A Very Rozek Christmas

 

 

 

 

 

This is what my sisters do in their spare time.  Amazing.  Unfortunately I was left off the list when the whistling talent was handed out.   The whole thing is brilliant, but the end might be my favorite part.

Way to Go, Girls!

Rozek Girls- Jingle Bells Medley

What’s this whole red and blue thing about, eh?

My trip to Canada was brief, as are most of my business jaunts. I like to get right home to the hubby and kids, but I could have tolerated just an hour or two longer this time. By the time I wound down from the show and jammied up for bed, it was 1 a.m. The car picked me up at 4:15. I settled myself into the black sedan and hoped to drift off during the hour long trip to Toronto’s Pearson Airport.

Within seconds, I knew the driver was a talker, something I normally don’t like, especially at that hour, but I was quickly drawn into our conversation and we pulled up to my terminal before I could say “Oh man, I’m sorry if I drift off on you. I can barely keep my eyes open.”

This delightful, roly poly fellow, with the innocent face of Santa Clause began talking about his hobbies, love of soccer and adventures of being a limo driver- a job he searched out post-retirement just to keep from setting a bad example for his teenage sons by lying on the couch all day.

The chat found its way to a story of an altercation. I don’t remember the details, but it involved a robber of sorts that he chased after on foot.

“Wow! Were you terrified?” I asked.

“No. Not really. So few people have guns in this country. They’re extremely hard to get”

A target shooter himself, he explained that in Canada the process to own a fire arm is long and drawn out. He had to take classes, have an affidavit signed and notarized by his wife stating that she was comfortable with her husband keeping a weapon in the house, and once all of that was completed, there was a mandatory one month waiting period before the gun could be obtained. They call it a “cooling off” period.

Naturally, this brought the conversation to the States and its total jackassery concerning such issues.

“What did you guys up here in Canada think of the election and the three ring circus it rode in on?”

“I didn’t really follow it. But what’s this whole red and blue thing about, eh?”

Oh, Canada. Might you have room for four more citizens? Two of them are extremely adorable. I can have them dressed in maple leaves and singing “O Canada” in harmony, lickety-split. Just think about it and get back to me. We’ll be rehearsing.

Fact Check:
All statements are true and correct. Even that which is most offensive- I was awake and in the car at 4 a.m.

Oh, Canada

Off to Canada for a concert. Let’s hope I make better choices this time…

Sleepwalking across the border

Bop Bust Buzz

Here’s the long-awaited bop verdict, folks. For those of you who don’t know what a “bop” is or why we are awaiting a verdict, read this.

Much to our surprise, taking the bops away from the three-year-old could not have been less of an issue. Aside from engaging us in an admirably well-played, yet futile negotiation, his bedtime was painless and bopless. Although, he did calmly tell us the next morning that he “wished for his bops during the night”, he hasn’t mentioned them again. He actually sleeps more soundly now without the plastic-to-wood clacking sound as they fall from his bed, waking and reminding him of what he now knows, he doesn’t actually need.

Done and done.

His sister, the 22 month old, on the other hand is a different story. After four nights and five days of screaming and crying until we’ve spent an hour and a half rocking her to sleep for both naps and bedtime, we have seen no progress. In fact, the days of late bedtimes and restless naps have taken their toll, and in her exhausted state, it seems to be getting worse rather than better.

We’ve aborted mission.

After an hour of screaming, 17 visits to her room to rock her, rub her back, change her diaper and tell her firmly that it’s time to go to bed, I caved. I ran to the drawer, grabbed her addiction and put it in her hand. She was out before I made it to the door and wasn’t heard from until 6:30 a.m.

In a year, should she not as gracefully accept the bop banishment as her older brother, I will surely admonish myself repeatedly and with great disdain. I invite you to do so as well.

But, here are my questions…

How much damage can be done to her jaw and teeth in the ten minutes a day she uses a pacifier to fall asleep? It falls out within five minutes of her slumber and is lost in the blanket or in between the crib rungs and mattress for the remainder of the night. Is it worth the loss of a much-needed nap and a consistent and peaceful bedtime?  Is it not just a better idea to wait until the child is old enough to understand (and has already dropped the sacred nap so there is less at stake), as clearly displayed with my son? Or is there some other horrific side effect of which I am not aware?

Honest questions, people. Thoughts are welcome.

Fact Check:

All statements are true, correct and un-fluffed.

Wordless Wednesday

Who Put the Bop in the Bop Shoo Bop Shoo Trash?

Even with all of our plans before the births of our children – (attachment parenting, on-demand breast-feeding, baby wearing, etc) they both became “Bop Babies”. For all those of you unfamiliar with Motherfog lingo, “Bops” are pacifiers. We don’t know where this name came from, but it’s become such a household name, that we are always confused when people have no idea what we’re talking about.

