Contraband

A few months ago, Gerardo lost his keys and we searched and searched and searched for them, high and low, hither and thither, to no avail. We asked Ruby several times if she had them, and she insisted she didn't. Certain they had been lost on the street, but hoping for a miracle, I asked her one last time if she had taken Daddy's keys.

"I didn't take them! I just put them!"

"Put them where?"

"In my boot!"

And sure enough, there they were in her red rain boot, the one exact place we hadn't looked. "Why didn't you tell us this earlier?" I asked. She shrugged. "I just forgot." Right. The kid remembers the hummingbird we saw in the garden two years ago, but "forgot" that she put Daddy's keys in her boot a few hours ago.

Living with Ruby is like having a pet magpie. Every time we lose something, we're pretty sure it'll turn up eventually in one of her purses, backpacks, boxes or bags. Periodically, I go through her stuff to weed out the garbage and rocks and wine corks and lids and other minutia she likes to squirrel away. Inevitably, I find little artifacts from around the house secreted away in zipper compartments or tucked into the bottom of her stuffed animal basket, things that caught her eye or captured her imagination. It's kind of fun to see what she found interesting (or forbidden) enough to claim as her own. Recurring finds include the digital thermometer and every bottle of nail polish we own.

Yesterday, after happening upon a cup of water filled with doll accessories that she had hidden behind the books on her shelf, I decided it was time to sort through her stuff again.

Here's what I found:

I don't let her play with CDs because a) they're expensive and b) I never know what's on them. I guess a whole stack of them was too shiny to resist.

A couple of weeks ago, I was looking for my Altoids. I found the empty tin in the cigar box where she keeps her crayons and markers and assumed she had eaten them all. Nope! They were in this glasses case - the one I couldn't find when I needed it last week. I had to put my glasses in an old sock instead.

She had to forage through a box full of pins and needles for this little jewel, which has fascinated her since she was a tiny little thing.

Last week I accepted an offer from my mom for a pair of her old reading glasses because I couldn't seem to find any of mine, which are typically strategically placed throughout the house. She probably found the top pair on my night stand, and the pair on the bottom was most likely in my purse.

Where is she finding all of this change? She collects it religiously, and these were scattered across her landscape, pooled at the bottoms of her purses and sorted into various boxes, tins and baskets.

We bought a coconut back in March, and although she didn't like the milk or the meat, she apparently thought the shell was pretty cool. I don't know at what point she dug this out of the trash, but she had it in with her hats - a hard, hairy yarmulke.

Gerardo and I are notebook junkies, filling pages and pages with song lyrics, grocery lists and notes to self. Ruby has a large quantity of her own notebooks, but as usual, she prefers the adult versions. Her little drawings and shaky letters of the alphabet are scrawled across random pages. 

The red spatula was in a backpack filled with chalk and Mardi Gras beads. The pig puppet in her doll crib was snugly tucked in with the napkin.

She was probably looking for pee pees and vajayjays. Sorry to disappoint you, kid!

We pulled these out during a storm because they're the only candles we have, and Ruby fell in love. I found them in her girly-girl pink straw purse with the ginormous fabric gerbera daisy on it.

"Where the hell is my phone charger?"

Text to my mom from May 6, regarding my birthday list: "...and a multipack of good quality pens, black ink, medium tip, with some kind of electromagnetic charge to keep them on my desk and give Ruby an electrical shock when she touches them."

Would you like one jigger, or two? (It's a good thing we don't actually measure our shots of booze.)

The child can't keep her sticky little fingers out of my jewelry box, especially now that she has her own jewelry box to keep things in. Never mind that she has a barrel's worth of oil invested in her very own large collection of plastic rings. To her credit, these were very neatly arranged alongside the sea glass from my ancient rock collection, which I will let her keep. 

