Free Free-Range Knitter by Stephanie Pearl–McPhee Page B

is relaxing, not stupid.
I told you not to look at her.
Where would I get three fluorescent light bulbs and a length of hose at midnight? (I hate science fairs.)
He’s a teenage boy. We all know what he’s thinking.
Because it can kill you. (Why you can’t play hide-and-seek with the dryer as your hiding place.)
I can’t make a bike bigger with the power of my mind! (This really did seem like the only appropriate answer. I have never been given a reasonable explanation for whatmy children think I’m going to be able to do about an outgrown bike at 10:12 on a Sunday night.)
Why is this so sticky? (Lemonade concentrate is not paint.)
Just because I’m not here doesn’t mean I can’t see you! (Okay, so I was coming a little undone.)
I don’t care what Linda says. Thunder is not God bowling.
Because it can kill you. (Why drying your hair while you are in the bath doesn’t save people time.)
Because I need to lie down. (Why I’m lying down.)
Because I’m having a bad day. (Why I’m taking my knitting with me.)
Because my head hurts. (Why I’m lying down with my pillow over my face.)
Because there’s no point. (Why I’m getting up.)

Fine Qualities in an Adult
    Dear Amanda,
    On this day eighteen years ago, I was feeling pretty cocky. You were born, and I sincerely thought I was equipped. I really did. Even though you were my first, I knew my way around babies and wasn’t afraid of them, and I was even pretty sure that I had fantastic baby-tending skills. Moreover, this parenting thing seemed to me like it was going to be pretty straightforward. I knew motherhood would have its challenging moments, but overall I thought I was going to be really good at it, and that it would be something I excelled at. I was pretty sure that with all the books I had read and how much research I had done, I would have a great grip on it. I thought that those parents who were losing it all over the place were just not working hard enough at it. I was going to be a relaxed mother.
    I think, darling girl, that we can both agree that I have been the exact opposite of relaxed in every way that there is to be not relaxed, and now I really don’t know whether to apologize or demand thanks for that. I don’t know what went wrong with my plan—my plan for how easy it was all going to be—but when you screamed your way through your first night on this Earth, despite everything the midwife and I could do to comfort you, I started to wonder if I hadn’t received a standard-issue baby.
    This was confirmed when you screamed your way through virtually every moment of the first four months of your life (thanks for entirely skipping sleep, too; that wasn’t at all challenging) and then spent the next several years trying to kill yourself in a new way every thirty-five seconds. At nine months you walked. At ten months you climbed to the top of the fridge and sat up there eating bananas. The moment I walked into the kitchen and found you up there is one that will likely be the last image I see in my mind’s eye as I depart this Earth. Sometimes at night I still try to figure out how you got up there.
    At eleven months I thought about tying you to the family bed so I could fall asleep without worrying that you would do all of this while my guard was down. At eighteen months you had a full vocabulary with which to add insult to injury; your favorite words were “No,” “Not Mum,” and “Me do it.” Everyone agreed that these choices were very telling. About the same time that you got verbal, you developed a proclivity for biting other children and taking off all of your clothes in public.(Really, no one could help but be impressed with your stripping skills. Fifteen seconds with my back turned in the grocery store and you would be bare-bummed by the apricots, chatting with some stranger. I can’t stress how glad I am that you outgrew that.) By age two you had the temper tantrum down to an art form that defeated even your “I’ve had four