What I Learned in Summer "School"

(Sing to the tune of Camptown Races)

Eleven weeks down and one to go, doo-dah, doo-dah!

Eleven weeks down and one to go, oh-doo-dah-day!

I might sur-viiiiive, I might sur-viiiiiive!!!!

Eleven weeks down and one to go, oh-doo-dah-day!!!!

Insert sigh of relief here! The summer is almost over and I am still not an alcoholic! Or in an institution! No drug dependency! And the kids are alive! Thanks to all these declarative statements, I’m even almost ready to start believing in miracles, oh-doo-dah-day! Honestly, I think the last time I used this many exclamation points in one paragraph, I was an emotionally-charged teenage girl who was either love-struck or really, really pissed. Now the only event to trigger such excitement is the promise of school starting in a mere six days. (must…resist…the urge…to use more exclamation points…)

Summer is a time of togetherness…for better and worse. The kids have spent so much time together for so many weeks that tensions are just as high between them as they are between them and me. Just today, for example, when Liam had been awake for maybe five minutes, he slapped Declan for no apparent reason. And then Declan promptly slapped him right back. Typically, slap-fests don’t occur until late afternoon, not first thing in the morning. To compound tensions, we also just got back from a family vacation to Colorado. So, in addition to the many, many weeks of no-school togetherness we’ve been subjected to, we just survived a lot of time of non-stop togetherness, many hours of which were spent in the cramped confines of the family mini-van. I haven’t Googled it yet, but I bet, statistically, that more homicides happen annually within the family vehicle than in, say, a place like Detroit.

Summer is also a time of learning…sort of a summer school of living life. Spending all your hours with multiple kids – and, often, their friends, or in facilities with other kids you don’t know from Adam– will teach you many, many things in many, many realms. For example, this summer I learned that two-year-old Declan can maintain a mouth-fart sound for the entire duration of dinner (with no breaks for eating, of course). Now that’s stamina. But, on the positive note, I learned that it’s not just my kids who can be super-annoying. While talking to another mom in the gymnastics waiting area one day, I witnessed her kid, about five years old, punch himself in the crotch, non-stop, for the entire duration of our conversation. Sometimes the only saving grace in parenthood is knowing that you don’t suffer alone.

I learned that Band-a-Loom (aka Rainbow Loom, aka Loom Band, aka Rubber Band Bracelet Weaver Thingy, aka Bane of My Existence Comprised of Millions of Small Rubber Bands) is a horrendous invention. I’ve decided that it had to have been invented by a grandmother with extreme passive-aggressive tendencies and great animosity towards her children. No one else would be capable of causing such grief to so many parents of adolescent girls. Today alone, and this is not an exaggeration, I must have vacuumed more than 100 tiny rubber bands out of the van (in addition to a melted candy cane, a blue jay feather, and some unidentified fur, among other treasures). I hate small rubber bands. I have nothing else to add.

I learned that my tolerance-for-yuck (I don’t know how else to phrase this) is so high that, apparently, I have absolutely no standards of anything any more. Declan has been plagued by a giant plantar’s wart on his foot all summer (curse you, family-member-who-shall-remain-nameless, who plagued my children with disgusting plantar’s warts). In spite of the many treatments I’ve applied to it all summer, one day I walked into my bathroom and discovered him applying my absolute favoritest lip balm TO HIS WART (in his defense, he was trying to medicate it). I looked at the lip balm, and then at his disgusting wart, and then at the lip balm…and then I gave the lip balm a thorough wiping and threw it back in the drawer. I know, I know...I’m disgusting. However, I am pleased to say that, weeks later, there has been no transmission from his foot to my lips.

I also earned that we say a lot of absolutely ridiculous things in our house (brought to my attention one day by Grace). Taken out of context, we’d all be in a wrap-around coat. Some of the things said this summer include:

“WHOEVER IS SOAKING APPLES IN THE TEAPOT NEEDS TO KNOCK IT OFF!!!!!” (shouted by me)

“If that dragon egg hatches in the van, we’re going to have a serious problem!” (again, me)

“NADIA! Why are there cherry pits in my underwear drawer?????” (Grace)

“Elephants like penis.” (Liam, often confusing the words ‘penis’ and ‘peanuts.’)

