First Sleepover

A few weeks ago Primo had his first sleepover. I haven’t written about it til now because it has taken me this long to recover. The last sleepover I went to was when I was in junior high, freezing bras and wearing my retainer. I remember it being wildly fun. And I’m sure Primo will remember this sleepover the same way. I recall it as an experience I could only repeat with the help of booze.

Lesson number 1 of parenting: the amount of fun your child has is usually in direct proportion to how exhausted you will be.

The sleepover was my brainchild, incidentally. On the last day of Kindergarten, we found out that Primo and Leigh, his very best friend, will not be in class together next year. These things happen of course, and maybe it will be good for them and prompt them to diversity their friend base. But still it was a blow. To pick up the kids’ spirits (and mine, too, because frankly, I was as sad to know they’d be separated as they were), I suggested that the following week, since there was no school or camp, that Leigh come to our apartment for both of the kids’ first-ever sleepover! The children were thrilled. It feels good to make children so incredibly ecstatic, and perhaps I was so high from this that I neglected to brace myself for the insanity that would ensue.

Let me say, before continuing, that the whole affair would have been fine, fairly unremarkable, if we were to live in a normal-sized residence, with over 200 square feet allotted to each of the member in our household. When you add a fifth person into our modified one-bedroom, you get pretty crowded. Of course, I grew up with me and my sisters and cousins often tossed in a bed all together – that was how I preferred it – so I don’t mind crowded sleeping quarters. As long as everyone is actually SLEEPING in them. Aye, there’s the rub. Because no one sleeps at a sleepover.

We had dinner with my grandmother and the kids ate cartoon-character cookies that were as big as their faces which Leigh had brought over as a sleepover treat. I’d told Primo and Sec that we could eat the graduation cake I’d made a few days earlier for dessert so of course they wanted this as an after-cookie dessert and when I told them it was just a wee bit too much sugar for their little systems, my grandmother pointed out they could always have it for breakfast.

“CAKE FOR BREAKFAST!!!!” they shrieked. The amount of sheer joy was almost at Christmas-level.

Then the kids put on their PJS and we negotiated bedtime reading, not as easy feat for two kids, and less easy for three. Primo wanted Just So Stories. Leigh wanted Meg and Mog and Seconda, for her part, demanded to do the reading herself which nobody liked. Finally, the sleeping bags were unfurled and the lights turned off and the party really got started

I told them they could talk and tell stories and jokes and look at books but that they should stay in their beds. And I do believe they would have, since both Primo and Leigh are generally law-abiding citizens, had not the anarchist Seconda led the way to revolution. All I know is that when I went back in the room a half hour later, the girls were both more bedecked in jewelry than Queen Elizabeth. Not only that, but they had taken out the dress-up trunk and we wearing elaborate costumes – Spiderman suits, animal masks, Hawaiian leis. Meanwhile, Primo was making a major arts and crafts project which involved scissors, glue, chopsticks and construction paper.

I confiscated the craft supplies and had them take off the costumes. Then I tucked them back in and left the room. Ten minutes later, I repeated the process. Ten minutes after that, I removed Sec, the instigator, from the bedroom and put her on a palette on the floor next to my bed. It was 9:30, which in my book is two hours past the point that I have any patience or energy left for child caring, so I informed the kids it was really time to seriously think about winding down. Getting down to it.

“We’re going to stay up ALL NIGHT,” smiled Leigh.

“Yeah,” giggled Primo, lying next to her on the floor, “we are NEVER going to sleep!”

I laughed nervously, “That IS a funny joke, guys. Very funny. But of course now it is really time for sleep/”

With Sec out, they managed to stay lying down, but the noise emanating from the bedroom – the chortles and guffaws, the shrieks of “POOPY FACE!” and “BOOTY HEAD!” Did not indicate we were getting close to slumber. It was 10pm, the hour at which I get ready to go to bed myself. I went back in.

“We WANT to go to sleep,” said Leigh, “But we just CAN’T.”

“Yeah, we just don’t feel SLEEPY,” echoed Primo.

