Book Clubs, Bullies and Bravehearts

Curious indeed that the mother of an 11-year old finds a way to create a faction within a faction, all factions headed by her and her clique. It doesn’t ruffle my feathers as much as it could, I tell you this in truth, but it tweeks me just a tad. How it is that my daughter can feel the vibe of exclusion and clique-i-ness inside the secret club meant for just original members…unless the newcomer happens to somehow have clout. Then you’re in. Just looking for a fun, mother-daughter time reading books with other peers, but have no clout? Not in. Clout, you’re in.

See where this is going? And while I have never really viewed myself as an underdog by sheer virtue of my inherent spiritedness, I have always had a penchant for sniffing out the alpha in any group of females since a very young age, and tend to feel compelled, how shall I say…to SQUASH THAT SHIT! Because I don’t like when people posture superiority over others, and I have very tender feelings for anyone who feels left out, less-than or unequal in any way as a result of someone’s pitbull approach to socializing. Because that’s just not cool. It’s mean and I don’t like it.

Back to the club. It’s not really as bad as all that. Yet. But it’s heading in that direction and picking up speed as the months go on, and before I step off this train because I don’t like where it’s going, you better believe Braveheart Mama’s coming to town and she’s ready to roll with the punches.

So beware, Bossy Mama. I am my sister’s keeper. Ain’t nothing getting past me no ‘mo. I will step in, speak up, raise a stink and never back down.

About what book we are reading next. So how you like me now?

The Guise of Injury

My dad’s companion of 17 years is leaving him. I’m pissed about it. I’m pissed that I have had to learn about love and marriage under the conditions of both my own and my parents’ mistakes, but it has been a burden and a blessing. I have felt the range of emotions only a person who’s lived more than 50 decades deserves to feel by my 25th birthday, and now at 36 have yet to feel some relief from it all. And I am truly lucky for the wisdom I carry in my soul. Some by way of others’ choices having a direct effect on my life, much through the experience of my own missteps and occasional long-sighted good judgement.

When I see 60-something adults struggle in relationship, I wonder where along the way they missed those epiphanies when they suddenly see what they didn’t used to, and grow beyond that place of struggle on to something better. What you always learn from these moments are aspects of yourself, not a greater understanding of the people around you. We fumble over ourselves and each other trying to figure out the motives and meanings of people’s actions, and in the event of discontent point the little finger away from our own chest and directly into the eye of the closest available body. We say if they would just “do more of this, or less of that,” this relationship would be better. But only it never is. Not when the finger points away.

They say they carry hurt feelings, they say they cannot reconcile differences, they say their perspectives cannot find common ground. I hear what they say all day long, but what I see is something so uncomplicated my 7-year-old has it licked. That love is a choice and either you choose it or you don’t. Love is about what you desire to give to another, the return is simply a natural consequence of altruism. But they carry the weight of every hurt they strive daily to conceal, and though it can be hidden but never erased, it seeps out into the white space of unasked questions and unspoken truths. The relationship itself becomes the air that breathes life into the pain that is groping for attention. Pain that can only be healed through the recognition of its origin, and only we can own that for ourselves. That pain wants to be as free from it’s host as the body wants the parasitic emotion to release and make room for something better.

But that is work. Facing your demons is ugly, nasty, dirty work and no one ever wants to do it. So instead, they demonize the ones nearest to them by casting a spotlight on their foibles and inadequacies.

And they remain in a constant state of self-inflicted lonliness, victimization and self-pity, under the guise of injury.

Academic Angst

Lately, academia has me riled up and beat down at the same time. There is an issue in our home right now with my difficulty finding mental space to do my schoolwork because it’s filled with concern about my kids and theirs.

My latest is the issue that I strongly support Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligence – that humans have a wide variety of abilities. That in itself is not the issue, the fact that the government only values math, science and reading is. I don’t think the whole sytem is bunk, but as I see my kids grow into little people with their own style, my desire to help them be in full expression of who they are meant to be grows with them as I simultaneously sense the public school’s agenda to squelch this growth and turn out a mass society of problem-solving test-takers.

