Flight karma.

This is kind of embarrassing, but I don’t enjoy most children. Not because I find them annoying or loud or self-involved or whatever – I realize that’s basically in their job description. Mostly I am uncomfortable around them because I don’t know how to talk to them. When they’re babies, it’s easy because, well, (a) they don’t talk, and (2) their needs (of the feed, change, hold, cuddle, make obnoxious noises to distract them, etc., variety) are easily met. I feel silly saying that I don’t know how to converse with a child, because logically it would seem pretty straightforward. Children don’t typically want to discuss philosophy or math and the like. But I’m awkward at small talk with adults, too, and I think the fact that I have very rare contact with children makes that social anxiety more magnified. However, on the heels of my delightful visit with the cutest, most smartest baby ever, I think I was carrying around some extra confidence and benevolence. So on the flight home, when I and all my other Southwest passengers lined up by our group letters and numbers like the good little flock of sheep that we were, when I ended up behind a woman with a baby and toddler, I didn’t inwardly cringe like I might normally have done in the past. I made googly faces at her baby in the stroller when she started to get cranky. I picked up her pacifier that she emphatically threw on the ground. I complimented the three-year-old on her scarf and asked if she was excited to go on her trip. (“We are going to see Opa and Oma!!!”) Their mom was absolutely delightful and very appreciative, but honestly, I just felt like I was doing what any reasonable adult should do.

So when we boarded the plane, I chose the seat directly behind this little family. (I admit there was a small chance that it was a selfish move – I figured if the flight wasn’t full it was unlikely anyone would choose to sit next to me and behind two kids.) But mostly it was because the mom seemed nice and that I felt my resume had been recently beefed up in the act of distracting babies. What followed was as delightful a plane ride as can be expected when you’re trapped in a steel box thousands of miles above ground. The older child had the window seat right in front of me and she kept peeking between the seats to say hello and chat with me. Of course once we took off, I could barely understand her over the noise of the plane, but I just would say something back to her and honestly, who cares if it didn’t make sense to her either – she’s three after all. And there’s something to be said for the pure excitement and joy of a child on an airplane (“We’re FLYING!!!”) that kind of takes away from the usual feeling I have on a plane (“Don’t crash, please don’t crash, don’t crash”). Even though she was very confused that everyone on the plane wasn’t also going to see her Opa and Oma. (“Opa is coming to meet us at the airport! Are you coming to Opa’s house?!!!!”) She was also helpful, though. (“My mommy said to sit down and keep my selt belt on!” Did your mommy say the same thing?” and when I told her I wasn’t traveling with my mommy: “Why not? Doesn’t your mommy want to fly with you to come to Opa’s house?!”) Her mom was so considerate and I’m sure told her repeatedly to not bother me, and, I’m assuming, used the words, give her some peace and quiet. Because at one point in the flight, she snuck (sneaked?) her head around, between the seat and the window and therefore away from her mother, and whispered in that loud-toddler-whisper, “ARE YOU ENJOYING YOUR PEACE AND QUIET?” Hilarious. Besides, she had really impeccable taste. (“I love you the most!”)

And totally made up for the last time I flew alone.

50 hours in LA

Last week I had the chance to fly to Los Angeles to visit my SIL and new niece while BIL had to fly back east for a funeral. A sad reason for my trip, but one for which I was very grateful because hello? CUTE WEE BABY WITH THE WIGGLY TOES AND CHUNKY CHEEKS! I hadn’t seen her since late September at her baptism, a weekend of numerous crazy and loud relatives (yours truly included), a weekend that would have tested the patience of anyone, and that baby handled it all like a pro. Of course, as babies do, she immediately kept on changing and growing within minutes of our departure, so I was thrilled to get to see her again. She’s six months old now and still the smilingest and happiest, most easy-going baby I have ever seen. And no, I’m not just saying that because I’m her proud aunt, and no, I’m not just saying that because her mom reads this blog. She is SERIOUSLY the best baby I have ever encountered. So cute and perfect and smart. She taught herself to crawl while I was there – taught herself how to get from re-positioning herself using her arms to scooting to full-on crawling. CRAWLING! I left Saturday and I’m sure by now she’s completing geometric equations. And did I mention the cuteness?

I really have nothing else to note about my trip because all I remember doing is making obnoxious sounds to the baby and speaking in nonsense talk. Things I’m sure I was once adamant about never lowering myself to do when around a baby. Of course, I also smooched all over that cute baby face even when it was covered in drool, something that would normally make my gag reflex go into overdrive, but apparently when it comes to a cutie patootie baby? No problem. I am not ashamed.

Randomonday.

• Old Navy. Your commercials. With the talking mannequins. Just stop. For the love of Mike. Stop.
• This. Makes me more angry than it possibly should, more angry than I have ever been about this situation. It’s about Roman Polanski’s arrest, if you don’t want to click on that link. I mean, I’m glad he’s been arrested, but the fact that it’s taken this long and he’s been living the happy life, working, earning awards, yada yada…What a jerk. JERK. (Yeah, I have a way with words.) The part of that article that fired me up the most was: In Paris, Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand said that he was “dumbfounded” by Polanski’s arrest, adding that he “strongly regrets that a new ordeal is being inflicted on someone who has already experienced so many of them.” Okay. It is terrible that his mother died at Auschwitz. And of course what happened to Sharon Tate was horrific. I have no words for it, and if just one of those things happened to me, I don’t know what I would do. HOWEVER. Drugging and raping a 13-year-old? That didn’t happen TO HIM. It’s ALL ON HIM. HE did that. For crying out loud.
• I wonder when, or if, I will ever get it up to do more than the bare minimum around the house. I mean, yeah, I do the laundry regularly. I cook dinners most of the time, but they’re nothing exciting or that interesting compared to how I used to cook. I leave crap piled around. I put off cleaning the bathrooms and bathing the dogs. I wonder if it’s because we’ve traveled so much this year rather than family coming to us (and therefore not giving my pre-emptive guilt a chance to kick in and clean up like crazy). Probably it’s just that I’m lazy.
• If you’re a framer, even at a second-rate framing place, the first words out of your mouth to customers should NOT be “There is no way I am going to sell you that frame to go with that picture.”
• We went to Los Angeles the weekend before last for our niece’s baptism. I hadn’t been to LA since I was maybe 8 years old? On that trip my biggest issue was whether or not to get the Mickey Mouse ears or Gilligan cap monogrammed with my name (I went with the sailor cap). This trip, besides the obvious awesome time with a cute baby and all the in-laws, two things stuck with me: the fact that I paid almost $60 for a 15-mile cab ride, a cab ride that was so breakneck I almost started to cry; and the fact that ALL OVER Hollywood there are HUGE billboards advertising TV shows. As my sister-in-law-once-removed said, “I don’t get it. It’s like preaching to the converted.”