Germinal writings on parenting multiples
I have realized that I don’t often write about our daily life in South Africa. Sometimes it seems too utterly normal to be newsworthy. Other times, it’s too bizarre to record with any sense at all.
Last Wednesday (almost a week ago already!) was a good example of this mundane/unsettling mix. The kind of day after which I ask: Um, was that normal?
My husband was up in Jo’burg on business, so I had all three kids (aged 3, 3, 4) on my own for a couple of days. Throughout those days I think: this is a phenomenal amount of work and responsibility for one mom! Phenomenal! And then I think: there are 10 year old kids in this country who look after 3 and 4 year old siblings, and there are countless single moms and grandmothers who care for broods much, much larger than mine. So get on with it!
Okay. 6 am. Turn off the house alarm, get breakfast, get the kids half-dressed, pile the kids into the car, pick up our housekeeper from the bus stop/taxi rank, return home, put the rest of the clothes on the kids, finish breakfast, put the kids back into the car and head out to preschool.
The twins are upset, partly because Daddy is away and partly because Thomas’ class is going on a field trip – and their class is not. We’re running late (as usual) so I hastily explain why Thomas isn’t going to his classroom and that I will be back to get them at noon. Still, they grip my legs at the threshold to their class. Twins: one leg each.
Back in the car with Thomas and directions to Monkey Town, our destination about 45 minutes away. I haven’t driven the route before so I’m advised (despite having written directions) to follow another mother ferrying another load of kids. Sounds good, but just two minutes out of the parking lot, she’s off like a bat out of hell in the opposite direction, not the way my paper suggests. Which way: speeding mom or written directions? I opt for the speeding mom, now just a blur down the road.
I know it’s easy to poke fun at the way people drive countries other than your own, and not always fair, but to generalize for a moment: South Africans drive fast. And hugging the yellow line so cars can pass despite oncoming traffic is routine and expected. So here I am on the back roads, heavy mist still covering the ground, heading off I don’t know where, at speeds meant for freeways.
But it’s just a school outing. I have a map. I have a cellphone. Thomas is excited. No problem.
There’s a lot of road work around Cape Town these days (in part to get ready for the World Cup in 2010). In any case, routes and travel times are unpredictable and accidents are frequent. After 30 steering-wheel-gripping minutes in the car, we are slowed and then stopped by flashing lights, sirens and running people. As we get closer, I see a white pick-up crushed and another huge truck carrying hundreds of Coke bottles smashed into a wall. Bottles are scattered all over the road and local residents are scurrying closer, either to observe or to gather any bottles still intact. I inch by, crushing glass under our tires, hoping we don’t get a flat, hoping no one was killed.
We’re now behind a rickety pick-up carrying wooden crates at impossible angles. The crates are held onto the truck by people, also at impossible angles and the truck is wavering back and forth over the yellow line. The road is narrowed by more construction and I swerve out to pass. I find myself just meters from the grill of an oncoming 18-wheeler. Expletives. I swerve back into my lane. Thomas asks about the expletives. I am now officially frazzled.
But we find Monkey Town and drive slowly to our parking spot. I unbuckle Thomas from his seat and we proceed on our school outing, viewing monkeys, eating snacks, running around. Like any school outing.
When it’s time to return to the school, I’m the first out of the parking lot. I know the way now, and I have to be back in time for the twins. We don’t have much back-up here; closest family is half way around the world, our few friends have kids of their own to look after and my husband is several hours away by plane. So I backtrack along the roads at a conscientious but decent clip. I hand out spare change at several intersections and decline to purchase cellphone chargers at those same intersections. Thomas sleeps. I relax. We’re back at the school in good time – but all the other moms are there before me. How? I don’t have time to ask. The twins are waiting and I have another 8 hours before any of them will sleep.
Photos are of the sky around our house. Amazing skies here!
So the twins, Alex and Jon, spend much of their time these days refining the art of bickering. I didn’t know 3 year olds could be so good at quibbling - or at duping their mother.
A few days ago, they launched right into it after breakfast. The topic was shapes, I think, whether a particular shape was long enough to qualify as a rectangle or whether it remained a square.
Alex took the lead: “It’s a square!”
Then Jon: “No! It’s a rectangle!”
Alex: “It IS a square!”
“Is not!”
“Is!”
Alex then moved from the table to the couch, presumably so that he could shout his entrenched opinion across the room. Back and forth they went, getting more and more riled, until they were screaming and angry, or so it seemed.
I had intervened several times, though half-heartedly I admit, and they had ignored me. But when the yelling hit that pitch known to drive parents crazy, I was good and ready to sort out the offending shape.
Before I could, however, Alex jumped down from the couch, arms waving and tone changed completely: “Okay Jon,” he said authoritatively, “now you say ‘is’ and I say ‘is not.’” And he paced back to the couch like a movie director with a deadline.
They picked up their “argument” right where they’d left off. Same intensity; different roles.
I felt like the camera had panned back, revealing the set, crew and the unsuspecting audience - that is, me.
I’m feeling a bit of blogging fatigue these days which, I suppose, is good for getting other things done. I just planted more seedlings in our solid clay garden. It’s largely futile without a dump truck of compost but they do look nice for a while.
Then I picked up an old book borrowed from the neighborhood library: The Reader’s Digest Family Book of Things to Make and Do, published in 1977. Our kids love making toys. Thomas is endlessly creative with his Thomas the Tank Engine set and over the past six months we’ve made the docks, the quarry, Muffle Mountain, cliffs, smelters and a ton of assorted cargo from things laying around the house, mostly cardboard boxes, tin foil and tape (with added messy bits like rocks, water and shredded paper).
Reader’s Digest is a little more ambitious. Most of the projects are well beyond preschool crafts. Still, it’s intriguing in a retro sort of way (is 1977 retro already?). There are whole sections on tie-dying and weaving, of course, as well as sections on acrylics, cooking, photography, sewing and woodwork. All the patterns and designs are included at the back of the book.
My section favorite is “Toys from the Past.” I don’t mean Tinker Toys or Pick Up Sticks but toys from the past, the 1800s and before. I’m inspired by the Wobblies, dolls made from ping pong balls, and the zoetrope - both of which should keep me from blogging until sometime next year.
