3 Poems, dicated by Daniil

A horse
Are you a horse?

A horse trots
A horse gallops
A horse sleeps
Horse, lie down

Danya rides Buzzy
Mama rides Bronzee
Caroline rides elephants
Baba rides giraffes
Pop rides nothing
Go, Pop, go

Dictated by Daniil Sjostrom
in the company of Caroline Kurpis and Mama
Simon's coffee shop
Mass. Ave., Cambridge

These days...

Christmas morning, two new horseslllllllllllll
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A true little story: Today Daniil and I visited the library, as we do most days when we're together. Danya chose a book on horse care, no surprise since he's all about horses these days. His favorite Christmas present hands down was the little toy race horse and jockey in blue riding silks. His favorite movies of late are National Velvet ("The race is very, very fantastic!" he says) and The Black Stallion, minus the scary parts. His riding lesson on Bronzee, a chestnut pony, marks a weekly high point. Danya posts on pony-back and chatters away with his teacher.
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As I checked out the horse book and chatted with Kathi the librarian, Danya lay on his tummy in front of the desk, toy horse in hand, staring off in space. I suspected his unusual silence might be pregnant with something interesting.
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"What are you thinking about, Danya?" I asked.
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"Love," he answered.
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Kathi's eyes welled up. She commented on what a sweet boy I have and how far Daniil has come over the past year. She recalled how shy and hesitant he'd been at first.
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"And what are you thinking about love?" I probed further.
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"You," Danya said, feet swinging side to side through the air. Kathi and I looked at each another and spontaneously drew our hands to our hearts.

I knelt down on the floor next to Danya and gave him a hug. "I love you more than anyone else in the whole wide... " I paused to allow Danya to fill in the blank. "Ocean!" he concluded. He promptly shifted the topic to horses and we paged through the book, sitting together on the floor, blocking a good half of the check-out desk, to learn about horse shoeing, horse combing, horse bathing, horse feeding. Stick to timothy grass and clover and avoid blue fescue at all costs.
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Love and horses. That's what we're up to these days.

Movie Picks, Age 4.5

Feminist Perspective

First, let me supply an updated picture of the beautiful Danya since I haven't posted here in six (!) months. Here he is peeking out of the window of a choo-choo train at the Denver zoo back in July. My, has he grown, physically, socially, linguistically, you name it. Hopefully, I have as well as a mom with exactly one year under her belt.
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I've been thinking about how to bring a feminist perspective to my mothering. How challenging to raise a boy in this still-too-gendered world where images of tough-guy masculinity continue to proliferate. Haven't we learned better by now? I know that some have, and I need to learn from them on my boy's behalf.
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It goes without saying that I want Danya to be socially accepted, to have friends, to "fit in," but not if this means adopting a prescribed male role that limits both him and others. I also don't want him to feel guilty/badly about being a boy, about being white, about having priviliges in this world. And I don't want to disempower him, by any means. I want him to be incredibly powerful and influential on behalf of good and creativity and fairness and all that marvelous stuff that benefits everyone. I guess I want him to be aware of inequities and injustices that are placed on both girls and boys and then to make conscious choices out of that awareness. I know all of this sounds vague here at the start. I intend to read and write more as I go along.

4 Years Old!

Words

So many words, English coming on so quickly. And so many fabulous original phrases and observations, untainted by conventional manners of speech. I need to start writing these down, lest I forget.

"I'm getting tall!" Daniil says proudly, daily. "I'm making a man."

"I'm a cement mixer," Danya says in the bathtub, stretched out flat, rolling round and round in circles.

"Starfish!" Danya exclaims, pointing to the tiny crystals of white frost on my red car as he sees me off to work. It's 6:45AM and he's still in his pj's, standing in the driveway, waving, winter coat thrown on top.

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"Skip, skip, skip to my lou... skip to my lou, my garlic."

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Lying in bed in the dark, lights out before sleep, we play a "saying" game. "Mama say 'guitar,'" Danya directs me. I dutifully repeat after him. "Mama say 'saxophone'"... "Mama say 'ceiling'"... "Mama say 'Ya tebya lou-blue'"... "Ya tebya lou-blue," I say. (I love you, in Russian).

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"Silly boy, Mama!"

"All By Myself!"

