Posts Tagged ‘mothers’

10 Mar

Happy Birthday to Me?

Posted by I suck as a parent in children, family, humor, kids, motherhood, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

Yesterday was my older son’s 17th birthday and I spent the day shopping…for me.

I hadn’t picked out a gift for my son yet and yes, it was on my mind as I lunched with a couple of friends and meandered through over-priced niche stores, but it didn’t stop me from shopping for me. And why would it?

The more I thought about it, the more sense it made to me that I should be getting gifts for bringing life to my child. Why wasn’t my husband buying me presents to thank me for giving birth to—and raising—his oldest child? Sure, he did that after our son was born but why stop there??

And grandparents? Where were my gifts?  Shouldn’t they be showering me with gifts as well? My contribution to this endeavor has brought them 17 years of joy beyond anything they could possibly have imagined and yet, I have never been appropriately thanked…with presents, that is.

The day didn’t start out as a shopping trip for me. As I set out in the morning I was actually a bit obsessed with finding my kid the perfect gift (especially since the day was upon us and I was empty-handed).

But when I found myself at the perfume counter at Barney’s, I knew I was no longer shopping for him. Yes, I made a good showing of trying to find him some after-shave but Barney’s doesn’t carry Axe and I wasn’t really going to spend fifty bucks on aftershave for a 17-year-old.

I’m not suggesting that you skip your child’s birthday celebration and make it all about you. No, your kid should have gifts and cake and celebrate with friends and family.

But raising kids is a thankless job—we’ve all heard that before—and it doesn’t really have to be. If no one is going to thank you why not give yourself a little treat on your child’s birthday. Why not spend the afternoon celebrating with friends – preferably at a nice lunch followed by a Sprinkles Chai Latte cupcake?

It really doesn’t have to cost anything, though. It could simply be the gift of time: time to read a book, or take a nap or go for a walk…but new perfume doesn’t hurt either.

6 Feb

Running Bases

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, family, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

“I started my friend on a run today,” my 12-year-old told me as we made our way past the deli section at our neighborhood grocery store.

“A run?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

“With a girl he likes,” he replied.

“I don’t get it,” I said.

He looked at me, eyebrows raised, a knowing smile playing across his face, “You know, running to first base, second base, third base…”

WTF??

I was frozen to the spot and not because I was in the ice cream aisle.

He’s 12!

And I’m his mom!!  Who says that to his mom??!

There is no way he understands what he just said, I thought. No way that my baby would be so intentionally crude in the frozen food section of the local grocery store.

“Do you know what that means?” I asked him as I reached for the ice cream (I couldn’t look at him and besides, I was going to need a lot of chocolate if his answer was yes).

“Of course,” he said.

“Where did you hear that?” I asked. I’m going to ground his older brother for life!! 

“TV,” he responded casually, not at all aware of the visions his comments were forcing me to have.

What kind of TV is my husband letting him watch??!

I turned to face him.

“Do you know what all the bases stand for?’ I asked.

“Whadda ya mean, stand for?” he asked warily.

“Sex,” I spat, probably a little louder than I intended because at least three people turned in my direction and glared at me.

“Sex?” my son repeated.  Now more people were staring.  “No, no,” he stammered. “It’s not sex. It means dating. It’s a homerun when the girl will go out with you.”

“No, it’s about sex,” I said matter-of-factly.

“Stop!” he yelled, covering his ears. “No, no, no. Stop talking about it!”

He raced ahead of me to the check out line.

Whew!  I thought. My kid isn’t a clueless little creep after all.

Despite the embarrassing stares from the toddler-toting set picking up their last-minute dinner supplies I felt pretty good about our little chat. And then it hit me…I just gave him something to think about! He was probably going to ask me what the bases were!

I put down the chocolate bar and headed for the wine department. This would definitely require something a bit stronger.

22 Jan

Oh, Christmas Tree!

Posted by I suck as a parent in children, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , .

It is January 22 and our Christmas tree is still in our living room. Although it is no longer standing (my husband laid it on its side yesterday – I think he thought he was hiding it from me) it has yet to be moved into our basement where it is stored for 11 months out of the year.

