themomazone

I do love kids. I think that children are the funniest people on the planet. Old people are hilarious because they don’t give a crap anymore about offending anyone. Children are hilarious because they don’t know they are offending or embarrassing anyone. They just observe and speak… crazy funny things.

I always knew I wanted to be a mom. I was never a person that was on the fence about having kids. If my husband said he didn’t want kids it would have been a deal breaker and he would have been, “that guy I briefly dated before I got married and had kids”. However, I have to say, and I know this won’t win me a lot of people over. I dislike Newborns. There. I said it. Newborns stink. Literally. They are sweet and cuddly and all for about 20 seconds and then they puke or poop on you. Newborns can’t do anything for themselves. You basically have to rip their arm out of socket just to get them in and out of the onesies. It’s insane. They are all work. ALL work. They require someone to provide all their food, and all their transportation. They even require someone to get them from the belly to their back. Talk about needy! And when you do they don’t throw out a, “Hey Mom, you’re the best. Love ya”. Nope, because they don’t even talk. They don’t even SMILE at you for the longest time! Unless they are farting in their sleep. Then they smile away as to say, “There sucker. Got ya. Now take care of me some more”. Newborns are just there. That’s it. Sitting in their blob state waiting for you to mess up.

Give me a good 1 year old. That is toddling and stacking blocks. Give me a 3 year old that can run and give me sassy face. That’s my kind of kid. I love talking to kids like they are grownups. Like asking on Friday at the playground, “So whatcha doing this weekend, yardwork or maybe your taxes?” and see them seriously say, “No, I’m going to be busy watching Disney channel and eating Goldfish, maybe playing in the sprinkler” Because to them that is their job. And it is an important job. Being a kid is rough business.

When there is a new baby around I always hear something holding the baby and say, “Doesn’t this make you want to have another one?” and my reply is, “HHHhhhhhheeeeeeelllllll no”. I will hold your little cutie until it fills it’s pants and then I am going to hand it over and go home and sleep… ALL night, with no interruptions. When I hear a newborn cry, you know that special little cry only tiny babies make, I can feel my ovaries shriveling up and trying to repel themselves from my body. And as they jump they are screaming, “You are NOT doing this to me again!” I am getting a niece soon and I am so looking forward to it. To see hold her and kiss her and buy her cute frilly little outfits but I am looking forward to MORE is enjoying a newborn while someone else feeds, diapers, changes and washes the frilly little outfits. When my niece is 2, my brother will have to keep me from kidnaping her, but while she’s a newborn, she’s safe at his house.

I will walk past rooms at my children’s preschool and see children desperately clinging to their mother’s legs, screaming, “NOOO MOOOOMMMMY”.  I have seen a mother try to push her child out of the car at carpool only for the child to pull a Garfield move and use every limb to keep them inside the car.  These kids want to be with their moms.  School Schmool.  Mommy is the bee’s knees apparently.

Here’s what goes down when I take my kids to school.  We get out of the car, I open their door. BOOM – they race, through traffic and hurdling over smaller children…. GET ME TO SCHOOL.  Screw the backpack, I’ll scrounge off what the other kids don’t eat for lunch. I don’t care, just let me get to school!  Mom SUCKS.  School rocks.  You know what Mom?  Don’t even walk me in… I’ve GOT this.   Just slow the car down to a crawl and I’ll do the tuck and roll.

I remember the first day of preschool for my oldest.  I had cried for days before.  I was letting go of my first baby.  This was the only time I had left her with anyone except her Grandparents and Aunts/Uncles.   I took her in with a soothing voice and ready to give lots of hugs and wipe away tears.  Instead, she turned around and marched into class and gave me the behind-the-back “you can GO now” wave.  WHAT?  I have fed, dressed, supported, and loved you for four years and a woman with a sand table and crayons has lured you away?  What the heck?  Instead my husband had to deal with the mess of me crying my eyes out.

All my children are like this… running in the opposite direction as I do.  Forget Mom, there are more exciting things around.  The Director of my children’s school supportively said that it’s a good thing.  That I have raised confident and capable children, kids that know they will be okay without me.  I think this is her very nice way of saying, “Yea, your kids just don’t like you very much.”