Twenty swimming lessons later, Daniil let go of the instructor's hand and paddled off on his own. Everything in its own time. Here he is swimming "all by myself" under noodle bridges held by the other toddler boys in his class at the local YMCA. I wasn't there in Russia to witness Danya's first baby steps. Hopefully the orphanage staff erupted with cheers. I did get to witness Danya's first doggie-paddle, solo, this past Saturday. A proud moment for him and me both.

Holding Baby Lilah

Suzuki

Violin! Danya eagerly practices at home, but will take not one suggestion from Mama. "No, no, no!" he insists. "Not like that!" It's his way or the highway... just like me with my mom, even now at age 48.

Blue Tresses

Dramatic. Beautiful. My boy with the blue tresses, a turtleneck Danya left clinging as he pulled it off over his head before bedtime. Note how he swings his "hair" so adeptly, so alluringly, my Russian diva.

"My Russia"

It's arrived sooner than I ever expected: Russia.

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The scene: Bedtime, lights out, Daniil is lying in his striped pj's (with padded feet), tucked in under the covers in his little bed. We've just finished our good-night kisses and hugs. I lie in the big bed next to him, still fully dressed, expecting to sneak out of the room in a few minutes, once Danya falls asleep, to do the dishes and other evening chores.

Danya: Tommy said "My Russia." No, Danya's Russia.

Mama: Danya's Russia, not Tommy's?

Danya: Yes. (Pause) Mama Russia?
Mama: I went to Russia to find you.

Danya: I'm here!

Mama: I found you! That was the happiest day of my life.

Danya: I'm here! I found you!

Mama: We found each other. I'm the luckiest Mama in the world. I am your Mama forever and ever. And you are my son. Moy solnyshka.

Danya: Big hug. Squish me.

I lean down and over to Danya's bed. We embrace in a big bear hug.

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Tommy, as I recall, is an older boy in Daniil's class at the Montessori School who also was adopted from Russia. I'm going to email the teacher to get details. And I'm going to talk with other adoptive parents about ways they've discussed adoption with very young children. I figured this would come up at age 6 or 7. My boy's ahead of the curve in many ways.

Daniil's Progress Report

Last week we returned to the International Adoption Center at Tufts Floating Hospital for Children. We paid our first visit in late September, after Danya had been home one month. So this was a 3-month check-in. They redid some basic tests and here are the results. Note that Daniil is 3 years, 7 months old right now.

Gross motor: No concerns whatsoever about his gross motor skills. They only measure up to a 3-year-old level and he tops out here just fine.

Fine motor: Daniil's FM skills have advanced 10 months over the past 3. His little fingers are now working at a 4 year old level.

Cognition: Daniil's cognitive abilities have advanced 20 months over the past 3. He thinks at a 54 month old level, like a 4.5 year old

Receptive Language: Advanced by 6 months over the past 3. Danya understands English like that of a 3 year old (this places him 7 months behind)

Expressive Language: Advanced by 11 months over the past 3. He speaks like an average 3 year+3month year old (4 months behind)

The doctors told me that they have never seen cognitive and fine motor jumps like this. They also noted that Daniil's quick, agile mind, full of thoughts, coupled with his delay in language, is a potential set-up for major frustration. I do note this at times at home when Danya can’t tell me exactly what he needs/wants and resorts to pushing or hitting me. In response, I ask him to use his words, remind him that hands are not meant for hitting, and ask, “What do you need/want, Danya?”

4 months home. In a brand new country. A brand new culture. With a brand new Mama, the first in memory. Learning a brand new language from square one. Living in a big house. Sleeping in a room with only one other person, not 15. Testing Mama's limits. Trusting Mama's love. Discovering chocolate-chip ice cream, and cats as living creatures with claws, and the joys of riding on a tall man's shoulders, and going to school for the first time, and what it means to have your very own Pop and Baba and Papa (my dad)...

Bravo, Daniil! Roaring applause, standing ovation

Quiet

I continue on the theme of finding me/finding peace in the midst of single motherhood. I checked out a book for Daniil from the library titled The Quiet Book by Deborah Underwood and sweetly illustrated by Renata Liwska. So many lines of this book take me to that meditative place Karen Langley wrote of (blog entry 1/3/11, Help When You Need It). The book leads off: "There are many kinds of quiet:" A single line of text then appears on each page under a whimsical drawing. Here are some of the lines that "take me there," to a clear, quiet place. (Since you don't have the benefit of an actual book in your hands and the chance to turn actual pages, I suggest that you try pausing for 5 seconds or more after each line to allow it to sink in and have its way with you.)




