In the Blink of an Eye...

In the morning, I will be the mother of a ten year old.  Double Digits.  A one and a zero standing side by side and I just keep thinking where in the sam hell did the time go???  A while back, I read a blog post that was flying around the internet. I was looking over my shoulder while reading it.  I could tell my face was getting warm and red...from embarrassment.  Countless friends were sharing it on Facebook and laughing and being, all, "Oh yeah, what do those old ladies in the check out line know?"    The comments, many of them cheering on the writer, telling her that she was brilliant and that they were words they could have written themselves.  I skimmed through the pages of comments, searching and searching for someone who shared my opinion.  There had to be at least one, right?  I found some, but we were grossly out numbered.

I had received those words that they were snickering about from my own dear cousin - and I had cherished them.  I took them to heart and I shared them with other new moms.  Now, I wondered if the moms who I'd shared them with were the ones who were now LOL'ing at this blog.   I felt so silly, reading those words.  New moms were not particularly receptive to all that, "Cherish every moment." mumbo-jumbo.  I get it to an extent.  Maybe the timing of the words isn't always right.  I mean, if little Johnny is hurling things from the carriage while you're shopping sleep deprived or you've got some dried up something or other on your shoulder....well, then, maybe it might not be the best time to tell a new mom to "cherish these moments because it goes by so fast."   It's just that those old ladies only see your sweet baby.   Their life experience sees past all of the chaos swirling around you in that current moment and they want to share that moment with you; to have a moment in time.

Right now, I might not be the mom of a child who is packing up and moving off to college. 

I might not be the mom of a child who is preparing to walk down the aisle. 

I might not be the mom of a child who is enlisting to serve our country...Although, I did glimpse that future once at the grocery store.   It was a hot summer day.  Both of my sons were decked out in their camo shirts & shorts, wearing their camelbacks full of water - looking quite ready for something, when the woman who was in front of me in line looked at them with that knowing smile.  She told me that her son was in Ranger Training in Hawaii.  I looked at my boys and then to the picture she had proudly pulled out of her wallet of her son's graduation from basic training.

I choked up.

I knew that she looked at my boys and thought, "It goes by in a blink of an eye."  She didn't say it.  She didn't have to.  Those words hung in the air regardless of whether or not they were uttered.  Mothers who have seen their children grow up before their eyes, know.  They look at those little kids in the check out line with their chubby fingers, missing teeth, skinned knees and they long for those days.   If they could build a time machine, it wouldn't be to go meet some crusty old queen or see the Pyramids in their heyday, it would be to spend just one more day with those chubby fingers and to kiss a boo boo all better.

I know that motherhood is not all pretty and fun and like the pictures in a magazine. { Although, I try damn hard to edit my photos & pair them with a clever status on Facebook so that it seems that way } Motherhood ~  It all starts with sleepless nights and smelly diapers; endless messy days filled with temper tantrums. There are tears and toys not put away.  Stacks of school papers that you think you'll never see the bottom of.  Yeah, all that crap, you don't think that you'll miss it or that you should have cherished it, but some day - and I'd put money on it, you will long for a day that you stayed in your jammies and never made it into the shower because you had been up all night with your baby.  Snuggling and soothing and smelling that new baby smell; from the topside preferably.  You'll miss all of those papers colored outside the lines, with at least one letter in their name made backwards.  That backwards letter that worried you and had you calling the teacher to make sure your little guy or girl was on track.   I'm telling ya, you're not gonna be laughing in a few years when you see your baby climb aboard the big yellow school bus or when your son walks off into the woods to go hunting with his dad. { I know I didn't } Or when you drop your daughter off at her first school dance looking like a young lady.  You're gonna cry and you're gonna wonder where the time went?

Seriously,  look at these pictures...I didn't age, but my son grew to my size, so it must have been in the blink of an eye!

Ok, clearly, I did age some.  I don't look like I'm 15 anymore...which isn't always a bad thing.  But it felt like it happened "in the blink of an eye".  

There are no words...

For the last few weeks, probably months even, I have been feeling incredibly nostalgic.  Many an hour I have spent flipping through the pages of photo albums, one of which will be ten years old soon.  Ten years old soon because tomorrow morning at approximately 4:40am my first son was born.  I call him G Love and Special Sauce and he hates it.   He is the light of my world.  I am who I am today because of him.

For the past few days, I've been working and crafting this wildly funny and sarcastic blog in response to a blog I read a few months ago disparaging the notion of, "Carpe Diem" as it relates to being a new mom.   I had some witty rebuttals and my own antidotes of when words like, "Cherish every moment" and "time flies by" were bestowed upon me.

In light of the horrific tragedy today, I can't imagine that there is one parent on the face of the planet who doesn't already know how precious each and every moment with their child is.  Posting it now would be in the poorest of taste.

