Scenes from a Carriage

- The most fashionable person I've seen in NYC so far I saw at the de-licing salon.

One-Armed Babysitter

A couple of weeks ago, I went to an instalment of the Upper West Side moms group. Only one woman from the previous week was there, so two new faces. One looked as if she had, at one point, been a model, but for a brand like Stussy. The other was a former school teacher from California who later told me she hated New York, and wanted to go back to the west coast.  All she had here, she said, was her family and her church.

We were in a park in Harlem this time, down 110th St., a few blocks from my apartment. As I laid my worn Wreck Beach sarong beside their matching JJ Cole park blankets (they were the exact right weight for the park, but still easily foldable) they talked about the first birthday party for the kid of a mutual friend at a "summer estate" in the Hamptons.

"They had rented a circus tent and a few performers. Like, clowns and magicians," said the model.

"And a birthday buffet," said the one I'd met the week before, a non-profit fundraiser.

"And there was a llama." 

"A llama," I said. "It's the llama that really brings the party to the next level." 

Just then three loud bangs cracked the air. The entire park- parents, kids, nannies, BBQ-ers, the homeless - went silent, looking towards the spot from which the sound had come.  There was a moment of very tense anticipation. Then the word "car" drifted back over the crowd and the afternoon buzz resumed.  

"Yeah, it was a fun party," the model continued. 

"Were there many kids there?" I asked. 

"It was made clear," the fundraiser said, " in the invite that the party wasn't really for kids." 

"What?" I almost said, but another woman had arrived. The first things I noticed about her, and maybe this says something about me, were the diamond studs and solid gold watch she was wearing with her casual capris and striped Polo shirt. The second thing was the pedicured toes painted red poking out of MK sandals, since they were at my level. 

"Hello everyone!" she said as she unfolded another JJ Cole blanket, then  placed her baby in the middle of the circle with all the other babies. Alice was aggressively tugging the Baby Einstein radio from the model's daughter. The model kept glancing over, frowning, looking concerned while trying not to look concerned. I gently pried her little fingers off of it and handed it to the girl. 

Talk turned to babysitting services. "My friend has a funny story about that service," said gold watch. "She signed on, and received a ton of emails from potential babysitters. This one candidate looked perfect. My friend called her references, and then talked to her on the phone. The girl sounded great, and she hired her to come babysit for a date night, sight unseen. The night comes, and my friend opens the door, and the babysitter only has one arm."

"Ha!" I laughed. "That is kind of funny. A surprise one-armed babysitter."  

Gold watch looked at me stone-faced. "That's not the funny part."

"Oh." 

"My friend had spoken with her former employers, three of them, and the agency, and no one had even mentioned that she only had one arm. It's just amazing that no one brought it up."

"This shows," said the school teacher, "that many "disabled" people can function just fine in an able-bodied world. To them there's no difference worth mentioning."

"Yeah," I said. "She probably did a great job. But at first it would be startling to see that the person you had hired to take care of your baby had, like, one arm."

"Obviously, this woman wasn't inhibited by her difference," gold watch snapped. The other women looked down at the grass. She was obviously offended that I had found humour in this part of the story. So what was the funny part?

"The funny part," continued gold watch, leaning forward a little to talk past me at the school teacher. "My friend was desperately trying to text her husband to warn him of this, since he was coming home a little later. She was SO worried he was going to say something inappropriate! Husbands, right?"

"Ha ha" said the school teacher.

Gold watch, who seemed to have a pretty strong command of the mommies group, ignored me for the rest of the visit, which, for me, wasn't that much longer. I guess she was offended because she thought I was laughing at the one-armed babysitter. But what she failed to get, I thought as pushed the stroller and stomped home, was that I was laughing at the mom. SHE was the butt of the joke, the one dealing with the surprise and initial awkwardness. And yes that awkwardness acknowledges difference, but a one-armed babysitter IS difference. Had the story been that the one-armed babysitter changed diapers with her feet, then the laughter would have been at her expense, and I'd understand the offence.

Or maybe something else was dangling in the web of UWS mommy-group dynamics, something having to do with my sarong. I have no idea.

Anyway, whatever. Alice update! We went to the zoo yesterday, and for the first time she saw all the animals that inhabit her books. Her eyes were wide as she frantically waved to the giraffes, zebras and gorillas. "Hi! hi! hi!"Hanging out with her is kind of the best.

