It's TIME to talk about breasts (and attachment parenting)

Warning: you are going to see some breasts.*

*If you are a man, this means Warning: open this magazine or you will miss some foxy side-boob.

That's what TIME magazine really meant by putting this photo on the cover in a photo shoot and article about attachment parenting, and Dr. Sears. 

I saw this cover and I want to stay quiet, to let TIME magazine and the mommies and the bloggers have it out, but I can't. It makes me want to stand up on the stool they put the little boy on to reach his mom's breast in an artificial, impractical and purposefully-provocative pose and say, BACK OFF! Let people parent in the way that works best for them! Leave breasts for their original purpose: to feed babies. Don't use them to stir up controversy between women by playing to the extremes, by throwing the gauntlet of 'good enough motherhood'. Don't use your big red letters to pit us against each other. Don't propose the ideal that one way of parenthood is better than another, especially not when there are a host of other issues in politics where we women need to stand beside each other; attachment parents, bottle feeders, co-sleepers and cry-it-outers. 

BAPTISM BY FIRE 

Before our first son Hayden was born with PRS, a craniofacial condition that included an undeveloped lower jaw, a cleft palate and a tongue that covered his esophagus and trachea, preventing him from breathing or feeding without machines, J and I had some ideas about the kind of parents we would be. We were adamant that parenthood would not change us. We'd read a book that encouraged us not to change our lifestyle for our baby, but to 'invite him to join ours'. We intended to get him sleeping through the night in his $800 Pottery Barn crib as soon as possible. I imagined I would try breastfeeding but supplement with formula so J could be involved and we could have the convenience of our travel-filled, sporty lifestyle. 

We were so committed to showing everyone parenthood would not slow us down that we booked a trip to the Bahamas to go windsurfing for two weeks after my due date. We figured one of us could hold the baby on the beach while the other surfed, and then we'd switch. On the day that plane took off, we were sitting beside our son in the NICU, praying for his life.

I remember before he was born, walking with my aunt, a mother of six, and telling her how I had read that you never nurse the baby to sleep or he learns to fall asleep at the breast, preventing the lifestyle acronym we had read about, E.A.S.Y. (Eat, Awake, Sleep, You Time!) and I remember my aunt just looked at me and said gently, "Wait and see when he gets here."

Hayden at CHOPWhen he got here, everything changed. (You can read Hayden's story here) He was born with an Apgar of zero, whisked away from us, intubated and transported to a childrens hospital downtown. We were told he would need many surgeries, months in the hospital, years of therapies. We were told he would never, ever be normal. 

But I digress. This post isn't about Hayden or my transition to motherhood; it's about BREASTS, and who TIME magazine deems "mom enough".

Back to breasts. Shortly after Hayden was taken away, I hooked mine up to a mint green hoovering pump in the hospital for two days, while I waited to be discharged. I'd had an emergency C-section and had to recover before I could be driven to the Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia to meet my son. When Hayden was six days old, doctors botched his first operation and he developed an infection. They took us into a small closet away from the other parents and told us he would either make it to the end of the week, or he wouldn't. We were no longer allowed to hold him. In a fog, I pumped. It felt like the only thing I could do.  Our son hung in there. When a doctor credited my expressed breast milk with helping Hayden to fight the infection, I pumped with new commitment. Every three hours, I hooked myself up to the machine in a converted cleaning closet next to the NICU. My breastmilk went into Hayden through an NG tube, and several months later, when he graduated from that, a Haberman feeder.

A baby with a cleft palate cannot make suction; a baby with a severely recessed lower jaw cannot make his mouth meet to latch; a baby who is failure to thrive cannot afford the calories it takes to try; and a baby whose tonuge has been stretched and surgically attached to the inside of his bottom lip to free up his airway cannot breastfeed. 