While we did follow through with all of the aforementioned parenting techniques, bops were thrown into the night-time mix to help pacify in between every two and three-hour breast-feedings.

But, when Zachary was around six months old, we made a steadfast rule that no bops would be allowed outside of the crib (or car if napping). This rule followed suit with baby number two and has been high on the short list of “brilliant parenting decisions” made by the Motherfog child-raisers. We have often praised ourselves for this family law, as so many benefits came from it. Not only were we free from chasing after pacifiers all around town, and being stuck with photos full of plastic-faced cherubs, but its practice encouraged a desire for “crib quiet time”. Both kids welcomed a couple of ten or twenty-minute stretches of daytime solitude in their own beds to steal some precious moments with their bops and a book or two.

However, we recently realized a fatal flaw in our plan. When the pacifier is only allowed in the privacy of the child’s bed, the courage and ambition to go through the agony of taking it away slowly wanes. It sort of becomes a little secret, free from judgmental glances from public onlookers. Unless you find yourself entertaining a playdate in your son’s room and the pacifier is spotted. In which case I have not been above quickly covering up with,

“Isabelle! What are your bops doing in Zachary’s room? Silly girl!”

But, before you know it, you’re looking at your three-year old, all dressed for bed, and he suddenly looks like a college kid dressed up for Halloween in a “Baby” costume with a pacifier hanging out of his mouth.

I happened to google the issue this morning, and was stung by the harsh critics on the web – critics, of course, being other mothers who I am certain are the images of maternal perfection themselves – once you agree to look past the glaring grammatical and spelling errors in their scathing comments.

But, lets move past my hurt feelings from judgments of those whom I have never met. Of course, they only ruffled me because it’s true. I am absolutely certain that Zachary is the only kid in his class that still uses a pacifier at night, but the decision to take it away has never aligned with what feels like the right time and place.

When he turned one, I was five months pregnant, alone with him in Utah, working long hours, and attempting to star in a show. Not the best time…for me.

At 16 months, we brought a new baby sister home. Certainly not the best time.

At two, we were about to move across the country. Definitely not.

Last summer, just before he turned three, we planned to tackle the issue.

He broke his femur.

Need I say more?

So, while at the moment, we seem to be finding ourselves in some modicum of status quo (pardon me while I go ram my head into a two-by-four), it’s time to Seize the Day.

But, if we’re going to do this, why not go hog-wild and make it a bat-shit, bop-breaking bash, and take it from the 22 month old too?

This morning went like this:

Me “Hey, honey? How would you feel about getting no sleep for the next week?”

Husband “Why?”

Me “I think it’s time to ditch the bops”

Husband “Um. OK”

Three minutes later…

“Hey guys! Daddy and I have talked for a long time about this. We’ve decided it’s time to say good-bye to the Bops. You are big enough to sleep without them now and they are going away. It will be hard for a few days and we are here to give lots of hugs and snuggles, but we know you can do it!”

Let the Games Begin!

Blogger’s Note:

A friend has a story she likes to tell about her first encounter with me. Apparently, I was amusing a group of people at a party with a story, got carried away with my own exaggerations, and cut myself off with,

“That’s not true!”

She has never forgotten it. It is true. I do exaggerate. It’s a family trait. But, as I have stated before on this blog, I will always fess up, and usually within the same conversation (or post). So, I’ve decided to add a “FACT CHECK” at the end of posts.

*FACT CHECK

1.)The bops are not in the trash. That would be mean and heart-breaking. For me more than them, I think. They are in a drawer and will perhaps be bronzed like a pair of first baby shoes

2.)That was an exaggeration I will most likely not have them bronzed. That would be very strange, even for me.

Have a click!

“Whatcha talkin’ bout Willis?”

I have a friend in Public Relations that likes to throw my writing out to different publishers and casting directors when projects come across his desk.  He called me last night to say that there is a new reality television pilot being cast that is looking for women in New York and surrounding areas who have successful careers, children, friends and spouses, and are navigating through the “have it all” scenario.  He sent her my information and blog link and she wanted to talk to me.

Putting aside the fact that I would rather eat three-week old fish wrapped in road-kill filo dough, than be on a reality television show, (that’s big talk. I don’t eat things that swim) I wanted to get more information.  This is an excerpt from the actual breakdown:

The POWER MOMS of NEW YORK.
POWER MOMS is a new docu-series focusing on a group
of successful women who somehow manage to do it all…
balancing work, kids, home, friends, events, parties and
family!

 

If this is truly a reality show, and not a sci-fi series where days are longer than 24 hours, there are glaring arithmetic errors.  I’ll get Nate Silver on it.

