*headdesk*

May. 10th, 2009 01:23 am
fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (like you as a friend)
Yes, I'm being extremely neurotic yet again. I finally worked up the courage to friend [livejournal.com profile] ellen_kushner, but then I chickened out on writing the obligatory comment to tell her that I did so. Hero worship gives me bad manners. *sigh* I worry too much over nothing.

It's like the time I had to write a paper on fairy tales back in college. I found this message board online, and posted a question about which books I ought to read for research. Two people called "Terri" and "Midori" recommended some excellent books and asked me what my paper was about. I answered, and something I said sparked a discussion between the two of them. I spent a delightful couple of weeks messaging back and forth, contributing to the discussion whenever I felt able, thinking about it whenever I was away from the computer, and generally feeling the first academic excitement I'd ever experienced in my life.

Then somebody mentioned Midori's new book.

I'd never heard of Midori Snyder, so even though I was impressed, it didn't turn me into a gibbering fangirl idiot. But then somebody mentioned Terri's last name. I realized I'd been chatting easily for weeks with Terri Windling. Yes, THAT Terri Windling, the artist and editor whose name adorned the inside cover of almost every one of my favorite books. I used to look at her cover art for hours at a time. And Bordertown; I'd just discovered Bordertown a couple of months before. Terri Windling!

I know, I know, authors and artists are just people. So what? They're people with better brains, and I can't talk to them without second guessing my every word. So silly. I finished my paper, thanked them both politely, and never posted anything on that messageboard again.

Ah, hero worship. At least I got an A on that paper. And hey, now I get to read Ellen Kushner's lj entries on my friends page. Convenient, that.

In other news, I just drank a huge gulp of ant-flavored Dr. Pepper. It didn't taste too awful--unpleasantly tangy, but not horrible enough to be worth getting up to open another can. The little nuisances would probably crawl into that one, too.

Whew!

Apr. 27th, 2009 07:34 pm
fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (out of cheese error)
Good gracious that was odd. Sorry for that extremely frenzied post a little while ago. I don't know what the hell happened to me. Temporary insanity? Too many bad drugs in my youth? I swear, my thoughts were darting around every which way all at once, thinking themselves almost, and trying to follow just one of them felt as impossible as tracking one tiny, silver fish as it swam in a school of thousands. So weird.

Typing helped a bit, don't ask me why, but my thoughts didn't start to slow down until the rain poured down outside. Huh, maybe it was all the electricity in the air or something?
fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (for pity's sake)
I’m starting to scare myself. In the past two months I’ve been more disaster prone than a main character in a YA romance. So far I have…
...done a whole bunch of stupid things. )
What next? Geez, I'm almost afraid to leave the house.
fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (WTF?! blue)
It was a little after midnight last night when a policeman knocked on the door of our hotel room. He seemed nice--short and cute and blue-eyed--and he couldn't seem to help smiling at me as he poked his head around the doorjamb. He asked oh so politely to come inside. Honestly, I thought he had the wrong room, because I couldn't figure out what on earth he was doing there, so I said sure. Why not? I knew we hadn't done anything illegal.

After he came inside, my polite puzzlement quickly turned to fear. He stopped being friendly. He wouldn't tell us why he was there until we answered his questions, and his questions were all about the kiddo. He wanted to know how old he was and why he wasn't in school. He wanted to know what was wrong with him. That was the scariest question of all, because there was absolutely nothing wrong with him. He was just sleeping. Startled, Larry and I both looked at our kiddo. He looked fine to us, and we said as much. Then we looked at each other--a big, giant WTF?! look--and then turned that look to the cop.

He asked us if we were smoking crack.

Seriously, he thought we were crack heads. Someone had walked past our open window and called CPS because they thought they saw Larry smoking something out of a pipe.

Of course, Larry was doing nothing of the sort. He was, however, making an ocarina. It's small, and maybe it looked like a crack pipe when he held it up to his mouth? I guess he had a cigarette lit, too, which would explain the smoke. Larry demonstrated this to the officer, played the ocarina a bit...and the man was enchanted. There was no more talk of drugs or insinuations child abuse, the barely concealed disgust just vanished. Suddenly we were decent people. The policeman even asked if he could buy an ocarina from us.

Pretty crazy, huh?

None of it seemed real. The cop actually apologized for bothering us before he left. Still, it took me about two hours to calm down enough to go to sleep, and I'm still a little shaky today. The whole situation was just so weird.
fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (yellow daisy)
Okay, so yeah, I'm a pretty lenient parent. I want my kid to grow up to be independent, the kind of adult that takes responsibility for his own actions--not some sheltered guy that totally loses all control at the first sign of freedom. And so I let him pick out his own clothes, brush his own hair (inexpertly), get really dirty, and play outside with his friends without me hovering over his shoulder. He's six. I don't think this is unreasonable.

Apparently, I'm in the minority here. Did you know he was playing outside yesterday? You let him wear that? Really!? Aren't you afraid he'll get sick from playing in the rain? You let him ride his bike WITHOUT A HELMET!?! OMG! he's MUCH too young to be by himself even for a second.


I'm starting to get scared. Is someone going to report me for letting my kid be a kid?

Last year some friends of mine got in trouble with Child Protective Services. I won't go into the whole complex situation here; it involves adoption and a really unorthodox family situation. But here's the main thing: the parents weren't reported because of some kind of abuse. It was because the kids were allowed to go barefoot, their hair was messy, and their clothes were all muddy. Some neighbor saw them walking down the sidewalk with their teenage brother, and she called CPS with a story about suspected neglect.

Now these are the coolest parents I know, and their kids are amazing. These are the kids who taught my kiddo to share when I was ready to beat my head against the wall in frustration. The older ones (10-13 yrs.) come by to chat with me and we end up talking about ancient Rome or WWI or gender roles among teenagers. They're the most well-adjusted kids I've ever met. They're not hungry, they're not cold, they're healthy. Yet, my friends were found guilty of neglect, because the kids were playing outside without an adult. In a suburban neighborhood.

Today, my neighbor came to tell me that the kiddo was riding his bike in the street. I told her thank you, but he was allowed to ride his bike since he knows to watch for cars. I also informed her that he may be small, but he's actually the same age as the other kids riding in the street. She just gave me a LOOK.

So now I'm worried.

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fairjennet: Text only. "In the beginning, there was nothing, which exploded." (Default)
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