I have determined that motherhood and marriage have brought me the gift of a few new superpowers. Having a baby had already granted me super sensitive hearing, allowing me the ability to hear Otter cry from many rooms away, hear Monkey say forbidden words under her breath, and hear Lee mutter distractedly while facing his computer. This hearing has enabled me to respond more efficiently to my family’s needs.

Apparently I now possess the ability to speak in a tone that can only be heard by dogs. I haven’t figured out what this special speaking power will grant me, but I am sure it will prove useful in some way beyond calling the dogs to me for animal cracker disbursement.

This power almost guarantees that no one but my mother will laugh at my jokes or hear my tragic parenting anecdotes. I believe she also received these super powers with her marriage and motherhood, and is therefore able to hear me with her super sensitive hearing, even though I am only able to speak at Dog Ear Pitch (DEP). Additionally, I am having to yell at Monkey to get her to listen to me, and raise my voice in order to impart information to Lee.

These downsides do leave me feeling awfully left out of things, as I can’t ever really share moments with my family as they happen. Anytime I try to point something out to someone, I usually have to repeat myself so many times that the moment has passed by the time they hear me.

As an upside, I am once again reminded of the importance of my mother, and her willingness to play straight man to my one person comedy act. I am not sure I could make it through all this if I didn’t have her to laugh with me, and I am thankful that she forgives the repeated 7 a.m. phone calls she has been getting. (Thanks mom!)

Has any one else discovered this unique ability?

Yesterday I had my tooth ground down, the nerves filed out, and three large spikes driven into the roots. Oh yeah, and they applied a hot poker to the surface of my tooth. Three times.

No, the U.S. Government was not attempting to extract information on WMD’s from me in the basement of some off shore prison. I was at the dentist, getting my very first root canal. Shudder.

Actually, it wasn’t that bad. I won’t call it pleasant, as I had to hold my mouth open “really wide” for an hour, and it’s never fun to be drilled and soldered (yes, soldered). However, the procedure did not hurt, because the dentist gave me four shots of lidocaine. Bless him.

I was a little freaked out when he busted out the mini propane tank, fired it up, stuck his metal tool into it, and said in his charming Russian accent, “Don’t panic if you see smoke coming out of your mouth, I promise I won’t burn you.”
Ha, Ha, HA!

On the flip side he was a little taken aback when I informed him that his accent was comforting to me, as it vaguely resembled the accent of a close friend of mine. The fact that he sounded a little like my friend Sanjin made the procedure much less scary. I could close my eyes, and think about having drinks in his 16th Street condo with more ease than I otherwise could have.

Today, my tooth is sore but not horrible. It would be better if the baby would stop slamming the side of his immense and concrete-esque skull into my jaw. Kids always know when mommy is at a weak point, and that is usually when they turn it up. I am not sure how this is an evolutionary strength, but it has to serve some solid purpose, because every flu, surgery, early morning meeting, emergency filing, school paper, or whatever can be guaranteed to bring out the sick or the crazy in children. Ugh.

Of course, Otter has good reason to be cranky, his mouth hurts. He had another little tooth break through his gums last night, and he has a third that will be making its debut any moment now. I suppose it is kinda cute that we are both wandering around with sore gums this morning. Maybe I can cuddle up to his warm little baby body and comfort myself with shared suffering.

In the meantime, I am off to crochet more Yule gifts, as I am a whiz with the yarn this year.

My darling daughter brought the following picture home from art class yesterday:

I think it is amazing! She created a better Picasso than I ever could. To top it off, she told me she ran out of time to finish it, as we missed two days for our Thanksgiving trip. So this fantabulous piece of art is unfinished. ( I added the border, and of course, the copyright warning. She may be a lawyer’s daughter, but she is not a lawyer herself. Yet.)

Maybe I need to get her into art lessons after piano, so she can explore her talents more fully.