Fibromyalgia: This Is Who I Am

I hurt. I hurt like a bird brought down from flight, a tree limb weighted by ice, a shuddering bolt of metal in a groove. There were times I ran in the sun. I have swum across lakes. I have carried heavy loads. I will still do those things. I will. But I hurt, all over. Something with talons has me about the neck and digs in, and I strive every moment to escape. Signals fire down my limbs. Elbow, wrist, fingers, knees, ankles.

I’ve recently been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, and I have the most profound relief. Honestly, I wish it had been something worse. Something that would make people really sit up and take notice! Because “Fibromyalgia” sounds sort of like “Oh, you have the Yuppie Flu” or “You have some chronically lazy and fake pain caused by your hatred of being a servile wench at the beck and call of the helpless multitudes” or “You wish to get out of folding the laundry again.”

Well, it’s real, and you can listen to people speak about it in the NY Times here.

And read about it here.

And here.

Fibromyalgia has the following symptoms, at least for me:

• Lots of fucking pain all over your body, most of the time except on those rare "gift" days.

• Crushing fatigue, on and off.

• Fuzzy-headed "fibro-fog:" A condition that makes you feel drunk, but not in a good way.

• A hyper-attuned startle reflex, such that a ringing phone or a sneaky kid with a water-bomb makes me have a small panic attack.

• An unsettling feeling of nerves "firing" in my body when they should not be. Like a series of small bombs going off: Plink! Plink! Plink! Every time they fire, I grow tense and exhausted.

Still, I wish I could have told people I had Lupus, or something like Granuloid MyoOptic Diffusion Carconosmia (doesn’t that sound scary?). My 16-year-old cousin died of Lupus! She really for real did. And that would mean I might die of it too, and people would feel really sorry for me and bring me pies and never once question the veracity of my pain.

I don’t have Lupus, so thinks the doctor. (Still waiting on the blood tests. I might have it, or worse.) And I don’t get any pie. I don't even care for pie! I hate pie. Don't bring me no stinking pies.

For months, years, I have asked doctors to tell me what’s wrong with me. They have all said I’m healthy as a horse.

“Your bloodwork is completely normal and there is nothing at all amiss. You should consult a psychiatrist, because you are clearly a nutter who is looking for attention and is making up a whole lot of fantasy badness in your head.”

“Your MRI shows nothing that would explain this pain. Everything is normal. Normal! I will send you to physical therapy, where they will charge you up the wing-wang to pull at some elastic bands and hoist wimpy 3-pound weights and do stretches. But your physical therapist will be exceedingly white-toothed and attractive, at least.”

“I’ll write you a prescription for Myclobenzaniadreapene. That will relieve some of the pain. Except you’ll be so sleepy you won’t be able to function. In any way. You will be comatose. And during your comatose-ness, you will actually still feel pain! Because the pill is actually just a placebo made of horseradish and marmot sweat, with a touch of sleeping powder as a glaze.”

Before I knew what this thing was, I complained to anyone in range, when I hoped to have a kind ear. My fingers turned cold and numb and white, when the temperature was a mild 62 degrees. I slapped at them and felt nothing at all. I cried, my cheek against the cold bathroom tile. My comb was filled with loose hair and I was as stiff as an 80-year-old, clenching tight upon the banister to get downstairs. Every morning is like that. I’m old before I’m young again.

I get really cold when no-one else in the room is cold. My teeth start chattering. I don't understand.

One friend said: “You're cold? Come on. Women are being enslaved in Syria. Hello, #FirstWorldProblems.”

I stopped complaining, for the most part. 

Well, no I didn't. But I tried hard. I tried to direct my complaints toward kind ears, such as those of my veterinarian friend, who, upon hearing some of my symptoms, suggested I see a rheumatologist. 

"My vet sent me," I told the woman who finally diagnosed me. My vet says she sees dogs gaze at her with the same kind of sad puppy-dog pain-filled eyes that I have. (She's one of the few whom I have allowed to see the full spectrum of unattractive misery.) 

