His Button

I can still see the little mechanism that resided on the right side of his stomach, etched in my brain as it is. It was such a mundane apparatus but since it kept my son alive, to me it was his everything. It was a small little button but because it was his mouth, the way he received nutrients, the way, one of the ways he was kept alive, it will always stay with me.

That little device was a part of a way of our life. Plugging in the tubing into that little button was a muscle memory thing for me. I matched up the line on the tubing plug to the line on the feeding device, twisted slightly so it was locked and place and let the bottle drip until he was fed. Once it was done, I matched the lines, popped the tubing out, and put the little plastic cap back on the button. It served its purpose until the next time.

I miss the button in the same way I miss him because it was part of who he was. He had that little apparatus since he was two weeks old. He died with it in place. I don’t know for sure, but I think he was cremated with it in place. I’d give anything to have that back, the old routines, the feeding rituals, the mechanism and tubing, because it would mean he was back. I miss him terribly.

I have another mouth to feed, and she is fortunately free of all the devices and mechanisms that granted him life for so long. I wonder what I’ll tell her about her brother one day, about that time in our lives. I know I’ll definitely tell her about the little button in his stomach that ate for him and gave us the time we so desperately needed with him.

 

Trifecta’s editors asked for 33-333 words using MOUTH in its third definition:

3: something that resembles a mouth especially in affording entrance or exit: as
a : the place where a stream enters a larger body of water
b : the surface opening of an underground cavity
c : the opening of a container
d : an opening in the side of an organ flue pipe

This is what I came up with. For some reason, when I thought of mouth, I thought of the surrogate mouth my son had while he was alive.Check out the other writers signed up for this challenge!

Important Dream Update

I guess if I bitch about it on my blog, it will come. I actually had a dream that I remembered and I got finish this morning! I saw the dream to its conclusion for the first time in I don't know how long! It was glorious ya'll, to dream and not be woken up. When I woke up, I was ready to take on the day, energized from all that dream having! I will triumph over everything now! I am dream filled! My dreams are the yummy icing filling to the chocolate cupcake shell that is my life. Getting to the middle of them is one of the funnest parts. (Hostess Cupcakes. Tear!)

Yes, yes yes.I hear you. What is that you want to know?.... What was the dream about? Oh that's not important. The important thing is that I finished the dre....  No I didn't get an exciting conclusion to the Viking versus Loganworth dream.... Was it just as exciting, this dream I had? Well, no not exactly. It's really not important.... Yes, I know I said I remembered the whole thing, but that doesn't mean it's worth elaborating on.... What's that you say? I can't just tell you I had a dream and not tell you what the contents of that dream consisted of? Ok Fine. *cough ItwasadreamaboutridingBMXbikesinaparkwithsomekidsandthenthey
ditchedmebecauseIwasanoldwomantryingtodowheeliesonadirtbike cough*. Yeah I know. Out of all the dreams I could've seen through to fruition, I somehow chose the most boring one in history. But remember, you asked the question! Some of the blame lies with you!

So, in conclusion I dreamed dreams and got to the conclusion of said dreams. Forget about the content! The dream is the important part!

Stop Interrupting My Dreams!

So for the last couple days now, the little munchkin has been getting up a little earlier than usual, and because I don't want to enforce this behavior, I'll give her a bottle but once she's done, I'll put her back to bed and try to get another hour of shut-eye before we all get going.

This has turned out to be a mistake. Apparently when I go back down for another hour, that's when my REM sleep wants to take place, so I'm usually in the middle of an epic dream by the time we need to get up in earnest, which means I will fight getting up at any costs. But I can't help it. It's a weird dream. I need closure damn it.

