The Second Year of Nursing School

Things break down. But sometimes they start broken. And thus it is with every car we buy, ever, since the history of us car buying began. When our first car clawed its way out of the primordial sludge, instantaneously evolved an engine with 400 working parts, and was naturally selected to survive apart from the sea, in our care, it was already broken. While we were dating Justin probably changed four or five flat tires on my van. (That's how I knew it was love.) The car he drove when we were dating billowed smoke every time the AC was on. Which is fun when you are dating in a 100 degree Utah summer. Somehow we managed the first year of nursing school with only mild automotive disasters (I think that is the definition of grace). But the second year began with me pregnant out to here, and Noah turning one, and two vehicles that were insistent on killing us all.

The jeep died randomly. It would just decide it had enough of this cruel world and turn off. In, of course, the most convenient places conceivable: like waiting to turn left at an intersection. Or better yet, as we were turning right through an intersection. The currently enormous driver of the jeep would then throw both of her hands up in terror, as if her Messiah might mercifully grant her telekinetic powers for an instant to fend off oncoming traffic. The aforementioned oncoming traffic would turn its head as it peered curiously at the convulsing walrus planted in the driver seat of a jeep lodged in the midst of traffic flow (in the same way a curious puppy pauses to consider a butterfly).

But we were never hit. Because God just wouldn't let us out that easily. His protection encircled us in utterly irrational ways. And for our preservation we worshiped. Because it was beyond our control.

And who could forget the Beast Wagon incident(s)? But no matter how many times the Subaru overheated and died, a glug of water and thirty minutes of fervent prayer later it always came back to us. We prayed for new cars. We prayed for someone to hit us so we could just grab the insurance and get new cars. We prayed for divine miracles of a coolant nature. What we got were two cars that overheated and/or died several times a week. And faith. And Patience. And perspective on needs and blessings. And for these gifts we worshiped. Because it was beyond our control.

*****
Hannah was born on November 22nd. It was a Friday. Justin's clinicals ended on Thursday night. For three days I got him all to myself, to help me bring another child into the world. A child I wasn't ready for. A child I didn't know how we would provide for. A child, who with the first blink of her eyes, as she was laid on my chest, drenched my world in sunlight.

And for my daughter I worshiped. With my daughter, I worshiped. Because her whole life was beyond my control. But the exquisiteness of her every breath was known and adored by our King of majesty. In the unknown we found joy. In my fear, I was given Hannah, from my Friend, my God. And as a family we worshiped.

I woke in the dark, of that hospital room, at 1:00am to feed my daughter. My husband was already up, studying Med/Surg in the corner.

*****

Justin started clinical rotations during the second year of nursing school. His day would begin at 6:00pm in the ICU. After the shift was done at 3:00am, he would drive straight to work and prepare lab samples until 8:00am. He would drive home to sleep for an hour, shower, make lunch, and then he would be to class by 10:00am. Class would get out at 5:00pm, and he would drive back to the hospital to start it all again. We would go for days without seeing him. When we did see him, it was with pity for clearly, one of the undead had lunched on his throat, and our beloved husband and father was turning into a zombie.

It was a blessing. His work allowed him to come in at ridiculous hours. We could pay the mortgage.

The loneliness consumed me. My care for my children became automatic, robotic. I found empathy for single moms: empathy and admiration. How could anyone do anything beyond the bare essentials by themselves with two children?

Justin's blood pressure spiked. His grades began to drop. Everything seemed to be racing out of our control.

But alone, at night, I worshiped. Because my baby girl breathed heavily in her crib. By son slept peacefully in his bed, and if nothing else on the planet, I knew He heard my worship. And being heard by Someone was enough. This darkness would not last.

*****
Someone got us sick. By Christmas time, Noah, Hannah, and I were so ill we didn't want a Christmas. We just wanted everyone to leave us alone as we wallowed in our misery. Justin somehow avoided the worst of it. He finished his finals and passed all of his classes, and had the holiday off to help care for our sick children. Noah's cold developed into a double ear infection. Hannah's sickness moved into her eyes, which became swollen almost shut. There was a long, miserable night. But there were two of us to fight this battle. God had given me my husband back in the knick of time. We couldn't fight the sickness, but we could stand together. We worshiped through the colds. Because long ago, one night in Bethlehem, another new baby opened his eyes in wonder at the frailty of humanity. And He empathizes with our weakness, with our hurt, with our sickness. We worshiped because it was Christmas.

