Silly Guardian. Every Nevadan knows the Star Trek Experience is at the Hilton, not Caesar's.
(And the new robes? They're goofy, sure. But the old robes were also goofy. Although I have to agree with the "evil pastor" sentiment - can I get one for my father to wear on Halloween?)
First, the negative bits: I have always hated Mother's Day. I think it's a cheesy, made-up, commercial holiday that preys on guilt, and I end up feeling manipulated. My feeling is that if your relationship with your mother isn't great for 364 days out of the year, a card and flowers on the 365th isn't going to fix it. (And while maybe in a few years I'll want someone to take my kid away for a day, I'm not really sure I like the message that conveys, either.) The overtone that Mother's Day is a day for the other half of the parental outfit to act as the dominant caregiver also bugs me. I mean, shouldn't he be doing his part the rest of the year, too?
So this is where I was when Mother's Day rolled around. I announced to Matthew that while I think it's a cheesy, made-up, commercial holiday that preys on guilt, a gift was not optional, and that I was partial to the idea of a digital picture frame so that I could have an all-Peach, all the time slideshow. And I also decided I was going to take the Peach to the zoo, just the two of us, because I wanted Mother's Day in our household to be about spending quality time, alone, with the Peach. Maybe next year she and I can go to the beach or something similar.
Anyway, that was the plan. We rolled up to the zoo at 9:12, and it was cold, windy, and threatening rain. For an hour I tried rolling her right up to the viewing spots -- within inches of some animals -- and took her out of the stroller, pointed, cajoled - but no luck. She was having none of the zoo. Finally, just as it was starting to rain, we left. It was a nice trip for me - with few people around and crappy weather, the animals were very interested in us - but not so much for the Peach.
At home, Matthew was sleeping. He'd caught some virus from the Peach, and was sleeping it off. (He spent most of the day sleeping, then went to work this morning at 4:30 because he was wide awake.) She didn't go down for a morning nap at all, but finally crashed at 12:30. This was the amazing on-off Mactyre sleep day, which went something like this:
05:30: Matthew up with Peach.
07:30: Peach asleep, Shelley awake.
08:30: Peach awake.
09:00: Matthew asleep.
12:30: Peach asleep.
13:30: Shelley asleep.
14:00: Matthew awake with Peach.
15:30: Peach asleep.
16:30: Shelley awake.
17:00: Peach awake.
18:00: Matthew asleep.
19:30: Matthew awake.
21:00: Peach asleep.
22:30: Shelley asleep.
23:00: Matthew asleep.
Productive, no. Restful, yes. Needless to say, this came on the heels of Peach's latest daycare virus. Sigh.
Today I took the day off. I've been trying to take off one weekday each week while Matthew and Peach are off at work and daycare, because I usually end up working one weekend day (at least) and because, well, my underemployment has to have some benefit. It's not paying my mortgage or student loans, so it might as well be something else.
I didn't nap (that is the gold standard of a good day), but I did work on that TiVo backlog (and figured out which Fred Meyer the Roloffs shop at on "Little People Big World") and made a cursory attempt at scrapbooking while doing so. Days off at home don't exempt me from getting Peach ready in the morning, and today I was actually awake enough to get the camera out.
(Yes, I spun off the baby blog, but for those of you who don't look at Eden's Garden, I have to show off my new favorite picture anyway!)
I just can't seem to get over enjoying saying how stupid the other side is. To be sure, I use different language, like:
"[Opponent] has moved for summary judgment on a cause of action which Plaintiff did not plead. However, even if [Opponent] had moved for summary judgment on the proper cause of action, [Opponent's] motion should still be denied because..."
Translation: "Opponent is a big fat idiot who is burning billable hours! Nyah! Nyah! Nyah!"
It is just so fun.
For the last year and a half, I've worked on a number of child sex abuse cases on behalf of a practitioner who does has a lot of these cases. This isn't where I thought I'd do a lot of work - the one sex abuse case I worked on in law school made me drink. (OK, just for one night. But still.) Most of what I'd known about sex abuse came from Law and Order: SVU. Now I can talk about sex abuse in really graphic terms, without even realizing I'm doing it. My summaries of fact in memos can turn your stomach, and frankly, they should. This is sick stuff.
