I die.