As we had imagined with bottles prenatally, J was able to be more than 'involved'. When Hayden finally came home from the hospital, I pumped around the clock and J hung the 90cc bottle on a coat hanger rigged above our bed that connected to Hayden's feeding tube. As predicted, this offered convenience! One night, when I was exhausted, I hooked Hayden up to his monitors, nestled him in his boppy in the middle of our master bed and pinned a note to him that said, "Hi Daddy! Mom doesn't want to see either of us until 8am. There are three bottles in the fridge. Love, Hayden." And I went and slept for eight interrupted hours in our unused nursery.

Hayden gets his mama milk

But at five months, Hayden weighed barely nine pounds and my milk supply dropped severely. My body would no longer be tricked. I took fenugreek and prescription meds. Other mothers offered to pump for me. I upped my regimen. I pumped on airplanes and in restaurant bathrooms. I pumped to bolster my son's immune system when he contracted RSV and pneumonia. I pumped because he had severe reflux and the feeding team was afraid he wouldn't tolerate formula. I pumped to get him through his first three surgeries. I pumped exclusively for eight months, and then my breasts shut down. There was relief, and there was fear--had I gone long enough? Had I done everything I could? Had I been mom enough?

Feeding MaxBREASTFEEDING SUCCESS

When my second son was born healthy, I took him to my breast immediately. I had waited three years for this moment. My nurse was old school, pissy, and horrified. An hour after Max was born, he was still latched on, and she huffed that she had never seen someone nursing while in the stirrups, and not to let him 'loll at the breast, or I'd end up being his human pacifier.' I told her I had nowhere else I'd rather be. I was Max's 'human pacifier' for almost a year. 

When our daughter Piper came along,  I breastfed for over two years. When she was three months old, we were rear ended at an intersection and the safety belt crushed my right breast. I went through unspeakable medical procedures and pain in the months following the accident, but I continued to breastfeed Piper on the left side until her second birthday. By then, she had developed an aria that she sang, "Nurse you me, now, nurse you me now, nurse you me nooooooooowwwww!" with a lot of vibrato and increasing insistence and volume and warbling on the high notes. One of the last times was on an overbooked flight that was delayed, with Piper on my lap and a twoPiper's courtside snack-hundred-pound skinhead with swastikas tattooed on his neck on my right as she belted out her snack time theme song: "NURSE YOU ME NOW!!!" I tried to distract her, but the aria continued. Staring straight ahead, my seat companion said through his teeth in a tight, Eastern European accent, "Is not problem for me if her feet are HERE!" and he plunked Piper's big twenty-two-month-old feet in his lap so she could lie down and nurse herself to blissfull sleep. 

PARENTING BY INSTINCT/Attachment Parenting

My point is this is the story of my breasts, and how they fed my children in a wide variety of ways and for different lenghths of time through their early years. It is also about how Hayden's difficult arrival, our baptism by fire into parenthood, shaped the parents we are today. 

When Hayden first came home, after weeks of not being allowed to hold him and fear of crying exacerbating his swollen airway, (he had narrowly avoided a tracheotomy), we wanted to carry him all the time, keeping him peaceful. Although he was only 7 lbs, after a day my arms ached. He hadn't reached the weight minimum and lacked the head control for the Bjorn, so I dug out that ‘hippie sling’ I had top-shelved after my baby shower. It was the beginning of the era of the Paisley Womb. 

Hayden in the paisley womb

We took our son everywhere in his sling. It helped with his reflux and kept him calm. We also slept with him between us in our bed to manage all the false alarms on his apnea and pulse-ox monitors, to change his feeding tube, to cuddle him and relish every gurgling snore.   

Led by Hayden, we stumbled into what we called Parenting by Instinct, only to discover that thousands of people were doing the same thing and calling it Attachment Parenting. We read Dr. Sears and it resonated. This felt right. 

We continue to practice this method, though it looks different as they grow. My breasts aren't a part of it anymore, but for years, they were. Attachment Parenting for us meant creating connection between us as a family. All three of our children were worn, carried in our arms or on our backs or in slings. All three of them slept (and some of them still!) sleep in our bed. Or we sleep in theirs. Or they sleep curled up with each other. Or with the dog. We move around. This works for us.