I need to start putting my makeup in the top cupboard with the poisons. But who are we kidding? If Ruby wanted to eat poison, she'd just climb on top of the washing machine and get it. The mascara wand was missing until I found it in her underwear drawer, so now the contents of the tube are all dried and clumpy. I'm pretty sure I'm going to stumble upon mascara smears and eyeliner graffiti somewhere in the house any day now. (The Burt's Bees explains where she's been finding the greasy blush that she smears on her cheeks from ear to ear.)

Bonus:

Last week I came upon this installation on the landing. My red embroidery thread (from the same pin & needle box where she found the measuring tape) is tied to a nail, threaded through Mila's eyelash curler, wrapped around the wooden hook thingie and secured to the windowsill hardware. The blue scarf is a nice touch, don't you think?

The Minefields of Motherhood

Happy Mother's Day!

What can I say about motherhood? It's exhausting, dirty, ear-splitting and frustrating, and it's often terrifying.

But that's just most of the time.

The rest of the time, it's the kind of joy that makes your chest feel like it's expanding out of your body and being sucked into a central database that contains everything in the universe that is good and beautiful. And then you have to release that aching pressure in your chest, so you pull your darling one away from her watercolors so you can hug and kiss her. She wiggles and screams and struggles against your kisses, which land in awkward places, like her eyeballs and teeth, while her elbows and knees land in yours. That's when things slide back to normal, you get your equilibrium back, and maybe it's better that way. Too much love writhing around in your chest like fat worms can drive a person mad, usually your child.

I understand that for some, motherhood is a beautiful, religious experience described perfectly by those precious memes you see on Facebook with instructions to "share if you love your son/daughter with all your heart." And while the underlying message is generally true, yes, we do have unconditional love for you and yes, you are the most precious thing in the world to us, it doesn't even come close to the daily reality of parenting, which is all about getting through the immediate future without injury, meltdown, or destruction on their part or self-mutilation on yours.

And that takes a lot of work. It takes foresight, intuition, good timing skills and a constant rotation of aces up the sleeve (okay, bribes) to keep things from getting ugly. Because when they get ugly, they get really, really ugly. Try reasoning with a bad, angry drunk. That's kind of how it is.

Lately, Ruby's been into screaming. Like, seriously ear-splitting, top-of-her-lungs screaming for bloody murder, and you can hear it all over the neighborhood when she's outside. Heck, I can hear the daycare kids a block away laughing at recess, so I'm sure that they can hear her screaming on this end of the block.

Yesterday, I heard Ruby fall down on the concrete patio. By the time I got to her, she had her hands clamped over her leg, and she was screaming and screaming and screaming and screaming. I was pretty sure I was about to see a bone protruding from her leg and took a moment to thank Jesus Christ for giving Obamacare to the poor. When I finally pried her hands away, I got a little dizzy.

There was nothing. Not a scratch, scrape, bruise or mark. "Seriously?" I said, drily. "This is barely worth a simple 'ouch.'"  I told her to stop screaming this instant, that screaming is for blood. A lot of blood.

"Buckets and buckets of blood had better be pouring out of your body before I ever hear that kind of screaming again," I think is how I put it.

That's just a brief glimpse into a single moment among scores of similar single moments in a day:

• "I know there's soap and glue in your eyes. How did you think rubbing an entire bottle of glue in your hair was going to turn out for you?"

• "What exactly do you want me to do? We don't have any strawberries. Screaming at the top of your lungs and throwing your cup across the kitchen is not going to suddenly enable me to conjure up strawberries out of thin air."

• "That's what happens when you wear my high heels down the stairs."

• "I just don't understand what made you think that stirring your pot pie into your milk and hiding it in your bookshelf for a week was a good idea."

Motherhood is a sneaky test. What kind of test it is for you depends on your weaknesses, of course. For me, it's a test of my ability to overcome my first instinct to yell, "What the fuck have you done?!" and instead respond to disaster by grabbing the camera first and then turning my attention to the Sharpie graffiti on the kitchen cupboards or the bottle of glue dripping from her hair. It's a test of my willingness to see the art in her messes, the humor and humanity in her absurd behaviors, and appreciate the curiosity behind some of her more inexplicable choices.

