IEP Time It's getting to be that time of year again and I just got off the phone with Joanne, Evan's 5th grade LS teacher. Why, oh why, do I feel so disappointed and hopeless after this talks? She said academically Evan is chugging along. Not at any great rate of speed but chugging...he's learning and doing very well. His reading comprehension is improving...and I can tell you, that's an area I have agonized over for, literally, YEARS! He can count money and make change...all good things. He can even tie his shoes now. BUT... And there's always a but with these conversations...and when I hear it, my heart falls. I bet if you monitored my blood pressure from the time she says "It's Joanne" through the "BUT.." part, it would be off the charts. I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop. And drop it did. His maturity issues are worse. He is acting more immature...not wanting to be friends because the two of them can't agree on how to play a game, tattling almost uncontrollably, all things we had hoped would improve and as of today, it looks like it's hopeless. And that's how I feel. I mean, what do we do? I really have NO clue. I enroll him in summer camps with age-level programming. He's in the Boy Scouts. What more can I do? I am at a loss and I feel like I am in a deep, black abyss. Experience tells me it will improve and Evan will mature on Evan's schedule. Three years ago I never thought he'd be counting money or tying his shoes. But when the teacher calls and it seems so urgent and this is a problem I CAN'T FIX - it just makes me want to curl up and sob.

Dear Jerry... Open Letter to Jerry Springer Dear Mr. Springer: I am writing to you on behalf of my family. I feel they would be excellent candidates for your show. I would expect they could be conversant and animated guests for just about any topic you would choose. Let me introduce them to you. First there is my father. He is really my stepfather but he did finally adopt me when I was sixteen because I had to get a passport. That may sound contrived but actually, he had been raising me since I was two and I had been using his last name. To be honest, they never really even told me I HAD another last name - they let my first-grade teacher do that for them. Imagine my surprise to find that I was a "dirty little secret!" Anyway, back to my dad. After spending years and years as a rage-a-holic who drank and did drugs and then came home and beat the crap out of my mom and tore up our house, my dad decided to "get sober." My mom passed away shortly thereafter which is kind of ironic when you really think about it since she had spent all of those years black and blue absolutely convinced he would change and when he did, she died. I can't say I stuck around either because I didn't. I was pretty fed up with his antics as well and we didn't speak for fifteen years. When we DID finally did get around to speaking again, which, I assure you, I did more for my sister's mental health than for his sake, things seemed to really have changed a lot. Sure, he was drinking but not the hard stuff anymore - only wine - and when he got drunk, he'd remove himself and go to sleep. It seemed the anger and rage he had vented all those years on my mom were suddenly under control. Now, Jerry, that didn't stop him from embarassing me - like the time we were driving to the Rolling Stones concert and we got lost in Washington, D.C. My dad rolled down the windows in the van and started shouting "yo homey!" at every white van that rolled by. I need to point out that this was when the DC Sniper was on the loose and shouting "yo homey" at white vans was thought to be enough to get you killed. But, overall, I really thought my dad had changed. I have found that not to be true. Now he has a Sponge or more formally, Spongebitch Hotpants, his new girlfriend. He met her after we brought him home from the Eagles concert, a subject which is still under hot debate in our family since it is generally assumed that by my leaving him at his bar after we drove him home, I opened the door to allow this tramp to move in. The prevailing thought is had I stayed with him and not just left him there we wouldn't be dealing with her right now. Now this Sponge...she's a piece of work Jerry. To have her and her alone on your show would be a ratings bonanza. She has no money, no assets - nothing at all to her name. She moves from man to man, mooching as much as she can along the way and who knows what it would take to make her leave because they've gotten into it many times and she's had bruises, cuts and scrapes from their fights and yet, she's still there. She's called the law on him twice. Once in Ocean City at his summer campground and once from his own house. I have to admit, that after the OC incident, he was pretty nervous about it since the campground he has an annual agreement with is pretty strict about stuff like that. He was pretty sure he'd be thrown out. Lucky for him, the cops took HER away THAT time although last night he wasn't so lucky and ended up cooling his jets in the county lockup. They are both a piece of work. I called him yesterday to talk about plans for our visit over the Easter weekend. I explained we'd bring our own food since it was also Pesach and we needed to eat special foods. I could just tell he was in a weird mood by the way he was harassing me about it. I wasn't surprised to hear they'd had another fight - she ended up with a scraped face, she says from falling on the front porch - and he ended up in prison. My poor sister has to bear the brunt of it all now that she's the current "chosen" and he doesn't want me to even know there's trouble in paradise. And I worry about her, too, since she does have her own mental health issues. I am also glad she's finally wised up and realized her illness can't make "Daddy" love her. For years she seemed to think if she got sick, he would love her more. It never worked...I try to make her feel proud now for being well for so long. Anyway, Jerry, it seems he called her at 2am when they locked him up and like I had advised her weeks ago when they had another particularly vicious fight, she didn't answer the phone at that hour. I mean, come on, he wouldn't do it for her when SHE was sick after so many times! But now Tami feels guilty and worried, too, that he'll be mad. I wouldn't even care myself but she does and probably because she works for him now and has to really put up with his shit. I just feel sorry for her most of the time. She has the two boys and the pothead husband. One of the boys has a severe handicap and can't even walk or talk. The other is like the devil incarnate and probably will end up in prison like Grandpa before he's sixteen. And my poor sister is overwhelmed with that as well as taking care of my dad and HIS little adolescent romance. It's hard for her. It's all pretty heinous, even for you, isn't it Jerry? They left the Sponge's dog alone when they went to Mardi Gras and he tore out all of the windows in the million dollar love nest. My dad, who has always said he was a "jew", suddenly turns into this Southern Baptist who thinks being Jewish is "silly" as he puts it. It's just not good. So pass this along to your producers, I am sure there's a show somewhere, sometime that my family would fit into like a glove. In the meantime, I have to figure out what to do about that planned Easter weekend visit. As of last night, the man was planning on having a ham and an easter egg hunt. Now, the egg hunt is innocuous enough and I don't plan to raise hell about THAT but the smoked pig is another matter altogether and one we aren't especially agreeing on. He plans to have her Section 8 kids with her "who's your Daddy" grandkids over for the day along with my sister's and my three boys. And that's fine. But I am not sure I'll be able to explain to my son what is going on if Grandpa breaks bad the night before while we're asleep and beats the crap out of his Sponge - all the while the boy listens in abject fear. And I am not sure how to back out gracefully without causing a family fight since I am not even supposed to know any of the above ever happened. Well, if nothing else, Jerry, I can admit....my family was made for your show. Or maybe it's the other way around??