I don't wish to complain, because it is utterly boring. But I want to explain away the grinding exhaustion that casts a dark shadow over my face during a game of Uno. I feel I should account for the fact that I keep grimacing, that I suddenly have to lie down. The raptor of pain has me in its grip. I’m not your mother anymore. I am a thing. I am a thing of want and hope. 

“What’s wrong, Mommy?”

“I’m in a little bit of pain, honey.”

“Are you sick?”

“No, I’m fine. I’m not sick. I would like a healing hug.”

And so they give them, believing in their small powers to cure. And every now and then I feel a frisson of energy awaken me, and my back sings, and my heart thrums, and my very hair starts to vibrate, and I think: “My son is a natural healer!” 

When the hurt settles again, I decide: “That was some powerful mojo. But it didn’t last. But it was for real while it did.”

(I really do believe in things like Reiki. In my next life, I will be a Reiki practitioner. I will help people, and heal them. And I do believe that my sons’ healing energy has given me something. Maybe I am a total whacknut, but littlest son’s last “Ultimate Special Hug With Kiss Attached And Some Chi” packed a big whammy. I'm not joking.)

My doctor gave me a pill. I am waiting for it to work. I don't write anymore. I don't do much of anything anymore, except wait for that pill to work.

It hurts while I am watching a movie. I try to pay attention to the plot, but really I am wondering: “When does the pain end? Will this go on forever and ever?” It hurts while I am watching my eldest son’s basketball game, during which he moves so gracefully, so swiftly, that, for a brief moment, it makes my heart swell and ache beyond comprehension. How could he be more beautiful? He's suddenly so tall, so heart-rendingly tall. And my second son spins through the living room and lands at the piano bench and bangs out a perfect rendition of the Star Wars theme from memory and then spins away, pain free, light as a breeze. And youngest son flails himself without fear from ottoman to couch in gap-toothed ninja derring-do, and I watch it all and feel love and joy and all along the way I can’t help but think I’m in pain I’m in pain I’m in pain.

I wish I could stop thinking about it for just one hour. Five minutes. And I feel incredibly guilty, because here they all pass before my eyes and what am I thinking about? Me. My own pain. Circus caravans and dancing yetis and talking penguins in bras could pass before my door and I would still be crouched in some small corner of my brain, cognizant of only one thing. Pain. Boring selfish whiny stupid ever-present pain eating my days alive.

What a bore. I have become a fucking selfish bore.

I wish I could stop feeling it.

But sometimes I make myself forget, actually. I am learning to play “Linus and Lucy” on the piano. When I sit down at the piano I become not myself, for some pure minutes, and although I feel pain tracing its insidious way down my right hand as I hit the chords, I don’t care.

Last winter, I decided I would learn how to skate, because it was the scariest thing I could imagine. I could twist an ankle! I might fall and crush my coccyx! Or I might fall and a skater would skate right over my hand and slice off all my digits! (OK, you have now probably realized that I suffer from anxiety, too.) I hurt all the time while I was skating, but I didn’t care. I was learning how to fly. One day, while I was clinging hopelessly to the side wall and scratching along, I heard a girl say to her friend, “You’ll never learn to skate if you always hold onto the wall.”

On that day I resolved to let go of the wall, and I was freed.

This winter I went sledding. I learned how to serve in paddle tennis, such that the ball goes in 95% of the time as opposed to 5% of the time. I practiced in my driveway once, against the garage door. I hurt the whole time I was doing it, but I didn’t care. I played one-on-one basketball with my son in the same driveway, and I was terrible­—an embarrassment! He took me down. He was “baller,” in tween lingo. I was a rickety, rusted thing. But I tried, and played, and that is what I care to count. I gave him a run for his money, because I never go halfway.

Every moment hurts. But every moment matters, even when I hurt. Right now, as I type, my neck and back and arms and fingers and knees are a blurred presence of pain. I want so much to walk to the piano and just play, free and clear. I composed songs; I want to finish them. I want to sing. I want to finish that beautiful novel, but after being at a computer all day, hunched and intent, my body betrays me: No more no more no more.

