When Nature Calls

I live not ten minutes from a pristine beautiful lake with beautiful sandy beaches, a brand new gorgeous playground, and more walking trails than a person could ever hope to stroll in one day.

I avoid that place like the plague.

It's not that it's not beautiful, or it doesn't hold special memories in my heart. Let's just say many a romantic memory has been made under the full moon dancing upon the black lake, while snuggled in my Boo's arms.

The problem with this lake, this provincial park, is I'm not the only one who knows it exists. Other people enjoy it's long stretches of soft sand and scenic views.

Other people with squalling infants and sand-kicking demon spawn who kick dirt in your face when you are trying to relax and enjoy the sounds of the gulls and the soft lapping of water at the lake's shore.

I admit it, I'm a wee cranky when I'm hot and I've got sand digging into places sand has no business digging into.

Which is why I stay home and enjoy my pool. My pool is my very private (heh) paradise. My own oasis where I'm not worried about getting sand in my whoo-ha or being forced to witness people parade around in swimsuits they have no business wearing.







Seriously. What is with old men and speedos? My retinas have burned into shriveled dry orbs more times than I care to count because of this phenomenon.

So I ignore my children's whines and pleas to be released out into the world and force them to make do with the luxurious chemical filled lake we call our pool.

I keep telling them it doesn't matter if all their friends get to go to the lake. They are lucky, no, blessed to be able to have a pool of their very own to swim in and not have to deal with leeches and pre-pubescent teens running around wearing itty-bitty scraps of material making arses of themselves.

I keep telling them that back in my day, I was lucky to be able to run through a rusty sprinkler when it was hot.

They don't believe me when I tell them that my family's pool was our bathtub and it was mighty hard to simply float in it and relax when you had your older brother pounding down the door threatening to drown you because you were screwing around in the only bathroom while he was jumping up and down trying to keep from having his bowels exploding all over the place.

Still, I want my children to be happy. I need them to be happy. Because dammit, they deserve it. They've been through more emotional upheaval in their short lives than most adults will ever face.

That said, I'm still not going to a public beach just to have my cooter rubbed raw and leeches chew on my boobs.

Which means I must occasionally play with my children in our pool instead of just floating around naked in it so that random neighbours can stumble upon my blindingly white body.

It was much easier when they were little and I could just spray them with the hose and they thought that was fabulous. Sigh.

Playing in the pool with them means getting jumped on, splashed at and tugged on all the while trying to pretend I'm not old and unfit, gasping and panting just trying to keep up with their seemingly boundless energy.

The upside to playing in the pool with them means that if I accidentally shove their heads under water I can pass it off as playing with them and not have them realize I'm just looking for a moment of peace and serenity.

Or a little passive-aggressive payback. Heh.

Of course, in the process of playing with them I swallowed more damn pool water than an elephant can shoot out it's trunk. Because you know, what's more fun than pushing your mom's head under water and watch her choke and gasp and snort water out her nose?

Finally, two hours later, I'd had my fill of not only bonding with Fric and Frac, but water in general. There wasn't a mommy trophy large enough or shiny enough to keep me in that pool for another minute.

Pulling myself up and out of the pool, the kids suddenly stopped splashing at one another and looked up.

"Where you going mom?" Fric whined.

I did what any graceful mother under fire would do. I lied.

"I have to go to the washroom." (Fingers crossed behind my back.)

"Aw. You're coming back in though, right?"

Yea. Sure. Of course, I mumbled.

Frac saw right through my weak response. (Damn it. Not to self: Learn to lie better.)

"Mom, you don't have to go in the house to go to the bathroom. Just do what I do," he helpfully yelled out.

"I'm not peeing in the bush, kiddo. Or off the deck. Or on the lawn. Unlike you, I have class." Said as I was digging out my swimsuit from my ass crack.

"No mom. Just pee in the pool, like we do. It's okay. Dad puts chlorine in it."

I mentioned earlier how much of that pool water I swallowed earlier on, right? Um, yah.

At least the mystery of why our pool is always so uncharacteristically um, warm, has been solved.

