By: Brandy Black

I couldn’t have said it better than Elizabeth Gilbert in her most recent book Committed…

“Interracial marriage was illegal in the United States until fairly recently.  All of this changed in 1967 with the case of a rural Virginia couple named -poetically enough- the Lovings.  Richard Loving was white; his wife Mildred was black.  When they decided to marry in 1958, interracial unions were still illegal in the commonwealth of Virginia as well as in 15 other American states.  So the young couple sealed their vows in Washington DC instead but when they returned home after their honeymoon they were swiftly apprehended by local police.  The fact that they had married each other at all rendered the couple guilty enough to haul off to jail…

The Lovings moved to Washington DC with the understanding that if they ever again returned to Virginia, they would face a jail sentence…

The Supreme Court in 1967 sealed the legality of “the Lovings” union in a 9 to 0 ruling.  At the time, I must also mention, a poll showed that 70% of Americans vehemently opposed this ruling but the courts were morally ahead of the general population on this matter…

You won’t be surprised will you if I now take a few moments to discuss the subject of same sex marriage…what I can say about the subject is that legalized same sex marriage is coming to America in large part because non-legalized marriage is already here.  Same sex couples already live together openly these days, whether their relationships have been officially sanctioned by their states or not.  Same sex couples are raising children together, paying taxes together, building homes together, running businesses together, creating wealth together and even getting divorced from each other.  All these already existing relationships and social responsibilities must be managed and organized through rule of law in order to keep civil society running smoothly…I recognize that conservatives are worried that homosexuals will destroy and corrupt the institution of marriage but perhaps they should consider a distinct possibility that gay couples are actually poised at this moment in history to save marriage. Think of it!  Marriage is on the decline everywhere, all across the western world.  People are getting married later in life, if they’re getting married at all, or they are producing children willy-nilly out of wedlock, or (like me) they are approaching the whole institution with ambivalence or even hostility…So why not let them in?  Why not recruit them by the vanload to sweep in on heroic wings and save the flagging and battered old institution of matrimony from a bunch of apathetic ne’er-do-well, heterosexual deadbeats like me.  In any case, whatever happens with gay marriage, and whenever it happens, I can also assure you that future generations will someday find it ridiculous to the point of comedy that we ever debated this topic at all.”

This is an excerpt that I couldn’t resist sharing.

By: Pearson Brown

Today I took my son to Joey’s Gym in Beverly Hills, the best little kid gym out there — with cool owners who genuinely love kids and their jobs, and I was thinking about how great it is that I got laid off one year ago today.

Thanks to being jobless, I get to take Stephen every Tuesday to his Gym Cats class, and I get to see him growing up little by little, like when he learns to wait his turn and listen for his name to be called before he gets to jump up and run the obstacle course and finish with a big hug for mommy.

And then I really got a dose of the benefits of being a stay-at-home mom when just before class was about to let out he started touching his ear and crying, saying “My ear hurts.”

We went to the gym waiting area where I tried to soothe him, but when he was inconsolable for nearly 10 minutes I left to take him home.  He kept crying and hitting at his ear.  Even Nemo on the in-car DVD player — usually reserved for long trips — didn’t help.

I called his pediatrician’s office from the car, and he was crying so loud I could barely hear the nurse.  They couldn’t see him until 2:45 pm, and urgent care was booked until 4 pm.  I took him home to wait it out, to see if I might have to take him to the ER.  I gave him some warm milk, which usually calms him, and he was still crying.  His temperature was 98.  After about 20 minutes he feel asleep in my arms.  I kept checking his temp with the ear thermometer.  It was now 100.6.  But he was sleeping peacefully.

He awoke a few times crying, but mostly he slept until 2:30 when I bundled him up and put his increasingly warm little body into the car seat.

The doc took us nearly right away.  His temp was now 102.  While I was explaining to him the symptoms, suddenly Stephen heaved and began vomiting.  Covered in barf, I tried to comfort him as he cried and vomited more.  The doc offered some wipes and paper towels.

The diagnosis –thank goodness –was simple stomach flu.  Treatment was a fever-reducing suppository and 24-hour liquid diet followed by 24-hour BRAT (bananas, rice, apple sauce, and toast) diet.

The main relief was that I was there with him.  I held him when he vomited again before leaving the doc’s office, and then when he got home.  He held my neck tightly when I laid down with him, and when I started to move to get a blanket, he whimpered, “Mommy, don’t go.”  Of course I didn’t go anywhere.  I was nearly tearful to see him so weak and sad, his cheeks flushed red with fever and his eyes half-closed.  The only good thing was, because I got laid off, I was able to be home with him during his time of need.