Even writing this hurts. Typing even hurts. But it was worth it, because maybe someone like me will one day read it and think: I am not alone.

We are not accidents. 

We Eat Like Animals

The April Fool's Day Prank I Pulled on My Mom

My mom has a habit of collecting newspaper clippings about awful tragedies and worrisome things that her children need to know about, putting them in envelopes, and mailing them off to us. 

Over the years I have gotten clippings that pretty much tell me I am going to DIE at any moment because the world is full of dangers. And clippings about bed bugs. My mom may have a specific fear of bed bugs. (One time, in fact, one of her bed bug clippings randomly wound up in a box of clothing that we were trying to sell at a tag sale in our yard. Most unfortunate! Nothing sold, and we could not understand why.)

Anyway, when it came to April Fool's Day I realized that the best person to prank was my own mother. (There will be more blog entries about the pranks I have pulled on my mother, because this is rich fodder indeed.) I decided to prank her with an email, even though she doesn't read email (my dad does, and he prints them out and hands them to her). So I thought, how about a [blank] of-the-month club? What would really give my mother a good laugh, once she figured out the prank? Ideas included:

Bag of Organic Matter and Compost of-the-Month Club
Something Dug Up at an Archaeological Site of-the-Month Club
Things That End in "Ork" of-the-Month Club (January: A Spork! February: Pork!)
Exotic Meat Nugget of-the-Month Club

But my brilliant sister came up with the perfect scheme. Bad News of-the-Month Club! (aka Clippings-of-the-Month Club, for more sneakiness). 

NEWS FLASH: I just got an email signed from my mother stating that she "does not wish to receive this service. Please remove me from your list." Maybe the Bag of Organic Matter of-the-Month Club would have been more favorably received?

Here it is:

Dear ______,

All sorts of need-to-know news is generated every single day, and some of it can be quite alarming: Articles about foreign bug infestations, infectious diseases, political plots, malfunctioning children's toys, cars that suddenly accelerate without warning, and so much more. But it's impossible to keep up with all the absolutely crucial stories that YOU really can't miss.

That's why we created Clippings-of-the-Month Club! Our dedicated team of editors works tirelessly each month to comb media sources, local and worldwide, to bring you the stories that you need. We inform. We educate. We help keep you safe and alert to what's going on in YOUR world.

And thanks to a special gift from Anonymous, you've been signed up for a full year of Clippings-of-the-Month Club absolutely free!

Each month, you'll receive a fresh bag of newspaper clippings delivered right to your door. You'll find stories that amaze, educate, and startle you. We guarantee that you'll want to share these headlines with everyone you know, especially your loved ones. It's truly "can't-miss" news. Here are just a few examples of the kind of news you're going to get every single month:

Please tell a friend about Clippings-of-the-Month Club. We hope you enjoy your year of astounding, amazing, and hair-raising news stories.

Best,

Juniper Crane

Clippings-of-the-Month Club Co-Founder

10 Ways in Which I Have Ruined My Sons' Lives (Irreparably. With flawed bagels, and beets.)

I have ruined my sons' lives completely and forever and here is proof.

1. I made my six-year-old take a shower. Yes, I actually made him take a shower. (He didn't want a bath, either.) Direct quote: "You have ruined my life forever. You have even ruined all my birthdays for the rest of my life, and all the weeks leading up to every one of the birthdays. And the weeks after the birthdays." (Note: This particular cleansing did not take place anywhere near his birthday.)

2. I failed to answer my phone when my 11-year-old called me to ask if he could go to his friend's house. Before he could try again, his phone battery died, so he was forced to come home, and was quite displeased. Direct quote: "Would it be so much trouble to actually answer your phone for one time in your entire life? Is it your ENTIRE life's purpose to make my life suck?" (Note: I did not answer my own phone because my battery was dead.)