*****
At Easter time Hannah's face broke out with painful sores. I waited for them to heal. They did not. Instead the rash spread down her body and up to the top of her head. When I woke her in the morning, her crib would be bloody from the scrapes left by her nails. We went countless times to the doctor. He prescribed every cream known to modern man, shy of steroids. We had to get antibiotics for the large sores on her head. I was helpless and heartbroken.

My daughter is rough and tumble. And tough. While my heart broke at every sight of her itchy skin, she giggled and grew and adventured. The gloomier I became, the sunny she appeared. God gave me this daughter for this reason, to turn my mourning into laughter. And I worshiped through the heartbreak; because how could you not sing praise with a baby girl so amazing.

*****
We survived to early June. Justin worked less and less hours. But somehow we still paid the bills. And he passed all of his classes. We had very little control over anything in life. But we had a God of mercy and grace. We had a reason to worship. Because He is God. And if we could only imagine a moment of His plan the joy would capsize our souls and teach us to swim where our feet cannot touch down and where the hope cannot be drowned.

All of my life
In every season
You are still God
I have a reason to sing
I have a reason to worship

And I will bring praise
I will bring praise
No weapon formed against me shall remain
I will rejoice
I will declare
God is my victory and He is here

The first year of nursing school

On September 13, 2012 Noah was 1 month old. I packed him in his car seat in a little baseball jersey onesie, and we went to the rec center to watch our church’s men’s softball team play. The game fell on the same night as Justin’s orientation to nursing school at Mountain University (changed to protect the guilty). When we arrived at the park, he was not there yet. Noah and I waited patiently (Noah slept, I waited not entirely patiently; because that is a battle I am still fighting). The game started. Our team was up to bat. No husband. It made me sad. I didn’t want him to have to give up a softball game for nursing school…

Moments later he dashed around the corner, he threw me a quick (and from my many years of interpreting his moods I could also tell an incredibly annoyed) smile. He ran into the dugout, threw his stuff down, grabbed a bat and went to hit. I wish I’d kept clearer mental notes on the whole matter, but I believe he wasn’t even wearing his cleats. The pitch arced toward him, my husband: 1) kept his shoulder up, 2) broke his wrists, 3) opened his hips, 4) directed the pent up frustration of a, as I would come to find out, incredibly stupid, waste-of-time orientation to school into the small cylindrical object hurtling at him 5) hit it out of the park.

I considered this to be a good sign.

*****

Homework started, and there were longer work hours to make up for class time. Noah didn’t sleep through the night until eleven weeks. My exhausted husband would struggle out of bed at 4:30 in the morning after having baby cries wake him up several times during the night. Sure, I was the one getting up and doing the feeding, but I also got to sleep in during those first few months. Saturday became homework day. Justin would sit at the computer in our office (which was in the third upstairs bedroom), while Noah and I played on the floor. Upon further assessment, this was not the best plan. Noah would wriggle over to Justin and beg to be picked up. I’m sure me reading “The Little Blue Truck” helped not at all with the studying of muscular anatomy. But we wanted to be close to him. We missed him. It felt like we never saw him…

But life went on. We weren’t struggling. We managed.

And then I got sick.

*****

I just threw up. ALL.THE.TIME. People needing IVs during pregnancy, who threw up for the better part of nine months, really shouldn't have to keep throwing up after the baby is born. That's why we have the baby: so the vomit stops.

I had scans and tests of every kind completed. I tried every conceivable form of tums known to man. Finally, I dumped my doctor, and made a last ditch effort by seeing a new family practice physician.

"Have you tried stopping your birth control?" he suggested. The nursing-safe birth control works by altering the body's levels of progesterone (progesterone being the very same hormone that gets all wonky whilest folk are pregnant). Well, that does make sense.

