Coming of Age, Again

So, it’s 11:30PM again.  The only sounds in the house are the rustling of sheets, soft snores and the occasional crash of a bedtime story book being accidently kicked to the floor.  It’s finally my turn to go to bed. 

Sometimes in the calm quietness of these late nights I get distracted from my bedtime routine by the bright over-mirror light highlighting my facial imperfections in the mirror.  I just recently noticed my once smooth forehead now sports the most delicate parallel lines across it.  I raise my eyebrows up and down and watch them deepen and flatten, but not quite disappear. Dang it.

Once in a while I spend so much time inspecting my puckering face that when I lay down to go to sleep, I realize that I forgot to brush my teeth, and back to the bathroom I go.

It’s my birthday this week, the “cute” half of the thirties is firmly behind me, and I’m sliding face first into forty faster than I am prepared for.  Why does 36 seem young and 37 seem so, so old?

To accentuate my new found oldness, my daughter’s 4^th grade class recently got “the talk” from the school nurse.  She’s been fascinated with the idea of puberty since she first learned about the concept last year.  This milestone event at school has re-ignited her interest in the topic.  

Seeing my little girl grow into a little woman as I’m slowly pruning from the head down, feels a little bit like taunting at my new ripe old age.  Don’t be surprised if you see me splashing water from muddy puddles in the area on my face hoping to find that the fountain of youth is somewhere in the Meadowlands area. Bog water ought to be good for something!

Maybe waiting on full blown wrinkles is like waiting for boobs.  Looking for them consumes your time in front of the mirror, until they show up and it’s no big deal.

But in case it’s not like that, and wrinkles end up being a devastating occurrence, I decided to come up with some reasons turning 37 might be great anyway:

1. No more wasting time at the liquor store trying to find my ID in my suitcase of a purse.  I definitely don’t look “younger than 30” anymore.
2. What you see is what you get.  I’ve been waiting years to discover my perfect hair and fashion style, like my put-together friends who have chunky necklaces to match each blouse and blazer, but it appears that jeans and cardigan with slightly frizzy, needs to be dyed hair is my style.  It’s almost liberating.
   
3. Searching for those vampire (because you can’t see them in the mirror) wiry chin hairs will give me something to do while waiting in lines. 
   
4. Friends aren’t afraid to be real.  We’ve got nothing to prove anymore in the friend department.  If we lose one, we can always pull a kid off the bench to spend time with.
   
5. When the early twenty-something girls are dancing, singing, and acting wild at the bar you can shake your head & roll your eyes, but if you want to join them you can just say it’s “Mom’s Night Out”  and those behaviors become perfectly acceptable.
   
6. After years of falling asleep in make-up and not religiously wearing sunscreen.  My face is now a test dummy for every kind of cream, gel, and crème that come in tiny, expensive bottles and tubes in an attempt to try and reverse my bad habits before it’s too late. 
   
7. I get to be the old kindergarten mom as my fourth and last kid enters school “for real” this fall. I know nearly all the elementary school teachers, how the buses and lunch accounts work, and where the elementary art room is, which in the eyes of the “new” kindergarten mom makes me a god.  I’m pretty sure.
   
8. If we run out of lined paper, my first grader can practice his penmanship on my forehead.
   
9. And… with a little math, I’m finally a 10! (3+7=10) …Which will probably feel just as legitimate now, as it did when I was 28..ha!

 This coming of age, again, isn’t as exciting as the first time around, but the result will probably be the same... hopefully – a new found comfort in my own skin – Now with wrinkles and age spots!… and a rogue chin hair, here and there.

Going, Going, Gratitude

We all have to face the loss of a loved one at some point in our lives.  The hardest are the unexpected and tragic deaths, or those whose lives have ended too soon, but even when you know the time is near for someone, and you’ve accepted that their passing is the best outcome, the loss is still hard.

I got word that my grandma will only live for another week or two.  She has been on dialysis for the last few years and the process has slowly stolen her mind and body.  A recent injury and issues with dialysis have led my grandpa to what must be the hardest decision of his life, to stop her dialysis treatments.  Now, as her blood becomes more polluted, she will slip away to death, a process, the professionals say, will take anywhere from one to three weeks.

While the news wasn’t unexpected, it hit me harder than I thought it would.  I spent the weekend getting teary-eyed as thoughts and memories floated through my head.