Travelling for Pesach The holiday of Passover is fast upon us! We have been busy thinking about it since the end of Purim...well, that's a lie, actually we've been thinking about it since the end of February! There's so much to do, especially in our house where the dog feels the need to take his dinner "portable" - mouthfuls of chametz-filled dog food bits are transported in his mouth from the bowl, through the kitchen into the living room, so he can watch tv while he eats. And naturally, now that we've discovered "the itch" comes from a food allergy to Beneful and switched his food out to the generic lamb and rice variety - he hates it and refuses to eat most of it. What this amounts to is a vast wasteland of uneaten kibble strewn about the living room and under the dining room table. Chametz, chametz everywhere!!!! I swear it is multiplying even as I write!!! The mission over the weekend and the next week is to clean like maniacs until we fall exhausted at the seder table of our friends, Shoshana and Bob a week from next Monday night. Slipcovers, I have discovered, are a WONDERFUL thing when it comes to de-chametzing your abode. Just take them off and fold everything to the middle! You don't have to worry about all the nooks and crannies in this case. I want to also wash all of the curtains although while there MAY be chametz in them...I hope not. I can't even begin to imagine what that would say about our ability to live as human beings and keep our house reasonably clean. Evan's room will probably be chametz-free by this afternoon. We have to explain to him the consequences of this which means, cut and dry, no eating in his room until after Passover. No toast, no cookies, no cereal eaten clandestinely at 4:00 in the morning when he thinks we're asleep (and I can assure you, at that hour, we ARE!) The Final Frontier is the kitchen and the process of de-chametzing is mind-boggling at best. I can only thank G-d that we have the World's Smallest Kitchen although thanks to yours truly, we have an amazing amount of cabinets considering the square footage out there. And they all have to be emptied, vacuumed and wiped down. The drawers have to be washed. Everything has to be lined. As my father told me when Evan had critters (ie. the Great Lice Incident of the Summer of 2003), it probably would be easier to just burn it down. Or travel. And therein lies the great secret - take your vacation during Pesach and you won't have to go through this cleaning extravaganza. You can just leave and go somewhere kosher for Pesach and leave the cleaning to the professionals! And yes, during a portion of Pesach we WILL be travelling! But to a chametz-free zone? No, I am afraid not. We're off to visit my Dad and his shiksa-Sponge in West Virginia. Since we'll be there over the sixth night of Pesach, this presents a variety of strategical problems, principally - FOOD. On GOOD days my father provides us with a banquet of ham, ham and more ham. Roasted, baked and deli varieties. And since we've been so good about staying away from that and moving further along on the kashrut observance scale, that is really a problem. My dad means well but figures food was meant for eating. And since he didn't have much as a kid, he pretty much assumes anything short of Fear Factor is fair game. And when I refuse to eat the ham or scrapple or bacon he lovingly prepares for us...I know it hurts his feelings. He HAS gotten better since last year but I still think it's an issue even if it's a small one. But Passover presents even bigger problems because not only will we be forced to refuse his pork products but also his chametz-ridden products like chips and bagels and muffins and cookies which he stocks abundantly when we're scheduled for a visit. No...this time we'll have to pack. I got packets of Passover potato chips for Evan to take along, fruit rollups I know are okay and we'll take chicken and boiled eggs and cheese. I may even make a casserole in a cooler that we can reheat. It would be a LOT easier if we'd eat out...salads always work and Evan likes fish so we could always get that. Coupled with the fact that I am pretty sure we'll end up on the Murphy bed without pillows again for the night...boy, am I looking forward to this. I plan to get the hell out of Dodge as early as I can on Sunday...but the man is seriously into holidays and I know an Easter egg hunt is in the works along with at least one homemade chocolate peanut butter easter egg. Don't get me wrong...I appreciate the gesture. It's not even worth a statement. It's candy and it's a holiday where you give candy. Just like Christmas is just about presents. My dad's view on the world is amazingly simple in that way. So Passover will be...interesting...this year. Last year I ended up obsessing about food most of the week and pretty much resigned myself to a diet of salad, hard boiled eggs, cheese sticks and matzo for a week. I am determined this year shall be better. How can it not be when I get to spend two days of it with the Sponge? Woohoo! I LOVE the holidays!

