Shut Up, Go To Sleep

Song: My Kind of Love-Emeli Sande

I finally got Henry (2 1/2) down at 9pm. Two hours past his bedtime, the only thing that made me feel better was the thought that "at least he will sleep through the night- for once." 

How often my mind misguides my emotions. My emotions misguide my mind? Either way.

At 11 o'clock I was reading, finally! Danny was watching TV, when we heard a low cry. It was an indecipherable cry. One we pretended wasn't happening at first and then I muted the TV to see if it was our youngest and not a cold, frightened outdoor cat. By 11:01 there was no doubt the noise belonged to us.  He was wailing. What was going on with this poor baby? Normally he started howling at 4am.  

Bummed, I cannot find the original artists name to give
credit this idea, but it wasn't mine! I just made a version.

"I think he wants you," I said.
"Why?" 

"Because he's yelling 'Daddy'," I said. 

Danny went to Henry's room. It got quiet. Then I saw Danny holding Henry outside our door. He was shielding him from the view inside our room in case I balked. Henry started crying again. 

"Oh, yea," I said. I realized what was being weighed and waved him in. Poor guy. (Make it stop.)

He has started coming into our bed. Not enough to call it a habit, but he's started. I know from our older two that it can go either way. Our oldest came in every night until he was five, "Oh, what's the big deal? It's not like he's going to climb into bed with us when he's 15? Let's enjoy it." I said. Kicking. That's the big deal and it happens way before 15. It starts hurting, shocking you out of sleep, when they're over a foot and a half. And the sleeping sideways is the big deal. They sleep sideways so you're scrunched hanging onto the edge of your bed like a rock climber in the middle of the night. It's not enjoyable. Breaking bad, wasn't easy. It took until he was five to give First Born the heave hoe. Then our middle guy came in maybe twice? Now, occasionally once a month if that. I can deal with the kicking and the sleeping sideways once a month because the rest is so precious. However, the few times Henry's come in he has plopped down into the middle of our King sized bed and crashed immediately, never moving. What could be easier? I love easy. Especially when I was about to find out if Hardy moved in with The Irishman *. 

Henry wiggled his way to the middle. His eyes were closed. But instead of a quick conk- he quieted down for about fifteen seconds. Then he started yelling at us, cranky old man style yet with a lisp and a poor grasp of consonants. 

"Turn off the TV! Turn it OFF!" His eyes remained shut tight. We started laughing. Having a two year old yell at you is funny, a two year old yelling at you behind closed eyes to go to sleep is ridiculously funny. "It's not funny! Turn it off!" We stopped laughing. Poor Henry. Little boss man. It's so hard to be taken seriously. Handle With Care...

"Off!" he begged. 

I was reading* so it was no sweat by me. Click. Off. Danny looked at me like, thanks. 

Half a second went by where he seemed soothed, when another demand was issued. 

"Stop it. Thstop it. Turn it out!" He barked, pissed off. "Shut off! Turn off the light!" 

"But Henry, I'm reading," I said, in my most gentle soothing way (= annoying.) "We brought you in here but-"

"SHUT UP! Shut up the light and sleep!" he said. 

Did lil homey just tell me to shut up? Nah, he got that confused. He meant "shut up the light." Whatever "shut up the light" means, it makes more sense to me than my baby angel telling me to shut up. We never say shut up. We think it. 

"But I don't want to, I want to read-" 

"SHUT UHP!! Shut up and stop it! Go to sleep," he demanded. "Do it!" 

Okay, that time it

Creeping to coup

was clear. He told me to shut up. But he was crying and screaming so I felt bad for him and a bit scared. 

Well, I was a little sleepy.  

Without looking back at Danny or Bossy Pants, I switched off the lamp. 11:04pm.**

I woke up at 4am. Terrified of the Stalin reincarnate sleeping between us, I was afraid to move. I could not risk calling his name, but I think Danny came to at about 4:30am. When he whispered my name in a tone that begged not to get his ass kicked by our two year old, I was relieved to have a comrade. After a few rounds of barely audible whispers, we forgot about the sleeping dictator and went over his putting us down for the night.  "Unbelievable, did you hear him tell me to shut up?" "That was the funniest part," "Not really, I mean, it was funny but it was kind of sad. A baby saying shut up?" "Oh, please... Shut up." Haha. "Thstop it."It was nice to be able to laugh without getting yelled at. 

Henry slept until 6am. Our voices woke him. He was smiling, kissing us, laughing, glad to be in bed with his folks.  Us glad we were back to being his favorite people, us glad he'll always be ours, us glad I will never wave him in again. :) 

*(If you're looking for a great read-The Imperfectionists By Tom Rachman)- Let me know what happens with Hardy. Her name tells me it won't be easy.

**All told, it took him 4 minutes to get us to sleep. All this time we've been reading stories, telling stories, getting water, a blanket, a bear, singing, dimming lights, turning up lights, getting into bed with them- when all we had to say was, "Shut up! Stop it and go to sleep!" Abusive, maybe, and sure it lacked a certain tenderness but genius in its economy of time and with such clear directive. Hmm, something to consider. 