I have so many wonderful memories of my beautiful grandma.  It’s selfish of me to not want her to go.  She doesn’t even really remember who we are anymore.  It’s only fair that her lovely soul be freed from her broken body.

But I don’t want to say good-bye, so instead, I’ll say “Thank You”.

My grandparents have always lived in St. Paul, where I grew up.  We spent a lot of time with them as kids and I thank my grandma for the carefree hours we spent rolling or sledding down the steep hill behind their house, or running through the sprinkler in our undies, as she and grandpa listened to the Twins on the radio.  I want to thank her for spending hours playing card games with us, as well as the occasional game of scrabble and dominoes.  And thank her for the sketch she drew of me diving off a diving board at swimming lessons in 1989, I still have it safely stored away.

I thank her for helping us “work” at grandpa’s auto parts store when we came to visit during the day, helping us up on the tall stools behind the counter to impress customers with our cuteness.  I want to thank her for her innocence and the laughs it brought – like the time when the internet was “new” and she was afraid to use our AOL dial-up because she was worried she might actually delete the internet.

And, thanks grandma for the weekend sleepovers complete with gram and gramps narrating a slide show of my mom and her siblings as they were growing up, we loved seeing the life size images projected on a screen in the kitchen. 

And thank you for the weekends when all the women in the family would gather at your house pre-holiday season to make homemade noodles that would become lasagna or ravioli for our giant holiday gatherings.  Grandma, mom and the aunts would knead and roll, while us kids would take turns turning the crank on the noodle maker, or carefully bringing freshly flattened dough to grandma’s big table to await it’s next turn through the noodle maker.  We’d get the left over noodle dough to cut into little animal shapes that grandma would cook up for lunch.

These everyday activities that have been cemented as memories in my mind, and stayed crystal clear all these years, are the result of the love and time she invested in us grandkids.

I will miss the delicate, graceful way she made her way though each day.  I’ll miss being embarrassed by the silly interactions between her and grandpa. So much of this has already been lost over the last few years.  What remains is the feel of her baby soft cheeks and that flowery grandma smell when you go in for an embrace, I will miss these the most. And the joy she would get of seeing any visitor, even if she didn’t know who the heck they were anymore.

I was fortunate in that I knew all grandparents and all but two of my great grandparents.  I lost my paternal grandma when I was about 4, I vaguely remember her, but rest of my grandparents, great grandparents and great aunts and uncles, even a couple great, great aunts hung around until I was middle school age.  Longevity is on both sides of my family with folks living until the late eighties, nineties, even my great grandma who lived to almost 104.  Which also means - I’ve been to a lot of funerals, but it’s been a while.  And this feels different.

Maybe my perspective has changed.  The loss of my grandma has conjured up a strange mix of sadness and relief.  Relief that her soul will be free of her aching body, but sadness for my grandpa, whose life will change dramatically without the partner who has been at his side for what seems like an eternity.  In time, the teary-eyed memories will hopefully just come with a smile, but until then -  I won’t say good bye, I’ll just offer my gratitude to the sweet woman who embraced the role of grandma, and will remain in my heart and mind as a wonderful example of grace and love.

  

Melting Down

It seems ironic that as everything outside is freezing up, I’m indoors melting down.  It happens every year about this time – the lack of sunlight, the weather keeping everyone indoors, the post-holiday dullness enhanced by the blah gray days that the calendar says will continue for a dozen more weeks.  It all gets a bit overwhelming.  

If I’m being completely honest, it’s overwhelming to the point of possible internal combustion, that point where human contact should be completely avoided because you can’t seem to say anything without the receiving end responding “Don’t get mad at me!” or “You don’t have to yell!”.

I’m not getting mad… I’ve gone mad. I’m not yelling, I can just no longer control the volume (or the tone) of my voice.  This is me, metaphorically hanging by a few fingers from a cliff while trying to nicely tell you to pick up your ever loving sh*t for the 100^th time. 

My cliff is not a rugged rock formation carved by wind and water over millions of years, but a wobbly mountain that has grown over the last 10 years out of missing gloves, dirty laundry, unfinished projects, work and other obligations – until it grew too tall to balance on, so now I’m hanging by the thread of some sweater/backpack/blanket/toy I was supposed to fix.

