I know this is a blog about life and all the funny little things that can happen when living it. I hope you generally enjoy it. Yet, that’s the thing about life, its not always happy. 

We learned this summer about a little boy in our community who was gravely injured in a backyard accident doing nothing more than the exact same thing countless people do everyday without incident.  His injury is probably extremely rare. One in a million even.

 I can only imagine what his mother is going through. Reality and statistics must mean nothing when it’s your child. Your child is that one and suddenly that one is a very big and important number. 

When that door opens and your child – or his health - is standing on the other side and you are powerless to help it must be the most difficult thing in the world. How impossible to accept that you, who were born to be this child’s mother, cannot make it all better. 

I always imagine that parents of an ill or injured child were in my shoes not too long ago. Unless they were born ill, everyone who has a sick or injured child once had a healthy child which means they’re not very different from me or you at all. Their child was a “normal” happy and healthy kid who left shoes by the door and milk on the counter and lost toys between the sofa cushions. And then, just like that, in the blink of an eye, the unthinkable – unspeakable - happens. Thus, they were all me at one point. Going about their daily life, enjoying themselves but maybe taken it all for granted too (at least I know I do). Then they – we - are struck with the powerful realization that life is so fragile and that the delicate balance of our health, happiness, and very existence is held together by a very fine thread which can snap so easily and without warning. That is when you realize that nothing in this life is so sacred that it cannot be taken away.  

Matters. I’ve heard so many tragic stories like this one lately that my heart hurts. I don’t mean to be melodramatic but it’s true. Life seems so unbearably fragile lately.  I am a pessimist. I tend to see the glass half-empty. I believe that carrying an umbrella will prevent the rain. I have to predict the worst in order that I might be pleasantly surprised if it does not come to pass. Maybe that’s the key…always expect it.  

I hope we can all take the time to appreciate the simple moments that really aren’t so simple at all. To remember that what matters is health and family and friends, and safe harbor.  

Not housing rates, the global market, the race for the presidency or the price of gasoline.

Tonight I’m thinking about all the children – and their parents – for whom fate turned on a dime. Or a lump, a bump, a bad break, or bad brakes. All the lives impacted in the moment when time – and reality –were forever altered. For all those whose lives are sharply divided by a distinct “before” and “after.” 

Today I want to hug my children a little harder, be kinder to my friends, and say an extra special prayer for all of us whose destinies and realities are waiting right around the corner. It says so much about what we have and what we think is important that what we think we cannot bear to lose and what we can survive are two different things. That what we think is untouchable and important really isn’t. That in the end the only thing that cannot be destroyed is our faith. It is the power to help us and carry us through. 

In truth, it is shameful how often I pray that I am not tested, even as I pray for those that are.

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 He is wanted for transgressions against humanity. His alleged crime spree includes such offenses as touching, being “weird,” “totally annoying” and, on occasion, “looking at me funny.” He is a master of disguise and even in the midst of an offense may appear sweet, sincere and wholly innocent. He is impervious to solitary confinement and his recidivism rate is high.

 He is a ten-year-old big brother.   

He lives, or so I am told, to make his little sister miserable. The victim further claims that I have “always liked him better.”  

When brought to trial his defense is both simple and swift. He makes counterattacks against his alleged victim. Apparently, he feels the same way about her. 

He further contends “I always side with her.” 

And me without my black and white referee’s jersey and whistle.  

Snap. If you felt the faintest quiver of a vibration not unlike a small earthquake recently, it was merely my last nerve snapping. This after two non-stop hours of “stop touching me!” “Mo-om he’s looking at me!” “STOP!!! Stop it! STOP ITTTTTT!”  

I can buy that sibling rivalry is “normal”, but to what extent before it constitutes a felony?  

I have had to point out to my eldest child on more than one occasion that one of the benchmarks for my success as a parent was assisting his survival to adulthood. My success in this endeavor was not looking promising as he had his little sister quite nearly over the edge.  

You can poke, prod, tease, torment and tickle-torture her but there is one thing you simply cannot, must not, do. 

You must not mess with her stuffed dog. His name is Chips and he is her favorite. She loves him madly and wants only the best for him. He sleeps with her at night, and spends his days either accompanying her to school or, on occasion, lounging around on the sofa awaiting her return. He is small, perhaps eight inches in length, and weighs just a tad more than air. He is light, compact, and one would think, easy to avoid. 

To our son, her big brother, he is, of course irresistible. The boy must mess with that stuffed dog every single solitary chance he gets. Chips, as you can imagine, makes a marvelous football.  

He is a good boy. Sweet, sensitive, caring. We get compliments on him all the time I swear. Why then, does he get this gleam – almost a glint really – in his eye and set his sights on tormenting his sister so often?  

Why does she, conversely, continue to rise to the bait? 

Therein lies the eternal question: Which came first? “She started it!” or “He touched my stuff!” 

