I’m in a house at the beach with double the number of penises I usually live with. This year we’re sharing a house with our friends from Memphis, who also have three boys. One is Finn’s age and the others are four and eighteen months– precious reminders of those ages which seem so far away with my own guys. The other two families we vacation with are just across the street. It’s our own beach kibbutz.
Last year the mothers (we were all college roommates) were afraid that the oldest kids, two boys and two girls, might stop being friendly and start being romantic. We were lucky then, and this year, although the hormones have definitely increased, the twelves are primarily concerned with protecting the whereabouts of their secret hiding place, reachable only by bike. “Let’s go play cards” is code for an imminent meeting, and so far even Drew, determined teen-wannabe, hasn’t cracked it.
This is the eleventh year we’ve taken this trip, and having the two littlest boys reminds us of how far we’ve come. Was Drew really just eighteen months old the year he got stitches in his lip from a shady Doc O’ The Beach? He seemed so OLD. Remember the year we started bringing bikes without training wheels? How long have I been making this delicious bean dip we eat every evening while the adults drink and play dice games?
Traditionally we go to the beach in the morning. Porter skimboards,
the majority of the children dig and make castles,
and a few holdouts stick close to the grownups waiting for the goldfish and pretzels to come out. Goldfish served on a plastic tennis paddle
Some members of our group have amused themselves by sitting on the beach and watching the people who walk by, then determining whether they are wearing proper beachwear. Should that lady’s cleavage be more covered? Is a Speedo ever appropriate outside the Olympics? (No- our husbands deserve to see some buxomness without having to buy a magazine for that particular purpose. Yes- it is also permissible to wear a Speedo at the Olympic trials, but these are not typically held at the beach.)
Finn and I have taken a couple of walks and determined that this year’s popular beach read is The Shack, a book that I was too snobby to order when Bill asked me to because the reviews castigated its poor writing. Other reviewers have called it the greatest “guy meets God” book EVER and the beach readers appear entertained.
After so many years we’re used to each other’s idiosyncrasy’s. For example, Kimberly refuses to buy any food that contains calories. Also, she loves the beach, except for the sand. We’ve spent many years bribing children to spill sand on her pristine feet so that we can watch her freak out and them carefully de-sand herself with the Diet Dr. Pepper can of water she keeps handy just for this purpose.
I’m still practicing with my camera, and Me Ra Koh is my new hero. At BlogHer she was able to make concepts I’ve read about and struggled to understand seem easy-peasy. I’ve picked a different tip to work on each day, and I’ve filled the frame, learned to blur the background, experimented with higher and lower ISO to increase color saturation and get shots in a dimmer setting. The pictures of Drew digging and this one and the one above of Porter skim boarding were taken at a lower ISO and should have more color saturation.
I took these below of Porter on the Auto setting and they should have less saturation, although it’s hard for me to tell after a couple of glasses of wine:
Some things don’t change, whether you’re home or away. We came home from an adult evening out last night. All three of my boys had put themselves to sleep, as instructed, although Porter put his special twist on it.
Goodnight, Finn.
Goodnight, Drew.
Well, maybe not exactly as instructed. Porter is buried under those pillows, and plans to sleep in this fort for the rest of the week.
FYI, he’s still asking as many as ever. Today when we got home the lawn service was cutting the grass and I didn’t hear from the duo for at least fifteen minutes, except once when Drew ran downstairs to say, “Hey Mom, if you have to talk to us in front of the guy mowing the grass, be sure and call me ‘Fred’ and call Porter ‘Bobby.’”
“Why would I do that?” I asked.
“I don’t have time to explain– just do it, okay?” He ran back up the stairs.
During lunch (a nutritious bowl of Beef-A-Roni seasoned with Tabasco and oregano) the boys laughed about their adventures in the front yard, while I just hoped they had not driven the poor man crazy.
I gathered that they peppered him with inquiries such as “Do you like Mountain Dew” and “Have you ever fried beef jerky?”
Apparently he still has his sense of humor intact:
Beware all Glamore visitors! My boys just might talk you to death.
You all know by now that my sons are into rap, and by that I mean today’s rap, which to me sounds like nothing more than nasty talk. I could write a rap song myself, just by stringing together words like this:
“Shawty on the floor, look all sexy in that thang, wanna buy you a drank with all the green I got, while we drink champagne, and do dirty stuff that I won’t describe here but would in great detail if this were a real rap song, my boo, yeah, uh huh, I be lookin’ at you, and your booty too…”
I’ve written about the rap music before, including the awful lyrics to “Low” and “My Humps” and the fact that I let Finn teach me the Soulja Boy dance.
Maybe it’s my liberal tendencies and belief in non-censorship, or perhaps I’m a terrible mother, but I don’t think the way to handle this rap situation is to ban the music altogether. I thought I’d try a different tactic.
I figure that as long as the boys are listening to this stuff, they ought to learn about it as well, and that means going back to classic rap songs, those from back in the day when we sang “Hotel, motel, Holiday Inn,” and thought we were fly.
I want to make the boys a playlist of classic rap.
Sadly for me, the only old rap songs I can think of at all are “Rapper’s Delight” and MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This.” (You can tell I’ve been a parent for too long; I originally wrote that title as “Don’t Touch That” which isn’t half as catchy but I say it all the time in this house full of boys.)
I wasn’t concentrating on rap back in the day; I was moodily lining my eyes with kohl and following the Cure and Hoodoo Gurus and Wall of Voodoo.
So I ask you, readers, can you suggest some rap songs that are musts for this list?
And in return, I’ll take you back to the unforgettable “Mexican Radio” by Wall of Voodoo:
It’s been a while since I did a Venn diagram for you, and I’m not sure I can end it all with a penis joke as I did last time. I’ll let my subconscious work on that while I relate the thought-provoking details of this weekend’s soccer extravaganza.