My partner is a school teacher, and it would be very hard for her to get a sub and run home at a time like this.  If I had been working at my PR job, it would have been very difficult for me to put down my client’s work and just leave the office to go home.  It would have been the nanny taking him to the doc and then staying with him to keep an eye on him and comfort him.

He is only two, so I am sure he will not remember this incident, but subconsciously I think he will remember that I was there for him, and he will continue to grow up little by little each day of his toddlerhood – a time that I am privileged to share with him daily due to my state of unemployment, and he will be a little bit stronger for it.

And even if he does not remember any bit of this time, I will, always.

By: Jed Olmedo

I’ve been living with my partner for over three years and let me tell ya, it only seems to grow as a challenge. As time progresses I keep imagining the same situations I saw at home playing out all over again in the one tiny room my partner and I are living in. Much more on this in later episodes of course. For now, let’s start from our current square in this game of life we play so well.

My name’s Jed, his name is Ever. He is a shy, sweet guy who for some odd reason accepts me and all my quirkiness and loves me for it. He is also the kind of guy who has a hard time finding his sense of direction in life. That’s where I jump in. I am his muse, though lately it seems that with the current economy and lack of jobs I’ve been laid off as one. For now I am the observant and often-times bitchy boyfriend who works a full-time job and is trying to find his own sense of direction as well, all while balancing friendships in need of nurturing love, cooking dinner, shouting at mother over the phone for making me an emotional wreck, trying to keep the house clean of pesky room-mates (we have 5 of them!), feeding the cats, rubbing their bellies, and encouraging/ pushing Ever to find that damn direction. We really are an odd couple but I like all things odd and misunderstood. Our love for each other is what matters most (Gosh! If only I could keep this in mind every time we argue!)You can catch this odd reality TV show every evening from around 5 p.m. ’til midnight on TheNextFamily channel. Very heart-warming, dramatic and sometimes just plain boring.

This is my story as a motherly man trying to start his own family. I still have many loose ends in life but I also have much time to figure all the kinks out. I personally like my ends a little loose. Gives life that gritty edge. It also gives me much to think about and thinking is something I do so much of these days. So let’s end this episode with one final thought. It doesn’t matter how much you stress over what family should be like. What really matters is that you have a family who can share love with you. I have Ever and my three lovely cats, and although it is a very small family right now, we hope that like a garden that needs water, sun and love, it can blossom and yield many delicious fruits some day. For now we’ll focus on the baby steps to get there. We’ve got the manure, the shovel and the gardening 101 book, money back guaranteed. Now let’s start gardening!

By: Pearson Brown

The 2007 Scarlett Johansson movie, The Nanny Diaries, based on the novel of the same name, tells one side of the story — of the life of a nanny and her awful employers.  Well I have another side to tell.

We just got a new nanny, and she’s a keeper.  She’s a sweet, kind and caring young girl of 23 years from Nebraska, new to LA, and she loves kids.  She is our third nanny in two and a half years.  We had hoped for consistency in child care for our son’s sake, but unfortunately the others had to go.

Nada

The first nanny, we’ll call her “Nada,” came recommended by a friend who had employed her as a housekeeper.  She seemed nice enough, very animated, though a bit screechy, and she came recommended by a mom who told me, ”She always helped out without being asked” and ”She not only cleans, she deep cleans.”  Wow, she sounded fantastic.  I hired her to babysit my son three days a week when my maternity leave was up and I had to return to work when my son was three months old.

She spoke Spanish and broken English, and I spoke some Spanish, but I found that her English failed her — as did her ability to understand my Spanish – when she did not want to understand.  For instance, she had agreed to do light housekeeping, such as mop the kitchen floor once a week and wash my son’s clothes, when my son was napping, but these things never got done.

When I came home for lunch or unexpectedly dropped in on her during the day, she would be reading a magazine at my kitchen table while my son napped.  When I mentioned that it would be a good time to do the laundry, she would nod and say, “Yes, yes,” but then she would continue to sit and read.  In fact, she would give me a dirty look right before she went back to reading her magazine, which by the way, was in English.

Okay, so that’s not so bad, but then I found out the real reason why she always rushed out in the morning to get to the park.  I thought she was eager to play with my son on the swing and let him run around with the other kids at the park.  After some recon, I discovered that she was dashing out to get her latte at Starbucks and then meeting her friends to chat while parking my son, imprisoned in his stroller, for up to three to four hours each day.  Then she would return home when he was sleeping — stashing her empty Starbucks cup in our bushes in the front yard on the way in — to read magazines and have lunch.