Parenting Across the Spectrum

This is not the only way to parent. We have fed formula. I saved the lid of the first can of Nutramigen we bought for Hayden, where my husband wrote YOU ARE AN INCREDIBLE MOTHER on the lid. I have many friends whose children sleep in cribs and beds. I hold dear to me women who have been able to let their children cry it out, because it worked best for their family. I applaud those who try breastfeeding, but know that it is not the only way to raise a healthy baby. I have friends and family whose children go to boarding school, who have nannies, who cannot fathom that we regularly wake up with several of our children nestled in bed around us. And I embrace the ideal that good parenting wears a lot of faces. 

So I take exception, I cannot let it go, when a national magazine tries to stir up controversy and sales by throwing gasoline on the fires of the mommy wars. Shame on you, TIME, for being sensationalist, for holding up the extremes as the example of something that works for so many. The above was the story of my breasts and of our unique introduction to the style of parenting that has worked for our family for ten years. What's your story?  

The Reluctant Grandmother of a Chameleon (or today's parenting dilemma)

Yesterday, my ten-year-old son Hayden went to a reptile show two hours away in Hamburg with a friend. After much haggling, we sent him with $30--all of his own dollars--in his pocket. This included cash for a $7 entry fee to the show and a McDonald's lunch. We talked about what he was allowed to bring home to his large habitat--which already houses a green anole, a very small garter snake, a fat spotted orange slimy salamander (their real name), a pickerel frog, a firebelly toad and 10-15 Eastern Mountain newts. The night before, Hayden was hankering for a veiled chameleon. We did some more research on chameleons. We have looked into this several times over the past few years, and everything I find says chameleons are very difficult to keep, and they are definitely not for beginners. 

We talked with my brother-in-law, who is well versed in the successful keeping of all things aquatic, amphibious and reptilian. Nick has created professional saltwater aquariums that included seahorses and eels, and he has built a stunning, full-wall terrarium in his office for poison arrow frogs, including a waterfall, live bromeliads, and an automatic misting system. He vouched that chameleons are something even he won't try because it is so difficult to recreate their natural habitat, and because they don't like to be seen, or handled. In fact, the successful keeping of a chameleon includes it feeling safe because it is hidden, in a quiet, leafy, humid, environment with strict temperature guidelines, three different light settings and a broad variety of insects and invertebrates to feast on. Nick told Hayden to get a leopard or a tokay gecko--easy to care for and can be tamed to handle.

You can imagine my displeasure when Hayden came home with a five-inch chameleon of unknown origin he had already named Frederick. He recited all the things the sheister who sold it to him told a gullible, big-eyed boy: that this kind was easy to keep, just needed a UVB light, a heat lamp and maybe a dozen calcium-dusted live crickets every four days. I've maintained a simmering rage all day that these traveling reptile show salesman are allowed to sell challenging and potentially dangerous animals to kids. (Hayden's friend came home with a baby NILE MONITOR--destined to grow to an aggressive eight feet! He was promised it would be friendly if he handled it frequently.)

Hayden was thrilled--he had negotiated the seller down from $30 to $21. He couldn't remember the exact species and there are over 180 different kinds of chameleons. He thought it began with an S. After much internet research, I think I am the reluctant grandmother of a senegal chameleon. 

Last night was a scramble and quick fifty dollars at Petco to get a corner of our habitat temporarily livable for Frederick. As I drove home in the rain with the UVB light, the red light, the starters for the flourescent tubing, a two liter mister and a baggie of calcium-sprinkled crickets, I struggled to put my finger on my emotions. I was pissed for sure. But there was more to it.

1) Hayden brought home an (unreturnable) animal we had discussed as being too challenging for our level of reptile care

2) the swindler at the traveling reptile expo knowingly sold a ten year old rookie an animal he couldn't care for, sentencing it to fairly certain death

3) that as an animal lover, I wanted to do my best to keep Frederick alive in honor of the fact that he is an innocent reptile who didn't choose this fate

4) but (and this is the big one) was all of this in conflict with the fact that I was sending Hayden the message he could do whatever he wanted, and I would pick up the slack for his poor choices? 

