Category Archives: Family

Family

Caught Un(der)aware

I love my kids.  I think they are each talented and bright.  But sometimes they do things that make me wonder if I am either a terrible parent who is twisting their little minds, or if they are just goofy.  I am often faced with situations I just don’t know what to do with.  Some serious, some humorous, all baffling just the same.  Things not found in books, never mentioned in anecdotes from family and friends. Subjects not covered in any of the 117 Brady Bunch episodes, and I’ve seen them all.  Time doesn’t seem to make it any easier, and I have no more answers with children two and three than I did with the first.

Everyday is trailblazing uncharted territory. 

Let me illustrate.  

Shortly before my daughter started kindergarten, I bought her some new underwear.  She has the cutest, roundest little tush, but her behind kept outgrowing her panties.  This time I bought them a size larger, hoping after allowing for shrinkage she would not outgrow them so quickly.  I guess I overestimated, because they were too big.   They bagged a little right where it counts, and were a bit loose around the legs.  Consequently, they tended to ride up and get stuck in the, uh, well, crack.  There’s no genteel way of saying it.  

Here’s where the story strays outside the lines.  She liked it.  She liked her panties all bunched up in her, um, well, between her buttocks.  So much so that if they slipped out, she would reach back and cram them back in.  This got to be quite embarrassing, at least for me.  If she was wearing leggings you could see this big bunch emerging from the top of her, uh, crevice.  And then there was the constant readjusting.  I explained to her that most people are concerned with keeping their panties out of that place.  However, after prompting, reasoning, and finally demanding got no results, I gave up.  It had gotten to the point where she would walk in backward circles around me to keep me from seeing her bum.  If I came into her room while she was changing, she would get this terrified, guilty look on her face and quickly sit down or cover her bottom.  

Geez, I wasn’t trying to traumatize the kid.  If she wanted a continual wedgie, it certainly wasn’t worth this much anxiety.  She could wear her panties any way she liked, but I let her know it would be nice if she would refrain from repacking in public.  

Then about two weeks into the new school year, I got a call from the kindergarten teacher. 

“I’m concerned about Julia.  I am wondering if she has some sort of medical condition.  She scratches her bottom a lot.” 

Oh, dear. 

“Uh, well let me explain,” I began.  “Actually, she’s not scratching.  I bought her some panties that were too large and rode up on her, and she decided she likes it that way.  So now whenever they start to slip out, she pushes them back in.” 

“Oh, uh, I, um, well, I see,” her teacher stumbled.  “Well, as long as there is no physical problem.” 

No, no.  No physical problem.  “Gosh, Miss Kindergarten Teacher, my five year old daughter is just jamming her panties up her divide.  Thanks for calling!”  Sheesh, write that one down in the book of Life’s Awkward Explanations.  

I told my psychiatrist uncle about Julia’s little obsession and the subsequent conversation with her teacher.  Perhaps he had some suggestions about how I could discourage this behavior, or could tell me if this was even worth worrying about.  He laughed so hard I thought he was going to turn blue.  “Get her some kindergarten thongs,” he gasped out between guffaws. 

Thankfully, Julia soon figured out for herself that people take note when you are constantly touching your butt.  She went back to normal panty wear on her own.  But you see what I mean, don’t you?  Oh, I was ready for booger eating.  I have no problem at all with decapitated Barbies, and I was pretty calm about impromptu safety scissor haircuts.  It’s the things they come up with that you’ve never heard of before that really make you doubt your gene pool.  

This was a lighthearted example, but I never realized before I had children that there would be so much uncertainty.  I didn’t realize there would be so many times when I just didn’t know if I was doing the right thing for my child, or not doing something I should be doing.  Maybe I yelled too much and this behavior was some outward exhibit of a ravaged psyche.  Maybe we didn’t spend enough one on one time, and this was a desperate cry for attention.  Maybe she’s just a goofy kid like a hundred other goofy kids.  But in the end (no pun intended), all I can do is whatever I think best, and do it with love.  I guess this and other interesting episodes are just part of the grand adventure of parenting.