For whatever it's worth, this is how my career has shaken out, and now it's something I think and talk about frequently, mostly with great passion and mostly with great anger. Because the victims are fucked up. Fucked up like Vietnam combat vets are fucked up.
Sometimes these are adults whose lives have been completely wrecked by the sex abuse. Sometimes they're kids whose lives are just starting to be completely wrecked by the sex abuse. The cases involve Boy Scouts, or ministers, or church volunteers, or family, or employers. (Sometimes they're all of the above.)
The one thing they all have in common? Someone knew the guy (yeah, they're all guys) was a molester. And that someone didn't say anything.
(And about the "my life was ruined by false accusations" people? I know -- especially in the context of bitter custody disputes -- that sometimes false accusations are made. In a perfect world, prosecutors and police would have much better tools to get to the truth of the matter - like, for example, what is ordinary sexual development and what is hypersexual, victim behavior. People who do make those groundless accusations should be criminally prosecuted and/or lose custody to the blameless parent. But frankly, there are so many molesters out there crying "my life was ruined by false accusations" that I have a hard time taking that line seriously.)
In a church, sometimes the guy molested a kid before, and no one thought to restrain him from "spending time" with other kids. Or sometimes the church leadership didn't want to "punish" other members of the molester's family by making a big deal of the molestation. Or sometimes the molester was a minister who the regional leadership knew was a molester, and yet decided to place in a church without warning the church beforehand.
Ditto Scouts.
Ditto volunteers.
Ditto foster parents.
Ditto employers.
Ditto neighbors.
And we all know what happens next, right? Because child molesters don't just stop if you pray about it, or if they promise they'll never, ever do it again, or if you give them a second chance, or if you just hope they'll get better. Because they don't, or they can't, or they won't. They just move on to another kid - and then that kid is fucked up, too.
So here's my helpful tip of the day: if you know that that guy diddled a kid, no matter how long ago it was, TELL EVERYONE YOU KNOW. And then call the police. He's not entitled to have a good reputation - as far as I'm concerned, he's not entitled to be around other people, period. He's not entitled to teach Sunday School, or lead a troop of Scouts, or act as a foster parent. It's not OK to say "he can volunteer as long as his own kids are there, too." (Often he's diddling his own kids, too.) It's not OK to say, "We are keeping our eyes on him." The guy is a molester and he will find some way to molest. If you know he's a molester and he's spending time around kids, it is your absolute moral duty as a human being to turn his ass in. Period.
If the guy gives you a creepy feeling but you don't have any "real" information? For God's sake, keep your kid away from him. You really think your kid's entire future happiness is worth sparing some creepy guy's (or his wife's) feelings?
And if you think someone might have molested your kid? Whatever the hell you do, don't ignore it and hope it goes away. It won't. Call the cops. Get your kid in therapy that day. And sue the bastard(s) who made it possible for the molester to have contact with your kid.
Sometimes it's the only way to make sure.
Yes, it's sunny and beautiful, with a projected high of 70 degrees. And I'm inside a climate-controlled law library writing about the craziness that is child sex abuse. Whee.
I've finally -- FINALLY -- finished the nursery, only 11 months after the Peach was born. Her nursery used to be our den (a co-opted back bedroom upstairs) and creating it involved many, many steps.
I think the crappy bit is that with having to hit the Skelaxin after moving the damn china cabinet, I could hardly have a celebratory beer. Maybe tomorrow.
Like nearly everything else related to the Peach, we couldn't have done this without help - except for that conception and gestating thing, of course. Friends Robyn and Mark provided a crib. Friend LuAnn provided blankets, sheets, and other bedding. Friends David and Kara moved the couch, ottoman, and TV downstairs with Matthew (I was pretty useless). SoozieQ gave us a diaper genie. And so, so many people helped with equipping the Peach with beautiful things - the elephant print from my sister, the gorgeous "Eden's Garden" quilt from Mary Ann, Eden's toys, wall hangings - so much. Thank you, thank you, everyone.
Oh, but did you actually want to see the nursery? Pictures are posted at Eden's Garden.
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