Getting My Hands Dirty

I have made five batches of homemade slime with my daughter since May 18th.  But it hasn't exactly been a "team effort."  Her contribution has been selecting the color and adding the glue to the bowl.  The bulk of the work has been mine. No matter how much I encourage her... I'm the one who has to put my hands in the goop.

As I worked on a bright pink batch the other morning, it occurred to me that this slime-making process feels a lot like parenting feels lately.

I'm the one who has to kneed it, and determine if we need more shaving cream or contact solution.

I'm the one who has to touch it before it's perfected and ends up with the sticky gunk under my fingernails.

I'm the one who has to put in the time, and make it "acceptable" enough for my daughter to want to play with it. 

Parenting is hard, and while I'm very grateful that I'm getting helpful "ingredients" from outside sources (my husband, my parents, my sisters, my friends) it feels like a lot of it falls on my shoulders. And on the really bad days, it feels like I'm tackling these messy parts alone. 

I guess what really made the connection in my head between parenting and slime-making is that I'M putting the work in, but I'm ultimately doing it for SOMEONE else. 

The things that I teach my daughter about respect and responsibility are going to (hopefully) make things easier for her future teachers.  The things I show her about kindness and empathy are going to help make her a more loving person toward her future friends/partners.  The things I preach to her about working hard and not giving up are going to help her future employers know they can trust her with the big projects and that she deserves that raise. 

So the next time I'm sticky, covered in slime, and muttering under my breath... I'm going to try to remember why I'm *really* getting my hands dirty in the first place. 

Romanticizing the Past

My husband and I celebrated our wedding anniversary earlier this week by going out to dinner.  We'd been given a gift certificate a while back to a nice Italian restaurant, but never managed to make the time to use it.  Not only I was exhilarated at the thought of a "kid free" meal, but I was also excited because I hadn't been to this particular establishment in almost 15 years.

The one (and only) time I was there was on a first date. (NOT with my husband, in case you were curious. Ha!) I remember the food being great, and I remember it was the first time I had calamari as an appetizer. It was also one of the nicest places I'd ever been taken on a date.  I'd been talking this place up to my husband for a while.  He's a bit of a foodie, and I was pretty sure he'd like it. 

We got there, and the food was... just okay. Hmm.

I think I may have romanticized my first experience with this restaurant in my head.

Don't get me wrong, the food wasn't horrible.  But will we make the time to go back there again in the near future?  Probably not.

The whole experience got me wondering how often I'm guilty of this whole "romanticizing the past" thing.

Were Saturday morning cartoons *really* better in the 1990s than they are today? Or was I just viewing them through a different "lens" than I view cartoons now?

What about TV?  Were those shows I grew up with actually better than what's on today? Or do I just have fond memories of watching TGIF on Friday nights and SNICK on Saturday nights because they felt like more of a "treat" than watching television does now?

And don't get me started on music.  I'm convinced that many people feel the best decade for music was whatever time period they were in high school/their early 20s. I read a study once that said the majority of people actually STOP seeking out new music/artists once they hit their 30s.  I know I'm guilty of this one.  You're going to hear "PopRocks" (1990s and 2000s pop and rock) on the satellite radio whenever I'm in control of the dial.

While I've only been a parent for 7.5 years, I know I'm going to be having wistful thoughts about the past when it comes to raising my kids.  My first grader is already talking about how much she wants a cell phone when she's a teenager.  (Kid, I didn't have my own phone until COLLEGE.  Calm down.)

So is all this romanticizing harmful?  I don't know.  So far, I don't think I've hurt anyone with my rose-colored views of certain past experiences.  Will I be able to to stop?  I don't know that either.  But maybe I should try.

If nothing else... perhaps we'll be able to have a tastier anniversary dinner next year.

Big Kids at the Playground

I took my kids to my daughter's school (after hours) recently to play on the playground equipment.  At the same time we pulled up, so did a car of three teenagers.  I didn't really pay much attention, as my youngest is a "runner" and diverted my attention away from them pretty quickly.