But, lets suspend our disbelief for just a moment while I tell you about this phone call.  It went something like this:

Casting Director: “So, let me describe what we are looking for and you can tell me if you fit the bill.  We need successful, career driven, educated, New York mothers who are able to work, spend plenty of quality time with their kids and spouses, plan events and parties and maintain an active social life.  Also, these women do not need to be wealthy, but can afford some of the nicer things.  For example, vacations homes and designer clothes.  This is a classy version of New York Housewives.  It’s an aspirational show that middle America will be inspired by.  Does that sound like you?”

me: “No.  It most definitely does not.  I do not own my own home, let alone a vacation home and fashion is not my thing.  I am not your girl, but seriously, who are you looking for?  You didn’t mean success in any career.  You meant CEO’s and the like?”

Casting Director “Yes.”

Clearly, she did not read by blog.  And clearly I will not watch her show.  Or maybe I will.  I must see who these women are and how they manage to defy the laws of nature.  Because, it’s going to be a reality show…meaning it is going to be 100 percent real, right?

have a click!

He was a duck?

When I was five, friends and family members would often brace themselves for a lovable, yet piercingly resounding greeting. My Aunt Kath tells it best when she recounts numerous tales of her hyper-active and boisterous niece running up to her, placing her nose centimeters from her own and screaming at decibels that could knock the wind out of you,

“HI AUNT KATH!”

So, as fun and entertaining as this little quirk was, my parents simply had to tend to the blatant hearing problem in daughter number four.

Like many children, I hit the operating table for the tubes that would put an end to this endearing trait forever. As far as I know, I do not greet people by yelling in their faces, but it’s hard to say. Do close talkers know they are close talkers? Hmmm.

Leading up to this miraculous life-altering surgery, were many visits to the ENT. Although Dr. King has long since passed, I will never forget him or his office.

There was a book that my mother read to me at every visit. It was about a man who tries to get an ant out of his kitchen with a hammer and destroys his whole house in the process. I remember the last page had a picture of the ant crawling out from the rubble unharmed.

I’ve thought of this book umpteen times throughout my life. The concept, even at five, stuck with me as being an important lesson.

Every project I’ve poured hours into, in an effort to craft each minuscule detail into perfection until I hammer out any recollection of what the project actually was in the first place, has come with a warning bell to the tune if this old story.

“Stop now, before you ruin the whole thing!”

So naturally, I have been searching for this book for about 20 years. No exaggeration. The problem was that neither my mother or I remembered the name of the book.

I googled possible names:

“Crack the Ant”

“Mr. Fix it and the Ant”

“The Ant lives”

“Let the Ant Be”

“Put the hammer down”

Nothing.

My Mother even went into Dr. king’s office for the sole purpose of asking the staff if they still had it.

Just FYI, and I know this is shocking news, but most medical offices replace their waiting room reading material more often than every 20 years.

Each time I’ve gone to a children’s library or book store, it’s become a habit to scan the bindings across the shelves just to see if something jumps out.

Nope.

Yesterday, I was at the library to use their coveted internet to pay bills. (no one can figure out how to fix the damage done to the cable/internet lines on our block during ‘Sandy’) On a whim I walked over to the librarian to have the conversation I’ve had a dozen times with others like her.

“I know this is a long shot, but I’ve been looking for years for a book. If I describe it, would you maybe know what it is?”

“You can give it a shot!”

“Its about a man who destroys his house trying to get rid of an ant.”

After 30 seconds of typing into a database, she said

“Henry’s Awful Mistake? By Richard Quackenbush? It’s about a duck.”

“A duck? I don’t remember a duck. Can I see the cover online?”

“Oh my gosh! I think that’s it! The man is a duck?! Do you have the book here?”

“We sure do!”

She walked me back to the aisle and I immediately recognized the first illustration after the title page.

Astounded, I thanked her profusely and told her 17 times that she was my hero and had ended a 20 year search. I checked out the book and read it to the kids in the car on the way home. Zachary has asked for it at least six times since then.

This can only mean one thing. My son is a perfectionist with a freshly implanted warning bell.

Remind me in 30 years to ask him if he remembers the guy being a duck?

Yours Truly,
Relieved that I can now move on with my life…and so can my mother.

Oh, I’m sorry. Did you want that on?

Here’s the power story.

I called PSE&G, New Jersey’s power provider, about eight times yesterday. With my calls, in addition to those from my five neighbors without power, we were surely heard.

We were told repeatedly that power would be restored by 11:59 p.m. last night. At around 10:00 p.m., I made another call to make sure that was still the case.

We have all been “sleeping” in rooms that are 45 degrees. I use quotations because none of us have slept in days. All on our block with no power have small children. I will say with conviction, that an extended power outage is extremely hard no matter what, but with little ones? Forget about it. Crazy sauce in a pot of non-boiling water. There is no ability to make it an adventure by pretending you’re on “Survivor”. By hour three, the novelty has worn off.