The problem is that every year since we bought a fake tree, I have been the one to bring the tree out of it’s storage closet, lug the parts up the stairs and assemble it in our living room. Then, in early January, I take down all of the ornaments—alone, take apart the tree—alone, drag it down the stairs—alone, and put it away – al (well, you get the idea).

But not this year. I already hurt my back taking off a cowboy boot, who knows what would happen if I had to stand on my tip-toes and try to pull apart our fake Fraser fir. I’m not risking it, so there the tree sits (although I did manage to wrest off the top portion of the tree which has been sitting on the floor since January 14).

photo

Of course, everyone wants to join in when we are decorating the tree but no one, surprisingly, wants to help with the clean up. And no one, surprisingly, notices that something needs to be cleaned up.

How is it possible that am I the only one who notices a 7-foot tall Christmas tree in the middle of the living room nearly a month after Christmas??

Still, I refused to demand that someone help me. I refused to yell and threaten and scream. I actually wanted to see how long it would take before someone in this house would ask why the tree was still up (or hiding behind the coffee table as the case may be).

photo

I was even starting to get used to it. If it wasn’t for my 12-year-old’s guitars that had migrated to the family room when the tree displaced them, I could probably live with the tree in the living room for a few more weeks. I even joked with a friend of mine that we should just leave the tree up and decorate it for every holiday.

There were so many possibilities! I could print out pictures of Martin Luther King Jr. and hang them like ornaments on MLK Day or hang dragons for Chinese New Year or hearts on Valentine’s Day or even make copies of my left hand on National Left Hander’s Day and hang those up.  Would anyone notice the tree then??

I was cracking myself up so I told my 16-year-old about my idea. “Geez mom,” he said. “I’ll take the tree down.  All you had to do was ask!”

Funny. I was so busy not yelling and threatening and screaming at my kids that I forgot to ask them.

Lesson learned.

27 Nov

Bathroom Humor

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, family, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , .

I’m writing this from my bathroom.

No, I’m not actually using the bathroom–I’m hiding.

It’s the only place in my house that I know that none of my boys (my husband included) will enter for fear that I may actually be using the space for its intended purpose (well, our dog always tries to come in, but he knows no boundaries).

See, I need my own space (especially during a long holiday weekend) and this is something that my men folk just don’t get. My job is to always be available for them and therefore, I should never be too far or too occupied to fulfill my duties as a doting wife and mother. But everyone needs a bathroom break so that’s my excuse. Of course, no one needs as many bathroom breaks as I pretend to—at least not without a serious medical issue—but they haven’t caught on yet. (Or if they have none of them is willing to take a chance.)

I don’t even have a very large bathroom to stretch out in. Our master bathroom is not the largest bathroom in our house and there are no oversized ottomans or attached walk in closets with comfy seats for me to perch on for extended periods of time. No, if I want to read or write or simply be alone I have a small stool (no pun intended) to sit on. This plays into my husband’s hands because if I was too comfortable he knows that I would never leave.

My husband has his home office (and his head because he is able to tune out everyone no matter where he is sitting), my kids have their bedrooms and the basement and the loft and who am I kidding, they have anywhere they happen to be sitting because that’s what kids do- they take over. But me? I can’t find a quiet spot in my house to call my own.

We don’t have an enormous house but it certainly isn’t a studio apartment either so you would think that if I wanted to have a phone conversation while standing in the kitchen my boys could find another spot in which to fight over the chocolate-covered popcorn. Apparently, they can’t. So I move.

But they follow me.

Even if I try to hide in the walk-in pantry or the laundry room they follow me (I thought they would avoid the laundry room on the off chance that I would make them help with the laundry but, apparently, that threat is not enough of a deterrent). The only place that they can’t (ok, won’t) follow me into is the bathroom.

So here I am. In the bathroom. Hiding.

Virginia Woolf wrote about the importance of a room of one’s own if a woman wanted to write. I don’t think she meant the bathroom but she would probably agree that it’s better than nothing.

So after I finish this I think I’ll do some Cyber Monday holiday shopping. I still have a few more minutes before they begin to suspect anything.

