A Typical Morning
Completed: 7/9/05
Rating: G
Summary: Getting Emily ready for school
I walk into Emily’s room, where I find that instead of coming in and waking her up as instructed, Josh has crawled into bed with her. He’s on his back on the very edge of the twin bed and Emily’s on her stomach in the very center, legs spread out, one arm wrapped around Bobo, the other flung over Josh’s chest. Welcome to my morning.
“Time to get up,” I say cheerfully, flipping on the light.
“Ten more minutes,” they growl in unison as Josh flings one arm over his eyes and she buries her face in her Barbie pillow. Sometimes they’re so alike it’s scary.
Unfazed, I turn and head down the hall, leaving the light on. “I’m coming back in ten minutes.” We go through this every morning. The alarm clock goes off, Josh tries for a morning quickie which he may or may not get, I instruct him to wake-up his daughter, which is how she’s referred to in the mornings due to her grumpiness, and then I get in the shower. Fifteen minutes later, I emerge from the shower to find them sleeping in Emily’s bed. They always ask for ten more minutes, which I’ve made up for by setting the alarm twenty minutes early, and I use that time to dry my hair. It’s our system and it works pretty well.
When I finish drying my hair, I walk back into Emily’s room, where they’re awake, lying on their sides chatting about who knows what. I’m not privy to these secret conversations of theirs. When I was pregnant, Josh made me put on headphones every night and listen to Yo Yo Ma for a while so he could talk to my stomach and not be overheard. The knowledge that he can’t go more than three days without sex is my only security that they’re not plotting to take me out.
“Are you two ready to get up yet?” I ask with a smile.
Emily rolls onto her back and looks up at me. “Mommy, did you really vote for a republican once?”
I look at a smirking Josh and shake my head. “It was an accident and I corrected it.”
Her mouth drops open. “Mommy!”
“I corrected it!” I often have to defend myself around the two of them.
“My mommy, voting for republicans,” she mumbles as she gets up and shuffles into her bathroom. “I bet he even liked guns.”
I walk over to Emily’s bed, pick up her pillow and throw it at my husband who laughs at me, grabs me by the wrist and pulls me down onto the bed, where he proceeds to kiss me while I laugh. Emily walks out of the bathroom a minute later. “Lip kissing this early?” she asks in disgust.
Josh chuckles against my lips and I turn my head and look at her. “Did you go potty?”
Emily gives an oops look. “No, I forgot.” How she can forget to pee, I’m not sure. “But I brushed my teeth,” she says proudly.
“Go,” I say pointing back to the bathroom. “And wash your face. I’ll be there in a minute to comb your hair.”
“Kay,” she says, heading back for the bathroom. Just as she gets to the door, she turns back to us. “I don’t think most grow-ups lip kiss as much as you.”
Josh rolls off me and gets up, not bothering to help me. Typical. “How much do we lip kiss?” he asks her.
“Eighty million times a day.” Josh smirks at me and leaves to shower.
I readjust my robe and head into Emily’s bathroom a minute later. There’s toothpaste on the mirror and water all over the sink and in her hair. Why do I let her do this alone? “Is your face clean?”
She’s studying her mouth in the mirror. “Yes. I think I’m gonna to lose another tooth soon.”
“Yeah? How loose is it?”
She plays with it with her tongue. “It’s just starting to wiggle around. I’m gonna send it to Grandpa Moss.”
I get her comb and a barrette out of a drawer. “Grandpa Moss, huh?”
“He let me drive his cart all around the golf course last weekend.”
“Which he wasn’t supposed to do.”
“But grandpa’s don’t have to follow rules.”
“They don’t?” I ask, sitting on the toilet.
She shrugs. “That’s what he said.”
“Ok Munchkin, let’s get this over with.” Combing Emily’s hair is the worst motherly job I have. She either has a very sensitive scalp or she’s the biggest wuss I’ve ever met.
Her bottom lip juts out and this is the only time it gets to me. “Can I have a hug first?” she asks in a pathetic tiny voice as her lip quivers.
I pull her into my arms, rocking her for a minute. “It’s gonna be quick today, just a ponytail.”
