And Then They Were Twenty

Long before we had children, Chuck and I said several times that we thought it would be fun to have twins. After the initial shock of seeing TWO heartbeats on the ultrasound, I looked at him, bewildered, and said, "We knew." We didn't know everything, though. Our pre-pregnancy twins were named Phillip and Paden.

Back in the day, there were no gender reveal parties. With the fairly new ultrasound technology, my generation debated whether or not to even find out the gender of the baby. Chuck and I agreed we didn't want to know before the birth. "It's like opening your presents before Christmas" was our oft-quoted opinion. Until we saw the second heartbeat. I told Chuck I wanted to know the sex of the babies. He said, "But we want to be surprised." I said, "We have been surprised."

So, we had our gender reveal party in the tiny ultrasound room where I lay with KY jelly slathered on my swelling belly. When the technician said, "That one is a girl . . . and . . . that one is a girl, too," Chuck hollered, "TWO WEDDINGS!" and flopped down in the nearby folding chair.

We teased that their names were Dollie Gladys (after our maternal grandmothers) and Eva Irene (after our mothers, but with the names they didn't use). I told Chuck's Nana (Dollie) their "names" on a visit to Memphis. She said, "Oh, I li-ike Eva Irene, but I don't li-ike Dollie Gladys." So, we quit teasing.

Since we didn't have our hearts set on a family name, we decided to make up some new family names. We named Emma fairly easily. Chuck liked Emily, but I knew several Emilys. I suggested Emma, because I hadn't heard it used in a generation. We thought Caroline just sounded pretty with it.

We couldn't agree on a name for the second baby. Soon after Christmas, I began to fret. Chuck suggested, "You name her, and I'll name her, and we'll see what works." He named her Abby Rachel. I liked Abby, but I didn't think Rachel fit. I named her Anna Claire. Chuck said "no" to Anna but "yes" to Claire. Finally, we were ready for Abby Claire.

In the wee hours of the morning after they were born, Chuck told me, "I named the little one Emma. She looks like an Emma."

The little one. Like Abby was an 8 pounder. The "big one" weighed 3 lbs, 10 ozs. The "little one" weighed 2 lbs, 11 ozs. They were due on March 9 but were born on January 23. They spent 5 days in NICU at SAMC before transferring to the well-baby nursery, where they spent another 2 weeks in isolettes. I spent all day every day in the nursery and took care of my babies as the pediatric nurses petted me. I went home and slept all night while they grew.

The babies were supposed to maintain their body temps in a regular baby bed, continue to gain weight, and weigh 4.0 lbs before they could be released. Abby was up to 4.5 lbs, but Emma weighed only 3.5 lbs. The pediatrician on call over the 3rd weekend was younger and more relaxed than the older doctors in the group. The least compromising one was about to come on call. Unbeknownst to Chuck and me, the nurses nagged the younger doctor relentlessly over the weekend to let us take our babies home. They reminded him that if he didn't let the babies go home, they would have to spend another week in the hospital away from their mommy and daddy, because of the strictness of the upcoming on-call doctors. They insisted that the girls go home at the same time. They badgered him on the unfairness of letting one baby go home and making the other one stay and the impossibility of mommy nurturing two babies at two different places.

On Monday morning, February 14, 1994, the phone woke me about 7:00 am. The younger doctor was about to go off call. He said, "Mrs. Conner, come get your girls. Happy Valentine's Day."

What followed was a two-decades-long whirlwind of after-school activities, spelling tests, and long summer days at Azalea.

It was a colorful twister of party balloons, VBS tee shirts, Mrs. Grossman stickers, and 2 sets of mouse ears.

Tucked into the tornado were class pictures, library books, scholarship applications, and patent leather Sunday school shoes.

Underneath the roar of the cyclone was the music from piano lessons and high school football games, giggles from sleepovers and slinging on the tube at the lake, crying from boo boos and broken hearts and exhaustion.

