Are You There Godmother? It's Me, Dotty.

god·moth·er

Pronunciation: \-ˌmə-thər\

Function: noun

Date: before 12th century

: a woman who sponsors a person at baptism

Godmother means something different to me than the standard Webster’s Dictionary definition, two very different and delicious meanings, to be exact. The first relates to casual eating in my adopted hometown, where a power lunch of ice chips and air kisses reigns supreme. If that nutritious combo doesn’t satisfy the calorie craving and one actually want to eat something tasty without spitting up three hundred dollars for black truffle turds or dangling duck balls, the city of angels has a bounty of scrumptious, cheap eats. Here, food truck burritos are otherworldly, Korean B.B.Q. is beyond compare and the local In-N-Out Burger is a Mecca for the socially deranged yet culinary cunning.

The one food missing from this great wasteland of mail order weather and factory direct facial surgery is the old school, Italian submarine sandwich. Los Angeles is a town where the sub sandwich is a non-existent meal choice, an apparition to any and all who need something more than that doughy paint roller that Subway tries to pawn off as a healthy and authentic snack. No thank you Jared, I will pass on the BBQ Bun Slinger Sub Melt that you so genuinely call your saving grace in positive dietary fare. You didn’t go to the prom and now that you have dropped an amount of weight equal to that of an eleven-year old flutist soaking wet, I still do not want to nibble on your foot-long friend.

Of course, if you want a real Italian submarine sandwich, the kind that Vinnie builds and Vito cuts and Carmine wraps and Teresa rings up, than you best get your ass onto a non-stop Jet Blue flight, fly straight into Logan International and saddle up to a Formica table at one of a handful of sub shops in Belmont, Massachusetts. There, behind the high counters and the deli slicers you will find a grouping of sandwich ingredients that The Earl of Sandwich would be proud to put between his grinder buns.

Over the years, when I needed my Italian Stallion fix, I would drive across town to the only decent place I could find in L.A, Bay Cities Deli, a local sandwich institution six blocks from the stinky, needle-sprinkled beaches of Santa Monica. Their best sub sandwich is called the Godmother and, with its vast variety of mystery meat slices, a blanket of Provolone, toothpick thin, shredded Iceberg lettuce and a slathering of hot peppers that most Italians would have sex with, it really does the trick. It cures heartache, a hangover and overall malaise when properly ingested with a side of potato chips and an ice-cold coke in a bottle. Combine that with the smell of car exhaust, salty sea air and angry body odor emanating from the throngs of pudgy, hungry hipsters waiting on line and you have yourself a mother you can really love.

My other definition for godmother has a longer and more complex meaning than simply, a really fucking tasty menu item that reminds me of my high school days when I skillfully and enthusiastically neck wrestled bad boys in plush backseats of late model American cars, cars that any mobster would have been proud to be shot in. And, this meaning of godmother does not match up with the official one as stated above by the God of all dictionary companies. She is not simply, “a woman who sponsors a person at baptism”, not by a long shot.

No, to me, the other meaning of godmother has nothing to do with God or religion or fire or brimstone. A godmother, as I see it, is a person who is chosen by newly exhausted and overwhelmed parents who both look and smell as if they’ve been hit by a recycling truck and left for a five-cent deposit refund in the alley out back. These carcasses need a clean hand and a rested soul and she is the one they grab onto in case they don’t make it through the first forty-eight hours of the new baby shit storm called parenthood.

A godmother is another parent, a parent who is chosen to help emotionally guide and love and care for a child who has just shown up and is ready to dance the Electric Slide twenty-four hours a day until his or her eighteenth birthday. When that day arrives, the godmother knows that she may very well get a knock on the door only to find a seriously angst ridden post teen who feels misunderstood and tortured by the very parents that wiped his or her ass clean, many a midnight, and dried up a torrent of tears when the milk spilled again. She is the crazy, cool chick who is willing to take on the very dreaded and plausible aforementioned scenario with verve, gusto and panache.

