Language

It was Maddie's turn this weekend.

Like her brother, she was more quiet on this trip than she typically is when in Riley's company. Part of that can be chalked up to not feeling well—she's had a cold to varying degrees since starting school in early September, and this weekend things hit a particularly low point—but some of it also seems to be a phenomenon of not being so chatty when there's no one to compete with. Or maybe when I'm listening to half as much talking it just seems quiet. Hmmm.

We had a really nice, relaxing time. We started with some shopping on the way out of town, stocking up on spices at Penzey's (Maddie is very olfactory and loved sniffing all the sample jars) and then picking up some fun bath stuff at Lush (I'm addicted to the Grass shower gel and we got Maddie a super fun bath bomb. We arrived at the beach to dismal weather, but chose to hit the pool, try out the bath bomb, eat some dinner, watch a movie, and snuggle up in bed together for an early night.

Maddie fell asleep almost immediately. It had been a long day, she was not feeling well, and we stayed up "late" for the movie. As she fell asleep and then throughout the night, her sleeping habits called to my mind the 5 Love Languages. OK, I know: SO HOKEY! I had never heard of the 5 Love Languages until, oh, over a year ago when a guy I went out with a few times mentioned them and the idea kind of stuck with me. I've still not read any of the books, but I tend to like these overly simplistic ways of categorizing emotions, actions, and feelings; I find these broad ways of categorizing behavior useful when trying to identify what's important to me and for gaining perspective on actions of others that seem otherwise without any identifiable motivation.

So the love languages, for those not familiar, are: physical touch, quality time, acts of service, words of affirmation, and receiving gifts. I put them in the order for which they resonate for me. The first two are pretty much tied as far as I'm concerned, with the second two being also tied and totally meh, and the last one (gifts) a distant, distant last. But that's neither here nor there. What I started to wonder about, as I was all snuggled in with Maddie, was how early a preference for one language over another might start to manifest. It's clear to me that for Maddie, as for myself, physical touch is very important. Even in sound sleep, that child could seek me out and needed contact with me even if just with a finger. I kept waking up to find a hand on my shoulder, a foot on my leg, her whole body pressed against mine. If I would move away (HOT!!!), she'd fling out an arm, searching for me, or scootch closer, closer, closer, until she made contact.

Riley's pretty sunggly, to be sure, but not at this base even-while-sleeping level. In fact, I'm not sure what I'd say his primary love language is at this point. Maybe quality time? I think all kids love some quality time; that's certainly big for Maddie, too. And receiving gifts! What child does not love to receive a gift!

I'm sure the Love Langauges people have something to say about when and how these preferences develop and how they change, or don't, over time. I haven't bothered to look into that. But it was nice, for two of us who feel emotionally fulfilled by that physical closeness, to snuggle up together and listen to the waves. As another example of that, we sat right up next to each other at dinner, on a bench on the same side of the table rather than across from each other as the menus had been set out.

The Love Languages people say that we are often drawn to partners who do not share the same linguistic priorities. I have seen friend couples for whom this is true, and it can be quite stressful. John and I were totally on the same page about this. We always held hands, and he was especially good at doing things for me that he knew I didn't enjoy doing for myself (acts of service). We were slightly out of phase on quality time (he needed more alone time than I did, which I sometimes took too personally), but we never gave each other gifts and that was fine with both of us. Whew. This all strikes me as a morning person/night person kind of thing: it's super helpful when both people in a couple are on the same page, and when not, it's way more stressful than it seems it should be. Insurmountable? Probably not, but nice to have an awareness.

And so I had a special appreciation of my time with my snuggly girl last night. I reminded myself of how important that touch was to her as she did that typical small child thing of turning herself completely around more than once in the night and connecting to me physically by kicking me in the face. It comes from a place of love, right? It comes from a place of love.

One

Last weekend, I took Riley to the beach. Just Riley.

I think perhaps I had mentioned that I was planning to do this, to take just one child at a time on an overnight trip. This is the first time I've done this. I've long wanted—and still want—to regularly spend one-on-one time with each of the twins, and as they have gotten older, I've started to grab hours here and there during playdates and such. But this was the longest stretch of Mama-Riley time I've ever had, and the longest stretch of hours the two of them have ever spent apart.

It all went swimmingly. Maddie stayed with my mom and stepdad, and by all reports, she was fine and thrived on the attention she got. The same is true of Riley. Both M&R had been a little nervous about the idea, and both felt like the one who was with me was getting the better end of the deal. Riley was more nervous than his sister about it all, and she generously offered for him to be the first one to go to the beach when we initially discussed the idea. I think, in the end, she now sees that she hardly drew the short straw (although she's very excited about her overnight with me this coming Saturday).