Frederick is still alive today. We are in the process of constructing a vertical habitat out of a cracked fish tank that will have the things he needs--UVB light and basking light by day, and incandescent light by light. We are making a false bottom out of egg grate and plexiglass to be the reservoir for a water pump and drip system that can, with the help of daily misting, keep the humidity up and provide a water source. We need more live foliage to create the privacy screening and climbing network. I have had to remind him several times not to handle him. 

Frederick the Chameleon

 I have made a chart. It has 52 squares on it; they represent the money I have spent in creating this alternative habitat for our 'bargain' chameleon. Hayden has until June 1 to fill those squares by working for me to pay off Frederick, or he goes to a new home. If at any time in the interim, Hayden cries uncle, I will help him find Freddy a better life.

For my part, I will stop complaining about the error in Haybes' judgment, stop bitching about the hoodwinker who sold a chameleon to a ten-year-old. I will drive to the pet store for crickets and mealworms once a week, and keep the silkworms supplied with mulberry leaves. I will remind Hayden to mist and change the light settings. And I will do my best to keep Frederick alive, and let Hayden enjoy him.

To be fair, he's pretty darn cute. The ten-year-old Chandra might have had trouble resisting him as well. 

Update on April 29, 2012 by Chandra Hoffman

Circling in on this, I realize...

The chameleon situation is actually a microcosm of what is to come: more and more I will have to let Hayden go out into the world with his peers, armed with nothing more than the conversations and input of the family who love him, and sometimes, he's going to come home having made a mistake. And J and I will lie in bed like we did last night, angry at the world that created this dilemma, and we will struggle to find the right choice, the teachable lesson, in the situation. We will debate how much we should rescue him, whether or not we should sweep in with a hard and heavy hand, or let him take a fall, or find a delicate compromise... When I look down the gauntlet of all the choices Haybes still has to make, I suppose I should be GRATEFUL that today we are only talking about an underfed, ill-fated, five inch chameleon.

Disclaimer: I have checked on Frederick more than a dozen times since lunch.

Favorites on Friday -- comedy

Early in our marriage, the story goes that in the middle of the night I rolled over to my husband and whispered earnestly, "You know what I love?"

And slightly startled, he said, "Um, no. What?" Maybe he was thinking I would say, You. Or something about the little baby, our firstborn son, nestled between us in his boppy pillow while the apnea and pulse ox monitor lights blinked their reassuring signals--all is well. 

"Comedy," I replied, deadpan, and I went back to sleep. This was relayed to me the following morning.

This might seem obvious, or at the very least, out of nowhere. Who doesn't love to laugh? It's true that I don't remember saying it, but I do remember where the sentiment came from. I had suffered a bad dream, following our pre-bedtime viewing of the latest episode of The Sopranos--I'm pretty sure it was the one where they beat the stripper to death. And I had decided, as I was falling asleep that night, that I was done watching things that made me sick to my stomach, and I would take care to avoid shows and movies that included man's inhumanity to man, (or woman, or child.) I also decided I wanted the TV out of our bedroom. 

I wanted more things in my life that made me laugh. This was coming on the heels of September 11th and nearly losing our son soon after his birth, when it felt like we had done a lot of crying. I have stood by this proclamation in the years since. I have put accalimed books like The Kite Runner  down because though I have read the summary and reviews and am sure it is a powerful and important story, I saw where it was taking me, and knew I didn't want that imagery in my head. It means most movies I see are pre-screened by loved ones who know my threshold. I stopped watching ER  after they vividly depicted the genocide atrocities in Africa. 