As the winds died and the dust settled, the baby girls each took a deep breath, smiled, and blew out the candles on her birthday cake.

The Little Yellow Rain Boots

He called them “my boats.” Aunt Angie gave them to him for Christmas 1999. She picked them up at a yard sale for about a quarter and thought he might like them. He was 18 months old.

He didn’t love them immediately, but day by day, week by week, his love grew until it was complete, devoted, and faithful. Before long, he wouldn’t wear anything else. He wore them to “school” with his play clothes and to Sunday school with his pretty clothes. He wore them to the grocery store with Mommy. He wore them until they were difficult to put on and take off. He wore them until he plainly said, “My boots.”

“They’re too little, Phillip. You’re a big boy. You need to wear shoes that don’t hurt.”

He wore them until little calluses grew on his tiny toes. He wore them until his piggies squealed in agony. Finally, he took them off and didn’t put them on again.

Aunt Angie had already found pair #2 at another yard sale. She was willing to pay whatever it took to save his feet—or at least a dollar. He graciously accepted the replacements, but he rarely left the house in them.

Everywhere he went, concerned grownups asked, “Where are your boots, Phillip?”

They were at home, displayed on the top of the cornice board over the front window in his bedroom. They’re still there, covered in more than a dozen years of dust.

In the summer of 2010, I took Phillip and his BFF Bradley to Toy Story 3. They carried Phillip’s Buzz and Woody dolls with them. (They call them "action figures," but they’re not.) One of my great regrets in life is that I don’t have a picture of the two 12-year-old boys, sitting spellbound at the movie, wearing their 3D glasses, holding those dolls.

At the end of the movie, Andy gave his toys to Bonnie, because he knew she would play with them. On his way to college, he stopped by the little girl’s house. She was outside in the yard with her parents. And she was wearing yellow rain boots.

Eleven years had passed since I had nursed the Boy, but I swear my milk came in.

Some Things I Like (And Some Things I Don't)

Some Things I Like

Lists – I don’t click on every list I see of “17 Things You Don’t Know about This Person You’ve Never Heard of Who Is In Fact a Big-Time Celebrity and So Uber-Cool that Your College-Aged Daughters Might Not Have Heard of Her Either,” but I click on a lot of them. (You had me at 17 Things.)

High school reunions – Nobody cares how fat other people are at 50 years old. They are fat, too. I have made new friends with former classmates while AT the reunion. (Stop making excuses. Go to your reunions.)

Cluttered bookshelves – Not Southern Living bookshelves. Real life, dust-covered bookshelves . . .

• Stacked with new releases, old classics, and a travel guide to Jamaica
• Overflowing with textbooks, scrapbooks, and Playbills from touring Broadway productions
• Laden with favorite pictures, children’s books, and Granny’s salt and pepper shakers encrusted with sea shells and a pink flamingo painted on the front
• (Bunnies are optional.)

Bathroom heaters – Brrrr! Ahhhh!

Christmas cards – If Christmas cards become obsolete in my lifetime, I’m not putting a tree up. I’m cancelling Christmas and going on a cruise. I want to hold my own pictures of my friends’ children and grandchildren. Is that too much to ask?

Skinny jeans

American Top 40 replays on 70s on 7 - "The hits from coast to coast." All over again.

350 degrees for 30 minutes

Poseidon – One Saturday last May, Phillip appeared at our lake cabin with a tiny yellow-bellied slider. He spent the day with his buddy Brett. They found the turtle at The Island. Brett’s parents thought it would be a great idea for Phillip to KEEP the turtle, “because he is so cute” (the turtle, not the Boy). I don’t do critters very well. If I do a critter, I prefer a store-bought one. I would NEVER have allowed anybody on my watch to take a lake critter home with him. Nobody really asked me. Brett’s mama came over later with a hand-me-down tank and some turtle food and put blood worms in my freezer. (WHAT?!)

