Spiritual Warfare

A lot has changed for us since my last posting. The Wife found a job and we moved to a smaller downstairs unit in order to save some money on rent. Unfortunately our new upstairs neighbors are something short of unbearable. It's not uncommon for them to play basketball inside their unit filling our living room with rhythmic a "thump, thump, thump. thump". Lately they've taken to throwing trash out of their balcony which lands in our patio... from the mundane items like discarded children's toys to the outright foul like used tissues.

We tried a few solutions to get them to stop this behavior:

1. We asked them to stop... "fuck you" was their response.

2. We called the cops... They don't throw parties until 3am anymore.

3. Collected and left their trash on their front door... They think it's some sort of game and threw it back.

Recently though, I discovered the answer. Jesus. Well, Christian praise music anyways. When it begins playing (our music is on a big random loop, we never know what we're gonna hear, it could be Jewel crooning "jingle bells" in the middle of summer) they close their doors and windows and retreat inside.

Jesus, not only does he save souls but sanity as well.

Toys

My father is always quick to point out how easy I have had it here in the U.S. He grew up immediately following the Korean War and watched his family's fortunes rise and fall like the tide. For most of his life, this meant poverty or at the very least, a daily struggle to move forward in life. Small things that I and my son take for granted, like store bought toys were a luxury that my father never experienced for himself but was determined for me to have. 

So growing up, while I never always got what I wanted, I never had to go without. The food I wanted to eat, the toys I wanted to have, in some way I always got those things. So there was that emotional legacy, my father provided for me that which he couldn't have himself. And in many ways I recognize this is the dream that all parents have for their children... for them to pass us, to achieve what we could not, to own what we could not, to validate our time here. 

Of course, I see that now, I understand that now, but when I was a child I was always furiously wanting. The more toys I could cram into my room the better, my shelves, illuminated by the soft yellow glow of my night light, transformed into a war zone where robots, soldiers and monsters waged a fierce and deadly battle. But my parents were not rich and even if they were to have come into money, I doubt they would have spoiled me in the way that I craved. And growing up, what I craved most of all, were transforming robots. Not transformers, but "Valkyries" from my favorite show "Macross". I begged them for these toys but these toys weren't just hard to find they were expensive. I never quite got what I wanted but I did get toys that were close, a repaint Transformer called "Jetfire" that I would take everywhere and have grand adventures with. But always, in the back of my mind, I recognized that Jetfire was not a Valkyrie and that the autobot symbol on his chest was an abomination. 

Years later, long after the plastic on Jetfire had grown yellow and brittle and passed away into legend and glory I found that those valkyries which I had so longed for as a child had been reborn. And I, wishing desperately to heal that valkyrie shaped hole in my heart have scrapped and collected and amassed a collection that embarrasses the me that is today but warms the heart of the 8 year old me, the me that always wanted and yearned but was never fulfilled. 

So today, these toys sit on my shelves in places of honor. The Baby looks up at them and asks to play with them and sometimes I let him hold them and smile as he pretends to fly them through the air, making swooshing sounds, knowing that my dreams live on through him, that some part of what I am, who I was, lives on through him, that chain unbroken. And I know that one day, one day soon, he'll ask when those valkyries will be his, so he too can love them and wage fierce battles on worlds that live only in imagination. When that day comes, I'll sit him in my lap, hug him and tell him, "When you get a job son, when you get a job."

Feeding Daddy

Two years ago I went in for a routine physical and mentioned that I get heart arrhythmia from time to time. Mostly when I go without sleep for a day so the doctor wasn't worried but ran the blood work anyways. The results were good, apparently my diet of cheeseburgers, bacon cheeseburgers and fried chicken wasn't working out for me and I was ordered to diet and do something called, "exercise". So here we are today and I haven't had fried chicken in a year or so but decided to try the new KFC "grilled chicken". 