Still Going Back to School

At 42 years of age, I am long out of elementary school.  But with just a thought I can call up the butterflies launched into flight each year in recognition of the first day of school.  I grew up here in Walnut Creek, and Walnut Acres was my school.  The weeks before school was to begin, the excitement began to build.  My mother would take my sister and me shopping for new clothes.  We would get five or six new dresses (girls were not allowed to wear pants to school).    We each got a new package of pretty colored underwear and a new pack of white undershirts with little bows sewed onto the bodice.   My mother would take me to the Junior Bootery, the only store that carried wide width shoes for my chubby little feet, and I would get one pair of school shoes to last the whole year.

Class assignments were mailed in August, and every day I would ask if mine had come yet.  There was some anxiety associated with this, anticipating the unknown.  I can still remember every teacher, from Mrs. Anderson in kindergarten to Mrs. Templeton in 6th grade.  Back in those days elementary school was K through 6.  As soon as I knew what teacher I was assigned, I would call my friend Christy to see who she had.  My mother would check with Mrs. Seamount across the street to see which class her son Brian was in.  The last week of the summer, we would go to the school to find my new classroom.  Then my mother would take me back to the entrance of the school, and have me find the classroom again on my own.  I would try to peak in the windows, and gaze at the door.  What would it be like?  Would I have any friends in my class?  Was the teacher nice?

The day before the big event, I would pick out my first day outfit.  Everything would be laid out, waiting.  I had a new book bag, paper, pencils, and erasers all ready to go.  And of course, a special new lunch box.  One year I had a Monkees lunchbox.  Another year, we bought a plain brown vinyl lunch pail with a zippered closure, and my mother put violet appliqués all over it.  It was beautiful.  Fresh from the bath, my damp hair neatly braided, I got to select a new pair of undies, and put on one of my new white undershirts to wear to bed.  It would still be hot in September and we didn’t have air conditioning, so the window was open.  I could hear the crickets.  It wouldn’t be quite dark yet, and Mommy would let us color in bed for a few minutes.  But I could never focus on my coloring book.  My heart would beat a little faster than normal, and I would feel funny in my tummy.  Surely I could never sleep. 

And here I am, years later, graying hair and all, still just as excited.  Only this time, it is my children who are going to school.   The routine has changed some since I was a child.  My children get many new outfits.  They get new shoes, but I do not expect them to last the whole school year.  Girls and boys can both wear shorts to school.  Book bags have been replaced with backpacks.  But still, it is a thrill to pick just the right backpack.  Should it be Hello Kitty or Barbie?  Ninja Turtles or Scooby Doo?  And of course a new lunchbox, in the same theme.

First day outfits are still carefully selected and laid out for the next day.  Flowered undies, Scooby Doo briefs, are tugged out of plastic packages.  Each child has a big bag of school supplies, as requested on the list from the school.  Clean and smelling of baby shampoo, they climb into bed.  A book or a video is allowed for just a little bit, because it is so hard to go to sleep this night!

The morning of the first day of school is the only day of the year I don’t have to take a steam shovel to get my daughter out of bed.  She is up before I am, gets dressed without a single nag, and is waiting at the door for me.  The rest of the year we barely make it to school on time, even though we live just down the street, but this one day she is ready to go and we are early.   I pull all three kids out to the front porch, and take our traditional “First Day of School” picture.  Happy scrubbed faces, new outfits and shoes, still stiff backpacks and unscuffed lunchboxes.  They are precious.

And I am excited.  Excited to meet the new teachers, to see what kids are in their classes, to learn what field trips there will be and see the new books.  Excited because my children are excited.  Because I get to be part of these days they will remember for the rest of their lives.  It is a privilege.  And each year, as I escort my little ones to their first day, I think “How lucky I am!”  This is the stuff life is made of.

Catharsis

My husband and I are going to buy a minivan.  This is big.  Not the car itself, the fact that we are getting one.  OK, the van is big, too, but that is not the issue.  Who drives minivans?  Moms.  Mothers.  Hausfraus.  Ladies who have willingly subjugated their lives and bodies to their offspring.  As have I, but the minivan is the last symbol of wifery and mommyism for me to adopt.  I have held out as long as I could.  At one point in my life I swore I would never drive a minivan, but now, I must confess, I can hardly wait. 