I sat down next to them and sang them a song – the whole time wondering whether Leigh’s mom sang to her, wondering if she thought I had a good voice, considering whether she’d tell her mom that I sang to them and whether Leigh’s mom would think I was a weirdo or an exemplar mom. After that, around 10:30, they did manage to fall asleep somehow, the two of them together in the bottom bunk. Then I worried that Leigh would fall off the bunk and not only hurt herself but wake my downstairs neighbor, so I lined the floor by the edge of the bed with pillows.

Then I joined David on the couch and teared up, so overcome was I with emotion at how much my baby was growing up. There he was, snuggled in bed with his first best friend, the two of them bed side by side, so big – old enough to read and tie knots and have bona-fide sleepover with silly jokes and staying up late -- but still such little kids, still in their kiddie PJS, still with the look of cherubim on their sleeping faces.

So, despite all my grumbling the next morning when they woke at 5:45am (!!!!) the truth is, I really enjoyed the sleepover too. What can I say, I am big old softie.

Don't repeat that joke

“Oh Mommy! Mommy! I have a good joke for you!” cried Primo the other day while we were paying for groceries at the supermarket.

“I want to hear it!” I replied. I really can’t ever say no to either of my kids telling me jokes, no matter no nonsensical, or singing me a song.

“There were these three girl sailors and they found a bottle in the ocean. And what should come out of the bottle but a genie! The first sailor said to the genie, “I want to be wise!” And the genie said “Poof!” and made her wise. Then the second sailor said, “I want to be wise,” and then genie said “Poof!” and made her wise. Then the third sailor said, “I want to be a THOUSAND times as wise as them,” and the genie said “Poof!” and made her into a BOY!”

He smiled broadly at me, waiting to hear my laugher.

“Who told you that joke?” I asked him, trying hard not to sound mad.

“Zoe,” he said.

“Zoe??” I asked, “Really?”

“What’s the matter Mommy?”

“Well,” I said, choosing my words carefully, because I know how easily Primo’s feelings get hurt and how much he wants my approval, “Let me ask you a question. Why is that joke funny?”

“Because you can’t be a THOUSAND times more wise than someone!” he smiled.

“Oh, is that what it is? What do you think the message is?”

“The message is, ‘everything in moderation.’ She doesn’t get what she wants because she gets greedy and asks for too much.”

The kid has a heart so pure and sweet I hated to even tell him what the real message of the joke was, hated even introducing such a stupid, offensive idea into a head that couldn’t even imagine something so mean.

But then I worried that he’d go around telling this joke to everyone, as he does when he takes a fancy to something, so I told him, “You know what honey ,sometimes people like to tell jokes which are insulting and I think that’s one of them. I think the message is that a boy is a thousand times more wise than a girl, and that’s insulting to me, and to your sister and to all girls, including Zoe.”

He was embarrassed and continued to maintain that it wasn’t the insulting variety of joke, but rather a cautionary tale about greed and immoderation.

“Yeah, maybe,” I said, “Just do me a favor and don’t tell that joke to anyone else.”

Commitment, 5 year-old style

Primo's BFF, Leigh, the chick he made the mix for, has been talking to him about commitment.

Yeah, that's right, going steady. Primo is pretty clueless about what it means to be boyfriend and girlfriend -- thankfully -- and Leigh probably is too, but she's a girl, and by the age of about 3, girls know they need to be married. I know this because of my recent daily proposals of marriage from my daughter. Stands to reason that by age 5 or 6, they know that having a boyfriend is a precursor to having a husband.

So, Leigh wants to marry Primo, pretty much as soon as possible, and though she is his best friend, he's not ready to be tied down.

"Maybe," he told her, "But I might have to marry Seconda."

Kid's got priorities, after all. Family first.

So today I pick Primo up from school and he told me that this month, he's excited because he's sitting at Leigh's table.

"But Leigh's always talking and talking about how we are boyfriend and girlfriend and how we have to get married," he said, "and its really annoying."

Half-naked

Primo’s Kindergarten class is doing this unit of study called “Family Study” and every week one student’s family comes in and gets interviewed by the kids. You talk about the members of your family, what your child was like as a newborn, a toddler, a preschooler. You bring in photos, baby books, even video footage.