It doesn't mean I don't stay abreast or ignore current events--it doesn't mean I'm an ostrich when it comes to suffering or the horrific things happening in the world. I subscribe to change.org and follow the cases and speak out against unjust or inhumane situations. (I only wish my continued daily hoodie wearing could be recognized as my ongoing protest for Trayvon, but it's also how I always dress, so it probably isn't noticed.) It is not that I don't care about wrongdoing or evil. But in my entertainment life, in those brief moments when I am not working or mothering or writing or running or digging around outside growing things, I want to be entertained, and I want to laugh.

So I was delighted when someone forwarded me this hysterical YouTube, the sixth episode of the Kid History series.  I watched and laughed, and dashed to the bathroom before I peed my pants, and watched it again. Since last weekend, I have probably watched it fifty times, and shared it with everyone I can think of who will love it as much as I do. The other morning, I woke up a little down, and watched it on my phone before I got out of bed, just so I could start out the day laughing. Though I have already noted it on my Chandra Hoffman, Author page on Facebook and tweeted about it, I thought I'd write a quick post in its honor in case there are a few blog followers who haven't seen it yet. Watch it. Wait, if you're a woman of a certain age, who has maybe had a few kids, go to the bathroom, pee first, and then watch it. 

Why are these so funny? I've watched them all by now (and I'll confess that I've even googled 'the Roberts family' and okay, yes, also 'is Richard Sharrah single?') for the story behind the story, but Episode Six is definitely the most hilarious and benefits from the best editing and comedic timing. Maybe it's extra funny to me because I've tried to pull off 'perfectly normal pancakes'. The other night, based on some recipes in the Jessica Seinfeld Deceptively Delicious Cookbook, I made a much-anticipated, colorful dinner--green eggs! pink pancakes! blue milk! I puréed the spinach and beets to color the breakfast food while the kids were at playdates, and then left the food coloring out on the counter after I dyed their milk, so they could all see I had just, you know, been going crazy with the food dye. That there was no reason why anything should taste even remotely 'dross'.  I went a little overboard with the beets in the pancakes and even J and I agreed you could really taste the earth in them. The green eggs went over okay with some parmesan on top. But our adult giggles gave us away and as soon as we let the kids in on our deception, everything ended up in poor Sampson's bowl. 

I've heard people sing the praises of these Kid History videos because they are 'clean'. The Roberts' family is Mormon and Episode One took an LDS film festival by a landslide. But that's not exactly why I love them. Sure, it's great to be able to share these with my kids instead of just snickering and closing the laptop and muttering, "Nothing," to their "What's so funny?!" But the clean nature of them isn't their appeal. I find plenty of humor in things that can't be shared with the kids. What is so funny here is the juxtaposition of big burly men and little tiny voices, the perfect capturing of the dynamics of family life and the priceless, authentic phrases of those cherubic little monkeys.

These have given me endless belly laughs this week, and heightened my appreciation for just closing my eyes and listening to the cuteness of my kids and my nieces and their pals, even when they say things like, "UGH! I'm going to come over there and-and punch you, like I always keep doing!" 

Enjoy. 

No training wheels

Yesterday, I spent the afternoon at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia with my oldest son, Hayden, filling out questionnaires, complaining about litter downtown (Hayden, slamming the dashboard, "Am I the only one who cares about trash in the trees?!") and paying our monthly visit to the lovely Dr. Choo.

If you live in the Northeast, then you know we are getting an unseasonably warm and early start to spring, about a month ahead of schedule. Wondering, with every day that passes and moves us closer to April, can we trust this weather? Can we shave the dog yet? Can we shave the Hayden!? (These will be addressed in upcoming blogs...)

Following a long wait and relatively painless appointment, Hayden and I were antsy to get home with plans to go on a bike ride and get out in nature. We battled I-95 traffic and arrived home in the slanting late afternoon sun to find Piper (4) insisting that she needed me to take the training wheels off her bike--she was ready to ride a two wheeler. These are the slightly rusty training wheels that I had only recently located in the weeds and under the porch where Max had hidden them after jimmying them off her bike last fall, apparently mortified to have a sister who needed training wheels. (Note: Max has been a seasoned bike rider since all of last May. More on that later.)

