I get my lovin' on the run.....

A teacher at Grace took these photos and sent them to the mother of the girl with a note for her dad to start getting his shotgun ready. The mother sent Jo the photos. Evan and R and buddies. They aren't in the same class but they meet for Friday Funday at Ms. Mary's. R looks so much bigger than Evan but she's only a month older. I showed Evan the pictures. "I ran away from R" he said. Didn't look like he was running to me.

Making Waves

This morning the clan - Grandma, Kerby, Tory, Sadie, Grandpa, Evan, Vivian, Jo and myself - went on the Sunday morning Canyon Lake tradition. Sweeties Donuts and a trip to the dam. My dad sat in a nice sunny spot and worked on his jumbo jalapeno sausage kolache while Jo and Carol and the dogs walked across the dam. The kids and I headed down to the lake where they got thoroughly wet and had a great time.

 

Cooking with Grandma

Vivian and Evan took turns and helped Grandma cook yesterday. Jo and I played sick and were no help so the kids stepped in. Wish they were this helpful around the home.

Orange

My little princess now kicks butt with an orange belt. She broke boards and kicked and punched her way past the belt test of Saturday while Evan stood in the audience and yell "Haiya" every time his sister did something.

The Other Day

The night before my friend in India had a close shave. She had almost chocked at a restaurant in Delhi over lunch when a perfect stranger from the next table saved her life by performing the Heimlich maneuver. Due to the wonder of facebook I was chatting with her in the morning and thanking her for still being alive. We discussed the ephemeral nature of life. I hung up and went back to work on my computer. Then my phone rang. Jen. "Arun - I'm driving your wife home". Jo's voice rasped in the background "find the epi-pen!". Jo had gone running with Jen. I found the Benadryl, Zertec, and the epi-pen and put them by the fornt door. Soon enough Jen arrived supporting Jo. She sat her down on the front steps. Jo tried and puked out two zertecs. It was time for the epi-pen. We've never used one before. They aren't small. I pulled the protective stuff off and looked at Jo. Jen encouragingly yelled something about stabbing her hard. I did - on her outer thigh though her workout pants and counted to ten seconds. Jo didn't even tense. After about 30 seconds of silence, Jo hoarsely whispered "hospital". Her pupils were smaller than pinpoints and her face was redder than a well-cooked lobster. Jen supported her and stumbled towards the driveway. I ran and got car keys.

Less than 3 minutes later (I was timing it from the epi-pen) I screeched to a stop in front of the ER at Seton. I ran and got a wheelchair. Jo fell into it. We ran through the ER lobby. I yelled "anaphylactic shock". They gave me a notepaper to write her name and dob while the speaker wailed "analphylaxis, female" and the ER doors flew open. I ran Jo's wheel chair down the hall and we were suddenly in an ER room with six medics. Jo threw up the rest of the pumpkin muffin as they transferred her to the bed and started attaching wires and tubes. The bp cuff hissed to life and the first reading appeared on the monitor. 73 over 37. The doctor and the techs got to work.

Thirty minutes and several shots and drips and readings later they were satisfied enough to raise the bed from the deep reverse-recline (Jo's head was a couple of feet below her feet) to almost level. I heard the doctor heave a sigh of relief and they started looking and talking to Jo and me. I sensed that the emergency portion was over.

They kept Jo at Seton for a little over 24 hours for observation. Jo wasn't happy and they had to deal with her. Next day she was well enough for us to ditch the kids and go on date night (saw Side Effect - not bad). We now keep the epi pen handy and try to make sure that the shadow of an egg doesn't cross Jo's path. That would be kapu.

The Party

A few weeks ago Jo asked Vivian if she wanted her birthday party at a soulless place like Chuck E Cheese's or at the park. Before counsel had a chance to yell "objection, leading", Vivian had picked the option with the soul. Then Jo had to work on her to drop her idea of a "beauty vampire party". From what we could tell, such a party would require girls to wear make-up like vampires and chase down the boys and kiss them. By the time Jo was done Vivian didn't want a theme at all. Good girl.

