Annie Valentine

This week’s column:

Today I taught my children an important lesson in perseverance.

In less than 48 hours we will be leaving this house to begin our global relocation plan. Trying to pack three months worth of necessaries for four kids, a husband and a cat is a job I doubt Martha Stewart could do without the help of a mild sedative. There are crazy women, and there are crazy women. Right now I fit in both categories.

As the mother, it is my job to load up our luggage with enough crap to get us through a month of vacation followed by a mass transit move across the world to Germany. The eight duffel bags in question need to have enough life living artifacts to get us across the planet until the boat with our household goods sails into port.

Frankly, I can’t decide what I’m dreading more. Trying to whittle our life down to it’s simplified nomadic counterpart, or the day when our ship comes in and then regurgitates eighteen thousand pounds of unnecessary baggage on our very German looking doorstep.

Last night I was wandering around the house wringing my hands and muttering softly when my dear friend Tricia stopped by to help point me in one of the thirteen directions that needed work.

“I don’t know what to do!” I said.

“Well, what’s most important right now?”

“I suppose I need to start packing…”

Just at this moment, my husband wandered through the living room. “Packing?” he said, “You don’t need to pack, that’s what the movers are for.”

We just looked at him.

There comes a time in every marriage where you are handed solid proof that your spouse has absolutely no idea how hard your job is. It was my lucky day.

Still, I have to say that the biggest draw back to The Great Move Preoccupation is my total loss of present tense. I can’t seem to pay attention to anything going on around me because I’m so tied up with the eternal to-do list in my head. And when I say “going on around me” I’m referring to the health and welfare of our poor little children.

Really, someone should feed them.

Last night I had my husband do the unthinkable. I sent him to the grocery store for chips and cookies. There were no burgers, meatballs, green beans or brussel sprouts to add nutritional value; our dinner was nothing short of digestive bribery.

“Okay kids!” I said as they swarmed around the grocery sack with hollow eyes, their little fangs ready to rip me to pieces if I didn’t shell out something fast, “Tonight we’re having a party!” I lied. “It’s chips and cookies and pop night! Who loves Mommy?” Three little grubby faces simultaneously yelled, “ME!” as they tore into the forbidden fruits of the junk food aisle.

After fifteen minutes of mindless gorging, I came back in to survey the damage. The kids weren’t looking so hot. “That’s enough,” I said, “Party over.” Much to their dismay, the food was shelved and the pop was chilled.

And what do you think was the first thing out of their mouths this morning? “WE WANT CHIPS! WE WANT CHIPS!” Their request was denied and we started into the day.

Every ten minutes, like a scratched CD, it came: “WE WANT CHIPS!” The response was always the same, “Not until dinner.”

By ten am their whiny, hungry pleas were making me crazy. By eleven I was looking for cotton balls to stuff in my ears (or down their throats). Finally the lunch hour came and they kicked it up to high voltage.

“We want chips! Can we have chips? I see them, they’re up there, can we eat them now? Please? Please?! PLEASE!!!! Chips! Chips! Chips! Chips!”

“ALRIGHT!” It was more than I could bear. I pulled out the chips, dumped the bag all over the counter, and watched them attack it like a pack of hungry hippos.

I stood there feeling like a total failure. I just taught my children that if they yell long enough and loud enough they can make me do whatever they want.

Or did I?

Maybe what I taught them is that perseverance will take you anywhere, even if your obstacle is three times bigger than you and rules your world with an iron potholder.

Yeah, I think they learned that last one.

My man has nice legs. When I say nice legs, I mean legs that look strong enough to pull his family across the desert in a hand cart nice. They’re gorgeous.

His are even cuter.

I think it’s only appropriate that nice legs be displayed whenever possible. Unfortunately for me, the styles during the past ten years have dictated that men wear long shorts.

Until now.

Last month, while vacationing in Vegas, we were shopping at H&M and ran across two pair of uber cute, short swim trunks for men; I totally talked him into buying them.

Then I ran home and burned all his other swim trunks because I’m sneaky like that.

Last night Jason and I went out to the pool for an evening soak after the kids were in bed. Jason was wearing his itsy bitsy blue shorts and I couldn’t wait to ogle him in the moonlight.

Unfortunately, I didn’t realize just how shy he is about his fantastic legs. The boy would not get out of the pool to join the grown ups in the hot tub. Why? He said it was because he liked the (slightly cold) pool, but we all know the truth: he didn’t want to incite public jealousy over his super short sexy swim trunks.

Now if he’ll only come out of hiding with them.