We lost a few important mechanical pieces in the process, the hazards of using a seven-year-old mechanic, and ended up reattaching the wheels with various pieces of scavenged hardware and zipties. So I was a little reluctant to take them off again--she and Quinn have been having a great week riding loops on their teetering pink and purple training wheeled bikes, but yesterday Pip insisted: no training wheels. She was ready!

Off they came. Then there was the process of suiting her up. The boys raided her ice hockey bag, just put away for the season, and jammed on various knee pads and elbow pads, and slapped a friend's borrowed helmet on her head. Max's hand-me-down Adidas and black hockey gloves so stiff they stayed curled on her handlebars completed the ensemble and gave her a very 'motorcross chic' look. 

"I want to start on the grass," she said, because she had heard of a preschool pal who has mastered the technique with many bruises but no actual bloodletting. So we went to the lawn, wobbling along the grass towards the edge of a hill steep enough for a toddler to sled down. 

"Don't let go!" she shrieked. I didn't. But then I gave her a little shove to show her that falling down doesn't hurt, just like ice skating, when you're covered in pads. Over she went, and shot me such a look betrayal from under her tilting, too-big helmet.

"I said don't let go."

"But honey," I explained, "if you are going to learn how to ride a bike, I have to let go sometimes."

"No."

If you have never seen Piper seriously pout, I can just assure you, it can be scary.

Her brothers called out that she should try the long stretch of gentle sloping driveway where they both learned so we headed over, me holding her up by the handlebars and seatback. They circled in on their big boy bikes--last year's favorite birthday presents from my parents--and gave advice. Quinn (3) sped down from her house up the hill, training wheels rattling, handlebar tassles fluttering, and insisted she needed her training wheels removed too. 

"Not yet!" her mother and I chorused in unison.

Piper and I ran up and down the long stretch of driveway, the little muscles in her shoulders tensed, with her barking a constant running monologue of "Don't let go! You're not letting go! Hands on the handlebar, and my seat! I don't feel your hand on my seat! Don't let go!" 

Max zoomed by, standing up on his pedals, and called out glibly the same thing we said to him in a thousand botched training-wheel-free sessions, "The faster you go, the easier it is, Pipes!"

Max learned on this same stretch of road last May, quietly, with his older brother, in about two minutes. But this was after three years of whimpering and crashing with me and J. Probably we started him too early, pushed him, eager to have him off and biking with his big brother and the cousins and friends who show up to ride the loop. Inevitably, the second we put Max on the bike, he'd start this high-pitched keening whimper, and as soon as we let go, he'd intentionally jerk the front wheel hard to the left, crash and run back to the house in tears. Every few months we'd try this, and then give up. He seemed content to ride a plasma car behind the pack of bikers, one leg tucked under him, the other pumping crazily to propel him forward. Like those super-crawler babies, why would he ever learn to walk? But eventually, on his own, long after the others, he did. 

And as the afternoon wore on and Pip's monologue of insisting that I NOT LET GO continued, I realized this would not be the day she learned to ride a bike. And I'll admit at first I felt a twinge of annoyance--that I was going to have to hold her up, stooped over, for the rest of the evening walk with the family and that afterwards, I was going to have to figure out how to get her training wheels reattached for the next few weeks, (or months, years...) I was tempted to push her--she could learn today! It could be so liberating! 

But as we continued on our loops in the perfect spring air, Sampson swimming in the pond and shaking his wet and slobber on us, the boys zooming ahead and then back again, catching a snake and letting everyone touch it, baby Harper with her little bare feet up on the handlebar of her stroller, my Mom and Linden and Quinn talking about which berries would be ripe first, I had a whooshing rush of gratitude. 