We stopped birth control.

I felt much better.

Until six weeks later when inexplicably I started feeling very sick again.

I remember looking at the pregnancy stick (which I'd swear I was going to have to start buying in bulk). I remember thinking, "This is good. You get a baby. This is God's plan. He will provide." ...And then I broke down sobbing. Because there's a limit to how much optimism you can conjure up in the face of a terrifying unknown.

But life goes on. It can't very well not. And with prayer and patience (which was growing by the grace of God) I found joy. We would manage.

*****

A few months later, my mom went to urgent care. This isn't a big deal. We go to urgent care more often than we eat out. Except this time it was a big deal. My mom had a heart attack. The day after mother's day. Justin was off to work and then to class. I wept, afraid and alone. I couldn't do this by myself. I couldn't stand alone.

But life went on. With worship and faith (which was growing greater every troubled moment), I found peace and courage. We would manage. We were not alone.

*****

Justin finished his first year of nursing school with a 4.0 GPA. My husband has always struggled in school. This was grace and peace and hope. This was joy. God had brought us through a hard year. We would stand. We were not alone.

You were reaching through the storm
Walking on the water
Even when I could not see
In the middle of it all
When I thought You were a thousand miles away
Not for a moment did You forsake me
Not for a moment did You forsake me

Thoughts and Answers

As I was helping my husband complete a dosage calculations exam (He was allowed to use any resources at his disposal including his not entirely unintelligent wife; we weren't cheating.), we actually had the following conversation concerning a problem.

Scene: We sit, both furiously setting lead to paper to discover how many ml/hr the nurse should infuse.

Me: 18.

Justin: What?

Me: It's 18.

Justin: What's 18?

Me: The number that goes in the answer box. It's 18.

Justin: (with a quizzical expression) Why?

Me: Because we only have 76 minutes and 35 seconds to complete the test.

Justin: No, I mean I want to know how you got 18 as the answer.

Me: (with a quizzical expression) Why?

Justin: I just want to know why you put the 'X' on top of the 75mg, not the other way around.

Me: (mournfully) I don't know! I just lined up the numbers and at the end an 18 popped out!

Justin: (about to argue, but seeing the anguish on my face, holds his tongue)

Me: Didn't you say nurses don't actually do these calculations on the floor anymore? Don't the pharmacists do that?

Justin: Yes. It just frustrates me.

Me: But we have the answer.

Justin: But I want to know why.

Me: (Knowing this means he is a better person than I am, I drop my head and desperately try to figure out how I got 18 [which was in fact the right answer], while miserably watching seconds tick away on the test timer.)

All I have ever wanted is the right answer in the box. He wants to know why. I admire that. I am almost sure it means he is much more intelligent than me... Or at least much braver. I want to be smart. He wants to think. 

Reason #732 why I love him.

A 30 (almost)-year-old Zombie

It seems fitting that a week before my thirtieth birthday I would begin turning into a zombie. Living flesh starts to decay, grace and poise are replaced with mindless stumbling, and a craving for buttery gray matter starts tugging at your tummy. (Just in case you were worried, I haven't gotten to that final symptom yet. Give me a few weeks though. Y'all 'll have to start wearing anti-brain-eater-helmets. ... or start carrying baseball bats everywhere.)

I bit my lip two weeks ago. I assume this is the first stage of the zombie transformation: autocannibalism. Apparently, a dose of poison entered my system from this minor wound, and it has developed into some kind of lesion in my mouth. (Aren't you glad, when you hopped out of bed this morning, you decided to read my blog. Cannibalism and mouth lesions in the same post. Who's a lucky reader? That's right: it's YOU!) Now, speaking is an agony, eating is unthinkable, and having my daughter practice her facial landmarks with me as her model is enough to make a grown women whimper. (EYE! the little girl declares, poking one dirty little digit into my eye. EAR she shrieks, jamming the same finger far enough into my ear to scratch new philosophy out of my brain. MOUTH! she squeals with delight , forcing my mouth open with her finger and then attempting to punch her entire fist into my mouth. Mommy's so proud. Could Hannah go grab the lidocaine for mommy please?)