The results were disapointing. I'm not sure what their grilling process is, but I suspect it takes place in the same pressure cooker as their regular chicken as it feels and seems to have just as much grease as their fried counterparts. What they lack from their older cousins is the taste. It's just bland, bland greasy chicken. So... all of the heart stopping fat of their regular chicken, none of the flavor. 

Hungry Hungry Daddy

The Baby's terrible two's started more close to 3 and for the most part, I don't mind. He's figuring out himself and what he wants and that's a good thing. I do mind when it comes to food though. I've sat around enough people in various reasons who don't like certain foods or make little faces or are constantly asking, "what's in that?" to know... well, I hate those people. It's food, that's what's in that. 

For a while, our trick with the "little trees" worked fine but no longer. Recently he's begun informing us when he's had too many vegetables passed to his plate and by too many, I mean one. And by "one" I mean a tiny speck of green the size of the finger nail on his baby finger. He's more than happy to eat vegetables that have been battered and deep fried but as it's my goal not to see him on a day time talk show, we keep pushing on him such appetizing foods as blanched soy bean sprouts. 

Today we both finally reached out breaking points. He with the soy bean sprouts and he signified his intolerance by making little gagging noises at the table and refusing to feed himself. Suddenly he was 4 months old again and wasn't quite sure what to do with those appendages at the ends of his arms. And I, well, I had had enough with gagging sounds, whimpering and little 3 year olds who had forgotten how to use those appendages at the ends of their arms. 

First I tried the bribery, elaborate promises of the great out doors and plunder in the form of new train track extensions. It was a bit like negotiating with the North Koreans, ply them with gifts, get suckered in by their enthusiastic agreement to terms and then frustration as they continue to do nothing. Then came the threats, promises to remove his new Gordon train and Cranky and all manner of toy trains and their accompanying accouterments. Tears welled up but food remained unchewed, unswallowed and hands stayed limply prone at the side. 

So here we are, 5 hours later. The unwanted food lies in the sink and the Baby lies laying on the floor weak and listless from hunger. His feeble cries for milk, cheerios, fish crackers, and dinner rolls met with sharp and quick rebuke. And I, feeling sorry for the little guy, have also forsworn food as it seems too cruel to enjoy food while the little one sups only on water. 

But soon it will be dinner and we'll see how long this hunger strike lasts. I'm willing to wait it out. A kid free of food snobbery is worth the dizzying pangs of hunger. 

Hangin' On

That would be us, only the squirrel looks far more comfortable than us. Three months down and still no work. 

Our Deepest Fears

Fear is something that's been peddled around a lot this past decade or so. Fear of the unknown, fear of people who pray to different gods or speak in different languages or who love differently. We've done a lot, or condoned a lot in the name of fear... choosing to grasp onto that which makes us different rather than that which unifies us. I try not to live my life according to fear but having a small person in training under my care has changed that in many ways. 

When Aidan was born the first fear was that he had all his proper bits and pieces not too many bits and certainly not too few pieces. Then he flunked his hearing test and that launched a year long fear that he was deaf. Then when we realized he wasn't we picked a new fear, autism, and I would carefully watch to see if he laughed or made eye contact or arranged his toys in certain ways. These fears were so consuming that regular fears like not feeding him shellfish until after his first birthday escaped us and our undeaf, unautistic baby boy was happily munching on shrimp shu mai long before he turned one. 

As he got older our fears turned to corners and bright green fluids that look like something yummy but definitely were not. We managed not to wrap our apartment in foam but we did put child safety locks on every cabinet and drawer. With every milestone we discover a new fear and we're faced yet again with that choice of whether to conquer it or to give in to it. Do we sleep with the window's open or do we put up iron bars?

At least, that's how the fear manifests for me. For my still unemployed Wife the fear comes in her worrying over finding a job. Endlessly searching through job listings and in constant communication with colleagues and former coworkers she struggles over the fear of being homeless of having to sell off our possessions and move back in with our parents. So she locks herself away in the spare room, studies technical manuals and emails strangers hoping for that one lead at that one company who wants her just as much as she wants them. 