My daughter noticed them though.

I'm doing that "mom trick" where you're trying to keep one eye on each kid, and I can see her circling them.  She's giving them a wide berth, but it's obvious to me what she's doing.  And I think it's obvious to them too.

This playground has a triple slide, and each of the teens is sitting in a bedway.  Finally I hear my daughter speak.  "You guys just going to sit there?" They laugh.  "Are you too scared to go DOWN the slide?" she continues.  They laugh again.  She climbs to the top and one of the teens immediately moves so she can go down.  She turns around and gives them a look that seems to say, "See? It's not that hard!" before she runs over to another section of the playground.

I'm taking in the whole scene and laughing to myself.  I know that some parents are bothered when older kids hang out at playgrounds, but these three seem pretty non-threatening.  Or maybe it doesn't bother me... because I'VE been the big kid on the playground.

I have memories of hanging out at parks and playgrounds with my friends when I was in high school.  I feel like we usually went at NIGHT, but I could be mistaken.  I don't know if I can pinpoint why we chose to hang out there. Was there really nothing else to do in our small town?  I know I had at least one friend who was vocal about how much she loved to swing.  Maybe we were just going along with her.  Or maybe it was more than that.

Maybe even at 17, we were trying to go back to something familiar. Something easier. You know, playground rules. No pushing.  No cutting in line.  No throwing the sand/woodchips.  No bad words. Maybe we just wanted to pretend we had the ability to temporarily escape the drama of high school.

I like to think that's what those three kids were doing.  I can't imagine being a teenager in today's social media world. It was bad enough to find out on Monday morning that your friends hung out over the weekend and didn't invite you... it would be WAY worse to see it playing out in "real time" on Instagram.

I'm not sure how old those teens were, but maybe they were seniors.  Maybe they are graduating high school in a couple of weeks and are on the precipice of some big life changes.  Maybe as much as they "can't WAIT to be done," they are also a little nervous about the next chapter. 

So if they want to linger a little bit longer in childhood while they still can... that's fine with me.

Just go DOWN the slide so my first grader leaves you alone, okay?   

Dear Bunny

Dear Bunny,

I am so sorry.  You didn't sign up for any of this.

Someone gifted you to my daughter when she was about 3, I think.  It seems kind of rude to tell you, but you were never her favorite.  You lived a quiet life in the toy box. You only ventured out for special occasions like "Stuffed Animal Tea Party" or "How Many Bunnies Do I Have, Mom?"

Just before she turned 4, and I found out I was pregnant with her little brother, I instructed her to empty her toy box.  I asked her to pick a handful of things that she would be willing to give to the new baby.  You got picked.

I've been trying to imagine how that felt for you.  Were you happy for a new assignment?  Were you sad she was willing to give you up so easily?  Were you just excited to get sprung from the toy box for a new adventure/some fresh air?

My son took to you right away.  His "B."  You've been sucked on.  You've been thrown into the toilet.  You've been tied up in a pillowcase and tossed into the washing machine. You've been used (many, many times) as a surrogate Kleenex. You've been loved.

And that "love" has taken it's toll.  You don't look like you used to.  Your fur isn't as soft.  You've completely lost your blue bow.  And most recently, your right ear split open.  I promise I'll fix that, but I'm not a doctor and you're probably going to have a scar.

What do you see when you look in the mirror?  Do you focus on the flaws? Do you see the scratched up eyes, the worn fur, the spot where the bow used to be?  Are you tired?  It's exhausting to be so needed.  Trust me, I know.  To be pulled and thrown and stepped on.  To be covered in someone else's germs.  To just want to be left alone (and not touched) for 5 minutes.

When you look in the mirror, do you see the bunny you USED to be?  Because I hope you can focus on the love. I hope you can see that you are so much realer than those toys shoved in the bottom of my daughter's toy box.  I hope you can see that your beauty isn't tied to your appearance.  Your beauty, your value, is in all those messy moments you shared with my son.

