The Cool-ish Mom

Growing up, I was what could be considered "cool."  Well, "cool" in that somewhat nerdy, loves-to-read-and-stay-out-of-trouble way.

Then I had kids and they made it their job to remind me - at every opportunity - of precisely how UNcool I've become.  They don't believe me when I say that wearing sensible shoes and getting enough sleep ARE cool, but one of these days, they'll come around.  No way can you look hip if you're sporting bunions and dark circles all the time.

A few weeks back, while believing that I had sufficient coolness to recognize what was currently hip and trendy, I ordered Evan a winter coat.  This was incredibly brave of me, considering he's a teenager with very specific ideas of what constitutes "hip" and "cool."  Still, the coat was an amazing deal on Amazon, and it had been really cold outside.  For the few misguided moments it took to purchase the coat, I truly believed that Evan would like it.  After all, I made sure it did not have any of the characteristics of coats he'd complained about in the past (too puffy, too heavy, too long, etc.) 

My next mistake was sharing my excitement about the coat with Evan. 

            "Hey, Evan, guess what I ordered for you today?"

            "What?" he asked suspiciously, certain that it couldn't possibly be anything good.

            "I ordered you a hip new coat!"

A look of terror came over Evan's face.  "Hip?  Mom, I don't mean to be rude or anything, but your idea of "hip" and my idea of "hip" are very different."

            "I know, I know," I said, "but you're going to love this one.  It really is hip and stylish.  In fact, I bet there are a lot of really cool kids at your school wearing this same coat right now."

Evan was dubious, but agreed to give the coat a fair chance once it arrived.

A few days later, he surprised me by asking when the coat would be delivered.  Aha, I thought; he IS excited about it.  I felt even more certain that I'd chosen a winner.  He would love this coat and I would forever be known as The Cool Mom, the one who understands her teen, the one who actually finds clothes he's excited to wear.

When UPS delivered Evan's coat, I was so excited.  Evan was at school, but I opened the box to make sure the coat was still as hip and cool as I remembered it being when I ordered it.  It was!  The color, the style - all perfect.  I just knew Evan was going to love it.  I put it near his seat at the kitchen table so it would be the first thing he saw when he came home from school.

Those of you with teenagers can probably guess what happened next.  Evan did not love the coat.  In fact, he didn't even pretend to like it.

            "You don't like it, do you?" I asked after seeing the visible disappointment on his face.

            "I'm sorry, Mom, but I would never wear this."

            "But I thought it was hip. I thought I'd gotten it right this time."

            "Actually, it IS hip.  It's just not for me."  Evan tried to break my heart gently.

            "Can you at least try to like it?"

            "MOM!"

            "OK, OK, I'll send it back."

The only thing that gave me any satisfaction was Evan admitting the coat WAS hip.  Oh, and a second thing:  writing on the return form to Amazon that my kid has no taste.

(dedicated to the memory of my friend, Lynn Borders Caldwell, who was cool without even trying.)

A Call to Life

(image from www.animalabusersspotlight.com)

Like many of us in this area, I'm trying to make sense, if that's even possible, of the brutal murders this week of an entire family. I'm trying to understand what would motivate someone described as "a nice guy who would do anything for you" to kill the mother of his children, her mother, her grandmother, her sister, her brother-in-law, their fourteen-year-old daughter, and leave their seventeen-year-old son critically wounded and fighting for his life.

 

As a further thumb of his nose to his family and our community, this deranged killer took his own life in a peaceful wooded setting that clearly didn't deserve to be blighted with his darkness.  If this was to be his chosen end, couldn't he have just killed himself first and avoided all of those other horrific steps?

I keep thinking about the victims and how they probably went to bed Sunday night like the rest of us, taking for granted that life would continue on the next day as it always has.  The adults may have been thinking about what they'd have to do the next day at work or what still needed to be done in preparation for the Christmas holiday.  They might have left dishes in the sink and grocery lists on the fridge.  The kids were probably thinking about upcoming finals at school and getting together with friends over the winter break.  Did they ever suspect that there'd be no next day, no Christmas, no winter break?

No future?

With one man's sick and twisted decision, an entire family is eliminated.  Just like that, three children are orphaned.  Just like that, life stops.

 

My youngest son attended kindergarten with fourteen-year-old Nina Flick.  Her smiling face and ponytails live on forever in their class photo on my bookcase, so full of promise and innocence, unaware of the horrors that would eventually befall her family.

If there is any wisdom to glean from this tragedy, perhaps it's to serve as a reminder to the rest of us of how quickly life can change.  In one maniacal moment, all that we know and love can be snuffed out.  When you think about it that way, what's really important in our lives rises to the top of our consciousness and lesser things fall away.

