i start off my practice this year with a pose that’s taken me quite a while to ‘get’…
YEAH! 
*wipes off sweaty, slippery underarms*
Author Archivegirl: “what’s that?” *points to a small fly on bathroom window* a moment later… sees a teaching opportunity… well, i guess if they smell as ‘lovely’ as cows…
now, maybe if Petr Horacek did one on lizards, i’d be able to empathise with them a liiiiiittle bit more… (but still, EEW!) they seem to fly through one milestone after another in a flurry, as if in a hurry to grow up and be less reliant on us…
no no, i’m not complaining, not at all. in fact, please, keep growing. i’d even petition for you to skip the whole dreaded business of teenagehood and go straight on to mature adulthood if i could. but i suppose that’s why milestones are necessary in the first place, to prepare them for that full bloom ahead… ++++++ and so, here he is, one of the 38,600 children this week to reach that exciting milestone that is P1.
as you can probably tell, he was VERY psyched to start his P1 life. being in a new environment and making new friends and having access to ‘big children’ – these things have always thrilled him. (what’s that? studying? meh, that’s just a distraction…) at the school, we were quite impressed that there were hardly any display of first-day jitters or anxiety or nervousness or clinginess or tearfulness normally associated with first-days (i’m talking about the children AND parents here). we reckon that’s the upside of having already been to pre-school. another thing we observed, they were such a well-behaved, orderly bunch. (for now.) and oh-so-cute. (for now.) the first thing he asked after he alighted from his school bus and met me by the canteen was: “can i buy something?” i think to him, primary school is a kind of ‘freedom’ – getting to hold on to his own money, having the autonomy to choose and decide for himself what to buy without mummy perpetually nagging or ordering him at his side. (instead, he had a P5 buddy to do that, ha ha. nahhh, he was very nice and all big-brotherly. we didn’t have to worry at all.)
“don’t worry,” assured one of the teachers to a bunch of parents peering from behind the barricade surrounding the canteen during recess time, all their eyes searching the blue sea of little uniforms for a glimpse of their kid. “i’m not worried; i’m just CURIOUS,” i muttered, chuckling at how preposterous we parents must seem, waving at our kids like mad visitors at a zoo. some, like me, got promptly IGNORED. LOL.
oh well. +++++ as soon as i got home, i smothered the girl with kisses and inhaled her heady sweet-sour scent all over her body. “i’ve got one more,” i rejoiced. maybe it’s a last child/only daughter thing, but i got sentimental imagining her first day of primary school in the future, in her oversized uniform and oversized school bag, coz obviously, she too will be as tiny as i was back then. (like this tiny:) yes, i’m afraid with the girl, i’d prefer the growing up to go juuuustt a teeny little bit slower. (although her streak of independence, while totally charming now, is quite a force to be reckoned with…!)
when i was briefing him after school on the timetable i drew up for this week, he actually negotiated/bargained with me to reduce his 4.00-5.30 slot by half an hour, and thereby increasing the 5.30-6.30pm slot by half an hour. first day of school already so clever ah? ok lah, since it’s your first week, i give you chance… Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry. been tetchy the whole day, fretting over tomorrow’s Big Event that is The First Day Of P1. can’t help but feel… nervous. and cranky. and tetchy. new bag packed with list of books, new shoes and socks set by the door, new uniform hanging on the door knob, allowance of two dollars (in small change) tucked in new money pouch. the boy has to be in the school hall by 7.15am, and we have to be up by 5.30am because his school bus is scheduled to be at our block by – ugh – 6.10am. i don’t know how i ever made it through school. what a horrible feeling. it’s like preparing to be sent to the gallows. BUT THAT’S JUST ME. the boy, well he is /quote/ SO very excited /unquote/. we’re still undecided whether to send him to a student care centre nearby after school, or just keep him at home with a routine timetable (although this option runs the risk of driving his grandma up the wall in the afternoons). guess we’ll have to work it out over the next few days.. Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry. “…. and i have no resolutions
actually, funnily enough, my so-called ‘resolutions’ in 2010 still stand… and i *think* i’m doing all right on all counts so far, although i seriously need to add that ‘go to bed earlier’ bit. :p (and hey, the new year also brings death cab for cutie to fort canning in march, yeah…) today, on the last day of the year…
i FINALLY did it…