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6 Nov

Parenting Disconnect

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, family, kids, parenting, payphones, reading a map, teaching. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

Of all the things that I thought I would need to teach my children, using a payphone never broke the top 500.

Why would I need to teach them to use a payphone? Doesn’t the phone have instructions written on it? Who doesn’t know how to use a payphone?

But then I read an article in the Wall Street Journal about how New Yorkers needed pay phones due to the spotty cell phone service and lack of power in the wake of Hurricane Sandy’s recent devastation. Apparently, many 20-somethings had never used a payphone before and they weren’t sure what to do.

I was appalled at first but the more I thought about it the more I realized that I have not needed to use a payphone in over 20 years so why would someone 20 years my junior need to?

And, more importantly, why would my kids need to use one?

In the time it would take my kids to find a working pay phone they could ask someone to use a cell phone unless, like the people in New York and New Jersey, there was no cell service or no electricity to charge their phones.  I know that my kids would figure it out but it made me realize that what I needed to explain was the finer points of making a collect call (because, really, who has change for a call anyway?).  I don’t think my kids have ever needed to call an operator or even know what an operator does.

To test my theory, I just asked my 12-year-old how to call the operator:

Me: “If you needed to call the phone operator what would you do?”

My Kid: “Why would I need to call the operator?”

Me:  “Humor me. What would you do?”

Kid: “I guess I would push ‘O’. But why?”

Me:  “What if you didn’t have any money but you needed to make a phone call?”

Kid: “Why would I need money to make a phone call?”

Me: “What if you didn’t have a charged cell phone?”

Kid: “I would ask someone if I could borrow theirs.”

Me: “What if you weren’t with anyone and you needed to use a payphone?”

Kid: “Where would I find a payphone? Couldn’t I just find a store that is open and ask them to use the phone? I’m a kid, they would let me.”

At least I know he’s thinking.

All of this made me wonder about all of the other things that I never thought that I would need to teach my kids. I don’t mean programming the VHS recorder or slicing a mango with just a knife,

I’m talking about skills that I never thought my kids would need given our technological advancements but maybe I should teach them anyway. Here are just a few:

  1. How to read a map. My kids think that GPS is all you need but there have been plenty of times when the very pleasant voice on my phone is telling me to turn left but doing so would land me in someone’s front yard. Besides, as we all know, cell service is not a given.
  2. How to use an encyclopedia (and do research) that is not on-line. I know this is something they should learn at school but I swear I haven’t seen my kids go to the library to do research since 2nd grade. Besides, I love encyclopedias. I used to read them for fun (seriously). Using a microfiche machine would also fall into this category.
  3. How to use a phone book. My kids probably don’t know where they are or why they would use one when they have access to computers, smart phones and tablets. But what if they are stuck at a diner/gas station/truck stop in the middle of nowhere and they need to use a payphone to call for a hotel room/ tow truck/food delivery? Yes, they can read so, yes, they could figure it out but forcing them to look up a number in the phone book might not be such a bad thing.
  4. How to use a fax machine. My 12-year-old and I were watching the movie, Air Force One, and one of the characters used a fax machine to send a message to the White House because the fax machine was on a separate line from the phones. My son asked whether anyone uses a fax machine anymore. My mother and father-in-law still have one but we don’t.  I just scan, .pdf and email. I have, however, needed to fax something so maybe the kids should know how…just in case they find themselves without the ability to scan, .pdf and email.
  5. How to start a fire without matches, a gas-powered cook top or a lighter. No power. No gas. Freezing temperatures. Enough said.
  6. How to sit at dinner without pulling out your smart phone. Ok, this one is not an actual skill (or maybe it is) but it is a necessity. I was at brunch with my kids the other day and neither one of them could sit still and have a conversation without texting or having a screen in front of them. Granted, the adults eventually pulled out their phones but I’m sure the adults could engage in conversation even if they didn’t have an app to fall back on (at least I hope we could).

What would be on your list of skills that you thought you would never have to teach your kids?

 

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27 Aug

Freaky Friday

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, family, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , .

