(Lessons on How NOT to Be a) Too, Too Mama

Sabbatical

Daisy — Thu, 05 May 2011 14:39:16 +0000

Daisy is taking one. Not from motherhood — that’s not exactly an “at will” gig — but from everything else. Just eight to twelve weeks or so, to undergo and recuperate from a medical procedure in body, a renewal in spirit, and a redesign in this little corner of the Web. When we return, be ready for a new look and feel in this space with some new but inter-related topics. It’ll be fun.

Benefits of Raising a Prissy-Pants

Daisy — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 17:21:47 +0000

It seems I talk funny, and it’s rubbing off on my kid. It is good proof that instructing by example actually works. Mind you, the Bear is not always unfailingly polite because, after all, he is four. And a boy. But NOTHING is more adorable to potential babysitters than hearing him pipe up with “Excuse me ladies, I’ll be back in a moment.” They melt, I tell you. They practically beg to pay ME for the honor of watching him. I’m so very glad he has learned to put his best foot forward when company is around. There will be time for these babysitters to become acquainted with….well, let’s call them his more “challenging” behaviors. But by golly that first impression makes a difference.

Lest some of you protest I am raising a child who is vulnerable to getting beaten up for his Victorian speech patterns, we do mix it up. Somehow the combination of prissy talk with scatology is uniquely hilarious at this age. I am not above, at bath-time lets say, stage-whispering: “Pardon me, Mr. Froggie, but I could not help but notice you have pooped in our tub. I do not mean to embarrass you, but I do ask that you make use of the potty we have provided. Our other guests would appreciate it.”

He’ll have plenty of models of other communication styles, but from mommy he will continue to learn to talk like a prissy-pants. I’m not being disingenuous for the sake of promoting manners, either. I just happen to talk funny.

Where is Daisy?

Daisy — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 17:29:03 +0000

Daisy is still lurking about. In fact, she is a good bit easier to spot out in the real world than that Waldo character. (Don’t tell me that signature striped shirt is a giveaway — I’ll SHOW you a dead giveaway, someday, when I am bold enough to out myself.) But, it is easier to hide in the ether of the Interweb than in the broad light of day.

I realized I needed to pop back up when my husband’s college buddy remarked to my husband that I had not been posting very much lately. Bravo for him, simultaneously lighting a smallish fire under my butt and chagrining my hubby with the realization that his own male friends manage to keep up with my online life better than he does.

Here’s my excuse for my piss-poor posting performance lately. I’ve got a long to-do list, and somehow thought I could motivate myself by telling myself that I could not play on my blog until I got the other stuff out of the way. This was a dumb move. I am not my own best boss, but I’m all I’ve got, now that I have left the formal workforce. The following are things that I have failed to accomplish this month:

My taxes (I did get an extension filed, though).
My freelance project (the 300 page beast I’m editing has managed to crash my computer at least 3 times now, though).
My various and sundry “you are officially old-ish now” appointments that I need to schedule (I did see my primary care doc — and got blood-work confirming that I look to be menopausal a decade ahead of schedule — though).
My research for the business ideas I dream up when I’m on the metro or walking to the store (I’ve got a weird and hilarious list of half-baked thoughts on my little notepad that stays in my purse, though).
My return phone calls owed to several people from my former corporate life (I have scripted some of them in my head in the shower, though).

Things that I managed to do instead of all of the above and writing in my blog:

A whole lot of “It Girl” on Facebook.

Yeah. So, it’s time for a new strategy. I’m tossing out the “no blogging until you’ve finished X” rule. I’d appreciate any carrot and stick suggestions you’ve got (I do better with carrots than sticks).

Thanks,

Daisy

P.S. (It Girl does not count as a carrot. It’s more a form of sticking my head in the sand. And taking it away cold turkey as a “stick” measure will only make me pout and/or tantrum.)

The Downside of Recaptured Youth

Daisy — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 19:42:59 +0000

So, who knew that “cool chestnut” was just code for “purple”?

(What’s that? You say the 1996 version of myself knew? Well, why the hell didn’t she speak up this morning?)

That is all.

Parenting Advice from Madame Curie

Daisy — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 13:29:18 +0000

“Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.”

This one seemed a particularly nice follow up to the previous post about struggling with life-in-general.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Four

Daisy — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 16:48:45 +0000

We had a meltdown yesterday. It came after a slew of birthday festivities, both for himself and for various classmates, and hosting house guests, and then more house guests, and a doctor’s visit, and. and. and. and. All of these things (well, almost all of them) he actively embraced and enjoyed, but even fun things can get to be too much. This fact is true even for grown-ups, but we are not as good at knowing when it is happening to us. Getting dramatic reminders of what the human condition is really all about is one of the most profound parts of parenting, if we pay attention and learn to read the messages.

This particular meltdown might have looked to some people like a reaction to spilling something on his shirt before preschool. My guy began by calmly announcing that he needed help getting a fresh shirt. And then the lip started to quiver. Then too, too many grown ups rushed to tell him that it was okay. The dam broke. He tried to explain: “It’s my favorite shirt.” Not actually true — but intended to underscore that this was not to be taken lightly. More grownups doing what grownups do, which is to offer solutions — “We’ll wash it and you can wear it tomorrow.” “What about your XYZ shirt that you love?” and. and. and. and. Oh, and we could not find the object he wished to bring for show and tell. Therefore, according to my tiny Bear, “we must have donated it.” Not actually true, and we did find the object. But we had recently donated many of his beloved clothes (because, in my defense, he was getting that street urchin look from holey pants that are three inches too short). So replying that Of Course we would not have donated this toy really missed the point. My barely four year old Bear began to hit me, with real intention. I said I couldn’t let him hit me, and I would have to move into the other room. He begged me to stay but also continued to hit. I chose to stay and to hold his arms still and let him scream his head off for a few minutes (or was it hours?) with the occasional kiss and move to hug him, of which many but not all were rejected, until the storm finally passed.