And it’s true!  My kids don’t like me as well as other people because I tell them NO.  I don’t want to be my kid’s friend.  Not right now.  Sure when you are married and out of the house, we can go shoe shopping and have lunch.  Right now, you are a kid.  I am the Mom.  Why would you like me?  I make you be nice, pick up after yourself, eat well, tell the truth, do homework, follow rules, cross the street holding hands, go to time-out when you break a rule, go to the doctor, take medicine, brush your teeth, go to bed…. WHY one Earth would you like me?  I am like a General around here.  General Mom.  I don’t expect you to like me.  I wouldn’t like me.

A fellow mom who has a child in Madie’s class asked at the beginning of the year if I thought Madie’s teacher was strict.  I had no clue, so I asked Madie.  She told me to define, “Strict”.  I said, “You know, has a lot of rules and high expectations.”  Madie didn’t even take time to think, “No.  She isn’t as strict as YOU.”  Yep.  This is why you love school.

I would call myself a “mean Mom”.  And I don’t mean in a bad way.  I hold my kids to high standards.  Not unreasonable but high.  I don’t ask my children to do something they are not mature enough to do. I have realistic expectations.  But the things that I know you are capable of doing… will be done.  Period.  This is why….  NO ONE likes a bratty kid.  Not even OTHER kids!  No one likes a kid that whines and cries and pitches a big fit.  No ones likes a friend that comes to play at their house and trashes their room and doesn’t offer to clean up.  Everyone responds to a sweet talker.  Everyone is more inclined to help a child with good manners. Everyone responds to a friend that is there to help and is kind to everyone. And my kids know it’s important to respect those who have been there before you, ones that can give you advice and help you along the way. Listening to others can get you to where you want to go.   My kids will be kids of those virtues or else….. or else they will be sent to time out and tickled until they wet their pants There.  (and then reminded that they are greatly loved and learning from your mistakes is a hard lesson).

So this is a warning that if you send your kid to a play date at my house, don’t expect me to bend the rules.  The other day a little friend was playing at our house and asked to do something and I said, “Sorry sweetie, we can’t do that” and she asked the no-good answer, “but WHY?” to which I kindly responded, “Because I am the grownup and I said NO.”  You could see my kids in the background shaking their heads and mouthing, “Ewwww,  rookie move”.

And if my child is at your house and pulls a stinker move… I hope you return the favor.

My husband and I are very different. Different as night and day… the stuff of which Paula Abdul songs are made of.  He is very VERY competitive.  I am love playing the game… as long as everyone follows the rules. I am a stickler with rules.  I love rules. (shockingly, my husband loves breaking a good rule) My children are all totally competitive like their dad.  The way to get them to do ANYTHING is to tell them it’s a race and they can win.  The person who picks up the most toys wins… boom.  Clean room in under 30 seconds.  I love and hate that about my kids.  I love that they think they are capable, that they are ready and willing to show you their best…. But I shudder at class parties when I see the fire in Madie’s eyes to win “hot potato”.  It’s freakin’ hot potato… let it go sister… this is not a contact sport!

On the other hand, I think we have gotten too crazy with this “everybody wins” crap.  Cause you know what?  I hate to be the one to break it to you but everyone doesn’t win.   I don’t worry about my kids when they don’t “win”.  Welcome to life…. You can’t always be the best at everything.  A few years ago, I signed up my two girls to play soccer at the “Y”.  Madie played her little heart out every game, Riley sat on the side and ate orange slices and picked flowers. Madie was plain pissed that her trophy was the EXACT same as her sister’s.  She said, “She didn’t even play half the games”.  I agree.  You ran your butt off every game in 90 degree heat.  You should have a bigger trophy!  When did we get this mentality?  When did we decide that it would mentally crush our children if they didn’t win and weren’t be recognized for their mediocrity ALL THE TIME.  In 20 years, when they are at a job interview, they are not going to call 20 people in and clap their hands and say, “YEEEAAA guys, great effort, you ALL get the job”.  That is going to be a harsh reality for a kid who for 20 years has been told they are amazing at everything.  They are going to be sitting in their childhood bedroom at home at age 23, surrounded by years of soccer and t-ball trophies wondering why someone didn’t think they were the bee’s knees.