There was a lot of soccer played by kids of all ages and genders in the Tiny Kingdom this weekend. While I don’t know whether anyone’s soccer skills improved, I do know that many life lessons were learned.
Porter and Drew’s soccer team played in their first tournament. Sunday’s game looked more like a Wrestling Smackdown than a soccer game. The other team was coached to play dirty, and they followed instructions well. Our goalie, who’s built like a solid fireplug, was mauled several times, and bears cleat-patterned bruises all over his body.
“Ah!” you say, “where was the referee during all of this?”
He was out on the field but served no useful purpose, as he failed to call improper throw-ins, hand balls, and goalie abuse. Apparently there were other violations which would have resulted in players getting a red card which means you are out of the game– sit on the bench immediately! but I don’t know enough about soccer to know what those rules were. The only reason I learned about hand balls is that for a time it looked like the other team had mistakenly shown up for a volleyball tournament.
The boys were understandably upset after their loss.
“They didn’t play fair,” some said.
“Why didn’t the ref call it when they shoved us?” others wondered.
But you know, in my view a big part of sports is to use them to teach the kids about life. It’s easy to teach them how to win. It’s more challenging to show them how to lose with dignity and shake the hands of the other team when tears are streaming down their faces.
There are few opportunities as blatant as this to teach one of the most important lessons of all: Life Isn’t Fair.
We can get up in the ref’s face. We can write a letter of protest and ask that this ref not be assigned to our team again, but none of this changes the loss to a win. Life Isn’t Fair, and it never will be.
Meanwhile, the females were learning lessons of their own about the intersection of sports and social engagements. There are four elementary schools in the Tiny Kingdom. A couple of sixth-grade girls at one of the other schools threw a boy-girl gala Friday night. That hasn’t happened at our school yet, but perhaps this school is maturing more quickly.
It was inevitable; the big bash coincided with a girls’ soccer game Friday night, throwing the players’ mothers into a tizzy I don’t envy. Reactions varied. Some girls who were dying to party skipped the game. Others wanted to do the same, but were reminded that they’d made a prior commitment to the team, and that both manners and character required that the first engagement be honored. Still others were thankful that the game was taking place so they didn’t have to attend the party and hang out with nasty boys. They see them enough at school anyway.
It’s doubtful I’d have been playing soccer in the 6th grade. Even if I had, I’d have been begging my mom to ditch the game in favor of the party, but I doubt she’d have given in. I’d have been clad in shin guards instead of a miniskirt, sulking all over that soccer field.
That, I presume, is why God gave me boys.
Boys who experiment with gender roles, but boys nonetheless. Finn, age 2, laden with jewelry
Porter, age 4, trying desperately for curls
Drew, age 2, in princess shoes
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I wouldn’t leave you without a penis joke after that buildup, would I?
For a while, John Wayne and Lorena Bobbit were talking about getting back together– after “the episode.” Their friends were mystified. Finally, while discussing it at length at the coffee shop one morning, an old fellow concluded, “Well, maybe he’s just not such a complete dick anymore.”
(I wrote this several months before I was to have my annual HepC test five years after my interferon treatment had ended. I’d been in remission, and the word was that if you stayed in remission for five years, you could call yourself “cured.” To see how it ended, you can click here.)
I was shocked when I heard the news about Eliot Spitzer. As the details emerged, I had a flashback to the mid 80’s that made me sick to my stomach. I’ve experienced many of the same feelings that I’m sure the Spitzer girls are now, although I didn’t have to do it under a media spotlight.
Plenty of experts have already weighed in on how a man’s adultery can affect his daughters for the long term. What he’s done doesn’t just influence the marriage—- his actions alter the entire family dynamic.
If Mr. Spitzer is going to regain his daughters’ trust, he’s going to have to ask for their forgiveness. It will take plenty of work and therapy on his part to earn it. He’ll have to be committed to working on his relationship with each daughter, and it won’t be easy.
If I had fifteen minutes to spend with the Spitzer women, I’d make sure they knew that they are all entitled to feel angry, hurt and betrayed. It’s not their job to make him feel welcome; it’s his burden to make them want to welcome him back.
I wish he’d never screwed up so royally. Now that it’s done, I am praying that he takes the high road, which is harder, as high roads tend to be, and thinks of his family first in going forward.
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A great book about putting your family first is Finishing Strong: Going the Distance for Your Family by Steve Farrar. It’s aimed at men and is written from a Christian viewpoint, but I read it every year or so as well. If any of you have recommendations for books about putting your priorities in order, let us know in the comments.
I'm Anne Glamore, wife, mother, lawyer and blogger. I have three boys, and I'm desperately trying to train them to become Southern gentlemen, but that may be an unrealistic goal. At this point I'd be ecstatic if they'd quit farting at the dinner table.
If you're new here, check out the Readers' Favorite Posts below or browse through the Categories. I write about my attempts to teach the boys about peckers and sex (which we call "making googly eyes"), my struggles with hepatitis C and spine surgery, the boys' adventures with fire and pets, my mom's death from ovarian cancer, my love of cooking (with plenty of recipes) and anything else that crosses my mind. Join me on Twitter or StumbleUpon or Email me.
To Use the Pickle Player: Click the show you want to hear, press play, sit back and enjoy. To read the show notes click HERE.
In "It's Natural" I will tell your kids about the birds and the bees, but YOU must stay in the room and perform the coital finger movements.
by Steve Farrar. It’s aimed at men and is written from a Christian viewpoint, but I read it every year or so as well. If any of you have recommendations for books about putting your priorities in order, let us know in the comments.