I also learned that you just don’t take kids shopping at the thrift shop, especially when your hobby is taking their stuff to the thrift shop unbeknownst to them. One day, Grace held up a certain toy and said to me, accusingly, “Mom! I’ve been looking for this! Why did you get rid of it?” And I said, nervously, “Um, that’s not yours. It just looks like yours. You misplaced yours at the house somewhere.” And she turned it over and said, even more accusingly, “Then why does it say ‘Grace’ on it?!” I knew the gig was up. You can’t teach your kids to be honest when you lie through your teeth to them. But on the same visit, when Nadia saw her horse shirt and shouted, “Mommm!!!!! Really???????” I lied – again - and told her it wasn’t hers. Thankfully, her name wasn’t written on it anywhere so I was able to weather the suspicion. Apparently, I also learned that I shouldn’t be the one to teach the kids about honesty.

In these last few days of summer, before the start of school, I hope I learn exactly one more thing….that even when I’m convinced I’m on the precipice of crazy, I never actually fall over the edge(!!!).

An Ode to the Crazies, Part 1 of 4

For some reason, people think I drink a lot and that my kids drive me batty. Maybe it’s my oft-dejected demeanor, stemming from trying to raise responsible people with manners and bladder control, only to have it all fall apart in a public space when one of them belches enormously and laughs hysterically, while another has damp pants. Maybe it’s the hopelessness that other parents recognize, knowing that raising children and herding cats probably are probably about the same experience in frustration. Or maybe people think this about me because I always say that my kids drive me batty and that I need a drink.

Whatever the reason, I feel I need to set the record straight. Do my kids drive me batty? Fo’ shizzle. Do I love them hopelessly? You know it. Do I often think they are delightful people who, in time, will likely grow up to become productive members of society? I do; I really do. Is who am I – not just the negative wine-guzzling side, but also the positive – a direct result of being their parent? Yes, inextricably. Is this an intensely complicated and emotional job? Ummm….does a bear crap in the woods?

I have been a fan of Erma Bombeck since I was a pre-teen. She was a parent of three and I, intensely ignorant of the subject matter at the time, rolled in hysterics at her descriptions of domestic servitude and parenting. Little did I know, little did I know…. One of my favorite pieces she wrote was love letters to each of her children, explaining why they were her favorite. She wrote to the oldest, “Dear firstborn, You’ve always been my favorite because...,” and then went on to describe why. Her letter to the second-born began, “Dear Middle Child, You’ve always been my favorite because...” And then there was the letter to the youngest: “Dear Baby, You’ve always been my favorite because…” It was a wonderful set of letters and moved me, even in the days when I had no kids, was a kid, and didn’t know beans about this domestic life I navigate daily.

A few days ago, Nadia did a series of things in a short period of time that I found to be absolutely enchanting. It caused me to sit down and iterate many of the reasons that make her so delightful, which reminded me of Erma’s letters to her kids. So, to combat the image I inspire of a drunken, frazzled mother, I wanted to spend some time focusing on some of the wonderful qualities of the small people who drive me to madness. 

Here is part one of four, dedicated to my second born.

Dear Nadia,

I love you the most because you are a little girl with a big imagination. You randomly do things like build a rocket ship out of a large styrofoam cup, install a bucket seat (a Dixie cup) and a seat belt (a stretchy bracelet), and send your duck to the moon. Recently, you had Duck participating in his own ultimate sport while rolling in a hamster ball down the driveway. I love that you’ve made Duck an adventure junkie.

I love you because of the funny things you say. You recently asked for if you could do something and I said, “Probably not, Nadia.” And you said, with bright eyes and an infectious smile, “So that’s a maybe?!?!?” Sometimes, you assume the role of the Queen of “What If?” 

Nadia: “What if a hurricane and a tornado happened at the same time?”

me: “Nadia, I don’t think that’s possible.”

N: “But what if, Mama?”

me: “Even if it’s possible, I’m sure the statistical odds are so low that it’s not something you’ll ever have to worry about.”

N: “But what if it happened, and you were sitting on the toilet and only wearing one sock?”

me: (deep sigh)

I love you for your self-proclaimed “way with animals,” as you proclaimed to your brother once, as he was petting a kangaroo, “Liam! You don’t know what you’re doing! I have a way with animals, not you!!” You want a firefly as a pet. You recently spied a loose dog, which ended up in our backyard while we tried to find its home. In the hour or two we had the dog, you’d named it, fed it and worked on training it. I’ve seen you catch four butterflies at a time with one swoop of your net. You recently wrote an ode to Mr. Nut Nut, a squirrel you spied from afar, once, that you identified as your “best friend.”