When I learned that my son was basically vegetating all day in her care, I said “adios” to her, and I went about finding another nanny.

P.S.  I will never know why that first mom gave Nada such a high recommendation.

Tricki

Due to being laid off at my job, I couldn’t afford to pay a nanny as I had done previously, so I offered a live-in position three days a week in exchange for housing.  I found our second nanny, we’ll call her “Tricki,” on craigslist.  She told me her career ambition was to one day own a day-care center.  She said she loved kids and had been a nanny before, though she could not get a recommendation from her former employer because she was a “stage mom” who had expected too much, and the employment did not end well.

Tricki was 23 and returning to LA to live after being laid off from her entry-level job in Colorado, where she had relocated to be near her boyfriend.  When I heard “out-of-state boyfriend,” I should have known better, but I took her into our home and she began babysitting my son while I was freelancing from home.

At first, things seemed fine, except my son’s sleep schedule inexplicably changed coinciding with her babysitting routine.  On days that Tricki watched my son, he began taking long morning naps, sometimes for three or more hours.  While I worked from my home office I often assumed Tricki had taken my son to the park, because the house was so quiet, but then I learned they were in her room, both of them sound asleep.

When I asked Tricki to shift naptime to the afternoon, she claimed she tried but my son just naturally fell asleep in the morning, though sometimes he had just woken up an hour or so before.  Finally, I got to the bottom of the mysterious sleeping schedule.

Seems that Tricki was tired from her night job as a hostess at a popular local restaurant, often followed by late-night carousing with her co-workers and friends, and she needed her rest, so she put my son on her schedule, for her own convenience.

I also noticed that she was calling and texting her boyfriend, a lot, and I was very firm with her that she should wait until my son was napping or when she was off duty to call and text.  She agreed, but the calling and texting continued. Constantly.

Once I came outside to see her standing in front of our house with my son in his stroller while she chatted on the phone.  I waited a few minutes, unseen, as she continued to chat. I went into the house for about 25 minutes, and came out to astoundingly find her still standing chatting on the phone.

Needless to say, the mopping and laundry never got done, but really, these issues were minor compared to what followed.

When I had already decided it was time for Tricki to go, and I was just deciding how to handle it, she threw a wrench in my plans to get rid of her by wrecking my SUV.  I had suspicions she was texting while it happened, but she claimed she simply did not see the parked van that she struck in the parking lot at Chuck E Cheese.  She had no funds to pay for the $4,000 in damage, but she agreed to “work it off” by putting in extra babysitting hours.

Then, through no fault of her own, as she pointed out to me, she had an emergency appendectomy, which required her to convalesce at my home for a few weeks.  During this time I of course was not able to do any freelance work as I had to take over childcare during the day.

After her recovery, I let her know that I was letting her go, but I explained that the reason was that my parents were coming for an extended visit and I needed her room.  When she knew she was on her way out, she showed her true colors.

The week before she was due to leave, she came home at 5:30 am so stumbling drunk she could not figure out how to use the key to get into our house.  My partner heard the commotion of her fumbling with her keys, and looked out our front window to find her crouched in the courtyard, urinating.  Appalled, my partner left for work and Tricki passed out in her room.  At 9:30 am I tried to rouse her.  I saw her feet sticking out from the covers and thought she might be dead.  I yelled her name and shook her but she was unresponsive.  I called 911.  Just as the operator was about to send help, Tricki emerged, smelling of alcohol, and apologized that she “must have overslept.”

That was the last straw, but it was not the last of the outrages.  Tricki was due to pack up and leave at the end of the week, and her boyfriend had quit his job, sold his car and decided to move to be near Tricki in California and stay with his parents who lived about an hour away from LA.  He came to visit Tricki while she was on the job babysitting, and Tricki promised that he would not be a distraction and in fact he was a really great playmate for my son, and it did seem that my son enjoyed his company, and at least Tricki was not sleeping all day and they actually went out and did things during the day.

Each night, after my partner, my son and I were in bed, Tricki’s boyfriend went home to his parents’ house.  Each night we heard them leave around 2 am, then Tricki returned home around 4 am. We never wondered how he got home, despite the fact that neither he or Tricki had a car.   Then we found out how.  Every night, after we went to bed, Tricki took my partner’s spare car key and helped herself to the car.  When my partner mentioned to me that she thought the car was not where she parked it, or the seat was moved back, or the gas tank was empty, I thought she was imagining things.  Then Tricki accidentally left her coat in the car, and she was busted.

With this bit of solid proof, I confronted her outright.  “Have you been taking the car at night?”