We were there an hour and a half. I was very close to serenading him about the dangers of polka dot bikinis. Love those itsy bitsy teeny weeny super sexy short (not really) bikini swim trunks.

This was our first day of vacation. Last night we rolled into town at midnight and checked into our time share for a week of bike riding, swimming pools and nature walks.

This morning the baby went off at 6:47 am; ten minutes later June sounded a snooze alarm. I dragged myself out of bed to gather bottles and sippy cups, turned on Nick Jr., and greeted the boys. After breakfast I started a load of laundry and made a trip to the grocery store.

Right when I got home the baby had a blow out, June peed her pants, and Rex enlisted me to help in the hunt for his missing walrus. I transferred the laundry, put the baby down for a nap, and fed everyone lunch.

While the kids enjoyed an afternoon movie I cleaned the kitchen while Jason took a nap (he did the dishes first). I knocked out this week’s deadline and finally got around to washing, drying and curling my hair.

Once the kids made it back I administered two time out’s, made three different dinners, carried my fussy baby around on my hip for half an hour, and got my children ready for an evening swim. I then folded the laundry, put the baby to bed and gathered everyone’s pajamas.

Once the swimmers stormed the castle I got everyone dried and dressed, did family prayer, skipped teeth brushing and sent them off to bed.

And here I sit, completely exhausted.

This feels suspiciously similar to any other Monday.

I think we bought a mythical car.

Because my husband is a responsible, shrewd consumer, we have spent that past month trying to get our hands on a Mazda 5. We’ve got cash, but only enough to get one with low (er) mileage from an auction.

Even with all his resources these babies are impossible to find, but last Monday we finally got lucky. A fellow in our ward helped us out and we slapped down cash on a 2007 with 62,000 miles on it parked somewhere in Dallas, Texas. It was, unfortunately, the ugliest color in the world (dark gray) and did have higher mileage than we wanted, but it was the right price so the deal was done.

The car was scheduled to arrive on Wednesday. We’ve been borrowing a car for a month now and the very thought of once again cruising around on my own four wheels has made me giddier than a school girl on opiates.

The driver left early Tuesday morning. By ten am, we got the first bad call.

“There’s something wrong with the transmission,” he said. “We’re turning it around and sending it back.” Talk about crushing. We leave on vacation tomorrow and WE MUST HAVE A CAR. I really don’t want to try to hitch hike with four small kids and a car topper.

“But,” he said, “I found one in LA. It’s a 2006 and only has 50k. We can have it to you by Friday morning. Oh,” he added, “it’s navy blue.”

BYU blue? Low (er) mileage? Gotta love those car angels giving us a helping hand. Thank goodness for faulty transmissions.

But.

We were supposed to pick up the car yesterday. By this afternoon it still hadn’t arrived. It is now 9:30 at night and we haven’t heard a word.

We’re scheduled to leave tomorrow at 6:00 am and I have decided that there is, quite simply, no car. I am past patient, more frustrated than a nine month old baby who can’t crawl, and emotionally overloaded.

What it comes down to is this. Tonight is the last night my family will spend in this house. We have lived here for four and a half years, longer than I’ve ever lived anywhere in my married life. As of tomorrow morning, all the plates will begin to shift. Life is never going to look like this picture again.

No more leaving the hall light on for Junie, no more sticky front door handle, no more watching my children playing outside in the neighbor’s yard. I will never see my tulips bloom, never watch the snow fall outside my upstairs windows, and I’ll never sit upstairs and listen to the renters play video games so loud the floor shakes.

I have been avoiding feeling these feelings for the past week. Just writing it out loud makes my throat lumpy and my heart tight. This is the only home my children know, and while the next one is going to be awesome, I feel like tonight I’m sitting in my past. It’s already over, no more memories to make.

I guess my obsession with the car is really just misplaced emotions. I wish it was here and we were gone and moved and away so I could busy myself with the chaos of crazy German adjustments, not the quiet stillness of goodbyes.

Tonight is my first goodbye. So goodbye, you wonderful house you. I have loved you for your flooring and your windows and your warmth. My children call you home, and we will remember you as a place where good things happened. Hopefully we’ll leave plenty of love in the air for the next family.

I think this goodbye crap is going to be harder than I thought.

I’ve decided there is such a thing as over preparing a child for life in general.

My boy Rex is a funny little fellow. He’s friendly and happy and frequently terrified. To be honest, we never quite know what he’s going to do next.

Last weekend we had a yard sale. You would think that an anxious child like Rex would be worried about our things, but it turned out he was the world’s greatest yard salesman. Every person who stopped was given a grand tour of our wares and a hard sell, courtesy of my five-year-old.