It’s a common misconception that our obligations weigh us down. In fact, I think they build us up. They create our identity and we take them on to grow into the person we think we should be, or what we think others want us to be.  And when it becomes overwhelming, we cling to them and the person we think we are, even when it hurts those around us…. Because.

Because we have to?

Because we don’t want to fail?
Because everyone else can handle all this, and sometimes more, so I should, too?

So I do, until a recent chilly winter day at the tail end of the kids Christmas vacation, I was struggling to get my work done so I can make it to the grocery store and back before dinner time. The kids were fighting and my list had gone missing… and when I’m finally – keys in hand – ready to leave, a condescending voice complains that I neglected to warm up the car AGAIN.  And that little thread I was hanging starts to unravel.

I remote started the truck as the cold winter walls and closed up windows of my home started creeping in, and wondered “why is it so effing hot in here!”  Looking for an escape, I “hid” sitting on the edge of the tub in the locked bathroom, silent, hot tears running down my face – meltdown eminent.

After a few minutes and deep breaths, I felt better –  grabbed some TP and cleaned up what was left of my eyeliner before emerging to a worried daughter that offered to spend part of her gift card to buy me some coffee at Starbucks, and a sweet hug from a 5 year old as he says “Love you Mama” in a way I never want to stop hearing. 

Their love and need strengthen me, enough – maybe, to swing my foot to the side of that cliff and catch my toe on the edge of a laundry basket giving me just enough leverage to push myself back up on to the top of the pile seconds before that thread gives way.

I don’t want help. 
I don’t need help. 

I just need perspective -  a way to level wobbly Mt. Obligation to make that helpless melt down feeling a little less likely.   A new way to look at not just my to-do list, but the season.

Nothing gives you more perspective than dangling from the edge of your sanity.  For the to do list -  my game plan is prioritizing the obligations in to what I MUST do, what I SHOULD do and, finally, what I MIGHT do, making that mountain into a series of rolling hills that are far less likely to drop me into a crazed oblivion.

Managing the season will be a little tougher.  I’ve never been a winter girl. I’d much rather trade the sleds and snowmobiles for blankets and books – but after a few days of not being out of the house, hibernation in your cozy home cave can start feeling a bit like being trapped in a cage.  I think my fix is to float some life rafts on to my calendar – a night out here, an activity there, an event or two to look forward too. 

 It’s bound to be harder than it sounds, but the result will be more of the me I want to be.  And… it’ll probably save me a bunch of money on TP and eyeliner.  

Crash Test Mommy

Crash Test Mommy Driver's License Pic :)

It’s almost 9PM as I plop down on the couch for the first time that day without something I HAVE to do.  As I zone out looking at the ceiling, the only uncluttered space in the house, a Acura commercial comes on.  A researcher is testing vehicle safety, placing dummies in a car, but this time they look like him and his family.  You can see the concern on his face as they barrel toward the wall.  A striking commercial for sure, but I was struck by the “Mom”.  I could relate to her. How many times have I felt myself, metaphorically, racing toward a wall – a crash test mommy.

My walls are a less obvious than the steely one in the commercial, adorned with warning symbols and caution tape.  Mine are the deadlines, events and obligations that dot my calendar, or sometimes the pressure I impose on myself to be the parent I think I’m supposed to be.

There is no formal training to be a mom.  No Bachelors in Momology or Master in Mommyhood. You can learn what you see from your parents, friends, and long winded parenting self help books, but we’re all alone in applying that knowledge and the results are sometimes less than desirable.

By some miracle, I’ve avoided an all out collision with one of these walls.  But I can’t count the number of times the fenders have been bendered. 

The whole purpose of being a crash test dummy, or mommy, is to collect data to improve performance, right?  Or at the very least, find the lowest possible acceptable level you can maintain without people wondering if they should call in professional help. So far the crash test mommy data has uncovered some interesting discoveries:

 1.        Laundry creates a soft landing.
If something has got to give, it’s going to be laundry.  The kids can wear mismatched socks and “flood’s coming” jeans – although preferably not together, for obvious reasons. And no one will die if they have to wear the same PJs three days in a row. 

2.       Don’t work so hard on dinner.
Sure, occasionally I want to make a prep heavy, “nice” dinner – lasagna, meatloaf, roast with taters and gravy, baked chicken etc., but don’t do it for the sake of the children.  They’ll always be more excited to see pizza, tacos or hamburgers on the table.