When I heard that video footage was admissible, I got very excited. That’s because David edited this amazing video of Primo’s first three months. It is not your everyday home video. The soundtrack features Tom Waits, the Flaming Lips and the Drive-By Truckers, there are all sorts of visual effects edited in, time-lapse work: it’s some serious stuff. There is a scene with me sitting on top of the radiator, with newborn Primo on my lap, staring out at the blizzard outside, and every single time I watch it I begin to sob hysterically because it takes me back to the wonder and the joy and the insanity of those first few months of motherhood. I love this video and I want the world to see it. But I will settle for Primo’s Kindergarten class.

So we unearthed the DVD and, since we haven’t seen it in awhile, we took a look.

Hey, here’s something I forgot.

I am half naked in this video. That’s what I said out loud when I saw it, “Oh my God, I’m HALF NAKED!!!”

I will hasten to qualify.

The aforementioned partial nudity takes place in a scene where David and I are giving one-week-old Primo a bath. I am not actually naked, I am just not wearing a shirt. Instead, I am in this maternity/ nursing bra. It’s not indecent because it’s not lacy or anything, more like a sports bra, and plenty of coverage but still – I am NOT WEARING A SHIRT. I normally don’t agree to being filmed topless but in this particular instance, I was actually deranged by severe, ruthless sleep-deprivation. The baby was a week-old. I probably didn’t even register what the word “camera’ meant.

But it’s really not just the indecency of me not wearing a short that makes the video objectionable. It is the fact that, seeing as I just had a baby, I am also sporting a big old postpartum flap of stomach flab which literally hangs over my sweatpants as I lean over to bathe Primo on the coffee table. It is incredibly gross.

Primo thinks it’s amazing, of course, and can’t wait to show everyone the whole video. I tell him that as long as we advance through that section, it is ok to screen. Great plan, Nicole. Way to trust a five year-old.

So we get up in front of the class and I open my computer to play the DVD and Primo announces to his whole class, with total glee, “We’re go9ng to show you a video and my mom is NAKED in it!””

Huge wave of laughter from the 5 and 6 year-olds. Not tittering. Chortles.

“Primo!” I exclaim, laughing nervously, “That’s not true.”

“Oh, yeah, she’s HALF naked,” he added, “Play it Mommy!”

I managed to skip over the nude part but the whole time the kids were wild and out-of-control, exclaiming, “nude!” and “booty!” and “underpants!” And Primo’s teacher was looking at us like we weren’t the wholesome folk she always imagined us to be. I wanted to explain about the nursing bra and the postpartum flab flap but it seemed better just to say nothing.

Fun times in the old Kindergarten classroom.

Love letter

Primo has started writing words. For David and I, two writers, this is about the most thrilling development since he started talking. So he's been coming home from Kindergarten with these letters he composes during "Writers Workshop." At his school, they have this policy about not correcting the kids' spelling and just encouraging them to sound stuff out themselves, which will explain why the letter I am about to share with you has such . . . unconventional . . . spelling. You should know too that Primo is a huge fan of the letter Q, in lieu of the leter C. So, "qat" and "qar."It kind of makes it seem like he's speaking a language much more exotic that plain old English.

In point of fact, what makes the letter difficult to read is not so much the spelling but the lack of spaces between words. Youdontrealizehowimportantspacingisuntilitsmissing. But I don't mind. It worked for James Joyce.

So here is my letter, which he wrote all by himself:
And it reads:

Mommy,

I love you and I hope that we will (something something) Christmas.

Primo

My baby wrote me a letter. Its been making me smile all day. My baby wrote me a letter.

PS. Anyone who can decipher wha words lie between will ("wl") and Christmas ("Qaestmeas") gets a prize. Of course I'll have to rely on Primo as the judge since he's the only one who knows the real answer, but I'm sure he'll be fair. He's five after all.

Fiction is stranger than truth

My son has a very active imagination. It’s quite diverting, to be sure, but sometimes it makes it difficult to tell truth from fiction. I really think even he can’t distinguish what’s real and what’s fantasy sometimes.

Lately, I’ve been grilling him about kindergarten. I know that if you ask a child, “How was school?” they are required by law to say, “Fine.” And if you ask, “What did you do at school today,” they are likewise bound to reply, “Nothing.”

So I fire off much more specific questions.

“When you go to dance class, does your teacher make you take your shoes off or can you leave them on?”

“Only the bad kids have to take them off,” he replied, “And I am never bad so I can leave them on,”

Interesting policy, I observed.