One year Madie played soccer in a “positive” league.  There were these rules for spectators.  You can’t scream anything negative.  I totally agree with people not screaming, “Hey dumb ass, you missed the ball” but they didn’t want us to say, “No the OTHER way!” when our kids were making a goal for the other team. Instead we were supposed to say, “Excellent effort.  A+, you are a rock star” or whatever.    It made me so nervous I would not say something in the “guided cheers” section that I didn’t say anything.  We also were not allowed to keep score and were persuaded when asked by our children to say, “I don’t know the score, the point is to have fun”.  Madie never even asked, she plain TOLD me, “We won 11-2”.  TRUST ME, she was keeping score.

I feel like while we are working so hard to shelter our children from harm, we are really doing them a disservice.  If not now, when is the good time for your child to learn that they can’t always excel at everything.  Children, more than anyone, are resilient.  Someone can tease them and they laugh along,  Someone can stop being their friend and the next day on the playground, they have found a new BFF.  I know few adults that can do that.  Kids brush things off.  Sure they may cry at first and be upset, but they go to sleep and wake up bright eyed, with all possibilities in front of them, ready to tackle the day.    It’s beautiful.  Kids are strong.  We surely don’t give them enough credit.

My mom has her sayings, one of them was, “who promised you fair?”  You never went to my mom whining, “That isn’t FAIR!”  She would say, “Well I never promised you fair, go to the person who did and tell them.”  Life isn’t fair, it’s plain not.   All you can do is roll with the punches.  And if that means my kid doesn’t get a soccer trophy for coming in 40^th place, I am okay with helping them work through that.

I don’t mean to toot my own horn… but here we go BEEP BEEP beep beep.  I used to be a smart person. I swear.  I was Literature Baccalaureate Student of the year for my graduating class in college.  There was only one chosen… it was just  me.  Just one. My professor  (who got her doctorate from Yale at 26) wrote a speech in which she said I had, “serious ideas about literature”.   We had our picture made together while I accepted my award.  I had professors used to write in the margins of my papers, “Publish this!”.  I, being a silly college student, thought they were just trying to be nice.   Now that I am an idiot, I realize they were being serious.

So shortly after graduating, I became a Mom.  I am not saying being a Mom is not a rewarding job.  When my children remember to say “please” and “thank you”, I pat myself on the back.  When they remember their “yes ma’am” and “no sir’s”, I reward myself with cake.  (don’t tell my trainer).  Being a Mom is hard.  Seriously hard.  But I am pretty sure a trained monkey could make my kids breakfast, pack their lunches, and get them to school.  My. Mind. Is. Going. To. Mush. If dinner was on the table and laundry was done… my family wouldn’t even notice if it was me or the trained monkey (I gotta FIND me one of those).

I used to relish in Shakespeare and metaphysical poetry.  Now I read Dr. Suess and the ingredients on cereal boxes.   What happened to me?  I am pretty sure I used to be smart.  Emphasis on the “pretty sure”.

My son was watching Diego the other day and I remember thinking, “River dolphins turn pink with age… hmmm THAT is interesting”.   Yea…NO it’s not.  I am getting my freakin’ facts from Diego!!!!  Diego is an animated 7 year old that plays in a fake rain forest.  Not a good source of credible material.  GET IT TOGETHER LADY!  Why ohhhhh WHY do I now find Diego insightful?

Basically I have mental white noise.  Going through the mommy paces while my mind is doing the fuzzy dots.  Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

I plan on going back to work when all my children are in school.  That is if I don’t publish a book and therefore I am on my book tour and unable to hold a 9-5 (okay you can stop laughing now)  I am so fearful of going on a job interview.  Seriously I can see it now…. “How do you think you could handle a work place conflict?” (Me not being in a job interview in 10 years)  “Weeeeelllllll, I am not that sure, but if I have learned anything from Phineas and Ferb it’s that……blah blah blah”  Oh my GOD!  I am going to reference Phineas and Ferb in job interviews, I just KNOW IT!  Please pray for me… now.

I seriously don’t know what happened to me.  Pre-child me is being stored in the attic with my college papers discussing the jester in King Lear as not being a real character at all but really Lear’s talking subconscious.  Current me is thinking, “Damn, are we out of juice boxes?”