3.       The little things are way more important than the big things.
If you mess up and disappoint your kid during a holiday or birthday, it’ll sting and you’ll feel the impact of it like that steel wall, but the kids will move on in a matter of moments.  However, if you consistently fail on a small thing: bedtime snuggles, the note in the lunch box, or forgetting to get the granola bars they like in three consecutive visits to the store. You may think it’s a not big deal (or even notice the mistake) but the kid will feel forgotten.

4.       Plans are for amateurs.
But old habits die hard, so I still waste time trying to control the uncontrollable with detailed, timed, list inspiring plans, only to have them run over by that car I’m trapped in.  Plans are like the toddler’s security blanket clutched so tightly until he notices everyone else is off having a wildly fun time.  So he leaves the blankey lying on the ground by his overturned sippy cup and joins in.  The plans just need to be forgotten.

5.       Work: But did you die?
Sure it’s embarrassing to perform below your abilities at work, especially when others notice, but usually (in most professions) even messing up a project in every way possible won’t result in your demise.  Sometimes good enough is good enough.  You can always try selling the mess up as “thinking outside the box”.   Managers love that.  Of course some professionals (doctors, pilots, cops etc) should ignore this completely and absolutely not mess up.

When it comes to those walls that keep appearing as I’m flying through life at a 100MPH, I wonder who’s got it out for me. Then I realize, I can only blame myself:

The person who would rather paint 210 Dalmatian spots on a white sweat suit and sew a fleece headband with ears (finishing seconds before he has to leave for school) to make my youngest’s Halloween costume, than shell out $20 for the Disney version.  The person who likes to make pizza from scratch rather than buy the $3.99 frozen version.  Or write notes for every lunch box, every day, or give into the begging child that wants to do one more after school activity, or insist on going a bit nuts with the cake and décor for the kids birthdays.  It’s all on me.

This afternoon the kids and I were talking about what we should make for Christmas cookies and treats – now I have a list of caramels, two kinds of truffles, 4 kinds of cookies, and a handful of other must make Christmas treats – all to be made in the next three weeks.  I can feel the acceleration already.

It’s okay to want to try and be the best at work and home.  It’s okay to load up the calendar and only get a chance to breathe at 9 o’clock in the evening… as long as you get a chance to enjoy all the effort you put into all that you do. 

Just over the horizon I can see the next wall being built.  In couple weeks the chaos of Christmas, with its last minute shopping, baking and wrapping, will be in full swing.  At this point I can only hope to avoid a full on crash into that festive wall, and instead, maybe land on a nice, soft, heaping pile of dirty laundry.  The truffles will make it all worthwhile.   

Dad's a Wonderful Guy

My Dad and I as Beetlejuice
for Halloween in the late 80's

"Dad's a Wonderful Guy!" "Dad's a Wonderful Guy!" That's what he would make us yell, his very own version of "Mercy!" during tickle fights, whisker burn, or my favorite, the "stop hitting yourself" game where he'd control our arms and make us bonk ourselves on the head, all in good fun. No amounts of "Stop! I'm going to pee my pants!" or "I think I'm going to puke!" shouted through fits of giggles would release us.

And it’s true, my Dad is a wonderful guy.  He’s also hilarious, a great storyteller, a hard worker, critical thinker and so much more, it only made sense to share a bit of my appreciation for my pop on Father’s Day.

My Dad was outnumbered from the start, having three girls to deal with before he finally got a boy.  But he didn’t let us be prissy girls and some of my fondest memories are of my Dad packing up all of us kids and taking us to fish off the shore on Bald Eagle Lake.  He taught us how to cast, bait our hooks, even dig a hook out of a fish’s gut.  And when we were old enough, about 11 or 12, he taught us how to clean them. Skills I don’t use often enough lately, but I’m still grateful for them.  

At about that age we got to cut down little trees with handsaws at our family’s tree farm, drag them to a brush pile and in the cleared areas, plant hundreds of little Black Walnut saplings. It was hard work, but pretty cool to see a forest that we planted.  He’d take us to the park to practice basketball in the small indoor court, which was usually occupied by a half dozen tall black guys playing full court, most under 6 foot white guys with 3 or 4 kids in tow would have been nervous about asking them to share the court, and they weren’t going to unless you pushed the issue, but not my Dad.  Us kids would spend the next hour or so practicing lay ups and free throws while my Dad impressed anyone watching by hitting three point and half court shots, we also learned you have to ask for what you want, and a confidence goes a long way.