Because when it all comes down to it, motherhood is an endless parade of hair-raising adventures, every single day. You never know what you're going to be doing or feeling from one minute to the next. You're sitting under a tree with a good book right now, but in two minutes, you may be elbow-deep in the toilet trying to retrieve Miss Cakes or combing soggy Cheerios out of the dog's fur.

This morning, we snuggled in bed for awhile, playing and making rhymes and telling secrets. Her hot breath in my ear, her skinny little limbs wrapped around my neck, absolute heaven. Moments like this make all the fresh hell of motherhood worth every disastrous moment.

(Here is how to get Sharpie off of your kid's face.)

(This ended exactly the way you think it did.)

An hour before this picture was taken, the room was spotless.

Almost a whole bottle of glue.

Four Going On Sixteen

Ruby has this creepy new game she calls "Jack and Girlfriend," in which she wants me to pretend to be her boyfriend Jack. She wants me to call her "babe," although she makes me pronounce it "behb," which conjures up a grease monkey with a mullet and a stained wife-beater. Ruby gets all dramatic and says things like, "Jack, I'm going to be so sad if I lose you," and, "I love you so much, Jack!" Has she been sneaking in some soap operas among the Aquabats and Super Why?

During "Jack and Girlfriend," Ruby makes me talk in a really low boy voice. She tries to kiss me, although I adamantly draw the line there, because when I fell for it the first time, she tried to stick her tongue in my mouth. It's just all very gross, everything about it. You know that skit they do on "Portlandia" where Carrie plays Lance and Fred plays Nina? My impersonation of Jack is the embodiment of Lance. I'm suddenly some douchey little scrapbag who's dating my daughter, and I can't stand me.

To make matters worse, I endlessly analyze how Ruby's responding to this guy, and I swear to God, she acts coy and plays dumb. WTF? This is not how I raised her.

I hate that game, and last night I told Ruby I wasn't going to play it anymore because it creeps me out. "Fine," she said. "I'll just get Daddy to be Jack." A little later, I heard Gerardo call her "behb" and enjoyed imagining his reaction when she went in for the kiss.

I can't pinpoint when she started becoming fascinated with all things romance, sometime in the last couple of weeks for sure, but it's been steadily developing for some time now.

We recently pulled into a downtown alley to pick up Gerardo from his studio. A young couple was sitting on a bench making out. Like, really going at it. Ruby was just absolutely fascinated by that.

Ruby: What are they doing?

Me: They're kissing.

Ruby: Why are they kissing like that?

Me: Because they like each other. Quite a lot, apparently.

About two minutes later, she's still staring, open-mouthed.

Ruby: They sure are kissing a lot, aren't they, mom? They must reaaaalllly like each other! They're kissing like this, watch!

And then she made this god-awful, scrunched-up face and moved her head in circles, wiggling her tongue around.

Last week in Target, she was enthralled with a package of men's underpants, presumably due to the half-naked man on the packaging:

And then I came upon this, to my horror:

I couldn't say, "Put that down! That's inappropriate!" because I don't want her to think nakedness and body parts are inappropriate. So she proceeded to point out all the parts and I had to label them. That's a vagina. That's a penis. That's also a penis. And that's a penis too. Vagina. Boobs. Penis. Butt. Boobs. Butt. Butt. Vagina. And so on. I made sure that book made it back to the studio with Gerardo the next day.

At the risk of going f*ing ape sh*t, I did some research this morning to help me decide if I should just cash in Ruby's college fund now and invest it in a sturdy pole, or if her new fascination with nudity and boyfriends is normal. I mean seriously, how is this normal behavior for a four-year-old? This obsession with boyfriends and girlfriends and French kissing and underwear models? And girl parts and boy parts and dog parts and doll parts?

What happened to princesses and superheroes?