Which is fine for the problem-solving, test-taking kinds. Except when the method of instruction only connects with a portion of those students. That leaves a lot of room for floundering attention for those who don’t get it, or worse don’t care to. My point here is not to criticize the institution of public education, but to question the national motive behind it. When this country was colonized, an education was a matter of class and self-enhancement. Trades and crafts were the money-makers, services such as medicine and law were there to support and sustain communities, and education was a means to understanding not only math, science and reading, but their rightful purpose in the world, which at that time had nothing to do with a fear some other country was doing math faster. This nation has bullied it’s way into a technical pickle, litereally. We are so fearful someone else will do it better or faster, beat us to the punch, that my 5th grader was in tears this morning over the ridiculous amount of math, reading and science homework she had to do. RIDICULOUS amount. Her backpack weighs more than my washing machine. Every ill this country contends with boils down to one single thing:

Denaro. Capitalism is to blame for the ugliness of slavery, poverty, hedonistic greed, certainly the wonderful economic situation we are in at the present moment, and every other one we have dealt with in the past. So how am I supposed to have faith that this country is educating our children in the right ways, for the right reasons? How am I supposed to listen to the brain-washed teachers tell us brain-washed parents all the good reasons the first 2 months of instruction in a school year is dedicated to MEAP testing when my daughter desperately needs that time to LEARN? Why are teachers getting paid to show movies in their classes, yet often robbing a family of the precious down-time they need in the evening to connect with their families because of all the work they didn’t finish in class? I sure as hell don’t have leisure time enough to pop in a movie during the week when my kids are on MY time, so why should they? Are elementary teachers instructing or babysitting? Now before you think I’m irrational and don’t realize the concept of homework has been around since the concept of a formal education, back the bus up. What I’m saying is that there should be magic happening in that classroom between teachers and students and minimal effort made in the home, not vice-versa. Sounds a little bold and lazy of myself to say, I know, but trust me; laziness is not what fuels my fire. I feel that there is no family life if 3 children have a combined 4 hours of homework a night. We barely even watch evening television, which is a good thing in itself, if only it weren’t replaced with an evening of tense hostility over comprehensive homework assignments.

Homework and the value of time-management and responsibility that goes with it is not problemactic as long as it is a means to a purposeful end. But is it? Is it really? My daughter is doing this stupid dance for everyone when she could be exploring things that she is passionate about, spending time enjoying her pets in the evening, cozy evening down time or just a little…this is novel…solitude. I know, I know, that’s what college is for. But how the hell does a person KNOW what they want if they are being told what they should place value on for 12 years prior? I am questioning the way we do life in general in this counrty, and I have a beef with the mindless drones we are to go along with the program of cranking out MY kids to meet the ends of the government’s agenda to be as fucking competitive as we can possibly be. I am not a competitive person and I don’t value that trait in anyone. If we compete, we cannot unite. If we can’t unite, we will be forever at odds with everything that threatens who we are and strive to be. Who needs that? THE MILITARY, of course. Old habits die hard I guess.

My daughter knows who she is and what she values, thank God, but I will be spending the entirety of her school years until 12th grade trying to convince her she is no less smart than anyone else in her class, despite the test results. Because I believe it to be true. She is more sharp-witted and insightful than half the girls I meet her age. But somehow her school experience is making her feel otherwise.

Curse you, global competion. Can we please just move to Switzerland where we can escape the rest of the muscle-flexing world?

Keeping it Real

For the past 4 years or so, our family began a tradition of watching a holiday movie in the evening on Thanksgiving. First it was The Polar Express, and since has been Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase. My husband and I are fanatics of this movie, so we popped it in figuring most of the adult humor would go right over the kids’ heads. It did, so we have kept this tradition going.

This year, we finally realized why the kids love this movie as much as we do. Because every year it’s like a “new movie” as they pick up on a few more details of rated PG-13 humor. Right now, there seems to be a resurgence of potty talk: new and improved. There was a time when weiners and dingos and farts were considered pushing the envelope, but lately they’ve really upped the ante.

Now, one might suggest not showing movies like Christmas Vacation to 7, 9 and 11-year-olds as the premier family holiday movie event. And to be honest, I can admit doing so may have given the message there are freedoms around this house that defy all logic and reason to the goal of raising polite and respectful children. Mixed-messages? Bad role models? Hipocracy?

