Writing has been hard lately.

My recovery from pneumonia got set back some by a bout with bronchitis because nothing can be simple. I’m doing much better now–a combination of prednisone and codeine have got me basically back to normal functionality–but up to this point, it’s been something of a wringer. I couldn’t even make a lap around Target without getting exhausted, so I spent the last six weeks going absolutely stir crazy, having to rely on Kyle to do grocery runs and help with the kids. And that has, of course, thrown off the equilibrium of the house as a whole–he’s stayed home to take care of both us and his own bronchitis, so we haven’t really had any “normal” weeks since the year began.

Which is probably bad for Sam.

But anyway. Writing has been hard because I’m both exhausted and bored. That’s not to say that life with a four-year-old and almost-one-year-old twins is boring, per se, just that it’s not interesting. A lot happens, but it’s not very thought-provoking stuff unless you’re coherent enough to turn your children’s attempts at mobility into a metaphor for life, which I am not.

Instead, I just report. Isaac is about as mobile as he can be without properly crawling, and has realized that he can pull himself up on things, which means that our usual repositories for the household stuff have ceased to be safe. With Sam, this meant an immediate rush to clean everything, but because I’ve been so sick and Kyle’s been so sick, it’s been more of a slouch in the direction of cleanliness and a lot of “hey, don’t touch that!”

Carrie is about as immobile as she can be and still be an almost-one-year-old, because twins are opposites sometimes. We’ve had her evaluated by both her pediatrician and early intervention, and I don’t think anything is wrong with her, per se, just that she’s less eager to learn new things than Isaac, at least when it comes to mobility. She’s still an amazing communicator, but she’s not interested in crawling or scooting or pulling herself up when she can just grab a toy right here and bang it on the floor and be perfectly content.

Isaac, meanwhile, while not a bad communicator, doesn’t quite have her finesse. Even without her using English words, it’s pretty easy to figure out what Carrie is trying to communicate–between gestures, tone, and syllables, she’s really good there. Isaac… eh, not so much. He whimpers and whines in a similar tone for most problems, where Carrie’s whine changes depending on what she needs or wants.

And Carrie has had a second evaluation from early intervention and is now getting physical therapy twice a month in addition to her once a month general therapy. We have exercises to do with her, but the problem is that she refuses to do them with us, or with me at least. One of the exercises involves having her sit on my thigh while using the other leg to hold her feet down so that she has to balance with her core muscles instead of resting against someone or something, but if I’m the one holding her, she immediately wrenches herself out of that position to cling to me.

And I mean. I’m not made of stone. I can only cope with her doing that so many times before I give the fuck up.

I know she’ll get there, just like Isaac did. When he was very wee, he was the one lagging behind in movement, but once he hit around four months, he soared ahead. Now it’s Carrie’s turn to lag.

(see what I mean? Not boring, but not interesting; it’s all very routine)

And then there’s Sam in the day to day. He’s still very much himself, still my little bundle of clever energy and love. We are counting down the minutes until he starts kindergarten, both eagerly and nervously, on both his and our parts.

I’d thought, for a heartbeat, about redshirting him (for those not in the know, this does not mean sending him down to a hostile planet with Captain Kirk as a necessary no-name sacrifice; it DOES mean holding him back in preschool a year to make sure he’s emotionally ready for a kindergarten that’s very different from what I remember it being), both for his excessive energy and for his lingering potty training issues (in short, and without too much depth: pooping in the toilet is a hurdle much higher than we realized it would be). I’d thought about it, and then I realized it wouldn’t go well for him. He’s still got a few hurdles to jump over, but they aren’t ones that he can’t reach, and intellectually, he’s more than ready to move forward.

He’s adding and subtracting, he’s doing a little bit of multiplication. He’s sounding out words, slowly but surely. He can write his name and a few other words, he draws good representative pictures, he can mostly remember the plot of a movie or story when asked about it. He’s curious still about science and nature, and I hope that sticks with him. I think he’s ready.

Just. You know. Kindergarten is so DIFFERENT now. When I went, back in 1987-1988, most of the learning was the stuff he’s going over in preschool–letters, numbers, colors, days of the week. Very basic stuff. And lots of playtime and naptime (I got to skip naptime because I could already read, so I spent naptime in the first grade class, learning to read better). Now it’s like… all the grades have been shuffled and kids are expected to be tiny adults before they even hit middle school. And that’s what makes me nervous.