Phillip named him Poseidon, because Brett’s yellow-bellied slider that he found in a parking lot at the zoo in New Orleans was named Zeus. AARRGGHH!! “Did you feed the turtle?” “Turn the tank light on.” “Turn the tank light off.” “Did you feed the turtle?”

By Thanksgiving, the second-hand tank was dying. Poseidon lived all day long downstairs by himself. It is dark downstairs, and the tank light finally broke. So, for Christmas, as a gift TO ME from the children, I asked for a new tank. And that we put it upstairs. So Poseidon wouldn’t be lonely. And could get some sunshine.

Presently, Poseidon splashes in his new, big tank. He swims frantically in the bubbly water cascading from the filter like he is Crush in the EAC. He climbs on the rocks that Brett’s mom stole from the lake and sticks his little turtle head out of the water. Chuck feeds him by hand. I watch him frolic and listen to the water gurgle. Everything about Poseidon soothes me and makes me happy. (Don’t tell Brett’s mom. She thinks I’m still mad.)

“My Favorite Things” – Is it redundant to put the song “My Favorite Things” on a list of my favorite things?

Words with a q – antiquated, loquacious, bequeath

REESTER EGGS!!!

"I may be ignorant, but I ain't stupid!" - Loretty to Doo, Coal Miner's Daughter

Party pictures with multi-colored friends

Old hymns recorded by contemporary musicians – Listen to “Nothin' but the Blood” by Alan Jackson and “Fairest Lord Jesus” by Amy Grant and try to hold back a hearty “Amen!”

A hearty "Amen!"

Hard copies, large print, blue ink pens

Kathie Lee and Hoda – I will never be Fan of the Week. They will never give me an Ambush Makeover. But if I’m at home at 10:00 am, and I remember, I’m gonna look for some laundry to fold in front of the TV. KLG and Hoda are funny and kind, and their show makes me smile.

Old cemeteries

Alliteration – “Good Golly at the groceries, Girlfriend!” (I especially like p.) “Pass the peas, please, Penelope.” (I don’t know a Penelope, but if I were an old British woman, I would like to be named Penelope. I would be peculiar, persnickety, and punctual.)

A worn out copy of Go Dog, Go! – “A dog party! A big dog party! Big dogs, little dogs, red dogs, blue dogs, yellow dogs, green dogs, black dogs, and white dogs are all at a dog party! What a dog party!” (Please see above references to high school reunions and multi-colored friends.)

(And Some Things I Don’t)

Makeovers – Once a week, Katie Lee and Hoda have an Ambush Makeover. Almost every single time, I prefer the “Before” picture to the “After” picture. In the “After” pics, the women don’t look like themselves. I think women are prettier without so much makeup and hair color. I think most women just need a cute haircut, eyebrows and mustaches waxed, and a good bra to pull the girls back up closer to where they were to begin with.

Self-checkouts – It’s not so much that I hate them; it’s that they hate me.

Separate – Can we just agree to spell it seperate?

Affect/effect – UGH! WHO CARES!!!

French-Fry-Free February – It is a self-imposed alliterative diet, and I hate it.

Diet Pepsi – Why, oh, why, oh, why, oh, why, oh, why?!

Coconut – It’s a good thing I wasn’t on the Minnow. I would never have survived on Gilligan’s Island.

ALL CAPS –ALL CAPS ARE ONLY TO BE USED FOR EMPHASIS! AND EASY ON THE EXCLAMATION POINTS, TOO!!!!

The live-action Grinch movie – Excluding "Where Are You Christmas," the makers of the movie Missed. The. Whole. Point.

A laser pointer in the hands of a boy (regardless of age)

“Just sayin’” – Obviously. It was just said. I’m just sayin’ that since it was just said, I get that whoever is “just sayin’” is just sayin’. And “just sayin’” doesn’t cover the sin of whatever was just said. To cover the sin of whatever was just said, one must just say, “Bless your heart.” (Just sayin’.)