Hand Painted Stair Runner - Update Brown to Grey- (1hr.)

Theresa Caputo- "I talk to dead people"

Songs: On Eagles Wings

To Where You Are by Josh Grobin

In Memory of 

John G. McMahon and Crissy Fox * 

*Crissy Fox whom I never met but was introduced via Facebook by my friend Christine Mullin and was, like many, inspired by, is being laid to rest tomorrow. Her symbol is the cardinal.*

*******

"But HEY, don't listen to me," she said, waving her three inch silicone nails over her head. "I talk to dead people."

My friend, Holly, surprised me with a ticket to see Theresa Caputo psychic medium at NYCB Theater in Westbury.  As a huge fan of the show Long Island Medium, with a heavy case of the doldrums, it was one of the nicest things someone could have done for me.  That alone would have been enough.  The thought would have counted. BUT IT GOT BETTER! Bettah.

Why? Because I was able to go!  You know with three kids something is always on the cooker getting in the way of my good time.  Not this time.  Nuh- uh. I got to see Theresa herself stuffed like a sausage into a short red sleeveless dress trimmed with dyed red ostrich feathers work the room in 6" sparkly diamond Louboutin heels.

The theater is surprisingly small and intimate. Nice! My pal upgraded us to second row.  Bananas!  The people to our left were fanatics-they'd seen her like ninety times.  Awesome.  I LOVE fans.  Any kinda fan.  Just be passionate.  Well, within reason. It must be positive, don't shave your head and be all supremacist or militant and sit by me and think I'll high five you. Okay, onward. Her daughter, Victoria, was in the audience. I love Victoria. And Larry Senior was hovering somewhere-we saw his tan greasy head for about a minute and then lost sight of him.

Holly and I illegally taking a selfie! 

Then Theresa came out.  The crowd went wild. I already told you what she was wearing.  So let's get to what you want to know, the big question. Is she a fake? Maybe.

I feel bad! I'm sure she has psychic ability, more so than the next guy.  We all have psychic ability.  If you have lost someone in the physical world, they are always with you.  You can access that peace by remembering them.  You will feel a sense of them.  Sometimes you might even feel anger, joy, laughter-a specific energy that was between you and that person.  That is them! A song may play on the radio and that's them.  This post is dealing specifically with the Theresa Caputo Experience, so let me not get lost with the whole genre. Theresa channels spirits of people she's never met.  That's wild. Few have that gift.  Was she faking the strength of her gift in those two hours in order to give us a show? Was she accepting things people were saying when they weren't actually connecting? I'm pretty sure! I think she must have to or there'd be no show.  I don't think she can pop on command.  The capacity of the theater is somewhere around 3,000 people.  She is pulling down at least $300,000. a show. That's a lotta pizza pie. A girls gotta deliver.  Plus, I can see how she sleeps at night.  Let me explain what I saw.

She comes out and it's awesome to see her. She's a total character.  There's nothing middle of the road in her pulse.  She's extremely; confident, loud, made-up, funny, done to the Long Island nines, accent, hair spray, all of it.  She herself is pure entertainment.  Throw in the ghosts and it's like putting marshmallows in your hot chocolate. Working off of that, she takes the better part of forty minutes explaining what it is she does, it's called "The Experience"- how Spirit comes through in an unusual way so that you know it's your loved one. She is not there to convince anyone that she is legitimate.  Thou dost protest too much.  I love Theresa, I still do but I hate getting held up. We were all there to see her. We know what she is and how she does.  We weren't bagged and blindfolded and launched into the Westbury Theatre. We went because we believe her and know how she works-who spends that kind of money on tickets to check up on a girl? Not us! It didn't make any sense. It felt like stalling. And then as I played the tape backwards, I see why she does that.

Okay, so after she takes 45 minutes to tell us her name and where she's from and what she does and how tall she is and what color her hair is (eyes rolled to heaven), she looks up into the crowd directly in front of her -about 500 people and asks, "Who here has the male that passed?" Well, 400 hands go up.  It's like shooting fish in a barrel.  Then she narrows down. Is she telling us or are we telling her?  Every one of those hands wants to be the one to communicate with

second row, another bootleg pic;D

their loved one, so people start playing games with themselves as she asks more specific questions.  Not out loud -but you can imagine what's going on in a persons head as they're standing there with a mic in their hand thinking and thinking about a simple question,"Did my dad have a tattoo? Well, he always said his freckles were tattoos from God."  NO! That is not a tattoo. They stand there staring at her until she asks a question that they can answer in the affirmative. Sit down.  But they don't sit down.  They stand there and lie. So is she lying too? I don't know. She may be giving them time to think because in her experience people go deaf, blind and dumb when confronted with big emotion. Or they are working her thinking if they stand there long enough eventually their loved one will come through.