Although Dave and I had lost our ability to perform the most basic tasks during Otto’s first week of life, speaking, walking, spelling and being pleasant are just a few that come to mind, Otto got lucky. We somehow managed to bestow upon him a great godmother in the midst of massive physical malfunctions and a tsunami of poop covered tears. She is a friend, a mentor, a watchful eye and a calm voice in a loud storm when things get windy. She is an infectious, thunderous laugh when life is funny. She is the one who sends the perfect gift on every birthday, never forgets a single Christmas, stock piles clothes and mails them promptly and adorns my child with generosity I could never match. She is a phenomenal, unparalleled mother, a passionate sister, a fiercely loyal daughter and a tireless friend. She forgives easily and forgets nothing. She endlessly nurtures and constantly cradles. She shines a brighter smile and hits a harder forehand, cooks a better meal and sings a softer song. She is the one I want in my child’s corner when the going gets tough and the tough are crushing.

She is a godmother and no, God has nothing to do with it. Not in my blasphemous, tattered, leatherette-covered bible. I am fortunate enough to define a godmother as my dear, lovely, uncommonly beautiful friend, as a sister not related by blood, but by life and love, a woman who watches over my son with the eyes of a perfectly coiffed eagle and the heart of a stunningly dressed lion.

In turn, she has honored me with the same role, that of God-Dotty, a title I have yet to live up to compared with the master class in godmothering she currently teaches every week. But if I take notes and study hard, if I refuse to read the Cliff Notes or do not cheat off of the valedictorian’s final exam, I may one day be half the godmother to her son that she is to mine. And I know, because of her, Otto will be stronger, funnier, smarter and better dressed than any of the other kids on the playground.

Then I think to myself, “Can I possibly have the same influence on her son as she will on mine?”

And the shrill, crackled voice that lives inside my large head replies, “Very doubtful, God-Dotty. She will already have given her son all those things while wearing a much nicer blouse, a blouse that doesn’t have oil stains from the Italian sub sandwich you just had to eat in the car.”

Sick and Twisted

Staying home with a sick, feverish toddler is a master class in unrelenting demands, a tornado of toys, a bucket of barf (if applicable) and strange conversations only Motrin can quell. Yesterday, when all the flu business began and the medicine had kicked in enough to get Otto off the sofa and into his toy pile, we had this little exchange.

Otto: I want another cookie!

Me: You have to wait just one second while I finish the dishes from breakfast.

Otto: Why?

M: Because I can’t do five things at once.

O: Why?

M: Because I never learned any magic tricks.

O: Why?

M: Because I look terrible in a top hat.

O: Why?

M: Because my head is larger than the average woman’s cranium.

O: Why?

M: Because I am a freak.

O: Why?

M: Because our family tree is more like a twisted, curving, walled vine rather than a standard vertical Oak.

O: Why?

M: Because of the lack of commuter trains and options in early twentieth century, rural, Northeastern United States.

O: I love trains, Mommy.

M: They would have too.

Look Ma, No Hands!

Every morning when Dave and Otto leave the house for school or I drop Otto off myself, I try to imagine what it must be like to be so independent and self-assured at such a young age. Otto’s goodbye tears have ceased to fall and his thrill of entering the classroom is daily and delicious. I am constantly amazed at his ability to feel secure and confident in a group of people who are not blood related while still shitting his pants on a regular and pungent basis. I have often wondered where he gets his sense of self and how he could possibly be so well adjusted. And then, I remember he is the product of two parents who ran across the country to attend far away colleges with their shoes untied and their long, curly hair whipping in wind while their parents nudged them out the door and waved goodbye with gusto and no regrets.

Twenty-one years ago this week I climbed onto a plane and headed to London to spend six months drinking lukewarm beer and swapping Vegemite lip balm residue with the local blokes. I had decided to do an exchange program through my university and head across the pond to learn why the entire Royal Family all looked like half melted ice cream cones. While there I also planned on “studying” Shakespeare, studying, of course, being the code word for binge drinking and weekend jaunts to other boozy European destinations where people wore weird sneakers, disconcertingly tight jeans and spoke strange words from even stranger looking mouths.