“Do you have to comb the underneath?” We go through this every morning. She plays the guilt card like no one else.
“Sorry baby, I do.” I hold her for another minute and when I try to turn her around, she squeezes tighter onto my neck, breaking my heart in the process. I’m proud of myself for being as strong as I am. When Josh does this on Saturday’s, he either does a crappy job or gives up altogether and throws a baseball cap on her head.
Finally I stand her up and turn her around. “I’m counting,” she tells me.
I start combing. “I know you are.” She counts the number of tangles I hit and then complains to Josh as though I’m abusing her.
Five minutes and three big tangles later, we’re done. “Hungry?” I ask.
She takes a deep breath and looks herself over in the mirror, finally smiling. She always bounces back from these disasters quickly. “Can I have Fruity Pebbles?” she asks as we leave the bathroom through her bedroom and head downstairs to the kitchen.
I smile at her. “What do you think?”
She shrugs and keeps smiling. “I have to ask.“
“You do?”
She nods. “What if one day you were going to say yes and that’s the day I forgot to ask?”
“That would be horrible,” I say teasing.
“I know,” she says seriously. “How ‘bout toast?”
“You may have toast.”
“Can I toast it myself?”
“You may,” I say, stressing the ‘may.’
“May I put my own jelly on it?” she asks, stressing the ‘may’ herself.
“Absolutely not,” I say with a big smile on my face.
“Mommy! We have to negoshit.” I’m absolutely positive she can say that word correctly but doesn’t because Toby taught it to her that way. And he only taught her that because when Huck was four, Josh taught him the word crap.
“Negotiate.”
“That’s what I said. Can I have juice?”
“No, but you may have milk.”
“But I hate milk,” she says, as if I’ve never noticed.
“I know, but I’m a mom and it’s my job to make you drink it.”
“Daddy would say yes,” she reminds me while smiling, hoping it will change my mind. It never does.
“True, but you’re not allowed to ask Daddy something I’ve already said no about.”
“I don’t like that rule,” she mumbles, using both hands and leaning back with all her weight to get the refrigerator door open. When it breaks the seel, she flies backwards, hitting the wall with her back.
“Funny, it’s one of my favorites.”
She looks through the fridge. “Can I at least have strawberries?”
Of course she can have strawberries. “Well…”
“Please….” She begs. I put a finger to my mouth to pretend to contemplate this. “Please Mommy. We have to negotiate!”
I smile as I’ve clearly won, which shouldn’t seem like such a big deal considering her age, but it is, I promise. Josh never wins. “Ok, you can have strawberries.”
“Yes!” she shouts, pumping her fist in the air and pulling out a bowl of strawberries and sitting them on the table.
“What’s for lunch today?” I ask her.
She goes back to the fridge to look at the calendar being held to it by a Harvard magnet from last summer’s family vacation. “What is today?”
“The sixth.”
“Rost beef, roll with butter, vegetable melody and peanut butter cookie. The peanut butter cookie sounds good.”
She is her father’s daughter. “Try the first word again. The ‘a’ makes the ‘o’ long.”
“R…. roast.” She looks over at me. “Right?”
“Yes. And it’s vegetable medley, not melody.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It means a mixture of different vegetables.”
The ick look makes an appearance. “One isn’t bad enough?”
I have to smile. She’s developing my wit. “I take it you’d like me to pack you a lunch.”
“Yes please. I’d like a Goober sandwich and Ritz Bitz.”
“How about a Goober sandwich and an apple?”
“And Ritz Bitz?” she asks, flashing her dimples.
“Please Mommy, please, please, please let her have Ritz Bitz,” Josh says in a very cute voice coming into the kitchen and picking her up, carrying her over to the toaster on his shoulder.
“Please Mommy, please, please, please, please.” she echoes, giggling as Josh tickles her bare feet.
I sigh. How am I to win in a situation such as this? “Fine.”
“Yes!” they both say, pumping their fists into the air. So alike it’s scary I tell you.
“But…”
“Oh…” they both whine, at which point I almost laugh and give in.
“You must finish your sandwich and apple before you have your Ritz Bitz.”
