ok, if anyone out there sorta kinda wants to see what BC looks like, check out this page: Syrentha.org.

there? now first, in the group shot at top, she is in the stroller, showing her best come hither look.

but wait… there's more.

she has her own picture just a little down the page. just look for the l'il blonde child who looks like she is either a) fluffing up her hair or b) nearly asphyxiating herself with her Tinkerbell canteen 🙂

my best bud's cat, claude, had to be euthanized this morning. he was nearly 19. after battling a kidney disease for two weeks, it was time. in her words, murph said :”he was vocal and opinionated to the very last, protesting when the vet had trouble finding a vein for the pre-euthanasia sedative. at almost 19 years old, he had a long, happy, and very well-fed life.”

claude was no ordinary cat. he was a thousand pound cat. ok, ok, so i exaggerate a little. but claude never met food he didn't like. we would taunt claudie — we'd say “claude – food!” and claude would perk up, prick up his ears, and look expectantly for some tasty morsel. claude was a big boy.

and friendly, too. i remember years ago, crashing at murph's apartment in NC before our big road trip to Athens, GA (where we were going to try to find REM. if that wasn't a goof.) i slept on the floor. a humungous claude stood over me and gave his characteristic call in the morning: “Wowwwwww, wowwwwwww!” yep. i dunno who you are, bitch, but it is time to feed ME. he followed me into the bathroom, and, i daresay he would have followed me into the shower. unlike murph's other cats, he was a very friendly guy.

when BC was very small, i took her to meet claude. she LOVED him. he sat patiently for a time, letting her gaze on his massive beauty. then, he was done. BC's first lesson in the world of cats: don't ever think they are there for you. you are there for them.

i have a wonderful picture of claude sitting near a pumpkin. when i was a producer at AOL many, many years ago, i used to use this picture as filler on pages i built. it was too funny. if claude wasn't grey and furry, you might mistake him for the pumpkin 😉

but my favorite still is claude with santa. i shall have to find that one and post it. yet another picture taken (with proceeds going to the local ASPCA of course, just like the pumpkin pic) showing claude's personality. there he is, large and in charge, sitting on some teen-aged looking santa. he takes up the entire lap, and then some. i help my husband celebrate xmas every year, and every year, i try to bring out this photo. it is just that funny.

i will miss claudie. i don't know how i will explain to BC that claudie is no longer here. but i sure loved that cat. in the back of my mind, i always figured that if g-d forbid something ever happened to murph, i would take claudie in. nevermind my colossal allergies. i would manage. he was worth it.

i hope someone has a big-ass bag of kitty treats for him, wherever he is.

one of my many guilty pleasures is the music from the play/movie “G-dspell.” and yes, i am still a Red Sea Pedestrian, but i grew to love this as a little girl listening to it over my friend Jen-Jen's house.

have you stopped laughing yet?

but tonight, after watching the movie, i am completely freaked out. its bad enough that the extremely gorgeous man playing John/Judas is now dead of a brain tumor. and that a cast member as well as the guy who wrote the play are both dead of AIDS. but the film, which is shot entirely in NYC in 1973, has some freaky moments where the Twin Towers are in the shot. the cast sings and dances upon what i am guessing is Tower One. then, there is a moment where the actor playing Jesus is spouting some moving theological words with the Towers over his shoulder. stuff about people all being people of G-d and that sort of thing. we are all one. you know what i mean.

i cried.

what's your battle cry? |
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tomorrow, BC and i are walking in the Race for the Cure as part of the Syrentha Savio Endowment team. it is only a 3 mile trot (with me pushing a stroller while BC probably squirms and won't be able to decide whether she wants to be in the stroller or out) but it means a great deal to me.

syrentha was my friend. syrentha was a joyous, wonderful woman. she loved to travel, loved her family, loved her life. there were pictures of her beloved nephew in her cube, and she just adored so many people. and so many adored her right back. one night, i remember she babysat BC so that we could go out. (we seldom went out until BC turned 2.5.) BC talked and talked about “samantha” for days afterward and how much fun she had with her.

i remember when syrentha first told me about her breast cancer. i had heard from a little birdie, and then, when i noticed that she was wearing a lot of hats/scarves on her head, it was pretty apparent that some heavy-duty treatment had commenced. i told her about my mom. my mom has lost both breasts to breast cancer. but 22 and 19 years later (respectively), i am grateful that my mom is still a beloved pain in my patoot. i wanted syrentha to hear positive stories of women who LIVED. she had already lost her mother, and i believe an aunt, to cancer. this chick probably could do with some happy stories, i figured.

but no one could ever take away the sheer delight of syrentha in her life. i think she always believed that she might fight this one out and win. i remember her telling me about the permanent tube she had put in so that they could have an easier time putting in her medication. she seemed so calm, so at ease with it all. and when she was gravely ill, she pooh-poohed everything and vamoosed off to italy with her beloved husband for a last, magical getaway. i never did get to see the pictures, but she described the adventure as a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

a few months later, in january, she died. she was 32.

her husband set up her endowment to raise funds for people who cannot afford chemo or other cancer treatments. we are raising money for this and for all breast cancer victims — and survivors.

i miss syrentha's sense of humor, her grace, and her perspective. i'm lucky i got to know her.

i have been a poor correspondent this week. so much to do.