Theory. One fateful day when all the yelling in the world wasn’t working, I theorized that the boy provokes her purely out of boredom and the enjoyable predictability of getting his sister’s goat. If attention is the goal, I reasoned, then what if his sibling simply refused to take the bait? Wouldn’t that basically disarm the situation? Good to know I hadn’t wasted that semester I spent sleeping through Child Psych 101 after all!  

Thus armed with my newly formed “better parenting through psycho-babble” mindset, I was fairly chomping at the bit for the sibling rivalry games to begin. Forget getting in touch with my inner child. I was going to talk some sense into my outer children. It seemed wise to start with the seven year old. They tend to be more gullible at that age.  

Predictably soon after, our golden girl came raving into the kitchen, temper flaring so hot she nearly had steam coming out of her ears. “He’s making that noise again and he knows I hate it!” “He keeps humming louder just to BUG ME!”  

I was so ready for this.   

“Well honey does that make you FEEL like he doesn’t respect your wishes? Do you FEEL like he needs to listen to what matters to you and take your feelings into consideration? Do you feel like you might want to sit down and discuss it when you’ve had time to calm down and not react in anger?” 

Eyes wide she gazed in amazement (at my obvious wisdom no doubt). She stood, completely disarmed and, quite frankly, distracted from her hatred of her brother just moments before (see how good I am? I should write a book!).  

Then she said the words that made me really feel me merit as a mother:  

“No, Mommy. That makes me FEEL like hurting him!”  

Hey, I tried. 

And, for the record, she started it.  

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 I remember when I first made the clear connection between what I wore and how I felt. It was the dawn of middle school, which in our district was seventh grade. Back in the dark ages of the 1980’s when I rode my very own dinosaur to school we called it “junior high.” We also called it terrifyingly awkward.

Nervous beyond measure about the brave new world of “big school,” I clearly remember donning my first double layer of polo shirts with the “popped” collar (read: collar standing straight up so it tickled our ears. This required endless fussing and adjusting throughout the day and caused more than one teacher to threaten, exasperated, to snip the collars clean off with scissors if we didn’t stop fidgeting and take a note on the hydrologic cycle or pre-algebra already!) I paired this fetching double layer of short sleeve chic with a pair of deep indigo Gloria Vanderbilt jeans so stiff it was difficult to bend my knees to sit, and a pair of the all-powerful Nike tennis shoes with the burgundy swoosh. While clothes shouldn’t matter. They did. And they do. They really, really do. I practically floated into the school, blissfully confident that I would stand out chiefly by fitting in.

Many years hence, and now a stay at home Mom who can work in her bathrobe if need be, I don’t actually remember the last time I donned an outfit designed to increase my strut through the grocery store. Not that I don’t have clothes in my closet that make me feel like a million bucks, I do. It’s just that a classic A-line linen number with coordinating kitten heels just isn’t quite right for the PTO.

Thus, I get up each day and wear something respectable, practical, and probably half a decade old. Accordingly, I now live vicariously through my daughter.

Found. Miss Thing, at seven, has finally found her fashion sense. After six and three quarters years of not giving a fig what she wears up to and including her brother’s hand-me-down overalls, she has been hit – and hard - with the knowledge that a great outfit can make a great day.

Channeling her inner girlie-girl my athletic, bug catching, tomboy has discovered the giddy allure of pretty dresses, twirly skirts, and the all-mighty power of the curling iron. She favors frilly dresses clearly designed for Easter Sundays and bridal parties. These are to be paired with “clicky” shoes (otherwise known as patent leather shoes that make that distinctly delicious tapping noise when walking on hard surface flooring). She will forego these only on PE days and only grudgingly. Even then you are likely to find her pounding out the kick balls in full crinoline and sneakers.

Accordingly, getting dressed each morning has morphed from an easy shrug into a cute little tee-shirt and jeans into a full-blown production featuring tights, accessories, and hair product.

Of course I enjoyed dressing her to the nines as an infant, but as affirmed country dwellers, I really did revel in having a child who would willingly – and quite cheerfully – don a sofa slipcover if I’d asked her to. Now, my little fashion maven is dropping ominous hints about shopping and uttering four-letter-words such as “mall.”

As I drip-dry all these party dresses (lest they all melt in a puddle of petrol-based shiny fabric and netting in my dryer), I ponder the importance of appearance and confidence and the messages – both pro and con – that this might send to a modern girl.

Style. Dropping her off, I watched her walk in to the school. She’s a little thing, nearly staggering under the weight of her pink kitty bookbag. Yet, somehow, she looks taller, her shoulders are squared and it’s a wonder those clicky shoes are any use at all as she fairly floats, rather than walks, into the building. In short, she looks exactly as only someone who feels really good about themselves can.  If I was a betting woman, I’d say she’s probably going to feel great all day long and probably won’t change out of those clothes till bedtime.