You will never be the same bunny you were before you met my kids.  And that's okay.

You're living a life you couldn't have imagined when you were "born" in that toy factory in China.

---

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.” 

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit. 

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.” 

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?” 

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

- The Velveteen Rabbit, Margery Williams

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Want to read more of my work?  Check out my essay "Mrs. Norton's Daughter" in WILL WORK FOR APPLES, the latest in the New York Times best-selling I JUST WANT TO PEE ALONE anthology series.  

Click here to get your copy today!

Plans vs. Reality

When I was in college, a friend once told me she hated making big plans.  Her reasoning was if she made plans, and then they DIDN'T work out, the expectations she created in her head wouldn't be met, so she would be disappointed and sad.  I thought this was pretty deep coming from a 19-year-old.

I also remember thinking it was kind of depressing.

I love making plans.  In fact, I think I thrive on it.  When we first started dating, I remember my husband saying that dating me was causing him to "plan ahead" more than he ever had in his life.  I remember laughing and making some joke about how I've always been "type A."

But lately, I keep thinking back to the outlook of my college friend... and wondering if she was right.

I recently thought something positive was going to happen to me, and it didn't.  In fact, I was so sure this positive thing was going to happen, that I made other plans BASED on the fact that it would happen.  And worse yet, I shared these plans with other people.  Now not only do I feel like I didn't deliver on a promise that I made, I am (to quote my friend) "disappointed and sad."

And yes, yes.  "Don't count your chickens before they hatch."  I've heard that idiom, I understand that idiom... I just can't seem to APPLY it.

When I was pregnant with my first child, I made all these plans in my head about what type of parent I was going to be be.  And, big surprise, none of these plans involved being so exasperated with your favorite 7-year-old that you end up shouting over something stupid.  Falling short of my expectations of motherhood makes me disappointed and sad.

When I was studying journalism in college, I made all kinds of plans.  Where I wanted to live, what type of writing I wanted to do, the types of organizations I wanted to work for.  None of those plans included my current "stay at home mom" gig.  Sometimes when I think about my current career prospects, and how they don't match up with the plans I made, I am disappointed and sad.

So where does that leave me?  I'm not sure I have the ability to STOP making plans.  I have some "fly by the seat of their pants" friends, and honestly?  They give me anxiety.

Maybe I need to start viewing my plans as more of a road map.  They can give me a sense of direction, but they need to allow for detours.  They can give me an overview of  my journey, but I'll still need to allow for an unexpected pothole or construction zone that might slow me down.

What is it that my GPS says when I make a wrong turn?  Recalculating? Maybe that's it.  I'll keep making plans.  I'll just work on being more open to "recalculation" along the way. 

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Want to read more of my work?  Check out my essay "Mrs. Norton's Daughter" in WILL WORK FOR APPLES, the latest in the New York Times best-selling I JUST WANT TO PEE ALONE anthology series.  

Click here to get your copy today!

Grieving for the Future

It's been a beautiful Easter weekend in my neck of the words.  The sun has been shining, the grass is finally looking green, and the temperatures are almost making me forget that never-ending winter we just finished.

It's also been giving me flashbacks to some of my childhood Easter memories, which mostly involve my grandparents.  When we were little, my Grandma Betty would buy us these frilly Easter dresses that were usually made from fabric printed with giant flowers.  (Some years she even got the white hats and gloves.)  She'd take us to church with her or we'd go with our parents. Then we'd end up out at her house later that afternoon for a big meal that always included ham (my favorite) and an egg hunt in her giant backyard.

The egg hunt, while super fun for my sisters and I, always seemed to result in fighting between my Grandparents.  Grandma Betty prided herself on keeping things EVEN between her three girls, and Grandpa inevitably would forget where he hid some of the eggs... which would result in her yelling at him when we didn't have the same number of prizes at the end of the hunt.

