Close readings and other (not so) felicitous surprises
My bleary eyed child wakes me from slumber, or perhaps it is the early morning light that filters through the non-blinded window. It is 5 am.
"Oh, my eyes! and my nose!!!" she complains and I don't blame her because for over a week her eyes have been red with a vengeance, and her snuffle, cough, blow, snuffle cough blow pattern was disruptive to our mutual sleep, needless to say.
I surreptitiously crept into my mother's bedroom, and my naked skin prickled with the cold. I didn't bother dressing because my father is out of town until this evening. She likes to sleep with the heat way down, around 60 degrees, and last week's thermostat adventure was a personal torment because her room, and her room only was up over 85 degrees with no respite. I don't give my girl another Benadryl because I still, at 5 am, have hopes for her waking up rested and perky for school. Unlikely, I know. I give her a Claritin instead, which seems to have little to no effect, and we tussle over the sheets, and she wails that she just wants to hug me, but all I want is not to be touched while I sleep. Little girl hands searching my torso for comfort isn't my idea of a comfortable sleep arrangement, and I chide myself once more for not kicking her out and into her own bed. I keep saying "this week", but it just keeps sliding away, much like my deadline for recommencement of dissertation work.
Of course I am trying to shake off the depressive funk that settled over me, and yesterday I indeed accomplished several of the work related goals that I set for myself. Paltry ones, I know, a chapter of theory, a film by one of my directors. But then I was at the gym and running for 2 hours straight. I would have switched activities, but the woman next to me was in need of some serious therapy, and I coached her, mother of three and married for 20 years, about what she could do to find fulfillment. Of course she listened to me, and my worries as well, and I just kept running and sweating. It was only the roar of hunger that called me off the machine and home to polish off the mushroom asparagus risotto that I had made a few days prior. And a banana, we can't forget the K.
So, this productive streak was halted quite suddenly at 8:20 this morning when her puffy eye and snuffly whimper made me decide to keep her home and make a doctor's appointment, today! I am feeling a bit woozy myself from our interrupted sleep, and I call into the school to legitimize her absence, remember that I wasn't going to the gym today anyway, make a mental list of the things I do need to remember to do: send my grandmother's present, return the T-shirts that weren't used in the tie-dye adventure that my now departed to his country brother instigated and then failed to supervise, read a chapter, watch another film. I can still do those things, I think. I call the doc, and cringe at my uninsurance, think about a story I just read and wish there were a continuation. Last week I. had another abscess in her gums and the dentist will need to pull not one but 2 baby molars. I am seriously going to build my case for malpractice against the horrible dentist that has now caused her to lose 3 major teeth because he didn't do a proper job, but that thought makes me ill, because I hate litigiousness and confrontation. On the other hand this little bit of oral intervention will cost over $600, and I simply don't have it to pay.
So as we breakfast together, a treat that I'll admit, I enjoy more than I should because I should be concerned that my child didn't go to school instead of gleefully basking in her discoveries (no, not really, I still think it is better for me to pull her on occasion and do educational activities that are far more stimulating that the weekly vocabulary sheets and timed tests that make even my eyes water in boredom).
"Mommy, hey Mommy... " she calls while I am reheating last night's chilaquiles verdes, and fry an egg to accompany the rice that came out perfectly. She wanders towards me, nose still in the book that she wanted to read instead of doing her homework, and which as soon as she knew she didn't have to go to school, she popped out of bed to devour. "The girl's name is 'Lisa' spelled L-I-S-S-A, and all along they have been spelling it that way and then here they spelled it L-I-S-A..."
"Well, babe, sometimes there are editorial mistakes, good eye. " Editorial obsession seems to be a family trait, sometimes it's a little scary, but it doesn't fail to make me smile that I am raising a detail-oriented close reader.
"Oh, my eyes! and my nose!!!" she complains and I don't blame her because for over a week her eyes have been red with a vengeance, and her snuffle, cough, blow, snuffle cough blow pattern was disruptive to our mutual sleep, needless to say.
