Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes

No internet. That’s good. I was just about to go fiddle around on there instead of writing in my only few minutes to spare today, Jack is watching The Lego Show and Fiona is in the bath, it’s been quite a week. Wait, it’s almost halfway into the next week. Days blend into one another, weekends don’t change for me as far as needed engagement in life, lives of others. I wonder about the other moms at the gymnastics class that yell down from the observation deck “That way lily”  and before they get that out they yell the kids name a gazillion times trying to get their attention, “Lily, Lily, Lily” distracting all the other kids, so pretty soon all the kids are yelling up “Hi Mommy” and half the kids aren’t paying attention to the coach, so then all the moms start shouting down to all their kids and it’s extremely annoying. How do they have the energy to be engaged with their kid even when they shouldn’t be?  Fiona does great at gymnastics, she listens to all the directions and pays close attention to the coach. Fiona can’t hear and listens to directions better than Jack. Jack takes a while to warm up, even on his second visit today. He started sucking his thumb. Finally, he jumps in, but not reserved -no- balls to the walls, skips the listening part 50% of the time. “Slow Down Jack, you’re gonna get hurt” the Coach says over and over. “I can do it by myself” He tells her when she gives him direction on a backwards roller move. “No Jack, I’ll help you” she tells him. He finally listens. I had to not yell “Listen to the teacher Jack” from the observation deck, that would be inappropriate. I’m not like the other moms. I study my sign, they look at smart phones, in between watching their kids and telling them which way to run. At home, after Fiona got home from school I was trying to spend time with her, Jack immediately started acting out; grabbing her toys we were playing with, not listening when I said “NO”, being obnoxious. “I have to go put away the groceries” I tell them. “Play nice, keep your hands to yourself.” The groceries have been sitting in the hall since Jack and I got home, I haven’t had time to put them away yet. I’m carrying up the last set of bags and I hear a door slam, over and over again, then a bang and a cry. I run down, there’s a big gap between the first cry, it’s quiet, that’s usually a bad sign. Jack has a bright red bruise slash across the bridge of his nose, it looks painful. My paintings on the floor, he slammed the door so hard the painting fell off the wall and whacked him in the face. He’s so full of energy and moodiness. He’s shy and gregarious. He’s super sweet, caring, and loving, but difficult. He fell asleep and Fiona and I had a nice rest. When he woke up he told me he slammed the door on purpose, to keep Fiona out of the room. “It could have been your eye” I said, “It could have been Fionas’ hand”. I don’t know, I’m afraid he’s going to be the kind of kid that does dumb stuff, out of frustration or for thrills. I can’t wait till Thursday and Friday to get some time in my studio. I’m going to do my radio interview this week and I have a talk I’m doing at the gallery on Saturday. Things to look forward to outside of the world of Motherhood.