all on my own, yeah! (ok, it’ll take a bit more time still before i move away from the wall and to the middle of the room. :p) the feeling when you’re on your head – EXHILARATING. and the realisation of your strength and ability to overcome your fears – priceless. i now have a new party trick! on the way to the Page One warehouse sale, working up a frenzy at the prospect of “up to 90%” sale, declaring it as “like being in heaven”, and attempted to explain to the boy a consumerist’s concept of a 90% sale. me: “let’s say a sweet is $1, 90% off means you only pay 10cts! and let’s say a book costs $10, 90% off means you only pay -*pause for quick mental calculation ha ha* – $1!” A: *impressed* “that IS cheap.” me: “so, now you know why I say it’s like being in heaven? since I like books so much?” A: “no, but if you’re in heaven, you don’t need to buy the books – it’s all FREE.” me: *damn* -_- +++++++++ fine, scrap the heaven part – there’s an unbelievably long queue outside the warehouse and it’s hot as hell. +++++++++ still in queue. a guy just walked past triumphantly clutching onto big plastic bags of books, proclaiming “HANG IN THERE PEOPLE! It’s worth it!” looks like this was also someone else’s idea of heaven. heh. +++++++++
$1… $5… $5… $5… it is Day 3 of Mission Possible: Bedtime Protocol. with the boy starting P1 in the morning session come 3rd january, there is no choice but to start getting him used to sleeping early. well, at least earlier than usual anyway. i’ve been way too lenient in allowing them the habit of a late bedtime. by the time we’re done with their nightly routines, they’d still be rolling around in bed till ohhh i don’t know…. 11-ish? that’s VERY BAD, ok. especially for their… brain development and what-not. i don’t know how and why their tiny bodies have such a ridiculous reserve of energy, EVERY DAY. i guess, partly why i allow for the late bedtime is because of my working-mother guilt, for having only a few hours with them after i come home in the evenings. partly, i myself have the bad habit of sleeping late. my nocturnal habits are even harder to break as i age. anyway, it’s been working okay so far, after the initial resistance and excuses and protests. and i now find myself with more time in my hands at night to do things. like, blog about this:
i’ve watched one episode of charlie & lola some time back, and while it certainly is quite charming with their BBC accents (which i try my level best to imitate when reading their books aloud ha ha), i’ve resisted the kids’ pleas to add the printed series to our collection thus far because: 1) i can find any number of charlie & lola books at the library (and probably have borrowed the entire collection); 2) i didn’t want to encourage them to watch even more tv, even if it’s BBC-endorsed (i know, twisted logic); 3) i’m a bit iffy on lola’s excessive use of superlatives (although i know children have the same tendency to exaggerate like so, but still); 4) it took me a few books before realising charlie is actually a boy (ok this has little to do with my point). but then, there are undoubtedly good bits in their stories, and the kids really extremely especially like them so very truly much (;p) and would often remember certain episodes or words or phrases in the books, so i relented and got them (and ok fine, myself) this, in a pop-up version. also since it goes with our theme for this week.
plus, have i mentioned how much i appreciate good paper engineering?
(omg it’s 1.40am, gah! brain development fail, hana!)
we were messing about with the dry ice that came with their ice-cream, pretending to cast spells into a cauldron, and getting my mystical genres mixed up, i asked them to each come up with three wishes for an imaginary genie to grant. aniq: “i wish for another abang adam! and i wish for another aidin! and i wish for another auni!” adam: “i wish for thousands of millions of dollars…. (to be) a professional football player…”
the other evening, aidin (the little fella there who’s auni’s age) was being badgered by the other three kids for three pieces of mentos left in his hand. reluctant to dole them out, he counted them and muttered aloud, “MAMPOS i got no more.” !!! (their oma eventually dug up some sweets in her handbag, like all good grandmas do, so the boy was spared the tragedy of having to distribute his prized mentos.) on sunday, we were all heading back after a wedding, and the kids were whining to go to their oma’s house to play some more. adam and aidin, of course, had to first seek their dad’s permission, which they REALLY don’t like doing. (their dad can be such a grinch, you know.) aidin, feeling the injustices of the world on his young shoulders, declared, “not faiiir!” and after a bit more of expressed disappointment, we called all four to come into our car to go to oma’s house. aidin, seizing uncle izad’s hand on the way to our car, looked up at him and plaintively uttered, “thank you for saving me all the time.” !!! SO dramatic, our little ones.