These were very important tears. They were tears over loved ones coming and going, over getting a shot not just in one leg but in BOTH at the doctor’s visit, over losing his possessions even if he had agreed to give them up, over the burden of needing to be dressed and packed for school and to remember that it was show and tell day and to choose a lunch, and. and. and. and.

Being four is terrific but it is also no picnic. Just like being forty-two.

One Thousand Terrible Posts

Daisy — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 14:57:22 +0000

I read too much and do not write enough. Yesterday I was chatting about this problem with a like-minded group of people, and I recounted a story my mother shared with me in one of her many attempts to gently help me with my perfectionism. My mother is an artist. When she was an art student, she received the following sage words from her professor: “[Student], you’ve got a thousand awful paintings in you before you make a good one. So you might as well start getting them out of the way.” Everything that I read these days about blogging and writing advises to take care not to hit “publish” until a post is ready for prime-time. Set it aside, come back and edit it, use images appropriately, break up your paragraphs, make sure your title is not too long and not too short. With those rules it is amazing that I would even begin to type, much less hit “publish.”

I’m going to take advantage of being a teeny fish in an ocean of blogs for a while and chuck all those rules. If I’m going to rise to the challenge and merit the label of Writer, then I need to get started and get those crappy posts out of my system. Nothing to lose, right?

A Good Excuse for a Bitchy Mood (plus, New Vocabulary!)

Daisy — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 17:29:56 +0000

Alright, I am calling it. I am either officially entering menopause, or am about to embark on that rarely if ever documented event known as the Sexless Birth. Note that I did not say “Virgin Birth” — the very existence of the Bear calls out that lie. I think it’s precisely because the phrase “Virgin Birth” is almost never sensical for women over a certain age that we resort to speaking instead about “Immaculate Conceptions.” But, I’m the daughter of a woman who was raised Catholic, so I know better. That phrase — Immaculate Conception — it does not mean what you think it means, all you non-Catholics. The conception of Mary herself was Immaculate, so the fable goes, because she was conceived without the blight of Original Sin that taints the rest of us, so the same fable goes, the moment sperm meets egg. The whole getting pregnant without having The Sex thing? THAT was The Virgin Birth. And that is just beyond anachronistic these days. (Yes, I do feel lucky that I’m raising a boy and not a girl sometimes.)

So, it is either menopause or there will be a Sexless Birth. It’s day 40++ and I am cranky. TMI, as the kids say, but deal with it. Oh, and the construction going on in the unit above me isn’t helping. With the crankiness, I mean.

Bye for now,

Daisy

Oh, Wow — I Really AM “That” Mom

Daisy — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 18:49:29 +0000

We got the little envelopes today. The ones that seal the fate of our small people. My son will not be a Raccoon* next year. He will be a Possum*. Mind you, my dear son never indicated that he particularly wanted to be a Raccoon. In fact, he seemed to assume he’d be a Possum — it’s a bigger class in a bigger room, with some older siblings of friends, and he’s more aware of it. But mommy was hoping he would be a Raccoon. Mommy fell for the Raccoon teacher. She fell for the Raccoon mascot. She fell for all the grown-up seeming activities in this calm, small classroom where they write in their journals over morning snack.

I’m thoroughly aware that being a Possum versus a Raccoon at age four will not matter in the slightest when these kids are twenty (or even when they’re 6, probably). When all the mommy’s got together and chit-chatted about what they put down as first choice for their darlings, I talked egalitarianly about the pros and cons of each choice and said things like “In the end, we put down Raccoon, but we’ll be thrilled either way — the Possum room looks fantastic.” I actually believed I was speaking the truth and was rather alarmed when I felt my stomach drop a little this morning upon opening that fateful envelope. My son is a Possum.

I am definitely not going to be the mom that demands an explanation and tries to bribe her way into a spot in the Magic that is the Raccoon room. I can see my own silliness for what it is. Self-awareness doesn’t change the feeling of disappointment though. Thanks for letting me reveal my ugly Diva side.

Daisy

*Silly classroom name-designations changed to protect identities.

Identity Crisis Solved By Three-Year-Olds

Daisy — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 14:56:40 +0000

This is a post to myself — a reminder of who I really am. As verified by very tiny people, who have an uncanny ability to cut through all the crap down to the core truth. It’s also a thank you to those tiny people.

So, thank you, Bear’s buddy, for spotting me across the street and tugging on your mom’s arm to point out, “THAT’S [BEAR’S} MOMMY!”

And a serious thank you to the Bear himself, who corrected me when I said that I was a lawyer. “You USED to be a lawyer. Now you are a writer.” It doesn’t get clearer than that. All I have to do now is prove him right.

And if I somehow fail, well, as his little friend inadvertently reminded me, I’ve still got that first gig going for me, and nothing can change that.