I slept wrong. (This is not my fault. I was having a retreat nightmare. The women's retreat is from a Friday afternoon to a Sunday morning. In the dream, we had to move out of our location to another house on Saturday. We had to move. We were being attacked. By dinosaurs. Which was sadly, less of an issue than the bedbugs last year.) When I awoke, My neck was locked in a sideways crook, reminiscent of the old zombie, valley-girl, head tilt. The neck pain also induced groaning, which was distinctly zombie-esque in nature.

At last weeks softball game, my sister-in-law and I were almost completely consumed my mosquitoes. (Which I understand in her case, with my exceptional sister-in-law being sweet as honey, she must be a delicious treat for any bug. However, in my case, all I can imagine is the 'special' mosquitoes, who prefer asparagus and artichoke flavored blood, must have sipped me to death.) There was quite a bit of blood loss. And now I have 57 beautiful little red welts peppering my skin. It's very undead-like.

As Justin is studying for his exit exam, I called my mother to see if I could bring over the loud boy and his tornado sister. The husband slunk into the room as I chatted away. He wrapped his arms around my waist. This is not an uncommon occurrence. We have this sick obsession with making the other person laugh, blush, or be utterly awkward while on the phone with their relations, or key church personnel. I was successfully ignoring him, which annoyed the husband greatly. He hauled me back, so I was sitting on his lap on the bed. I continued talking unfazed. (We've been playing this twisted game for a long time; it takes pyrotechnics to break my concentration.) My mother was telling me about their plan to adventure off to Winco for groceries, which was riveting. With a heave (that I imagine was quite more forceful than if he had been throwing around a 108 or slightly more girl), Justin flopped himself back on the bed, dragging me with him, he rolled me to one side and then threw me across the bed.

This did interrupt my flow of conversation (as being tossed like a rag doll in a dryer tends to do), so I recovered my phone quickly, bolted upright to finish my talk with my mother, and then kill my beloved. Suddenly our room started spinning more than usual. I laid back down quickly. Sensing something was wrong Justin mercifully stopped Hulk-smashing me. I did my best to listen to my mother's post office woes without throwing up my breakfast everywhere. I politely said my goodbyes, hung up, and buried my head in our comforter with a groan. The second attempt at sitting up fared no better. The room was spinning around me... or I was spinning around the room, which I am assured are different sensations (and wasn't it a sad little lab rat that had to discover that). Things began to settle, and Justin asked if I could stand. I unfolded my legs, slid off the bed, and... fell into his night table.

So with that, my husband successfully sloshed my ear crystals, again, re-igniting benign paroxysmal positional vertigo. Which I think means he won the game, but simultaneously lost him any leverage in any decision over the next week. Because, while submissive, I'm also just plain mean.

While the calendar declares that I will not be thirty for ten more days, my body has decided it is time to break down. I will be a full on undead, brain-eater by Christmas.

30 quotes on 30

"The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits."
Theodore Roosevelt

"Yeah, but 30! You get crow's feet and chicken chin. Your nips start heading south and your bum turns to yogurt!"
Northern Exposure

"Thirty was so strange for me. I've really had to come to terms with the fact that I am now a walking and talking adult."
C. S. Lewis

"There is a difference between twenty-nine and thirty. When you are twenty-nine it can be the beginning of everything. When you are thirty it can be the end of everything."
Gertrude Stein

"At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty, the wit; and at forty, the judgment."
Benjamin Franklin

"After thirty, a body has a mind of its own."
Bette Midler

"It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster, and will never soften again."
William James

"All that I know I learned after I was thirty."
Georges Clemenceau

"Doctors tell me I have the body of a thirty year old. I know I have the brain of a fifteen year old. If you've got both, you can play baseball."
Pete Rose

"Everyone is the sum total of past experiences. A character doesn't just spring to life at age thirty."
Kelley Armstrong

"Don't trust anyone over thirty."
Jerry Rubin

"This country has a complex about age. It's unbelievable. If you're over thirty, you've had it in this country."
Eli Wallach