I was lucky enough to have two cool (unfazed and liberal), very learned (sky high I.Q, multi-lingual and nerdy), well-traveled (one brown and Brazilian and one pale and fluent in French pastry making) and independent (elitist and pretty fucking fabulous) parents who insisted that I get out of Dodge and go find myself somewhere very far away. They pushed me out of my malaise and onto a transatlantic flight using an electronic cattle prod and threats of disfigurement. My mother’s life long dream was, for at least one of her children, to enjoy Europe as much as she did in 1961, before the Vietnam War broke out and Americans were globally despised for their flatulent foreign policy and their loud, football fan voices. On the morning of my departure, with my father distracted by a hunger pang and an overall fear of inexplicable, sudden death, she secretly handed me a wad of American Express Traveler’s checks and a prepaid phone card and told me to write when I got there.

My decision to attend a large, over-tanned, PAC Ten School I had found in a catalogue of colleges that did not require written essays along with the requisite application forms had been impulsive at best. My senior year, I steadfastly ignored the advice given to me by my high school guidance counselor, a real turd, wrapped in cotton poly blend mediocrity.

After perusing my dismal SAT scores and sub-basement class ranking, a cruel and unfair system that was as medieval and painful as fingernail removal for unfashionable religious affiliation, this dimwitted slip-on loafer performed no guiding or counseling whatsoever. His idea of steering me in the right direction was to suggest I apply to a few local trade schools whose curriculums involved mastering heavy machinery and inter-mural waste removal. With a button down shirt a double amputee could fasten, and a pair of pleat front Dockers that screamed, “Kill me now!” he sat back on his cheap plastic, public school desk chair and farted out brilliant queries like, “Where do you see yourself at fifty?” and “You don’t have a Boston accent. What’s that like?”

My parents saved me twice. First, they allowed me to gallivant off to a meat mouth party school (sorry Wildcats, but really…) in order to escape a high school that crushed my soul with white pumps and velour v-necks, never once bemoaning my choices or showing disappointment in comparison to their stellar academic achievements and pursuits. Instead of obsessing and insisting that I follow their sidewalk into the Ivy League life of argyle sweater discussion groups and female facial hair forums, they stood happy and proud that I was simply alive and practicing my oral exams in a study hall filled with under achievers who loved beer bonging and grain alcohol baths instead of on strangers in an IHop restroom.

Then, when my crooked path turned too far south and I began leaving my Tucson apartment in wrestling shoes, spandex tights and shoulder pads on the outside of my shirts, they once again stood strong and shoved me to England without a second thought. With all the mistakes and missteps I had made thus far, they still trusted my judgment and let me find my way thousands of miles cross the Atlantic and out of reach of their protective glare and sarcastic, scrumptious, embraces.

Their tremendous trust and flagrant faith gave me the confidence and the skill to really fuck up and fix it myself. I ran off to Europe in black snakeskin cowboy boots and did my best to see the world with my new crooked, convex lens. I began a love affair with piss warm pints of ale, tried to marry a Cadbury Flake Bar, scribbled putrid poetry in spiral notebooks, draped myself in basic Bohemian black, slept in baggy flea market blazers, twice daily raped a cheese slathered baked potato and cuddled up to a real live, uncircumcised British bar keep who favored primary colored nut huggers to the sensible and stylish boxer shorts of my youth.

After six months of vertical scholarship, rainy contemplation, unadulterated alcohol ingestion and a Euro Rail to euphoria I felt bedraggled but buoyant. I returned home with two pounds in pocket change and a bulging twenty on my ass. Although puffy and pale, I truly felt that my real life had finally begun. I found a summer job, a new school and a calm, confident cosmopolitan perspective of a whole new world of pub food and milky tea. Within a year I met my future husband and we started on a hilarious, every changing road trip of hand-me-down furniture and gourmet food, a trip that continues today with a crazy old cat, a grouchy, brilliant dog and a child that takes my breath away.

Without the support of my parents, two individuals who took long, scary voyages and huge chances in their pursuit of knowledge and love and exotic fashion trends, I would never have had the guts to throw up my hands and run toward the unknown. And every time Otto bounds toward his teacher or falls into the lap of a friend in class or says hello to a stranger at the Target who does not look like the type who owns a van, I think of my parents, as well as David’s, who quietly and lovingly removed the training wheels from our bicycles after we learned how to ride all by ourselves.