Our oldest daughter is what I like to call, “dark and twisty”.  Her favorite movie is Tim Burton’s version of Alice in Wonderland.  You know, the freaky one with Johnny Depp.  She talks about death and afterlife with a little excitement.  Death is not frightening to her, but a journey to loved ones that she misses.  Into the arms on her Grandma Rose, she says.  My husband blames me for all the John Donne and George Herbert poetry I read to her in the bathtub when she was an infant.  So be it.  Maybe she’ll get my bug and be a writer.  So far she wants to be a fashion designer and I just don’t know where to file that.  Her first grade teacher is convinced and ready to invest in her first line of clothing.  I am secretly hoping for Poet Laureate.   I would never tell her out loud.  Because then I would be one of those crazy stage moms that lives their dreams through their kids.  And frankly, I am just too tired for that level of intensity.  As long as you don’t move back home with me, be whatever makes you happy and provides decent health coverage.

I think as moms we give up a LOT for the sake of our kids.  I could have been a writer or the White House Press Secretary if I wanted… but instead I am raising responsible, God loving, Mommy fearing kids,  SOOO here I am… reading People Magazine like it’s medieval Lit.  One day, I’ll have my life back.  I can be published at 40 with seriously wonderful kids that are inspired, well mannered, and confident.  I know they will be my best legacy.  Far better than any award, or paper, or job.  But until then if you pass me by in carpool or at the grocery…, could you say, “You is Kind, You is SMART, You is important”…. I would really appreciate that.

You know when you run out of everything in the house…. You know the grocery run that includes everything from paper towels to toilet paper to Fabuloso to ketchup to diapers.  One of those $250 jobbers that makes you think, “What in the HELL did I buy?”  So a couple of Monday’s ago, I had to make that grocery run.  We were down to picking the softest pinecone when we went to the bathroom. It had to be done.  Well with unloading the 14 bags of groceries and all the bulk paper products… and the three year old… I managed to leave one thing in my car.  Well, really two things that I hold dear, my purse… AND my phone.  I never do this.  Seriously I don’t.  I mean if I get 5 minutes to play Bejeweled Blitz, I need my phone handy.  I can’t dress my kids for school in the morning without checking the weather on my phone.  I have an addiction. It’s a problem I am looking into remedying.  In the meantime… expect a text from me.

On that one fateful morning that I did not bring my phone in the house… or immediately remember that I do not have my phone in my pocket,  my daughter decides to pull a cir-de-soli move on the monkey bars.  The famous jump from the 3’ off the ground platform to the second monkey bar.  She had done it hundreds of times before… but on this morning, her luck had run out.  BOOM. Fall. Instant radial and ulnal fracture. Or what they like to call in the ER, the buckle fracture.  My daughter, without one tear in here eye, goes to one of the first grade teachers on the playground and asks if she can sit down because she had hurt her wrist.  She takes her other hand off the “hurt wrist” and immediately the teacher realizes, THIS needs nurse’s attention STAT.  The former orthopedic nurse realizes THIS needs an ER.  Moms phone is getting bombarded with calls and texts.  Mom is at home…. Putting away the 40 rolls of toilet paper she just bought, while her phone is going wild in her purse… in the car.    Thankfully Best Friend that works at the school says, CALL DAD.  Dad gets the call.   Dad happens on a rare occasion to be close to home and come by and nonchalantly says, “Madie hurt her wrist and they want you to go check it out.”  Mom grabs her keys and starts running.  Madie’s school nurse is a no joke nurse.  She doesn’t call with a bump or a bruise or a cough.  Her calls mean say “needs immediate medical assistance”.  I run to the school, 90 to nothing.  It’s a feeling you can’t describe.  Knowing your child is hurt and scared and wanting their mom and you are unloading paper towels and gallon sized ketchup bottles.  How could I have been SO stupid and careless?  I get to the school and blow the 10 mph sign.  I figure this does not apply to mothers of children with bodily injuries.  I run into the school.  In my mind I was sprinting…. But in jeans in ballet flats, probably not.  My bestie is at the door.   She has the “grisly face”.  Like the… I am out of La Crème so we have to drink the cheap stuff face.  But that face has whole new meaning when it comes to the well being of your kid.  She preps me, “It’s going to be okay but she needs to go to the ER.”  I get to the office.  I see instantly everything she has been through in her face… pain, fear, nervousness, relief.  Through the entire thing, Madie has not shed ONE tear.  She is so strong.  I swear she is going to give birth one day and not realize it and be draggin’ that kid by the umbilical cord.  I have no idea how she does it.  She amazes me.  I stub my toe and cry with a whiskey chaser.  She breaks two bones and thinks her teacher could “pop” it into place for her… seriously, she thought her teacher could “put it back” for her.  Love that kid.