My Dad was always serious about us trying and doing our best, when we played softball he’d be out in the yard playing catch with us, or the whole family would hit the park to bat and field.  In school A+’s were a must, and boy, we tried.  We all did well, even if it wasn’t all A+’s, but Dad never let us get too proud of ourselves, he was kind of our anti-ego.  He always thought we could do better, and because of that we always tried.  It may seem a bit harsh, but if you think you’re the best, you might use it as an excuse to stop learning and growing.

My Dad was in charge of teaching us about all things with wheels, I remember vividly trying to learn how to ride a bike.  We lived on a busy road in St. Paul and our backyard sloped down to our garage.  We spent many a terrified, tearful try rolling accelerating (without even having to pedal) toward the man door of the garage as we tried to learn to ride, I think that was called motivation.  Years later he taught me how to drive, the terror was all his this time, 20 years later he’ll still bring up our death-defying trip to my first drivers test, when I took a 25MPH clover leaf exit at 60MPH on two wheels.  Not sure what the big deal was…we made it just fine, didn’t quite pass my test though.

I inherited a lot from my Dad, I remember being 8 years old, standing the length of the kitchen from my parents trying to read a box of Raisin Bran and discovering I had my Dad’s bad eyesight. I spent the rest of my childhood wearing chunky, plastic framed glasses looking like an animated cartoon bug.

I also got his sense of fun and humor, from making up silly songs, to teasing the kids.  You haven’t heard “Tip toe through the tulips” until you’ve heard my Dad sing it.  He also has his own “special” (loud and crazy) way to sing Happy Birthday to the grand kids.  Every once in a while, a quiet afternoon would erupt into full blast “Black Magic Woman” by Santana and “Hair” by the Cowsills when my Dad decided to put his old records on, and us kids thought it was the coolest thing ever.

I also inherited my Dad’s ability to worry oneself sick, as evidenced by my acid reflux and TUMS soaring stock prices.  In the pre-cell phone era, my sister and I worked. I was at a grocery store and my sister at Kmart, just up the road.  My sister didn’t drive, so I was often her ride.  One night I got off at 9PM and because my sister wasn’t done until 10PM I just hung out for a bit.  My Dad, expecting us home shortly after 9PM went into panic mode and decided to go out looking for us. By the time he got to Kmart we were already on our way home, safe and sound.  He didn’t have to worry so much, we were good kids.  And we’d do anything to avoid a vein bulging, butt chewing from Dad. 

While I don’t have a bulging forehead vein, I hope, I realized I had my Dad’s temperament the day I heard myself yelling about tiny scraps of paper, one of his biggest complaints. The paper was the kind that falls off the edge of a sheet of notebook paper when you pull it free from the wire.  Trying to keep the house clean with a pack of kids is nearly impossible, and I started to see scraps of paper everywhere.  They must be invisible to kids, I never noticed them when I was young and my kids sure don’t see them.  I had to laugh and call my dad to tell him I could finally see the little scraps of paper.

My Dad’s also the perspective behind my politics, although he’s never preached to us, he’d just point us in the direction of the information and let us come up with our own conclusions.  He still sends us articles to read, and if ever the subject comes up on the phone, the next hour and a half is always an impromptu “solve the world’s problems” brain storming session.

You know how they say “Work smart, not hard”?  My Dad works smart and hard, which rubbed off on all of us kids, we don’t make excuses when there is a job to be done.  He’s also a handyman; an electrician by trade, but a mechanic, plumber, and contractor when need be.  He added on to our childhood homes so each of us could have our own rooms, he made us all dressers, one of which is still used by my daughter today.  Now that he’s retired, he takes requests, making toy-sized wooden garages for my boys, a baby cradle for all the granddaughters, picnic tables for each of us and more.

As I see my husband try to balance work with time for the kids, I realize the struggle my Dad endured to make sure we had a great dad and role model, and that we were prepared for the world when it was time to take it on ourselves.