“What kind of games do you play at “Math Games?” I asked.

“Well the teacher is Miss Meg.”

“What a perfect name! Miss Meg the Math teacher.”

“And she asked what 7 plus 7 was and I knew the answer was 14 and I won! I got to wear a crown!”

This, too, seemed unusual -- kind of weirdly and atypically competitive --and also a rather large coincidence that she would have asked the exact mathematical equation to which my son knows the answer. Ask his 7+9 or 6+6, and he wouldn’t be wearing the crown. But still, I told him I was very, very proud.

Yesterday I asked, “What did your teacher read to you at storytime?”

“A chapter book about Elvis Presley doing karate,”

“What?” I countered, “Is that true? That sounds very strange.”

“It IS true,” Primo insisted, “And Marilyn Monroe was in it too but I don’t remember what she was doing.”

That’s probably for the best, I thought to myself. I mean, I love Monroe probably more than the average Joe, but her hobbies and habits don’t make suitable reading material for children.

Since I often look for books that Primo has read in school at our local library, I asked his teacher today at drop-off: “Hey, Cathy, what’s the name of that Elvis Presley book you read to the kids?”

“The what?’ she asked.

Primo tugged on my arm hard and whispered with a mischievous grin, “No! Don’t say anything about that!”

“Oh,” I replied, “Nothing, I guess I was confused.”

“OK,” she smiled, just glad, I’m sure, that the day was over and that the last of the naggy parents and wacko kids had left the building.

Then a block later, we ran into his schoolmate Myrna, on her way home.

“Hey, Myrna,” I asked, “I’m interested in your opinion. Is Miss Meg the math teacher boring or fun?”

Primo tugged on my arm again as Myrna said, “Who?”

I glared at him and asked her, “What’s the name of your math teacher?”

“Joe,” she replied.

The funny thing is, Primo is a total straight-shooting honest Abe when it comes to everything else, He won’t even lie when he stands to gain sugary treats.

“If I give you this cookie, will you stop attacking your sister?”

“No,” he’ll say, “I won’t! But gimme the cookie anyway!”

He often uses the expression, “I cannot tell a lie . . .” to preface confessions of guilt. He is precisely like David, whereas my daughter, like me, lies just for shits and giggles.

But now, for no reason whatsoever, we’ve got tall tales galore about Kindergarten. Is the reality of it so gruesome that he has to invent a fantastical world populated with Elvis Presley and Miss Meg Mathmaster? Only time will tell.

Chanel Shenanigans etc

So, remarkable feat of mischief my daughter treated me to yesterday. In the spirit of school starting, I’ll present it to you as a problem set.

How are the following items related?

The AC/ heating unit in our brand-new apartment and

The small bottle of Chanel No. 5, given to me four years ago by my husband as a birthday gift.

Clue: The bottle is now empty.

If you guessed that my daughter poured the entire contents of the perfume bottle into the AC unit yesterday, you would be correct! Our apartment now smells like Marilyn Monroe’s boudoir.

News on the big biy front:

As David was turning out the lights at bedtime last night Primo informed him, “2 +2 = 4”

“Yes, that’s right,” said David, “And 3+1=4, too.” He went to shut the door.

But not before Primo chimed in: “That’s impossible.”

Kid goes to kindergarten, thinks he knows everything.

Pluto's Raw Deal

Speaking about space travel . . .Now I don’t know too much about Pluto. I’m no expert or anything but I will tell you this. I’ve taken a shine to Pluto. My son likes Pluto, ergo I like Pluto. And what’s not to like? It’s tiny, and freezing cold and oh-so-far away from our dear planet. It’s got a great name that rolls trippingly off the tongue. Pluto is a damn crowd pleaser. Even Aldrin agreed when we saw him this weekend.

So why’d they de-frock it, I want to know.

Honestly, I’m peeved about what seems to me a rather sudden and reckless decision to cut Pluto off the planet circuit. I mean, who gets to decide that? NASA? Planetary specialists? Don’t we get a vote? I grew up with Pluto and I’m sentimental about it. My son has plans to start a restaurant on Pluto one day. I don’t like to hear his dreams of becoming a outer-planetary conquistador/ entrepreneur diminished by Pluto’s de-frocking.