So off to the ER we go with an ice pack and a make shift Elementary School nurse splint.

You never know how many bumps and pot holes you hit until you have a child sucking in air in the backseat with a broken arm every time you hit one.  The drive was terrible.  I wanted to get there as quickly as possible… but didn’t want to hurt my child in the process.  We get into the ER quickly.  Ironically, we get the SAME doctor and the SAME examination room where 3 years before Madie had to have a sterling silver ring cut off her finger with a surgical saw because it was cutting off her circulation and she was about to lose it (the finger that is).  I swear if they don’t name that room after us…..

They tell me it has to be set.  They give me the option of general or local anesthesia.  I pick local. They try to set the break 5 different times.  I beg Madie not to watch.  I had to not watch to keep from blowing chunks.  Hearing the clicking of the bones was enough to make me want to toss my cookies.  Madie just kept watching.  After 5 times of stoically observing, she said, “Can we not do that again?”  Holy Moly.  Please!!  I, the Mother, can’t take it anymore!!!   She gets splinted and sent home with a referral.

That night I put her in bed with us. I know it’s crazy, but the idea of not having my child back “in one piece” really did something to my mind.  I had dreams all night of trying to forge things in the garage to get her arm straight.  I just wanted my baby back in one piece.

My brother-in-law gets us into this stellar Orthopedic surgeon that sees us the next morning.  He takes one look at the x-ray and says, “When can we schedule the surgery?” Ummm now …. and never.  I mean I want the kid fixed.  But I was thinking we could go the magic wand route?  No??  No Pixie Dust in this office??? What kind of doctor ARE you??

The next morning we needed to get up at 4 to get to the hospital on time…. My alarm does NOT go off.  It’s like the Seinfield with the marathon runner who sleeps past his alarm. I wake up at 4:40.  We are supposed to be in the Medical Center at 5:30.  Start the crazy running music because we are off!!  I think this was really God’s way of calming me down.  I didn’t have time to think about being nervous or worrying myself to an ulcer.  I only had the time to do what we needed to do.

We got to Children’s Memorial Herman on time. Madie was totally cool with surgery.  She was fine with getting to nap while they fixed her arm.  That was UNTIL she went to pre-op.  The tubes, machines, beds, curtains, hospital gowns…. it was too much.  She looked at me and said just two words, “I’m scared”.  I wanted to break down and cry and say, “MEEEE TOOOOO”.  But I can’t do that.  The last thing they need is two hysterical Hawkins women on their hands.  We have some bones to fix here!!  So I decided to go the distraction route.  I told Madie that when we gets into a really deep sleep, she toots.  I told her I was going to ask her doctor to count how many times she pooted on them.  I was convinced it was going to be over 30 times.  You can always distract a kid with inappropriate potty talk, and Madie fell hook line and sinker.  Then I told her she would probably be hyped up on drugs and moon everyone in the recovery because her hospital gown had a booty opening.  She decided to give a pre-op mooning and told me to take a picture and send it to her Aunt Gigi.  A smile on her face.  For a minute, she forgot she was scared.  I forgot I had banned potty talk in the house.  We were just trying to make it through the scariest time in a long time.

People came to answer questions…. Madie said, “yes Ma’am” to them.  I thought to myself, “Even in her fear, she kept her manners.”  How strange for me to remember that of all things? They told me we had to take out her earrings.  I told them  “No Way”, that just a few days before she had worked up the nerve to get them pierced and they told me they had to stay in 6 weeks.  The doctors told me in the “event” that they had to resuscitate her, she couldn’t have any metal on her body.   I lost my breath and told them to take them out for me.  Couldn’t they just put that in writing?  Like those legal disclosures on ITunes where they say, “Click this box to agree to the terms”.  Let me just click the box.  If I NEVER hear Madie’s name and the word resuscitate  in the same sentence again, that is okay by me.  Just let me click the box.

I couldn’t walk her all the way.  I walked by her bed…. very Grey’s Anatomy style.  I could hear, “How to Save a Life” in the background.  I told her she was brave, I loved her, and I would be right here when she woke up.  Then it came… not because of a fracture, or a trip to the ER, or the 5 attempts at settings, or the trip to the Ortho, or the idea of surgery, but at the idea of being separated from me, the first tear rolled down her cheek.  My heart broke.  I told her she’d be great, that she was the toughest dame I knew.  Her bed went down the hall… I made it all the way to the waiting room before the great flood.  I confiscated the tissue box.   Hell,  I think a nurse threw it at me.  I was a hot mess.  No other way to say it.