The Payoff Apparantly, the $75 I was promised for typing Tom's paper and putting up with the corresponding shit has turned into a quickie dinner at Olive Garden. I can't say I am surprised but I CAN say I'd almost prefer NOTHING. In the first place, I don't appreciate "food" rewards. Why would I enjoy going to dinner with him when we don't even eat lunch together at work? The point is, this was an arrangement of convenience for us both. He got his paper and I was under the impression I'd get $75 bucks. Apparantly it only matters that one of us got what we excpected.

Oh, the humanity! My sister called this morning as I was wolfing down a bowl of Fruit Harvest, a very tasty cereal, by the way, and told me she had some news. After all the ups and downs over the past 9 months with my father and his spongey girlfriend, I have learned not to get too excited when Tami tells me she has news. Today's headlines? Between 3:00 and 4:00 this morning, the Sponge walked into the sunset. Two things with this. First, my dad lives at the end of a very large plan on a very (and I emphasize VERY) dark road. So either the Sponge has truly lost her mind, was doing it for show or had some big, bodacious bad boy waiting for her somewhere in that plan in a very warm car. I tend to think it's somewhere between the second and third choices. While I realize he's a big boy and that he can certainly make his own decisions about this, I really think she's not above getting someone to waste him. Despite his obvious issues with anger and his temper, he has a big heart. And even though he always tells me it was my MOTHER who brought home all the strays, it IS true that he did too. And the Sponge was just such a stray. Unfortunately, the other strays never plotted to kill him, nor did they run off and sleep with everything in a pair of Levis in the 25413 zip code. I guess we'll see if this means the Sponge is sponging off someone else. I, personally, am not optimistic. For one thing, would YOU just walk out of a million dollar house without a dime in your pocket given that you had no integrity to start with? I could see it if you started out with a few scruples. In her case, she never had any. Experience tells me that he will posture that he's sick of her shit and he's done with her. She will cozy up with some mountain man and screw his brains out for the next three days. Then one or the other will start pursuing the other one until, like atomic fusion, they are stuck back together again. Then the fighting will start again...and her whining. He'll buy her a makeup gift - which reminds me, where are the puppies he bought her throughout all of this? And her big old dog Roscoe? If nothing else, those dogs tie her to him and in some really creepy, Angelina Jolie way - make them a "family." She'll be back...trust me. I'll keep you posted.

Double-Take I am riding into work this morning and listening to the radio...as I am often wont to do. A commercial comes on for Bravo! about their special that airs for the next three nights on "Sexiest Moments in Film." Now I will admit, at 7:49 a.m. on a Monday, I am not neccesarily the most awake individual but I was fairly confident, after watching ALL of the last season of Sex and the City and being a HUGE fan of the eighties film White Nights, that the voice-over was being done FOR SURE by Mikhail Baryshnikov. POSITIVELY! Imagine MY surprise when the voice said, "This is Kathleen Turner..."