Every day.

When I was younger than, say, 12, and the bossy older sister of two other girls, I wanted to be a teacher. Playing "Schools" at home was my favorite way to while away the hot Aussie summer days during school holidays. All the stuffed toys (fully dressed, of course, because only babies get around nekkid), and my two kid sisters, would get assigned a seat in the classroom and be handed out tests to complete while I strolled the aisles between the imaginary desks and answered imaginary questions from Big Ted, and various knock-off cabbage kid dolls.



Me: No, you may not go the toilet, you're in the middle of a test.

Kid Sister #2: MUUUUM!!! Lucy won't let me go to the toooiiilet!!!

Mum: (makes a life-long point of not responding to screams from across the house, so does not reply, but you better bet your ass that if Mum yells 'GIRLS!!' from anywhere in the house or surrounding suburban property and we don't drop everything and head in her direction sooner than later, there would be trouble.)

Me: (in my best 'stern teacher' voice) FINISH. YOUR. TEST. (in my sweetest, I-want-to-be-your-favorite-teacher-in-the-whole-world voice) Does anyone have any questions?? Big Ted? You okay?



I eventually came to the realisation that I didn't actually want to be a teacher at all. What I REALLY wanted was to be able to boss people around all day. Later, I came to realise that what I really wanted to was to be able to boss people around specifically within some sort of creative-outlet type of environment (I was VERY into drama class at the time). Even further down the road, almost to the end of high school, I realised that I wanted to boss people around within some sort of video/television/media production type of environment.

Nowadays, I work for a marketing/advertising agency in a SOMEWHAT 'boss people around' kind of capacity. What I've recently realised, though, is that the 'creative-outlet type of environment' actually needs to serve two purposes in my life... and my current situation is only serving one. I work with some very creative type folks, and play a part on a team that produces some creative type work, but my contribution to that team? Not creative, for the most part. A fair amount of diplomatic bossing around, but not a lot of creativity on my end. That's alright though. I've found that, since having a kid, my need to feel fully fulfilled in my day job is not so strong. I don't want to feel SO terribly invested in my job that I end up feeling like I'm short-changing the kid in some way. I also don't want to feel like I'm short-changing my job too badly either.

The creative outlet, however, needs to be discovered. I feel that. I've done some graphic design, I've done some writing, I like to think about interior designy type crap way more than I probably should given our current financial constraints. And now? Sewing. More specifically? Sewing. Cloth. Diapers. I know. I can't even believe it myself.

Point of all this, of course, is that I'm going to keep up this writing thing because, if nothing else, I can do it with my ass firmly planted on the couch with a glass(es) of red wine nearby at all times. But I also sew, and use on my kid, cloth freakin' diapers. These are not your mama's cloth diapers, of course, and it sounds way more domestic than it really is. But there it is. Ridiculous! I'll save the teaching for the people that actually have good-hearted and well-intended thoughts about educating the youth of (insert country name here). I really only ever wanted to do it so I could be a relentless nag and get paid for it. When I found out that corporal punishment was frowned upon, I lost interest. Quickly.

Parenting Firsts

Two words: Caddyshack. DOOOOODIE!

Ye olde, dreaded, poop-in-the-tub.

As I uttered the words, aloud, 'Are you pooping??', I saw it.
I lunged for her, and hefted her out of the water fast as lightening. Then held her by the armpits, slippery and dripping, over the tub as I evaluated the scene. Poop. Lots of it. Lots of little bits of it. Floating all over the place. Dear lord, how did she just get all that done so quickly?

She screams. Irritated that her beloved tubby-time has been cut short so abruptly.

I rush her to her room, get her into a diaper and pj's, and close the door to the bathroom. I'll deal with that later.

We spend a few minutes playing on the couch. It's her new favorite thing. She runs the length of it, falls over, throws pillows, lays down and says 'night night', then jumps up and runs on the cushions until she falls over again. Lots of giggling, from both of us. In the back of my mind, I'm imagining what the bath tub looks like right now. Toys, letters, that stupid Rainbow Fish book, rubber duckies, and little bits of poo: all hanging out together, bobbing around in the rapidly cooling water. Geee-ross.

A few minutes of playing on the couch is enough time to make me realise that she ain't done yet. I put a clean diaper on her, for the second time in minutes. How soon is bedtime?

Tyler comes home. She hears the key in the front door, from all the way in the back of the house, and yells 'DADA!!!' in the same excited voice that is, lately, reserved only for exclamations of 'DADA' or 'ELBO' (the television). He's brought wine, bless his heart, without even knowing the horror that awaits in the bathroom.

We play a bit longer then brush teeth, and DADA! does the bedtime routine while I get friendly with a bucket, a pair of rubber gloves, a bottle of bleach, and a scrubbing brush.

Still not even CLOSE to the worst crap I had to deal with this week.