Why, Logan, what are you doing in my dreams? via

Take yesterday morning for example. I was sort of dreaming a movie up in my head with who I initially thought was Wentworth Miller but upon further introspection I'm pretty sure is Logan Marshall-Green. Although, maybe it's a weird mesh of the two, like what would happen if the two of them had an illegitimate child together and he grew up to be all fit and gorgeous. Anyhoo, Logan/Wentworth or Loganworth if you will, was on a magical quest with some buddies when he's stopped by a big burly viking. I'm talking the dad from Brave, the dad from How to Train Your Dragon, and the Scotsman from Samurai Jack all rolled into one. (Although, now that I've had a lot more time to think about it, the viking dude looked a whole lot like the goons in Tangled, but that's not even here nor there.) The viking dude is blocking a path that Loganworth wants access to. There's some witty banter back and forth and I know things are about to get good when suddenly, "Bloody Munchkin." Nudge. "Sweetheart." Nudge. Tug at covers. Nudge. "Time to wake up."

The world's coolest Scotsman? I think so. Via

"Uhhhhhhh," I answer back. I wish my husband understood Sleepingese because he's know that 'Uhhhhh' translated to: 'I'm about to watch an epic fight scene! Five more minutes!' But he doesn't understand Sleepingese so he takes that as a sign that needs to do more prodding and poking. Apparently the adage  'let sleeping dogs lie' has no bearing on his life whatsoever. Then he proceeds to try and strip the covers off me until I wake up. So, to sum up, I don't get to finish my dream, I'm woken up in one of rudest ways possible, short of getting water dumped on my person, and I have to wake up my fifteen month old and get stink eye from her in the process. Banner morning. If I do say so myself.

This morning he was even more maniacal. He tried waking me during the middle of a dream I can't even remember because he woke me up in the middle of it! It felt pretty good. It probably was pretty good, but I really don't know because I was woken up! He wanted me to get the munchkin who was awake, but I was not to be stirred I even said "Uhhhhhh", hoping in vain that he'd learned Sleepingese since yesterday (Spoiler Alert: He didn't). In a devious move, he brought the little munchkin in. And she stops being busy for no man or woman. She proceeded to twist and turn and crawl and squeal, and thwap and kick me with reckless abandon until I finally got up. What's worse as I couldn't even growl at her that I needed five more minutes because she really could care less.

It's really maddening. I mean all I need is five more minutes to have some sort of dream closure and nobody in this house seems to want to give it to me! I would pay cash money just to see one of my dreams through to a conclusion before I wake up. My whole kingdom for a complete REM cycle! Until then, don't mind me, I'll just be trying to sleep through a slapping munchkin and and nudging husband hoping to have an exciting conclusion to the 'Loganworth vs. The Viking' dream. I just need to see them fight. It's gonna be good! Come on!

Another conversation in which Quentin Tarantino figures heavily

Fighting Nun doesn't really understand this, but in the morning when I get up with the baby and I turn on the TV in the living room, my immediate inclination is to find something that I already know and thus don't have to pay full attention to. Lately my go to of choice has been Prom. That movie is a stinker but a stinker filled with pretty people and Emily Valentine (OMG!) of all people so it's easy to let it pass before my eyes. This morning though it was Pulp Fiction.You all know how I feel about Tarantino, and how I sometimes get too emotional about his work, this one in particular. Well my Pulp Fiction obsession reared its ugly head again.

Mia Wallace in Lego Form! Via

To Wit:

Bloody Munchkin: So what I want to know is, how is it that when we quote this movie 'Warm, Warmer, Disco!' never comes up?
Fighting Nun: Because... Uhm, its not a very good line.
Bloody Munchkin: It could have its uses!
Fighting Nun: 'Look at the Big Brain on Brad' Uses?
Bloody Munchkin: Well, no.
Fighting Nun: Guess you answered your own question then huh.

Ok, this all may be true, but I'm still struck with the fact that years later I'm still finding little Bon mots like this one that I've never used. Something else I find intriguing is how well this movie goes at its own pace. I found the movie on cable right before the "What does Marcellus Wallace look like?" conversation and continued going about my morning business of playing with my daughter, getting her breakfast etc. I look at it once and hear the "Warm, Warmer, Disco!" line which gets stuck in my head, then I keep moving on with my morning. I expected to be well into the golden watch conversation by the time breakfast was finished, but Mia Wallace hadn't even OD'd yet! Actually, when I went upstairs to clean up the munchkin, she was just in the process. Quentin goes at his own damned pace and nobody better rush him! The movie has its own idiosyncratic rhythm, as do all Tarantino movies and you better be willing to let the rhythm wash over you, else you're not watching his movies right. I haven't seen Django Unchained yet, so I don't know if that's like some universal truth I just unlocked, but it feels about right.