According to a million mommy forums and pediatric and psychiatric websites (yes, I was a little concerned!) it's perfectly normal behavior. Disconcerting for the parents, but normal. You should see all the panicked posts from parents! Whew! Glad I'm not alone. Make a mental note of that, new parents, and save yourself some sleepless nights.

The advice is clear across the board: Don't panic. Don't overreact. Stay calm, honest and matter-of-fact. Which is always how I react on the outside. But on the inside, I'm kind of gagging. It's icky when your four-year-old puts her little hands on your cheeks, looks you deeply in the eyes and pulls you in for a sloppy tongue kiss.

A Conversation With Ruby About The "S" Word

Ruby has become fascinated with rhymes. At bedtime, we play a rhyming game where one of us says a word and the other comes up with a rhyme.

At lunch, Ruby had a play date with her peanut butter. The result was a lovely peanut butter finger painting on the plate and two gooey, disgusting hands. I carried her to the bathroom sink and gave her explicit instructions to touch nothing, and she responded by immediately resting both hands on the edge of the sink and squishing them around.

Me: I am so close to throwing a major fit right now.

Me: (under my breath) Shit.

Ruby: Hey! Mom! Shit rhymes with fit!

Me: Yes, it does.

Ruby: Shit and fit! They rhyme! Isn't that just crazy?

Me: It is!

Ruby: But little kids don't say shit, right mom?

Me: That's right. "Shit" is a grownup word. Only grownups can say it.

Ruby: I can only say "shit" in the bathroom, right, mom?

Me: That's right, but only when you're alone.

Ruby: Can you go out of here so I can say shit and fit?

Me: Let's just get this peanut butter off your hands. Hey! What rhymes with hands?

Bringing Up a Child in a House of Horrors

When I taught fourth grade, I had a bookshelf full of art books in my classroom. Classic art, poster art, graffiti art, comic book art, you name it. The kids loved looking at them, and one day I noticed a group of boys who were very (very!) engrossed in a thick book entitled something along the lines of Art, A to Z. They seemed to be really (really!) enjoying it.

(I'm sure you can see where this is headed.)

I casually walked over to their group. "What're you looking at?" I asked.

One of the boys, who we'll call Jimmy (yes, THAT Jimmy, the one who flipped off a friend, and when I asked him to go to the safe seat, yelled, "Why? What the hell did I do?") was snickering.

Jimmy: Ms. Bailey, this book is inappropriate.

Me: Why is that?

Jimmy: Because look, it has boobs.

Me: Hmmm. Yes, I see that. And...?

Jimmy: That's inappropriate.

Me: Why?

Jimmy: Because these ladies are naked!

Me: Those are classical paintings by great artists.

Jimmy: But they're naked!

Me: Are they doing anything inappropriate?

Jimmy: No, but they're NAKED!

Me: Well, if it bothers you, maybe you should look at an art book that doesn't have nudes.

Jimmy: No, that's okay.

I spent the next week or so jumping every time the phone rang, waiting for that infuriated parent to demand to know why I was allowing my students to look at porn, waiting for the principal to call me in and fire my ass.

Maybe I'm completely off-base, but I detest the idea of sheltering children from art. And that's why I had to have a conversation with Ruby that I hadn't planned on having for a loooong time.

Ruby: Hey, mom! Is this lady dead?

She was looking at a Frida Kahlo book. Specifically, she was looking at this painting:

Okay, so maybe I should re-think my position on censorship, at least until Ruby's a little older. Or maybe not. I don't know, I really don't. 

Me: No, she's not dead. It looks like she's having a baby.

Ruby: It's coming out of her vagina.

Me: Yes, that's how most babies are born. That's how you were born.

Ruby: There's blood.

Me: Yes, there's a lot of blood when babies are born. 

Ruby: Is the baby dead?

Me: No, the baby's fine. Once it's all the way out, it will open its eyes and start crying. Here, let's look at this painting instead. It's one of my favorite Frida Kahlo paintings:

I'M KIDDING!! Please don't call CPS.