I love you for your love of the natural world. You collect it in all forms and your room is a bone yard of rocks and feathers. On a first grade field trip to the zoo, you proclaimed (with lots of dramatic flair), “I FINALLY got to touch a REAL feather attached to a REAL peacock!” It was about the best day of your life (that week). One time, in your bed, I found a flamingo feather, a hawk feather, a peacock feather and some random, unidentified feathers. I have half-jokingly said, many times, if there’s another worldwide, avian-induced malady, there’s a good chance you will be identified as patient zero.

I love you because you’re full of kindness, but a firecracker when required. Recently, at a wave pool at a water park, you emerged from the pool with a two-year-old boy in a life jacket, who you had found alone in the wave pool. If someone or something needs help, it’s Nadia to the rescue; but if someone starts a fight, you won’t hesitate to fight back. You are small, but mighty.

I love you for the snapshots of childhood you burn in my memory. The other night you ran by at warp speed, shouting, “Flying toads!” You are startlingly fast. Your white hair floats around you like iridescence as you streak by.

I love you for your joy – that which fills you, and that which you spread to others.

Summertime Blues, part 2

Clearly, I am doing something wrong. I mean, with this whole parenting thing. I think that I am having more trouble with all of it than everyone else or, at the very least, that everyone else is much better at hiding their exasperations. My standard greeting lately has morphed from “Hello!” to the ominous, “I’m not gonna make it,” coupled with sad, puppy-dog eyes. People who know me think I am being humorous, but I keep telling people that what appears to them to be humor is genuinely a cry for help. Now, at least, I will have it in writing that I have been a woman crying out for help for nearly a decade now and that no one took me seriously. My despair, however, has yielded one major positive: I have a title for my autobiography. A couple weeks ago, in a fit of frustration, I shouted to no one in particular, “Welcome to Crazy Town!!! Population: me!” Now that’s a title that’s going to move some copies!

Now that we are already in the second week of summer “vacation,” my peanut butter intake has skyrocketed. For lunch, I just used a knife and went directly from one jar to the other, delivering, alternately, peanut butter and raspberry jam, straight to my mouth. This is obviously problematic for two reasons: it’s bathing suit season, AGAIN (expletive, expletive, expletive), and Mike has serious issues with jam ending up in the peanut butter jar. I tell him that there’s no time for a second knife when I am on the verge of a meltdown, but I don’t think he believes me. This parenting is seriously stressful business and, sometimes, only excess peanut butter and jelly, sharing one knife, can take the edge off.

I frequently read studies about people in various professions who are most likely to suffer from PTSD. They are generally fairly obvious professions: soldiers, police, corrections officers, doctors, nurses, etc. I often wonder why no one is looking at parents. Parents of multiple kids, parents with a spouse in the military, parents of special needs kids, parents of potty-trainers, parents of teenagers…I have an unproven theory that no one is in worse shape than parents and that scientists are too afraid to publish this truth. Our population depends on people continuing to have children so the unpleasant truths about parenting remain unexplored and/or hidden, depending on your preferred type of conspiracy theory.

Another group of people to blame in the big cover-up are parents. When I was pregnant with Grace, exactly ONE friend told me an unpleasant truth, which was, ultimately, wonderful, and I have hearkened back to her wisdom multiple times over the years.  She told me that people talk about this connection they automatically feel when their baby is born. She said she didn’t feel it, that the bond wasn’t immediate. She also told me that there would be times when I’d want to throw my crying baby out the window in the middle of the night; and that was normal, too, AS LONG AS I didn’t ever act on it. No one ever said anything like that to me except for her. So, either everyone feels it and no one says it, or she and I are just equally horrible parents.

Don’t get me wrong…I love my kids and would (and do) do anything for them. I’d be lost without them…absolutely crazy. But the opposite is equally true, too. That I frequently feel lost with them and that I will go absolutely crazy because of them. It is difficult to have such strong, conflicting feelings. Which is just one more of the ways parenting slowly chips away at one’s mental well-being. Not only do I constantly marvel at how many children survive childhood (kids are accident-prone and full of pretty dumb ideas for a lot of years, and I am certainly NOT excluding myself from this group), I also marvel at how many parents survive parenthood. It is a complete mystery to me that more parents don’t end up institutionalized, at least short term, or have significantly lower life expectancies.