 

These days, I hold my own kids tighter, getting in one last squeeze before they pull away from me to go to bed or leave for school.  I'm so very grateful that they are here with me and safe, their lives a brilliant promise ahead of them.

 

Perhaps by simply living our lives, and doing our best to love those around us, we can most appropriately honor those who were taken from us too soon.

I encourage all of us to begin.

**For those interested in helping, a fund has been established by Univest, WordFM, and the Rotary Club to benefit the surviving Stone and Flick childre. You can go to WordFM.org to make a donation or send checks payable to Univest Foundation with “Stone & Flick Children Fund” written in the memo line. If individuals wish to direct donations to a specific child, they can include their name in the memo line. Checks should be mailed to Univest Foundation, 14 North Main Street, P.O. Box 559, Souderton, PA 18964.  

The Truth Comes Out

(image from mentalfloss.com)

A few nights ago, the kids and I were in the living room after dinner.  It was a rare night when the oldest two were home, and all three of them were talking and teasing each other.  I was engrossed in the book I was reading until their banter suddenly caught my attention.

            “Well, at least I didn’t give you toilet water to drink when you were sick, Matt!”  This protest from my youngest son toward his older brother was the first time I’d heard such a thing.  I mean, sure, we discuss toilet water like every other normal family, but it’s usually in the context of “the cat is drinking it,” or “it’s overflowing all over the place.”

            “Wait…toilet water? Matt, you gave your brother toilet water to drink?”

            “Evan, aren’t you ever gonna forget that?  I was EIGHT!”

            “So you did give your brother toilet water to drink.  Matt, how could you?”

Evan, happy to now have an audience, proceeded to tell the story of how he asked Matt for a drink of water while he was sick on the couch and Matt gave him toilet water instead.

            “How did you know it was toilet water?”  I asked Evan, hoping that this story was just one big exaggeration.  I mean, my kids get along great, don’t they?  They’re decent and respectful to one another when I'm not around, right?

Evan was more than happy to shatter my cozy image of sibling harmony.  “I knew it was toilet water because it was warm.  Also, because Matt told me it was after I drank it.”

Matt, knowing he was snagged, simply had to report on a misdeed of Evan's. “Well, at least I didn’t lock you in your room all the time like you used to do to me.” 

I did know about this particular infraction.  Our house is old, and the door to Matt’s bedroom has a skeleton-key lock on the outside of the door rather than on the inside.  Whenever Evan and Matt would play together in Matt’s room and have a disagreement, Evan would storm out, slam Matt’s door, and then lock it from the outside.  Matt would be trapped in his room, pounding on the door and yelling, until someone freed him. 

Evan, anxious to return the attention to his own mistreatment, said, “That’s nothing like giving someone toilet water to drink.  Toilet. Water.  When they’re SICK.”  Evan was clearly going for maximum sympathy.

            “It’s not like I peed in it first or anything.  Geez, Evan!”

That’s true.  If Matt wanted to be truly evil and malicious, he could have peed in the toilet first.  I briefly wondered why Matt hadn't thought of that because if he had, he surely would have upped the gross-out factor.

They continued to tell tales of sibling pranks on one another, each trying to secure the title of Most Tormented Brother.  Apparently, they only behave like civil human beings when I'm around.

At least something good came from these confessions:  I now know to not ever ask any of them for a drink of water when I'm sick. 

Achievement for the Old and Overwhelmed

(image from thebumpyride.blogspot.com)

Recently, my son and I were talking about the idea of achievement and how this varies at different points in your life.  Obviously, as kids grow, their achievements are many:  walking, talking, potty-training, starting school, earning their drivers' license, graduation, etc.

 

This made me realize it's been a while since I've achieved anything significant (assuming not strangling that guy making sales calls on his cell phone in the middle of the restaurant where we celebrated my birthday doesn't count as an "achievement.") 

I know, I know...I have managed to keep all of the kids alive, and I don't usually embarrass myself in public (not often, anyway,) but I'm talking about medal-worthy achievements that I can claim in my increasingly "mature" age. 

The way I see it, anyone can earn an advanced degree or survive a jump out of an airplane, but you need the perfect combination of age and apathy to master these feats:

1)  I can ignore laundry piles like a BOSS.  My laundry pile is so high that we have to place caution tape around the clothes hamper.  If the pile were to fall over on a child, we'd likely never find him again.  While I do manage to wash the items on the top of the pile once in a while, I'm certain there are items of clothing on the very bottom that haven't been seen since the Bush administration.

2)  I can carry five plastic grocery bags at one time and still manage to unlock the door.  This is a true feat of dexterity and fortitude. Placing the bags on various fingers according to weight is a skill that is learned over years of dropping said bags in the middle of the driveway. Having to fish cans out from under the minivan is always a good time.  And then there's the matter of pinched off circulation.  If your fingers don't cramp up or fall off by the time you reach the door, it is a good day indeed.