From now on, I'm sticking to hurling water balloons at their heads when I feel the need to bond.





He gives a whole new meaning to 'A little Pisser.'

MudSlide

"MOM!"

"MOOOM!"

"MMMMOOOOOOOMMMM!!!"

I'd like to say I couldn't hear my darling son yelling his head off at the back door, but that would be lying. That boy can generate as much volume as a jet engine and deaf as I am, his voice can still penetrate the fog enshrouding my head.

I was just ignoring him while shopping online. From the tone of his voice, he wanted something and I had just made myself comfortable on the couch with my laptop perched on a pillow and a popsicle in my hand. The last thing I wanted to do at that moment was get off my arse and well, parent.

"MMMMOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM!" he bellowed.

Realizing my son is like the Energizer bunny and would just keep on yelling at me until I answered, I sighed and called out, "WHAT?"

(It's much easier to shout back then actually get up to see what he wanted. It's classier too.)

Maybe I would have gotten up to see what he wanted if I hadn't spent the majority of the day on my hands and knees scrubbing floors and walls that my darling children can't seem to keep clean. Maybe I would have gotten up if I hadn't spent the day slaving away doing their laundry while they frolicked outside in the pool as I sweated inside and sorted socks. Maybe I would have gotten up if I hadn't just made supper, only to have them whine about having to eat brussel sprouts.

Maybe. Probably not though, knowing me.

From my comfy spot on the couch, I could hear Frac yell "SDLKJLFJAJEONGLKJFDLKJ!!!! HOSE! JJKHOIUEMFLNKHRWKJ!!! FIND!!! LKJGDSORKGLSKJDRW!!!"

Annoyed that I couldn't make out what he was so loudly barking at me, (and mildly annoyed that I couldn't just have one freaking minute of peace,) I pretended I was on a deserted island and ignored my child licked my popsicle.

I didn't feel bad about it either. I figured if he was bleeding or broken, he'd have already showed me his war wounds. What ever he wanted couldn't have been too important.

"MMMOOOOMMM!" He yelled again.

Why is it when you are scrubbing out toilets your kids never seem to need you but the moment you open your laptop or answer the phone, they have this sudden urgent need for your attention?

And why is it after more than a decade of parenting, I am still befuddled and annoyed by this wonderment?

Sigh.

"MOOOM!"

"Oh for pete's sake, Frac. If you want to talk with me, walk to the living room. Stop yelling across the house. The neighbours are going to think you were raised by a redneck." Heh.

Seconds later, my eldest son walked into the living room covered in slime, dripping wet and tracking a pile of mud and filth across my freshly scrubbed floors.

"WHAT THE H-E-double hockey sticks!!!".

"That's what I was trying to tell you, Mom. I fell into the slough and I stepped in goose poop. Where did you put the hose? I thought I would rinse off before coming in the house."

DOH!

As I chased him back outside and mentally cursed to myself about having a piano tied to my ass, I grabbed the mop and started rewashing my floors. Again.

This time, I thought to myself, when I finally get a chance to sit back down, I'm skipping the popsicle and diving straight into my mommy juice.

After all, I need to toast my *stellar* parenting skills. I'm not thinking anyone else will do it for me.

The Smasher's Daughter

With the onslaught of the summer heat, the kids have been pestering me to take them to the local ice cream shack to buy them a treat. I have avoided the ice cream shack like the plague ever since I discovered it's existence.

The kids, however, clamor to be taken there, as it is the local hot spot for kids their age to gather and gossip. Boo spent many a dollar wooing his teenaged girl friends on the weathered benches out front and can't understand why I'm bucking so hard to avoid the place.

But for me, ice cream is meant to be eaten in the sanctity of one's home, straight out of the carton and preferably with out embarrassing one's self.

I had a mortifying experience when I was younger, involving ice cream and boys.

And it's all my dad's fault.

"Why, did he trip you or something?" Boo asked.

"No. Something much worse," I sighed and then proceeded to tell him the story of the Smasher's Daughter.

When I was sixteen, I hopped into my dad's truck as he was going to the gas station to fuel up and buy a pack of smokes. It was a sticky summer evening and I was hoping to twist my daddy's arm into buying me a cool treat.