New Year's Resolutions, belatedly

I know I'm already eight days late on this conversation, but, better late than never right? I need to list out my new year's resolutions where somebody somewhere might make me accountable or at least it is in writing what it is I planned to do with the year. But before I do, I thought I'd quickly review how I did with last year's resolutions.

I only had two, to read more and write more and I have to say, for me, I did pretty good on both accounts. I read a lot more, and I'm also glad to say that I bounced around in genres and didn't get stuck in a rut on that account. The one thing I didn't do was finish an honest to God book. All my reading took place on my Kindle, so the second part of that resolution didn't go anywhere, unfortunately.

On the subject of writing more, I have put work into stretching myself and writing more here, and in writing creatively, which is good but it's all kind of sitting there, not doing anything, which isn't good. I need to make more of an effort to get my writing out there and have it do something. I'm happy with what I've done but I can do more. So I propose the following as my resolutions:

1. Read More Routinely
   
   The problem with reading is trying to fit it in with everything else. I'm only going to read more if I carve out a  time for it. Last year, reading with my Kindle was so effortless because I was usually reading while feeding my daughter. Now that she's older, and she needs that feeding time less and less, my window for reading is smaller and smaller. I try to fit it in, but it sometimes just doesn't happen. Fighting Nun has made some resolutions of his own and he thinks I can fit in reading while he's working out and so I hope to make that a habit.
   
2. Read an actual book in between all the Kindle Reading
   
   This will be the year I read a book with actual covers and not just digital media. It could be Swamplandia, Kavelier and Clay, Downbelow Station, or it could be Lois Lowry's Son, which I just got for Christmas and have been eagerly anticipating for years. Lois Lowry is my jam ya'll. If you haven't read The Giver, get yourself a copy post haste! Who knows, but I vow to read an actual book this year, even if it kills me.
   
3. Write more of Substance
   
   I have done better about writing stuff and writing here, which is surprising to me. I had 56 posts last year, which is more posts than the last four years put together. So that's something. I hope to do close to the same amount this year. But I'm less concerned with the writing on this blog than I am with my creative writing. First there's the matter of that unpublished book I need to get out there and the two more I have yet to write. I'm still not very far along with completing the second book in the series and I really don't want it to stagnate. I also have some other big ideas that I've started that I need to see through to some sort of completion. But I think I've scared myself into not doing anything because I've timed myself and I can write about a page an hour, and since I only have about 70 pages of the second book, I'm scared about knocking out pages and the work and time it will need. But I asked Santa (read: mother) to get me Dragon Naturally Speaking for Christmas and now I should be able to make the process a little faster, I'm hoping.
   
4. Eek closer to my goal of getting published
   
   I'm working towards getting my book critiqued by an actual critique partner (Hey Jason, what's up? Consequently, if you'd be willing to buy a copy of his book Eternal Retribution and promise to buy copies of his upcoming Homecoming with the caveat that he finishes my critique faster, I'd really appreciate it. So would he.) I think I'll have a better understanding of what I can do to the book to make it more publishable. I took a class last year on getting published from the always awesome Gotham City Writers Workshop and I want to put that information to use once I've completed revisions based on my friend's critique. (I also can not wait to critique his upcoming book. Good luck Jason!) 

So that's it. I think all of it is achievable and doable and I've just got to see it through. Wish me luck....

The Pancake Conversation Redux

Bloody Munchkin: So, now when he goes to daycare, he tries to hide the pancake however he can. I was told he usually stuffs it down his pants.
Fighting Nun: He stuffs the pancake down his pants?
Bloody Munchkin: I don't know if he's really hiding it or trying to get our daughter to do something else by stuffing the pancake there. Either way, he's still sticking pancakes down his pants.

The pancake conversation has taken a weird turn people, a very weird turn.