That’s ok, because as I saw her disappear behind the doors, I too was immediately back in school, wearing my corduroy skirt, Holly Hobby tee-shirt, and walking tall in my wedge-heel Hush Puppy shoes.

I probably looked like a train wreck, but I felt like a million bucks.

I’ve decided that learning to feel good in your own skin – and the clothes your skin is in – is admirable. Fashions may come and fashions may go but the feeling you get from feeling good about yourself never really goes out of style.

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Having two children less than two years apart teaches a person a lot about parenting. The problem is that the person will be too bone tired for the first six years to remember a single bit of it.

For some, that new baby when the other baby was still a baby was a surprise. A happy surprise, no doubt, but a surprise nonetheless. For others, it was a conscious decision painstakingly choreographed. There is much talk of the children being “close” to one another.

Close enough to poke an eye out, maybe.

There are also many in the “get it over with all at once” camp. As if childrearing were really just an elaborate hazing ritual or painful rite of passage between graduation and that sporty little roadster and the comb-over you’ve had your eye on for your upcoming mid-life crisis.

continue reading…

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Hanging upside down at 45 mph is definitely NOT the time to start fretting about your child’s hip-to-shoulder ratio.

I mean, if I were going to become obsessed with whether or not the overhead restraint system on a roller coaster could ACTUALLY prevent my child from plummeting headfirst to the earth, it would have made a LOT more sense to consider that with our feet planted firmly on the ground.

Instead, we were winging our way skyward at startling speeds. The people, and midway, below were receding like ants as the coaster climbed up and away. Honestly, I think I saw cloud cover.

This was the first time I had ridden a coaster with the mindset firmly set less on “thrill-seeking fun lover” and more “terrified overprotective mom.”

You see, when it’s YOU getting on the ride you have a rather savoir-faire attitude about the whole thing. It’s safe, it’s bolted down, and it’s inspected, right?

That trickle of fear as your lap bar locks you in place is part of the fun. That lighthearted moment when entertaining ride operators opine that they “hope” to see you back in 90 seconds is all part of the theater.

That momentous climb and stomach-dropping descent is all part and parcel of the adrenaline rush you came for.

Risk. Then they snapped the restraint bar over my “baby” and I just about lost my mind. This is the child I obsessively buckled into a car seat inside an airbag-laden minivan to drive 25 mph through the village.

Yet I was now allowing a teenager with a laminated badge to buckle him in preparation of being hurtled through the air at warp speeds with our feet dangling below. How does that make any sense?

Our son first expressed an interest in roller coasters last summer. Because he was 9 and of average height, I still had a little wiggle room (as did he). He did not, thank the Lord, meet the height requirements.

Fifty-two inches tall is the magic number for all the really good, high-velocity, rip-the-flesh-from-your-face roller coasters. This is crazy because any mother knows that 52 inches is not tall at all.

I would have preferred it be something a bit more substantial, say 7 feet or 8 feet.

Even before the “train” (as they coyly call roller coasters because “hurtling death cars of doom” didn’t test well) rolled out of the station, I knew we (OK, I) had made a terrible mistake.

As we hurtled through the space-time continuum, I could think only of tragic miscalculations. Did they mean 52 inches for anyone, or just those husky kids I’m always reading about? My kid is skinny. What if he slips out? He’s so small, after all. He still has a safety rail on his bunk bed for Pete’s sake!

I don’t think I breathed for the two-minute duration of the ride. Well, that’s not technically true; I did take a couple of deep breaths, primarily to provide ample oxygen for my screaming. I am not what you call a good role model.

Then, just as quickly as it began — it was over. As the car came to the much-ballyhooed “complete and final stop,” the teenage ride operator and resident sadist assured us we could now put our arms and legs outside the car if we so desired. As if I could unclench my white knuckles from around that restraint bar.

He’s funny, that kid. Finally free of the g-force, I could look left and see my child again. His eyes were closed and his face was pale. Climbing out of the car on shaky legs, he clutched my hand, pulling me forward as we nearly jogged down the ramp back to safety.

We were leaving that terrible steel beast in the dust! We were nearly free of the terrifying experience, my baby and I.

I said as much with the opinion that I was sure glad that was over. Turning to me, still shaky, his eyes opened wider and a huge grin split across his face: “That was awesome, Mom! Let’s do it AGAIN!”

Six “agains” later, our son was essentially fearless.

Grown. Leaving the park that night, the lights on that big steel monster twinkling behind us, I took note of a very prophetic sign: “Lost and Found is Located at Guest Relations” and I thought how wrong they really were.

Lost is the heart of a mother who arrived with a little boy and left with a “big kid” who is braver than she. Found is the courage of one small(ish) boy who arrived that morning having attained exactly 52 inches and left feeling 10 feet tall.

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