He even found a little fun in that preparation, when it was time to head off to college, my Dad did the “here’s how to check oil/fill washer fluid/change tire” refresher course. He also put a bucket in the trunk with supplies we may need: sand, tire gauge, air pump, rag, etc.  It was only after I had been gone awhile that I went to check the oil and found the rag was an old pair of his tighty whities, which were only made more hilarious with a big brown streak of oil on them.

You should meet my Dad, he’s a funny, smart, strong, wonderful guy. Thanks Dad, for all you do and all you’ve taught me over the years!

Building Character One Crappy Parenting Moment at a Time.

I think most of us start out thinking we are going to really ace this parenting thing.  How hard could it be?  You just have to love them and teach them right from wrong and they'll turn out perfect, right? But that first sleepless night when your darling infant refuses to accept love, and pleading, and endless boob as a good enough reason to go to sleep, you may have realized this wasn't going to be a piece of cake.

The slow-learner parents might not realize this until a year and a half later when their angry toddler refuses to take "no" for an answer and an epic battle of wills follows, ending with a sobbing heap of parent and a giggling toddler flinging applesauce and eating those smelly fruit puff things, because... well, because the winner in a battle of wills is the one without the to-do list.

Over my past decade of parentdom, there have been many times when, my child(ren) refuse to accept my wise guidance, my incessant pleading, or loud - dare I say - yelled instructions, and I've said and done things that I wish I could take back or do-over.  Many of those times, the kids have deserved a do-over.  But there is no pause or rewind in parenting, and maybe in the minor ways that is for the best.

I was pondering this the other day, as I often ponder things.  After a not so "gold star" mom moment, I thought, wouldn't it be great if time could be returned, like the ill-fitting pair of jeans I impulsively pulled off the clearance rack and bought without trying on first?  You could just grab your receipt for a crappy parenting moment and Father Time would pony-up a few fresh minutes that you could use a little wiser, or a little nicer?

But nothing is so simple... here's where this blog turns into more of a story... [roll dream sequence footage here... everything is wavy, and there are chimes!]

An old man sits behind a simple counter with a small cash register.  His face is a web of wrinkles carved so deep into his flesh you wonder if they hurt.  A beard, frizzled and white, falls from his face, ending somewhere behind the counter, just barely revealing the ironic "Got Time?" logo on his standard issue customer service polo shirt.

As I approach the counter I can see that while time has left its mark on his skin, hair and stature, it has spared his eyes, which remain bright and wise and kind.

He watches as I place my purse on the counter, waiting.

I feel a bit nervous and stumble over my words as I dig through my purse.  "I'd like to return some time", I say, "Can I return some time?"

"Depends", replies the Old Man, "If it was truly poorly spent, I'd consider it, I suppose."

I pull out the first receipt, "Oh.." I say, "this was one of many times where I had to work and the kids were bored, If I had this time back, I'd spend it doing something they'd enjoy, or maybe something educational?"

The Old Man studies the receipt and passes it back to me.  "I can't return this." He explains, "this was educational.  Your children learned that life isn't always fun and games but it takes work and dedication.  That's a valuable lesson they're learning."

"Okay." I say skeptically, "I understand, but what about this..." I pull out another receipt, a long one. "This is all the times my children have hurt themselves in some minor way, and I told them to "walk it off" or "you'll live".  Surely I should have been more of a doting mother, tending to every paper cut and scratch, right?"

The Old Man laughed, "Did they live?"

"Yes."

"Then they learned that they can pick themselves up when they fall. You can't always be there for them.  You don't really want to return that do you?" he asks.

"No, I suppose not."  I agree.  I dig through my purse determined to find some time he'd return.

"Oh! This one!  You've got to agree this one is bad, I burdened the kids with a problem that was above their age range." I explain, "Money, house, car, people issues, I've probably given them too much information regarding all of them!"

The Old Man thinks for a moment, I thought I had finally got one, until he slid the receipt back across the counter.  "No." he says, "Of course it's not ideal to make kids worry about grown up things, but none of these are out of their realm of understanding, and a little reality when they are little will make a lot of reality easier for them to handle when they are grown."

I frown. Man this old guy is tough! Frustrated, I start lining up my remaining receipts, "What about this one?  The time I didn't take time to admire their art work?  Or this one, my poor kid had a nervous breakdown at the table when I made him eat his peas?  Or this - when I didn't let my daughter go to a party and it broke her heart?  You've got to admit these are..."