She was speechless.  Then she managed a few lines that she must have rehearsed when she realized she left her coat in the car and would likely be questioned: “Just a few times when it was late and I went out for ice cream and I didn’t want to walk to the store late at night.”

Right.

So Tricki was gone.  Good riddance.  And don’t even think about getting a reference.

P.S.  I think I know now why she wasn’t able to give me a reference.

Hope

So now we have Hope.  She’s working out great so far.  I’ve given up on the laundry and mopping thing.  If she does it fine, if not, I’ll just do it myself.  The main thing is she is responsible and she takes good care of my son.

Ok, so her first week she wrecked my partner’s car.  A lady just unexpectedly stopped in front of her and she couldn’t brake in time.  No one was hurt.  For some reason the magic figure for body work these days is $4,000, and that is what the latest nanny crash cost us.

Stuff happens, and perhaps this one incident with the car “got the stink off” as an old friend used to say about breaking a spell of bad luck.

We sure hope so.

By: Brandy Black

I came home the other day with a receipt in hand, excited to share the news with Susan and Sophia that we have sponsored a child.

Susan- You did what? Where?

Me- Larchmont, 70% of the kids that are sponsored get a college education.

Susan- You got scammed

Brandy- No I didn’t, it’s only 70 cents a day to help save a child’s life!

She laughed at me, I went on to explain that it’s through Children’s International and they have been around for 30 years and that we would be getting a picture of the kid in the mail and a letter and we could even visit the child one day.  A week passed and no letter, no picture, no packet.  After another week went by I called, angry and ready to renounce my monthly payments.  The friendly gentleman on the phone assured me that the packet was on its way and that I had truly saved this child as he was in a destitute situation.  I felt better.  After a couple more days passed with no letter I was cleaning off our side table in our dining room and under a file of papers found the packet.  His name is Lenin and he’s from Ecuador and he is 5 years old.   He’s very handsome and looks curiously healthy- I guess I can’t really be mad at that although I was somewhat disappointed.

He sits on our fridge and now Sophia points up to him and says “Lenin, my sponsor brother”.  Despite Susan’s cynicism and mockery comparing me to “About Schmidt”, I eagerly await his first letter.  Susan does too.

.

.

[photo credit: Flickr- Pink Sherbet Photography]

By: Brandy Black

Sophia’s birthday was last week and her party was on Valentine’s Day.  We had it at Amy’s Playground an indoor play area for kids.  I have been preparing for a month, just little things, toys here, centerpieces there, bracelets, rings, sunglasses, spiral straws, I couldn’t stop, every time I went to Target I would buy more.  I couldn’t go online without finding vintage valentines and miniature rubber ducks.  Susan finally put a moratorium on my toddler shopping sprees.  I had a blast doing it which is not normally how my party planning goes, I’m usually stressed out and making lists galore all the while sure that I’m forgetting something.  What can you screw up with a kid’s party?  I had no fear, only fun, and was convinced that I’m only having children’s parties from here on out.

I dropped off the centerpieces and toys on Friday so that unloading on party day would be a breeze while toting the toddler.  They opened the box and the first thing Amy saw was plastic rings and beaded necklaces.  She explained that those were choking hazards as my daughter and most of her guests were only 2.  My face went flush, I froze and I had that moment that I had played out many times when I was pregnant, that moment where you realize you have no idea what the hell you’re doing.  I felt as if Amy and her staff were looking at me thinking “How have you not killed your child?” I remembered the time my friends Leslie and Jared came over with their two toddlers and I had lit candles all over our house- she had to rapidly blow them out one by one.  What did I know? I wasn’t a mom!  Now, here I was standing there thinking, “What the hell do I know? and shit I’m a mom.” What’s worse is that I actually tried to explain my way out of it, “well they are for the inside of the mailbox centerpieces so the kids won’t be playing with them until the end”.  Amy assured me that there was a good chance that they would be playing with them throughout the party and it was simply not safe. Luckily I had shopped too much as always (much to Susan’s chagrin) and had back-up toys that fit the 2 year old criteria.

The party was a hit, Sophia had a blast, no one choked, Amy’s Playground was beautiful, the staff was on it and took care of every last detail and I would absolutely have a party there again and again and again and finally not one toy was touched from the centerpieces until the end when the angel children politely asked if they could take some rubber ducks home with them.  Better safe than sorry

This was the best money ever spent, the staff took care of everything from beginning to end- they even loaded our car up with all the presents and decorations at the end of the party.