This is a five-minute segment of texts from this past Friday night:

9:25:What time am I picking you up?

9:27:??

9:28:Why aren’t you picking up your phone????

9:30:Where are you?

Couple those texts with three missed calls during the same five-minute period and it seems like a typical Friday night exchange between parent and teen. Only these texts and calls were from my 16-year-old to me.

So uncool.

Let me rewind a couple of hours.

I went to a party at a friend’s house Friday night and I mentioned to my son that he might need to pick me up. I didn’t want to drive to the party because I wanted to be able to have a glass of wine with dinner and my husband was out of town. With no designated driver my options were limited to bumming a ride home with someone who would probably be drinking (not a good idea), calling a cab (which seemed silly for a two mile drive) or walking the two miles home which would normally be fine only my friend’s house is in an area that is on a stretch of winding road with no sidewalk.  It’s scary enough to drive there at night let alone walk that area.

That’s when I had my epiphany: my 16-year-old could pick me up. What good is having a built-in designated driver if you can’t take advantage of him?

I knew that he wasn’t doing anything terribly exciting that he couldn’t tear himself away from for 15 minutes so why not. Right?

Fast forward a few hours…

I had been at the party for a couple of hours when I finally heard my cell phone ringing.

 

“Where have you been?” he yelled into the phone when I finally answered.

  Shit. I’m going to be grounded.

I swear that was my first thought. That’s how much he sounded like my mother.

“I thought you wanted me to pick you up,” he continued in the same raised voice.

At no point did I want to snap at him and tell him that I was the parent and he couldn’t tell me what to    do. Instead I was thinking, Whoa, dude, chill. I’m at a party and you are ruining my fun.

I had to  suppress a laugh.

“Come get me in a half hour,” I finally responded. I hadn’t planned to stay at the party very long anyway and I figured it was the least that I could do since my oldest had let his little brother tag along to his friend’s house.

37 minutes later.

I felt my phone vibrating and I saw this:

10:04 – “Mom, please come up. I can’t be parked where I am.”

10:05 – “?”

10:06 – “Are you coming up??”

10:07 – “We’re coming down to get you.”

Whaddya mean you’re coming down to get me??

I turned just in time to see my youngest son coming down the stairs to the party.

I was a bit mortified. People were looking. How embarrassing!!

I shooed him away, said my goodbyes and reluctantly marched up the stairs to the waiting car.  My son was now rolling down the passenger window and glaring at me.

“I’ve been waiting for 15 minutes,” he said as I climbed into the car. “And he,” jerking his thumb at my youngest in the back seat. “He needs to go to bed. He’s been yawning.”

OMG! My son had morphed into the parent.

There are times when I look at my mom and wonder when she became the child and I became the adult. I didn’t expect my son to step into the role of parent until he was at least 30. And, yet, here he was, lecturing me the whole way home about how he had to wait for me and it was late and his little brother needed to go to bed. I felt myself sinking lower in my seat, suddenly feeling like a teenager who broke curfew.

Which is why I didn’t call him the following afternoon when I needed a ride after my post-pedicure birthday mojito. He can be such a buzz kill.

30 Jun

What Were They Thinking?

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

As my youngest son and I were driving to the doctor’s office in our local hospital we began reminiscing about the time that I was racing to catch up to the ambulance carrying him to the same hospital after he hit his forehead at a local swimming pool (see #1 below). This got me thinking about some of the other, perhaps not as urgent, moments in my two boys’ young lives that resulted in injuries. I laughed a little as I looked back at these moments because these particular injuries were really just so ridiculous. I can’t imagine any girls being injured in the same ways (Maybe I’m wrong. Please tell me if I am).

Of course, I blamed myself for every one of these injuries (“If only I had been there when he decided to sled down an icy stairway!” “If only I had taught them that metal chairs hurt when you land on them from a high vertical jump!”) But, I realized after reviewing this list, that all of the lessons that they’ve learned and all the nagging that I’ve done wouldn’t have prevented any of these injuries because boys do mind-boggling things. I was simply “letting” my boys be boys.