Maybe. Maybe all that. But to believe I am contributing to the depravity of my own children by exposing them to stuff that may exceed 4th grade suitability is counterintuitive to my belief that my putting restrictions on too many things will cause them to fear and avoid my disdain. If I get my panties in a wad over the sexual tension between Clark Griswald and the hot lady in the lingerie department instead of laughing at the sidesplitting humor, will they feel that their own sexuality is a thing to be ashamed of, or that it happens, is natural and can make for some funny, awkward moments? Sure, I could avoid it altogether, but there is nothing teachable in that. Only avoidable.

In other words, I am choosing to keep it pretty loose here. I’m sure there are more simpler, tidier ways of going about these kinds of “teachable moments” but what’s the fun in that? And I guess every home has a threshold for what the line of appropriateness is. For me what really matters is not so much what they hear and see, but that they know how we feel about it. That they can tell the difference between funny and offensive, what falls within or without our family code of values. Which swear words are bad, and which ones are blasphemous. The difference between healthy human affection and self-demoralization. We point out song lyrics to our kids to be sure they are paying attention to the artistic expression, or lack of, instead of mindlessly buying into pop culture.

And all that aside, once in a while I drop an f-bomb at my 11-year-old when I need to really get her attention. Once in a while my husband lets one rip to get anyone’s attention. But all the time my kids know our home is an environment where we are learning and growing together by testing boundaries, pushing envelopes, and sometimes crossing lines. They know that this is a safe place to explore the world around them. A place where they are comfortable and free to ask about anything on their minds.

Recently something went off in my son’s little 9-year old head that there was something more to this funny dance he sees dogs occasionally doing. Perhaps something a little “saxy” as he put it. I asked him what he meant by saxy and he said, “That’s what I’m waiting for you to tell me!”

The One

My husband has been travelling a lot. That means I’ve been parenting a lot – solo. My children are in school for a full day now, but I am also a student at the university full time now. So the balance has only shifted from one kind of crazy to another in many ways. Anyway, we deal with all that because I am determined and my family is supportive. At least my husband, as much as he can be. The kids complain but it is really all they know. Mommy has been plugging away at a degree for many years. After scolding my son lately about procrastinating doing his homework, he told me I was one to talk. He wanted to know how many more years I’m getting “held back” in college because I’m getting old! (He’s right, but I assure him one is never to old to drink from the cup of knowledge!)

Back to the solo parenting. It has been a treat, to say the least. Not bad, just challenging and exhausting. Our weekend together was cut short, and Mama doesn’t like weekend interference. I am quite a spoiled brat about my weekends. I like to chill with my family and friends and savor the break from the grind of school and work. This weekend’s schedule delivered to me a travel-weary man on Friday night, and before he had his bearings, boarded him again Sunday morning on a flight far, far from home.

The children and I do just fine as a team when daddy’s gone. Though he doesn’t travel very regularly, he travels enough times in a year that we are accustomed to the drill and have developed coping mechanisms to adjust to our missing family member:

The one who makes the 6-7p.m. witching hour better just by showing up with hugs ready and willing to join the fun after a long day of work. The one who occasionally gets up extra early with my oldest daughter to help her go over math material they studied the night before just to be sure she feels confident. The one who goes to Wal Mart for me when I need stuff like garbage bags or shampoo (it is forbidden in this family by this particular person to buy these items anywhere else. I’m not complaining!) He’s the one who finds a way to delegate a late meeting at the office with the Big Guy and a volleyball game. His work is important but his kids are his life. He’s the one who gets though homework and the bedtime routine with me every night. His absence from this part of our day is missed most by all of us. The kids are tired and crabby and need the attention of both parents, they miss their dad, they bicker and antagonize each other because they can. They have me licked and the Scary Bedtime Yeller won’t come flying around a corner if someone’s feet hit the floor. They miss and need their Scary Bedtime Yeller! He’s the one who makes bedtime for me a treat and a pleasure instead of a date with a lonely cold bed. I like my solitude just like anyone. I believe I am my own best friend. But there is something comforting if not self-serving about retreating when I need to and returning to my loves when I have found my zen. When my buddy is gone, I lose that option. I can’t get a kiss or a snuggle when I want one. I can’t express my thoughts openly to someone who might understand them or even entertain them. I can’t wake from a bad dream and reach over for shelter, or wake from a good one and reach over for a booty call. The part where he wakes up an hour before me and gets ready for work, in and out of the bedroom with the lights on an off, shower fan running, water running, dogs tip-tapping on the wood floor waiting to go out, kids stirring and coming into my bed one by one to crowd me out of my last half hour of blissful rest under the covers is not the part of living with someone I like the most. But other than that part, I miss the one who shares a life with me.