People tell you how much work parenting is, but the emotional roller coaster that accompanies it is probably something people can’t appropriately warn you about, anyways, it’s something that can only be experienced. Unless, of course, I am doing something wrong which, I often think, is a distinct possibility. My personal and parenting faults are many: I am obsessive, I am an over thinker, I’m a perfectionist with unreal expectations, I want to do well but am plagued with insecurities and doubt, I am chronically mentally exhausted and overwhelmed, I’ve lost almost all of my memory and I mourn my almost non-existent free time (as I type, my four-year-old is bellowing, “Mooooooommmmm….help me with this puzzle!” I am ignoring him). I never know if the list of things I am failing at stems from doing something right, or from doing something wrong.

Growing people is hard work…from the day the seed starts to germinate until the day the plant is mature and fully bloomed. And the years in between are filled with work, worry, work, worry and more work and worry. And I can’t help but wonder (and fear) if, when the kids are finally grown, there’s ever satisfaction and pride in the accomplishment, or if we are plagued by the question: did they turn out just fine because of us, or did they turn out just fine in spite of us?

The Neglected Caboose

The other day at soccer practice as I was talking to another soccer mom, she sat her 18-month-old on the sidewalk and poured a snack directly onto the sidewalk for her daughter to eat. The mom looked at me and must’ve seen some kind of surprise on my face, and she said, “What? She’s the third…you know how it is.”

Indeed, I do. A parent’s standards of safety, cleanliness and general supervision decreases exponentially with each child they have. The surprise that my face likely revealed was not that a parent was using a sidewalk as a plate, but surprise that she so brazenly did it, with no attempt to pretend-look for a snack cup that wasn’t there, and that she offered no apologies and, embracing the Nike spirit, just did it.

I mention this not as a passing-of-judgment on this parent because, as she so accurately pointed out, I do know how it is. I remember, shortly after Declan was born, stumbling on a parenting “cartoon” on Facebook. It showed a sweet baby and had the caption, “First child eats dirt. Parent calls doctor. Second child eats dirt. Parent cleans out mouth. Third child eats dirt. Parent wonders if she really needs to feed him lunch.” I shared it and added something like, “Fourth child eats dirt. Parent is not even aware child ate dirt because she gave up a couple years ago.” And that was shortly after Declan was born. In the two intervening years, supervision and general parenting standards have only gone from bad to worse.

Later children (which I will identify in our family as the caboose on the Crazy Train) are cursed – and alternately blessed – by the “neglect” that results from being born into a family with many children and exhausted parents. As my mother’s sixth child, I often joke that, by the time I was born (and after having raised my often-in-trouble siblings), my mother had pretty much given up. By the time I was a senior in high school, I had no curfew and would occasionally come home at 3 AM on a school night. My brothers and sisters were often up-in-arms about what they claimed I “got away with” and “how easy” I had it in comparison to them. In a lot of ways, I felt micromanaged because I was almost an only child, having come so many years after all the others, yet in many other ways I take some credit in raising myself, as a result of a mother who had, after the antics of a pack of siblings who grew up wild in the free-wheeling 1970s, gotten tired and given up.

I’ve had several chuckles to myself over the sidewalk-as-plate incident. While I largely view the ingestion of dirt, germs and expired food as an exercise in immunity-building, I know that’s not always a popular stance to take, especially among parents with fewer children who are still motivated by high standards. Still, it’s always encouraging to know that I am not alone in my laissez-faire ideas, and that there just might be other parents out there who don’t bother to pick the cat hair off the lollipop that falls on the long-unvacuumed rug.

I frequently feel bad for my boys, thinking they are getting the short end of the parenting stick somehow. Grace’s hair was always combed, she always had proper outerwear, and her clothes were new and clean. Nadia’s hair was almost always combed, she usually had proper outwear and her clothes, though hand-me-downs from Grace, were still in pretty good shape from all of Grace’s intellectual, gentle-on-clothes, supervised activities. Liam’s hair is frequently uncombed, he sometimes has outerwear (today, as we were fighting for him to wear a coat, I may have actually said, “Go ahead and freeze! I don’t give a rat’s patootey!”) and he has whatever clothes Grandma sends him. As for Declan, I can’t say for sure that I’ve ever combed his hair in the morning, and he frequently brings the coat to me to remind me he needs one. His clothes sometimes match but often have holes. At least he’s dressed, right?