So on a bright sunny beautiful breezy February afternoon about 25 kids and 25 parents congregated at Ramsey Park. Vivian's old friends from Grace Garden were there. And several new ones from Magellan - mostly boys. One even brought his keyboard and had her sit down in front of him and he played her a tune.  The kids played and ate cake and beat up on a pinata (Karen was called to step up and take the last shot at it to prevent the kids from knocking themselves silly). And Vivian turned six.

The Cake

Last week Jo went to Evan's classmate's birthday party. The cake was from Costco. It made an impression on Jo. So we set about looking for Costco members and after asking one person we decided to drive to the devil's lair itself and become members. I felt like crap from flu symptoms and Jo was on Tamiflu. So we walked in like zombies and tried hard not to scoff at the extra extra large packages while stuffing as many of them as we could into our shopping cart. Here Jo is modeling an extra large gift card!

Then we picked the kids up from Ms. Mary's and went to Target. Evan chilled and lounged on the cart and we tricked Vivian into looking the other way while we got her a lump of plastic with fake hair (some sort of a horse with accessories for doing it's mane and tail). Then Sam showed up to babysit and Jo and I went to Walmart to buy plastic chairs for grownup's to sit on at the park. You'd think there's only so much plastic and and so many big box stores you can do in one day. But all's well that ends well. We finished out date night at the cake ball restaurant nibbling on tiramisu cake balls and milk shake made with a good sized shot of Old Monk rum.

And the cake? It was a huge success. Here's a photo of Jo cutting it up while Kiren points out the slice he wants. Several parents complimented us on the cake and asked where it was from.

Hmm - Now What Was I Doing....?

What was I doing last year on February the 13th? In Goa with Jo and the kids. And the year before? Skiing in Santa Fe. And looking further back, unless I enlist the help of this blog I probably don't remember. But if I go back to 2004 - before the kids and before the blog - I remember vividly.

Two nights before, on Feb 11, I had driven Jo to the Amtrak station in Austin where we boarded the delayed Texas Eagle and soon retired to our sleeper cabin. In an hour in San Antonio our carriage would be shunted and then hooked to the Sunset Limited coming in from New Orleans and headed to Los Angeles. A few hours later we'd detrain at Alpine and drive off into the west Texas sunset in the Avis car that would meet us at the train station. But when we awoke the next morning hoping to see the wilderness of Pecos county, instead we saw the back of the Alamo Dome in San Antonio.

So it wasn't till very late that night that I turned off Highway 67 somewhere between Marfa and Presidio near the Mexican border and started driving down this utterly dark dirt track to nowhere. Jo was convinced this was not going to end well till the stone entrance and low adobe facade of Cibolo Creek Ranch finally came into the the limited view afforded by the rental car's headlights. The staff had all gone home for the night but they left a note for us and a nice fire in our fireplace.

The next morning we woke up to an amazing sight. The hills of Big Bend and Presidio county starkly towered in the distance and close by. The sky was that brilliant desert blue. And the bare trees and cactus were covered in glittering ice crystals. I walked Jo to a glade with a chandelier created by a frozen natural spring and in this icy desert wonderland asked her to marry me. And when she said yes I put a ring on her ring finger on the wrong hand because neither of us knew any better. But it's kept.

And today, February 13th, 2013? Jo is laying on the couch and I'm on my way to Walgreens to fill a prescription for Tamilfu. And then I'll have to quarantine her from the kids and my dad.

Medical Ear Piercings Anyone

In the last newsletter from our pediatrician's after hour kids' clinic was this little item. Now why would Vivian and Evan's doctor's office, an otherwise fine medical establishment, do a side business in after-hours ear piercing - but only for 4 to 6 month old and 12 years and over girls?

So what's a 6 year old girl and a 3 year old boy to do? Not get your ears pierced this evening for one. Sorry V & E.

Dad and Me

This morning I woke up feeling like a hundred trains had run over me again. I got in the car with Jo and dropped the kids off at their schools. On the way back home we stopped by the gym and saw Jen. She thought I looked like a "a homeless Indian dude". At which point Jo wondered aloud why I had even gotten out of the car at both schools. So I looked in the mirror when we got back home and realized that she was right.

