Tuesday, August 30, 2011

A Bad Mother

Brie and I had quite the day yesterday: a bit of nasty text-o-gramming back and forth over a situation that had her mad at me.  We resolved it by the time I had to pick her up from work (her car's in the shop, one of the issues) but that got me thinking about another time when we were less than happy with each other.  That time was when she decided she was going to move to Washington state with her boyfriend a few years ago.  From that, came what's written below:

LETTING GO

When I was younger and thought I ruled the world, my mother put the mother curse on me.  You know what that is: your mother tells you that she hopes you have a child just like you some day.  Well, this actually came true because I do have a chip off the old block. 

A bombshell was dropped on me recently: I'm a bad mother.  I know it comes as quite a shock, especially since I have always considered myself to be an exceptional mother.  But it has been brought to my attention that I am controlling; hypocritical, and think I know everything.

So who made this grand pronouncement?  My 22-year-old daughter Brie came to this conclusion.  She announced that she was moving to Washington State with her boyfriend, and I told her she'd have to get through me first.  I guess that was the controlling part.

Granted, she's an adult and of course I can't keep her here with me forever, but to have her 3000 miles away?  That isn't sitting too well with me.  This isn't going to be the smartest move she's ever made.  That's the I-think-I-know-everything part.

The funny thing about this is: she may be right, at least about the hypocrite part. You see, I left home when I was 19.   But of course that was different: I had 2 years of college under my belt, had been working for a few years and had a stash of cash when I left.  And of course I knew everything about the world.  It's not the same with my daughter; thanks to the sheltered life she's led with her single, over-protective mother.

We had a big argument about this supposed move, and stopped speaking to each other.  That gave me plenty of time to think about what a bad mother is, at least in her eyes.  So here's what's on my list:

  • A bad mother takes her 4 1/2 year old and 1 month old and removes them from an abusive situation
  • A bad mother makes sure that the only babysitters her daughters have are trusted family members, like their grandmother and aunt.
  • A bad mother tailors her work hours so she can attend any school function her children are involved in, be it chorus, orchestra, band, field day, or moving up day (to name a few).
  • A bad mother leaves a cushy job she really enjoys, so she can take a more flexible one to accommodate the testing and meetings required for her young autistic child.
  • Whether a bad mother is working full time, part time, or not at all, she makes sure her children notice no difference in their standard of living
  • Even though a bad mother gets lonely for "adult company", she would never move anyone into the home because that wouldn't set a good example for her daughters.
  • A bad mother raises girls who don't smoke, drink, do drugs, and have something special to give their husbands on their wedding night.
  • A bad mother spends money that she doesn't have so that her daughters can have the prom dresses of their dreams.
  • A bad mother cries herself to sleep at night worrying about her children: praying for their safety and well being.
  • A bad mother solves all of her children's problems and fights their battles because that's how a tigress takes care of her cubs.
  • A bad mother, when she sees her child standing on a train track with a speeding locomotive heading for her, pushes the child out of the way and lets the train hit her (figuratively, not literally!).

With that in mind, I had to figure out what a good mother is:

  • A good mother knows when her job is done, and knows when to let go.

That's it.  Whether I want to admit it or not, whether I like it or not, my daughter is a grown woman and I have to let go.  It won't be easy: I'll be kicking and screaming the whole time.  But I am letting go.  I'm going to let her make her own mistakes, and choices, and be her own person, without me trying to make things perfect for her.

She's leaving on March 28, to be her own person and to finally get out from under her mother's shadow.  She may not be leaving under the exact same circumstances that I did, but that's her choice.  After all, she has a mind of her own.  And if I raised her correctly, she'll be able to make wiser choices in her future.

If there's one thing I need for her to know, it's that although I'm letting go of her physically, I'll never let her go in my heart.  Because no matter how grown she is, or where she is: she's still my little girl.