You're Baa-aack

I told myself two weeks ago that we would break up. This charade of mutual caring and respect was finally over and out. I was done. I could not handle that kind of commitment anymore. I could not and would not put up with the exhausting crying and the whining and the need for constant attention that you threw in my general direction. I had bigger plans. Instead of focusing on you and your drama I was going to spend my nights starting the new draft, the new baby in the house, the road to Wellville.

But last Tuesday, as I sat alone at the folding table of dreams with my laptop gurgling blue light into my corneas, I spotted the numbers in the corner of my screen and my heart thought of nothing but you. 7:58 p.m. and all alone, I knew I was too weak to say “fuck off” to someone who has been under my skins for so many years, like a terrible case of Scabies that refuses to succumb to antibiotics or skin graphs of any kind.

I got up from my fake desk and shuffled over to the sofa wearing a bathrobe only a Care Bear could pull off in a snow storm, fell onto the sofa and gave in. With my strength diminished and my self esteem hiding in my crinkled, wool socks I pushed the button and it all came rushing back, like a river of vomit at a freshman kegger. The blue graphics, the crazy camera moves, the small, homunculus pulling me in with his faux-hock hair and paunchy button down style. The four kings sitting atop their Aeron Chair thrones ready to toss insults across the room like trendy rocks at a medieval stoning.

After watching every one of your shit covered episodes from day one, season one, and, having attended four of your live tapings and one finale, where I sat close enough to pet Simon’s chest muff with my crooked, tone deaf fingers, I could not turn my back on a Paula Free season of tantrums and triumphs by a group of unfashionable nopefuls dying to become the next Fantasia weave cast off. I pride myself on my loyalty, my stick-to-itiveness and my dedication, even if that means selling myself to the reality television devil that you are, you American Idol, The Final Conflict, you.

Puzzle Me

Now that Otto has dropped his nap I think a lot about what the purpose of the nap is, in general. It is a time to unwind, decompress, contemplate and rest from life’s challenges and demands, screams and shit fits. Taking an hour to lie down and stop the noise while collecting a drool sample on a Bed, Bath and Beyond pillow sham should be a requirement for every person, big and small. But in today’s society of caffeine whores and work-a-crackheads, stopping for any reason is looked upon as murdering time and mutilating possibilities.

With modern technology and the raping of global silence no one can truly escape the sound bites and tidbits that float around the ether and land in your bowl of chicken noodle soup when you are trying to take an hour off from life. This past winter, after a long year and a longer three I felt burned out and beat up. It wasn’t that I was despondent or defeated.

Rather, I just wanted some peace and quiet, no plans on the horizon and no conversations. I was so tired of talking and having my words come out in jumbles and jabs instead of fluent, coherent sentences. Every time I spoke it sounded as if I had a dick in my mouth, a dick I didn’t even recognize.

I tend to give my all when talking to someone and hopefully, listening in kind. And, although I tend to be someone who really focuses on the art of the chitchat, especially the telephone talk, I am also a person who retreats when the life gets too loud and the voices become too high. After Otto was born the phone chats were no longer on the menu at Chez Cohen. He happened to be a baby that did not groove on idol banter while nursing, playing or drooling on my one clean Target shirt, the only one that made me look hip and not homeless. And when he was napping all those months ago, I did not want to take my few hours of solace and pour them into a portable metal face friend with caller I.D. and a redial function. As far as the casual hang and the verbal exchanges mano y mano, those too would soon be relics of the past.

But Otto was just a small piece of a bigger, more complicated puzzle, the kind that a crazy aunt might give you for your birthday with a package that says it contains 1000 pieces and is supposed to make a beautiful, Bavarian landscape. But, the puzzle is sadly missing parts of a majestic Oak, a languid lake and the head of a quarter horse, the centerpiece of what was to be your masterpiece in cardboard patience and artistic expression. When completed, you look down on your shitty card table and realize that Auntie Too Cheap bought this sad selection of scenery at a yard sale and now you have a slice of crappy, Swiss cheese where a delicious Gouda ought to have been.

After throwing away the headless horse and water view jigsaw puzzle with teal and mauve accents you move on to another artistic endeavor that you hope will satisfy your need for quiet reflection while scratching that itch for tearful achievement. Simply put, by last summer, I needed to empty out my pockets and carry only the small chunks of time I had for my family and myself, all the while hoping those nuggets would morph into a pile of quiet family meals, restful nights and writing samples. With that, I secretly hoped for understanding from those phones that no longer rang with my foghorn voice of loudness and longwinded messages of madness.