3. When my nine-year-old, who tends to strew a lot of food around his seat while he eats, left bits and pieces of crumbs all over the floor, I jokingly suggested that we nickname him "Bits." He bolted from the room in tears. Direct quote: "You are a cruel mother."

4. Once, at a local Grange fair, my six-year-old desperately wanted to try one of the arcade games in which you shoot darts at balloons to try to pop them and win prizes, including ugly stuffed animals in appalling hues. Each try cost five dollars. I refused, and explained to him that these games were often rigged, and that he would not win the giant purple gorilla. And even if he did, the beast would not darken the threshold of my home. Direct quote: "You have ruined my life forever, and you have ruined it so bad that you have even ruined it after I am dead. I want a different family."

If you don't have one of these in your house, you have definitely ruined your child's life.

5. I served the same six-year-old a bagel on which the cream cheese was not properly smeared so as to cover every nook and cranny on the bagel. He looked at it in disgust, and then promptly burst into tears. Direct quote: "I can't even get a good bagel around here. No one ever helps me. I have to do everything! You need to fix this bagel so that there is not ANY spots that do not have cream cheese on them!"

You missed a spot. You worthless failure! I would have been better off raised by circus folk who would have LET me have a go at that balloon-popping activity and I would have WON a stuffed animal, for sure I would have. Now fix my bagel. 

6. Just about every time a child loses a tooth, I completely forget to put money under the pillow from the tooth fairy. I remember the next morning, and in a desperate frenzy I rush upstairs hoping that the child hasn't noticed. If I am lucky, they also forgot because they were too hungry for breakfast, and the tooth is still there. However, in most cases, they have re-hidden the tooth in some completely obscure place in one last effort to find out if the tooth fairy is clever enough to find it. Now it is far too late to do anything but write an elaborate, long note from the tooth fairy explaining that she got caught in a windstorm or had a lot of work to do after a fistfight in which children lost many teeth. 

In addition, my brothers ate the cookies that we left out for Santa last year with such gusto and chomping and "yum yum" noises that my nine-year-old was drawn out of his bedroom and compelled to spy upon them. Direct quote: "Mom. I know things. I have seen things. Many things. You don't want me to speak them out loud. Do you? DO you?" 

7. After having had too many margaritas at a friend's party, I ended up telling their 10-year-old daughter the name of the girl that my son liked at the time. Whoops. I guess that was pretty bad? But for goodness sake, the child should've been in bed! Let's move on.

8. I told my 11-year-old that his two younger brothers were like a gift to him because he had constant companions and steadfast friends that would last a lifetime. Direct quote: "Your poisonous fecundity has completely ruined my sanity and deprived me of any chance of a nice hot relaxing shower without the revolting scent of my sibling's turds plopping into the toilet at the SAME TIME." He didn't say it out loud. But his eyes did.

9. When I served my six-year-old an innocuous chicken tender, he informed me that this wasn't the type of chicken tender that he preferred, and that I should know this by now. He just doesn't care for that brand of chicken tender, and the fact that I served it to him indicates that I have little understanding of his needs. Direct quote: "This is the worst day of my life."

10. I tend to write humiliating blog entries about a child pooping out blueberries during tubby-time, and other things that my sons surely would not want the world to read. However, I have been posting so sporadically that I think I have only about five followers by now. So it's seriously not a problem at all that I can use phrases in my blog like "ass-grabbing toadhat" and "muppet-fondling marmoset" (totally hypothetical examples of phrases that I might use, mostly in photo captions). Because just a handful of local moms of my sons' friends will ever read this blog and cast shame and aspersion upon my family, and will come for us with the beets, rutabagas, eggs, offal, old toys, etc. to toss at the property with cries of "Pfaw! Horrid badly-raised children!"

All these items would look totally NOT out of place on our lawn. I mean, my son did say he wanted "beets" for Christmas this year. He definitely meant these types of "beets," right?

Fertilized by Doctor Dre! I mean, um...what? These are beets!