"There's an 'Everything must go!' emotional liquidation feel to the end of your twenties, isn't there? What will happen if we turn thirty and we're not 'ready?' You don't feel entirely settled in any aspect of your life, even if you are on paper."
Sloane Crosley

"My greatest enemy is reality. I have fought it successfully for thirty years."
Margaret Anderson

"A woman over 30 knows herself well enough to be assured in who she is, what she is, what she wants and from whom. Few women past the age of 30 give a damn what you might think about her or what she's doing."
Andy Rooney

"When you turn thirty, a whole new thing happens: you see yourself acting like your parents."
Blair Sabol

"A poet more than thirty years old is simply an overgrown child."
Henry Louis Mencken

"Time and tide wait for no man, but time always stands still for a woman of thirty."
Robert Frost

"I’m turning thirty this year. And you know the saying, a woman over thirty is more likely to get hit by a bomb than find a man."
Fanny Fink

"A man thirty years old, I said to myself, should have his field of life all ploughed, and his planting well done; for after that it is summer time."
Lew Wallace

"The body is at its best between the ages of thirty and thirty-five."
Aristotle

"A woman over 30 will never wake you in the middle of the night to ask, “What are you thinking?”. She doesn’t care what you think."
Andy Rooney.

"After thirty the world becomes softer."
Bonnidette Lantz.

"Before thirty, men seek disease; after thirty, diseases seek men."
Chinese Proverb

"Can I keep the presents and still be twenty-nine?"
Rachel - Friends

"I keep being asked about it like I'm meant to be having a nervous breakdown, and I didn't realize I was meant to be having a nervous breakdown. I've got a lot of friends in their 30's and they all seem alright, so I'm sure I'll be fine."
Keira Knightley

"Life doesn't begin at thirty it just begins to show."
Anonymous

"Women over 30 are dignified. They seldom have a screaming match with you at the opera or in the middle of an expensive restaurant. Of course, if you deserve it, they won't hesitate to shoot you, if they think they can get away with it."
Andy Rooney

"30 was the best year of my life until the next year and then the next. Every year since 30 has been the best year."
Bonnidette Lantz.

"Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man."
Ecclesiastes 12:13

Early/ Late/ Missed Father's Days

My father makes an annual summer trek to Florida in June. He goes because he is a good man. He goes because he has a family there, a mom and a sister, who, despite every feminist inclination, sometimes need a man around to help out. He goes because perhaps the presence of a man of great faith might encourage curiosity, might encourage lesser known paths, might bring hope and joy and peace. Although, I suppose having an enormous, 85 degree ocean minutes away might be another small reason he goes.

Noah misses him, when he goes. My still very two-year old son nearly had a melt down this morning, when I tried to take him out of his car seat. That is Papa's job.

Hannah was utterly confused. As my father comes down the ramp she always points and utters, "Baba! Baba!" But today, it was Nana.

I generally miss father's day with my dad. We still celebrate the holiday (which is generally what happens when you marry into an enormous family. I am living my Big Fat Tipsy Greek Irish Wedding). We make sure we do something for my dad either before he goes or when he comes back. But that Sunday, I am always a little sad, when I can't give him a hug, tell him how blessed I am to be his daughter, how good and wonderful a man he is, and that I love him so completely.

He is a good man. And he serves a great God. I can think of no better compliments than these. I can think of no better life than this. And I can imagine no other childhood, than the one I had growing up under the watchful, fun, loving eyes of a good man and a great God.

Paying Through the Berry

A friend at church gave us three little strawberry plants a few years ago for our garden. They turned sad and brown, and gave us no strawberries the first year. Thankfully, we were too busy with babies, homework, clinicals, and having no life what-so-ever to rip the wilted plants out in the fall. It snowed on them a few days later, and we considered this to be nature cutting us some slack. However, the next year, the plants miraculously turned green! Little white flowers sprang out. And on a midsummer's night eve we picked the fruits of our labor: six little red strawberries. This was not even enough to have with shortcake. I think we devoured them before they even made it inside to be rinsed off (ah nature! It's all organics and proteins.).