No, what I did was, I casually diverted her attention to another book, Pulp Art, containing super colorful and mostly-appropriate pulp fiction artwork. Because that's what was close at hand.

Later, I went through the books on the lower shelves and removed the one of crime scene photos from Paris in the early 20th century and the Mafia Encyclopedia, both of which are exactly as gruesome as you might imagine.

But then I started thinking, jeezers, what else is in this house that might potentially traumatize a kid?

I walked around the house wearing a kid's eye, and...well, I found a few things that may or may not qualify.

First thing when you walk into our house, you're greeted by two of Gerardo's paintings in the stairwell:

The walls in the dining room are rife with art, including one of the first collages I did (Bad Dream, ca. 2005); Gerardo's Sin Brazos; the sweet-ass painting my niece Mackenzie made me for my birthday, inspired by Edward Gorey; and the terrifying Golden Snitch Gerardo's son Leo made out of feathers.

Then, you've got the nature shelf, with an alligator, a toad, a turtle, a shark in a jar I found at Family Thrift years ago, and some skulls, including monkey and mouse. On the piano is my limited-edition booklet from Mark Ryden's Blood Show, with beautiful, gruesome paintings. 

We don't want our kids to be afraid. Especially our little kids, whose fear can result in many, many nights' lost sleep, not to mention having to make up elaborate lies on the fly about how mummies detest music and won't go into a room where it's playing, so listen to your CD and go to sleep. Or how ghosts won't go into a house where there are dogs, because dogs have a frequency in their bark that turns ghosts into dust. And with THREE DOGS in the house, how could a ghost possibly be in your room, go to sleep.

The thing is, and I'm no expert here, but we're all born with fear. It helps us survive. And we manufacture a lot of that fear. In fact, we sort of love being terrified, which is why zombies have found their way to mainstream TV and four-year-olds pretend to have tea with them.

We're all "traumatized" during childhood by something or another, and it comes from whence it will come. One of my favorite shows to watch as a kid was the very tame, kid-friendly Bewitched, but my most horrifying nightmare came from that show, in which a ball of light followed me down the stairs, then turned into my sister's face, grimacing menacingly. Which she proceeded to actually do late at night, in the moonlight, after I told her about the dream. Which is probably why I still remember the dream so vividly.

So I think the paintings, the chicken feet, and the shark in a jar can stay. I will censor what Ruby sees through what my mother calls "skillful neglect." The skill is deciding what really does need to be restricted. (Like crime scene photos.) The neglect is taking chances that in living with us, Ruby will probably encounter some things that bring up a whole slew of interesting questions, which I'll do my best to answer as simply and as honestly as is appropriate.

Are we raising a traumatized serial killer? My bet is no. Are we raising up a little freak? Probably, but that's to be expected, I guess.

Case in point: While the other little kids at preschool used autumn colors to paint to the prompt "autumn leaves," Ruby came up with this:

A Conversation With Ruby About Lunch

Me: Would you like a peanut butter sandwich for lunch?

Ruby: Yes. But I like how Daddy makes it.

Me: Why? What does he do that I don't?

Ruby: He doesn't put peanut butter on it.

Me: He doesn't put peanut butter on it?

Ruby: No, he puts tuna on it.

Me: Just tuna?

Ruby: Yes.

Me: Well, then, that's a tuna sandwich, not a peanut butter sandwich. Do you want a tuna sandwich instead?

Ruby: No, I want a peanut butter sandwich.

Me: With peanut butter on it?

Ruby Yes.

A Conversation With Ruby About Appropriate Places to Pee

About three-quarters of all the showers Ruby has ever taken have been with me. We were all set to get into the shower this afternoon:

Ruby: I have to pee.

Me: Okay, go ahead.

Ruby: I'll wait.

Me: No, go now.

Ruby: I'll just pee in the shower.