I mean, I went to special lengths to find Primo a solar system-themed lunchbox for the first day of Kindergarten, and when I bring it home and scrutinize it, guess who’s conspicuously absent?

You better believe Mars is there, because hey, everyone loves Mars. And Venus, sure – she’s not going anywhere. Saturn's a shoe-in. Who gets kicked off the planetary team? The underdog, of course. Typical.

In our house, under my watch, Pluto always counts. If you agree, you may enjoy this T-shirt, (thanks M, devoted follower, for the tip).

Nobody puts Pluo in the corner.

At least, that’s what I say.

The First Day

So yesterday was the big day. Kindergarten. Were we ready? You be the judge. My son went to school wearing:

Brand-new backpack and matching lunchbox, chock full of aliens.

A customized luggage tag (thanks, Shutterfly for prompt delivery) featuring our family photo, hanging from said backpack.

New (and ridiculously expensive) mini Sigg bottle which promises never to leak or break and to keep water icy-cold. My son likes icy-cold acqua.

A T-shirt which my sister and I made for him the night before, spelling “I LOVE SPOOKS” in iron-on decals.

His beloved collection of Garbage Pail Kids.

His beloved collection of monster maniac action figures.

AND

a gold chain with the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus on it.

In the preceding weeks, we read every single "Going to Kindergarten" book out there. We got a Sandra Boynton calendar and X’ed off the days leading up to “FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!” We sneaked into the building the day before school started and took a peek around before the parent coordinator kicked us out. But not before we saw a photo of his new Kindergarten teacher on the wall -- Ms. Rhonda Finn

“Oh I like her,” I said, “She has a nice smile.”

“Yeah,” said Primo, “She has a nice smile and a thin face. She looks like a corn husk doll.”

I did all the prep work that can be done. And then some.

And yesterday, when we walked him to school, he was happy. Or at least, trying hard to be, Telling everyone he passed that he was going to his first day of kindergarten, singing an “I’m so happy to go to Kindergarten” song. When we approached the school and saw the throngs, the veritable masses assembled at the gates, I grew tachycardic but we soldiered on, smiling and singing.

It was no nursery school drop-off, that’s for sure. There were literally hundreds, if not thousands, of people making their way into the school – moms, dad, babysitters, kids, babies along for the ride, everyone scrambling to get through the doors and find their rooms and get their bearings. I think David had a small and silent panic attack. But we made it into the building, up the stairs, to the room. We shook hands with thin-faced, nice-smiling Rhonda Finn. We “explored the classroom,” bumping into the dozens of other kids and families who were also adventuring through the dress-up corner and book collection. We located Primo’s nametag and settled him into his assigned seat at table number 5. And then, with a kiss and some fortifying eye contact, we said goodbye.

When I went to pick him up a few hours later, there he was, head on his desk, looking tired, but brave. He made it. We made it.

And so the school daze begins.

The K Word

There’s an elephant in the room readers. I think you know what. It’s the second week in September. My son will be turning 5 this year. The elephant in the room is

Kindergarten.

It’s happening. This week. Lord help us.

“So I hear you’re starting school next week,” said my cousin to Primo.

“Yes,” he replied, “I’m a nervous rex.”

“Don’t you mean nervous wreck?”

No, he informed her. A Nervous Rex. It’s a Garbage Pail Kid.

I’m not going to sugarcoat this for you, guys. The kid’s not happy at all. He does not want to go. He’s panicking. I don’t know what he thinks happens in Kindergarten but it must be bad because he will sing loudly to blare out the sound of the word whenever I mention it to him.

“It will be just like your old school for the most part,” I reassure him, “You’ll have a cubby where you put your stuff and there will be colored pencils and crayons and Legos and blocks. I think you’ll like Kinder—“

“JOHN JINGLE HEIMER SCHMIDT!” he yells.

So I bought him a special lunchbox with aliens on it and a new spooky T-shirt for his first day and I stocked up on his favorite monster action figures so my bribery arsenal would be full.

On the bright side, he’ll have a good friend in his class with him. “A childhood friend,” I told someone the other day. They laughed. He is, of course, still a child. But it’s Kindergarten, man, public school, the big leagues. My baby will have to wipe his own butt. God, time flies.