shiso mama

Our neighbors have been employing this fantastic nanny, and for some time now, they have been inviting Otis over to join Avi, their two year old, in a nanny share. “Bring him over whenever. Just leave him with Pema.”

Just leave him? I thought. How could I possibly? It was bad enough that I left him with Grandma R. But MORE time to myself? I just can’t justify that!

Yes, folks, it’s parenting with lots of guilt! It’s like being a traditional Asian parent, but you FEEL the guilt rather than INFLICT it. How is that fair? I feel incredibly lucky that we’re in an economic situation where I don’t have to work full time. F is incredibly supportive of my choices, and of my current and past career indecisiveness, and that’s given me the freedom to work as I do now - part time, with the school year, with some theoretical time to work on my art, and of course, as a stay at home parent. But with this flexibility, I feel a lot of guilt. I feel like I have to be engaged with my child at all times, that I must spend all our waking hours together enriching, teaching, and entertaining him. That doesn’t even fit in with my personal philosophy of parenting, but still, the guilt. Oh, the guilt.

But one day, the kid was making me coo ray zee. I was one high pitched screech away from bonkers, and it was only 8am. So I grabbed him and ran across the street, where they accepted him with open arms. And I haven’t looked back since. Sure, I still feel guilty about paying someone else to take Otis to the park, but he loves it.

And here’s where we have the problem. Otis sees Avi 2, maybe 3 mornings a week, depending on who else wants to share Pema. But Otis has become a total Avi addict. Despite the fact that she has tried to gouge out his eyes with her fingers, and ignoring the fear that one day prompted him to throw his hands in front of his face in self defense when she was so excited that she ran towards him screaming, he can’t get enough of that girl. ALL freaking day and ALL freaking night (Thank God he goes to bed early), he moans for her.

“A’ee, A’ee, A’ee!” he cries, running towards the door. He pushes his nose to the glass, looking longingly at her front door, hoping to catch a glimpse of her.

“Kai!” he demands, turning his imaginary key in his hands, imploring you to open the door. If there’s hesitation or a denial, he runs straight into your leg, hanging, the universe’s balance at stake, desperately whining, “Bao bao! Kai! Kai!”

At first it was cute. Now he’s working my last nerve with this lovesick penguin routine. He runs up to each window and shakes at the blinds to look out. He stops everything - nursing, reading, sleeping - just to call out her name. It’s relentless. I spend all day thinking of reasons why he can’t see her. She’s sleeping/eating/not home/at the park/busy. I don’t know why I do this; he has no idea what I’m talking about.

This morning, on our way out, we finally saw Avi. We maneuvered our stroller across the street and he was making happy anticipatory gurgles as we approached. I let him out of the stroller and set him on his feet. And he just sat there and looked at her blankly, like he had no idea who she was. And after about half a minute, he wordlessly ran the rest of the distance to where she was sitting in her stroller, yanked the bagel she was eating out of her hand, and tried to run away with it.

Third Aunt Grandma G and Fifth Aunt Grandma K came for a visit today. Ding Dong, ring the bells, more worshippers on the way! When I heard the soft knocking on the door and looked out the glass panes towards the approaching figures, what I noticed first was the boxes and boxes of STUFF they brought for Otis, uh, I mean, us.

Homemade Chinese and Western food, depending on which of his halves he wants to feed. Otis likes chicken! Otis likes rice! We want Otis to eat more vegetables! Finely chopped vegetables to go with Otis’s rice! Vegetables with chicken for Otis’s rice! Tons of fruit to wash down all those savory goodies! Staples from Costco were presented, also Otis related. Disinfectant wipes, to clean Otis’s potty! Jet Dry, to help wash Otis’s dishes! People, did you know how much love could go into the gifting of a bottle of rinse agent?

And that little glutton for attention ate, nay, slurped it up. Before his nap, he sat on his sofa, with the grandma aunts sitting across from him, their adoration shining upon him. And he kept switching positions, turning his head this way and that to toss coy smiles at them, giggles rumbling from deep in his belly. He was like a model at a photo shoot, pausing after each pose, looking to make sure that his audience was as enraptured as before.  Did he learn this from Mrs. Shiso Bro, our resident model?

Later in the afternoon, when we were all hanging out in the studio, Otis ran up to Fifth Aunt Grandma K and peeked in her skirt pocket, which was gaping open. He tried to bury his hand in her pocket, and finally used his sign for phone, looking for the cell phone that he was sure was hidden in there. Which it was. But then, we all went out for a walk, and he wanted to find that phone again. He picked and picked at the ribbing of Fifth Aunt Grandma K’s sleeve, trying to produce that phone, prying it up and pulling it towards her shoulder. When he couldn’t find it there, he looked in the next logical spot, first tentatively moving a few fingers into the placket of her shirt, and then growing bolder until he was elbow deep down the front of her shirt, fishing around for that phone and finding nothing but a grope. We’ll have to remind him to use that ruse when he gets into his teenage years.

And finally, more tales of inappropriate touching. During Otis’s bath, I heard the following things stage whispered:

- Oh, he’s scratching his, uh, butt again.
- Babee, don’t scratch your butt!
- Look, he’s really mauling it.
- Do you think there’s something wrong with it?
- Maybe it’s itchy?  It must be itchy!
- Why is he doing that?

It’s OK, I scream from my bedroom.

- Oh, Mama says it’s OK for you to do that.

We gave Otis away this past weekend. With nary a care in the world, F and I frolicked and cavorted, wined and dined, read lots of fantastic books, and saw several movies. Oh shit, that’s what we should have done. No, Otis went to Grandma R’s house this weekend so we could install a sprinkler system in our front yard. Exciting, no? Thursday, we got a call from our friend Lynna, inviting us up to Napa for the weekend for mudbaths and wine tasting, and F and I looked at each other with longing and excitement before the crushing disappointment set in.