Her surgery went without a hitch, her doctor was thrilled, my sweet friend came to bring me a diet Dr. Pepper and hold my hand.  Madie snored in the recovery room for TWO hours before she opened her eyes and asked, “How many times did I toot?”  When they brought her sling to go home she looked at it and asked, “Does this come in different materials?”  I guess black canvas wasn’t working for her.  My fasionista and future Super Model was back in one piece.  Now on to the billing department.  Damn, this kid is getting expensive!!

New parents should be given Miranda Rights in the hospital before they can take the baby home. And it should go something like this, This is a final sale, there is no returns under any circumstances. Anything and EVERYTHING you say will be later repeated to you when you least want to hear it, out of the mouths of minors. Everything you said before walking into this hospital that you said, “I will never say to my children” will not be held against you. You were stupid.

I always wanted to be the mom who never raised her voice, who only constantly said positive and uplifting things to my children, in a hushed tone, and who frowned on those others moms who didn’t do the same. Then I had kids. And well, now I look at those hushed toned, calm moms and think, “Her doctor must have her on the good drugs”. I feel like I am a good mom. First time I ask, “Kids, please put on your shoes.” Second time, “Hey guys, I believe I asked you to put on your shoes please.” Third time, “Dudes. Shoes.” Fourth time, “Shoes. Shoes. Shoes.” Fifth time, “PUT ON YOUR FREAKIN SHOES!” I don’t want to yell, they make me! Why why WHY does it take 5 times to get you to slip on some crocs? My mom NEVER raised her voice to us. I mean I have the memory of an elephant, so I would remember. She never did. But we were exceptionally good children. We never questioned. My mom said, “do this” and we did. If my mom said, “Sit in this corner and I’ll come back and get you” I would still be in that corner TODAY if she hadn’t come back. She called us very compliant children. She calls my children, “Strong willed and NOT compliant”. And it’s true. They are wonderful kids. They just have their own ideas – about ev.ver.re.thing. Sometimes when my Mom helps me with my kids, like giving them a bath, I will hear her scream, “STOP THROWING WATER ALL OVER THE FLOOR” and I know I shouldn’t but I hysterically laugh. It’s not just me. I am not that bad of a Mom. If they can make MY mom yell, they can make Mother Theresa lose it. The worst is when your kids take the things you say, be they good or bad, and use it on you. This week I lost something and Madie told me, “Mom I need you to think, when was the last time you used it?” Dude don’t you think I tried that first? This isn’t like you saying, “I can’t find my other shoe” when you are standing on it! This thing is actually lost. One time, I told Riley I couldn’t find my keys when they were on my finger and she just pointed to them and said, “Really Dude? REALLY??” Okay I now find that is a little irritating when I say that. Mental note, cut out the “really dude”. When Madie was about 2 we were playing a game where we were “taking” each other’s mouths. I would pretend to grab her lips and be her and so I said, “I’m Madie, I’m not picking up my toys and you can’t make me, Hum (pout). I won’t eat anything but gum and ketchup with a spoon. Hum (pout).” Madie got that *oh it’s ON* face and grabbed my lips and said, “You better get in the car RIGHT NOW or I am leaving and I am NOT coming back!” My husband died laughing saying, “Yea that’s you alright”. Ah Dog, for reals. It’s like hearing yourself on an answering machine and you think, “That’s not what I sound like!” But you know it’s what you sound like to everyone else. I was in Panda Express yesterday grabbing food to go and there was a mom and dad with 4 kids. The kids were trying to decide what you order and their parents were frustrated… the line backing up behind them. The kids were asking to try bites of food. One of the kids tried to throw a bite in his mouth steaming hot and spit it out on the tray and said, “This is hot”. The mom replied, “well blow on it ding-dong.” I giggled to myself and thought, “OOOh man that one is going to come back to haunt you.” Good Luck Lady! It’s going to be Christmas morning when you have had 2 hours to sleep and you are on step 30 of 180 for building a lego castle and you will be frustrated and your kid will say, “read the directions, ding-dong.” And what can you say to that?