There are many kinds of quiet:

First one awake quiet
Don't scare the robin quiet
Coloring in the lines quiet
Hide-and-seek quiet
Last one to get picked up from school quiet
Swimming underwater quiet
Pretending you're invisible quiet
Lollipop quiet
Right before you yell "surprise!" quiet
Making a wish quiet
Best friends don't need to talk quiet
* Right before the concert starts quiet
First snowfall quiet
Car ride at night quiet
Tucking in teddy quiet
Bedtime kiss quiet
Sound asleep quiet

*my favorite

Help When You Need It

This just in from my dear friend and counselor Karen Langley who is a serious student of A Course in Miracles (ACIM). I'd put out a call to her for support and insight on how to create more "me" time and here is her response.

Back in the day, I waited for my daughters' nap time and then dropped what I was doing and ran to the meditation pillow. Also, I had another mother who was working at home across the street from me and we would sometimes cover for each other. I agree that as a single parent it must be crazy hard.

Even now I forget to try this kinda simple thing. See if it helps: When Daniil's attention is on something else, close your eyes and remember meditating... rest in that remembrance for a few seconds and you might actually feel like you meditated when your attention returns to Daniil.

OR, remember sharing a moment of quiet peace with friends, or the laughter (usually at ourselves) with friends. Take as long as you can in that remembrance and you might feel that peace or laughter again.

OR, think of a color, or sound, or person, or painting, or a nature scene that centers you, or inspires you, etc. and let yourself go into that feeling.... Sometimes remembrance of what once worked/helped before brings about the same experience.

The brain is quite easy to trick. It really does not know if we are in that experience now or if we are remembering. This is kinda the reverse of 'being here now.'

Instead, be where a lovely moment happened (that you can bring to mind) and see if you can re-experience it now. This could be fun finding what works and what does not. This helps me a lot while waiting for doc. appts. or my grown-up daughter to show up when she is nearly always late, or even when my old sweet dog is taking her time doing her business and I am freezing outside. (I think of summer heat warming up my skin.)
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I say, 'whatever works.' We are already and always in The Love of God and often need to trick our brains into reminding us! It does not have to take a long meditation. In fact, ACIM says that a few moments of True Remembrance does more for us than a lifetime of meditation.

Renunciation 2

"Dying to one's life as it was." I came across this definition of "renunciation" while watching a PBS special on the life of the Buddha. It immediately resonated. Ah! That's it exactly. This is the process I'm undergoing as a new mom.

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Death of any kind is unnerving, to say the least, even one that results in enlightenment or transformation. I know from experience that this process of renunciation/transformation/resurrection would be much easier if I totally surrendered to it. But I keep holding out: there must be a way to hold onto the me I once knew--my routines, my creativity, so much of my self-care, alone time, even my very thinking patterns--mustn't there? It's proving fruitless. As I continue to cling to my past, I'm only causing myself more (psychic) suffering.

So it's time to figure out how to create the necessary conditions for "letting go." I recall a beautiful letting-go poem by e.e. cummings, one I memorized many years back:

let it go-the smashed word broken
open vow or the oath cracked length
wise-let it go it
was sworn to
lllllgo

let them go-the
truthful liars and
the false fair friends
and the boths and
neithers-you must let them go they
were born
lllllto go

let all go-the
big small
middling
tall bigger really
the biggest and all
things-let all go
dear
lllllsso comes love

Okay, so I’ve got to trust that when I let go, love is there to catch me. This sounds really good, but, honestly, I'm still left resentful that I have to give up so much of what makes me "me" to be a mom.

Then I remember the work I did with a terrific therapist in Arlington, MA. Although Suzanne happened to be a practicing Buddhist, our work together consisted of doing something traditional Buddhism would not condone: we created overarching "frameworks" or constructed narratives that I could fall back on when I felt myself entering unknown territory in my life. For instance, she'd often remind me of the mythology of entering the underworld. It's a given: one can't see for a while. It takes time for one's eyes to adjust in the dark. It's also a given that as I keep walking I will indeed begin to see what needs to be seen. And not only that. I'll also be given necessary aid along the way. A helping hand from a stranger. Direction from a snake that, at first, appears to be an inert gray stick. Eventually, I will emerge up into the light, transformed, wiser for the journey and the trusting and the reliance on the natural order.
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I've decided to contact Suzanne again and ask her to help me create another useful narrative to help me chart this uncharted new- and single-mom territory that is putting my very fibre to the test. I'm hoping that her support, along with prayer and talking with lots of other parents about their experience, will ready me for complete surrender into motherhood.