But when you back out of life for a while and stop yodeling to the mountaintops, then you run the risk of not being heard by your fellow sheepherders. And 2010 has begun with me feeling a bit guilty and confused as to why, when the going gets tough and the sirens are blaring, I often prefer the company of a wool sweater with hooves as opposed to partners in crime.

I am who I am and my wiring is such that I love being alone and not speaking for long periods of time as much as I love steamrolling a conversation and talking to a overwhelmed store clerk, a prickly repair man or a wall if it will listen. All I can do is try harder and do better and hope that the friends that hear only silence sometimes know that they are aloud in my heart, always.

Happy Birthday To Everyone

This upcoming weekend will be a jumble of balloon knots, twisty ties, curly ribbon and cake plates. We have four kids birthday parties to attend and one baby shower. Now, back in the day when I was bitter, lazy and profoundly inconvenienced by something as simple as a gust of wind, this calendar calamity would have torn me a new armpit and left me for sleepy.

But now that we have an un-napping toddler, twelve hours a weekend day to fill and a long list of really cool, really fun nursery school parents who get the joke and write their own, a solid gang of tiny hooligans for Otto to play with and wrestle on and enough diapers to absorb a monsoon of yellow river water, I am thrilled to party hop like Lindsay Lohan with a bus pass. The gifts have been purchased, the map has been printed, the schedule memorized and the excitement barely contained. Sure, Otto is beaming that he will be allowed cupcakes at least four times in the next two days and I am bursting with emotion at the thought of demi-glazed pizza bites, burgers the size of golf balls, pre-cut fruit salad that makes eating pineapple a lazy man’s luxury and as much bottled water as I can pour down my pie hole.

But the real prize for me, the reason to get up tomorrow and race around town in an all black ensemble covered in cake frosting and regurgitated sprinkles is that I don’t have to come home to a dirty kitchen and a pile of dishes a street rat would question. Five parties out means five meals away. Five meals away means five less times I have to use my brain to decide what to prepare to satisfy my tiny gourmand who is too small and too “busy” to climb up on a stool, grab a sponge and wash the mess that was just made so Team Cohen can survive another day without the hungries and the angries.

Yes, Otto might get cranky on our road trip all over Los Angeles proper due to over stimulation and unadulterated happiness. He may even be seriously confused as to why we continue to hand off gift bags of goodies to his friends while he gets nothing more that a kazoo and a dirty Spiderman napkin. Maybe on Sunday night I will be too tired and bloated and unsexy for a hot make out session with my new flat screen boyfriend. These are the prices you pay for a very long, very busy birthday bouncing weekend. But the kitchen will be clean. Did I say that already? The kitchen will be clean.

They Have A Dream

Otto and his classmates (names have been changed to numbers to protect their identities) are learning about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. all this week at school. After memorizing songs and factoids about the history of this great man, Otto's teacher, Leila B., asked all the kids the following question and was given the following answers. I could not resist...

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream, what is your dream?

Boy #1: I drink drinks when I have a dream.

Girl #1: My Mommy cooks some things and stuff. Hey Leila B., I have a different dream all night long.

Boy #2: A trash truck bumped another truck. Speedy raced and Mader raced too.

Boy 3#: My friends, Boy # 4, Boy #5, Otto, Boy #1.

Boy # 4 (Otto’s BFF): Tigger, he take a nap with me and then he falled down. My hair broke and then I kicked foot and then I jumped and then I go on a dinosaur and then I touch his mouth and then I ride on him and then I run around him.

Boy #5: To play with the Cinderella game. Play Operation. Play with Mommy and Daddy and Sophie and Charly and Suzie and the fishies and not the snake cuz it’s scary. The butterfly cuz I’m in the butterfly class.

Boy #6: About playing. Playing with my toys. Sliding and swinging. Playing on the monkey bars. Go on a airplane to see my cousins in New York. Hannah, Jared and Danny and Emma and Grandma Penny.

Boy #7: I want Dr. King to play cars with me.

Otto: Monkeys. I dream of Bundy and then I wake up.