Me: Uh, no, you won't just pee in the shower. That's disgusting!

Ruby: It's not disgusting! It goes right down the drain!

Me: Do not pee in the shower. Oh, my God. Do you pee in the shower?

Ruby: I always pee in the shower.

Me: I don't want you to pee in the shower ever again. Never, ever again.

Ruby: But it's fun! 

Me: Well, from now on, you can take your showers with Daddy.

Unbelievable! By my calculations, I've been peed on in the shower approximately 312 times.




Previous post: A Telephone Conversation with a Technophobe

A Telephone Conversation with a Technophobe

My mother is very intelligent, but when it comes to solving visual problems, she's a genius. She constructs these 1:12 miniature houses with obsessive attention to historical and architectural detail, using styrofoam, toothpicks, joint compound and modeling clay.

Wherever it makes sense, she uses natural elements: The dirt floor on her ca. 1853 New Mexico adobe resulted from experimenting with different types of soil from Yankee Hill Brick Co., which finally led to the exact right color and texture. (It's a perfectly-balanced combination of "red" dirt and "buff" dirt, in case you're wondering.)

This week, my mother finished her ca. 1713 French farmhouse (updated to its current year of 1853.) It's been a labor of love three years in the making, right down to the 2,500 roof tiles she carved out of Sculpey and hand painted and the 1,100 handmade (in France) miniature hexagon tiles she hand painted and laid, one by one, on the kitchen floor.

This morning, I showed my mom how to create a Facebook photo album so that she could post some detail shots of the farmhouse on her wall. As usual, she sat next to me and wrote every single thing down as I showed her, starting with the first step, just in case she forgot: "Go to F.B."

You see, in real life, in three-dimensional space that you can mold and manipulate viscerally with your bare hands, my mother is a highly resourceful and creative force. But put that woman in front of any electronic device, and she turns instantly into a drooling, doddering old woman shaking her cane at a bunch of goth teenagers. You have to take this batty old thing gently by the hand and lead her slowly and patiently through the technology until she can fly on her own. Then she turns into my mom again, my young, modern mother who texts as fast as a teenager and downloads Slim Whitman onto her iPod without blinking.

Please let me illustrate for you what that's like, to walk my mother through digital territory that's unfamiliar to her. Here is a transcript of the phone conversation we had this afternoon when she called with a question about her Facebook album:

Mom: The description of my album is kind of long. Will it all fit? I'm guess I'm not too clear on this description part, how it's going to post.

Me: It should all fit on the post, but if not, it'll tell you to read more. Here, look at one of my photo albums on Facebook so you can see what it'll look like when you're done.

Mom: Okay. How do I do that?

Me: Just open a new tab and go to Facebook.

Mom: Uh...I don't know what you mean.

Me: Just hit Command + T to open a new tab.

Mom: (Long pause.) Am I hitting the button that says "Tab?"

Me: No, just push the command button and the T button.

Mom: Okay. Uh, the command button?

Me: It's the one with the little cloverleaf symbol.

Mom: [silence.]

Me: Okay, put your finger on the space bar.

Mom: Okay.

Me: Now, move your finger to the button directly to the left of the space bar.

Mom: Okay.

Me: That's the command button. Now, push that and then push the "T" button. "T" as in "Tab."

Mom: Okay, so wait. Am I pushing the "Tab" button? Or not?

Me: Oh, my God. No. Okay, listen. Push the control button and then while you're still holding it down, press the letter T. Push the key on your keyboard that has the letter T on it.

Mom: Now it says Top Sites.

Me: Okay, good! You're in a new tab. Find Facebook among those top sites and click it.

Mom: Now I'm on Facebook again.

Me: Okay, now go to my page.

Mom: Your page?

Me: Yes. My home page.

Mom: Okay, how do I find your page?

Me: Click on your "friends" link on the left side of your screen.

Mom: Okay... Hmmm.  I'm not finding that.

Me: Are you on your page or on the news feed?