“And here!” he’d say, “Look at this great baby thing! You can buy all the baby things from my mom, right over there! She has a baby named Georgia! Do you have a baby who can use this thing?” You never know how a kid will react until they’re under the gun.

The mister and I love to travel and routinely take our kids excursioning. Like all young parents who watch too much news, we’re overly cautious and paranoid that the moment we turn our backs someone will steal one of our children.

To prepare them for this potential thievery, we’ve taught them all to stick close to Mom and Dad because everyone knows that tantrum throwing three-year-olds are highly abductable.

With preschool out for the summer, I have once again been plunged into full-time parenting. Junie and Rex are home all day long and no thanks to the legal system, I get to stay here with them. In order to make this summer less miserable for everyone I’ve come up with a list of places to visit, starting with our local children’s museum.

Last week I packed up the three youngest and met my sister-in-law at the museum for a leisurely mid-morning outing. I asked myself, what kid doesn’t love a children’s museum?

Rex. Rex does not love the children’s museum.

Unfortunately for us we arrived at the same time as a busload of unruly elementary school children. It was total mahem. Children and chaperones running everywhere, trying to play everything at once.

“Mommy!” Rex would holler any time I achieved more than a four foot distance from him, “Where are you going? Don’t leave me Mommy! SOMEONE WILL STEAL ME!” He would then look at me with those big blue eyes, brimming with potential tears, cling to my hand like an ivy plant on miracle grow and cast suspicious glances at the pregnant woman sitting next to me. Cause we all know what she was planning. Who wants a new baby when you can steal a fully grown five-year-old in the throes of a panic attack?

Once the waters cleared and the busload of children departed, we were left with a few extra toddlers and an entire museum to ourselves. And that is when Rex discovered The Barn.

Complete with a milkable cow, two sheep, a goat, pigs, and chickens, he was in future farmer heaven. When it was time to leave he broke down in tears once more.

“But who will be their farmer?” he cried as we left. “The chickens will get so lonely without me, nobody will love them and help them find their little chicks! What if someone steals the chicks? Who will protect them so they don’t get stealed?”

Hey, it’s a good thing I love him so much because that one isn’t going anywhere. Honey, get the basement finished; at this rate he’s going to be with us a long time.

I found out today that my old high school wants to cut the music program because apparently, music is nothing but a side note in the educational process. And yeah, that pun was totally intended.

I’ll be honest, those last two years in high school were brutal for me. I felt more alone during that part of my life than I care to remember. My friends and I were making very different choices and I came to the gradual realization that sports are for people who like wearing tennis shoes and getting sweaty–two things that don’t look good on me. In a small town at a small high school, kids who don’t play sports don’t have many other options. Music was just about all there was left.

Lucky me!

Our school might have been small but the music programs rocked. If you could get past the really super lame cheap home grown sets, our drama department wasn’t half bad either. Frankly, it’s one of the reasons we want to raise our babies there. In a small town, kids have a shot at just about any extra curricular activity that interests them.

The thing about this situation that really chaps  my hide is that my hands are kind of tied. My sister works at the school, so any information I get from outside sources automatically makes her look like a snitch (which she grew out of 17 years ago). I have a nice little foothold in the community thanks to my column, but in order to protect her I can do next to nothing.

But despite all of that (and to her horror), today I called the principal at the high school. My first attempt resulted in a slightly hysterical message alerting him to my horrified state of mind and determination to bring in the big horns and save the program. My second attempt was probably more intelligent.

I called back and caught him right before he listened to my message and offered up a more honey flavored opinion and some excuse about being hormonally imbalanced.

The result? Unless he’s a liar, he told me this afternoon that he has decided to keep the program going, both band and choir, even if it is only at the most basic level. And you can’t tell me a phone call or two from concerned parents didn’t play a part in that decision.

That is some rockin’ good news.

Friends, we have got to speak up more. If you believe in something then make a call, write a letter, pull the fire alarm. We might not be the decision makers, but we can sure turn on a little heat and stoke the fire. Be courageous. Our voices should be used for more than just calling the family to dinner.

June has declared ownership of our cat.

Rucifer is a nice kitty, a gentle kitty, and lately he’s kind of a frightened kitty. I would like to say I have no idea why he’s such a scaredy cat during the day, but it’s pretty obvious that it has everything to do with the fact that daytime is when the kids are awake.

And the moment they’re in their beds, he comes out and gets happy and social with the grownups.

I really don’t see the kids handle the cat very much but I’m starting to realize that things happen around here without my approval all the time. Take last week, for example.