"Not returnable." He interrupts, pointing at each receipt he explains, "When you didn't have time to look, he had time to be proud of himself without others approval, and this one, well... peas are good for you..."

"That's what I said!"

"And this one? There are other parties right?"

I nod.

"And she learned that missing out on a little fun here and there isn't the end of the world."

"Right, Okay..." I say, "but, I saved the worst for last...."

"Alright." says the Old Man, "Let's see it."

I gingerly pull the last receipt from my bag and slide it across the counter. "This happens more than I'd like to admit."  Feeling ashamed I explain.  "I often can't shake a bad mood and it effects the way I treat people, including my kids.  If the work is piling up, or I have an annoying client hounding me, or nothing is getting done around the house, I get short tempered and snappy and have literally  no patience for what is really normal kid behavior.  No amount of taking deep breaths seems to help and I feel terrible for my tone and attitude when they deserve better."

"I see." says the man looking at the receipt.  He opens a drawer behind the counter and takes out a pen.  Finally! I think. At least I'll get a second chance to right this wrong.

Taking his time he scribbles something on the receipt and slides it back to me.  Before he removes his hand he asks "Do your children know you love them?"

I nod.  He releases the receipt and I read what he's written.  In shaky old man handwriting I see "No Returns. All Time is Final."

I look up at him confused and a little annoyed.

"Every day I sit at this desk and decline those who want to turn back the clocks, my clocks." he says.

"But... but why do you have a return desk?"

"Because," he explains.  "its important to review your life's moments, especially the ones you're not proud of, so that you can learn from them and decide how you'll react when you encounter those situations again in the future."

I nod.

"And," he continues, "most often the moments you feel you're failing as a parent are the moments your kids are learning the most valuable lessons.  They can learn their ABCs and 123s from anyone, but they need to learn the hardest lessons in the safety of love."

They need to learn the hardest lessons in the safety of love.

"Their trust and belief in your unconditional love lets them see past the tone that comes with your bad mood.  It teaches them empathy... and," he says with a chuckle "when to run their little butts to their room and quickly clean it before mom really blows her top."

I smile.

"The best parents not only worry about their mistakes, but they own them.  Take time after the moment has passed to explain or apologize and in return teach your children the most important lesson, that being perfect is not possible, but being accountable is."

As I stand there wrapping my mind around his wisdom, the old man starts to fade away, before he's gone he says "Your flaws build their character."

[Insert wavy coming out of a dream sequence and chimes here]

Our flaws build their character.

Imagine how little the child of a perfect parent would know.

Trying to be the best parent is still the goal, of course, but when I inevitably mess up, I don't need to save the receipt in hopes that I can get a re-do on that moment someday.  I can own it. I can explain it and I can apologize when necessary.  Saying "sorry" doesn't fix mistakes, but explaining them builds a base of understanding.  With that base, my kids will learn compassion, empathy and a way to understand people, not by what their actions are, but why they do those actions. And hopefully, this knowledge will help them to grow up to be better parents, and people, than we are.

My Mom is...Magic

When you’re a kid it’s easy to name the best qualities of your mom.  Usually they are scrawled in crayon on Mother’s Day projects sent home with your first grader or kindergartner.  Simple things like “she’s nice”, “she’s funny”, “she helps me”, or “she’s a good cooker” as my youngest says.  As you get older it gets harder to put into words what makes your mom great, because it’s less about what she can do and more about what she has done for you – how she made you great.

It's impossible to describe with words the amazing lady who made me.   I have one of those moms that’s good at everything, which makes it a real challenge to be “just like mom”.   She reminds me of Barbara Eden on “I Dream of Jeannie”.  Whatever you need she can wiggle her ears (instead of her nose) and get it done.

My mom raised four kids too, except she had three girls and one boy.  We were fairly confident kids, we new mom was there, but never overbearing.  I don’t ever remember my mom complaining either, even though I’m sure we were worth a “good long complain” a few times a week.

She taught us early how to do the dishes, sweep the floors and do our own laundry.  Maybe it’s because I have more boys, but I haven’t been as lucky in teaching mine.  They love to do the chores, but if left unsupervised, they go a bit overboard – using a quarter inch of water to clean the floor, or a half bottle of dawn just to rinse the dishes before they go in the dishwasher, and at least 18 paper towels to clean up the smallest spill.