(ps: all four got their wish of playing to their hearts’ content and had a sleepover at their oma’s that night. AND their mummies & daddies had a nice quiet evening catching up on movies in their respective homes heh heh. so… good job, superhero/genie/santa uncle izad!)
we’ve completely run out of shelf-space, despite occasionally handing down books to their child care centre, and regularly discarding worn-out toys, and with his recently acquired pile of primary one school books and paraphernalia, we’re even more hard-pressed for storage space. we seem to have little luck looking for the right bookshelf – many times our intention to shop for one was shelved (so to speak) due to circumstances; one time we managed to step into ikea tampines but the shelf we eventually decided on was sold out; and a few days ago we got round to the ikea at alexandra, finally purchased one to our satisfaction, but when we got home to assemble it, it couldn’t be fixed and the wood broke (we got a full refund). it’s as if SOMETHING is conspiring to prevent us from getting a new shelf in his room… or perhaps, just one from ikea?? i don’t know. (we could be reading too much into it.) meanwhile, our furniture woes continue. boy: “mummy, i want to tell you something. i like to hang out with you.” i’m not sure what brought about this line of conversation. we were walking around vivocity, me holding his hand tightly so he wouldn’t run off into the crowd. it’d been quite a day: i’d brought them to the office in the morning. (they’ve been asking to come to work with me again ever since.) i’d brought them on board a docked ship in the afternoon. i’d bought them books from the floating book fair. (but no, NOT any more of those princess ones she’s holding, please!) then, more books from the lovely Page One bookstore. (which now I hear is GOING TO CLOSE DOWN WTH?!) i’d brought them to watch the latest ‘Alvin & The Chipmunks’ movie, even though their high-pitched singing GRATED ON MY NERVES OMG. i’d brought them to the playground and a dinner of disgusting fried fast food. i guess, i like hanging out with them too. (until the end of the day when THEY grate on my nerves and i’ve had enough of scolding them. =================================== i’m not sure if that conversation earlier had anything to do with me telling him the story of ‘Room’ (by emma.donoghue). his interest was piqued when he read the title on the cover and asked me what it was about. so i’d been telling him the story in bits and pieces as i progressed through the pages. i’d finally reached the conclusion of the book the night before, and he was in rapt attention as i told it to him in the car on the way to the office that day. i could see how compelling the storyline would be to him: it’s written in the voice of a 5-year-old boy, who has never been outside of the room (or rather, the windowless garden shed) where he was born. his mother was abducted 7 years ago, and had been kept captive in the 11ft-by-11ft room by her kidnapper ever since. she was repeatedly raped, impregnated, then gave birth to the boy and raised him all by herself as best as she could under the dire circumstances. she never allowed her captor to touch, or even look at the boy, all his life. you might think that being locked in a room your entire life, never knowing the outside world (or even believing or understanding that there is one), would be a truly horrific thing. but to the boy, the room was his world, and it was enough, because he had his mother. like a protective womb, the room for him was safe and secure, even as he lies in the wardrobe at night while the kidnapper makes his mother’s bed creak. she was everything to him – his playmate, his teacher, his friend, his nurturer (he’s still breastfed at 5, and there’s a brief touching part near the end when they’re out in the world and he bids goodbye to his mother’s breasts, a symbolic ‘weaning’ off his dependency on her). she invents games to keep him active, tells him stories, teaches him to read, uses recycled materials for crafts, establishes a routine and good habits. i imagined living in a closed room with an active, curious child, with limited resources to keep him engaged all day, every day – i would DEFINITELY go mad in less than a week. but then i read this – the real case of elisabeth.fritzl, locked and abused in the basement of her house by her own father FOR 24 YEARS, and gave birth to 7 children in that span of time. the eldest child was 19 by the time they were released. it’s a miracle she did not go mad. the human will to survive is an amazing thing. for the boy, perhaps the story of Room drove home the point to be thankful for his life, his possessions, his freedom, and opportunities. and hopefully, for his mummy, who tries to provide him all those things, and more. =================================== i am my mother’s only one, i wear my garment so it shows, only love is all maroon - bon iver, ‘flume’ my addiction mounts.
(loving julian.barnes’ writing, it’s so… english.) Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry. |
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