3)  I can gain weight so easily that Sumo wrestlers are jealous of me.  I am so good at this that I don't even have to actually eat any food to do it.  My body has apparently found a way of  extracting calories right out of thin air.  Talk about a talent!  As soon as I increase my exercise to combat the weight gain, my body immediately assumes I'm lost in the woods and works even harder to conserve body fat.  As soon as the current thin craze is no longer popular, everyone is going to be begging to know how I do it.

4)  I can routinely miss huge areas of hair on my legs while shaving in the shower.  This one is probably less of a talent and more of a side effect of poor eyesight.  I can't understand why someone hasn't invented glasses that you can wear in the shower.  They should put tiny windshield wipers on them, too.  Then I could actually see to shave.  Until that happens, I double-dog-dare you to find someone with more patches of overlooked leg hair than me. 

I'm still perfecting my ability to scold a child without saying a word, as well as trying to break my current record of keeping houseplants alive without any water.  

Not to brag or anything, but I guess you could say I'm a bit of an overachiever.  I'm always looking for ways to improve myself!

Diving in the Deep End

(I think he shows a healthy amount of trepidation, don't you?)

My youngest son, Evan, started high school this week.  He wasn't looking forward to it.  I understood his apprehension as there's much to be anxious about.  He's coming from a school with 200 kids and going to one that has over 2000.  He'll be changing classes, obeying bells, and dealing with lockers for the first time ever.  Plus, the school is huge.  Schools this size eat smaller ones like his old school for lunch.  Speaking of lunch, he didn't even know how to use a cafeteria as he's never had to navigate one before.

I did my best to prepare him in whatever ways I could.  We studied a map of the school and plotted out routes to his locker and all of his classes.  I showed him where the bus would be parked so he could find it at the end of the day.  I reminded him to ask a teacher if he gets lost or needs help.  I assured him that everyone feels nervous when they start high school but it will get better after a few weeks. 

I don't think he quite believed me. 

During the summer, I enrolled Evan in swimming lessons. He'd never learned to swim, and since he'd need to know how for gym class, lessons seemed like a good idea.

  

Over the span of a week, his instructor guided him through a predictable sequence: first, kicking with a board, then swimming freestyle, then the backstroke, and then the breast stroke.  The final lesson would be diving.

Evan did not want to dive.  Every day, he worried about it and every night, he lost sleep over it.  I told him he'd easily bob back up to the surface and that it's incredibly difficult to sink all the way to the bottom.  We watched small kids diving in the twelve-foot end of the pool with ease.  None of this calmed his fear.  Each day, his instructor would ask, "Are you ready to try diving today?"  Each day, his response would be no.

Finally, at the last class, he couldn't avoid it any longer.  His instructor knew he was nervous, so she had him progress to the diving board in steps:  first, jump off the side of the pool straight into the water; next, squat and arc a bit into the water; finally, stand and arc into the water.  Evan performed all of these tasks, surprising himself with each success.

The only thing left to conquer was the diving board.  I knew that the diving board was a symbol of dozens of other little fears that Evan had allowed to consume him.  If he succeeded with this one thing in spite of his fear, it would give him the confidence to push through all kinds of other challenges in his life.

 

Evan's anxiety was visible as he reluctantly approached the diving board.  He paced in circles at the base of it, unable to move onto the actual board.  His instructor assured him he could do it.  His father and I assured him he could do it.  His instructor even agreed to walk out on the diving board next to him.  Evan wasn't having any of it.  He was frozen with fear.

As someone who understands anxiety well, I thought of things that help me move through fear.  In my experience, the quickest way out of fear purgatory is to get angry about being there in the first place.

"Evan, you've got to get angry at your fear," I shouted.  "It's keeping you a prisoner.  You've got to get mad and just do it!  Don't let your fear have control over you any longer.  Do it and get it over with!"

I'm sure this advice made him more angry at me than the diving board, but at least it convinced him to move.  As his instructor encouraged him, Evan inched out to the end of the board.  His dad and I cheered him on until finally - miraculously - probably just to shut us up - he dove in the water.  He bobbed back up to the surface with a huge grin on his face, jubilant over his success.  He took a dive in the deep end and he survived.

 

No doubt Evan's triumph over the diving board was on his mind as he started his first day of high school. 

When he arrived home, I asked him how school was and if he was able to find all of his classes.

"I nailed it," he said.  "It was much easier than diving in the deep end at the pool."

I don't think I have anything to worry about.  This kid's going to be just fine.

You're Never Too Old to Forget Something New

(Mewcifer, helping me study)

Recently, I've been studying for an exam that my employer wants me to take for my job.  Passing it is entirely optional unless I prefer to remain employed.