Why wouldn't I want to run alongside my pedaling daughter and hold her up? How lucky to have the chance to show her in a concrete way that I am listening to her, meeting her where she is, and I am there to literally catch her when she falls? So we went fast on the long stretches, me hunched over and loping awkwardly like one of the Hobbits. I made my finger and thumb into a loop around the crossbar over her handlebars, showing her that just as Max kept bellowing, the faster she went, the less my fingers needed to grab and steady her. And she got it, and she giggled as we sped on down the hill. 

Piper did not learn to ride without training wheels yesterday. Sometime today, when Quinn shows up ready to race around the loop with her, I'll jimmy them back on. But last night, nobody came home in tears. Piper was proud of her accomplishments, of her bravery, of what she had done. When J pulled in the driveway, she crowed, 

"Daddy, I'm learning to ride without training wheels!"

And she is. 

 Piper, March 2012

Guest dog blog -- Zulu, the mutt from Laos

Perhaps this post from Lisa McKay in Laos (who is technically now in Australia, awaiting the birth of her first less-hairy, human baby) should be THE ONE THAT WAS ALMOST THE ONE... It is a hilarious discussion between husband and wife on the merits of acquiring a Samoyed in the tropics of Laos. Their debate reminds me a bit of this post gone viral by the Bloggess on what happens when lines are drawn in the marital sand. Luckily, Lisa and Mike handle this in a way that doesn't involve a giant wire rooster, and ends instead with their local mutt named Zulu. You can read about him here in It’s a boy. Lisa and Zulu

Lisa first wrote to me when we lost Jonah last January, professing her love for Newfs and the impracticality of owning one in Laos. I confessed that for eighteen months, I kept my original Newf Dakota in the Cayman Islands, shaved to the skin and sunscreened. I am enjoying her blog postings and expat musings, looking forward to hearing about her newest adventure: motherhood. Enjoy her guest spot below and be sure to check out links to more dog tales...

Friendly companions from Siberia

It’s been three months since we moved to Laos, one month since we moved into our house, and one week since our neighbor’s computer was stolen. His front door is less than ten steps away and when he left his door unlocked and went out in the middle of the day last week someone strolled up, let themselves in, picked up his laptop and took off. I was likely sitting right next door when this happened.

Mike and I were less than thrilled when we learned about this. We really like our house here in Luang Prabang. All the toilets and air conditioners and taps are working now (as are some of the hot water heaters) and it’s beautiful, really. Downstairs is just one large, tiled, space. In the middle of the room are two gothic pillars – I call it the ballroom. From one end of the ballroom a curved wooden staircase sweeps up to the second floor. It’s all very Gone With The Wind.

Even the windows – draped with gold tasseled curtains – are beautiful. But it’s a bit of a shame that we didn’t fully realize until after we’d moved in that one of the reasons they are beautiful is because they are not obscured by burglar bars. Or that the locks on these clear panes of glass are, shall we say… flimsy. Or that there’s no easy way to secure them from the inside because all the windows in the house (all nineteen of them) open from both ends.

So in light of recent events, we’ve decided that we really do need to get a dog, and this weekend we started trying to figure out how to do that.

Most people in Laos, it seems, get their nice big dogs from Thailand or China, but on Sunday we got a tip. There is one place in town that sells dogs, a friend told us. If we went right at the petrol station and down past the first roundabout we’d see a small shop selling bonsai trees. That was the place.

So on Sunday we went looking for bonsai trees, hoping they’d lead us to puppies. And sure enough, they did. In the back room of the bonsai store, in a wire cage, was a beautiful ball of white fluff that licked my fingers and batted my wrist with her paws and tried her best to climb out of the cage and into my arms.

“Awwww,” I said. “Awwwww.”

“What is that?” Mike asked.

“It looks like a husky,” I said.

The bonsai-dog seller couldn’t speak any English but he bought out a book and pointed proudly to a picture of a very large, very furry, white dog. This adorable little bundle was a Samoyed. And she cost three hundred US dollars.

“What is a Samoyed doing here?” Mike asked.

“She’s so cute,” I said.