The sprinkler system? Never got installed. We paid some guys to come and take away all the excess dirt and junk in our front yard, but we realized just before we started work that we didn’t ask them to take away enough dirt, and had to spend the weekend moving dirt around. Why have a Bobcat do it when two, out-of-shape parents with no extra time and kinda crappy tools can do it instead? Progress was slow, and one becomes fatigued surprisingly quickly, and then one becomes discouraged when one sees how little said progress was made when said fatigue set in, but we got quite a bit done, especially since we’re just competitive enough so that one would not quit if the other was still working, and that kept us going for a while past the point of exhaustion. We did more this weekend than we have in a long time. We went out to dinner both nights, spent time with friends, read the Sunday Times, even helped our neighbor shovel a massive pile of chicken manure. We went nuts flinging our free time and productivity around.

But by Sunday morning, we both missed Otis quite a bit. Originally Grandma R had proposed bringing him back Sunday night, so we could work the entire weekend. But I finally convinced her to bring him back after breakfast on Sunday. All morning long F and I continued working in the yard, with one eye on the front door and an ear cocked for a slowing car. Finally, just minutes before his nap, they came home and I rushed out to meet them, anxious to see Otis. He greeted me with barely a glance, having spent a weekend surrounded by adoring masses, both at Grandma R’s house, and at the local dim sum restaurant, where he is a small-time celebrity. He was stuffed with all kinds of tasty Chinese treats and apple juice (which he doesn’t get at home), and watched lots of TV. It would be just heavenly for us (and certainly Otis) if Grandma R took him for a night every weekend or two, but we don’t have the balls to ask her to do it. We already feel like we take advantage of her as it is.

Here is a story from Grandma R:

Over the weekend, Grandpa G’s sisters came over to borrow some of their Chinese soap opera DVDs. When they were getting ready to leave, one of them picked up her purse and the bag of DVDs that Grandma R had prepared for her. When Otis saw her pick up the bag, he ran over to her, possessively ripped the bag from her hands and ran back to give it to Grandma R. She claims that Otis was mad that this interloper would try and steal from their house, his house. When the other sister grabbed the bag playfully and tried to hide it behind her back, he ran over and craned his neck to and fro, looking for the bag to reclaim again, insistent that what was in the house before they came over should stay there, if he had anything to do with it. Grandma R was very pleased about this story - just more evidence of Otis’s cleverness and smartitude - and she told the tale with such enthusiasm that I think the entire neighborhood now knows about it. By the way, I have now heard this story three different times from three different people, since my mom now gets her news directly from Grandma R, and then everyone else in the family has to retell it to me as the news ripples through the rest of the family.

… and so do I. Will be back to blogging soon. But one little parting tidbit.

Otis and I went to Ikea today, and on our way out, he smelled the cinnamon buns, demanded to be lifted up, and pointed excitedly, shouting, “Ro!” (That means meat.) We got in line and I bought him some frozen yogurt. He loves ice cream, but has never been given anything on a cone to eat. He was pretty excited, but would you believe it? He had no idea how to eat it. I kept trying to show him how to stick out his tongue and lick it, but in response he would either 1. Press it against his face and repeatedly look surprised when the cold yogurt touched his lips (even after the 5th time) or 2. Try to suck it in like he was trying to drink it. The only solution we could come up with was for him to use a wooden coffee stirrer as a spoon. I kept having to scrape more and more of the melting mess into the trash and finally chucked everything in there when he wasn’t paying attention.  My conclusion? Too dumb for ice cream.

Here he is trying to drink his frozen yogurt:

And here he is, too dumb to get much down his throat:

Ice cream is another of F’s favorite foods.  Between the bacon incident and this, the kid’s THIS close to being disowned.

Otis gets more phone calls in this house than anyone else. That’s pretty amazing, considering the kid’s got a vocabulary that allows him to communicate little beyond a love of food, peeing, and about three animals. Here’s a typical conversation:

RING RING

me: Hello?

caller: Oh, hi. It’s you. Yeah. Um, well, I called to talk to Otis. Is he there? Babee? Babee?

I put the caller on speaker phone and gesture for Otis to come over. Otis rushes for the phone and tries to swallow the phone whole.

Otis: wararahhhh!

caller: Otis! Babee! Babee! It’s ______! Call me _______! Call me _______! It’s _______!! (Otis looks blankly at the phone)

Otis: da!

caller: Da da? Da da? Did your mother beat you? (”Da” means hit in Chinese)

Otis: da!

caller: Da da. Otis! It’s ________! Call me ________! Did you EAT a lot?
Otis has lost interest and has wandered off to pee on something.

caller: It’s ______! Sing me a song! La la la. Da da da. I miss you! It’s ______! Did you see a niao (bird) or did you niao (pee)? Otis! Otis?

me: He’s wandered off somewhere.

caller: Oh, it’s you. Where’s babee? Otis! Come to the phone! Talk to ______!

This continues for several more minutes until caller finally gives up, ready to hang up.

caller: Otis! Say bye! Bye bye! Mwah. Blow me a kiss! Mwah. Mwah.

me: OK, bye.

caller: Otis! Bye! Bye! Mwah! Mwah!

me: Bye.

caller: Bye Bye! Bye Bye! Otis! Say goodbye to ______!

me: OK, I’m hanging up now.

caller: Bye! Bye!

I can still hear the faint sounds of more goodbyes as I reach down to push the disconnect button. We get a lot of these phone calls around here. We just got Skype, and are working on getting everyone connected via video phone. I can only imagine what the phone calls will be like once they can start seeing images.