It is so much easier to get three kids into and out of a minivan than it is a sedan.  I can seat them far enough apart so that little arms cannot reach across and grab a Happy Meal toy out of a sibling’s hand, or poke any available body part.  There is no problem fitting one car seat and two booster seats, and it is easy to buckle all three.  No squeezing my hand between child seats searching for the seat belt latch.  No struggling to lift a little body past the booster seat to the car seat in the middle.  Absolutely no possibility of the oldest child having to ride in the front seat because three child seats do not fit across the back.  Plenty of space, plenty of drink holders for everyone.

And why should I ever have objected?  After all, being a stay at home mom is what I always wanted, and I waited a long time to get here.  I love toting them to soccer, ice skating, and birthday parties.  I embrace my life as a mom.  I just don’t embrace looking like all the moms looked when I was a little kid.  You know, warm and loving, but kind of, well, sort of like yesterday’s lettuce; post-peak, you might say.  A little thick around the middle, just past the glow of youth.  That is exactly what I look like, but somehow the minivan has come to symbolize all this for me.  So I held out.  I put up with a too-small deteriorating old sedan for too long because it was not a minivan.  I couldn’t afford anything else, either, but that is beside the point.  I repeatedly insisted that when I had the money for a new car, I was going to buy a bigger, nicer sedan, not a minivan.  Any nerdy family car was OK as long as it was not a van. 

Of course logic tells me that although there may be a correlation between minivans and encroaching middle age, that does not indicate causality.  But logic is not involved here; this is emotional.  So let’s cut to the chase.  I am on the cusp of middle age.  Some would say I am already there.  I have born three children, and I look it.  No matter how hard I work out, I am never going to be the same woman who could wear allover Lycra and look good.  So if the minivan is some sort of personal rite of passage, bring it on.  I am ready to let go of all previous prejudices, and just be who I am.  Actually, I kind of like who I am.  And that person needs a new car that can handle a family of five. 

And let me tell ya, there are reasons why these lumbering boxcars are so popular, and it ain’t their good looks or great mileage.  It’s convenience, baby.  And when kids are around, that’s what it is all about.  That, and safety.  So I am going to get the whole shmeer.   Leather seats, 6 disc CD changer, subwoofer under the driver’s seat (I have no idea what this does except it has something to do with good sound), air deflector on the hood to keep road damage down, fenderwell trim to do the same, auto doors and power seat adjustments.  I am going to be a minivan mama.  Woooo hooo!  I have arrived!

Back to School

At 42 years of age, I am long out of elementary school.  But with just a thought I can call up the butterflies launched into flight each year in recognition of the first day of school.  I grew up here in Walnut Creek, and Walnut Acres was my school.  The weeks before school was to begin, the excitement began to build.  My mother would take my sister and me shopping for new clothes.  We would get five or six new dresses (girls were not allowed to wear pants to school).    We each got a new package of pretty colored underwear and a new pack of white undershirts with little bows sewed onto the bodice.   My mother would take me to the Junior Bootery, the only store that carried wide width shoes for my chubby little feet, and I would get one pair of school shoes to last the whole year. 

Class assignments were mailed in August, and every day I would ask if mine had come yet.  There was some anxiety associated with this, anticipating the unknown.  I can still remember every teacher, from Mrs. Anderson in kindergarten to Mrs. Templeton in 6th grade.  Back in those days elementary school was K through 6.  As soon as I knew what teacher I was assigned, I would call my friend Christy to see who she had.  My mother would check with Mrs. Seamount across the street to see which class her son Brian was in.  The last week of the summer, we would go to the school to find my new classroom.  Then my mother would take me back to the entrance of the school, and have me find the classroom again on my own.  I would try to peak in the windows, and gaze at the door.  What would it be like?  Would I have any friends in my class?  Was the teacher nice? 

The day before the big event, I would pick out my first day outfit.  Everything would be laid out, waiting.  I had a new book bag, paper, pencils, and erasers all ready to go.  And of course, a special new lunch box.  One year I had a Monkees lunchbox.  Another year, we bought a plain brown vinyl lunch pail with a zippered closure, and my mother put violet appliqués all over it.  It was beautiful.  Fresh from the bath, my damp hair neatly braided, I got to select a new pair of undies, and put on one of my new white undershirts to wear to bed.  It would still be hot in September and we didn’t have air conditioning, so the window was open.  I could hear the crickets.  It wouldn’t be quite dark yet, and Mommy would let us color in bed for a few minutes.  But I could never focus on my coloring book.  My heart would beat a little faster than normal, and I would feel funny in my tummy.  Surely I could never sleep.  