And by the way: I've already put the mother curse on her. J

P.S.  Thankfully, as you know, she moved back 5 years later just like I had done in my past: chewed up, spit out but ready to rise from the ashes.  Yes: she is a chip off the old block.  Well, not that old  😉


Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Angels Among Us

I’m usually an every Sunday church goer, but this past Sunday I decided to do church at home.  For me this means I listen to the sermon from the Moody Church in Chicago, IL from 11 until noon.  I really like Pastor Erwin Lutzer; so I knew I’d get a little something out of whatever his sermon would be about.
This week’s message was about angels.  Not just what they are doing in Heaven; but also what their characteristics are and how they manifest themselves to humans. 
As I’m listening to the sermon it got me thinking: have I or other family members had encounters with angels?  The answer to that is yes, and on many occasions.  Some visits were much more vivid than others, but ultimately it turned out that the only explanation for what happened is that there was angel intervention.
For me, the encounter that always comes first to mind is when I was in the hospital having Brie.  I didn’t realize I had an infection at the time, so when I gave birth they took her to neonatal for observation and I couldn’t see her.  I had to stay in the hospital for almost a week trying to get rid of the infection; and of course I was worried about the baby.  I had an IV in my arm but it hadn’t been put in right and my arm and hand started to swell.  By the second day it hurt and I kept asking the nurses to remove it or put it in again but they wouldn’t.  That night after 11 o’clock a woman came to my room. She was dressed in scrubs, a lab coat and had a stethoscope around her neck. She had brown-rimmed glasses and long dark brown hair. She introduced herself as Dr. Katherine and said she was there to check on me.  I asked her if she could tell a nurse to do something about my IV; and she said she’d do it. So she took out the IV and replaced it; and very soon the swelling began to go down.  We chatted a bit and I told her I was a little worried about my baby, because I couldn’t see her due to the infection.  She volunteered to go to neonatal to check on her.  When she came back she said the baby would be fine, and hopefully I’d be able to see her in a day or two.  She stayed with me for about an hour; and then left.  The next night, she showed up again.  She checked on Brie, and then stayed in my room to watch a movie with me. It was “Brother Rat”, a really old (1938!) movie about recruits on a military base.  After the movie she left.  Dr. Katherine came to my room every night while I was there; and on the night I told her I’d be leaving the next day she said that she was going to start her vacation the next day. I thanked her for all of her visits to me and Brie, and wished her a wonderful vacation.  The next day, when I was getting ready to leave with my baby, I stopped by the nurses’ station to leave a note for Dr. Katherine.  But when I asked for her, no one knew who I was talking about.  I described her, told them how she’d changed my IV and was starting her vacation but they said there was no one by that name employed as a doctor there.  After I thought about it, I figured there were only a couple of options as to who she was: either someone escaped from the mental ward, or an angel.  I’m pretty sure she was the latter.
That’s an angel that was seen, but there is one that I didn’t see.  When Kitty was maybe 5 years old, she and her sister wanted homemade French fries for dinner.  Since I was watching something on TV, I decided that I would peel the potatoes in the living room so I wouldn’t miss any of my show.  After peeling the potatoes, I stood up to go into the kitchen.  At that moment, Kitty came running up to me to give me hug.  I had the knife pointing out and as God is my witness, she ran right into the knife and it went in her eye as she collided with me.  I was terrified, she was pressed against me screaming and I was afraid to move my hand for fear her eyeball would be impaled on the knife.  But I finally slowly moved back and took out the knife: and lo and behold there was nothing on it.  I made her move her hand from her face and there was no sign of the knife having touched any part of her.  I told her she was all right and she stopped screaming, and was fine!  Lesson learned from that unseen angel: NEVER have a knife around children!  And I never peel anything anywhere but at the kitchen table.
A couple of years ago, Brie was crossing the street and she was hit by a taxi.  When the police arrived and parked in the lot across the street, the officer told her friend that Brie would have to come over to the squad car for him to take her information.  Her friend helped her up so she could hobble across the street, but suddenly a gentleman came up to her, said his name was Mark, picked her up and carried her across the street: setting her down by the squad car.  She said she had noticed him earlier, but afterwards when she looked for him he was gone.  She had never seen him before, and hasn’t seen him since.  So I’m thinking that was one of her angels.
Pastor Lutzer mentioned that angels often take the form of something familiar, so we are comfortable with them.  This made me think of my father.  I sometimes have dreams, or ‘visits’ from him, and he’s always dressed in his navy blue suit and his gold-rimmed spectacles.  As I listened to the sermon though, I started to think that maybe I wasn’t being ‘visited’ by my father: but by an angel taking a familiar form.  In some of these visits, my ‘father’ gives me a word to pass along to someone specific to keep them from harm.  In a couple of instances, I was told of a bad situation that was occurring that I hadn’t known anything about, and it was true and needed to be taken care of.  Since it says in the Bible that there are no tears in Heaven, I believe that my father wouldn’t be able to see what is going on here because some things would definitely make him sad.  That’s another reason for me to now believe that it’s an angel, and not Daddy Clank I see.
These are just a very few examples of the angels that are in my family’s lives.  I bet if you think about it: you can come up with a few examples of your own.  Maybe something unexplained happened, you crossed paths with a stranger and it felt comfortable; or you were miraculously saved in a dangerous situation that defied explanation.  Maybe the explanation is: you were touched by an angel.  I know that I have been...

