As hungry as my friends tell me they are for more Thailand description, I have to take a break and complain about my Most Hated Thing which everyone knows is dinnertime.
Tuesday, August 16, 6:35: Mike leaves (late) for boy scouts because I remind him (late). I set the table, meaning I place pre-assembled plates of rice, chicken, sauce, and diced canned peaches in front of Mia, Cora, and Lina. This is the Mom-equivalent to yelling “game on.”
6:35 Carter screams. Mia yells, “I want milk.” Lina and Cora poke their food with their fingers and make faces. I fill a cooking pot with water so it’ll be easier to clean later.
6:36 Carter screams. Mia yells “I want milk!” twenty-seven more times. I mix rice, sauce, and pureed carrot in a bowl for Carter and ask Lina and Cora how many times I’ve asked them to poke their food in disgust using their forks, not their fingers. They arm themselves appropriately.
6:37 I shovel carrot slop as fast as I can into Carter’s mouth. It’s never fast enough. Whaaah! Shovel. Swallow. Whaaah! Shovel. Swallow. Mia yells “I want milk!” forty-nine more times. I tell Mia to take a time out. Cora and Lina have sniffed their forks, containing .2 micrograms of actual food. Presumably they smell stainless steel.
6:38 Mia yells, “I want milk!” sixty-million-five-hundred-with-a-remainder-of-seven times. I leave Carter to put Mia in a time out, meaning I lock her in the basement. (Child Protective Services, you are welcome to read my blog. If you come at dinner time, it’s all-hands-on-deck, so bring knee pads and a bib.) Miracle of miracles, Lina and Cora agree, via standing up, sitting down, rocking on their chair, dropping their forks seven times, and giggling that the food is acceptable. They begin eating.
6:39 Carter, not being fed, shrieks and surpasses rock-concert level on the decibel scale. Tears pour down his face. Mia’s shrieking surpasses rocket launchings. I return to the table. Shovel. Swallow. Oh, thank you, one of them has stopped. Lina and Cora shout for more food.
6:40 I shovel food. I say, “Lina. Cora. How are you done eating already? Why are you shouting?” They say, “We are starving and angry that you tricked us by making the food look terrible (read “not artificially colored”) so that we requested tiny amounts and now must be fed right now or we will be distracted at the table which, as you know, leads to toppled plates on the floor and over-turned chairs. Now! Now! Now!”
6:41 Shovel. Swallow. Shovel. Suddenly, Carter throws his head back, winces, and violently pushes away the bowl of food I’m holding. He is full, didn’t I know that? The puree mix doesn’t spill. The Most Hated Thing has spared me. I run to dish the older girls more food. I let Mia out of the basement after she repeats, “Can I have milk please ?”
6:42 I pour milk while Lina drips peach parts from her elbows, laughing about Cora’s knock-knock joke. (“Knock, knock. Who’s there? Diaper. Diaper who? I’m going to go pee-pee and poo . . . .” Voice interrupted by gales of laughter. “-poo. On your bum-bum!” More gasps. Can anyone breathe when it’s so funny?) I tell Lina to hold her arms, snaked with seven home-canned peaches she had decided to eat with her hands, over the table. She’s too busy laughing to hear. A peach plops to the floor. I grab her arms and pull them over the table. She pulls back. “Lina, stop!” Peach juice is flung on the back wall and window. “Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop!” I say. (You can see were Mia gets it from, sigh.) “Go to your room!” Right then, the front door opens. We have a visitor, Nate, who smiles on his way in, essentially calling, “Hey, I’m basically in a good mood.” Lina wipes her arms, stomps to her room. I say, “Dinner isn’t my best time, Nate.”
6:43 I try to smile. Nate’s a visitor. Cora’s plate is inexplicably flung two feet above the table, flipping end over end and scattering rice from the sliding glass doors to the china cabinet as it clatters to the floor. I stop trying to smile. Carter cries for a sippy cup. Mia whines, “Mom, can you feed me?” which translates to, “I-hate-your-terrible-cooking-can-you-give-this-crap-to-homeless-people?” Cora stomps to the couch, feeling rejected because it’s hard to be four and fully aware that your parents think that you’re “somewhat problematic.” Nate gets a facial expression that reads, “I didn’t know Nikki got like this.” I clean up the rice while I’m good and mad or we all know it’d stay there for three days.
6:44 – 7:29 I feed Mia by hand so her I’m-hungry shouts later in the evening won’t blow my eardrums. I get Carter a sippy cup. I talk with Nate and calm down. I eat salad that’s soggy (my plate was pre-dished as well) and think that the chicken is surprisingly good when all I did was cook it with cream of chicken soup. The girls are playing nicely in the front room with Nate. Carter plays with his birthday car. (It goes back! It goes forth! Back! Forth! Back! Forth! It’s amazing!)
7:30 Mike gets home. He asks, “How’d it go?”
7:31 Nate gracefully bows out, saying good-bye before the answer begins.
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