Julep: This is (almost) 40

40 days from tomorrow, I will be 40.

Usually my Epoch of Birthday Introspection is from my actual birthday through New Years - it's a strange block of days that seem like a prelude to the new year, since I have turned the page but the rest of the world hasn't yet. This year it's come on much sooner, and it feels weird. But as I think back, I felt weird before my 30th birthday also. I remember describing it as feeling sort of like an emotional bottleneck -- everything squeezed tighter and then you were through, out in all the space imaginable on the other side.

At 30, a lot of what I was feeling had to do with the things I thought I would do by the time I was 30. I had  set a lot of goals for myself, primarily professional and financial things, and I had accomplished those things. I was successful and independent and I was standing there looking around wondering "Where to?" I remember telling my priest that I didn't know what God wanted from me next. And I remember that he told me to pray with a sincere heart, "Here I am, Lord," and then buckle up, because when you tell the Lord you're ready things will move dramatically, in ways you never expected.

So here I am at (almost) 40, in a totally different space, what with the husband, the kids, the family home and the college savings - and yet the fundamental question I'm feeling is still the same. Where to, next? What is my purpose from 40 to 50?

Part of it is realizing that I am no longer the Bright Young Thing. My friend Jeff said that he was a little disappointed the day he realized he was no longer a wunderkind, but just a 40 year old guy doing the same things as most 40 year olds: raising a family, earning a living, making a home. I know what he meant.

Another part of it is realizing that when you're 40, a lot of the major building blocks of your life are in place and that reduces the sense of possibilities. Are you ever going to ditch everything and travel the world with a backpack? Well, if you are our friend Bitsy, maybe. But if you are a parent with two kids, a dog, and a mortgage, probably not.

A third part is the recognition that this is truly midlife. The journey outwards is over. We all have to acknowledge that somewhere between 40 and 50, for virtually everyone, you've crossed the midpoint and are on the way home. And I don't mind that in one sense - I'm not particularly worried about death - but it's weird to think that so much of the record of your life is already behind you.

I remember that around this time of year when I was 29, I had some revelations. Before Thanksgiving I told my mom, the patron saint of non-confrontation, that if my sisters were b!tches to me (as usual), I was not coming home for Christmas. I would stop in to see my mom at some point, but I would spend the holiday with my uncle and his family, where everyone would be glad to see me. 30 felt too old to put up with that shit any longer. And  I don't know what she said to them, but whatever it was, it worked. Here ten years later, I have a genuinely nice relationship with Big Sis, and Lil Sis, well, she's still a pain in the ass, but mostly not to me. I would never have predicted it.

I wonder what the revelations will be this year. I wonder what I can't predict about what my life will be like at 50.

I'm celebrating my birthday with 4 days in New York with my maid of honor. And we've rented a house at the beach this summer with my matron of honor and her family. I don't know what I'm going to do on my actual birthday. I don't want to let it pass in silence, but I'm thinking that maybe this needs to be a whole year of celebrating all of what got me this far.

Julep: And while I'm here....

I got home last night to see that Mr. Mama left the kids' breakfast dishes in the sink. Now I see why her son is such a slob.

I realized this morning that she also let Bits carry her special cup on the ride to school, and then didn't bring it back to the house. I had to call her this morning about the cup - the Bear said he thought it was in Mr. Mama's car, and I didn't want to keep looking around the house if he was right - and she acknowledged that she had the cup but did not whisper one word of apology about dropping the ball on me yesterday.

That woman's emotional maturity peaked in high school. Not only is she about as reliable as a (poorly raised) teenager, she treats her own screw-ups the way a teenager does, too.

Julep: Let us sing of coupon books.

We are all having a great experience at the kids' new preschool. The Bear is feeling good about himself and the music teacher thinks he is the greatest thing since Mozart. Little Bits loves her teachers, and Tiny Twinks is teaching her all about how your bow should be wider than your head. We are not too jazzed about the 7.2 days off over a four-week stretch starting this week, but you know, when you sign up for a preschool run by the Tribe you have to deal with their multitudinous fall holidays.

The one thing that has really irked me so far is the fundraising. When we showed up for the Parents' Night the week before school, we were handed a pile of coupon books and told that we were required to sell them for $20 each, as a fundraiser. Since then, I have been inundated (by which I mean, reminded at least twice a week) about my obligation to sell these d^mn coupon books and turn in the money so that the kids' classrooms can win an ice cream party.

OK, here's the thing. I'm not selling the coupon books. I answered today's email and told the office staff that I'm not selling the books, just give me a number and I'll add it to next month's tuition payment. She sent the number, I amended my auto-bill-pay at the bank, and we're done. See how easy that was? Here's a tip: I don't mind attending a fundraiser event, but this mandatory shilling of unwelcome articles is unseemly and a little bit ridiculous.

The vast majority of the people in my office are either administrative types or attorneys who are not partners. I pay their salaries, in other words, and I find it unseemly to ask people I pay to return some of their money to me -- even in exchange for a coupon book of dubious utility.