And here I am, years later, graying hair and all, still just as excited.  Only this time, it is my children who are going to school.   The routine has changed some since I was a child.  My children get many new outfits.  They get new shoes, but I do not expect them to last the whole school year.  Girls and boys can both wear shorts to school.  Book bags have been replaced with backpacks.  But still, it is a thrill to pick just the right backpack.  Should it be Hello Kitty or Barbie?  Ninja Turtles or Scooby Doo?  And of course a new lunchbox, in the same theme. 

First day outfits are still carefully selected and laid out for the next day.  Flowered undies, Scooby Doo briefs, are tugged out of plastic packages.  Each child has a big bag of school supplies, as requested on the list from the school.  Clean and smelling of baby shampoo, they climb into bed.  A book or a video is allowed for just a little bit, because it is so hard to go to sleep this night! 

The morning of the first day of school is the only day of the year I don’t have to take a steam shovel to get my daughter out of bed.  She is up before I am, gets dressed without a single nag, and is waiting at the door for me.  The rest of the year we barely make it to school on time, even though we live just down the street, but this one day she is ready to go and we are early.   I pull all three kids out to the front porch, and take our traditional “First Day of School” picture.  Happy scrubbed faces, new outfits and shoes, still stiff backpacks and unscuffed lunchboxes.  They are precious. 

And I am excited.  Excited to meet the new teachers, to see what kids are in their classes, to learn what field trips there will be and see the new books.  Excited because my children are excited.  Because I get to be part of these days they will remember for the rest of their lives.  It is a privilege.  

And each year, as I escort my little ones to their first day, I think “How lucky I am!”  This is the stuff life is made of.

The Fair

Every now and then the crust of everyday life withdraws and you are left momentarily with the fundamental core of motherhood.  You never know when you are going to have one of those moments, because it is not necessarily when something of great magnitude is happening.  You may be changing a diaper, watching your children play in the backyard, helping with homework, doing or hearing something you have done or heard before.

I had one of those moments today at the county fair.   My almost-five-year-old son was on an airplane kiddy ride. About 8 miniature red baron type airplanes on long arms extended from a central pole.  As the pole turned and the airplanes went around in a circle, the long arms slowly raised and lowered the planes.  I watched my little boy run up to a grounded plane and climb inside.  He looked uncertain as the ride started, then slowly grinned.

This son of mine, of my three children, is the one most likely to drive me to drink.  This is the one who pushes every button his temperamental 8 year old sister has, just to see the show.   He is the child who tries to climb the display of Pepsi 12-packs at the grocery store, and hides from me behind massive packages of paper towels at Target.  He has more than once deliberately dumped an entire bottle of shampoo in the bathtub to make bubbles.   He will scream and throw himself on the floor, wrapping his arms around my feet in an effort to prevent me from moving until he gets his way.   His water glass empties, and his dinner plate becomes an ocean for an armada of lettuce leaves around a mashed potato island.  He has locked me out of the house, laughing as I ordered him to open the door, and said things I cringe to repeat.  Oh, I could go on and on.

But he is also the child most likely to spontaneously hug you and tell you he loves you.  He can be happily playing with toys, will look up for a moment, “I love you, Mommy”, and go right back to his play.  He even hugs his siblings and tells them he loves them, when he is not torturing them.  He is the child who thinks to thank me for small pleasures, like making more lemonade or washing his favorite shirt.  If he and his two year old brother get a Happy Meal for lunch, he asks for one for his sister, too, even though she eats lunch at school.  He remembers to console family members who have suffered a loss. He asks more questions about life, love, God, death, and heaven.  He is the child who told his Daddy that he would never forget him, not even when Daddy got old and died.  He is my middle child.