So maybe I just ruined a few birthdays and all the weeks leading up to them and all the weeks following them?

Coming Soon....Chapter 14 of the Manny diaries! In which he gnaws off his own tongue. Sorta. 

Art and Love Therapy for Evil Little Boys

Since our return from NH two weeks ago, my three boys have been on the verge of fratricide. At summer camp, they were all in separate cabins and left to torment only those in their own age bracket. And their counselors, poor scarred 18-year-olds who still probably wake up at night in a cold sweat.

But now they have turned on each other like wolves, guided only by my new 14-year-old babysitter who was left with no recourse but to lock them in the basement and blast the "Frozen" soundtrack at them from the stereo. I fully sanctioned the activity. When they finally broke free my eldest son snatched an empty Vodka bottle from the recycling bin and chased young Mordred (as they call her) down the street brandishing it at her. I am sure the neighbors have an even finer view of us than they did before!

The evil reached its pinnacle yesterday afternoon, when 1) Eldest Son hauled Middle Son across the driveway, leaving him with horrible asphalt burns 2) Littlest Son scratched Middle Son so viciously that 3) Middle Son kicked Littlest Son clear across the room and cracked his head into the record cabinet housing the turntable.

The babysitter had long been let off duty, and I hastened downstairs to the screams. The accusations flew fast and fierce.

"He hurted me worser than I did him so he should be punished badder!"

"I did NUFFINK."

"I did nothing; however, I am sure I shall be blamed as I always am, because this is the course of things."

That last speaker, age 10, then flung the TV remote at my head and, as it bounced off my skull, I shouted "GO UPSTAIRS!"

"You always punish ME and not THEM!" he shouted. "Just because I hit you in the head with something you punish ME! Is this fair? Oh, you are such a good mother!"

He was right. They all went into a big fat time-out while I fumed about what I would do to PUNISH them. For wasn't punishment the only acceptable solution? I fretted that I was a bad mom. I didn't know the least thing to do right now. What would serve justice for their naughtiness?

Then it came to me. I would kill the little buggers with kindness. I gathered them in the living room and proposed several options to make reparations. They were:

1. You will each write a heartfelt letter to both brothers expressing that you love them and WHY. The letters must be of a reasonable length and written to the best of your abilities.

This got feedback:

"I dunno how to spell!"
"This is the worstest!"
"Oh shoot me now."

2. You will perform a skit representing the theme of "Brotherly Love." The skit must be of reasonable quality. It may not include battle scenes or death.

This also got feedback:

"But skits without conflict suck."
"Can we have just one battle scene? It could, like, lead up to a scene in which we all hug?"
"Will you be filming it? Cause if so, NO."

3. You will parade down our street singing a song that I will quickly compose called, "I Love My Brothers and My Brothers Love Me."

Feedback:

"I will nevah evah do that."
"Option Three sucks."
"Shoot me now."

Middle Son was openly weeping at this point, and Eldest Son was thrashing about in chair rubbing at his eyes. Littlest Son was staring glumly into space.

So, all options voted down, I told them that they had to collaborate to devise Option Four themselves. And they had to do it without arguing and come to a polite and genial agreement amongst the three of them as to what Option Four would be. This was, of course, the secret behind Option Four. The devising of the option was the activity in itself. Whatever they cooked up would simply be bonus material.

I left the room and returned in about five minutes. During that time, they had all mutually consented to make gifts for each other. The gifts would be made out of clay. They were very keen to get started. There was no talk of screen time. They were, in fact, excited about their plan.

I got out a bucket of air-dry clay and put on some music and they made these. They aren't done yet; they still need to be painted and presented. But they check them throughout the day to see if they are completely dry yet, and Middle Son keeps asking when he can give his presents to his brothers.

A magnificent dragon.

Handmade necklaces.

Strange stubby things?

After the experiment was over we met in a circle for a group hug, during which the boys, unprompted, said things like:

"I love you, my brother."
"My brothers is the best!"
"Hugs and love! Hugs and love!"