I was going around the house collecting laundry like a good little wifey and ended up in my bedroom. Much to my husband’s delight, I have recently purchased a large hamper with a lid to hide the chaos from the universe.

Trying to gather a full load of colors, I lifted the lid to see what was left and found myself staring into a pair of sweet and slightly pathetic eyes.

Just at that moment, June came down the hall.

“Mommy! What are you doing?” She asked suspiciously as I quickly closed the lid.

“Um, I’m just cleaning up. What are you doing?” She looked at me with slanty eyes, then casually glanced at the hamper.

“I’m just looking for Rucifer.”

“Really? Well why don’t you go look under your bed?”

“No, I don’t want to look there.”

“Why don’t you look under my bed?”

“Well, no I don’t want to look there either.” She was nervous, I was nervous, and I’m pretty sure the cat was terrified.

“Where do you want to look then?” I asked, pinning her down with my all-knowing stare.

“Just not everywhere,” which is the obvious answer for a three-year-old with a secret.

“Hey! Why don’t you help me with the laundry? Could you go get the basket from the bedroom for me?”

Since June loves to participate in anything that involves me or my life or things I’d like her to stay out of, she jumped at this chance and ran to do my bidding. And that’s when the cat and I pulled off the Great Escape. I’ve never seen an animal make itself so scarce so fast.

When June came back in and found me digging around in the hamper she was not pleased. “Hey! What did you do with my kitty?”And that’s when I launched into my lecture about kitties and prisoners and people who will someday live with the devil if they’re not nice.

So much for agency. Since then I’ve found the kitty in three different toddler-made prisons hidden around the house. Hey, at least she always puts in a toy and a blankie for him.

Last week I had a kidney stone. Let me rephrase that; last week Gibraltar lodged itself in my urator then decided to travel.

After a number of noteworthy (but not paper worthy) symptoms that all screamed shrapnel, I found myself sitting in a lonely exam room awaiting the arrival of Simon Cowell’s twin brother, who apparently practices urological medicine.

“Hello!” he said, entering the room and shaking my hand. “Well, it looks like you’ve got a pretty big kidney stone in there. How are you feeling?”

“Like I’ve got a pretty big kidney stone in there,” I responded.

“That’s not the only one,” he said, pulling up my CT scans on the computer. “Let’s see, two on the left side, another on the right…how’s your diet?”

I knew this question was coming. I am a kidney stone veteran, and the doctors always ask the same thing: why do you eat rocks?

“Sadly, my diet is awesome. I’m vain and this is the only way I can be skinny,” I responded.

“Well,” he said, “Let’s look at this list and see where you’re at.” He handed me a packet of What Not To Eat and started to review. “Do you eat a lot of salt?” he asked.

I thought back to the log of Summer Sausage in my fridge, the jar of BBQ almonds on my cupboard, and our suspiciously low peanut butter jar.

“A little,” I said.

“Yeah, that’s not going to help.”

“Well,” I said, “I do try to drink a lot of diet coke, and we all know that coke and asparagus are good for kidney stones.”

He looked at me with a bewildered expression, so I continued. “You know, when you start to get a kidney stone, all you have to do is drink a two liter bottle of real coke in one hour and chase it with a can of asparagus, including the juice. It usually works, I didn’t have time to try it yesterday.”

There was a long pause as he studied me, taking careful note of my glowing blond head.

“And what is this supposed to accomplish?” he finally asked.

“Well, you know, it…gets it.” I said. He just stared at me. “It disintegrates it, burns it to a crisp, whatever! All I know is that Coke and asparagus will fix kidney stones.”

He shook his head, thought about lecturing me and realized it was probably pointless. “Anyway,” he went on. “If you check out this list–”

“Oh! Lemonade!” I said looking at the list, “That’s right, I need to drink a glass of lemonade every day and that will keep the kidney stones away!”

“Um, where are you getting all your information?” he said.

“The…internet,” I added, although this isn’t actually true. I get most of my information from my older sisters, who know everything about everything and pass their worldly wisdom on to me as often as humanly possible. Somehow I think the internet might be more reliable.

“Yes, well, let’s talk about your surgery,” he continued. “We’ll go in and blast that kidney stone, but there’s a chance we might have to put a stint in so the larger pieces can filter out.”

“I’m going to be asleep for all this, right?” I asked.

“Of course, you won’t feel a thing. The stint will just have to come out a week or two after all the pieces have passed.”

“And you’ll put me out when you remove the stint?” I asked.

“Well,” he said slowly, “Not exactly. It’s not that big of a deal though, we just have to go in through your urethra to get it.”

“But I’ll be asleep when you go in to get it, right?”