This year, the plants have multiplied like bunnies. They have taken over a third of our garden, sending runners down both fences. We finally have a healthy crop of juicy, tart, delicious strawberries! Although, it is a crop perhaps too healthy now. (What, you expected me to be satisfied?)

In order to reap our harvest, we settled on child labor, and hired a couple migrant workers who were passing through town (otherwise known as our living room). We promised to pay them in strawberries for their work. The boy worker was quite helpful, although we did notice that not every strawberry he pulled from the vines made it into the basket. The girl worker was almost no help at all, and seemed to not even understand that we pick red strawberries, not green ones. Although, she did help by eating rocks out of the garden at an alarming rate. (My daughter, the only child who prefers rocks to berries.)

Once the fruits were cleaned, we set them down for the workers to glean their just rewards.

He was overwhelmed by the possibilities...

But soon they got down to eating their delicious paycheck...

 

                                      

                 

And we discovered with Noah around, there is really no crop of strawberries too generous. Maybe next year Justin and I will get our long awaited shortcake. Sigh.

         

An Anomaly

An unusual occurrence just overtook me. Bed time for my kids was forty minutes ago. Normally, this is a blessed time of day that I look forward to with eager anticipation. I love my children, I find them hilarious, inspiring, and amazing... and exhausting. There have been more days than I would like to admit, where I chanted in my head, "Just make it to 6:30. Just to 6:30."

Tonight, both kids were feeling particularly whiny. I think the Purple Tornado was over-tired from a day of destruction and mayhem and being too adorable for words. The boy-cub was having a rough time: mommy cut off the tomato supply after only six, the nasty copyright people pulled Josh and the Big Wall from YouTube, and... well he has an intense weather pattern for a sister. It's a rough life. We managed to get them fed, milked up, "clean handsed", and we had our moment with Hulk and Elmo. (Noah has an Incredible Hulk toothbrush. The toothpaste is Sesame Street. When he is ready to brush his teeth, Noah will put on his deepest, growliest voice and bellow out "HULK 'n ElmOOOO!" Sometimes he will add Cookie Monster, Big Bird, and Iron Man into the mix. Curiously, the only Sesame Street character left out of the toothy inventory is Super Grover. [Who I think would be a smashing addition to the Avengers... Maybe they could trade and send Captain America to Sesame Street... "I don't wike it!"]) From there diaper changes, prayers, kisses, and winding up butterfly mobiles commenced. Then finally the doors were closed, and I slumped into the ten minute post bedtime fuzz.

Now it's 7:30. Usually, the time I take on evening adventures (Bible study, working out, gardening, pounding junk food, and watching Chopped reruns). But tonight, I was overwhelmed with the desire to go back into Noah's room and hang out with my best buddy boy. It's been a rough time, lately. The roller-coaster of this past year in our life has taken another cheek flapping dive, leaving my stomach and my hope back on the last peak. I'm clenching my teeth for the next hard twist, white-knuckling anything solid in front of me, and just praying we don't get flipped upside down again. There are so many blessings we have, but having to count them so often is wearing on me.

This week it has been little things, miniscule, "blips on the radar of our lives" according to my mother. But tonight it's been hard mustering the good cheer to not devour an entire pan of rice krispie treats. Or a full container of feta cheese (I know, I have problems).

I want to hang out with my son. Even in the midst of the whines, they give me such joy. I want to read The Little Blue Truck for the 8,000th time, and have Noah make all the animal sound effects. I want to have him drive his trains down my arm like a railroad track with a chugga-chugga. I want to enter the great monkey and teddy bear debate he is currently hosting, and confirm once and for all who is the fluffiest and snuggliest.

His troubles are simple, not irrelevant, just simple. His moods change quickly, the darkness never lasts too long. He still giggles at things I think are funny, but am too grown up to laugh at. His world is full of light, and drama, and color, and fresh wonder. I just want to be with my Little Man for awhile and remember that he is utterly amazing, that life itself is singularly phenomenal.