on tuesday, we had our parent-teacher conference at BC's school. before the conference, i walked around chinatown. got some coffee, went into the funky chinese herb store (where a lady was pounding up some funky mixtures of G-d-knows-what), played “guess what's in THAT can,” and got followed on the street by a creepy guy who stopped when i stopped and walked when i walked. anyway, back to escuela. the teacher adores BC, says she listens well and keeps the other kiddies in line. are we talking about the same kid? BC is petite – she is barely on the weight chart for her age – so i guess she is truly living up to a nickname i gave her as a baby: “miss small but feisty.” anyway, it is a pleasure to hear that your kid rocks at school.

yesterday, BC was home with me. we had to return something at the LLBean store. BC LOVES LL Bean because she can crawl into set-up tents and play. she wanted to play with the “feathers” (actually fishing gear – lures and such), but i just couldn't handle the thought of a thousand little fishing thingies all over and just me to pick them up.

then… the disney store. some of you know how much i really don't like the Mouse. but a promise is a promise, and so we went. i nearly had a coronary. “i want this, mommy — and this, and this, and this, and…” ad nauseum. she had to touch every blessed thing in the store. and play a game on the computer. and see what was showing on TV. and push the baby in the stroller. and… you get the picture. we had to leave or else miss gymnastics class, but she was so wound, tired and (i think) hungry that i knew we were headed for a breakdown.

and breakdown we had. we got home, and i started to make lunch. “i don't WANT that, i want THAT!” whine whine whine whine whine. i finally lost it. i screamed at her. she dissolved into tears, and i realized that screaming is not a helpful option. i felt awful for screaming, but she was just making me insane. but, as always, i have to remember that i am the grownup. i need to take a breath and just realize that this little person is just a mixed bag of emotions, needs, and everything else.

::mantra: i am the grownup, i am the grownup, i am the grownup::

we ended up sitting on the kitchen floor, having a chat about being angry and tired and cranky. we ended up as friends again. well, not friends, but mom and daughter.

i will not be taking her to the Disney Store alone for a long, long time, though. you can bet on that.

somehow, memorial day weekend is usually a bad weekend for us. pre BC, we were in a car accident one year, and then usually fought on others. i think three days in a row of family togetherness is a bit much for us…

but this year, it wasn't a bad weekend. on saturday, we drove out to delaplane, waaaay out in cow country, for the annual strawberry festival. BC got a rainbow painted on her arm (which she promptly smeared), won a cupcake in a cupcake “race” (yep, sugar at 10 a.m. yippee.), made a sand painting in a bottle, whined because we wouldn't buy her one of those birdy kite thingies, and petted farm animals. she learned a new word there: slobbered, as in “the cow slobbered all over my hand!” and that doesn't even include the excitement of a cow taking a piss right before your eyes. ah well. her big favorite, though, was a guy named mark jaster who, surprisingly enough, is a jester. yep, complete with lycra pants and a jingly hat, mark endeared himself into BC's heart.

and yes, we had strawberry shortcake and strawberry sundaes.

so saturday wasn't a bad day. although being sick kinda cut short my joy.

on monday, though, we went to a barbeque at uncle wil and aunt marsha's. we always have a great time with them, and BC adores, and i do mean ADORES her uncle johnny askew. i can safely share that i suck at croquet. BC adores the million cats who live at w&m's; but i think the star of her day was ungle johnny g & aunt janine's dog, paulie. somehow, she forgot the word slobbered in this instance, but no matter. paulie is a wonderful and sweet-tempered doggie. of course, after all this animal exposure: a) my allergies went haywire, and b) BC wants a cat, dog, and basically any other animal you could name. including, i suppose, a duck billed platypus. (she knows about them, too.)

i can forgive her that, though. i can forgive her anything. especially after she spontaneously broke into song. yep. her little cherub face sang “strawberry fields forever” with no prompting from anyone. lord, i love that child.

somehow, chocolate doesn't taste as sweet anymore.

here's why.

Me, trying to get my kid to sit on her chair: “c'mon, sit down on your tushie, BC. it's snack time.”

Julia's mom: “hahah. BC, you don't have a tushie to sit on. it's so tiny.”

BC, insistent: “i have a tushie!”

Julia's mom, laughing: “i'll tell you a secret. julia's daddy doesn't have a tushie, either!”

BC, after thinking for a minute: “then how does he go poop?”

i don't think anyone truly understands sleep deprivation until he or she has a child.

child gets sick. mom and dad don't sleep. child gets well. mom and dad get sick. but someone has to run after child. mom and dad get sleepier. child wakes up at night to go to the bathroom. screams for a parent's help. or. child wakes up fearing alligators/monsters/witches/accountants (hahaha, just seeing if you were paying attention there, now) are in her bedroom/under her bed/in her bed. mom and/or dad awake to inform her first that there are no such things, then change the tune to yes, there are such things, but we will squirt them away with anti-alligator/monster/witch serum (read: water in a squirt bottle), then change the tune to alligators/monsters/witches are afraid of me because i am MOMMY! (or daddy.)

child goes blissfully back to sleep. mom and/or dad lie awake for the next two hours, pondering everything from work to terrorism to should i get the bathroom remodeled.

yep. sleep deprivation. that's what they should do to the prisoners of war. they'd be talking. yeah. y'betcha. y'huh.