(Side note: He'd usually find the missing plastic eggs a few weeks later when he ran over them with his riding lawn mower and shot pink plastic scraps across the yard.  Ha!)

Now, I'm not naive.  I know that even if they were still alive, we wouldn't have been able to recreate the Easter from my childhood.  And I'm so happy I have those memories of my grandparents stored away in my head.  But, if I'm being honest... I've been grieving a little bit recently.

An essay I wrote was published in an anthology last week.  I wish I could share that news with my Grandma Betty.  She'd be, to use her words, "just tickled." And while part of me really wants to believe that she is still able to watch over us and be part of our special moments, it's not the same as being able to talk with her.

I would have loved to give her a copy of the book and listened to her praise my essay.  I would have loved to see the look on her face when she read another contributor's essay about yelling at a nun or the one about kissing a pig.  I am so curious if she would have stumbled over the word "transgender" in one of the other essays, and if we might have had a conversation about it. I think it would have been an awkward conversation, but maybe she would have surprised me.

It struck me that I do quite a bit of this "grieving for the future."  I grieve for the future moments that my grandparents won't be there for.  I grieve for the future moments that my friends who died way too young aren't going to experience.

What do you do with those feelings?  I don't pretend to have all the answers.

But, as far as the anthology and my Grandma?  I'm going to donate a copy to her local library. I'm pretty sure she would have been "tickled" about that too.

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Like this?  Then you'll love my essay "Mrs. Norton's Daughter" in WILL WORK FOR APPLES, the latest in the New York Times best-selling I JUST WANT TO PEE ALONE anthology series.  

Click here to get your copy today!

On Repeat

My 7-year-old daughter is in her bedroom, listening to music. I don't recognize the song, but she's playing it on repeat. I hear her start to sing along... with gusto.  Because it's 2019, and I almost always have a mini-computer (that also makes telephone calls) within arm's reach, I google the words she's singing.  It turns out that she's singing a song from "Tangled: The Series," which is a cartoon on the Disney Channel that she doesn't even watch anymore.

I hear her sing it a couple more times... then she moves on to something else.

And I have a flashback.

It's late 1995/early 1996, and I'm listening to my new Meat Loaf CD.  Is Meat Loaf appropriate for middle-schoolers?  I don't know, but I'm guessing it might have been on my Christmas list. Either way, it's the "Welcome to the Neighborhood" album.

But maybe that's not the best way to describe it.  I'm NOT listening to the album, I'm playing my new favorite song, track #10, over and over and over again - "If This is the Last Kiss (Let's Make It Last All Night)."  Again?  Appropriate for a middle-schooler?

I'm dancing around in my room, singing with the same gusto my daughter would emulate 23 years later, when I hear my Dad shouting from downstairs.

"FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!!" he bellows. "EITHER PICK A DIFFERENT SONG OR TURN IT OFF!!!"

I don't remember exactly what happened next.  I think I just turned it WAY down.

I've repeated this pattern several times in my life.  Find a new song, fall in love with the new song, play it over and over until I can sing all the words (and all the instrumental parts, ha!), and then I move on almost as quickly as I became consumed with it.

I read an article last year that called this behavior "extreme re-listening."  While the word extreme might come off a negative, I guess I don't see the problem.  Listening to music can be an intense, emotional, and personal experience.  And if you've found a song that you can connect with - put it on repeat.

I asked my daughter later that night about the song from "Tangled."  She said that she'd never heard it until earlier that day, but she really liked it.  "I guess I got a little obsessed, Mom," she said.

That's alright kid.  I promise not to shout at you for your "extreme re-listening" habit.  (But, let's not listen to any Meat Loaf lyrics for a few more years.)

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Like this?  Then you'll love my essay "Mrs. Norton's Daughter" in WILL WORK FOR APPLES, the latest in the New York Times best-selling I JUST WANT TO PEE ALONE anthology series.  

Click here to get your copy today!