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Perhaps I will soon get to the jumping-off point where I can say, wholeheartedly: "Yes" to this too, O Life, O Love, O Great and Blessed Unknown. Let my surrender into motherhood change and transform me as You would have me changed and transformed for the sake of service and the sake of Joy.

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Then again, maybe I'm making things way too complicated. Maybe all I need to do is go out and corral a big stable of able babysitters and then shell out the money to insure a set number of "Lisa" hours each week. I'll try both tacks and see what happens.

First Christmas, Snapshots

Power drill and tool bench a bit hit. Thanks, Santa.


Pop's lap, the comfiest chair


Baba and Danya send the slinky all the way down the stairs.

Christmas Adventure at Long Pasture

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Aunt Coco can always be counted on for fun.

Mama helps with the unwrapping.

Christmas: "I like it."

The Grandparents

Daniil and "Dayadushka" (my dad)

Danya and Pop (my stepdad)

Danya and Baba (my mom)

Higher the Better

Daniil likes serious high heels and pulls them out of my closet every morning and night. "These are my shoes!" he insists, laughing, and looking at me with a knowing twinkle in his eyes. "Your shoes?!" I respond in mock surprise. "Yes, my shoes," Daniil asserts, sashaying with impressive confidence, I must say, in my/his 3" heels.

I Like to Talk

I'm left speechless in the face of my boy's exploding speech. Tonight I told Daniil how much I enjoyed listening to him and hearing his English develop. "I like to talk," he said and clearly meant it. There's been a palpable shift in the past day alone, like turning on a faucet. It's been exactly 3 months since we touched ground in Boston and Daniil started his English-language immersion. I've always been told when it comes to behaviors, like giving up caffeine or adopting an exercise routine, that it takes 90 days to break an old habit and solidify a new one. I'm not sure if this three-month rule of thumb applies to languages, but it sure seems to be the case with Danya.

Today we checked out from the library for the second time the low-brow toddler classic Everyone Poops. (We'd already checked it out once and read it aloud most nights for two weeks' running.) When we got to the next-to-last page, Daniil took over and narrated non-stop in complete sentences straight down the line of animals:



"Giraffe eats leaves. Lion eats meat. Gorilla eats bananas. Zebra eats grass. Pelican eats fish. Pig eats slop. Boy eats kasha." Complete sentences, in English!
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I took one look at my boy and realized that he was as bowled over as I. It was then that I applauded his progress. "I like to talk," Daniil replied. "And I love to listen to you talk," I said.

I look forward to years of talking and listening, listening and talking, as language opens up my boy's heart, mind and soul to me and others.

"Befaneet"

Meet Bethany, our morning Nanny. Daniil and I hit the jackpot. Bethany lets herself in at 6:15AM, empties the dishwasher, feeds Frieda and Simon, puts on my tea water, and starts breakfast prep for my boy. By the time he and I wander downstairs around 6:35, Bethany's ready to roll with breakfast and trains and the long drive to the Sandwich Montessori School, and I'm ready to take off for a full day of work. How blessed I am to leave my boy in the arms of a caring, fun-loving and skilled young woman--who has fallen in love with Daniil. He asks and comments about her frequently in the evenings and over the weekends: "Where's Befaneet? Befaneet's driving... Befaneet's eating... Befaneet's sleeping."

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My return to work was a shocker. It's like feast or famine. For the past 12 weeks I've been with Daniil for 14 waking hours every day: marathon Mom. Now, on work days, I'm lucky if I see my son for three hours total: 30 minutes in the morning and two-plus hours in the evening before his 7:30PM bedtime. I sure wish I could create a more balanced scenario, but, alas, there's no part-time option for a middle-school principal. My dad reminds me that Daniil's world is expanding and that this is good and healthy. I appreciate this reassuring perspective, and it appears to be true. Daniil loves Bethany and her undivided attention each morning. And he simply adores his teacher Sarah who sings and dances with him, along with his new little friends in school, including a girl he reportedly likes both to kiss and to boss around: "Walk, Leila! No running, Leila!"