Ah Declan…my poor, neglected caboose. Since he doesn’t know any differently, maybe he’s not even aware of his neglect. Maybe, just maybe, he will grow up easy-going and carefree after his childhood in our madhouse. Maybe he will be self-sufficient and capable. Maybe he will be a peacemaker and negotiator. Maybe there’s good to come out of the craziness and “neglect” he’s growing up with. It’s the conundrum of the caboose – the blessings and the curses.

I’ve decided my fellow soccer mom is my new hero and muse, and I keep thinking of her as a radical pioneer. Back in the day when I only had three kids, I am pretty sure I was still at least minimally concerned with “keeping up appearances.” What she did was akin to burning a bra outside a Miss America Pageant a half a century ago. I wouldn’t have dared to do what she did! What a free spirit she must be, comfortable in her own parenting skin.

Either that, or she’s just too tired to care. Her poor, neglected caboose...

The Chicken or the Egg?

It’s a classic chicken-or-the-egg scenario: Do we never want to take our children to public places because they act like animals, or do our children act like animals because we try to never take them out in public? It’s so hard to distinguish which came first.

Over the years, I have been startled at how closely children and animals are related. Kids and animals have their own distinctive, and frequently offensive, scents. Kids and animals are unpredictable…even the domesticated kinds (of both species).  Both have been known to fling their own feces. Both are frequently guilty of inappropriate, and inappropriately loud, noises. Both exhibit pack behavior and can be dangerous, especially if you stumble upon them when you are alone and vulnerable.  They have similar manners (or lack thereof), and neither belong in public places.

Take tonight, for example. Twelve days late, Mike and I worked up the courage to take the kids out to an actual restaurant to celebrate Grace’s birthday. Although we used to eat in restaurants pretty regularly – even when we had just two or three kids, we rarely do so now that we have four kids. Man-to-man defense was a much easier game to play, and we closely resemble a traveling circus pretty much every time we leave the house. We still do quite a bit for having such a large posse o’ children, but eating – even at home – is generally the least fun experience of the day. And dinner, as I suspect it is in most homes, is the most “adventuresome” meal. It’s not for the weak of heart or spirit.

We went to Bella’s, an Italian restaurant that is about as upscale as our small town has to offer (they have tables with chairs, in addition to booths!). Our first mistake was taking a table in the middle of the restaurant. For a family like ours, a dark corner, far away from other diners, is the ideal location. We are a loud, sometimes unruly, group, and a centrally located, brightly lit table is merely a stage for the drama to unfold, forcing other diners to serve as our unwitting audience.

Shortly after having ordered, which, for our family, takes about as long as eating the entire meal, Liam belted out a rousing rendition of Old McDonald. The entirety of it went just like this (in an off-key, sing-song tune): “Mick and Donald had a farm, and on him farm he had a cow,” (end sing-song voice and adjust volume to a shout), “I JUST FARTED!” I couldn’t judge the reaction of the other diners because I promptly buried my head in my hands and did not look up for an appropriately long time. I am confident I heard a belly laugh from the table next to us but I couldn’t make myself make eye contact with that table for the rest of their meal.

After some time coaching Liam on farting etiquette in restaurants, our mortification slowly subsided and small talk resumed. Then Nadia asked, out of the blue, “Do crabs have eyes on their shells, or on tentacles?” She has such a random mind, but frequently asks questions that remind me how little I know. 

The food arrived, which is always a hopeful event for parents, as food frequently helps occupy mouths so that fewer words come out of them. The downside of food is that it requires some basic etiquette, like using utensils, which is often lost on children, even those as old as seven. But the meal was progressing, dirty looks were dished out as necessary, and the end was in sight. Then Liam had a eureka! moment and announced, loudly, “When I get home, I need to poop!”

There was more face burying and head shaking. My eyes met Mike’s and the look on his face, with jaw clenched and a hint of madness in his eyes, said all there was to say. I wondered aloud why we continue to leave the house. Grace and Nadia snickered and giggled, and Liam offered another sentence or two about what a great pooper he’s become. And I realized that my family has become that family – the family that I might’ve sat next to 15 years ago and said, under my breath, “If those were my kids, I’d never leave the house!” 

