throwing clothes away
The most remarkable thing about our flight from Los Angeles to Paris wasn’t that it was 11 hours, but rather that we made it a record 10 hours and 24 minutes before Maya threw up on me.
Walking after dinner at our favorite restaurant Al-Ajami
Really, I have to commend myself for keeping calm. A few years ago an episode like this would have had me in tears! But this time I held it together pretty well.
I held Maya’s barf bag too. I also held her hair back, cleaned her up the best I could, refrained from yelling at Ali to keep his “useful” suggestions to himself (why does he insist that drinking water is the cure all to everything?), and I somehow kept my own gagging to myself.
Oh, and I ignored the glares of other disgusted passengers (yes, Mr. Business Traveler in the Gucci loafers, I timed her motion sickness so she’d vomit on landing. Just to annoy you).
Giant Christmas tree at the gorgeous Galeries Lafayette
Now here’s where things got sketchy: What to do with Maya’s dirty clothes?
I obviously couldn’t pack her ruined clothes in my luggage and I had no plans to hand carry such items through customs, into a taxi, and then into our hotel room.
Window display at Printemps
So with no other options I put Maya’s spare outfit on and left the dirty stuff in the custody of Air France Flight 069.
I know. I totally contradict myself. I mean, why do I fear throwing away food but I have no problem throwing Maya’s perfectly good shirt and sweater into the trash? I make no sense sometimes – I realize that.
Maya sat down in a chair at Printemps and was asleep 5 minutes later.
But if there’s one thing I’ve learned about being a parent it’s that you just have to let some things go.
And so I did.
au-revoir
For Christmas this year, all I wanted were some answers.
I wanted to know:
- Why a normal person needs four knives to put a snack together.
- Why Ali criticizes my cooking concoctions but thinks it’s okay to eat a sandwich containing honey, peanut butter, jelly and butter?
- Why my husband ate this sandwich an hour after he devoured the homemade waffles, scrambled eggs, and hash browns I slaved over?
- If it simply doesn’t occur to my husband to put his dish (and four knives) in the dishwasher.
- If he thinks I enjoy cleaning the kitchen 10 times a day?
- If he thinks I’m a nag. Because I think I’m a nag.
- If he even has a clue that I took this picture.
As I’m sure you’ve guessed, I got no answers for Christmas.
But as you read this I am on a 11 hour flight to Paris right now. So I guess we’ll have plenty of time to discuss.
mickey d’s
Although I claimed it would never happen, I knew that in my heart of hearts it would. Eventually. And it did.
Yesterday, Maya ate lunch at McDonald’s.
Yes, I realize that until yesterday Maya was the only 6-year-old in America who hadn’t had the pleasure of eating processed and sub-par fast food in a less than savory environment. But after pondering two approaches to the situation at hand I knew that my options were minimal.
Scenario 1: I question Maya’s Winter Camp coordinator’s decision to take the kids on a field trip to an ice skating rink and then to McDonald’s afterwards. I unsuccessfully hide my annoyance that she won’t reconsider a less offensive lunch alternative. I consequently earn her annoyance and become known as “that uptight mom” among all the other teachers. Maya gets to be known as “that uptight mom’s deprived kid” and teachers alternatively feel sorry for her and dread getting her in their class, knowing that they’ll have to deal with me. Maya inevitably experiences backlash from my actions and then hates me. She drains her therapy fund, can’t function as a normal human being, and consequently lives with us forever.
Dinner was not at McDonald's but at the Grove in West Hollywood. Instead of a side of fries we had a lovely view of the fountain show, complete with fake snow, Santa, his sled, and an eerily authentic Rudolph with a red light for a nose.
Scenario 2: I give Maya an apple for breakfast to counteract the big bowl of grease she’ll be eating in a few hours, I hand her a $5 bill with a warning that she should not, under any circumstances, go near a soda fountain, and I feel secure in the knowledge that one meal at McDonald’s is worth not having Maya living with me when she’s 45.
Choices are really just the lesser of two evils in disguise. I realized that today.
While I'm not going to win Mother/Wife of the Year Award anytime soon, I haven't killed anyone yet or shot myself in the head. And that, my friends, is how I calculate success these days. 
FANCY THAT FANCY THIS 