So I gathered my five remaining brain cells together - you know, the ones not busy keeping track of kids, pets, and car keys - and began studying.

 

Reading the information was fine, even with the subject matter being a bit on the tedious side.  Still, I put in the required number of reading hours and thought all was well.

My problems began when I attempted to actually recall what I'd read.  As I finished each chapter and took the practice quizzes at the end, it became clear exactly how much of what I'd read just wasn't sticking in my brain.

 

Funny thing - remembering stuff is pretty critical to passing an exam.

Considering I'm as old the invention of the ZIP code, my learning-stuff-to-pass-an-exam days are far behind me.  Combine that with the fact that you lose a quarter of your brain cells in childbirth*and it's easy to see why I'm struggling.  I've had three kids, so doing the math tells me there's very little left in the way of brain capacity to work with.

 

Yet here I am, trying to make the same demands on my brain that I did when I was twenty.  No wonder it laughs at me:  "You want me to juggle your life AND learn something new?  At the same time?  NOT GONNA HAPPEN." 

This is the same insolent brain that allows me to walk into a room without actually clueing me in as to  why I felt compelled to walk in there in the first place.  My mind can be a real jerk at times.

To have any hope of passing this exam, I knew I needed some new strategies - ones that don't rely on memorization.

I decided to increase the number of hours I sleep each night.  I figure it can't hurt, and maybe my brain will be a little more accommodating if it's not always sleep-deprived.

 

Next, I'm trying to read more carefully.  In this age of information overload, it's easy to fall into the habit of skimming content instead of reading it.  It's kind of like how you listen to every word your spouse says for the first five years of marriage, and then after that, you're lucky if you catch the fourth or fifth sentence.

My youngest son suggested that I highlight the critical words in each question (such as "is NOT correct," "is true EXCEPT") so that I don't miss them.  Looking over my incorrect answers on the quizzes revealed that skipping over those words is indeed something I've been doing.

What really seems to be making a difference is that I've also begun relating each concept I'm studying to something I already know.  I didn't make it this far in life without experiencing a ton of things, so why not put that hard-earned wisdom to work?

 

Can't remember the elements of a contract?  I'll just think back to that rock climbing participation agreement  I had to sign so Evan could go with his class.  Not sure I can recall how loss assessment coverage works?  Thinking about the Hurricane Sandy damage at my mom's condominium will certainly jog my memory.

 

My five brain cells and I are going to rock this thing.  We may not be twenty anymore, but we are wise, mighty, and determined.  And that's even better.

*OK, I totally made up that childbirth thing, but it sure feels that way!

The Early Bird Catches the Teenager

(Yes, there is a kid under there.)

Recently, our family took a break from our responsibilities and headed to the shore for the day.  Having to wake up teenagers reminded me of how I'd rather do just about anything else.  Getting five people up, showered, and out the door by a certain time is no easy feat.

Actually, only four of us have trouble waking up.  My husband is a morning person, though technically he wakes up so early that it would still be considered night by the sane among us.  By the time I stumble downstairs, eager to plant my face in a hot cup of coffee, he is already well-caffeinated and ridiculously perky.   

I don't handle "perky" well on a good day, let alone first thing in the morning while I'm still trying to unglue my eyelids.  The only reason I haven't stabbed him yet is because he moves faster than I do.  One of these days, I'm going to switch all the coffee in the house to decaf so that I have a chance of catching him.

It wouldn't be so bad if he kept quiet and stayed out of my way for, say, three or four hours while I wake up.  Instead, he hits me with questions the moment I come downstairs.  Have I seen his shoes/camera/keys?  How much money is in the bank account?  Did I remind (insert child of choice here) about (insert forgotten chore here)?  I don't know why he can't just write this stuff down on a note so that I can properly ignore it until I've had a chance to wake up.

The kids, on the other hand, are not perky at all.  On the Perky/Dead continuum, they are somewhere around Comatose.  They sleep so soundly that I'm tempted to stick spoons under their noses to see if they're still breathing.  If I can manage to rouse them at all, they will lie and tell me whatever is most likely to make me go away.  Thirty minutes later, I realize that the child who promised he was getting up and in the shower is still in his bed, sound asleep.  Believe me, no one feels more homicidal than a mom who has to start the wake-up routine all over again.

While getting ready for our shore trip, I realized that I've been doing this waking-up business all wrong.  Why should I be the one to wake up the kids when Mr. Perkypants has been up and fully conscious for hours?

 

My kids think that I'm annoying when I wake them up.  Muahahaha!  They have no idea how annoying their well-rested and super-caffeinated father can be.

I can't wait to see how this goes.  It may actually be worth getting up for.