The Octopus and the Mermaid

I was thinking about the parents at school, cause I was at a volunteer thank-you luncheon where they served like twelve (okay, two) kinds of cheesecake at 10 in the morning and of course I had EVERYTHING, and all the other cakes too because being a volunteer means you're really hungry for cake and watermelon. And Lilly was having her third of an all-day series of breakdowns because she stayed up too late on her birthday yesterday and then got up early to see Emma's dance at school, and Lilly has reached her breaking point, she is only a frail and newly 5 years old, so when her Transformer isn't transforming back into the car shape at 10 a.m., there is hell to pay and that involves dissolving into tears and falling on the floor, even in front of people. But then somebody gave her a lollipop, god bless their cavity-loving soul, because that bought me a half an hour of eating all those cakes. But what I was REALLY going to write about was how it's weird how the parents and teachers have husbands or wives that just DON'T match up. Like the very cool, fat rock and roll teacher with the skinny husband. Every time I see him, I can't believe he's still alive, she's so substantial, and her love, even just walking TOWARDS him, just based on physics, must have force and gravity and he's like, built like dorm furniture. I just see splintered wood. Or the athletic dad who used to be a pro baseball player, and his kids go to our school, and the wife is like, a sea serpent. Like short, and nice, but she slithers, all these tentacles and wide, like the octopus that took down the Nautilus in 2,000 Leagues Under the Sea. People just marry below them, or maybe the octopus is way more interesting than the baseball player, it's just movies always focus on the dream hero, so that's who we think we're rooting for, when in reality, most of us are the octopus that gets knifed by Prince Eric's ship in The Little Mermaid and dies a spectacularly watery death. The goo and the slithering is just so unsettling. Of course we'd rather all be the baseball hero. So clean, and cheery. Lilly came down the hall yesterday morning in her tye-dye t-shirt she slept in, and her morning hair, still half-sleep stumbling, with a big smile on her face saying "I'm the birthday girl." Right into my arms. I just picked her up in the middle of making breakfast and lunches, on a school morning in June, and my eyes got all teary because this is the stuff you stop for, holding your baby on her birthday, when she just wakes up and there is the possibility of all those presents coming on that day. The octopus and the mermaid. And then Nathan got in trouble at school for having water balloons and a laser pointer in the class where the teacher already hates him, and I had to try and be a responsible parent when the Vice Principal calls me and reads me his list of criminal charges and Nathan will have to be in detention at lunch and I think detention, that's where the fat girl learns all her songs in "Hairspray." But then I really like the VP, he's tall and gangly, loves the kids, and has a really cool vibe, my friend Tina even said she saw him walking by the school and almost crashed her car looking at him instead of where she was going. It's not that he's so handsome, it's just that I think he's probably 27. So then I swore I wouldn't lecture Nathan and then there I was acting like a cranky old nun cackling what Not To Do, so I tried to quiet myself and let him understand mistakes, and be 11, and trust us, trust him. Love him. And Emma rubbed my feet the other day with lotion, and she is really really good. We were watching "I Dream of Jeannie"'s, and I told her of my secret love for Roge, the hapless neigbor who wants to have a Jeannie. I love the bumblers. And then Emma did her dance at school, in black and white, in a black tie, to "Men in Black" (how many movie references can I get in one blog?), looking like a tough g-man, and she and her friend Lauren are at the front, leading 60 kids in the dance, in front of all the million parents gathered in the courtyard, and her team is a unified block, she is a lead dancer, and I'm thinking oh my god, she's a lead dancer. She's a great, great leader. And she's beautiful, and funny. The Octopus, the Dancer, the Mermaid, and the Criminal. And Saint Barry. I will put pictures in here.