About six inches below the bread line

I'm thrilled to announce I have my first paid writing job.

I spent two hours the other day writing an article, taking some original photos and submitting it (you can read it here).  For that I will earn $1.25 a month for the next 24 months.

Yes, you read that correctly.  $30 over the next 2 years. Score.

You see, Mr Sensible came home the other day and suggested in his rather off-hand way that maybe I should get a job.  Well, he didn't say it quite like that, he merely pointed out that Young Aunty was earning a respectable income tutoring students at university and I was.. well, earning nothing.

So I did what any self-respecting job seeker should do, and I sought on Seek.  Incredibly enough there were three positions for writers in Perth, and since I had no experience in the finance sector and didn't want full time work, the only one remaining was a reviewing position for Weekend Notes (no, I hadn't heard of it either).  Their basic premise is: do something on the weekend and write about it. 

So I applied, I was accepted and now I am their 16th ranked writer (not bad since I was ranked 56th when I first started... my first piece must have been a hell of a good one).  My goal is to get in the top 10 within 8 weeks (apparently they get offered the free stuff to review). 

So here I am, finally, a honest to god, paid writer.  Now I figure all I have to do is write another 199 this week and every week thereafter, and I will be earning a decent wage.

*****
The more people who read my stories the better my ranking will be, so feel free to swing by once in a while and see what I am writing about.  I have just submitted a piece on birthday parties for kids, with any luck it will be up in a couple of days.

Oral Delivery

The Blonde Bombshell is almost as preoccupied with 'another baby' as I am.

She keeps coming out with random little comments: on the way to Kindy, in the bath, at the dinner table.  I am not constantly talking about having another child, although if she brings the topic up, I am happy to discuss it with her.  But only briefly, as her sense of time at the age of 4 is completely non-existent and I don't want to spend the next 9 (or 12 or 15) months listening to 'is the baby coming today?'.  She talked about being a baby 'last week', most things happened 'yesterday' (including Christmas), and 'next week' when she is 18 she will be 'painting her hair red like Mummy's'.  You see my point?

So last night on the way to the bath, as she was dancing around in her knickers with a wand in one hand and doll in the other I had to laugh when she stopped suddenly and faced me.

'When I was a baby I growed in your tummy, didn't I?' she asked.

'Yes, when you were a baby you grew in my tummy,' I said, thinking she's a tad too young for a biology lesson comparing the stomach and the uterus.

'And then I came out your mouth,' she told me.

What?

I paused for a second weighing up my options.  What was worse: allowing her to think that babies were born via the mouth, or trying to explain which orifice they actually did come out (or in my case, needing to be sliced open and having the baby pulled out).

In the end, the conversation was cut short by the timely arrival of husband, and I breathed a sigh of relief.  However I realise that it is inevitable that she will mention it again, and not only will we need to discuss how the baby gets out of Mummy's tummy... but also how it got in there!

Things My Children Told Me

'I like your bottom, Mummy.  It has hair on it', the Blonde Bombshell told me thoughtfully last night as we dried ourselves from the shower.

'Thankyou,' I told her, not entirely sure what response was warranted under the circumstances.

As I watched her hop from bathmat to bathmat to collect her pyjamas (one piece at a time), and then sit on the floor to wiggle into her Buzz Lightyear knickers, legs in the air, completely uninhibited, I smiled at the priceless little gems she offers me.

As a long-term researcher I write everything down. A decade working and studying in the university system has set me up well, and since I have long learned the fallibility of my own memory, I counteract my forgetfulness by jotting everything down.  This way they become recorded memories, rather than lost moments.

I have decided to start collating these into a book, so that one day you might see a copy of the following on the shelf of your local bookshop:

I like your bottom, Mummy.  It has hair on it.

Things my children told me

by Shannon Meyerkort

What do you think?

Breakfast Breakdown

It was probably after Miss Curly Mop had thrown the third pancake across the marble floor of the restaurant, skipping it like a stone 'til it rested against the foot of a very unimpressed waiter, and then let a mouthful of scrambled egg slide down her chin and let it stick there like a small, wobbly goatee that I wanted to cry.

When the Blonde Bombshell started sticking her fingers into the bowls of cereal on the buffet, while singing loudly about the importance of doing wees on the 'big' toilet I wanted to vomit.

But it was when I totally lost it with both of them in front of a restaurant full of people that I just wanted to die.  Let them stick hot needles in my eyes, surely it would be less painful than trying to manage two over-tired, far-from-home, cranky children in the very swanky, very expensive, very breakable Palazzo Versace on the Gold Coast.