My family does enough to help me with my kids - and my friends either have their own coupon books to hawk or don't make enough money to buy something from every d^mn friend's kid with a fundraising requirement. (It's the Pampered Chef party of the next decade, I can sense it.) I am not asking our loved ones to subsidize our educational choices by purchasing a coupon book of dubious utility.

The school keeps suggesting that the books make great holiday gifts for the mailman, etc.Sure, because nothing says "I wanted to share the joy of the season with you" like a coupon book of dubious utility. This is essentially telling me that I should pay for the books myself and foist them on others to whom I feel obligated to give socially-required-yet-awkward gifts. I'm pretty sure the mailman would rather get cash, or cookies, or a $15 Starbucks card,

People: this is a private school. If you need more money to run it, raise the tuition by $100 per year - or create an annual $100 activity-and-materials fee, or something. Don't waste the trees on the coupon books, and don't waste my time on the endless reminders to sell the d^mn things.

Julep: So typical

This morning was the annual fundraiser breakfast for the large local non-profit organization I have chaired for the past three years. Fortunately for this story, I am no longer the chair and no longer called on to speak at the event ... but I was still hosting a table of ten, not to mention that I knew there would be many folks in the crowd that I would want to greet and chat with. (Not least among them you lovely dears.)

Last weekend Mr. J was in Detroit, sailing. He was supposed to be home for three days before turning around and heading to Minneapolis. Well, as it happened, he was wrong about the scheduling and he was only home for about 36 hours. He left yesterday afternoon. It's fine, I can deal with the kids on my own for an extra day or two, but I was going to need some help in the morning today as the kids are not supposed to arrive at school before 8:15, and the doors were opening at the breakfast at 7:30 a.m. for an 8:00 start time.

I called on Mr-Mama. It seemed like the reasonable thing to do, since my own mama was already on board to help pick the kids up at school three days this week, and since the Mr-Parents live half a mile from my house, and since Mr-Mama made a huge point of telling me while I was with her last weekend that she is always up in the morning and had thought about volunteering to take the kids to school on the regular (ha!) but she thought it would be good for Mr. J to get into that routine. Sure, whatever.

So I texted her on Monday night about helping out this morning (Wednesday). She was all about it. No problem at all. I'd get the kids up and dressed and she'd be here by 7:20 to give them breakfast and drive them to school. Great.

Well, this morning at 7:20 she was not at my house. She's routinely late so I was not yet panicked. I got very busy dealing with the Bear, who was having a rough morning (sleepy and cranky), and the Bits, who had somehow removed her own diaper and peed all over her bed such that everything had to go into the washing machine including (the horrors!) her beloved Baby. I was starting to stress, though. My trips downstairs by myself had reduced the Bear to tears, so I was reduced to begging Bear to please, please put on his clothes so that we could go downstairs and call Mr-Mama. At 7:33, we finally got downstairs and the phone rang. It was Mr-Papa. He said, "Was Mr-Mama supposed to be over there this morning to help with the kids?" I said, "Yes, ten minutes ago." He said, "I'm on my way right now and she'll be right behind me."

Through a blessed confluence of green lights, and after literally sprinting two downtown blocks -- providing a great source of entertainment for the people sitting in the Einstein Bagel Bros windows, I'm sure -- I made it to the registration table for the breakfast at exactly 7:59, and I got to my table at the very moment they turned down the lights. I don't need this kind of stress in my life.

This, THIS, is exactly why Mr. J says every time I suggest that we call his mom for help: "I can't rely on her." I would be so mortified and ashamed if my child ever said that about me. The only silver lining is that her flakiness seems to be nudging Mr. J to do better himself.

Julep: The HRF

Mr. J's sister got engaged last weekend. Y'all know that I am dearly fond of Mr-Sister. I am somewhat less fond of her beau, whose previous title (The Highly Regrettable Boyfriend) must now be revised to The Highly Regrettable Fiance. I don't dislike him in the pure sense. But he is not merely socially awkward - he is just plain anti-social. And he makes me uneasy. I don't trust him.

Here's the latest classic example. Mr-Sister is having a lot of anxiety around wedding planning. Now part of that was inevitable, given her mother. But I truly did not think it would be so difficult for her to make some high-level decisions and then tell Mr-Mama to have at it.

I had a long chat with her the other day, and here's what I discovered: The HRF doesn't want a wedding. Not a real one. Mr-Sis told me, "He'd be happy to go down to the Justice of the Peace and have dinner after in my parents' backyard." Furthermore, she said, "He doesn't want to get married in front of a bunch of my parents' friends, or even my friends that he doesn't know well." So Mr-Sis is tying herself in knots trying to transform the wedding she always assumed she would have into something smaller and less ... wedding-like ... so that The HRF won't be uncomfortable.