I mean, how could he resist me if I batted my teal green eyelashes at him and whined non-stop about being hot, all the way to the gas station?

When we got to the gas station I was horrified to find a gaggle of boys I went to school with, loitering outside the front door of the store. Boys whom I thought were cute. Boys whom I was hoping to one day woo and entice with my wit and charm and shiny pink lipstick. Boys who took my breath away by simply existing.

I panicked. I was with my father, who was dirty and wearing ugly work boots, sitting in his ratty old truck and I hadn't taken the time to groom myself for any chance meetings with boys. Could I get any uncooler?

Suddenly, I didn't want a cool treat any more; in fact I no longer wanted anything more than the powers of invisibility or for my father discover he forgot his wallet at home and for him to immediately turn the vehicle around and save me from having to walk into the store along side my father.

Dad, however, after listening to me whine and needle him about an ice cream treat for the better part of ten minutes, was not going to let a few boys and my red cheeks interfere with my plans for mint chocolate chip goodness.

He ordered me into the store and with my head hung down to my knees I stared at my toes and ignored the snickerings of the cute boys around me. I felt like I had died and landed straight into teen aged hell. My father of course, was enjoying my discomfort immensely.

Sadistic bugger.

After getting our ice cream cones he yanked on my arm and tugged me out of the store and straight into the middle of the group of boys I was so desperate to avoid. If only I had known I would be seen in public with my dad, I thought, I would have put on some makeup and brushed my hair.

Dad, noticing my red face, did the unthinkable. He stopped dead in the middle of the group and took a big lick of his ice cream cone. He winked at me and started making "Yum, Yum," sounds as loud as he could. The boys watched the show my dad was putting on with great amusement.

He took another big lick and then grinned at me and grabbed my ice cream cone. He smiled at me and then he smooshed both ice cream cones into the brick wall of the gas station. I stood and watched in horror.

As the boys snickered.

Dad, satisfied the ice cream wasn't going to fall off the cones and onto the pavement by our feet, looked at me, looked at the boys and took a great big exaggerated lick while practically yelling, "Yummy!" He handed back my ice cream cone and smiled.

"Go on, take a lick. It won't fall off now," he grinned.

I looked at him, horrified by how he had just demonstrated his redneck ways in front of a group of cute city boys, and tentatively touched the tip of my tongue to the smushed scoops of ice cream now beginning to drip down the side of the cone.

"See, it's YUMMY!" he snorted and urged me to take a bigger lick.

Meanwhile, the boys all silently watched, grinning and feeding off my humiliation.

I took a big lick this time, anything to get my dad to move his feet which seemed permanently welded to the concrete at this point and get back into the damn vehicle. "Yum," I murmured as I wished for the ground to swallow me whole.

Dad, satisfied he had accomplished his mission to mortify his oldest daughter and turn her into a social pariah for the rest of her high school years, laughed and started his way to the truck.

Just as I was about to hop in and hide under the dash, my dad called my name out. All the boys turned with great interest to see what other horrors this father had in mind for his daughter, their school mate.

"You remember how I smashed the ice cream into the wall today. Next time it will be a boy's head if he ever asks you to lick anything of his," he growled at the boys.

Suddenly the snickering stopped and the boys all went kinda green.

None of them ever asked me out. Thanks Dad.

"And that's why I don't want to take the kids to go get ice cream. I was known as the Smasher's Daughter for three years! I wasn't COOL! If it wasn't for you, I'd have never had a boyfriend in high school and I would probably be single and living with a bunch of cats and a pile of used vibrators!" I told Boo.

Boo was busting a gut laughing, picturing my father threatening those boys and embarrassing me all at the same time.

"That's so awful! I can totally picture your dad doing that," he giggled. "No wonder you were such a geek back then," he laughed.

"Bite me."

"I have a better idea," he grinned and stood up.

"Hey Fric, how 'bout a father-daughter outing and we grab some ice cream?"

Looks like I'll soon have company as I eat my ice cream at home. I better buy a bigger carton of ice cream.