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Timing is Everything

Both of the girls were working yesterday, so I thought it would be a great time to sneak off to Wal-Mart after work.  Usually there is no issue with going to that store, but my reason for going was to purchase some romance novels.  I have been forbidden by my daughters to buy any more romance novels, because I currently have around 40 that I haven't read yet!  I love Harlequin SuperRomance books, and also the Silhouetter Special Edition books.  But as you can imagine: I don't have the time to read like I used to so they are kind of piling up.  However, I don't want to miss out on any of the sequels, so each month I now have to sneak to Wal-Mart, buy them and then hide them when I get home.

But the gist of this entry isn't about the books.  It's about what happened while I was at Wal-Mart.  I went into the store and headed right for the book section.  I read the descriptions on all 12 books and decided I only needed 4 of them.  As I was heading toward a register, I decided to detour to the soup aisle just in case they had brought back the "hot-ass oodie of noodie" (more on this in another entry!) which of course they hadn't.  I did notice a brand I wasn't aware of, Hanover, and decided to try a can of their Chicken Pot Pie soup.   I didn't want to have that for dinner, so I also went to the frozen food section to get a TV dinner.  I picked up something really good by Boston Market; and since I was already in the frozen section I also got a box of Magnum dark chocolate ice cream bars (dark Belgian chocolate over vanilla bean ice cream).  Now that my hands were full (didn't think I'd need a basket!) I now headed for the cash registers.

This is where I had to make a judgment call.  Wal-Mart is always packed, and I wanted to get out of there as expeditiously as possible. So I went to one of the "speedy checkout" lines, for 20 items or less.  I figured this would be a good bet, since there were only 2 people ahead of me.  

I turned my head slightly, and  noticed a man had gotten into line behind me with only 1 item.  I figured it wouldnt' take me too long since mine would scan quickly, so I didn't think I needed to let him go ahead of me.

There were 2 people ahead of me, so of course that meant the cashier slowed down to a snail's pace.  No matter what short line I get in, it's guaranteed to hit a snag and move at a snail's pace.  The gentleman behind me said, "How long do you think this wil take?"  I said, "I'm not sure, but  I can guarantee it's not going to be a speedy checkout."  He laughed, and I turned to get a better look at him.

My my: what a handsome man he was!  He was taller than me (highly unusual!), had a head full of salt and pepper hair, hazel eyes, a great smile, nice teeth, fresh cinna-minty breath, was in good shape and appeared to be my age.  This NEVER happened in Wal-Mart!

Needless to say, I was intrigued.  So we began to converse, trading witty repartee and sending off those "hmm, interesting" vibes.  He seemed to have the same kind of sense of humor that I do, and I was really enjoying the conversation as he talked a bit about himself, and discussed how long we'd have to be in line, and different topics.  Man, I had hit the jackpot!