We concluded it all with a "Go Team!" cheer, after which I solemnly reminded them that any of the previous options could easily be invoked at any time.

The next day we heard a long, piercing scream from the bathroom. Middle Son had sprayed perfume directly into Littlest Son's eyes. He claimed he had been spraying it to "cleanse the room of bad smells" and that he had sprayed it far from Littlest Son's face. In fact, the victim had had his back turned to him!

Littlest Son cried out that his brother had "broken the bond of brotherly love."

A forensic reenactment of the crime revealed that the lie was preposterous, and the offender was sent to bed. The next day, I decided to bring down Option One (letter writing) as the penalty.

The gist of the letter read, in sum:

"I did absolutely nothing wrong and have no guilt whatsoever because I am innocent and did nothing wrong and am innocent. Will you forgive me? Love, your brother."

I shall start work on my original Brotherly Love song shortly, which will be filled with uniquely embarrassing references such as:

Brothers never argue, brothers always share.

Brothers even give up their last pair of underwear.
My brothers are my blood, to them I'm always true.
If they ever called upon me, I'd even wipe their poo.

Public performances forthcoming.

The Waters of the Afterlife Are Filled with Man-Killing Fish

I recently had a conversation with Littlest Son, now age 6. Somehow we got on to speaking of the meaning of life, and where he might have been before he graced us with his presence on the planet.

Mom: Where were you before you got here?

Son: In the Before Place. It's just grass. Grass and lots of darkness, and people talking in the darkness.

Mom: Babies about to be born—they're the ones who are talking?

Son: No, there are no ages in the Before Place. Well, actually, everyone is five years old.

Mom: What about life after you die—do you think there is an afterlife? What's it like there?

Son: How would I know?! I am not dead yet!

Mom: But what do you think it might be like there?

Son: Oh, it is all trees and grass and flowers! Everything is very beautiful. And peaceful. Half of the world is grass and trees, and the other half of the world is water. The water is blue. It's all beautiful!

Mom: And?

Son: And the part of the world that is water is totally filled with sharks.

Mom: Sharks?

Son: Oh yeah, sharks.

Mom: So, in the afterlife, you can't even swim because the water is completely shark-infested?

Son: Yes, but this is only including those sharks who have died. Not all sharks.

Mom: So, a reduced number of sharks?

Son: Yes.

Mom: What about the bunnies? Aren't there any bunnies in the afterlife? Butterflies? Nice things like that?

Son: Nope, only sharks!

In the category of "Where on Earth did we come from?" you might also like The Oeuf Room.

Spying on My Son at Recess

Today I went on a little run to blow off some steam, in the middle of the day. And my normal route took me past the elementary school playground where Eldest Son and Middle Son attend school. But lo, I'd arrived at an odd hour, for all the kids were outside for recess! I normally ran past this area much earlier in the day, but work had intervened.

I slowed to a walk, looking for the distinctive green shirt my son was wearing. Here was a rare opportunity to observe him in his native habitat. I might get a glimpse of something interesting. For, as he has told me, fifth-grade boys like other fifth-grade girls and vice versa. And there is lots of intrigue!

I am NOT a helicopter mom. This was a total accident!

I prowled along the fence line for a bit. I wondered if any of the teachers policing recess would think I was a creepy stalker-type, although stalker moms in jogging outfits are probably rare, so I decided that putting my hand to my forehead to shield the sun and actively looking for my son would make me appear to be more of a "concerned mom" who was just checking in on his well-being. I even affected that "concerned mom face" as if I might be a mom who had received a message just then about a child vomiting during recess and had been called to pick him up immediately.

I couldn't spot the little devil so I patrolled the playground border one more time. Then I spotted him! He was in a group of about four or five kids, smiling and talking and looking like he was holding court. Yes, this was good. I recognized one of the boys next to him. A possible ally, possible enemy. One never knew with this character. I'd have to keep a close eye on the fellow. Eldest Son looked pretty confident. He almost swaggered a bit, despite some run-ins with a chunkier bully that had caused a bit of trouble during the fifth-grade year. His long, blond, girl-magnet hair was gleaming in the sun. "Yes. Yes! Yes to never paying a barber's fees ever again!" I thought.