“Yes,” Mike said. “She’s a very cute puppy that’s going to grow into a big hot muddy ball of tangled fur. What is a Samoyed, anyway?”

“I think they’re sled dogs,” I said.

“Obviously,” Mike said, nudging me out of the store. “Because it makes total sense to import a sled dog to Laos.”

I think Mike thought that was the end of that conversation. Silly Mike.

When we got home later that day I looked up Samoyeds.

“The Samoyed comes initially from Siberia,” I said, looking across the kitchen table and Mike at smiling guilelessly. “She’s a long way away from home… just like us.”

“Siberia,” Mike said. “What else does it say?”

I foolishly continued reading the Wikipedia entry out loud without editing anything out. “Samoyed’s have a dense double layer coat. The undercoat consists of soft and short fur that keeps the dog warm. The undercoat is typically shed heavily once or twice a year. This does not mean the Samoyed will only shed during that time however; fine hairs (versus the clumps of top coat shed during seasonal shedding) will be shed all year round, and have a tendency to stick to cloth and float in the air.”

Mike gestured to the ballroom behind us. “Are you seeing it?” he asked. “I want you to picture the whole room full of white hair floating in the air.”

“That is what we have a maid for,” I said. “We were just saying we didn’t have enough for her to do.”

Mike looked at me with narrowed eyes.

“This is not a good idea,” he said.

“Nomadic reindeer herders bred the fluffy white dogs to help with herding and to pull sleds. She’s a working dog,” I said, starting to build my case. “She can work for us.”

“What we need is a guard dog,” Mike said.

“Well…” I said, scanning down the wikipedia entry, “it doesn’t actually seem that she’d excel in that domain.”

“What does it say?” Mike said.

“Samoyeds’ friendly disposition makes them poor guard dogs; an aggressive Samoyed is rare. But,” I rushed to keep reading as Mike started laughing. “Samoyeds are excellent companions, especially for small children, and they remain playful into old age. When Samoyeds become bored they…”

I stopped reading.

“Go on,” Mike said, still laughing.

“They may begin to dig. And herd things.” I finished lamely.

“But they are excellent, friendly, companions,” I reminded him, trying to regain some ground.

“And you live in such an affection vacuum that you’re in desperate need of friendly companions,” Mike said.

“She and I would understand each other,” I said. “We both thrive in cool climates. She could sit beside me under the air conditioner at the kitchen table. She could lie on my feet and keep me company.”

“Right,” Mike said. “Because that’s exactly what you’d want – a giant furball lying on your already overheated feet in the tropics.”

“Well,” I amended, “she could lie beside my feet. And occasionally she could reach out and lick my good foot. Gently.”

“Of course she would,” Mike said. “Of course. Only your good foot. And only gently. And I can see it now – this shedding ball of fluff who wants to dig and herd and who hates the heat and that we’ve said we’ll train to stay downstairs. You’ll go upstairs to work in the study and feel sorry for the hot little Samoyed downstairs and you’ll leave the air conditioner on for her.”

“No I wouldn’t!” I said, shocked. Then I thought about how hot it can get downstairs and I amended. “Well, maybe, on very hot days. For she would be a friendly companion.”

“No,” Mike said.

Late last night, right before we went to sleep, I rolled over to Mike and cuddled up to him lovingly.

“Friendly companion,” I whispered in his ear.

“Guard dog,” Mike said. “She’d herd an intruder right to our computers and lick him along the way for good measure. Besides, who buys a three hundred dollar dog in this town?”

Then he laughed. “I know exactly who buys them. Men who are incapable of standing up to their wives, that’s who.”

“Friendly. Companion.” I said in my most alluring voice.

“Go to sleep,” Mike said.

***

In the end, we did not end up getting that darling little Samoyed, but we did end up acquiring an adorable mutt we named Zulu. If you would like to know more about our adventures with Zulu here in Laos you can follow these links for more of this story:

A tale of two puppies

Puppy lessons in parenthood

Puppy lessons in parenting: Resource guarding

Zulu from Laos