So, here is my top ten list of stupid things that my kids have done and the resultant injury. And, just so you know, I was only present for two of them—#2 and #3—and I couldn’t have stopped either one of them if I tried:

#1 – Running into a pole in the middle of the kiddie pool. (result: 5 stitches. Also, the club has now banned anyone over the age of 5 from the kiddie pool);

#2 – Running in the house while looking behind him and turning just in time to meet the corner of the door jamb (broken nose);

#3 – Jumping up for no apparent reason and landing chin first on the back of a metal kitchen chair (3 stitches);

#4 – Sledding down the neighbor’s ice-covered front stairs. The sled continued on but his head stayed behind and hit the concrete stairs (CT scan, no concussion);

#5 – Playing soccer in the street—barefoot—and kicking at a ball that was right along the curb (broken toe, lost toe nail);

#6 – Playing soccer in the 3 1/2 foot wide upstairs hallway—barefoot—and kicking at the door jamb instead of the ball (broken toe);

#7 – Getting shot point-blank in the ear with a high-powered water gun during a water gun fight (punctured eardrum);

#8 – Lying across the top of a large ride-on truck and pushing himself straight into the dog’s elevated metal water bowl (broken nose);

#9 – Getting shot in the neck while playing paint ball without a neck guard  (a lot of bleeding and a big scar, physically and probably emotionally as well);

And, my personal favorite:

#10 – Shooting himself in the leg with an air-soft gun to prove that air-soft guns don’t hurt (they really do and, they leave a mark).

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14 Jun

Why Do Parents Have to Be the Grown-Ups?

Posted by I suck as a parent in boys, children, family, kids, parenting, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , .

Last weekend a very good friend of my older son’s showed up at my younger son’s championship baseball game – and rooted for the other team!!

Ridiculous, right? Who’s with me?

Granted he knew a kid on the other team but, still, why pick sides?

I know it sounds petty but WTF, this kid is in my house all the time and has been since he was 3 – that’s 13 years of dinners, snacks, sleepovers, movies, museums, you name it.

I didn’t let the behavior go unacknowledged – I just couldn’t. When he said, “Go Knights! (the name of the opposing team), I responded: “No more food for you in my house.” And I really meant it.

My husband thinks I’m ridiculous. I think I’m totally justified.

I want to question this kid about his behavior, let him know that I do not approve, and, more importantly, make him feel like crap about his decision. Apparently, that is not good adult behavior and I’m supposed to act like an adult.

But I don’t wanna! (If you were here you would have seen me stomp my foot).

Over the years, I’ve learned to bite my tongue when it comes to watching my kids’ friends behave badly. It tends to have a negative impact on my kid’s friendships. I once told my son that one of his friends was never allowed back in our house because he was being mean to my son in front of me and I thought that was disrespectful. Needless to say the kid never came back and my son didn’t stay friends with him. Apparently the kid is not a bully anymore but he’s still afraid of me.

I also scared another friend away when I accused him of stealing– which, let’s be clear – he did. But still, he was 6 at the time so maybe it wasn’t the best use of my energy.

I didn’t actually see him take the money but I cross-examined him and watched with relish as he tripped over his lies.

I was getting change from my purse for my son’s friend for the lemonade stand that he and my son were setting up in our front yard. I took out a five-dollar bill, put it on the counter and turned away for a minute (literally a minute and I mean literally, in the literal sense). When I turned back the money was gone and the kid was slowly walking away from the counter. Just then my son came back in the house and I turned to both boys, “Did you take the money off the counter?” I asked, not in an accusing manner more in a ‘Huh. Now where did I put that?’ kinda way.

“What money?” my son asked.

“The money that I just put on the counter?” I said, looking directly at my son’s friend. I pointed to the now barren counter. “It was right there.” I said.

“There wasn’t a five dollar bill on the counter,” the friend said.

Aha! I had him. I knew that I never said “five-dollars”; I just said “money.” But even with his slip up, he still wasn’t coughing up the dough. Short of frisking the kid and calling the cops there wasn’t much more that I could do.

A little while later the friend came back in the house without my son. “Look what I found outside,” he said, holding up a five-dollar bill.