I was feeling better by mid-morning. I got a haircut. Then I shaved my dad. This evening Jo and I went out on date night and when I got back home my Dad was feeling perky and we took this picture. Groomed Chatterjee men are indeed a rare photo-op not to be missed. 

A Tale of Two Schools

Both Evan's and Vivian's school had events last week. On Thursday was the Sweetheart Dance at Grace Garden. And then on Friday was Magellan's glamorous Noche de Gala (auction items included a stay at the Driskill and a night at the concert while being chauffeured around in a Rolls, and a week-long trip to Paris). For the Sweetheart Dance we arrived early to help set up and left last after helping clean up. We had tickets to the gala and a babysitter but Jo and I instead opted for a lovely date night dinner at the newish Sway restaurant in south Austin.

We didn't notice the discrepancy till Karen pointed out to Jo in her own sweet way that we love the Christian old-school pre-school and seem a tad uncomfortable with the trilingual secular private primary school.

There's a simple moral for me. You never know. Just because you have the same educational goals for your kids doesn't mean you are going to like their parents.

Spies

Between margaritas Jo picked up a packet of sticky moustaches for the kids from the Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. So one morning last week I was awoken up by a hoard of mustachioed people. I think Evan looks like a handsome Telugu actor from the 70's.

Blog Turns Six

Last month this blog turned six years old with over a thousand posts and a respectable readership. Besides remaining married and being a father it's unusual for me to stick with anything. And I have for three reasons. Vivian, Evan, and you. So thanks for sticking by the blog. Here's the  text of my first real post.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

What's in a Name?

That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet.

--Bill

Bill is credited with penning the above in 1593 - that's about 10-12 years after the birth of his first child. He'd forgotten what's in a name by then.

Jo and I are ready for the kid - about as ready as we have ever been for anything, though everyone tells us you can never be truly ready. Except that we don't have a name. It all started a few months ago when it became apparent that a name would be required. We knew we weren't good at doing this (we named one of our cat's "Crazy" because she was, but mostly because we couldn't come up with a name).

Jo would suggest names that popped into her head as we drove along the scenic road to the Hill Country. Stony silence. Then we borrowed name books from Laura and tried those. Still nothing. Finally, last Sunday, Jo and I agreed to meet in a week with a list of Top 10 names. I crammed the book of names till the wee hours. A few weak scribbles. I'd see Jo pour over her Mac and I could tell she was working on names. Sunday night came around, and we compared lists after dinner at Satay with the Shah's. Nothing.

Not even on the same planet. I only got to "K", so I have an over-abundance of names starting with that letter (Kane, Kavi, Kabir, Kedar, Kell, etc...), and the name we are looking for may be just around the corner in "L". By this point, I expected a certain amount of a feeling of accomplishment - of feeling that we were getting closer - proportional to the amount to alphabet we have covered. But that's simply not the case. Gaah.

If kiddo comes on time, we have room for three more Sunday lists. If he/she is early, we are even further up the creek. And there seem to be no paddles in sight. Keep an eye on this space - something is bound to happen...

The problem appears to be cultural. In a world of cliched cultural problems, I try to keep mine to a minimum. Jo and I come from physical worlds thousands of miles apart. But we don't feel it. We think similar thoughts about a bunch of important things. We don't have a huge cultural divide. We never have arguments that end in cultural punting. But not so with names.

I don't need the kid to have an Indian name. But I do want the kid's name to mean something. In my list, each name is neatly annotated with it's origin and meaning (my favorite is Kane - "beautiful" in Welsh, "golden" in Japanese, and "eastern sky" in Hawaiian - wow!). Jo's names have to sound right. She really doesn't care a hoot what a name means. All we need is a name that sounds right and means something deep.

My first cat was named "Socrates" - after the famed Brazilian midfielder, natrually. I wonder where this quest will end up.

Posted by arun at 9:55 PM 

Wedding Photos

This is my favorite photo from our wedding. The photographer's husband was behind us and grasped the moment. 

This photo and two other have graced our living room walls since our wedding. Today Evan was sitting on top of me while I lay on the couch. Out of the blue he pointed to the photos and said "Daddy - what are you doing in those photos?".

