Magnolia is a puker. She has been since the day she was born, or rather before she was born. During my pregnancy with her, I spent the majority of my day running to or from the bathroom. I had just been hired at the Grateful Bread, a bakery and by just pure luck the heavenly scent of bagels and a nice schmere sent me heading for the john. The thing about hippies; they are a culture of tolerance and I took full advantage of that. My counter skills were less than stellar and my appearance had something to be desired. I would stand there in my radiant greenish tinge as the beads of sweat appear on my forehead and start to salivate pre-purge. Struggling to maintain the façade of the glowing pre-natal goddess, I'd muster the last few drops of customer service and say " So you would like an organic rice milk latte and a whole grain ba- one moment please" and take a brisk jaunt to the loo only to return a minute later wiping the vomit induced tear away and resume, "-and what kind of cream cheese did you want on that?"

The pregnancy progressed and my list of things that made me ill expanded. My repertoire not only included smells, from food to makeup products, but also visuals such as the color orange. But with every experience, I fine tuned my bathroom routine. I started to develop a style that adapted to my changing needs. I won't go into the details, but bladder control became a main consideration.

Yet there was a silver lining on the darkest cloud, I just couldn't see it from the bathroom. It was all over one evening two weeks after my due date when I gave the heave ho to my eight pound screaming ball of indigestion. The joy of my newly reclaimed iron gut was short lived, however. As I looked into the eyes of my joy, my love, my Magnolia, she saw peace, safety and we both met serenity for a moment and I could almost detect an angelic smile and- retch. She was a puker.

It was a natural progression and should have been expected, yet I still was not prepared for it. At first, it was only in the car, and that could be avoided by never leaving the house. But it can only last for so long, and you have to get out. The routine we adopted in the beginning usually entailed driving as far as possible in as short a time as possible and when the partially digested milk made it's encore appearance, we screech to a halt and I'd run around the car flailing wildly and panicking only to pull the gooey baby seatbelt off of her in order to stop her from choking. Needless to say, a very dramatic ordeal, yet fully entertaining, I'd wager, to the innocent bystander.

Five years later, we have managed to simplify the process. "Mom? I have to puke."

"Kind of or really?"

"Um, kind of, in about a mile." Magnolia squirms a little.

"Okay, just let me know."

"Mom, now."

"Now?"

"Now! Right now!"

We screech to the same halt, but that's the only drama involved, Magnolia hastily unbuckles her seatbelt, gives the tell-tale gag-burp hybrid, opens the door and lets it go. "Get it all outside the car, sweetie"

"-urp-okay"

After the final heave and a few sighs, she straps her seatbelt on and continues singing her version of 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air'.

“Mom?" Magnolia takes a moment from her song.

“Again?"

“No, I'm hungry"

I grab from the stash of recovery snacks and we are on our way again. Down to a science. But this is only after much trial and error. I can't begin to count the bags of Burger King food we thrown out after they have been temporarily consumed, we should see about a rental fee, or maybe next time I should give it back and try for that refund, "well, as you can see, she wasn't completely satisfied."

In order to make lemonade with lemons of circumstance (or maybe stomach acid), my husband and I tried to turn this frown upside down. We developed a game entitled, "What makes Magnolia puke?" It's not really a game, but more of a mental list of things to avoid, or how to prepare for the inevitable. For example, it's best to avoid things like dog breath especially around her food, grass clippings and wearing turtlenecks, but preparation is required for car trips longer than two miles, teeth brushing and public bathrooms. Magnolia is now breaking into the less tangible reasons now like thinking about spiders eggs and conversation topics involving animal hair.

Choosing friends is also an arduous task. Once we went to a family dinner with the neighbors, innocently enough. But the neighbors had two dogs, a cat, three rats and a chinchilla. My husband and I arrived at the door, exchanging niceties and entered the house laden with dinner fixings and the all of a sudden the dreaded sounds of Magnolia saying, "Eww, what's that-"

Needless to say, our evening was cut short and our niceties, along with a few apologies were exchanged and we went home and ordered pizza.

Now Magnolia is in school and every first day of school we need to tell the new bus driver, teacher, school nurse about the phenomena that is her quivering belly. And yet in all of this, she remains unfazed. Puking is as natural as breathing, eating eye crust (which, amazingly enough is not on the list) or pooping (which is). Magnolia is a bold, charismatic imaginative leader. It's just required an awareness that most 7 year olds don't have, and I think it keeps her in check with her body. And now to have the foresight to let mom know.