Long pause

So, a few things that have happened since I last wrote forever ago-

- I haven't gone out very much after 6:30PM since moving to NYC. Other than the nights I go to the theatre with Michael, I've been in bed by 10, unless I've started on the downward spiral of New Girl episodes, in which case I'm up until the writing gets bad again.

On a Friday a few weeks ago, I was planning my night- deciding whether to read Vanity Fair's profile of Nicole Kidman or sleep, when an acquaintance from Regina, Natalie, emailed me. Would I like to hang out with her tomorrow night? In the time since I'd seen her, she said, she'd married the bassist from Arcade Fire. They were playing a secret (but sold-out) Williamsburg gig that night. Would I like to come backstage and have a drink? Yeah sure why not. The one night I go out, might as well spend it backstage at the show of one of my favourite bands.

Natalie and I grabbed beers from the corner store (which made no sense since there were tubs of them backstage) then found our way through a makeshift curtain. We were standing by the snack table (Heineken on ice! Fresh carrots!) when the band gathered and slid their arms onto each other's shoulders to form a circle for their pre-show salutations. Natalie and I awkwardly looked away and around the room. It felt like we were witnessing a very intimate moment and we were the only two non-band members in the room. So off to our chairs we went.

The audience, which was a mix of Pitchfork-reading 20-somethings and oldies like me, was dressed up in tuxs and ball gowns. The band played new tunes for the most part, and it felt a little like a rehearsal for the tour they were about to embark on. After the show, the backstage area filled up and I stuck beside Natalie and Tim.

A very dapper looking gentleman, his curly hair greying, walked up and gave Tim a hug. "Hi Mac," Tim said.

"I have a couple things for you,"said Mac. He handed Tim the yet-unreleased new Spanish album from Destroyer.

"Do you like Destroyer?" Mac asked me.

"Hell ya,"I said. "Is the new album any good though?"

Pause from everyone. "Yes, I think it is," Mac finally said. Of course this was Mac McCaughan from Superchunk, founder of Merge Records. Who produces Destroyer and Arcade Fire. He better think it's good.

At this point I actually saw someone I kinda sorta knew - John Cameron Mitchell, creator of Hedwig and Hannah's boss on Girls. I excused myself from the awkward and approached him to say hi. He grabbed my arm and slurred "come have a smoke with us." I'm not sure if he knew who I was, but out I went. He pushed open the emergency exit and pulled me into the alleyway. And there, waiting by a garbage bin, was Owen Pallett. I remember him standing in a wisp of smoke, but that might not be accurate.

"Caaarrriie, do you know Owen? Have you heard of Final Fantasy? That's him."
"Of course, I love your work. In fact, I saw you in Regina once. I asked you to come join us for drinks, and you said no."
Again, pause. "Well, that was a tough tour. We were all really tired..."
"You said it was because you'd drank so much in Saskatoon!"
"Oh...I'm sorry.... if that offended you." He looked quickly at John.
"No, no! I don't care! I really don't! I'm just...talking." John quickly changed the subject to Obamacare.

It was a super fun night, but mostly because Natalie and I hid in a corner, drank beer and talked. Even in the midst of backstage craziness, nothing beats girl time.

Also,

- Still waiting for Green Card. Wondering if I'll ever be allowed entry into the work force again.

- Alice does a little dance every time she hears the word "robot."

Moms of the UES

In the thick of our sleep problems (she wakes up only twice-nightly now!) I saw a posting on a mom's meet-up site for a talk given by a sleep expert. It was perfect timing, and seemed pretty necessary at that point. The posting made a pretty clear distinction, though - it was for the Upper East Side. But it included lunch, wasn't too far from our neighbourhood, and we were desperate for sleep, so why not. I paid the $40 and couldn't help but get a little excited about meeting other moms, UES or not.

Sleep Training

Recently, Alice lost her voice. She sounded like a very small, baby-talking Kathleen Turner. She lost her voice because of the four consecutive nights of scream-crying as we Cried It Out.

Breast Feeding in Public

Since arriving in NYC, I've been trying to gauge the level of acceptance of public breastfeeding (under my "modesty sheet" of course. Very Victorian.) And I've noticed that I now, a month in, feel a lot less comfortable with it than I did in Canada.