“Deal!” she exclaims, reaching her hand out towards me. I shake it and Josh sits her down on top of the counter and pours us both a cup of coffee and her a glass of milk while she sticks a few pieces of bread into the toaster. I get out the Goober peanut butter/grape jelly mixture. It’s pretty disgusting stuff, but she loves it.
When the toast is done, Josh puts grape jelly on it for her. He must’ve overheard our conversation. “That’s a very nice barrette,” he says, hopping up on the counter beside her.
“We have a table,” I remind them. They don’t move.
“Mommy hit a bazillion gillion tangles,” she huffs.
“Emily…”
“Three tangles.”
“Well, that’s almost a bazillion gillion,” Josh says, smiling over at me.
“I know,” she tells him.
“We could always cut your hair,” I remind them, turning back to the lunch bag.
“Donna!” “Mommy!” they screech simultaneously.
**********
After breakfast, in which Emily spills grape jelly down her pajama top and milk on the floor, which is why she doesn’t get dressed until after breakfast, I tell her to go to her room and make her bed while I get dressed. Josh sees this as an opportunity to watch a strip tease and follows me into our room, trying to slow me down and distract me from the task at hand. He usually succeeds and today’s no exception.
Once I’m dressed, I go into Emily’s room and find her sitting on the floor playing Barbie’s, her comforter thrown not so neatly on top of her bed, her pillow thrown half-hazardly on top, and Bobo sitting in the center. She’ll get neater as she gets older, right?
“What would you like to wear today, Munchkin?” I ask, walking over to her closet.
She gets up and joins me, leaving Barbie in the middle of her floor for me to step on later. “Hmm… let me see.” Oh no.
“How about your tan
“How about the dress Aunt CJ bought me for my ‘done with the flu’ present?” Good Lord, she’s spoiled.
“No dresses on gym day,” I remind her.
“Right, summersaults,” she says. She looks around for a minute. “How about my jeans with the flower on them and my perfect t-shirt?” By her perfect t-shirt, she means the shirt that says ‘it’s not easy being perfect.’ Another gift from Aunt CJ.
“That would be fine too,” I say, pulling them out of the closet.
“Wait!”
“What?”
“I’m not sure yet,” she says, flashing her dimples. “I just wanted to know if that was an option.”
I resist the urge to scream and say instead, “How’s this for an option. Pick something by the time I count to ten or you can wear the outfit your Grandma Moss sent you for your birthday.”
Her mouth drops open. “Not that, Mommy! Anything but that!” It’s one ugly outfit.
“One, two…”
“Daddy!”
“The yelling, Emily.”
“Yeah?” he yells from our bedroom.
“Three, four…”
“Butterfly outfit or the perfect t-shirt?” she yells again. It’s a losing battle.
“Five…”
“Butterfly!”
“Six…”
“I think the butterfly outfit,” she says casually, pulling her pajama top off her head and throwing it towards but not in her hamper.
“Very good choice,” I say, smiling.
She takes off her pajama bottoms. “Do I have to put on clean panties?” I hate that word.
“Of course.” Do all kids ask this question?
“I just put clean ones on after my bath last night,” she reminds me.
I nod as thought I’m contemplating this. “What are the underwear rules again?”
She sighs. “Every morning, anytime I get out of the tub, and anytime I get done swimming.”
“Does this fall under one of those categories?”
“Cate-what?”
“Categories. Is this one of those times?”
“Oh. Yes.”
I gesture and bite my lip. “Then…”
She nods and walks to her dresser where she begins to carefully search through her underwear. “Don’t I have butterfly panties?” Where did she even pick up that word?
“It’s just underwear Emily. They don't have to have butterflies on them.”
She looks over at me with large eyes. “I have to match, Mommy.”
Patience is a virtue. “I’m counting to ten again, Emily. One…”
I stand helplessly by and watch as if in slow motion as she starts ripping underwear out of her top drawer, flinging them over her head and across the room. When she comes across her butterfly underwear, she does a little dance, and then slips out of the dirty ones and into the clean ones. “Emily Joan,” I say quietly when she’s done.
She looks up at me and then around the room, then back at me with an uh oh look. “I’m picking all those up now,” she says quietly.
“Yes ma’am, you are.”
