Not-Birthday

Since I bent your collective ear with about how sucky my birthday was, I wanted to let you know what a lovely not-birthday I had.

I had long-standing plans with friends to go to the coast at the end of last week (taking advantage of the boys’ spring break)—and even though I lost a day of it to the atypical chicken pox disaster, I sent the eight-year-old off with most of the gang Thursday morning, and followed with the four-year-old, and the working spouses (ie, the husbands) on Friday morning

And even though it was mid-afternoon by the time we rendezvoused with everyone else, we still decided to take the nifty little motorboat ferry out to the National Seashore barrier islands (Shackleford Banks, if you’ve been to that part of NC).

And it was a gorgeous, clear, spring day.

And we saw wild horses.*

And dolphins in the harbor.

And pelicans skimming the waves.

And the beach was deserted and pristine enough to remind me of my favorite poem about the ocean:

If you should dip your hand in,
your wrist would ache immediately,
your bones would begin to ache and your hand would burn
as if the water were a transmutation of fire
that feeds on stones and burns with a dark gray flame.
If you tasted it, it would first taste bitter,
then briny, then surely burn your tongue.
It is like what we imagine knowledge to be:
dark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free,
drawn from the cold hard mouth
of the world, derived from the rocky breasts
forever, flowing and drawn, and since
our knowledge is historical, flowing, and flown.
from Elizabeth Bishop, “At the Fishhouses”

And my friends made me an angel food cake with pudding sauce and berries, and everyone—five kids, five grown-ups—sang happy birthday.

So, I declared my real birthday null and void, and took that day for my birthday instead, because I’ve reached the age where you can do things like that if you want to.

Remember our slightly bizarre rabies vaccine experience? Well, here’s the latest:

Tuesday morning, I took my four-year-old in to the pediatrician for the hive-like rash he’s had since Friday. He’s been on spring break from preschool since 3/29, and was supposed to go back tomorrow—but I knew they’d show him the door tout suite if he showed up with an undiagnosed rash. Hence the preemptive strike, even though he hadn’t been sick, and it seemed to be clearing up on its own.

The doctor took one look at him and said, “That’s not hives, that atypical chicken pox.”

Cut to my astonished face.

“But,” I spluttered, “he’s been vaccinated” (as is mandatory).

“Yup,” said she, “that’s why we call it atypical chicken pox. It’s the kind you get when you’ve already been vaccinated.”

“But,” I spluttered some more, “they looked like hives—no blisters.”

“Yup,” she said,” with atypical chicken pox, it can look like anything.”

“I’m stunned,” I said.

“You look stunned,” she said, “but at least you’re laughing.”

Well, because, lucky for her, I had already hit rock bottom the day before, as I spent my whole birthday watching four sweaty, squabbling little boys (we’re having a heat wave here, wrapped in a green haze of tree pollen)—watched them in the service of having my friends watch my kids so that I could actually work today and tomorrow. Which now? is moot—since I’m home with the (not-sick) four-year-old until new pox stopping popping out (just a day or so, with any luck).

So, yup, hit the muddy bottom of the slough of despond and have bobbed back up to the surface-- where there’s nothing I can do about the fact that it’s impossible to look after my kids, have a full time job, and retain my sanity except laugh. Laugh slightly maniacally.

And, on the upside, it got me out of the horrible meeting I was supposed to be in yesterday. And after you’ve had four cranky boys rampaging through your house, one pox-y one seems relatively peaceful.

And, poor thing, he is kind of itchy, though not, I repeat, particularly sick. Still: Job? What job?

NB: Before you ask, apparently being vaccinated does make things better—makes you less sick if you do end up with chicken pox, for one, and much less contagious when you have them, for another.