How much I’ve learned about so many things – most of all, patience – in the years spent in the company of children. We keep leaving the house, even when common sense says we shouldn’t, sharing our little slice of craziness with those whose paths we cross. Though Grace and Nadia frequently say, “Mom is crazy!” I look forward to that day, well in the future when they are out with their own kids (who are misbehaving in all kinds of ways), that they have their own which-came-first epiphany, wondering whether I was out of my tree before I had kids, or if, just maybe, I had kids and then fell off the deep end.

51 Weeks Later

Fall is probably my favorite season, thanks in large part to all the fun, outdoorsy, family-friendly things to do. Likely for these reasons, it's been on my mind almost constantly over these last couple of months, though it's not like I ever forgot. But whether watching my small monsters carve pumpkins while wielding sharp objects and making a giant pumpkin-guts mess; or watching the posses of sugar-fueled trick-or-treaters roaming the neighborhood, my thoughts keep returning to the victims, and to the parents of the victims, of the Newtown, CT, school shooting last December.

As Thanksgiving came and went, those families were on my mind all the more as my constant thought throughout the month was how grateful I am to have a family that is happy and healthy and safe, and that I am grateful that my problems are small, in the grand scheme of things. Which is probably exactly how those families felt just last year at Thanksgiving, mere weeks before the unimaginable happened and the courses of their lives were forever changed.

It has been almost a year since that day, and the families have endured almost all the firsts…the first Christmas without their children, first Valentine’s Day, spring, summer, fall, birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and, soon, the first anniversary of the deaths of their precious children. The media focus, the community focus, the world focus that will be on them in the days leading up to December 14…I don’t know how they will manage it.  The grief they live with daily is unimaginable; to do so publicly in a country that watched them suffer and then couldn’t even pass any of the gun legislation they lobbied so passionately for is even more unfathomable.

When I think of the shooting, there’s one face in particular that comes to mind. His name was Dylan and his vivid, mischievous blue eyes were so beautiful. And, just as clearly, I see the haunted, devastated eyes of his mother. Her face stayed with me as the picture of heartbreak. A little guiltily, I am always so thankful that I don’t know that kind of suffering, and I hope I never do. But I am also always plagued with fear that horrible things happen to ordinary families. Families like ours. A year ago, so many families in Newtown, CT, were just normal people, living normal lives, when the most abnormal thing happened to them…randomly, without warning. The reminder that so much in life is completely out of our control is such a devastating, terrifying reality.

I was driving to Liam’s pre-school the other day to pick him up. I saw a man walking on the sidewalk with what I initially thought was a gun. On second look, it was a big L-shaped metal tool. But I see possible harm everywhere now, where is doesn’t really exist.  The horrors of that day in Newtown struck a fear in me that refuses to leave…the paranoia that a violent event can be waiting for me or my family anywhere, even in the least likely of places. When I walk into the kids’ schools, my first thought is “How unsafe this is.” There’s only one door that shields my precious children from the craziness in the world. I have the same thought at the gymnastics studio, at the community pool, at WalMart…that there’s no guaranteed way to stop a bad guy, should one of them arrive with a well-devised plan and lots of ammunition.

After a tragedy, there’s often a search for the lesson to be learned, for the ‘good’ to come from the bad. If there’s a ‘good’ anywhere in this, maybe it’s the threat of loss that helps me focus on the good in life and appreciate it all…especially those days, of which there are plenty, when I want to pull out all my hair and surrender myself to a facility with padded cells. I often remind myself that those parents would give absolutely anything to see their kid have a tantrum or make a giant mess or shove their sibling. The thought is sobering.

Sometimes I look at my children and their goofy little faces just choke me up. The delicacy of their features are almost doll-like, the long eyelashes like paint on porcelain. The sound of their voices and giggles are so precious; the intricacies of their personalities make each of them so uniquely special. I think of their potential, imagine their future. I can’t imagine them not having a future. This is the danger of loving. While the potential for joy is immense, so is the potential for suffering.

As the Newtown families approach the last of these “milestone” firsts, my thoughts are with them, as they have been all along. Their losses remind me that a day that ends with the well-being of my family is a good day. Their losses remind me to be thankful for all that is good…not just at this time of year, but every single day.