Some things lately have been popping up, giving me a little nudge, and saying, “hey, you are getting old.”  I think it’s probably all these darn 80’s clothes that are creeping into the stores.  My kids are asking me to buy them the same crap I wore when I was a kid.  If Madie asks me to cut her those crazy huge bangs, I’m putting my foot down. That wasn’t a cute look for anyone.  But I will probably cave on the neon keds with no laces that she has her eye on…. Sigh.  If Town Center gets a Units store, I’m moving.

So since I am seeing fashion come full circle, I am thinking of all the other things from my childhood that my children will never see because they won’t come back into style.

Payphones – seriously my kids have no idea what these things do.  Madie asked how old she had to be to get a phone.  I told her that her Daddy bought me one when we got engaged (to keep tabs on me).  I told her her fiancé might give her one as a present.  She asked why I didn’t get one as a kid and was floored to find… there weren’t any.  Life without a cell phone – CRAZY.   She asked if you could text.  I told her you passed notes.  Floored.  I tried to find a payphone recently when my cell died and I needed to meet someone.  Took a while to find one and when I did a local call cost me a dollar.  A freakin’ dollar!!  I remember when I was in high school, payphones went from 25 to 35 cents.  It was such a drag.  Now you had to carry a quarter and a dime in your pocket.  What a pain!  I had a crappy old car that didn’t run half the time and no cell phone… imagine that?  I turned out fine.

VHS – Tapes.   My kids have no idea.  Screw that, I don’t even think my sister-in-law has seen a Beta.   Poor suckers who bought those Beta machines. I am OLD!  You had that one VHS that you used to tape all your shows.  Your TV VHS.  If you were fancy you had a VCR that had a timer… if not  (like me) you had to push record before you left and fast forward through the 2 hours before that Friends episode you wanted to watch.  My kids will never know to, “Be Kind – Please Rewind”.  How sad is that?

Cassettes – You knew this one was coming.  I was a child in the cassette to CD conversion.  Actually I went from records (not kidding had a Michael Jackson record player with the one silver glove), to cassettes, to CDs.  My sister had Will Smith’s “Parents Just Don’t Understand” and Tiffany’s “I Think We’re Alone Now” on single record.  Those might be collector’s items now.   Who didn’t love getting the mixed tape?  Some friend would make you a tape with a bunch of crazy different songs on it.  You had to time that crap just perfectly or you cut off a good song on the A side.  You can’t just start where you stopped on there on the B side.  Nothing like singing a good jam just to hear the “click”.  Damn A side.   That is one way to mess up a great song.  Turn around… every now and then I get a little bit lone… CLICK.  ARRG! It’s sad that I knew which songs were A sides and B sides.  Third song on the A side of that Heart tape…. That’s my SONG!  My car was from the 80’s so I had a cassette.  I had to purchase that awesome CD converter.  It was like a tape with a cord attached that went to your CD player.  Super High Tech.  I saved up for that sucker.

Clothes Pins – I showed one to my kids and asked them what they were.  They said the things that close the chip bag.  What?  My kids had never hung clothes on the line until we went to Belize and used one for our wet bathing suits and towels.  Madie commented on how handy that things was.  Yea… but not as handy as our gas dryer.   My mom had one of those rotating clothes lines.  The square that turns round and round.  My sister and I had a parachute and swung ourselves around with that on the clothes line… good times.   We didn’t have much money, we had to be creative.

JOYSTICKS – How awesome was Atari?  I mean – which one of you didn’t think you were the pitfall champion of the world?  Those killer graphics.  You know those squares linked together to make swinging vines, that if you missed you fell into the square jaws of killer alligators?  One joystick, one big orange button.  Not A, B, X, Y, Left, Right.  Just one button.  I think my kids would just be amazed that moving the controller around in the air would cause the screen to do… nothing.  They would say it needed more batteries.  They would try to detach the chord.  My family did get a Nintendo pretty early on in the Nintendo life.  My mom had figured out the perfect folded paper, old wooden block combo to hold the game down so it would play correctly.  Pushing it up and down… blowing in it.  Whatever it took to get that Mario baby!