SIN

Ok, I probably have about seven minutes to write this, given the inner baby sleep clock I’ve developed.

 
- Alice said "da da" while looking and waving at M. She said it with intent, and purpose. It was definitely different from the usual baby talk. It was magical. It actually felt like magic.

- Last week, I had a meeting with a media company about some past work. I can’t really say which one, except lets call them SIN. They have a Yes/No list that’s pretty infamous. Skaters. Extant photography. Anyway, they wanted to ask me about research I had done in the past for a segment they’re working on for their video department.

Fourth of July

Fourth of July- we pack Alice up and make our way to the Macy’s fireworks display. It’s two hours of punishing heat, pushing the stroller up hills, weaving it around people so as to not skin their ankles and dragging it up long flights of stairs. But there’s a break- The subways here are for the most part air-conditioned, which means 45-minutes of lovely. About four hours before the fireworks are set to begin, we get off in Chelsea and make our way to the park to set up camp. The crowds are starting to grow, filling the sidewalk and spilling over onto the streets, and the police everywhere, looking serious and damp.

Sunset Park

We’re here! Well, not quite. We have two weeks in Brooklyn before we move into our own place in West Harlem. Right now, we’re staying in the Sunset Park neighbourhood, a Chinese/Hispanic community. Yesterday evening, when it started to pour, you could hear surprised exclamations in both Spanish and Mandarin. I had gotten Alice ready in her stroller for an evening walk, and as soon as we got to the door, the rain started. People slapped wet Chinese-language newspapers onto their heads and ran for cover. Alice and I trudged back upstairs, and once we were comfortable in front of the window to watch the rain, she heard thunder for the first time. She didn’t seem to think much of it.  

It’s an interesting hybrid, Chinese/Latin. There’s an OK 24-hour Mexican restaurant down the street, followed on the next intersection by Chinese storefronts selling linens and a locksmith service. I think I’ve seen four white people so far. I practice my Mandarin with my landlord and his family, who occupy every other suite in this building, and older floral Latinas bless Alice in grocery stores and bakeries.

Also, holy baby jesus it's hot. Sweat, just sweat. Everything's sticky. We live in front of the fan. 

I’ve only left the fan once, well almost. It was to meet Michael on the southern edge of Times Square, at about 30^th and Broadway, on the edge of the fashion district, and I had decided to walk the last ten blocks. It was about 7pm, and I trudged upstream with the stroller and all of Alice’s gear through the flow of young female professionals leaving work. Their dresses were fantastic – interesting, perfectly accessorized, expensive. They conducted business on headsets. They were younger than me. And as I lumbered along, the stroller cutting a wide line in the stream, my status – a stay-at-home-mom, a SAHM – flared up with the contrast.

This is what I do now, and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done (Alice didn’t get to sleep until midnight last night! When I’m not taking care of her, I’m cleaning. You’re on call 24/7. It never stops. She's the most amazing thing ever in the history of amazing.) But involved is a military-style exercise in destroying the construct of the self. I can’t work for the next year probably, maybe two. And eking out writing time is like wringing ink from paper. To keep our muggy, AC-less apartment from declining into garbage-infested chaos, I am constantly working. I’m a housewife, and will be for a while. Nothing against this very hardworking profession, but it’s a shift in definition. I’m not used to not thinking about myself constantly.

But I'm throwing myself into it. Yesterday I read that egg yolk mixed with warm water removes most coffee and tea stains, and that a child needs consistent, loving care from ages 0-2 for their brains to grow right. 

Anyway, baby crying. Day begins. Happy Fourth!

Holy Crap

So, my move to NYC has been bumped up two weeks, meaning we have two weeks less to pack, sell, clean, say good-bye. We're in Walla Walla Washington now until the end of June, and then we have two weeks to get everything done. My husband drives all of our stuff to NYC on the 15th, I stay and clean with the baby for five days, fly to Vancouver for 10 days, again alone with the baby (but with lots of help from my friends!) then fly to NYC on a one-way. We're in a sublet for about a month in Brooklyn, and then move into student housing on the upper west side. It's going to be INSANE, and I will not be able to do anything else. So my dreams of maintaining this blog may be dashed, at least until July. It's a crazy time.

Happy mother's day!