And the kids miss dad too. But we all grow a little when he goes. We grow in strength, independence, gratitude for our family and I grow, most of all, secure in knowing I am truly okay when he is not here. That I can handle this brood, keep them happy, healthy and fed, in order, house clean and survive my own life all by myself. I am a strong woman. I am confident. I am self-assured. I am capable of handling the details of my life without the help of a man. I don’t need him after all.

I want him. And that’s what makes me a very lucky girl. Thank you, God, for showing me how to see the helping and healing love that is present and abounding in my life rather than the illusion that it is hidden and must be unturned.

A Funny Thing

Today I saw a funny thing. Just one of those silly little sights that catches your attention and makes you belly-laugh to yourself; like the guy at the paint store who leans over to smell the paint and gets a glob of paint on the end of his big nose, and doesn’t know and proceeds to have a conversation with you while you die laughing inside. Or that time of the day on Halloween when people are in some sort of professional setting wearing costumes, after the hype of the first hour of the day wears off and everyone gets back to work looking completely ridiculous with the clown shoes and curly wig while conducting business.

I was in my car at a stop light and I noticed in my periphery a really cool, brand-spanking new Thunderbird with a detailed appearance and slick, modern color pulled next to me at a light. I immediately wondered who might be the driver of this modern, vintage classic. This car made a statement. I turned and there were two of the most adorable elderly people I have ever seen. They were dressed to the nines with hats, fur, cigar, you name it. To this I thought, I hope we will one day be so cool. These sassy folks were the object of my envy for their apparently vivacious attitude toward life.

As they pulled away, I noticed a huge box crammed in the back and wondered what this cargo could be. I sped up a little and got a closer look: DEPENDS! It was a Costco size box of Depends. I laughed so damn hard I nearly needed to wave them down for one!

Reality Check

This morning my 11-year-old followed me around the house as I multi-tasked my way through the routine with an additional thing to accomplish: getting myself ready. This morning I was driving on a school field trip. She kept talking about her nightmare and wanting to tell me the details. Just no time, there was too much before me that needed immediate attention.

“Getting ready” is something I have to force myself to do even for a Friday night date with the hubs or a night out with the girls. Getting the shower isn’t the problem, it’s all the riggamaroll that comes after. And my hair, if not handled with care and many steps of conditioning, product, air-drying and serious finesse with a blow-dryer, will leave me looking like Roseanne Roseannadanna.

My skin is another story. It requires a 10-step procedure too. My closet is a bomb (not to be confused with THE bomb) where my fickle mood leaves most of what I try on when I HAVE to look good draped over the rod, on the floor or mixed into the dry-cleaning pile. Suffice it to say, weeding through that jungle takes more time than I have to spare to get my chic on for school drop off and mom errands. So I do shower at night, morning drop-off in my pajamas and somewhere in the day I have a meeting with a bra and a toothbrush. A hairbrush and some lipstick if I’ll be mingling with the public.

This morning I showered before the kids got up and proceeded to march them through our morning in my robe wondering what 10 minutes I could steal to put myself together.

And my daughter, whose field trip I was driving for, kept following me around trying to tell me about the “nightmare.” I just didn’t have the time to listen. 20 minutes beofre walking out the door, still in my robe, I frantically announce to my kids that any last minute details that at this point had not been taken care of would be left to them to figure out for themselves. There were still teeth to be brushed, breakfast to be eaten, shoes to be put on. Upon my announcement, my oldest daughter flies into the kitchen and starts giving jobs to the others while she herself multitasked packing snacks and her own needs. “Get your shoes on! Here’s milk for your cereal! Take this toothbrush and BRUSH!”

I was amazed at her desire to get things rolling in an orderly fashion for once. Usually she takes great pleasure in being the Golden Child who does everything herself and on time, not helping her siblings for the sheer contrast their laziness holds to her personal responsibility. She is praised for this every day, and I know she loves it.