…fun kindergarten stories to distract from my nerves.

NUMBER ONE. My kindergarten was in an extension of a church, and our only play area was near the cemetery next to the church. We used to play in that cemetery, which was honestly so green and enchanted, until somebody broke a headstone–not someone in our class, but somebody.

NUMBER TWO. We had a tally behavior system, and the only unfair tally I received, at least in my mind, was when some other kids in the class decided to hide behind a car instead of going inside at recess (how the teacher missed them, I’ll never know) and I stayed behind to tell them that they should go inside. When they didn’t listen, my guilty heart sent me to go and tell the teacher what was going on, and I got in trouble–both for not coming in with the rest of the class and for tattling (??). I am still not over this injustice.

NUMBER THREE. Because the school was about forty minutes from where we lived, I’d ride there with my dad in the morning and ride home with my mom in the afternoon. My dad drove a little red Toyota Corolla, and I would sit in the front seat and sing along to Amy Grant tapes with him (because back then, children could sit in the front seat; it was a different time). My mom drove a blue Monte Carlo with my brother and sister in the back seat, and her car broke down approximately every fifteen seconds or if you sneezed funny. Every afternoon, we’d listen to the radio, and while I remember exactly nothing else of what we listened to, I remember hearing Bobby Darin’s “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” at the same time every day, and it was awesome.

Anyway, back to my nerves. I don’t want Sam to be overwhelmed, is what I’m getting at. I don’t define success as necessarily having fantastic grades or being class president or anything; if he attains that stuff, great, but I’m more concerned with that he’s progressing and that he’s doing what he needs to do in order to progress. And I want to make sure he doesn’t lose a love of learning. I’m afraid that entering a more structured class environment will be rough for him there, but at the same time, I also don’t feel like I’d be able to give him what he needs by homeschooling him (which I used to dream about doing, but now that I’ve got three kids, ELL OH ELL). He’s a REALLY social kid–he needs people, loves people. And even if I brought him to co-ops and homeschooling groups, I don’t know that I could provide what he needs in that sense.

So we’ll see what happens. I think he’ll be okay; he’s a resilient enough kid, and we’re a pretty good support system, if I do say so myself (I do), but.

Well, you know. I’m a mom. I worry.

But at the same time, there’s not a lot I can do at the moment. I’m talking to his teachers, asking if they think he’s ready. I’ll talk with the kindergarten principal. I’ll see what we can expect. And then I’ll buckle the fuck up.

In the meantime, the twins are turning one in less than a month, which is its own level of surreal. I had all these enormous plans for their birthday party that are kind of puttering now because of how sick I’ve been and the way I’ve been side-eyeing our finances (we thought we’d be getting a pretty decent tax return, but then student loans). Now it’s turning into more of a “well, we’ll all hang out and eat pie” party than anything else. Which, you know. They’re one.

I have no idea what, if anything, to get them. We still have most of our baby toys from when Sam was that age (we are terrible and need to do a toy purge, but Sam still plays with so much of it? So it’s weird?), so they’re not really lacking for anything. I guess probably I’ll end up getting them some leash backpacks, for when they do start walking (I use leashes on my toddlers, and I am so not ashamed, because it’s SO much easier than trying to make them hold your hand and reduces the overall number of meltdowns). Clothes. Maybe some plushes–Sam’s favorite lovey is a stuffed dog that Kat got him for his first birthday.

And then there will be Sam’s birthday, which is even more intimidating because he wants a party this year (specifically, a pirates-and-Star Wars party). Our house is definitely not set up for a party, even assuming maximum cleanliness of both the house and the front and back yards, solely because we have no parking. We share an easement with our next door neighbors (to everyone’s chagrin) and our driveway is really narrow, so if we did have anyone come and visit, they’d have to leave in reverse order that they came, which is just inconvenient for everyone.

Part of me wants to see about doing Sam’s party At A Place (like all the cool kids did when I was in school, and it was usually the roller skating rink, and this is making me sound so old), but another part of me is like “that costs money!” and then I feel bad. We’re verging on out of the woods in terms of financial stress, but we’re not quite to a point yet where I can drop a bunch of money for a party At A Place.

But we’re also not at a point–and won’t be, unless we ever move–where we can have a party at home.

Grumble grumble sigh. I want to give him a good party. I want to give my kids great birthdays. But it’s… hard.

Like writing.