It's come to this: I was reading a review of Drunk Mom, the new memoir by Jowita Bydlowska about her decent into alcoholism soon after giving birth to her son. Bydlowskais was a serious drinker, a black-out drunk, and it is after a night of binge drinking that she wakes up one morning with no recollection of the night before. This happens frequently during this period in her life. She's the only one home, and she doesn't know how long her one-year old has been in the crib alone. She assures herself that he hasn't gone hungry- bottles of formula in the crib "spill milk onto the mattress."

My first thought was, she feeds him formula?

I've been battling the guilt related not to a serious addiction to alcohol but for using Similac Advanced once a day, sometimes twice, to supplement my breast milk supply.

My worst offence was when my husband and I were in NYC for a few weeks in a rented apartment with my parents. I saw about four shows, and left my parents each time with the baby and a six-pack of the test tube-like containers of Advanced. I was pumping in the morning and evenings, getting up about twice a night to breastfeed her, breastfeeding her every three hours during the day, but it still wasn't enough to not supplement when I went out. It was the first time she had tried formula. As a result, she had some unforeseen digestive troubles that took a week to go away.

The flack I got wasn't so much direct finger pointing as praise for my recognition that what I had done was bad. 

"Well, now that you know, you can stop using that stuff."

"Have you tried (lie ins, where you confine yourself to the house for a week and do nothing but feed; drink fenugreek tea; "look feed," where you feed her every time she moves her eyes in your direction)?"

"Have you tried everything?"

Supplementing with formula is not the best thing for babies younger than four months - breastfeeding promotes the growth of health bacteria in their stomachs, and they're particularly sensitive to this in their first few months of life. It's one of the many, many health benefits to breastfeeding. Breast is Best. Breast is Best!

My own guilt was overwhelming. Once we had returned and I'd realized the magnitude of my mistake, I'd stand in the middle of our living room, recounting the tummy troubles she had suffered and ball as my baffled husband tried to reassure me that the baby is fine. And the baby was totally fine.

But I'd put myself before my baby. And I think that's what it comes down to. I'd done something that might not have been THE BEST for my baby in order to see some shows. Because mothers need to try everything, everything, leaving their former selves deflated in a heap behind them, in order to give their babies the best. And a part of me believes this.

But those shows? They included some of the best pieces of theatre I've ever seen. Sleep No More was wild. Peter Brook's The Suit was this shining little gemstone. I was talking to a theatre prof here, and the Nature Theatre of Oklahoma's Life and Times came up, and we had this satisfying talk about that kind of art that I wouldn't have been able to have otherwise. I felt totally enriched by all of it.

So what do we sacrifice for our babies, and what do we keep of ourselves? I'm still trying to figure that one out.

PS: We're moving to New York! We have two months to prep before we haul ourselves out of this place (although I totally love it here, and am sad to go.) It's random and insane.

Over-sharing

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Wow, old school

Blogging seems so old school now. Since I last posted three years ago, so many other forms of personalized publishing have cropped up. But it's like hip-hop and office supplies- I like it old school.

I think I'm going to start posting again, here on Laili, into the void. I'm a mom now, on Mat Leave, starting to think about preparing to move to New York. I have a contract I need to finish in the next few weeks, but I want to spend some time jotting down thoughts on good 'ol Blogger.

Thunderstick

If you are in Vancouver, go see Thunderstick! Awesome wicked rad. Very funny, very moving, great performances by the fantastic Lorne Cardinal and Craig Lauzon.

But why was the house half-empty? Why wasn't this show more effectively promoted ? The show has been getting great reviews. What does it take to get a little online campaign going a week before opening? Not much. My amateur writer's salon could promote an event more effectively. I didn't even see any posters up other than 8x10 fliers thumb-tacked to a cork board in another theatre. I love the work that the Firehall programs. They stage important, edgy, political theatre. I just wish they put some money/strategy into getting the word out about their shows BEFORE they opened.

Dream

I had a dream last night that I walked up to a long table and along one side of it sat a line of people stuffing down KFC's Double Downs. When I asked them how it was, they all opened their mouths and let out this "aaaahhhwwbbb" sound. I want to try one.