Mom: How do I tell?

Me: Do you see any posts from people other than you? Like, other people's status updates?

Mom: Yes.

Me: Okay, you're on your news feed. Click your name on the upper right-hand side of the dark blue strip at the very top of the screen. It's directly to the left of the word "Home."

Mom: Okay. Now I'm on my page.

Me: Okay, now on the left side, find the box that says "Friends."

Mom: Okay.

Me: Now, see if you can find my photo there, and click on it.

Mom: Okay, hmmm. I don't have you on here. We're friends, right?

Me: Yeah, but that box only shows like, nine random friends. Okay, so above the nine little pictures of your friends, click on the word "friends." That will take you to the complete list of all of your friends.

Mom: Okay! I'm still not seeing you. Am I looking for the picture of you reading on the patio?

Me: No, now it's the painting of me and Gerardo. Go to the search field and start typing my name.

Mom: Uhhhhh...so do I click on "find friends"?

Me: No, go to the search field. It's the little box under the "find friends" button. It says, "search your friends."

Mom: Here you are. Okay, I'm on your page.

Me: Now, scroll down to February 17th and look at the album I posted. That's what yours will look like. So it'll have the title of the album in bold, then the description underneath that.

Mom: Okay, I see how it's supposed to look. That makes more sense now.

Me: Great! So now go back to the tab you're working in.

Mom: Okay. Uhhhh...how do I get back there?

Me: Just click the other tab.

Mom: The other tab? I don't know what you mean by "tab." You don't mean the "tab" button?

Me: OMGZ. No, this has nothing to do with the "tab" button. These are browser tabs. They kind of look like folder tabs. Along the top of your screen, right below your bookmarks bar, you should see two tabs. One might say something like, "Facebook" or "Marjorie Bailey" and the other one might say "Facebook" or "Kristen Bailey."

Mom: I don't see anything like that under there. I guess I still don't understand what you mean by "tab."

Me: Okay, here. Think about when you pull a manila file folder out of a file drawer. You open it up and put it on your desk and you work on stuff in the file. Then you get up, take another file folder out and open it right next to the first one. Now you're working on the second file, but the other one is still open, right next to you. When you open a new tab in your browser, you can work on two completely different things at one time. Now, manila file folders have tabs that you label so that you know what's in the file. So does the browser, right along the top.

Mom: Hmmm...I still don't see anything that looks like a tab.

Me: Here, I'll text you a picture. Call me when you get it.

Mom: Okay, I got it, but I can't read what you're pointing at.

Me: Mom, I'm pointing at the tab! I'm showing you what the tab looks like! There are three of them in the picture. See?

Mom: Okay, I see those, but I don't have that.

Me: Take a photograph of your screen and text it to me. I'll call you right back.

Me: Alright. Read me the words on your bookmarks bar.

Mom: "Sedona Vacation" "Tulips & Tantrums" "Straw Home" "Ice Climbing" "Dubious Domestic."

Me: Okay, Now, read the next row of words right underneath the row of words you just read to me. Just below the bookmarks bar, that very next line of text.

Mom: Okay, let's see...in parentheses, the number 3, followed by "Upload complete." After that, it says, "Kristen Bailey."

Me: Okay! Those are your goddamn tabs! The first tab will take you to the album you're uploading on Facebook. The second tab will take you to my page on Facebook. So to go back to your Facebook page, just click on the other tab. See?

Mom: [completely surprised] Oh! And there it is! I'm back on my Facebook page again!

Me: Whew! Okay. So, now, what was your question again?

Me and Mom: [laughing for about a minute at the absurdity of all that.]

Mom: You seriously need to write this whole ridiculous thing up as your next blog post. I won't mind.

I wish I could link to her photo album so that you could see the incredible details of her farmhouse. Unfortunately, her privacy settings are too strict even for anyone to see it if I share it on my wall. I would call her to walk her through changing those settings, but I'm sure you can imagine how that would go.