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I often think of my genetic contribution to each of my kids as being relatively minor.  Anyone will tell you that my kids look a lot like their father.  In fact, I ran into a lady who taught both Bryan and myself in high school the other day.  She looked at my kids and said, “I’m sorry, Grace, but neither of them look a bit like you.  I only see Bryan.”  I have actually had people ask me if I was the nanny.  (Okay, seriously, just one person, but the principle remains.)  I have resigned myself to the fact that if you were to line up ten children and have people pick mine out, they would be wrong.  I think I get this genetically from my Mom.  I look nothing like her while the resemblance to my BioDad is unquestionable.  So, I get my genetic invisibility from my Mom, if that makes any sense at all.

In any event, it was with some annoyance that I realize that the main thing my son has inherited from me, genetically speaking, is color-blindness which the opthamologist made a point to tell me.  Of course, I am not color blind as the gene for it is carried on an X chromosome and I obviously have a healthy, color-blindness free X-chromosome gene to make up for that particular deficiency.  And this concludes our brief foray into genetics–thanks Gregor Mendel.

This development didn’t come as a surprise as we suspected as much when Drew, at five and a half,  has never mastered colors with the same surety that most children confidently shout out colors at 2 or 3.  He usually can correctly identify most colors in isolation–if they are very richly colored.  Present him a landscape of colors and he is mostly lost.

The interesting unanswerable question is: Just How Color Blind Is He?  Well…we can’t know.  We may not ever be able to know because the frustrating intriguing thing about color blindness is that he does not know what he has not seen.  And, at this point, he doesn’t have the realization that he doesn’t see things the same way others do or the vocabulary to describe what he doesn’t know he’s missing.  And I think I just confused myself with that particular circular train of thought.  Simplified…he can’t possibly describe if he knows what the color purple is because he may see…oh, let’s say…a muted shade of red when he sees something that is purple.  The same goes for every other color.

This we know for certain.  He can see colors.  He can see shades of colors.  More than likely, some colors (red, greens, browns, purples) are muted or distorted in some way.  He sometimes has a hard time distinguishing certain colors but since most colors are interconnected, it’s hard to determine how to pinpoint his deficiency.  He can see yellow.  Of that we are certain…probably.

This isn’t a big deal.  Going forward, it will merely be a matter of reminding him and his teachers that he may or may not be able to distinguish the red squares from the purple squares, etc.  Think back to your earliest learning experiences and I am sure you will realize just how important a role color distinction plays in schools and early learning.  The heart-ending part for me is remembering that I was frustrated and worried because he didn’t know his colors.  I remember thinking that others judged him and me because he wasn’t able to accomplish this basic skill.  I specifically remember one time when I was commenting to my SIL that Drew STILL didn’t know his colors.  She offhandedly suggested, “Well, why don’t you use M & Ms–that’s how I taught my son (who is younger than Drew) *his* colors.”  As if it was Just.That.Simple and I had neglected to realize it.  In hindsight, I can completely see that she was merely telling me what worked for her but at the time, it felt like an indictment on my parenting.  “If you just did *this*, he would learn.”  Because she couldn’t have possibly known the time how…er…*sensitive* I was about this particular issue.

In any event, it does make for some rather hilarious situations…for example as we were walking out of the opthamologist’s office, the lady offered Drew his choice of sunglasses.  She laid them out and asked which color he preferred.  I said, “It doesn’t matter.”

Obviously that’s not entirely accurate.  He can tell some colors.  It’s anyone’s guess as to what he can see or not.  Sometimes he surprises me with what he can distinguish and what he can’t.  And of course, thrown into that is the fact that sometimes, he is just lazy, not paying attention or purposely not saying the right answer just to keep me thrown off balance.  I believe that is what he strives to do–make it harder for me.  Make this muddled mess called parenting even MORE unnerving, muddy and difficult.  Now that, he has definitely inherited from his father.

On Friday, Bryan and I went and pledged to some crazy dude that we were legally of sound mind and body and that we hadn’t imbibed any drugs, alcohol or pills (up to that point in the afternoon, anyway) and that we could, in fact, make decisions regarding the future of our children and our fortune (HA!) in case of our tragic and early demise.  Whew!  What a way to start a glorious (if Freakin’ f-f-frrrreeezing) February weekend.  Yes, we FINALLY wrote a will.  And now, we feel much better knowing that if we smash ourselves to bits our kids are in good hands (HA!).  I admit that it was a little disconcerting having to make Decisions regarding what to do if I am in a coma, on life support, PREGNANT AND IN A COMA, or recently deceased, etc., etc., ad nauseum.  Fortunately, I put those decisions in the competent hands of my little sister.  Now, if something happens to both Bryan and me, SHE is the one who gets to decide what to do with me.  Talk about responsibility.  DON’T SCREW IT UP, DAWN!  IT’S ONLY CHOOSING HOW BEST TO HANDLE THE EARLY DEMISE OF MY CHILDREN’S MOTHER.  Teehee!  Good luck with that!  I figured that getting my Mom to handle such questions as to bury or cremate (Roast me Over A Spit and call it DONE!) and whether to pull the plug would be tantamount to torture so I figure I would give my sister that pleasure.  Mostly because I know that she thinks like me (practically) and won’t get overly emotional about the state of my {hopefully} assuredly dead body.  No mummification for me, thanks.

So, with that fun, fun, fun topic out of the way, I am not nearly as ashamed as I should be to admit that I spent all day Saturday doing absolutely NOTHING.  Bryan and I geekified ourselves by watching Serenity and bemoaning the fact that there will probably not be another movie or a resurrection of the show Firefly.  Then, I read the rest of the day.  Seriously.  I made an ass-dent in the couch so deep, I believe we are going to have to restuff the cushions.  It was glorious.  Utter selfishness and laziness is such bliss nowadays.  I rarely indulge myself to that degree and I am so immensely glad no one tried to interrupt me.

Now I am going to take a moment to complain.  Shocking, right?

I am constantly flushing the toilet around here.  My kids nearly always forget to flush the toilet.  No matter what is in there.  I am always reminding them to flush, flush, flush and they still don’t remember.  WHY, for.the.love.of.God, do they magically remember to flush when I am in the shower?????  Since my kids are young and we only have one bathroom, I typically leave the door unlocked or open while I am showering so that I don’t end up with a puddle outside the bathroom door to mop up.  BUT, it’s a little frustrating that they all of the sudden remember to flush right as I am rinsing the shampoo out of my hair.  And we live in one of those houses where one water-using apparatus causes the rest to cough, sputter and nearly die.  And the added bonus of flushing the toilet while the shower is running is that the shower becomes an INFERNO.  Like the temperature of the water reaches BOILING or something.  SCALDING.  VERY, VERY HOT.  AND, because our plumbing seems to be a little wonky, it takes it a while to fill up the daggum toilet.  So inevitably, I am shivering in the cold while I wait for the toilet to fill up and the shower to resume normal operating temperature–somewhere below ‘raging fire pits in HELL’ degrees Fahrenheit.  But, I swear to God, if I come back to the bathroom twenty minutes after my shower is over, someone will have left a present in the toilet and conveniently forgotten to flush.  It never fails.  And I can’t point the finger at a particular kid because it seems to be a conspiracy.  They are actually working together on this.  Unbelievable.

Al—righty then.  Enough potty talk.