TYPEWRITER – On a recently Antique outing that my husband subjected me and the children to, we ran across a sweet old typewriter.  My kids were entertained the entire decade it took for Dad to “look around” the store.  They were like, “MOM – when you push a button… this thing with the letter on it just POPS UP!”   I told them not to even get Mimi started on typing on carbon paper.  My kids will never know the smell of white out.  That’s bananas.  Madie always asks why I can type so fast.  I learned on a typewriter.  Man that class was loud!  We were eating corn on the cob once and I was trying to be funny… so I made typewriter noises.  Dadadadada (eating corn till the end) CHING. Back to the beginning of the corn.  My kids laughed and then they asked, “what were you trying to be anyway?” Fail.

The worst part is… this is ONLY THE START.  I am just waiting for the day to switch on the “oldies” station and hear Dr. Dre’s Chronic album.   Rap is going to be on OLDIES.  My kids will be in high school and someone will remake Eminem’s “My Name Is” and my kids will be like, “Hey – how does Mom know this song?  She isn’t cool.”  And I will have to say, “THIS SONG IS OLD!”  Nirvana will be my kid’s Elvis Presley.  This is WRONG!

I am not saying I don’t want times to change. For technology to come to a stand still.  I don’t know what I did before an Iphone.  Seriously, the other day was shaking my head and thinking, “I can’t believe I had a blackberry for so long”.  Really???  Girl who used payphones??  Girl whose first cell phone was a Nextel?  Aka fancy Walkie Talkie!!  I am jaded.  Not saying I am not.   I think this is just why old people don’t really like young people…. How can you relate?  I’m going to be the crazy old lady they are pushing through the halls of the nursing home yelling, “BE KIND – PLEASE REWIND” and the sweet little young nurse will roll her eyes and think, “What the hell is she talking about”.  And you know what?  I’m cool with that.

Feminist, I have never claimed to be.  I like respect as much as the next person.  I don’t know anyone who would say, “You know, I would like to be respected a little less if you could work that out.”

The ERA (Equal Rights Amendment) has been floating around for almost 90 years, without success. Here’s my personal (aka crazy and twisted) view on what it would take to make equal actually mean, you know, equal.

First, if women really want equality, they should be ready for that awesome 18 year-old birthday present, a draft card.  When my sister and I turned 18, my Mom celebrated.  When my brother turned 18, my Mom got my brother’s draft card in the mail and she sat down and cried. Strap on those fatigues ladies, we are equals now.  I personally think the armed forces could use more of us.  If we can get a three year old to stop pitching a fit in Walmart, I think we could negotiate peace with the enemy.

Secondly, be prepared for all the niceties to go by the wayside.   No more, “You can’t be mean to her son, She’s a GIRL.”  Forget some guy giving his seat up on the bus.  Open your own doors from now on.  And that toilet seat,  it’s gonna be up half the time because we have equality now.  Good luck not falling in… or should I say, “Ladies first”.

If we want real equal, it means girls, no more crying your way out of a ticket.  Or crying your way out of anything.  I know it’s convenient and downright helpful at times to turn on those water works.  I am not saying I am above it.  But seeing a bunch of our equals (guys) running around in tears all the time will really wreck our nerves!  There’s no crying in baseball, or in anything anymore.

My sister went to college and majored in History.  I went to college and majored in Literature. My brother went to college and we lectured him on how you can’t major in History and Literature and make enough to raise a family.  I don’t remember getting that lecture.

Personally, I am teaching my son, and have been since birth, that women are women.  Special.  And he has to be gentile, kind, and understanding.  If a girl is crying, hug her.  If a woman gets on the bus and has no seat, he better get up.  He better run when he sees a woman struggling with a stroller at the door.  He will learn all these things the way his sisters did, just in a little different way.  When he potty trains, he will not be allowed to leave the seat, “On the boys” as my girls call it.  It sucks to fall in in the middle on the night because someone left it, “On the boys”.   He’ll take out the trash for his wife. Every. Time.   This child will be lucky enough in the future to only have one week in the month that some woman in his life is not PMSing.  And he’ll handle it like an understanding gentleman. He won’t have a choice.

I like being a woman.  I like chivalry.  I like that I am different and should be treated that way.  No one will work as hard as I work, or care as much as I care, and I think that comes through when you talk to me.  I’m not worried about some guy getting a job over me.  I know for SURE he can’t multitask like I can.  I’ll be impressed if he can bring as much passion to a job as I can.

So if it means I don’t have to sweat a draft, and have doors opened for me, and can cry my way out of a ticket, I’ll get paid a little less.  I think it’s worth it.  But then again, no ERA group has ever asked me.