background on Babyland

We first discovered the existence of Babyland when we stumbled across an old recording of something unimportant. However, in the background there was a baby singing a song. Our team of researchers worked diligently to amplify the background singing and mute the mundane mutterings in the foreground. What we heard turned out to be an epic song of valient warriors led by the heroic Baby Trudy. It went a little something like this:
"Baby Trudy from Babyland, and the water balloon brigade!
Baby Trudy from Babyland, and the water balloon brigade!
Baby Trudy from Babyland, and the water balloon brigade!
Water balloon,
Water balloon,
Water balloon,
Water BALLOON...
Brigade!!!"

We then determined that our course of action should be as follows: we should listen carefully to the babies around us and see if we could figure out what they were talking about.

We listened with our hearts... and we began to hear! Stories were told of journeys taken in race cars facing backwards in baby safety seats. Tales tumbled forth of water balloon fights that went on so long the babies' hands got pruney. Crying babies wept over the early days when there was little food in Babyland - before the nurses arranged for cooks to live in - and all they ate was Bitter Apple Stew...
There were stories of pie, dancing, dinner, and freshly baked bread with butter. And how after dinner every night the babies retire to the parlor where they play games and laugh and clap their hands. Until, one by one, they yawn and stretch. And one by one, they trundle upstairs to get into their little baby beds with white downy quilts, close their eyes, and dream... of butterflies and pear crisp, and sheep chewing bubble gum, and cows jumping over the moon.

At this point, we have a working hypothesis: Babyland is where babies live before they come here. And if we really listen, we can hear all about it.

Hope is On the Way!!

I've been thinking lately about when I was young. I believed in destiny and soulmates. I believed that I was an ancient soul who had been on the planet since the advent of time and that I had been at least partially responsible for the sinking of Atlantis. My goal in this life was to bring something fantastic to fruition on the planet.
But first I needed to lose weight and grow my hair long.

I was saddened by the fact that my soulmates - yes there were more than two and yes I realized that I had been wrong about the first three - were dating other people. It was ok though, because I knew their souls and I knew that they loved me even though they thought they loved their girlfriends. So I hung on their every word listening for the hints that would indicate their true feelings for me. And I knew that they would recognize who I really was just as soon as I lost weight and grew my hair long.

The first step in the process of achieving my ultimate goal - and fufilling my destiny - was to get the world's attention. Then everybody would be listening when I gave them the enlightening fantastic universal news bulletin. That meant I needed to become a famous movie star. Quickly. And in order to attain that status, I really needed to get on the ball about losing weight and growing my hair long.

I guess what I'm doing here is offering you - the world - an apology. I am sure the message would've come through if I'd managed to get organized about the whole thing. But unfortunately I've been consistently stuck on level one. I was thin with long hair in my mid twenties for about 3-4 years but sadly I was pretty self obsessed and forgot all about saving humanity.

Sorry.

The good news is that I've recommitted to growing my hair long and I am really going to try to stop eating at night. So within about a year (fingers crossed) I'll be back on track to becoming a famous movie star and then I'll be able to, you know, tell you all what I was planning to. And it should help.

Something is Amisssss in Babyland

Something has happened somewhere in Babyland and all of the nurses put together have not been able to figure out what it is. But they know something's been done - something not right - because all of the babies are hiding when called. When found, they look sheepish. So far, Horowitz is claiming the 2nd. (That's the Babyland ammendment that states that any baby capable of defending other babies in court doesn't have to say anything even if he or she knows exactly what happened because it might come up later in an issue of attorney / client priviledge. This ammendment was ratified shortly before the missing shoe mystery was discovered to have happened.)
When babies break the rules, the nurses can tell because they all get a peculiar expression on their soft sweet faces of waiting to be caught. Please see the following example:

The Bakery is strangely devoid of patrons and the Library is filled with stage whispers of babies hidden in the shelves of picture books and behind the puppet stage.
This reporter took the liberty of placing a mini tape recorder inside one of the puppets and was able to discern the following discussion between two unknown little ones:
"They took it. Why are we hiding?"
"They said they'd frame us if we told."
"But what does that mean?"
"I don't know. But I don't want it."
"Did they eat it?"
"Yes."
"Did they share it?"
"No."
"What's this?"
"A tape recorder."
"Did they put it there?!"
"Don't even touch it!!"
"We must run!"
The soft sound of baby bare feet running away followed.*

Well, whatever was taken, we know that "they" ate it. And I, for one, hope it was edible.
Updates will be forthcoming as information becomes available.

*Note: if anyone has any information regarding the disappearance of my tape recorder within the past few minutes while I was writing this article, please contact the offices of the Babyland Gazette. You know who you are. Baby Trudy.

conversations with my children

On boundaries:

My son was quite clear with me the other day as I was rocking him in the chair. "DON'T Flinnnnnnn!" he ennunciated. "DON'T Pannuuuuuuu!"
???
Now we have a song about it.
Don't Flinnnnn, Don't Pannuuuuuu...
Don't Flinnnnn, Don't Pannuuuuuu...
If you flin, but don't panuuuu
thats not an improooooooooov-
Ment.
So Don't Flinnnnnn,
and never Pannuuuuu...

And growing up:
My daughter was thinking aloud in the car today.
"If I was born already knowing everything that adults know and being able to do what adults do," she said, "then... I would buy my own house and get dressed by myself."
"Wow." I said. "Then I would have to find something else to do with my time, since it's my job to teach you how to do things."
"Yeah. Then you would have to find another baby."
"No" I responded. "I'd just stand back and watch you and applaud."

This conversation made me realize that I was going to have to figure out my own path again at some point in the next 13 years.

The interaction with my son, on the other hand, made me realize... I shouldn't ever Pannnuuuuu. Or Flinnnnn.

Orange Geraniums

I strive for elegance but often overshoot the mark and end up striving for excellence. And I fail.
Sometimes that leaves me so deflated that I greet the morning with a sense of overwhelm and despair. I would love to meet the dawn with a smile and an expectation of good things. Rarely, I do. I have a role model for this ideal: my Granny Boggild.

She was tall and thin and always well put together. She wore orange cable knit cardigans with pearls, and sat in her wing back chair in front of her stone fireplace, knitting and watching tennis on her small television with the view of the lake behind it. In the window boxes that lined her wooden deck, she'd planted orange and yellow geraniums. I should probably add that she also wore pants, usually cream coloured, lest you get the wrong image stuck in your mind.
As time passes since Granny's passing, I realize that I remember her in colours: her blue and white bedroom, her silky light sweaters of orange, pale blue, or brilliant deep green. Her cottage was beige and olive green with accents of color here and there. Her hair was light reddish brown until the day she died at 92 years old.
Yellow painted wicker chairs sat in the screened in porch on the green painted wooden floor. We would sit together there and knit and drink Earl Grey tea while discussing other people who we really hoped would get their lives together.
Her kitchen glowed deep yellow with a red and black rooster lamp on her tiny wooden table for two. Long ago we perched there together on chilly mornings eating slightly burnt whole wheat toast with homemade strawberry jam when it was too early for my Mom and brother to get up. Later I sat there holding my cocker spaniel puppy, talking to her about my life and my puppy and she smiled and shook her head in advance sympathy and told me how it's so hard, we get so attatched to our puppies. She was right.
Not so long ago I sat there trying to burn the image of her and her kitchen into my brain. I did that with all of the rooms in her cottage and boathouse. I knew that she would leave us, it would all be changed and if I let it, it would fade.

Happy Birthday Granny. I bet that even if Heaven was all white when she arrived, it's got orange geraniums now.