BSS

Saw Broken Social Scene at the Commadore last night. I was going in with some low expectations for some reason. I had seen them in Regina about eight years ago at this small club and it was so intimate and raw, I didn't think they could beat that. But they were so freaking good. Tight, incredible musicians, great live show, fantastic forays into jamming, which didn't get wanky at all. Super dancable. On one side, I had three giant football players calling out beefy holla's, singing all the lyrics. On the other side was a 50 year old couple. Tons of young bespecled artist-types. Everyone was digging it. And then went on forever! Super generous, they obviously just loved playing and stirring up the frenzied energy. They were having so much fun. There were some of the same members from that first show in Regina, and they played even better.

Creepy

I actually like neck tattoos on some people, (I'm THAT hardcore,) but not on this guy. This morning, before work at the warehouse, I was in Starbucks getting a coffee. This tall, gangly kid comes in, and asks for a bagel. The first thing I think is, he's too nerdy and awkward, too YOUNG, for those neck tattoos. The way he spoke to the barista was off putting. Not un-nice, but too loud and forced, as if he was imitating himself, rather than just speaking. Totally uncomfortable in his own skin.

At the warehouse, I'm eating my breakfast in the last minute countdown before nine, and the kid walks in. Great, I think. "Hi, I just saw you at Starbucks," I say.
"Did you recognize my trusty bagel?" "No. Your neck tattoos." "Oh, thanks!" Wha?

Later on that morning, over heard talking to another warehouse employee: "Oh, I WANTED to buy a sniper rifle. But they're $15,000! I can't afford it, so I got a bunch of them tattooed on my arm." Urg.

Later on that afternoon, at a fancy hotel- we were, in panic mode and running out of time trying to set up an event. things were a little stressed: He comes storming past me, and in front of our clients, screams: "Fuck this shit. FUCK IT. I'm leaving. This is SHIT. BAM BAM BAM BAM (in reference to the hammering he might have to do, and its loud noise.) He searches out the hotel manager and says "Fuck this corporate bullshit. You're all assholes. You're all corporate assholes" and takes off, leaving us in the middle of the job.

He didn't screw The Man. He didn't show those corporate pigs. He left me and three women, making chump change and collecting layers of rash on our arms from the ceder, with hours of more work. I hate him.

And I thank sweet baby Jesus that he can't afford that sniper rifle.

American Apparel going down the tubes

Yay! Rejoice! According to the Globe and Mail, American Apparel is dead. The Globe is probably the last outlet to catch on to this. I think it's probably been clear for a while that the company is going down. The one time I've been in a store in the past year, there were more skinny, bespectacled staff than customers, and the racks were overflowing with unsold product (product I actually kind of liked, very conservative compared to the neon catsuits.) They've had a long list of shitty things happen to them in the last little while. A employee died at their Los Angeles headquarters; they hired undocumented factory workers despite the fact that their entire brand is based on a claim to ethical hiring practices; a leaked document showed that workers were hired and fired based on sexiness, and that no one was allowed to sue for sexual harassment. Gawker actually did a really great investigative series on the company, to the point that a non-disclosure agreement was written into employee's contracts. Now their stock has gone down 90 percent, and they're closing stores. Hurrah! The reign of faux-underground teen porn and wide-rimmed glasses is over. It was nice to have comfortable, logo-less clothing for a while though. Hopefully that will stick around.

So, what's next?

Xiao Dao

My post yesterday got me thinking about a few people I know, which got me thinking about Xiao Dao. This story's in three parts. 1) How Xiao Dao lost his leg to the Communist regime, 2) how I locked Xiao Dao in the attic with a TV full of porn, and 3) how the Chinese rep for Jimmy Walker unloaded me on Xiao Dao's doorstep.

1) In 1985, Xiao Dao lived in the apartment over us in Beijing, and him and my step-father became good friends. XD was 27 at the time, and I remember him in our ratty green chair, cigarette in hand, his half-leg, a stump that ended right above where his knee had been, twitching restlessly. He folded his pant leg over the stump, then pinned the remaining fabric to the material on the back of his thigh. XD and Gerry liked to drink and light fireworks off the balcony, or drink and talk about politics. XD looked and talked like a half-Chinese Oscar Wilde. He had a caustic wit, a frevent desire to be a capitalist, and an impressive ability to hop up three flights of stairs.