I can't remember any time that I have ever been so upset, not even on September 11, 2001.  And we all know how devastating that day was,  but that was Pre-K for me.  Pre-Kids that is.   When people tell you how having children will change your life, there is no way to put it into words.  It's a feeling.  It's your heart on your sleeve.  Your children are your heart beating freely and carelessly outside of you.   The reaction that I feel today from this unspeakable tragedy has made me fully and completely see the difference becoming a mother has made in my life.

I am heaving and sobbing.

We have talk radio on most of the time at work so we heard what was going on.  We saw accounts of a shooter at a school online.  For hours, the only news was that a teacher was shot in the foot.  Not that that isn't terrible, but when the story changed and they said that children were shot and killed.

I lost it.  I know that I am not alone in feeling this way.   Losing a child is every parents' worst nightmare, never-mind to have it happen like this.  There are no words.  There are no words.

I hope I don't have my head bitten off for this...

I have a Menorah on my mantle and the Star of David on my Christmas tree.  I am not Jewish.  My husband is not Jewish.  Therefore, my sons are not Jewish.  Yet, there are at least three Stars of David on my Christmas Tree and a Menorah {made from paper } propped up on my mantle...the very same mantle that our Christmas stockings hang from.

And yet, there it is.

I'm not freakin' out.  My kids haven't started wearing yamakas and speaking Yiddish.

All of these religious symbols were made at school.  Made at the school my children attend.  A public school.  "Separation of Church and State" has been slung around so much this month, with ever increasing ferocity each "Holiday Season" { as it is now called } that I want to vomit.  The Separation of Church and State is not even in the Constitution of the United States of America, yet people throw it around willie nillie any time God is written or uttered in a government run something or other. 

The First Amendment does, however, play off of it Jefferson's phrase "Church and State":  "Conrgress Shall make no law respecting an  establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free  exercise thereof."  I'm not sure how that translates into we have to paint the country grey and strip each citizen of its heritage and traditions, but really, isn't that what is being done when we hideaway any semblance of any celebration?  

A Christmas Tree was taken out of an RMV because it offended someone.  Seriously, if any place in this country needs some holiday cheer, it's the RMV!  The annoyed people are a little bit right.  America is not a 100% Christian-Jesus-Loving country.   In the world, there are as many ways to believe and not believe as there are countries in the world.   I'm pretty sure there is probably representation of each of them right here in this country.  After all, that is why America is called the "melting pot".   What the separation of Church and State means, the reason that we have it that is, is the reason the Englishmen left England.  The Church of England was forcing their religion on everyone. 

Over the past few weeks, I have heard some wild and crazy things.  You'd think it was a real life skit with Steve Martin and Dan Aykroyd writing the news stories.  Frosty the Snowman was put in the Manger of a Nativity Scene?  Are you kidding me?  Below are a few arguments I've read or heard for taking holiday celebrations out of schools.

Religion has no place in school. 

The thing about religion is that it is intertwined into the fabric of our lives.  Wars are fought over it.  Songs are sung in praise of it.   Literature is inspired by it.   Whether or not you believe in God and how you believe in God is irrelevant to that fact that people do.   Many, many people do.   You can't teach history without talking religion.

The religion we practice is different than the ones they are teaching/celebrating at school.  My children will be confused.  { she specifically used Christian-Jewish example }

Really?  A Menorah is going to confuse your kids?  I'm pretty sure that Jesus was Jewish and it's actually nice to discuss Jesus and his past.  Doesn't our past shape the person we are today?  Tell your children about the miracle of light and the symbolism of the candles.  Sheesh!

Well, we don't believe in God.  At all.  I don't want my kids learning about the baby Jesus.   

Ok.   Not learning about the baby Jesus isn't going to make the baby Jesus go away.   And if they don't practice anything, then how is learning about someone else's faith going to confuse them?

During this Holiday Season, we have the culmination of so many celebrations.  Hmm, something about that longest, darkest, day and light coming into the world that seemed to be a good time to place God.  God is light.  Light is Good.  God is Good.   However simple it needs to be explained.  

What we have during this month of December is a tremendous opportunity to learn.  We can learn about Christmas and how Christians celebrate.   We can learn about Hanukkah and how it is celebrated.  There is Kwanza, The Winter Soltice and Bohdi Day as well.   And please, don't forget the Festivus for the Rest of Us.   Education leads to understanding and where else should we teach children about other cultures and the ideas and faith that they hold dear?  I think school seems like a pretty good place to start.   

Erasing celebrations doesn't increase tolerance, education does.  Learn about your neighbor, love your neighbor, whether they are Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist,  Pagan, or Atheiest.   We can coexist.

Listamania

Is this month not the mother of all lists?  Christmas gift lists for the kids, the teachers, co-workers, family and friends.  To-Do lists for writing out cards and picking up the stamps…once you cross off creating and ordering your cards that is.  Ah, the list for baking cookies, dropping off Toys for Tots, putting up the decorations and finding the perfect tree.  Lists – Friend or Enemy? Helper or Hindrance?  That is the question!