She was talking about flying off to the Bahamas - she said, "we could invite about 50 people." I gently suggested to her that a destination wedding is extremely inconvenient for people with small children who must either spend thousands of dollars on airfare to bring the whole crew or figure out who will watch their children at home - and I don't mean her brother and me, I figure that Mr-Papa will at least help us with the tab although there won't be much he can do about either Mr. J or me (ha, I pretend that it might possibly be Mr. J) having to spend the evenings after 8 p.m. sitting in a hotel room while the party goes on downstairs and our children sleep, as I do not want to live out the story of that British couple whose daughter was abducted from their hotel room in Portugal while they had dinner downstairs. Where was I? Oh yes, she has several very close friends with small children and non-extensive bank accounts. Also, her lifelong best friend will be nine months pregnant in the spring and certainly not flying to the Bahamas. Oh, and her 90 year old grandmother won't be able to go either. Finally, I asked whether The HRF would be really more comfortable in a group of 50 where approximately 6 of them are his own friends and relations.

I think she has ditched the destination idea. She's now talking about some barn out in the countryside that rents out for weddings. And listen, it's her wedding, she should do what she will love. It's not the specific plans that are bothering me ... it's the idea that your fiance doesn't want you to have a wedding full of the people who have loved you throughout your life, who want to come and celebrate your joy with you, because he's uncomfortable in crowds. Suck it up, dude. He is perfectly happy to stay home and sit on the couch with her at all times - and maybe the times that they are alone together watching TV are wonderful and blissful, I don't know, What I do know is that before she met him, she was a quintessential people person. I know that people change as they get older, and maybe she has realized that being in big groups isn't something she really enjoys or needs in her life. But I don't think so. I think she keeps thinking that it will get better: as he meets more of her friends and gets to know people better, he'll be more comfortable around them. But I think she is mistaken. I don't think he wants that at all. He wants her to make her life smaller so that he will be more at ease in it. And I hate to think she is carving away pieces of herself in order to make him happier.

Oh, and I ain't sayin' he's a gold-digger ... but I am wondering if there is any tactful way to suggest to her that consulting a lawyer about a pre-nup would be a really, really good idea. Shower gift, maybe?

Julep: let the record show...

... that my fears about leaving Mr. J in charge for most of the first two weeks at the kids' new school were unfounded. He stepped up to the plate beautifully. In fact, I now think it was a real blessing that I was gone so much those first few weeks, because it forced him to develop strategies to manage without my contribution. Now that I am home, he's not relying on me to nag him out of bed, thanks be to the sweet baby Jesus. Three weeks in and so far so good.

In discussing this with LoLa, I recognized that in general, Mr. J responds well to pressure. In fact, he thrives on it. He is at his best when everything is going to hell around him. And this is a bit of a stress point in our marriage, because I am not someone who likes to let things go to where catastrophic failure is a real possibility.

Faced with a situation where he has to act or disaster will ensue, you can count on Mr. J to save the day. He will always sink the free throws when the game is on the line. If he'll pardon me the UK analogy, he's a Harrison twin. But (no disrespect to the Harrisons) he is also the player who caused the team to need a game-winning free throw, because he was distracted on defense and dawdled around on the shot clock and seemed like he was sleepwalking through the whole first half.

It was easier to let Mr. J do his own thing when it was just the two of us. Now that we are raising children, I feel obliged to, you know, not fuck them up. So I backstop him, and that makes him lazy. Probably if I were willing to let Mr. J almost-fail more often, he would do better at taking responsibility for our household, family, life ... but I might have a coronary from the stress. I'm thinking there's a zen koan in here somewhere.

Julep: shifting gears

Just read an article quoting Rand Paul in which I immediately thought, "What an idiotic thing to say." A little normalcy is a nice thing.

The kids start their new school on Monday - and will be classmates with the Twinkle sisters! I am excited about this in the big picture but getting anxiety about the transition. Under the new regime, Mr. J will be responsible for dropping the kids off every morning. He will have to be up and somewhat functional at 7:30 a.m. five days a week, and I am here to tell you that he is not good at getting out of bed in the mornings.Yes, he is an adult. Yes, this is the sort of thing that the rest of us had to learn to adapt to a solid twenty or thirty years back. I'm not trying to say it's reasonable, but it's a concern.

If it were me, I would be spending the start of August carefully trying to calibrate my bedtime and rising time to the new normal, so that next week would not be such a shock to the system. I don't have to tell you that I have (thus far) seen no signs that Mr. J is doing the same.

I thought I had a plan in place that was going to give me at least some way to force his hand -- I told him that I would get the kids up and dressed every morning, then leave for the office and let him handle breakfast and the drop-off. This plan masquerades as a division of labor, while allowing me to make sure the children are dressed decently and that they are up and roaming the house thus giving him an urgent sense of the need to get out of bed rather than simply sleeping though his alarm clock.

Then I realized this week that I will be out of town for work on Thursday and Friday mornings next week, and at least three mornings of the following week. Three mornings is simply not enough to get Mr. J into a new routine.

I'm starting to worry. My poor kids are going to spend their first two weeks at a new school being those kids who can't show up on time.