Being a mommy is never easy.
It is usually hard and sometimes it just plain sucks! You never have a day off, you are always
being watched by little eyes and you are always on the clock for shaping and
molding little lives into becoming responsible adults who do and say the right
things when you are not looking. These
lovely little curtain climbers see, hear and repeat everything and are always
willing to quote you…whether it is correct or not. One of my biggest fears was that one of my
children (probably the girl) was going to drop the word cocksucker in church
and have us excommunicated! The bad
there is that it is my husband’s bad word of choice but he is so even tempered
and nice that no one would believe it, thus assuming they learned it from me. I am
the one in the family with the gate mouth, the one who says what comes up,
speaks her mind and doesn’t sugar coat anything so I must say that bad press
and stink eye is an acquired taste.
I am also the unconventional one. I have never, nor will I ever claimed to be mommy of the year. I do things my way. I read the books, take the courses but I
raise my children in the way that works for me.
You can read all the self help books and take all the courses in the
world and I am not knocking any of them, but when you are down in the trenches
with your children all day, you simply reach the point of doing what works and
anyone who makes you feel badly for it…well folks, it’s all fun and games until
someone loses a eye! Talking with
someone about how they are raising their kids is a sticky business and even a
mild mannered individual will rip you a new asshole if they think you are criticizing
them. I see people in stores, at parks,
restaurants and parties doing things that I think to myself, oh yeah, I would
do THAT differently. Realizing of course
that I have the benefit of judgment and the time to think because I am not the
parent everyone is putting through ocular intrusion! To date, my husband and I have missed so many
meals at restaurants (or eaten dinner out of the Styrofoam to go box) that we
are now in the habit of eating like prisoners when we are in one just so we can
finish before someone shows their ass.
When this happens we just remove them as a way of paying it forward I
guess, hoping everyone would do that instead of ruin the experience of other
paying customers. We don’t hit, spank,
pop, drag or doggie door them (although, we do dream of doing this sometimes)…we
just briskly walk to the car without words.
We mainly do this because it teaches them that they must leave a place
they do not deserve to be. Acting up in
a restaurant is unacceptable and if you can’t “act like you aughta” then you
can leave and miss dinner. Yes, this
also means going to bed with nothing when we get home.
Since I am not a parent that can spank or hit, I have to
teach with words and actions, lessons if you will. I cannot lie sometimes I have wanted to smack
the crap out of my children for doing something I told them 15 times not to
do. There is a difference in thinking it
and doing it, thoughts are free. I have
learned from my husband that in almost everything, there is a teachable moment
and I try to look for those. I still
approach them differently than he does but I hope that he and I together, with
all our training, opinions, hopes and desires can teach our children to become
good, honest and self reliant, productive members of society.
When you don’t listen, you have to feel.
When my dad used this line on me, it meant that I was just
about to feel a spanking by his hand or something else. I use this line on my twins also but for me
it means something different. It means
that they are going to feel the pang of responsibility and the slap of accountability. It will come in the feeling of embarrassment,
sadness or knowing they have disappointed me.
I readily admit that it may be easier to spank them and get it over with
but teaching them why instead of ouch goes a lot farther. Enter the meanest mommy in the world. Grocery shopping with twins has been like being pecked to
death my ducks since they were old enough to push that damn customer in
training cart all by themselves.
cute huh, hell NO
My ankles
may never be the same. I have learned to
wear my Chuck Taylor’s when shopping with them because at least I am covered
well passed my ankle in those!
Actually, mine are blue
One day
in Harris Teeter I had told them both so many times to knock it off, stop it,
don’t touch it and leave alone that my son got so tired of hearing it that he
asked to sit in cart. I obliged. The girl child would never choose to be
restrained in that way so she continues to walk. Coming
down the aisle where the candles are I reminded her that this aisle has
breakables and if she touches or breaks anything, she will deal with the
consequences. Just so she knows what
said consequences are, she asks “what will happen if I break something?” I told her that we may have to buy it. She answered with, “well I don’t have any
money.” I said, “well then you had
better be careful.” To her, not having
any money meant she was off the hook.
Once we reached the point where you could smell the candles we stopped
to look. I thought of buying one only to
remember that $24.99 for a candle is ridiculous! I was looking away when she headed toward the
peach, soy candle. She picked it up by
the lid and the candle flew out of the lid and crashed to the floor. Glass few everywhere! All over the floor and up into the air
cutting her brother on the foot in two places.