And as I watched this exacerbating, wonderful, contradictory little boy of mine fly up and down, I felt a tidal wave of love.  I stood in the hot relentless sun, squinting up at my airborne boy, treasuring his joy.  The noise from the midway slowly receded. Time stood still.  I stared at him as he flew, and concentrated hard to commit this exact moment to memory.  His grin, his dimple, how the breeze from the flying plane moved his hair, his wave each time he passed the spot where I was standing.   I will remember this as long as my mind is my mind.

When such special moments occur, I think of a passage from the Gospel of Luke.  Unlike Mary, Mother of God, I was born with a large helping of original sin and my son is no Messiah, he’s just an ordinary boy.  But Mary was a mother who loved her son, too.  And I remember that Mary, watching her child, “kept all these things in her heart.”   Of course the situations are far different, but somehow the words seem to fit.  Everything else slips away,  I am left with something intense and basic that I somehow must preserve, and I keep these things in my heart.

Middle Child

There was a fully hosted bar.  The wedding guest rested one foot on the railing of the bar, caught the bartender’s eye, and motioned to his empty glass.  “Hit me again”, his silent gaze seemed to say. 

“Don’t you think you’ve had enough, son?” the bartender said quietly. 

The guest looked at the bartender with sad hazel eyes.  “Please”, he said with a catch in his voice. 

The bartender took pity, and filled the glass with a dark liquid, adding a squirt of something red.  My five year old son Jackson said “Thank you”, and walked off with his fifth cherry coke.  

My cousin walked past me, laughing.  “Jackson sure looks at home at that bar.  That kid cracks me up!” 

Sigh.  I worry about that boy. 

Dear Jackie, what am I going to do with him?  He tries to climb the stacks of Pepsi 12 packs at the grocery store, and hides on the shelf behind huge packages of paper towels at Target, ignoring my frantic calls.  He delights in torturing his older sister, who is so sensitive.  He knows every button she has, and pushes them at will.  He has repeatedly dumped out entire bottles of shampoo in the bathtub to make bubbles or wash his Rescue Heroes.  Tonight he deliberately threw rice in my water glass at the dinner table, laughing until he saw my look, then saying belatedly, “Oops.  That was an accident.”  At five years old he still throws tantrums, wrapping his arms around my legs in an attempt to hold me hostage until I agree to his demands.  No punishment, no incentive seems to reach him. 

Yet this same child, who is most likely of my three to drive me back to the bar for a refill, is also the most likely to spontaneously hug you and tell you he loves you. He can be happily playing with toys, will look up for a moment to say “I love you, Mommy”, and go right back to his play.  He even tells his sister he loves her, between button pushings.  He remembers to thank me for the small things, like making more lemonade, or washing his favorite shirt. 

This contradiction in Underoos asks more questions about life, love, God, death, and heaven.  After nighttime prayers with his Daddy, he told my husband, “I love you, Daddy.  Even when you get old and die, I’ll never forget you.” 

One night his sister Julia asked at the dinner table “What does steak come from again?  I forget.”  I opened my mouth to say “cows”, when Jackson piped up and said,

 “It comes from God, Julia.  God made everything.  He loves us, so he gives us food to eat.” 

My sister wonders at his range.  How can one child be so blatantly disobedient yet so loving and sensitive? 

When Jackson was born, our pediatrician, with whom we have a wonderful relationship, was busy giving birth to twins.  When she returned to her practice and met Jackson for the first time, she held him in her arms and looked intently into his eyes.  “Julia will always be our angel”, she said, “but this one…there’s something special about this one.” 

Yes, his spirit is larger than life.  What will become of this child of mine?  Will he be president or criminal (or worse, both)?  Watching him terrorize the household, my uncle once laughingly commented, “Better put bars on his windows now, so he can get used to them!” 

Recently we started giving Jackson an allowance for completing simple chores, and thus discovered his avarice.  Well, maybe we could use this to both our advantage.  After misbehaving dreadfully on allowance day in spite of several warnings, my husband sentenced Jackson to surrendering one of the two dollars he had received.  He was very proud of his allowance.  This will hit him where he lives, we thought.  He was upset for a moment, but then calmly took his remaining dollar, made copies on the copy machine, colored them green, and cut them out with safety scissors.

 “Now I have lots of money!”  he said gleefully.  “Do you want another one, Daddy?” 

Oh my.  Our son the generous counterfeiter.   We are so proud.