I surreptitiously crept into my mother's bedroom, and my naked skin prickled with the cold. I didn't bother dressing because my father is out of town until this evening. She likes to sleep with the heat way down, around 60 degrees, and last week's thermostat adventure was a personal torment because her room, and her room only was up over 85 degrees with no respite. I don't give my girl another Benadryl because I still, at 5 am, have hopes for her waking up rested and perky for school. Unlikely, I know. I give her a Claritin instead, which seems to have little to no effect, and we tussle over the sheets, and she wails that she just wants to hug me, but all I want is not to be touched while I sleep. Little girl hands searching my torso for comfort isn't my idea of a comfortable sleep arrangement, and I chide myself once more for not kicking her out and into her own bed. I keep saying "this week", but it just keeps sliding away, much like my deadline for recommencement of dissertation work.
Of course I am trying to shake off the depressive funk that settled over me, and yesterday I indeed accomplished several of the work related goals that I set for myself. Paltry ones, I know, a chapter of theory, a film by one of my directors. But then I was at the gym and running for 2 hours straight. I would have switched activities, but the woman next to me was in need of some serious therapy, and I coached her, mother of three and married for 20 years, about what she could do to find fulfillment. Of course she listened to me, and my worries as well, and I just kept running and sweating. It was only the roar of hunger that called me off the machine and home to polish off the mushroom asparagus risotto that I had made a few days prior. And a banana, we can't forget the K.
So, this productive streak was halted quite suddenly at 8:20 this morning when her puffy eye and snuffly whimper made me decide to keep her home and make a doctor's appointment, today! I am feeling a bit woozy myself from our interrupted sleep, and I call into the school to legitimize her absence, remember that I wasn't going to the gym today anyway, make a mental list of the things I do need to remember to do: send my grandmother's present, return the T-shirts that weren't used in the tie-dye adventure that my now departed to his country brother instigated and then failed to supervise, read a chapter, watch another film. I can still do those things, I think. I call the doc, and cringe at my uninsurance, think about a story I just read and wish there were a continuation. Last week I. had another abscess in her gums and the dentist will need to pull not one but 2 baby molars. I am seriously going to build my case for malpractice against the horrible dentist that has now caused her to lose 3 major teeth because he didn't do a proper job, but that thought makes me ill, because I hate litigiousness and confrontation. On the other hand this little bit of oral intervention will cost over $600, and I simply don't have it to pay.
So as we breakfast together, a treat that I'll admit, I enjoy more than I should because I should be concerned that my child didn't go to school instead of gleefully basking in her discoveries (no, not really, I still think it is better for me to pull her on occasion and do educational activities that are far more stimulating that the weekly vocabulary sheets and timed tests that make even my eyes water in boredom).
"Mommy, hey Mommy... " she calls while I am reheating last night's chilaquiles verdes, and fry an egg to accompany the rice that came out perfectly. She wanders towards me, nose still in the book that she wanted to read instead of doing her homework, and which as soon as she knew she didn't have to go to school, she popped out of bed to devour. "The girl's name is 'Lisa' spelled L-I-S-S-A, and all along they have been spelling it that way and then here they spelled it L-I-S-A..."
"Well, babe, sometimes there are editorial mistakes, good eye. " Editorial obsession seems to be a family trait, sometimes it's a little scary, but it doesn't fail to make me smile that I am raising a detail-oriented close reader.
posted by ilana at 6:38 a.m.
4 Comments:
que horror entrar al blog de un mexicano escrito en inglés. por eso no tienes ni una visita.
qué cobardía no mostrar quién es uno y dejar comentarios pendejos y errados. le aclaro una vez y sólo una vez, que yo no soy ni he sido nunca mexicana. no tengo porque explicar, pero pareciera que ud. está obsesionado con que yo escriba en español... y sí, lo hago, pero sólo cuando me dé la gana. así que, cordialmente le invito a que deje de joder.
Qué clase de imbécil del del primer comentario. Metete con alguien que tenga tu propio idioma de idioma materno, pendejo. Lo que es con Ilana es conmigo!
sip Ale, un reverendo imbécil que ya hace tiempo deja comentarios semejantes. Pero esto de acusarme de malinchismo cuando ni siquiera soy mexicana, estuvo suave... gracias amiga, por el apoyo moral ;)
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