And! One of the girls standing next to him was the girl that he has told me he likes. She was hanging on his every word. He'd picked well. She was definitely the cutest girl in his class, in my estimation. Her back was turned to me, and I could see Eldest Son slouching and acting all cool and digging his hands in his pockets and scuffing at the gravel with the toe of his sneaker. Maybe this meant...she liked him too?? I'd pulled my headphones out of my ears in case I could hear a bit of the conversation, but the burble and cacophony on the playground blurred everything.

Then I saw one of the other girls in the group poke at Eldest Son and gesture towards me, and I read her lips: "Isn't that your MOM?" I tried to duck down but too late. Eldest Son gave me "the look" that said: "Oh good grief, what are you doing??!!" Before he could react further I shot off like a rabbit down the street, as if I'd not been on a little jog but actually a crazy, ass-burning sprint. Yeah, I'm trying to beat a personal record! I waved to him idly as I shot off down the street.

When I asked him on the walk home from school what they'd all been talking about, he simply said: "Oh god, Mom, what were you doing, anyway?"

"I was interested in seeing my son, as any mother would be! I care for your welfare and like to see how you are doing and all that! And I totally happened to be passing the school. So, um, does this mean that she likes you?"

He moved rapidly away from me, shaking his head, his backpack bouncing on his thin shoulders. "Whoo boy, mom, you really...I dunno. Mom! You are crazy," he said.

A Man in My Attic and a Rodent in My Ceiling

This past weekend we heard a scuttling and skittering inside the kitchen ceiling, occasionally rattling the lightbulbs in their sockets. The sound travelled, moving from the area right above the kitchen table, to behind the cheesy Nu-Econo Brik facade, then settling above the various cupboards. There was a lot of scrabbling. Something was alive in our ceiling.

"That's a big cricket!" said my five-year-old.

"It's a RAT," said my 10-year-old.

"It sounds like the Shawshank Redemption in there," I said.

"That's a RACCOON," said the man who lives in my attic, turning to me with dark, beady eyes that were alight with the scientific realization that he'd just stumbled upon. "And you know that raccoons are bad-ass motherfuckers. They have these little hands, like real little HANDS, and they just...jump at you without warning! They jump at your neck! And they clutch and bite. They have rabies. Oh, did I say motherfuckers? Fuck! I'm sorry about that."

Raccoons are real bad, whether you are drunk or stoned or sober as a judge. It doesn't matter! They'll tear you to bits!

"Whud you just say?" said the 8-year-old. He turned to me with glittering eyes and a wide-as-shit smile. "Did he say the F word?"

"Yeah, lil' what's-yer-name," said the man from the attic, huffing a mouthy breathful of bourbon at us. It was noon. "You. You. The Middle One. You're a real smart lil' shit. OH! I did it again." And he slapped his hand to his mouth and opened his eyes wide like a girl caught with her skirts blown up over a grate.

Why do I have a drunken, perhaps mentally unstable, 63-year-old man living in my attic? Well, he's not there at the moment, to be honest. He left on Saturday evening to go live on a pig farm.

Maybe I ought to back up a bit.

OK. So this fall, our friend wanted to move back east from California and he needed a place to land for a while. We needed a bit of backup childcare, so we agreed to make an arrangement. He'd stay here and work on selling his vast modern art collection, pick up the boys from school, cook the occasional meal, and so on. We'll call him "the Manny." Or Manny for short. We weren't thinking too clearly but, hey, we were willing to give anything a shot. Our long-term marvelous nanny had moved back to England in October and we were eager for an alternate childcare solution that didn't break the bank.