My mom had patience beyond what I can muster.  As she created craft sale items, she’d set us up to make our own little projects – decorative pins, hair bows, painted things, boo boo bunnies, and she’d let us sell them at the show and keep the money.  I still drag out the a good ol’ glue gun and a tin of buttons to make a masterpiece or two with the kids, but when a button ends up glued to the table, and the tin gets tipped, spilling the rest to the floor, I’d rather call it quits than laugh it off.   She always let us decorate the cookies for the holidays, and painstakingly paint molds with candy melts to make fancy Christmas chocolates. She’d even put the splotchy, hideous ones we made out on the tray for Grandma’s house, so we could show them off.

My mom taught me the right way to play with your food – like creating pancakes in any shape we can imagine.   I’ve gotten pretty good at making pancake snowmobiles, 4-wheelers and princess crowns. I also remember all of us kids crowding around her, mesmerized as Mom carved a watermelon into an animal shaped fruit bowl and hand-decorated whatever we wanted on our birthday cakes.

Mom is quite the seamstress, making us clothes when we were little, as well as Halloween costumes, and  holiday dresses – letting us pick our own patterns and fabrics at the fabric store.  She even made our school uniforms and my wedding dress and all my bridesmaids’ dresses.

She walked me through crocheting a dress for my baby doll when I was about 12.  Taught me how to sew, cook, balance a checkbook, and even got us “jobs” at her jobs – mostly filing - during our Christmas and Spring breaks, but we loved feeling so responsible.

I realize now how my mom could have done things easier and faster by herself, but she always took the time, as excruciating as it might have been, to let us do and learn. I forget to do this sometimes, when dinner is already late, or I have a million things to accomplish and not a million hours to do them .  But the best way to learn is to do and my mom did this well – she continues her admirable patience with the grandkids now, letting them each add their ingredient to the pancake batter and mix it in, when she could just dump them all in at once.

Even now that we’re grown, my Mom is always there for us. In college my laptop wasn’t working and was sent in to be repaired.  When Best Buy wouldn’t fess up to what happened to it, it was gone longer than it should have been, and multiple visits to pick it up only resulted in lies and excuses,  my mom went to the customer service desk and in her perfected Queen Bee tone, told them they were producing my computer or getting me a new one.  After scaring the pants off the poor service guy, he confessed my computer was being held hostage due to a bankruptcy at the company that was supposed to repair it and I walked out of there with a new computer.  I must learn this skill!

And when my first child was born, she came to help for a few days, it was such a relief to have a pro on-site when you’re worried about doing everything wrong.   She came for the next three arrivals too, watching the siblings-to-be and keeping them busy when I came home with a new little one.  She stayed only a few days, as we settled into a new routine.  Then she’d float away like Mary Poppins leaving a well-prepared house behind.  I shed a few tears each time she left.  Partly hormones, I’m sure, but mostly because I was so grateful to have a mom willing to give not just her time, but care, comfort, and a clean house, at a time when I couldn't really give anything in return (unless you count the new grandchild).  And she always made it look so easy.  I hope I can return that favor to my kids someday.

Maybe the best way to describe my Mom is “Magic”.  I’m in the midst of this mom thing and I’m still not sure how the trick works. But I’m getting an idea.  As parents we have an audience all the time.  We are the show, and our biggest fans, who may occasionally get a little rowdy and throw tomatoes, are mostly mesmerized by what we moms can do.

The magic of mommyhood isn’t from fairy dust or some lucky kid rubbing a lamp to find an ear-wiggling genie.  It’s love.  Plain and simple.  It’s love in every handmade Halloween costume and decorated birthday cake.  In every time I didn't have to eat the Lima Beans.  And that night we spent changing each other’s scribbles into pictures.  In every time I pick up a crochet hook, sewing needle or spatula and think “my mom taught me this”.  And, when I sing to my kids and remember all of us in the living room singing “Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree”, trying to get my little brother, Ricky, to fall asleep.  Your actions, patience and all the effort you put into teaching us was the best kind of love, and it made us the capable and maybe even a little bit magical adults we are today.

Thanks Mom, for being “magic” for me, and now the grandkids. I’m still mesmerized