Being a Good Bad Role Model

In the shower this morning, for unknown reasons, I started to wonder if I am a good role model to the people I come across on a daily basis. As a parent of four and, as much as it pains me to say, a senior military spouse (“senior” in that Mike’s been in the Army for a while, and we’ve been together a lot of years), sometimes I think that I should be “setting the example,” whatever that means. Not necessarily for my kids, mind you…I think they know me well enough at this point to look to their dad when needing a role model. But, in our neighborhood, which is also a military community, I’ve been around the block a few more times than most of my peers, simply due to my ‘advanced’ age, and I got to thinking about how others might view me.

Almost immediately, I started to laugh. The idea of “role model” quickly fell away, as I thought perhaps the correct description of knowing me was really more akin to something out of a scared-straight program. “Look, kids! THIS is what YOU could become if you don’t clean up your acts!” Imagine tiny faces with wide, horrified eyes and terrified expressions. I don’t know why I found this so funny, but I laughed and laughed, and then I laughed some more.

A few examples quickly popped into my head…examples that, I am fairly sure, indicate I am NOT a role model, or at least not a good one. Recently, my mother-in-law sent me a book review. Its title? Moms Who Drink and Swear: Loving Your Kids While Losing Your Mind.  So, when my MIL saw the words “moms,” “drink,” “swear,” and “losing your mind,” her first thought was of me. I can’t even take offense because it’s all true. I drink, I swear, and often I do both at the same time. Frequently, I am confident I am losing my mind. And, apparently, I don’t even try to hide this.  Score one in the NOT a Role Model column.

Then, a few days ago, Nadia said to me in the car, “Mom, slow down. You’re going even faster than the school bus. You’re going to get pulled over AGAIN.” Of utmost concern to me in this sentence is the implication of the speed at which the bus driver hauls my kids around. Of course, if I had a bus full of kids, you can safely bet I would also be traveling at a high rate of speed, to get those kids OFF my bus. Of other concern: the fact that my daughter thinks I get pulled over a lot. I don’t know what qualifies as being pulled over “a lot,” but, regardless, she thinks I have a lot of police encounters, which sounds like another tally mark on the side of NOT a Role Model.

One day a year or so ago, while Mike was deployed, I realized I hadn’t seen my new neighbor in forever. I knew that her husband was also deployed and she had three small kids, of which the youngest was a newborn. I began to worry about her, thinking that maybe she was having trouble coping with the deployment and/or single-parenthood.  I decided I would soon go over, offer some guidance and “take her under my wing,” so to speak. Later the same day, as I had a complete and total crazy-woman meltdown over my role as single parent, Army-spouse, parent-of-four, I decided that perhaps the kindest thing I could do would be to NOT go over. What, I thought, could I possibly offer in terms of advice to anyone? More likely, seeing me in my beaten-down, sarcastic, grizzled-Army-spouse status might actually cause her to lose any hope she might have, as opposed to me being the shining example of well-adjusted wonder-woman I want to think I am.  For her benefit, I steered clear of her, thinking denying her my influence was the kindest thing I could do for her. Score one more in the NOT a Role Model column.

A favorite example happened a couple years ago. I was describing to a friend an incident that had occurred in my house. As I recounted the story that ended with a giant stain in my bedroom that looked like a Jackson Pollock painting, with cat vomit as the medium, and my subsequent unraveling into near-madness laden with an incredible slew of expletives, my friend looked at me soberly and actually said, “Sometimes I think I’m the worst parent in the world, but now I know I’m not.” I figure you could take this two ways: either I let her know that we all share the same struggles and we’re all, in fact, sort-of-normal as we deal (sometimes badly) with the crazy situations we frequently face as parents. Or…she’s not the worst parent in the world because I deserve the title. I think she probably meant the former, so we will score this one on the side of Role Model, since I haven’t been able to score anything on that side yet.

Plenty more incidents flashed in my mind…incidents in which I perhaps didn’t come off positively. I did a quick tally and simple math confirmed it’s much more likely that I probably am NOT the paragon of virtue I wish I were, or that I wish others saw me as. But, because I love silver linings, I decided it’s good to be true to oneself, even with all one’s imperfections. And then there’s this…being a bad role model can also be good (along the lines of “Scared Straight”), if it affects positive change. If I don’t always model good behavior directly, maybe people can learn something good from all my bad examples.