Boy # 8 : To wake up. To go back to sleep. To wake up again. To sleep again.

Girl #2: Go to bed sixty hundred and playing with my friends and having dinner at home.

Girl #3: About Mommy and Daddy go back home and go to sleep and wake up and then the sun came up.

Girl #4: My Mom say she wants to dream with me. Tomorrow she goes to bed with me. Teddy sleep with me. Teddy he wana walk. Ten sisters. A baby one. Two baby ones. Daddy I call him Daddy.

Girl #6: A snake eat food.

Rod Was A Dick

In my last post I actually spelled wrought iron, rod iron. Like the asshole rugby player I dated in college, both were huge mistakes.

A Little To The Left

I have an addiction. Not to anything that comes in a glass bottle or a pill bottle or a soda bottle. And, the obsessive shopping thing is clearly not my bag (pause for deliciously bad pun). I can hardly starve myself as eating is as important to me as sleep, an institution I give generously to and work tirelessly for. My commitment to the sandman is paramount, which is clearly proven by the fact that I have never met a nap I didn’t suffocate with my love. My past mild adoration for poker and casino gambling died in a tragic head on collision with the reasoning that my hard earned money felt so much better in a mid-priced leather wallet than being dragged across a green felt table and into the pants pocket of a bloated dealer wearing a sweat stained tuxedo shirt and lifeless, drooping eyes.

No, my uncontrollable habit happens to involve heavy lifting, lots of dusting and a sense of satisfaction only a pedophile at Disneyland can truly understand. I love to rearrange. When life feels stagnant and Otto’s toys have taken over like the brazen body odor of a large stranger on a broken elevator, I move things around and tell myself that we have just moved into our new dream house. The brown Scandinavian Salvation Army chairs, once bored and north facing are given a new lease on life by being turned at a groovy, hip angle and made to look like nightclub seating before the deluge of vomit has landed. The vintage, aqua dresser, after spending a few morose years staring head on at the poop green sofa, now has a great view of the heating vent and the ascending stairs to somewhere. The green lamp is now in the southwest corner and the swirl painting I found in a trash bin, a yellow and green acrylic number that looks like a an artistic representation of a bad acid trip on Easter Sunday, is nestled into the corner next to the bucket of Otto’s dirty, sand-filled shoes.

But the real masterpiece, the shit on my shingle is the new playroom we created. The other night, while sitting on the sofa, the upholstered Goliath that can only live in one place due to a living room built by 1930’s Cubists, I suddenly saw a solution to my deep, dark recession depression. Our dining room, a space no larger than a Koo Koo Roo take-out container, seemed to be crying out for help. Over taken by a huge farmhouse table that my husband and I insisted on buying to make our place feel like the loft in our convoluted, design mag fantasies, the dining room appeared to be an Al Qaeda hide out decorated by a newly recruited Cost Plus employee hell bent on Muslim home makeovers and martyrdom.

Every time we ate a meal at la tableau le ferme we would have to crawl over one another to the kitchen for a water refill or a full breath of air. Dinner guests were squashed against the wall and crammed next to the over sized highboy, while we encouraged them not to extricate themselves until the meal was finished, for fear of serious injury or death. If anyone needed to use the restroom off the dining room or regain the feeling in the lower extremities, it would have to wait until dessert was served in the living room area and/or enough alcohol was consumed to mask the pain.

So, while gazing into the cave of chaos, I channeled one of my all time, favorite yet annoying clichés, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” With the strength of a linebacker and the determination of a one-legged baton twirler, I pulled the football field- sized table into the living room and made the dining room Otto’s very own toy store, thus solving the infamous toy takeover mystery of 2009. All his playthings were now relegated to his new playroom and we could eat meals without passing out from lack of oxygen. And, instead of the room seeming minuscule and unusable, it now felt spacious and purposeful. Not only that, Dave girded his loins, climbed across all the old junk we have in our over flowing garage and rescued an antique, wrought iron baker’s rack we stashed away another lifetime ago to help corral the chaos.