While this was going on, I remained in the bathroom doing my hair and putting on make-up. We all finished together and on time. I was ready and they were too! Success! My big girl seemed the most pleased with this moment.

In the car, on the way to school, I asked her to tell me about her nightmare. She said, “I dreamt we were going on the field trip and you were running late and said you’d meet me at school. And when you showed up, you were wearing that old black fleece, your pajama pants and your hair in a messy ponytail. As Usual. I almost died!”

At that moment I realized it might not hurt to channel my inner fancy-mom once in a while. If not for my own dignity, at least for my kids’!

Happy Birthday Big Girl

Today is my oldest daughter’s 11th birthday. Eleven once seemed so grown-up to me, when she was 4 and I could hardly imagine such a mature version of her. But funny as it is I still see my first baby when I look at her. Yes, she is growing in leaps and bounds. Her waist is getting a little smaller, her feet bigger than mine now. But when she has moments of frustration and tears, her lips quiver and tighten exactly the same as when she was 4 months old making it impossible to separate that sweet baby from the young lady who appears before others who know her.

To me she is just my baby. I know the landscape of her face and her heart better than anyone ever will. I thought to myself tonight when I was lying in bed with her talking how I will see her all her life as no one else will. When she one day finds her life companion and has a family of her own, to them she will fulfill a role as close and intimate as the one I have with her, but yet they will never see what I see when I look at her. They will even see her in ways I have not: as a lover or caretaker to others, but they won’t carry with them a sense of who she was before she became who she is now.

The time I have with her is now and I am so grateful that I have had the opportunity to make parenting her; loving her, my number one objective. I cherish the memories we have created and wonder how it would all be different if I worked outside the home. How the mornings would be different if I had to focus on getting myself ready instead of standing at the sink or stove in my pajamas fixing a hot breakfast. Or if I couldn’t drop into their school anytime I felt like it to participate in their activities, bring up dry shoes after a soggy field trip or just have a little lunch with her. Funny, she’s the oldest yet the least embarrassed to have me around her in her social realm. I think about how being focused on them at after school pick-up and having the house prepared for them gives them something comforting to come home to after a long day at shool. Something often cooking in the oven, beds made with an occasional special item on them like new socks or something from Target’s dollar section. I run errands most days covering things such as groceries or picking up kneepads for volleyball. I wonder how our lives would be different if I had to put energy into a job, or worse a career.

Yet great moms do it every day sometimes making me feel “less than” for not seeing myself capable of filling both the role as mother and employee. But as I reflect on my life with my children on their birthdays, so many tiny memories come flooding back to me I know have made all the difference. Perhaps if a childcare provider witnessed 8 hours a day of their little expressions and nuances and me 8 hours less, something would not be quite the same as it is for us. What that something is I cannot say, but I have an intuition it is something. There is a sense with children of 2 working parents that they belong to “everyone.” They assimilate easier into a variety of environments. They fit well into the crowd. They have a strong sense of independence I see less often in children who have a parent one step ahead of them at all times.

But I also see some difference in the mother-child connection. I can’t place my finger on it or even know that it is less desirable, it’s just different somehow. At social settings, working moms and dads seem to struggle more to even out the job-sharing when they are trying to socialize. Looks shoot at each other across the room that beg for relief from the task at hand – a diaper change or getting a plate of food ready. They seem equally tired and unaccustomed to being at the mercy of a demanding child. I know any two parents go through this at parties, but the ability for the stay-home mom to multi-task by sheer virtue of a built tolerance for it makes meeting her children’s needs second nature. It’s what she does. It is her full-time job. And typically a dad who appreciates the amount of time his stay-home wife spends tending to the children’s needs is willing to step up so she can relax for a minute. He is relieved of the pressure most nights after work to “job-share” household duties because it is just done. It’s been getting done all day.

I see great moms fulfilling every role imaginable from career woman to homemaker, this is not to say one mom is better than another. Only a reflection of what I feel has been gained for the amount of time I have had with my children; how that time has added up to something bigger and more important than I could have ever realized. At the time we made the decision that I would quit work to stay home, it was based purely on my desire to solely care for them and the blessing of being able to financially.