I never wanted to come here.  Being surrounded by glass tables, crystal chandeliers, $200 bath towels and lots of breakable bling is not my idea of a relaxing holiday.  But through a series of unfortunate events here I am, sans husband, with two homesick children and three in-laws who probably wish they hadn't witnessed me have a complete melt-down only minutes after the plane landed.

By the time my parents-in-law joined me at breakfast I was literally shaking, caused by a combination of anger, sleep deprivation and caffeine.  I wanted to run screaming from the room but I was afraid I would slip on the marble floors and slide headfirst into a table of designer black lilies styled to within an inch of their genetically modified lives.

Luckily they took pity on me and took the children away, leaving me to shake and sob in solitude.  Around me, the detritus of breakfast: three uneaten pots of different flavoured yoghurts, four bowls of different cereals, nibbled upon pancakes, discarded breadsticks, scorned strawberries.

I stared hard at the table, trying to hold the tears in.

As I stood to leave a lady stopped me with a gentle hand on my arm.

'Your daughters are so beautiful,' she said.

I must have looked surprised (or dubious).

'Is this your first day?  Have you flown in from somewhere?' she wanted to know, guessing the answer.

'We came from Perth, we're a little tired,' I said. Making excuses for my (and their) behaviour.

'Well, they are just beautiful.  You should be very proud.'

And with that simple comment from a complete stranger, I was able to lift myself from my slum of self-pity, remind myself how lucky I am, and I was able to get on with my holiday.

Breast is Best

I took pity on Mr Sleepyhead tonight and offered to shower the Blonde Bombshell.

It's an unwritten rule in our house that he showers the big one, and I am responsible for the little one.  I can be a bit derelict in my duties and every now and then have to throw Miss Curly Mop under the shower with her big sister and her daddy and then it turns into something approximating World War Three, It's a Knockout and that kids show from the 90s where people got slimed.

But with him resembling three of the seven dwarfs (Grumpy, Sleepy and Sneezy) and likely to pass out in the shower and crush her by mistake I thought it prudent to take the Bombshell upstairs to wash.

After we had washed and we were sitting on the floor of the shower splashing in the water she crawled into my lap and asked me:

'Are you going to make another baby?'

I gave her a cuddle and said 'Would you like that?'

She nodded and smiled and then, very gently, very seriously kissed the tops of my breasts.

The Blonde Bombshell has always been quite fascinated with my breasts, mostly I presume because she was old enough to witness me breastfeeding Miss Curly Mop, which I did for a full year.  Despite their not being quite as perky or full as they once were, they still hold a fair degree of fascination and mystery for her.  It's a pity this isn't necessarily true for all members of the household.

'And how many new babies would you like?' I asked.

'Ten,' she said.

'I don't think I could make another ten, but I will certainly try and make one.'

After we were dried and dressed and our teeth were brushed we came downstairs.  Mr Snoozy was asleep on the couch, still in his work clothes.  I watched the Bombshell approach her Daddy and very gently kiss him on his hand before running back to me for a bedtime story.

How could I not want another?

Thank God I'm A Country Girl

We're having our back garden redesigned by a fabulous bloke by the name of Roger who has been doing a tremendous job transforming our dead, dirty and uninspired space into a kiddie (and adult) paradise. 

I'm talking cubby house, a 'stage' for performing, garden beds high enough to balance on but not high enough to fall and break little bones, flower beds, veggie patches and big beautiful spaces to run and be crazy (as kids are wont to do).

Anyway, I digress.

Most days I wander out for a chat. He is a very interesting man and sometimes I have had enough of talking about fairies and poos and painting with the Blonde Bombshell.

Today as the girls scampered around the garden watering what plants remain (and the plastic grass and themselves and the mud) Roger leaned on his compacter, looked directly at me and asked:

'So, are you from around here then?'

'Sure,' I said. 'My folks live in the suburbs a bit north of here.'

'But you're from the country right?'

Ummmm.

Now I should state that I am a city girl.  Born and bred.  Raised in the 'burbs, private schooled, university educated [not that country people aren't any of these things].

'No,' I finally said.  'Do I strike you as being from the country?'

He shrugged.  'You just seem too sensible to be from the city.'

I was actually quite chuffed, not only for all the country people who are apparently quite sensible, but also for me, that someone (who has been privvy to all the madness and screaming and tantrums going on inside my house over the past few weeks) thinks I am sensible.

On his return from work this evening, I told this little story to Mr Scornful and asked him if he thought I was sensible.

His response?

Something approximating 'hummph'. It's possible he even chuckled.

What would he know?