Skip to main content

Kimmy

 It's been two weeks of nonstop turmoil and major decisions on a national scale and within our own home. I'm still mentally adjusting to the new no-contact policy we'll have towards birth family. So much to say--none of which  have the energy to recapture here. 

Instead, I have a completely rude observation to make that will only be detrimental to my future parenting and which I should excise from my thoughts immediately. 

You know that annoying sitcom TV character sidekick whose only function is to cheer on the lead character? You know how in tween shows (Full House, Saved By the Bell--from back in my era) that person was completely annoying? They wore a vapid look and made overly-enthusiastic comments once per minute in a squeaky voice? Think Kimmy or Screech. 

That's Jane. 

Imagine you're putting out a snack which you do every single day and it's the same old snack they've had, literally, hundreds of times before, e.g. grapes, apple slices, pretzels. Imagine the whole house is quiet and kind of sleepy because it's winter and everyone is sort of in hibernation mode. Now imagine this babytalking, squeaky voiced, weirdly enthusiastic girl with a big vapid grin says, "Oh boy, gwapes!" as you set the plates down. 

Imagine she has done that exact same thing for every single snack for two years. No variation. No human response. Always the big vapid grin and the squeaky baby-talking exclamation.  

You'd kind of want to slap her, wouldn't you? I don't. Instead I grit my teeth and walk in the other room and brainstorm ways to tell someone to be less excited, less interested, less talkative, just....please be grumpy! Please be rude! Please be angry! Please be tired! Please have a tummy ache! Please just be absolutely anything other than the vapid robot you always are. 

If you think I'm being extreme just imagine living with Kimmy, perpetually being the most Kimmy-ish, all the time. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Flash Fiction - Guilt Free

And this one I wrote for the fun of it. It was delicious to wallow in such a world of self-indulgence I'll never know. This is flash fiction (less than 1,000 words). Guilt Free It was fudge sauce, thick and cold from the back of the fridge, dipped in gourmet raspberry jam—the kind from France with the understated label—straight onto a spoon and then suckled in my mouth, a frosty mug of milk tremoring faintly in my left hand, to be gulped in indelicate swaths allowing a dribble or two down my front, the first time I hit her. Not really hit. Shoved. A forceful push. A push that began with contact. The contact of my hand wedging so neatly between her small sharp shoulder blades, wedging in so that I almost could not retract myself from the catapulting force launching her into the tub. Not a hit—there was no smacking, cracking, sharp stinging rebound. No bruise. She’d laughed. She’d thought it was a game. Like when I clapped my hands together as she went up the stairs, cla...

Teaching "ouch"

I taught the girls to say ouch. When they first came to me their hair was a mess. Snarls, mismatched lengths where sections had been hacked off, thin and coarse hair that tangled in every hair clip I tried, etc. Due to a healthy diet and daily vitamins, as well as good hair products and regular brushing, their hair is now sleek and glossy. Jane has a cute haircut. Kate's hair is growing longer every day and curling into ringlets that bounce. I was so afraid of hurting them when they first came! I have naturally curly hair and my mother's is stick straight. She never understood how much it hurt when she pulled the brush straight through. I haven't let her touch my head since I could do my first clumsy pony tail. (At first, I held their hair so loosely while trying to do it that every single pony tail fell out minutes after going in. Looking back I feel like those people who don't know how to put a diaper on and it falls off when they lift the baby up!)  But eve...

What Chronic Lying Does to a Relationship

 We got through Christmas. It was fine. Jane held it together better than I thought she would. We went to an AirBnB for four days between Christmas and New Year. That was my gift to the rest of the family instead of presents. I gave Theo a break from everything--he did no meals or childcare. It was good. He got to rest and I took the kids to have fun experiences.  Now we're back to normal. The normal that is now our family. Everyone seems happy; content.  But then, two days ago, there was this tiny interaction between Jane and I that illustrates, for me, how broken our relationship is.  She's been complaining that her room is too hot. First, we closed the heat vent to her room. Then, I gave her several blankets so she has options for how warm she wants her bed to be. She has many types of pajamas and she can choose whatever she wants to wear. Her room is frigid compared to the rest of the house. Still, she complains. I think at this point it's just a thing with her--...