Armed with rubber gloves and a body condom, I cleaned the rack as if it had been dipped in toxic waste and fecal foliage. This act of ‘cleanliness is next to Godliness’ not only got my duster’s itch scratched but a whole new shelf unit to organize all of the trucks, cars, trains and rubber dinosaurs that have made my life a pile of foot injuries in the fetal position. All the random containers that covered the playroom floor were now neatly lined up on the rack and colored coordinated like Martha Stewart’s guest cottage tampon cupboard. The train table that used to look like a tiny Tokyo, after Mothra crashed a Godzilla family reunion, was now clutter free and proudly sitting in its very own vestibule. Every dump truck had a parking space, every ball had a basket, and every Play had a Doh.

Of course, in its new home, the table of terror allowed us to have guests over for a hot meal without having to ask them to remove their clothing and enter at their own risk. But, it was clearly swallowing up the living room, one cheap accessory at a time, making me feel nervous and exposed every time I sat down to eat. A quick trip to the local antique store, code word for mothball smelling crud pile, garnered a small, 1940’s drop leaf number, small enough to fold down and fit in the corner but large enough to seat six when needed. This new addition gave me yet another rearrange fix I craved while making our living space less Hoarders and more, Extreme Home Makeover: Dead People’s Furniture Edition.

Otto loves his new romper room and has already mastered the art of dumping everything out of the neatly placed bins and putting them back empty, exactly where they belong. I, on the other hand, am writing on the shrink to fit table that goes where we go and does what we need it to do. Meal for two? Table for five? Typing for one? Is that a lamp stand in your pocket or are you happy to see me?

After all the sweating and wiping and pushing and pulling, our crazy old apartment with its cracked walls, listing floors and horrific lack of storage space feels calm and controlled. I got my rocks off without a near tragic overdose and lengthy rehab and everything downstairs now has its place.

Oh, shit crackers! I forgot. There’s another story.

He Dropped The Bomb On Me, Baby!

Over the holiday of lights and leisure, the inevitable happened. I thought it would be at least six more months until it fell like the Berlin Wall. But he chose the eight days of Hanukkah and the twelve days of Christmas to give us the gift that keeps on giving. Otto dropped his nap. Now, for those of you who know not of what I speak, the nap is the most sacred of time during the first few years of a young cub’s life in which the angry lion and bitchy lioness are giving a respite, a mini break, a moment to reflect on the mistakes made and the sleep not received in the room where the magic used to happen.

When your eyes are like two, itchy woolen mittens and your head throbs as no hangover could ever duplicate, you realize that any sliver of time taken to close your eyes and feel weightless again is time well spent. The months creak by and you crave pillows and cotton balls and shoulder pads and padded walls, anything that you can rest your weary skull on. Every noise is anathema, every cry, World War III. A transatlantic flight in coach or a lengthy stay at an internment camp begins to sounds peaceful at this point.

Since the day he was born, I would collapse into my laundry hamper the moment Otto gave in to the nap. Be it three minutes or a blessed two hours, I would take anything I could get, just as a pre-op streetwalker on a slow Sunday night. The exhaustion was epic. The tears were real. I was a wimp and I never tried to pretend otherwise. Narcolepsy must run on both sides of my family. I can sleep twelve hours at a stretch without prescription medication and that does not include a two-hour afternoon siesta. Why I never opened up a tapas kiosk in Madrid is beyond me. You eat and then you sleep and then you go home. Shangri-La.

For the first few days of the winter break from school, Otto fought the nap as if sleep meant a visit from the acne prone Freddie Krueger and his Ginzo hands himself. We read a plethora of favorite stories, gave him gallons of organic milk, massaged his kneecaps with feathers and fiercely cuddled with him until we fell asleep and he lay awake with hubcap-sized eyes staring at up our nostrils. Nothing worked and we were Raggedy Ann and Andy after the spin cycle and a good drubbing.

The third day we woke up early and determined. After Googling “Kids Museums Los Angeles”, we got our learning on, spending every moment on the go for the next ten days. We learned about the Apollo space missions, the internal organ size of an Aphid, ogled a 1976 Ferrari Testarossa from the film The Gumball Rally, sat in a real police helicopter and ate Pho at Vietnamese restaurant we never knew existed right near our apartment.

