I spent the day yesterday with my ten year old daughter and her ten year old  friend Ann. It was monumentally exhausting. It was a new sort of tired, the tired that comes from your core. The tired that makes you want to weep and sit in a corner.

The tired where you simply want to say, “Okay, I give up. I suck at parenting, and I’ll buy you all sorts of fancy crap if you promise to never ever speak again. Ever.”

That’s right. I want to bury my head in the sand.

My daughter wants a cell phone. She may not have one. It is not a fiscal issue, it’s a parenting issue. Jane is ten, and although she would love to be 15, she will simply have to wait. End. Of. Story.

Oh, not really, because Jane then explained to me that she’d be willing to accept a telephone in her bedroom. I told her I was okay with that. She wants her own telephone number.

Really?

I have to get a ten year old their own phone number? She has a laptop and an iTouch, really? Her own phone number?

I tried to steer the conversation toward using things like ichat and gmail to talk to friends, and the girls immediately started talking about the “lameness” of social networking sites.

“Club Penguin is so stupid that you can’t even enter a number.” Jane began.

“Oh but you can spell them out if you need to.” Ann replied.

Note to self: Check and recheck logs for Club Penguin

The girls then proceeded onto a long discussion about OurWorld.com and how they “deal with” people who ask them what their real name is.

Both girls were enthusiastic in knowing that a quick reply like, “can’t you see, my name is Username834.” Lets the other person know that you plan to remain anonymous. Really, how long can a ten year old outsmart an adult? Both girls knew it was imperative to report the user immediately.

I equate the internet with the mall. I’m showing my kids around, and teaching them safe habits. Unlike the mall, they’re needing these skills more than I’d hoped for.

My solution? No cellphone and the kids are on laptops. If I’m in the kitchen, they are too.

Right now, that’s what works. I want to give them some leeway, but we’re just not there yet. The telephone in the bedroom? I’m thinking yes. Perhaps we’ll tie it to school performance, a birthday or even as a bribe to not tell her brother about the tooth fairy.

There’s a lot of push and pull here lately. My kids want to be independent, and it would be cruel of us to not allow them some freedom. We are obligated to keep them safe.

Today I have more questions than answers.

Twelve years.

Our daughter made us parents and our son made us a family.

I’ve lived with my best friend for twelve years. I do, in fact, have it all.

I exercise a lot.

It’s not for the reasons you might imagine. I play doubles tennis just to have fun and move my body, but I play singles for one reason and one reason only.

Eggrolls.

I love fried food. I love it so much that I was 198 pounds when I was pregnant with the kids. I have the palate of a morbidly obese woman, so I exercise. With two hours of activity I reward myself with two eggrolls. I don’t really want to play a singles match, I’d rather play doubles and move a little less. I want the eggrolls, so I run a little harder. I play to win. I start planning my lunch sometime around the 14th game.

I also have a taco truck habit. I love the tortas and ceviche and a Mexican Coca Cola with the sugar and the tiny bubbles. I refuse to drive to a taco truck. My favorite taco truck is reliably parked on Mulholland Drive year ’round.

I run to the taco truck.

My running shoes make me slobber. I am Pavlov’s Dog.

Can you have it all?

I just had three hours of tennis followed by thirty minutes of lunch. I ran out of time to sit and enjoy my food. I will be up late cleaning and dusting and folding laundry. It is a choice I made.

Can you have a career and kids? Do you even want one? Is it bad that I don’t want one, but still resent the fact that my wardrobe offers nothing in the way of “business casual”?

What is “it all” and why do you even want it?

Don’t give me Mommy Wars, give me your definition.

One of the best parts of living in Los Angeles is that we have all the media here. By media, I think we all know that I mean porn.

As I’m waiting for my leg waxing, I cannot help but listen to the porn star as she tries to convince the 50 something career woman to get her “ass waxed”.

Both women had implants the size of icebox watermelons, not an ounce of cellulite, puppet like upper lips and frozen foreheads. Their conversation quickly moved to bleaching the anus and nipple inserts. They then realized they had the same financial planner.

And I just sat there thinking Oh my gawd, women will do anything to get laid.

Here’s the video

If you are lucky, one day you will meet Lindsay Maines and Audrey McClelland. They are somewhere beyond lovely, and it was my privelage to be on a panel with them.

A special thanks to Maya Binisneer who jumped in at the last second to save us from ourselves.

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