By: Pearson Brown

I’ve been re-reading and editing the book I began writing FOUR YEARS AGO! I can’t believe there has been such a lapse. Before taking a break, I actually wrote 400 pages, and I loved writing it, but planning to have a baby, trying to conceive and then giving birth, caring for a newborn and now raising a two-year old took precedence.

Of course little Stephen is still my first priority, but with being laid off from my job 10 months ago and freelance jobs paying so little, I began to think that perhaps finishing the novel will not only be enjoyable but profitable. I had shown the first 220 pages to an agent who immediately wanted to represent me, which I think was a good sign. Another agent at ICM to whom I told part of the story was also eager to read it. So, with that encouragement, I am back on track.

They say a writer must write everyday, and now that I am blogging and freelancing as a journalist I am doing that, and I think it actually helps my novel writing. It’s like exercise, or practice. Do it everyday and you get stronger and better.

So we’ll see how it affects my blog posts. Ready, set, write!

Out With Mommy

By: Brandy Black

My daughter has taken to only wearing tank tops.  Every morning I try to slip a T-shirt or god forbid a long sleeve past her and she screams “Tank Top Mama, NEED the tank top, WANT the tank top!”  I can’t figure it out, but even through our rainy trip to San Francisco, she insisted on being dressed for the summer.  So I’m doing laundry like crazy and searching the stores for summer dresses and tops.  I have even tried buying very thin comfy shirts, which I prefer because I too run hot, but Sophia won’t have it.  I just know in a month when we are fully stocked for her new style and the sun is starting to peek out again, she’s going to want mittens and scarves.  Oh the plight of a toddler-bearing mama.

By: Brandy Black

“Oh, actually Susan’s Mom and I’m Mama.”

This is a phrase that I have repeated multiple times with various family and friends over the last couple weeks. Every time I say this annoying, yet incredibly important phrase it reminds me of a conversation Susan had with a friend a while back.

Said friend was complaining to her about a couple lesbians who always tell him what to call them in relation to their children.

“Why is it so important who’s mom and who’s mommy, they seem to get so uptight about it.”

At that time our daughter wasn’t even talking, so Susan didn’t really know how to answer the question –she hadn’t given it much thought. But now…now we get it.

Although we gay people might irritate straight folks with the emphasis of a title in the presence of our children, it is truly important to us. See, I think people forget how lucky they are to have a built in name- mom, mommy, dad, daddy. These are things that a child is born knowing. Names that are universal- everyone knows who they are talking about when a child shouts at the top of their lungs….DADDY!
When little Sophia asks for Mama, there is either an awkward pause or a quick assumption as to which one of us she might want. This is generally the case unless we give a brief family vocabulary lesson. Many times our definitions go in one ear and out the other and I find myself a broken record and probably rather “uptight”.

My 9-year-old niece, Jenna, got it right every time and I hadn’t even schooled her yet. She took it upon herself to do her research and she called me by my given name and Susan by hers. She even corrected her mom when she would slip up.

“Mom, Brandy’s Mama and Susan’s Mom.”

It was truly touching. Thank you, Jenna, for your sweet, heartfelt attention to detail; it didn’t go unnoticed by me, Susan or Sophia.

By: Brandy Black

When I was pregnant, I enlisted advice from a few close friends who had children with amazing sleep habits. They all told me to follow a sleep schedule, so we did. As a result I have been a scheduled mommy –to a fault. I followed “Baby Whisperer” from the very start and only allowed a cheat here and there. It was tough, but we knew that in the long run, we wanted an independent sleeper. The Baby Whisper is actually a pretty gentle approach, but it doesn’t allow for yummy cuddle time for naps, etc. We have been deprived.

In the last 6 months we’ve been craving cuddle time, after all, rules are made to be broken! Our well-trained daughter won’t have it; she refuses to take naps on the couch with us or even sleep in our arms on a plane. On one hand, it’s great –she goes down every night at 7PM (for anyone) with no complaints. She is a great sleeper and, I believe, loves her crib time. On the other hand, we never get to cuddle with her! Susan gets bitter with me every once in a while and swears if we have another one, we’ll cheat more.

Today, I called in sick because we didn’t have a nanny for the day. Susan had a lunch break for a couple hours and the three of us hung out on the “Big Girl Bed”, reading books like we do. All of a sudden, Sophia draped one arm around me and the other on Susan and bam went to sleep. I lay frozen; I didn’t want to move a muscle for fear that I would ruin the first cuddle with her moms. My feet were cold, I had work to do, and I wasn’t tired, but I lay soaking in the joy of my little one’s small chest rising and falling on mine as I drifted off to sleep.