We stood under a 1965 United 707 jetliner, knowing that in the new world of airport security and paranoia we would never have the opportunity to view the belly button of a plane at such close range. While Otto shrieked at the wingspan and the engine size, all I could do was think about how cool the fabric must have been on the original airplane seats back when a stewardess was a perky waitress and a passenger was given unlimited peanuts, an extra Chivas Regal nip and an upgrade just for being a dick.

All the warnings we received from parents with older kids about the end of the nap stage made it seem as though a jail sentence was right around the corner. The thought hung over us like an acid rain cloud on a sunny day. How would we get through the afternoons with not so much as an hour break? How could we possible entertain our monkey friend for twelve hours on weekends and six hours on a school day? All these questions and more swam around my brain until they drowned. I would simply do what I did during my blissfully easy pregnancy and ignore the bad thoughts and embrace only the good.

But on that third day of vacation, we realized something that no one had told us. When your child no longer naps, the day is your oyster. You can go anywhere you want as a family, do anything you like as a gang of hooligans and not be a slave to the sleep patterns of a small, tired, grumpy Neanderthal.

Sure, I sometimes miss those long afternoons staring at the monitor, shaking uncontrollably and praying that the trash trucks or the coke whore neighbor won’t wake Otto up. And, of course, there are moments when I crave a Sunday afternoon newspaper read while upstairs, Otto drools on his stuffed elephant collection. But overall, I am so excited that the race to nap has been replaced by the race to do. He is a barrel of shit and giggles, asking questions about everything and wanting to learn as much as possible before nighttime arrives. My exhaustion has been replaced by exhilaration and I now feel more like a mom than I ever have before. But, it is only Tuesday. Talk to me in a few days.

Listing To The Left

2010 is here and so I am, finally. I am back on track with a new schedule and a list of resolutions as long as Snookie’s arm hair. Yes, The Jersey Shore is one of the main reasons to love on 2009. As is our new television, Otto’s everything and Dave’s overall amazingness in the face of a wife who needs 10 hours sleep, is newly allergic to down and can no longer consume more than one drink for fear she may crumble into a pile of her own vomit.

To start off this new year, I want to share two lists. One is the aforementioned resolution list and the other is my celebrity rider list. This is a very specific document that details all the things I must have in my green room before giving a concert. Okay, I do not play an instrument, I read music less skillfully than all three of the blind mice and my singing voice is probably as close to a Joan Rivers mouth fart as it gets. But just in case I suddenly become crazy famous for leading a super group and wearing hot pants and platform skull boots without irony, I thought the universe might want to know exactly what I would want to have at my fingertips before and after I rock the Casbah.

Dotty’s Rider List

8 cases of sparkling water carbonated with bubbles from Lady Gaga’s Grammy outfit

Iced green tea, unsweetened (Tazo Zen if must know) and filled with magical powers

A wheel of extra sharp aged cheddar cheese the size of a man hole

Apples, really pretty, fake looking, crunchy, unblemished Pink Ladies that scream, “I am not organic but I am fucking gorgeous!”

Wild Arugula handpicked by all the assholes that said I would never make it as a singer

A vat of Dave’s homemade marinara sauce to bath in

A vat of Dave’s homemade Bolognese sauce to wash my hair with

Gold infused spaghetti

A salad bowl filled with Hot Tamales with the red ones removed

Valrohna 70% Dark Chocolate with feeding tube attachment

Fresh sprouted wheat bread, the kind that tastes, feels and looks like cardboard gift boxes but makes you as regular as rain

An iPod with the complete catalogues of Madonna, Neil Diamond, Jack White and Led Zeppelin, including a taped message from Jimmy Page telling me how much he admires my work and a pair of Gucci headphones that someone hands me when I am feeling groovy and want to hear it

Am I forgetting anything? Oh yeah, a case of Herradura Anejo that leaves no hangover, reverses the aging process and leaves an internal euphoric afterglow that no amount of street drugs or doughnuts could equal.

As far as the 2010 Resolutions go, I want to give up sugar, do more yoga, hike with my friends, revamp my blog site, write five days a week, have a rough draft by the summer, clean out the one closet we have, find more patience, volunteer more often, improve as a mother, rock as a wife, be a better friend, demand a better friend, wake up earlier, fix what’s broken and laugh at the bad.

May 2010 bring you all good things. Now let’s get to it!