His father, Robert, had been a British intellectual and staunch Communist. He came to China and became the editor of the English Communist daily, married a Chinese pianist and educator, signed on as a member of the Chinese party. Fifteen years of dedicated service went by. Then Mao came to power and the Cultural Revolution began and an employee of his whom he had supposedly wronged ratted him out to the local for being forgein and not a devoted party member. The soldiers came to his office, made a big show of arresting him in front of his reporters, and took him away. He was placed in solitary for three years, a sentence punctuated by frequent torture sessions.

The rest of his family, his wife and two sons, were also arrested, and taken to a hotel room. The windows were covered with the same newspaper their father had edited, layers of it, so that the print barely glowed in the daylight. When it became clear they were going to be there for a while, XD's mother drew a keyboard of the sheets and taught them piano, humming the notes as they played. She delved into the deep recesses of her considerable memory and taught them everything she knew from her years in education. She kept them on a strict schedule - up at 5AM, breakfast at 6, kinesthetics at 6:30 - to keep them sane. This was harder for the older brother, Xiao Bao. We were told he left something in that room after they were finally released three years later, that his personality fundamentally changed. I remember him as being quiet, serious, not a frequent smiler, the opposite of XD.

In the last few months of their confinement, XD began to get very sick, sweating into the sheets, a throbbing pain in his leg. He couldn't find the energy to move, let alone play the sheet-piano or do kinesthetics. The first thing they did after being released was take him to the hospital, where doctors found that the cancer had spread up his leg. They immediately took him into surgery and removed it right above his knee.

I used to practice piano in their apartment, XD's mother gently keeping time with her long finger. She gave me cookies and smiled through my clumsy starts and stops. I remember down the hall from the piano there was a room that smelt like cleaning products and bitter herbs where a pale, sunken man lay in bed all day. Sometimes he would shuffle past in a brown robe, but for the most part, he was always in bed, staring at the wall. One day, there was a knock at the door, and a man asked for Robert. His wife went to fetch him, and as she helped him approach the door the man told him that he was very sorry, that he felt such a deep sense of regret for what he had done he couldn't sleep. He was a small man, but a humble man now and needed Robert's forgiveness. Robert collapsed, and was taken to bed, and died a short time after. At least this is how I remember it being told - the man came to the door, and Robert died soon after.

That's kind of a sad ending. But XD is literally one of the coolest people I've ever met. So totally funny and smart. At least there's that - at least he survived.

Women of East Germany

This is facinating - a study has found that women raised in East Germany are, well, better. They diet less, make only 6 percent less than men, compared to the West's 26 per cent. They have kids earlier and work full time and have higher-positioned jobs. They have less issues about childcare and balancing work/parenting. Younger childrearing and daycare aren't necessarily positive things in themselves, but the lack of neurosis surrounding them might be. You could argue that sending a kid to daycare at 3 months is too soon, that he needs his mom around him constantly for a little longer. But if the mom, when she does bring him home, feels no guilt, is positive and happy and fulfilled in the time she has with him, that's probably a good thing.

But it makes me think about the positives of growing up in a Communist sustem, which are never, ever talked about. We value freedom above all else, so any system that restricts it is EVIL. But the few people I've met who have grown up under communist rule; my bitchy but brilliant translator in Kazakhstan, Sacha; Xiao Bei, a former Red Guard; the poets we met in Cuba who ran the Writer's Union there; my step-father's good freind who had to build his own computer from the scraps we sent him, piece by piece in the mail. They were so self-sufficiant, such hard-workers, that talking to them made the weaknesses that come from having grown up in the West flare up like a rash.

Sacha had a mind like a steel trap and worked with a focus and energy that blew me away. She wasn't nice, which was startling because, where I'm from, niceness, especially in women, is very important. I mean, most ANTM winners climb to the top based on their "likeability." Presidents are elected based on "likeability." It's a personal softness that indicates the common touch, a relateability. You haven't gotten too big for your britches if you're still likeable.

But Sacha grew up not having the luxury of worrying about things like that. Maybe a little hardship produces personal strength, and we've constructed our culture so much around likeability, commonality, individual convenience and comfort; TV watched alone in our living rooms, ect ect, that we've lost a bit of that strength. I know very strong people from North America, of course. But culturally, comfort has taken a big lead in priorities. Comfort and freedom. Maybe that bubble has burst now, though. We're paying the price for easy luxury.