Not a bad cut (he had not even noticed yet) but his foot was hanging
down from the seat so it bled more than normal. I decided I would let the two
of them figure out he was cut at their own speed and go from there. I picked up the candle and all the big pieces
and handed her the lid which was not broken.
I looked at her and said, “come with me.” In an elevated and nervous voice she asked me
where we were going. I told her to see
the manager and the tears began to flow.
“whhhhhhyyyyyyyy mooommmmyyyy” “I
aammmm sooorrrryyyyy.” Her brother said “hmmm mmmm, now you are in
trouble” but I shot him stink eye and told him to zip it and he did. I got down on the floor so she and I were
face to face and told her I knew it was only an accident but we had to do the
right thing. Explained to her that she
had broken something that cost money and she needed to do her part to fix it so
we were going to talk to the manager about it.
I did the best I could to push the cart with one hand and lovingly hold
her little hand with the other. We got
to the front desk and she looked up at her brother for support only to see that
his foot was bleeding. She burst into
tears even more upon the realization that it too was her fault. She said, “mommy please don’t make me do
this!!!” I said, “honey it is ok, we
will do it together.” Bless her little
heart, when the two managers walked over to us.
I sat her up on the counter. She
was crying, her brother had tears in his eyes and so did I. The two managers did not know whether to shit
or go blind! One of them looked at me
and asked if she could help. I looked at
my daughter and she looked at me then looked at the manager and said through
tears, “I broke this candle (pushing the lid over to the manager) and cut my brother.” She then looked back at me as I was brushing
away a tear. I said, “What else do you
need to tell her honey?” She looked at
the manager, took a deep breath and said, “I am sorry, I didn’t mean to, do you
want me to pay for it because my mommy says I may have to?” This particular manager must have had
children and knew what I was going through so she had a really kind look in her
eye. The other one looked like he wanted
to run to aisle 7, grab one of the steak knives and ram it through my black
heart then grab a spool of turkey twine and hog tie me until DSS could get
there! The female manager said, “honey
thank you for telling me about the candle, I know how hard it was for you and
no you don’t have to buy it but I am so proud of you for telling me.” She reached into the hand of the other
manager and took a band aid and an alcohol pad then she gave it to my
daughter. My daughter opened it and
began to wipe her brother’s toe and then put the band aid on his toe with my
help. In a whisper she looked up at him
and said, “I’m sorry.” He told her it
was ok. We then walked back to the
candle aisle with the manager and stood with her while she swept up the mess,
walked it to the trash can and once again told her we were sorry. She hugged my daughter and patted me on the
back and said, “take it easy, you are a good mommy, most would just walk away.” I felt like the devil and I may very well be
but I bet my daughter keeps her hands in her pockets and looks with her eyes
the next time we go grocery shopping, at least on the candle aisle anyway.
On the way home.
IN
On the way home my daughter said nothing. She looked out the window with a very pensive
look on her face the entire ride home.
My son asked me a question that made me cry and proud of him at the same
time. Side Note: When I was 5 years old my mother
made me face down a manager at K-mart for stealing a Barbie shoe. Once we were home and she discovered I had
it, she marched me back to the store and sent me in alone to tell the manager
what I had done. It is one of the
memories that stuck with me and I have never again taken anything that did not
belong to me. I told my children about
this at some point. My son asked me
about this memory and if I will remember it forever because Grammy did it to
teach me. He did it because he
understood the magnitude of what I had done.
In his own way he was letting his sister know that although what I did
seemed cruel, it was done to teach her a lesson and he was also letting me know
that he understood I did it out of love.
After he said it, she turned and looked at him and smiled a tiny smile
then looked back out the window. He
looked at me in the rear view mirror and said, “I love you mommy!” I couldn’t speak so I reached back and
grabbed his foot with my hand. He knew
what I meant. When we pulled into the
driveway I went to help them unbuckle their car seats. She was still shaking but she looked at me
and whispered, “I love you mommy.” I
said, “Honey I love you to the moon and back.”
She said, “I know.”
That night at bedtime she talked to her daddy about what happened. She explained to him that she caused the accident and told him what happened. He asked her how it made her feel. She told him that what mommy made her do was hard but she knew it was right. She is only 5 years old and there will be many more accidents and broken candles but if I remember the memory of what happened to me at 5 then chances are she will also. I hope she will also remember me with love and respect for loving and respecting her enough to give her the power to do what is right.