Now, as my oldest has just turned eleven, the products of all we have put into the kids are beginning to really show. And you know, part of their character comes from seeing the good, bad and ugly in me too. One of the hardest things to do as a stay-home mom is balancing work and play. The children get on your nerves after a long day. We don’t usually have extra money for expensive recreational fun. When I worked I remember every work day was an objective to pick my child up from the babysitter, get home, eat, bathe and get to bed because I was exhaused. We lived for the weekends. But when I quit work, suddenly life was now.

Happy Birthday Sweetheart. I love what we have built together.

Ugg!

My amost-11-year-old daughter was treated to a shopping trip with my mother-in-law for her birthday this weekend. I hinted to her that “Uggs” are something she has been wanting for three years now. Most of her friends have them and I once did, and she likes them. The fact that they are “Uggs” and very expensive are irrelevant to her beacause each time she has been with me in a store that sold anything resembling them, she asked me to buy them for her. She likes the look and feel of that style.

But I held out knowing her birthday was near, and since my both my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law collect things like Uggs and Coach purses I knew they would be the perfect candidates to buy them for her birthday. And so she did. And my daughter was delighted. She has been wanting them for so long. “Why not?” I ask myself.

Because it goes against my belief that young children should not be encouraged to enter the world of materalism.

But I liked those kinds of things when I was young too, and my parents we not exactly the Ugg-wearing types themselves. Or, more accurately the Liz Claiborne or Polo types. But I liked all that stuff. And occasionally for birthdays and Christmas I would recieve them as gifts. When I turned 14, I got a Friday night job from 5-10p.m. as a hostess in a restaurant a mile from home. Then I could buy my own little luxuries – perfume or a special purse.

But eventually I realized that there would never be enough money to keep up with it all. So I had the purse, but I needed the outfit to go with it. Just one was not enough, I needed one for every day of the week. And what good were nice clothes if your don’t have really nice shoes to go with them? Or a coat? When eventually I got a car there were expenses to go with that so my money needed to be stretched and balanced evern further. I still liked designer things but the reality was that I needed to prioritize my spending. PRIORITIES. What was important? What did I value? What experiences would I be willing to forgo in order to have those things, like concerts or spring break in Florida?

Now that I have a daughter who is entering this phase of childhood I am extremely careful about how we proceed through it. We live in a community where there are many kids who see things like a North Face or Uggs as a right, not a privelage. Their parents would have their children wear nothing other. And there are people I know who really can’t afford to buy expensive wardrobes for their kids and boast about the value sytems they are executing in their own homes, yet soon enough the kids show up with the North face and the Uggs. Peer pressure must have gotten to either the parents to look like capable providers, or the kids who want what their friends have. Or maybe like in the case of myself or a few good friends I know, we get some great hand-me-downs! Yesterday I was unpacking a bag given to me by a friend and feeling really good about the resourcefulness of recycling clothes and that as my daughter watched she was excited to get some fun clothes from her friend who can no longer wear them. Don’t get me wrong – I love to buy my kids new things that are just for them, but in between hand-me-downs are a great supplement. Anyway, as I went through the bag, eventually the Ambercrombie & Fitch came out.

Shit. She recognized it. “Mumma I want some Fitch and Ambercrombie clothes.” I asked her why and she didn’t really know except they looked familiar like some trend happening around that she was not part of. This really made me think for a second. Do I deny the child a right to fit in, to feel good about herself? But I want her to feel good about herself despite what brand-names she wears, not because of them. Then again, is her 11-year-old reasoning sophisticated enough to grasp this concept? To brave the crowd with Old Navy for the rest of her school years to prove that she does not have to “buy” coolness? Do these kids even make the connection between the name and the cost attatched to it? If not, then I suppose we are fostering ignorance for letting them wear it without regard for the monetary value. If they do make the connection then are we simply reinforcing the idea that we should be willing to pay a high dollar for the image we want to present? What is the image? That the little moose embroidered at the bottom is just sooo adorable? When I was young it was Ralph Lauren Polo. Half of us didn’t even know what the hell the guy on the horse was even doing. Is it that the clothes fit a little tighter in just the right spots? The clever sayings on t-shirts suggesting the girl wearing them is a little hottie? WHAT IS IT???? There is a generation gap here that I thought I would never be lost in with my own daughter. I cannot understand why parents do this to their kids and then to all the other kids like mine whose mother is fighting against the degredation of our youth’s sexual morals.