Does Theresa know they are doing this? Well, I did. She must. She does this for a living. Yet, you do get caught in the moment. Suddenly she's there standing in front of you and you wouldn't even remember if you had a father, nonetheless one with tatoos.  Things dawn on you later, when you are at home, she explained. Still, there was a lot of fishing. That stole from the show. It definitely added to the doubt she planted when she started on the lengthy foot of "I have nothing to prove." Then there are other places where I thought, there's no way she could know that. There are so many people jumping up and interrupting I just don't think Medium-ship or whatever it's- called lends itself to huge crowds.  She probably knows this but when you're pulling in over a mill a month, when you are selling out shows, you have a production company in contract, two kids in college and you are giving people a night out filled with hope! Who is going to say "Oh no, I'll just stick with the one-on-ones at a buck and a quarter? Right or wrong?  I don't know. I don't know. I dunno!!

"You can't make this shit up!"

Near the beginning she asked, "Who here had a son pass in an accident on the driveway?" Only one hand went up- it was that specific.  And then it turned out that lady didn't lose a son on a driveway, she just stood when she heard son.  (It is so sad to see how many hands go up when she asks, "who here lost a son?"- to see that in itself is a master class in compassion. Enough to say to yourself, well, if they get solace out of Theresa, whether she can hear spirit or not she's okay by me- and that's how I know she can sleep at night.  She gives hope worth the price of admission. Some people are living moment to moment.  That moment of hope is all they have.)  Later when she was by our section she came back to the same question, posed a little differently, "a male who passed on the driveway." This woman stands up and Theresa asked, "Was he on the driveway?" and she says, "No." She is blank staring Theresa as if she shouldn't even be talking to her. So Theresa says, "Well, Spirit is making me stay here so I'm going to continue.  This young male is taking responsibility for his death, he's saying he shouldn't have been there but I'm going, wait you're too young to be responsible for anything, and he's saying no Theresa, it was my fault. And he keeps showing me a driveway, a long driveway,"  And the woman goes, "Well, my nephew was sledding on my driveway and got hit by a bus when he got to the end," So there's where you go, Ok, she asked you like 4 times about the driveway and you kept saying no?! Then Theresa goes, "Was he young? Cause I feel like he was very young," and the woman says, "he was four."  And you just lose it.  You're just like oh, no wonder you couldn't think straight cause it's too much.  Your sister came over to go sledding with her baby and went home alone.  So there was that moment. Then there were a ton of misses.  A ton.

*She barks a lot when it's not working.  It's intimidating.  It may have been a rough night.

Still in our section, she started calling out, I have the number 13, spirit is saying the number 13.  My dads birthday was April 13th. I know he comes in on 13. I felt like it was him. I wasn't ready to hop in though when someone who may have lost a baby needed to speak, like that other dingbat. So, then she says, "6 now, who lost a male with the numbers 13 and 6? 13 and 6. Come on now.  Who is it, right here, 13 and 6. Spirit is telling me I'm RIGHT here." She's motioning her bare arms up and down to the right of me.  I am lost on 6, there's no 6!  "Shoeshine, he is telling me shoeshine, 13 and 6 and shoeshine," she says.  My dad had a shoeshine! A wooden brown shoeshine box with all kinds of brushes and rags and I could practically smell the Kiwi stain. So I go "My dad had a shoeshine," in this barely there voice.  Holly looked at me like, oh boy.  Theresa looked at me but then a woman way up top stood and shouted "Shoeshine!" like it was Bingo at the town hall so instead Theresa took off to go see about her. She was a dud. Theresa came back around us,  "13 and 6 and shoeshine, right here."  I lost my nerve completely.  There was no 6. Two out of three wasn't enough.  She moved on.

This one girl stood up and said she almost died in a car accident.  I swear.  Theresa asked "Who died in a car accident where there is survivors guilt, that means you feel it should have been you?" and the girl stood up.  Theresa asked said, "Okay, so you were in a car and you switched seats with the driver and because of that the driver died and you survived." The girl goes, "Oh, no, I was alone in the car, I almost got into an accident.  I swerved and just missed it." She goes "If yaw standin' here, tawking to me, ya not dead!" Then she throws her hands in the air, and hollers, "HOLY MOLY YOU CANT' MAKE THIS SHIT UP!"

Theresa.  I don't know if she was reading Spirits mind but she definitely read mine. Now had this woman been shy of a pulse? Then we would have all been on bended ear. Alive and talking? Hush. Come back when you're dead.

Then it ended.  I told the fanatics next to us about 13 and shoeshine and she said, well anyone who'd be in his 70's now, had a shoeshine."  I thought oh, that's true. So we left thinking it was mostly bullshit.  I'll speak for myself, I thought it may have been mostly bullshit.  Holly thought it was total bullshit.

When I got home, I remembered.  My dad born on the 13th had 6 kids and a shoeshiner. Things dawn on you when you get home.  I see why she does that.

Tips- Join the Fanclub to get tickets, you will save a bundle.  Holly spent three times as much on our tickets. I can't say how much in case it gets back to her husband.  But "survivors guilt"? I had receivers guilt. 

Bring your loved ones momentos with you. Lots of people had bags of "cremains" a word I learned at the show - they had cremated people in ziplock bags. It seemed to help.