This 10:00 p.m. phone call was different than the rest. The woman told me that all seven tickets under my phone number were showing “resolved”. It would seem that the visible air coming from our mouths was a figment of our imagination. I looked at the clock to see if it actually displayed the time, indicating that we just forgot to turn on the lights or heat.

Nope. The issue had most definitely not been “resolved”.

She assured me that we would still be up by midnight, two hours away. This sounded fanciful to me, but for my own heart and soul, I needed to believe her.

We went to bed feeling like it was “Power Eve” and dreamt of men wearing yellow fluorescent vests and hard hats jumping down our chimney with magical power-restoring tools.

At 3:00 a.m., I woke up to the kids crying and cold.

At 7:00 a.m., I made call number nine to PSE&G and could no longer get through to a human. We drove around the neighborhood searching for power company vehicles and found none. Giving up, we got in the car and drove to friends in Philly to borrow their generator.

We pulled into our driveway six hours later, armed with the generator and two full gas tanks. Lo and behold, our yard was scattered with those magical yellow-vested and hard-hatted people.

Apparently, while we were on our generator mission, my next door neighbor also went driving around in search of help. She found some men in PSE&G trucks and asked them to come to our block, but they knew nothing of our area and were not authorized to do anything. She begged for someone in charge, explaining that all of us, herself included have small children. They finally told her to search the neighborhood for a red truck and a guy named Bob. He would have answers.

She actually found this red truck and Bob himself! Although he had strict orders to not leave that area, he took pity on her and followed her car to our houses. Within minutes, he had a whole crew looking for the problem.

Our house lit up before we had the generator out of the car.

What was the problem?

During the snow storm that followed
Sandy, our power was shut off for repairs on another line. When these repairs were complete, they forgot to flip our switch back.

All of us went without power for days because of a switch.

The dozens of phone calls did nothing because they did not consider us a large issue, and according to them, they restored our power after Hurricane Sandy. Which was true. For all of 30 hours.

Although, we still have no internet or cable, and most likely won’t for weeks, I am happy and warm, my children are asleep in their beds without seven sleepers and four blankets, and all is right and cozy in our house and those surrounding it.

The moral of the story?

Look for Bob. He has the answers.

Brain DustBuster

I’ve always thought that I was born with some sort of defect. A missing part, like an Ikea box, if you will.

Miscommunications are a part of life. They happen. And, the particular types of which I write are rectified quickly. A mumbled word is heard as something outrageous and halts the conversation like a road flare. Often, these are humorous. We chuckle and continue on, back on track.

But, what happens when the understood word or phrase is horrific and offensive? These too can be quickly rectified (although sans chuckles.)This is where my missing part comes into play.

It is my theory that most of us are born with an automatic Brain DustBuster that sweeps these embarrassing moments away, allowing its person to move along with little additional thought on the blip.

I, on the other hand, get trapped in a loop. The loop during which I was understood to be ridiculous, or perhaps ignorant and/or heartless. Even after many explanations righting the course, and can’t seem to let go of those seconds or minutes, no matter how brief.

An example:

We were powerless for nine days, gloriously restored for one and a half, and then yanked from our cozy relief once the snow storm hit. A snow storm that paled in comparison to any I have witnessed in my 35 years as a North Easterner (minus the five we pretended to belong in Southern California’s valley).

So, as I sit here and write this with numb and chilly fingers on my iPhone, I am still unsure as to why we have no power. Last week, as live wires lay draped and flaming across our yard, it was quite obvious. We did not sit and wait for the lights to magically appear. We knew that as long as our yard contained zero electrical crew members, we would enjoy zero electrical amenities.

But this outage is baffling and beyond irritating, so i made a call to New Jersey’s power company to raise hell politely inquire.

During my call, the rep gave very little helpful information, and just said that they were trying to restore power to everyone by 11:59pm on the 9th of November. (tonight-still waiting)

“I just don’t understand! Why did the power go out at all? The storm wasn’t that bad?”

Oddly, she responded calmly,

“The storm was that bad, Ma’am. People lost their homes. Some lost their lives.”

And there it is.

Of course I spent the next five minutes making sure she knew I was not referring to Hurricane Sandy, but the silly snow storm that followed it. But I can’t shake it. For three seconds, this woman thought there was a jackass on the planet who would downplay a catastrophe that left thousands homeless, killed many, and ripped babies from their mother’s arms. And, during those three seconds, she thought that jackass was me.

Still cringing.

Please send Brain DustBuster.

Maybe an extra one came in your box?

Blogger’s Note:
The Verizon cable line has been destroyed on our block. We are told it cannot be put back up for weeks. For that fact, all typos are to be overlooked as I have no cable or internet and am using the WordPress app on my phone to write and post.

Better yet….

I’ll leave you the username and password. Would you be so kind as to log-in and edit at your leisure? While you’re at it, write a couple of entries, would you?

Username-fix our power
Password- cold