"I'm getting married. Who is that standing beside me?" I asked.

"A princess" he said without hesitating.

My son knows what I knew!

Laughing in the Face of Natural Calamities

Here's a Einstein-esque photo of my dad from five years ago when we were visiting Alu and Michelle in Rhode Island. At this moment those two are being battered by a snowstorm and blizzard and are huddled around their fireplace with no electricity or heat while it's 10 degrees Fahrenheit outside. Send some warm feeling that way if you can.

But back to now. Well - almost now - yesterday. I was pan-frying some fish for my dad when the fire alarms went off. Jo ran around the house and performed the fire-alarm-has-gone-off ritual - opening doors and windows and them swinging them back and forth to let in more fresh air or carry away the smoke or something while the alarm screeched on in every room. Even my dad who was asleep on a recliner in front of a sunny french door heard the ruckus. He asked Jo what the matter was. Jo managed to transmit the fire portion of the message but not the rest of the context. A few minutes later when the fire alarm and the fish were stable I went to tell him what had happened and to reassure him that the house wasn't on fire and we hadn't forgotten about him in the event that it was.

Later that evening I had to park the car in the garage. The back story here is that BMWs windows only work for six years and then die in the open state. This is the second one to fail in two months and we haven't yet managed to schedule a service for it. And there was a chance of rain last night so at around 11pm while my dad was munching on a light supper I went downstairs and parked the car. The garage is directly below my dad's room and the garage doors are mounted on the ceiling of the garage. You can feel the vibrations when they are being operated if you are directly overhead as my dad was. When I finished and returned upstairs to get my dad ready for bed he mildly inquired if Austin was prone to earthquakes. I explained what had happened. And then he unexpectedly burst forth with a belly full of laughs. "A fire and then an earthquake. What a day!" I haven't seen him laugh like that in years.

Chuck E

There may be no greater sacrifice that a parent has to make than to take his offspring to Chuck E Cheese's at 9:30am on a Saturday morning. And I have avoided it till today.

We arrived. Then Vivian and Evan played on a token-operated monster truck together for a few minutes. This is what they look like today. There will probably be another photograph like this in about a decade with a bigger truck.

After that they both took off in different directions and roamed the jungle of token-operated games and machines utterly alone while their friends did the same till it was time to sit and eat pizza and cake in an assembly-line operation of kiddie birthdays. For the first time in my life I had fond memories of Disney World.

And here Vivian is dancing with A. He arrived at Suck E Soul at about the same time we did and I noticed that his face turned beetroot red when Vivian said hello. During pizza he sat next to my daughter and slowly crept closer and closer till he was occupying half her seat at cup cakes. Then they danced. I asked Vivian later. "Yes - A wants to marry me but I won't let him." Smart girl.

Sweetheart Dance

Here are three photos. Stories later.

Dandy

This evening Evan tried on his jacket and shirt for his Sweetheart Dance. No one bothered to bring him his pants. He didn't seem to mind. And then he and Vivian ran around the house like crazed lunatics. I'm looking forward to seeing how this works out on Thursday.

Kinder Blues

Vivian's parent-teacher conferences are always dramatic. On Thursday her Spanish teachers told us that she wasn't learning any Spanish and that she had an attention span unfit for first grade. Come June perhaps we should consider her repeating kindergarten they suggested. On Friday Vivian came back with this taped to her shirt.

Will the real slim shady please stand up?

Changing the World

I'm proud of my wife. When I met her she wanted to go work for the Truth Commission in Rwanda. Later she wanted to help victims of domestic violence in Austin. Now Jo is changing the world one pre-school dance at a time. Out with the traditional Daddy-Daughter Valentine's Day Dance. In with the Sweetheart Dance where any parent and child combination can choose to dance. The other day we were at a party store looking for stuff for the dance. While Jo was doing the looking the kids helped themselves to some big ass fuzzy hats.

Enchanted

Jo's is traveling. I got my Dad a caretaker for the weekend. The kids and I went to Enchanted Rock this morning and finished the afternoon eating ice creams and donuts at Fredericksburg Bakery. What a day! Oh - and both Evan and Vivian walked all the way up and down by themselves.