But for right now, I have to be a parent. We have a schedule to keep. We have order and discipline to maintain. I have to offer him consistent boundaries enough to keep him safe in a world so free it is paralyzing. I have to be an example of putting aside one's own needs for the better of someone else: because ultimately, it is better that he get some sleep, that he have a routine, that he understand night time and obedience and independence.

Of course, once he falls asleep, all bets are off. He's a deep sleeper, and it wouldn't be the first time I've tiptoed into his room, re-covered him with a blanket, and thanked the God outside of the roller coaster for the twists and turns that made me this Little Man's mother.

The Littlest Avengers

The trouble with reading stories to my children is becoming apparent. Noah's favorite books are: David and Goliath, Gideon, The Little Blue Truck, The Mighty Avengers, and Thor. As we read The Avengers we got to a page where the Avengers were fighting on Asgard. Thor was battling his vile brother, Iron Man had taken on a dragon, and Captain America was fending off a burst of magic with his shield. I pointed excitedly to the page and cried, "Noah, look! The Hulk is smashing a frost giant!" Noah contemplated a moment and clarified, "Goliath." Uh oh.

"No no, buddy, this is a frost giant, and that's the hulk."

My son pointed at the hulk and said, "David."

So if anyone knows how to clarify fiction from historical reality for a two and a half year old let me know.

I would just stop reading the Avengers, but my kids love them. Noah knows all their names and at least one interesting fact about each. His first and still best joke is:

Me: What color is Iron Man?

Noah: Pink!

Even Hannah is learning their names now. There is nothing so adorable as seeing my 18 month old in her little ballet skirt, hair in pigtails that stick up like antennae, point to the book and squeal with glee, "HULK SMASH!"

Perhaps they connect so well with these characters because they are in fact baby superheros. Noah is Circuit, master of technology. 

Justin had stumbled in from an ER shift and collapsed in bed at 6:45am. It was now 7:15am, and I was desperately trying to get my kids together and out of the house without making the usual atom bomb exploding racket that accompanies our mornings. As I got Hannah ready Noah wandered in and pulled out a little people house. We got this toy secondhand, and it has never worked. It's supposed to make house-like sounds when you push the pink buttons, but in a year of owning it, it has been utterly silent. A smile of relief crossed my face. He selected a quiet toy, finally! In the still of the morning, suddenly a telephone rang loudly. It wasn't my ringtone, or Justin's. I looked around furiously for the offensive and LOUD ringing. It wouldn't stop! I looked down and saw Noah pushing down the pink telephone in the house's living room. He grinned at me. Then he pushed down on the pink washing machine and it blared a swishing sound through the house. (My actual washing machine isn't that loud!) I snagged the bewitched toy and handed the child my Ipod.

My Ipod is special. The on/off button is broken. You have to hold the menu button down for a good fifteen seconds before the screen will blink to life (which will only happen 75% of the time). And it freezes. Daily. It is at once a blessing and the bane of my existence. There have been times when I seriously considered smashing it against a light post and being free of it. When I handed it to my son, I assumed he would not have the patience or know-how to get it to turn on (since half the time I can't). I turned back to Hannah for five seconds. I swear, it was only five seconds! Suddenly Abi's mix song 1, Blaggards, "Big Strong Man" blasted out. (Just keep walking, nothing to see here.) I whirled on my son in disbelief. "How did you do that?" I wailed. Noah, dropped his head and froze. Chiding my poor parenting skills, I lowered my voice. "It's ok, buddy. Here, you can keep it." I said retrieving the mutinous device and handing it to him.

I hustled the kids off to Nana's house for the morning so daddy could manage some sleep. I was drying dishes and chatting with my mother, when she stopped cold and uttered, "What the ...?" Their gas fireplace was burning brightly. I was about to scold Noah for turning it on, when my mother informed me that the fireplace had been broken for months.

Someone get that kid a cape with a screwdriver on it! Circuit strikes again!

And we all already know that Hannah is the Purple Tornado. She has the unique gift of destroying everything. Perhaps the two of them will grow to be arch enemies: Noah on a continual quest to bring order and electronic light to the universe as his baby sister spins destruction and chaos in a pretty purple vortex.