A few things about the trip surprised me:

1. Riley was so quiet! He is normally a really loud, talkative kid, but on this trip he was fairly reserved and quiet. Maybe he actually has a deep appreciation of silence but never gets a chance to experience it since he's always competing with a sibling for a turn to talk and have my attention? Dunno. It sure caught me off guard, though.

2. I am a much more relaxed parent when I'm only caring for one child.

3. That said, the things that Riley does that annoy me are still annoying even when there's not another child around.

In other, unrelated, news, I'm still going on dates with the same guy and it's still slowly and steadily great. I still love my house. My job is still chipping away at me, but I'm not completely and totally overwhelmed as I was for a couple of months there. I'm getting an iPhone 4S! Woo! Now that's news.

What's really news, actually, is that I've become a person for whom it is in fact big news to be getting an iPhone 4S. Big news is no longer that my spouse is going on hospice or that I haven't slept in weeks because my babies wake up every 45 minutes. Big news is no longer a cross-country move or a job change months after my spouse died or a six-figure loss on selling a condo.

No, no, no. Big news is getting a smartphone, going out with someone kind and smart and thoughtful, planning our au pair's birthday party, making the decision to let Maddie and Riley watch Star Wars. There is a deep contentment in big news being the stuff of everyday life. I was out to lunch with a colleague yesterday, and in the course of our conversation, it dawned on me that I've never stayed in one place or done much of anything longer than a couple of years for my entire adult life. Sure, I lived in Boston for 10 years, but in 5 different apartments. I did have one job for seven years. Eight? Something like that. But that's the longest I've stuck with anything: a job, a home, a partner. John and I were together almost exactly four years from our first date to his death, my longest relationship by quite a bit, but in sheer time a blip on the radar. Even Maddie and Riley have only been a part of my life for five years (six if you count the pregnancy).

I've been an emotional late bloomer my whole life. I'll be 40 in January. It's just now, after a whole hell of a lot of change and lightning-quick living, that I feel thrilled by the idea of being here, where I am, for the long haul. I know that change will come, and I don't wish to stagnate. But I wish to be rooted and grounded, and I wish to know the contentment that can come from being still.

Upswing

After my latest series of posts in which Everyone Was Out of Sorts, I'm pleased to report that we're all on the upswing.

Maddie is settling into school. It's clearly still tiring for her, both physically and mentally, but she seems more like herself, more settled. She gives positive reports about her days and hasn't asked to bring her lovey to school. She did completely lose her mind on Friday night, falling apart about something tiny and absurd, and she is still seeking control over any and everything in her sphere. But I can see the shift happening, and I'm glad for her (and, selfishly, for me).

My work is evening out. As many kind commenters picked up on and offered suggestions for, the issues at work run deeper than just things being busy right now. Much of the deeper issues are not appropriate blog fodder, but I'm working on them now that I have time to think about something beyond staunching the flow so that no one bleeds out. I think my job is fundamentally good for me, but it's the most difficult job I've ever had and I can find it hard to put the effort into it that it needs. Also, I've learned from this job that management does not come naturally to me, nor does leadership. I'm a slow learner about a lot of things, and those areas seem to be no exception. The growing pains are difficult, and I'm far from hitting my stride, but I want to give it more time. I love many things about my job, and I'm an optimist, an optimist who finally has a few minutes to catch her breath during the work day.

I don't know at what point you say that you're dating someone, but over the past couple of months I have gone out on a number of dates with someone and we plan to keep going out on dates, so maybe we're dating? I don't know. We are certainly enjoying getting to know each other. Past experience would indicate that blogging about dates is often a death knell, so I hesitate to say much, but I'll say this: he is a smart, thoughtful, interesting, and kind person. Being around him makes me feel good about myself and about my life, and it makes me happy. So I'm enjoying that, although we both have busy, complicated lives and so we don't see each other all that much. But when we can, it's nice, and unhurried, and just positive.

In other positive (if totally random) news: Spotify is genius; I've been running more often, faster, and with more enjoyment; I continue to love, love, love my house; I'm not ready for the transition to fall and winter; I'm hoping the recent, more regular blogging settles back into a trend. I don't know that I'll ever have as much need or desire to write as I did during my more intense periods of grief, but I miss the regular practice of writing. May it be so.

And now: gratuitous kid pics! M&R got haircuts over the weekend. Here they are, in all of their five-year-old glory. Riley looks kind of surly, but the notoriously hard-to-photograph Maddie is looking quite sweet and lovely, if I do say so myself.