“Well no,” he said.

“Right. Let me just say this plainly,” I said, “There’s absolutely no way you’re ‘going in through my urethrea’ while I’m awake.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad–”

“Not that bad? Excuse me,” I said, “Have you ever had anyone stick anything up your urethra while you were awake?”

He looked a little sheepish, “Well, no…but my wife–”

“Tell you what, as long as you put me out dead I don’t care what you do to my urethra, deal?”

What could he say? He might know more about kidney stones, but I’ve got some serious stock in the pain department. With four kids, sometimes I  need a spinal tap just to get through Monday. Thankfully he didn’t have to worry about the stint retrieval which is good because I’m pretty sure that experience would have scarred both of us.

The concert was epic. I actually felt emotional at one point because they are that good.

But the thing that I found colossally heartbreaking was the guy in front of me. He spent the entire concert taking “videos” with his i phone. He didn’t put that thing down once to see what was happening on the other side of his stupid screen. Bono in 2D is so much better.

Quite frankly, I saw 4000 of this dude’s friends doing the exact same thing. I felt like yelling, “Put your freaking phones away and open your eyes, for crying out loud this is U2!” Of course I didn’t because no one would have heard me over the awesomeness of the band. Plus I didn’t want to lose the beat or expend judging energy until after the concert.

Sometimes I think we get so tuned into how the world looks through our phone or our computer or our DVR that we completely lose the point.

Today I’m getting together with my SIL for a playdate with our kids. With this move riding up on me like a tight pair of jeans, I want to take advantage of this time to love being here in America. The parks, the hikes, the McDonald playlands…life in the USA kind of rocks.

And hey, I can take the internet with me.

(PS – For future reference, never wear stilettos to a concert when you might or might not have to walk 11 eternal blocks to the car because trains are dumb. And yeah, the last four blocks I went barefoot.)

Oops, I think I misspelled that. I meant to spell it like this, U2. Cause that’s where we’re going tonight.

In case you don’t know my husband, he’s super super cheap. We’ve been to one concert together in the past decade, Neil Diamond, and that was practically at gunpoint. He loves music and hates paying people for entertainment (unless there’s a ball involved).

But last week for his birthday he surprised me. “Honey,” he said, “I think I know what I want for my birthday. Let’s go to the U2 concert.”

He got on Cougarboard, his go to site for any and all information regarding man-related issues, and asked if anyone had tickets to sell. Luckily, some guy emailed him back and offered to sell us two tickets in row 22 at cost.

Apparently, this guy feels very strongly that U2 is a religious experience, and that profiting from the sale of these tickets would be like selling tickets to see the prophet. Bless his religious heart.

Due to Jason’s work schedule and our move, we had to give up taking a trip to Mexico this past week to see a dear life long friend of mine get hitched. I’ve been super depressed about it, so he took me to St. George and Vegas for two days so I could cry in the sun. We decided to leave the kids and the baby behind.

I repeat, we left the baby (in good hands with her sweet Aunt Hayley and Uncle Jake who looks like a Pedro with his rocking mustache).

This is the first time in her life I’ve been away from her for more than a few hours (most of which she spends sleeping) and it wasn’t easy. I was sad for at least seventeen minutes. Then we stopped for gas and both got to go inside because THERE WERE NO KIDS IN THE CAR.

During our time in Vegas, I wasn’t myself. Literally. My dear old friend (and Jason’s favorite playmate) Natasha took over for the day and acted in her usual slutty manner–outfit included.

I didn’t think this would be a problem since I wasn’t going to see anyone I know (DeNae, stop yelling at me, you know I love you), but it turns out Jason had made arrangements to meet the dude and buy the tickets.

The dude from Cougar board. The nice, religious, Mormon, family dude who would never ever think of stepping out on his wife with a trampy broad like Natasha. The same guy we’ll be sitting by tonight at the concert.

And me in my stupid stilettos.

He texted Jason to tell him he was waiting in the parking lot of the restaurant, so J handed me the keys. “Don’t worry,” he said, “He won’t even see you. Just head to the car and I’ll get the tickets from him.”

I turned and started trouncing along in my uber short shorts and deathly high heels, happy to be out of range. Happy, that is, until I saw that parked one car away from our vehicle was a suburban full of kids. And a dad. It looked like they were waiting for some…

Do I really need to tell you more?

The moral of this story is simple. Never buy U2 tickets from a nice Mormon guy if your wife is dressed like a slut because she’ll feel the need to explain herself at the concert. And if her name is Annie, she’s going to tell him and his wife way more about your life than you ever wanted anyone to know.

Happy birthday, darling!