For our son, his fears are different. He fears falling into the toilet while he goes to the bathroom. He fears being left alone or having to sleep alone. He demands that we hold on to his leg while he sleeps and in the middle of the night, he'll blindly flail around with his hands to make sure we're still there. He fears he won't have enough to eat and he jealously guards his food and shrieks, "MINE!" when I try to grab one of his crackers. But mostly though, he's deeply afraid of being eaten. 

I guess it all started when he was a wee little baby. I would playfully nibble on his little cute hands and say, "I'm going to eat you!" and he would squeal and laugh. Little did I know I was sowing seeds of fear and terror. 

The other day the Wife and Aidan when to a well known resturant that features a large anthropomorphic mouse as a mascott. The picture at the start of this entry is from that trip. As you can see, Aidan is not having fun. Later that night I asked him about his visit and he was enthused and excited as he told me of the whack-a-mole game and stuffing his face with pizza. But when I asked him about the big mouse he got quiet and it almost seemed as if he got physically smaller. 

I hugged him and asked him what was the matter but he just pulled closer to me and looked down and away and wouldn't say anything. I asked him if he was scared of the mouse and in the smallest whisper, a whisper that was barely more than a chilled breath, a whisper that made my heart sink, he said "...yeah...".

I hugged him closer, "What's wrong? Why did the mouse scare you? You like little mice, right?"

He looked up at me. His eyes conveyed a desperateness, the sort of pleading cry for security that only the very young can convey to the people they trust fully and in that same hushed quiet still voice said, "... mouse eat me..."

"Mouse eat you?" I asked... choking back the bales of laughter.

"...yeah..." he whispered. He was serious, he was in the grips of his fear, as he looked away I could see the flash of a pain and shame so deep and so earnest. I held him as the laughter bubbled it's way out of the deep darkness of my soul. 

"The mouse doesn't eat you." I comforted him as my face broke into a big cheshire grin. The guffaws came, there was nothing I could do. 

"Mouse eats me." he said again all earnest and sad and more than a little hurt that I didn't believe him. 

An Allegory for the Trinity

My son loves the Pixar movie Cars, if we let him, he'll watch and rewatch that movie all day long... happily and contently the way some people pray or meditate. 

As with any religion, Baby is completely taken with the central character, Lightning McQueen, and owns shoes, books and numerous toys engraved with his image. When we bought him his first McQueen car, a small matchbox style diecast car, he was in love. He would take that little car everywhere always clutching it tightly in his little hands. His love was so perfect that he would clutch that little toy car as he slept. So when he lost it we realized there was only one thing we could do... we rushed out and bought another McQueen car for him. This one was larger in hopes that it would be harder to lose. Eventually Baby's aunt learned of his devotion and for Christmas he received a Lego type McQueen car a present. It was around this time we also found the first toy car that fallen behind his changing table. 

So now he has three cars, each the same yet unique. And each car has a special purpose and fills a unique need. The first car, the smallest one, he calls "Baby McQueen car". It is this car that accompanies his on his outings. Small enough to slip into his pocket he carries Baby McQueen with him everywhere. The larger diecast McQueen car has no special name and it stays in his room. The rear axle is bent and the car doesn't roll freely and often it gets neglected. Hidden under books, tossed in with other toys but it's always there for him should he go looking. The final McQueen car, " 'eggo McQueen" is the toy that he loves the most dearly. This is the one he can take apart and re-arrange. When he decided the aggressively portrayed eyes were scarey, he took them off. When he decided he liked them, he put them back on. Sometimes McQueen shares parts with the 'Mater and for a while he sported a little police siren from another set. But it's always " 'eggo McQueen" and Baby looks for this toy when he sleeps and even in the middle of the night his little hand gropes around in the dark searching for the comforting touch of the cool plastic.