It started out pretty well. Manny proved himself to be an exceptional—nay, a gifted—cook. The man has a natural way with food and it's a true passion of his. He buys fresh food and turns it into genius creations. I think it's a calling that he might have missed thus far. Food was his art. He even dreamed about it.

It troubled me just a little bit that he couldn't remember my three sons' names after a week and that he preferred to refer to them as "the children of the corn." He also wondered whether, instead of "time outs," we ought to try "duct tape and dark closets."

I was horrified, but he grinned like a Lumpen Jack o'lantern.

"Kidding. Aw, I would die for those boys. Die for them."

His jokes were hardly appropriate and he had no linguistic filter, but I pretty much knew that he would, indeed, lay down his life if it came to it. But try explaining that to a local pal who wonders, "Who is that homeless man who shambles your boys to school? Is he some relative or what? Why does he look like crazy Bill Murray in Caddyshack but with long, dank hair? Is he, like, a Vietnam vet?"

Yes, he is, and you do not want to know what he saw while in service.

"I don't wike you," said the five-year-old to him one day, rudely.

"Willya listen to that shit!" he responded. "Lil' sons o' bitches. Man, I do love 'em, though! I really love 'em!"

But he also had other loves. Liquid loves.

When he first arrived he informed us that he no longer drank alcohol and that, when he quit months prior, he “shat his pants regularly, sweated his guts out, and had horrible shakes.” But, he’d be delighted to have a beer just tonight, thanks! One beer turned to two. Two turned to a bottle of wine. A bottle of wine turned to a bottle of vodka. Things started to go down the slippery slope.

One Monday afternoon, I received a phone call from him. He was about four blocks away and claimed that the “food was too heavy to carry home.” He sounded…off. Weird. He said his legs hurt. He was slurring and mumbling. I decided to leave my 10-year-old in charge and drive the few short blocks to acquire him. There he was, sitting by the side of the road, surrounded by deflated shopping bags, looking every inch a demented homeless man. I opened the car door and he started like I had shot him. I beckoned him in. He finally made his shambling way into the car, and, once he was in, I realized he stank of booze.

“Have you been drinking?” I asked.

“Oh no, I been taking some Vitamin B-12!” he said. “It messes you up real bad.”

Uh-huh.

Then he said: “A lot of these housewives around here got real fat asses. But you got a fine one. Oops, don’t tell your husband I said that.”

Right.

Once we arrived back at the house he asked me to unpack the groceries. He lurched around, hurling pork chops hither and thither as he attempted to get them into the pan. All the while he was guffawing and babbling, and the boys kept coming into the kitchen to see what the ruckus was about while they were supposed to be doing their homework.

I had to go and check email. (All this was happening during my workday.) While at my computer, I heard a suspicious “unscrewing and gurgling noise.” Our guest had poured himself a “cockytail,” as he called it, and was now lurching about the house yelling happy obscenities and hurling stuffed animals at the boys. I came in to arrest the chaos and was struck in the eye by a beady-eyed turtle puppet.

The boys got more and more excitable, as boys do. I smelled pork chops grilling. This could not be my childcare situation!

My eldest boy ran up and Manny said, “What’s the fuck is up with this little monkey?” My boy raised his eyebrows at me in a questioning manner that said "Who the fuck have you hired as our nanny, mother?"at which point Manny smacked him atop the head with a flat palm. Gently enough, but enough to register a small ticking time bomb in my brain: This situation must end, and end quickly.

The next thing I knew, my 5-year-old was wailing that Manny had smacked him on the buttocks with a plastic scimitar.

“I did not do that!” Manny protested.

“I saw you do it,” squealed the 8-year-old.

“Tattletale!” said Manny. And he lunged, guffawing and exhaling clouds of alcohol, at the boys, who squealed merrily and escaped. They thought it was a lot of good fun, actually. Fortunately.

I did something I never do on a weekday. I begged my boys to quietly watch television, while I furiously texted my husband. 

Next chapter: Manny goes into the city, and vanishes from the radar.

Postscript: The kitchen rodent has now been heard in the second-floor ceiling.