She smiles her ‘I’m too cute to kill’ smile and starts picking up underwear and I take a deep breath so as to not strangle her. When she’s done, she shuts her drawer, leaving underwear leaking out the top, and then takes the butterfly outfit from me. “I love you,” she whispers.
I try not to smile, but I only half succeed. “I love you too, and it’s a very good thing. Otherwise I’d give you away.”
She tilts her head and squints her eyes. “To who?”
“To whom, and not to Aunt CJ, so don’t get excited.”
She raises an eyebrow at me and she looks so much like Josh right now that I practically melt. “Daddy wouldn’t let you give me away,” she says matter-of-factly.
I raise my eyebrows back. “He might, if I promised to kiss him on the lips a lot.”
Her mouth drops open in shock and disgust. “Even more than now?”
I nod. “If I had to.”
“Daddy!”
“The yelling Emily,” I remind her.
“Yes?” he asks, poking his head in the door.
“Would you let Mommy give me away?”
He shrugs. “What do I get in return?”
“I’d promise to kiss you on the lips, a lot.”
“Well…”
“Daddy!” she shouts.
He picks her up, kissing her bare tummy. “I’m just teasing. Anyway, Mommy doesn’t want to give you away.”
She looks over at me. I stick my tongue out at her and her mouth drops open again. “I think she does.”
“Nah, if she gave you away, she’d have to live with me all alone, and I’m not as much fun as you.”
She looks back at him, a little worried. “You’re pretty fun.” This makes him smile widely. He loves being the ‘cool’ dad.
“Well yeah, but not as much fun as you.”
She smiles a little. “True. Plus, you’re not as cute as me.”
“That’s for sure,” I say.
“Hey!” he says, putting her down.
“Face it Daddy. I’m cuter.”
“Much cuter,” I say to her.
“I come in to help and you pick on me?”
She flashes her dimples and climbs up into my lap. “Aren’t we cute, Daddy?”
“I’m leaving now,” he says, trying to hide his smile as he heads for the door.
“Look at us, Daddy. We’re cute.”
“Yes, Daddy. Look at us,” I pipe in just for the hell of it.
He gets to the door and turns to us and we both give him our best smiles. He stands there for a second just staring at us and his smile fades. “God I’m the luckiest man in the world,” he says quietly before turning and heading down the hall.
Emily turns to me. “He likes us a lot.”
“Yeah, he does,” I reply quietly, squeezing her closer to me.
She hops down out of my lap a minute later and starts tugging her clothes on. “Do we have time to paint my fingertails and toetails?”
“We painted them last night after your bath.”
“But we painted them blue and my shirt’s pink.” I blame CJ for all our choices.
“Yes, but there’s blue in your butterfly.”
“There is?” She picks her shirt up to look at the butterfly and flashes me her stomach. “There is!” she exclaims.
I help her button her Capri's and touch up her hair, then send her downstairs to go over her spelling words with Josh while I finish my hair and make-up. I step on Barbie as I leave her room.
**********
When I come downstairs fifteen minutes later, Josh is lying on the couch with Emily sitting on his stomach. They’re watching ‘
“Nope, hot.”
“H-O-T. Aunt CJ’s show should be on every day.”
“I keep telling her that. Hit.”
“H-I-T. Hey, that’s the Congressman from Starbucks!”
Josh smiles at her. “Congressman Wolfe. Republican from
“S-I-T. Is he the republican Mommy voted for?”
“Ok,” I say defensively as I come in the room while Josh laughs. “How are those spelling words?”
“Too easy,” they reply in unison.
“Is your book bag packed?”
“Yes,” they reply in unison again. I shake my head. They get up then and get their book bags. She throws hers over her shoulder like Josh does and we walk out together.
When we get to my car, he leans down and kisses her cheek. “I’ll meet you at your t-ball game today,” he says and she smiles. “Then tonight we’re on our own while Mommy’s in school.”
“Pizza?” she asks excitedly.
“And ice cream,” he says smiling at her.
He stands up to kiss me goodbye. “In public?” she screeches.
“I’m afraid so,” he says chuckling. He gives me a quick peck on the lips before walking to his car.