My daughter tells me on the ride home from grandma’s that her 4-year old cousin has Uggs too. During the visit my daughter was told to “respect the Uggs.” My daughter wondered what she meant, for she couldn’t imagine how one would disrespect their nice new shoes they love. “Well, keep them looking nice. Don’t run around getting them dirty or jump in puddles.”

To this I thought, That’s sort of funny. I thought that’s exactly what 4-year-olds were supposed to be doing with a new pair of boots. Not these boots, I guess. These are Uggs. These boots are for looking at, apparently. Freedom lost by the age of 4 in the name of Uggs.

Little Loves

Today’s post is one of sheer gratitude. As I lie in bed reflecting on my day and thinking about all I have to accomplish tomorrow, a sudden feeling of joy came over me. It was like the feeling I get as I fall into bed utterly exhausted on Christmas Eve after a frenzy of gift wrapping, scrubbing up the family for church and delegating deviled eggs and Great Grandma at my mother-in-law’s all evening. A catatonic state of hypertension somehow overshadowed by abounding love for my three children as I imagine their happy faces and excited little bodies in the morning. I know tomorrow isn’t Christmas – in fact it’s just an ordinary old Wednesday, but somehow a feeling of anticipation to see them in the morn crept in amidst my tiredness, just because I miss them while they sleep.

They will wake up slowly, each in their own fashion: My big girl will pull her growing body out of bed herself with little prompting except from her own alarm she set the night before. She likes to be ready for everything, just like her daddy. She takes supreme care of her personal hygiene. She is responsible and self-motivated. She is the object of my admiration.

My little man will be asleep sawing logs when I reach him. He will not respond to wake-up messages or turned-on lights. I may stroke his hair and kiss his cheek, which will elicit little stirrings, but it isn’t until I humor him with corny jokes or paint imagery in his mind of his teacher at that very moment probably eating oatmeal in his underwear, with a booger on the end of his nose and his hair sticking straight up. Sometimes I sing a silly song like: Believe me, Mon, don’t bug a crustacean. Crabs are crabby when they get no sleep! Eventually he wraps himself with Favorite (his blanket) and heads to the bathroom where he will carelessly leave a wet comode for his poor unsuspecting little sister.

Who, will not be in high spirits at this early hour. She is most likely to take all of the morning plus some to completely assimilate into the bustle of her day. She’s my secret favorite to wake up because she is my baby. I can still see reminants of baby features in her face and little arms and hands as she lies tucked in with a stuffed animal secure in her grip held close to her cheek. As I look her over for a minute I swear I can smell the salty, sweaty, old-milky scent that was once so familiar when we shared a bed and slept skin-to-skin all night. We would wake up together in the earliest, quiet part of morning before her big brother and sister joined us for a lively breakfast routine. We snuggled and nursed and devoured every moment of pure and bonding love for each other. Because this memory of infancy is freshest with my last one, the sensory experience is awakened every time I see her sleep.

I kiss her on the cheek and wait for a response. I stole a term of endearment which my good friend has given her own son, and I use it in different variants depending on the response I get. The name is “Chi.” I’m not sure how it came to be for my friend or what the heck it means, but she often referred to him as “Baby Chi” (pronounced chee) For some reason – because it’s so cute I guess, it fits perfectly into my descriptors of my little one’s morning sounds. First I say, “Wake up, Baby-Chi!” “I’m NOT Baby-Chi!,” she protests. If she streches and makes a little squeal I say, “Awe..it’s Squealy-Chi!” When she has drool on her pillow I say, “Look! It’s Drooly-Chi!” This one makes her especially mad. All the Chi’s do because our little buddy is supposed to be the Chi. He’s the baby, not her, she tells me.

And all this happens before 8 a.m. So can you see? I have so much joy in my heart in anticipation of all these little nuances that make my kids who they are, make them mine. They are my little loves and these private moments, moments even daddy does not share, are to me the most beautiful moments of my day.

For me, every morning feels like Christmas. Thank you God, for my family. They are my heart.