So I decided since he wasn't wearing a wedding ring, I needed to be bold and give him my number.  Just as I was mustering up the bravado, his cell phone rang.  He excused himself to answer it, and I was waiting for him to hang up.  But wouldn't you know it: now the cashier wakes up and it's my turn to cash out.  I tried to pay as slowly as I could, since he was still on the phone, but I didn't want to hold up the line.  But I walked slowly to my car in case he came out: nothing. I went to my car and sat there for a couple of minutes: still nothing!  Finally I realized how foolish I was being. If he'd been interested he would have asked me for my number.  So I put the car in gear, pulled out and started driving past the store.  Now  he comes out, but he's still on the phone!  So I took that as a sign that it wasn't meant to be, and headed home.

As I was driving I wished I had a business card I could have given him.  That was a relatively safe way of putting myself out there, but I had put off making up any business cards because I'm...lazy!  So an opportunity to make a new acquaintance slipped through my fingers.

I went home, put my stuff away and then got on the computer. I hadn't been up there in a couple of days, so I had email galore.  And wouldn't you know it: there was an email from Staples, with a coupon for 100 free business cards.  Seriously???  If I had opened my email a couple of days ago, I would have HAD a business card to give to Mr. Hottie!  Well that just proves that timing is everything.

So after work today guess where I'm heading?  That's right: to Staples!  Maybe it's God's way of saying "I'm giving you a second chance and I'll put Mr. Hottie in your periphery again".  Well, that's what I hope God is saying.  Stay tuned!!

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Give Me a Beat!

Kitty, my creative, mysterious child, has developed a new interest.  For the past few months, she has been making "videos" and posting them on YouTube.  Of course these videos don't feature her: they feature her Living Dead Dolls!

When she first said she was going to make a video, I was wondering how she was going to do it.  I don't know how to make videos using inanimate objects.  But I never should have doubted the industrious Kitty, who unbeknownst to me had been studying making videos in her program.  Why am I always the last to know these things? 

Anyway, when Kitty makes announcements of what she's going to do, I say "Okay" and wait to see what happens; or if it happens.  So one Saturday morning while I was getting my hair done, Kitty called and said, "Guess what?  My video's finished."  I said, "What??"  and she said, "Yep, I got up at midnight and worked on it from midnight until 4 this morning to finish it.  You can see it when you get home."

So of course instead of running my errands after my hair appointment, I had to hurry home to see exactly what this video consisted of.  Kitty had her computer downstairs and I eagerly pulled up a chair and she started it for me.

It was entitled "Slumber Party Massacre".  It featured not only some Living Dead Dolls, but also some Sailor Moon dolls as well!  She had sound effects, music, and used different photos she had taken.  It was a hoot!  I felt sorry for the Sailor Moon dolls because they met with various...untimely ends, but it was really cute and creative.  Go Kitty!  I loved it :o)  And she was so proud of herself.

But when her sister watched it, she thought it was scary.  Or maybe she just thought it was scary that Kitty had her dolls roaming around the house after everyone had gone to bed!  Brie's a little freaked out by the dolls, but I'm pretty sure that they wouldn't do any harm to her.  :p  But she did admit that her sister had talent.

Kitty is now up to...7 videos I believe.  And 4 are actual music videos!  My favorite is her take on Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love", featuring Lou Sapphire.  I'm a big fan of his, haha!  So cute.  She also did one for Bon Jovi's "You Give Love a Bad Name"; Toni Basil's "Hey Mickey" and her latest one is "Nasty" by Janet Jackson.  I love them all!  It takes a long time to do them, because she has to take loads of pictures as she moves the dolls in unison and in synch, times the photos with the music and produces a finished product. 

So I can't wait to see what else she comes up with.  My goal is to somehow get Ellen DeGeneres to see them, then have Kitty on her show.  That would be awesome, and Kitty could finally get the trip to California that she wants.

So stay tuned!  And check out the videos on YouTube: kaiennasunshine5000.  I guarantee you'll be amazed :o)