“Really?” I asked innocently. “You just found that?” What I really wanted to scream was, “Seriously? Do I look like an idiot?” Instead, I waited.

“Yea,” he said. “I found it on the side of the house.” He went on to explain how someone must have dropped it when they were buying lemonade and it probably blew over to the side of the house.

I was really appalled at the extent of the lie. But I was on to him and I was moving in for the kill.

I asked him what side of the house he found it on and he pointed to the west side of the house.

“Was it wet?” I asked him.

He looked at me with an expression that seemed both puzzled and just a little bit frightened.

“Was the money wet?” I asked again.

“No,” he said, clearly confused.

“Interesting,” I said. “Because the sprinkler is on, on that side of the house.” I pointed (I’m sure, very dramatically) to the window where the water was spraying against the windows at regular intervals as the sprinkler moved back and forth in the yard.

It was a solid cross-examination. I didn’t go to law school for nothin’, you know.

He never actually confessed but he didn’t hang out here very much after that. Either he knew that I had his number or he thought I was crazy (probably both). Was it worth it? I don’t know. Would I want my kid to hang out with someone who swipes cash from my house? Probably not, but maybe it was just a phase the kid was going through. I’ll never know.

As for the baseball incident, my older son called his friend a traitor and they laughed about it. Very mature behavior.

I, on the other hand, am going to withhold all of the good snacks from that kid from now on. So there!

5 Apr

Omnipotence is a Bitch

Posted by I suck as a parent in Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , .

I remember when my kids were little and they thought that I was all-powerful. I could make bumped heads feel better with a kiss, I knew the answers to almost every question they asked, and I always knew exactly what could make them laugh.

I was amazing back then.

But now, even though my kids are convinced that I know nothing and they know with the utmost certainty that I have no super powers, I am—seemingly—still responsible for everything…including the weather.

Yesterday morning my 16-year-old snapped at me because it was only going to be 63 degrees – in April! In Chicago! Instead of the unseasonably warm temperatures that we had been having of late it was going to be a normal April day. And that was somehow my fault.

“Mom,” my son yelled from the top of the stairs. “Is it warm today?”

“It’s supposed to be about 60 degrees,” I responded as I walked upstairs.

“What?!” he shrieked. “60 degrees. Why?” he asked, shooting me an accusing stare. “Why?”

I actually felt guilty for a second, as if I really did have something to do with the temperature.

This was on the heels of the “why do you make me go to school at 8:15?” accusation. At the time, part of me wondered if it was, indeed, within my control to set the start time for school.

I had to shake that one off as well.

I let him rant about the injustice of his 16-year-old, suburban life and chalked up his mood swing to a lack of sleep or a hormone imbalance or whatever teenage issue was pushing out any shred of logic or reason in his brain.

I said nothing because I knew that anything I said could and would be used against me on the 8-minute car ride to school.  Besides, I clearly needed more coffee to endure another onslaught.

But he was not done.

“It’s Wednesday,” he grunted just one minute into the car ride.

[pause]

I noticed him turning toward me and I could feel him glaring at me accusingly. Was he really going to blame me for it being Wednesday?

Really?

“Why do I have to go to school on Wednesdays?” he asked, his voice rising in disbelief.

I laughed. Out loud. Actually it was more of a guffaw.

But really, what else is there to do when your kid poses such a ridiculous question?

Even if I said, “You don’t need to go to school on Wednesdays anymore,” he would just respond with, “Well, if I don’t go on Wednesday then Thursday would become Wednesday so then Thursdays would suck.” And so on, and so on, and so on.

He didn’t see the humor in all of this but that didn’t matter. Parenting, for me, is all about perception; that is, how I perceive the situation. A good spin can make anything look better. And boy was I going to spin this one—it was either that or bang my head against the steering wheel.

We finally made it to the school without further incident (well, there was that moment when he got mad at the people walking their dogs on the sidewalk so slowly, but at least he didn’t blame me for that).

As he got out of the car he looked at me and shook his head (because I was still smirking, of course). “You are so moody,” he said. And with that, he was off.

Ah, if only I was all-powerful…

 

 

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