The thing about listing and I don’t mean when a sailboat has lost its wind and floats lifelessly about, although that is how I felt sometimes when I  was thinking of making all of those endless lists.   Notes on scraps of paper, food items you’ve run out of scrawled on the white board, “Post its” scattered helter skelter to call your attention to the more urgent needs.  They all made me crazy!  All of them.  Ok, well, except for the post-its.  All summer long while my husband was backing the truck up the driveway before the sun had even begun to creep up over the trees there was always a post-it greeting him.   I placed one on the dashboard each night just past midnight as I crept home at that un-Godly hour from work.  We were two ships passing in the night all summer long while he was in the Academy and I worked evenings.   They were quick-love-notes.  I could never be mad at those cute little stickies. 

But,  all of the other scraps of paper, stacks of words on the back of an envelope, errands to be run written out on a receipt, the endless listing on any scrap of paper….those ones.  I hated them!  And I decided to make them stop ruling my life.  I rule them now.  All of the things that I need to do, whether it’s to remember to pick something up, order cupcakes, take down directions; it all goes in my little book.

I finally put it out of my mind that I will ever finish a list, as in complete everything on it.  Sheesh, because that’s like saying, “I finished the laundry.”  Or “I put all of the dishes away.”  Or “I have the house cleaned.”   All of those things are the same as shoveling while it’s still snowing.  They never end, there will always be more.  Your “to-do” list will always grow like the grass in the summer time.  That’s life.  It’s how you deal with the list that matters.   Wow, I’m getting deep here!  I’m sure there are people out there that just wing it.   Living on the edge, they are.   Running to the store without a shopping list.  They probably jump out of airplanes too!  Sadly, I am like am like a stumbling fool in the dark without a list. 

I have been working hard this past year to break the habit of starting new lists and then frantically digging for them in my bottomless pocketbook when I finally arrive at the store.  I’ve become much more efficient.  I have a little book, it’s nothing special, just a plain old little spiral notebook to jot down all of my reminders.  It keeps addresses from new friends and pieces of random information - tidy; all in one place.    I am down to four unused pages.  My little book is tattered and torn, but it has kept me sane since January – relatively speaking.  Ahh, a New Year’s resolution that I have succeeded at!  I’m not saying that I don’t go rogue sometimes and scribble something on the back of a work order { like the notes for this post } but for the most part, I think I’ve got it!

I even rewarded myself with a new cute pink notebook with my initial on it!   

Merry Birthday & Happy Christmas!!!

December is my month to shine!  So, the whole reason that I created this blog was that I’m a super over-scheduled nut who can’t say, “no” and I am always racing around to get things done and usually at the last minute.  That's my calling card - Lastminutemama!

Yes, that was me on November 30^th close to midnight, burning my fingers on the glue gun, slicing up glittery paper and squeezing warm chocolate into little Christmas trees molds & topping them with sprinkles.  And, yes, I was scribbling seasonal delights on tiny tags so that the boys would have something to look forward to as we counted down to Christmas. Ahh, the Advent Calender is done…just the nick of time.  Ok, truth be told, I finished writing out the tags the next night because I had run out of ideas and needed to call in for back up.  My mom came up with, "write letters to soldiers, drop food off at an animal shelter and a few other good ones."

Really, it’s the story of my life, racing around and I wouldn’t have it any other way.  I’m destined to be that way, in fact.  I remember just a little over 10 years ago, I was sitting in a deck chair at a family cookout when someone’s aunt, aunt-in-law, no relationship to me, asked when I was due.  When I told her December 25^th, she replied that I had ruined my child’s life and his or her birthday would always be over-shadowed by Christmas and he’d receive joint presents. 

Umm, thank you?  Maybe next you'd like to just say, "Congratutions."  ...I wish I had said that!

Well, he does receive joint presents…very often, but they are not joint Birthday/Christmas presents.  They are joint Birthday/Birthday presents and joint Christmas/Christmas presents with his brother.  Somehow, I managed to ruin his life too and gave him a December birthday as well.

What that crotchety old lady didn’t know is that I am a master juggler, creative craftster and we rock the Birthday-Christmas month of December. Although the boys due dates were Dec 25 & 24^th, I did manage to pop them out on the 15^th & 10^th.  So, I didn’t totally ruin their lives! Ha, take that! 

If you ask them when their birthdays are, they will tell you on Christmas!  Being “Christmas Babies” is something that they take very seriously.  Wearing a Santa hat on a beautiful fall day while we enjoyed an Art Stroll – it’s been done.   Sleeping with the red stocking cap on in summer – Yup!  It’s a year round phenomenon. And so when December rolls around, we turn it up a notch.  The 12^th month is all for them and we celebrate like nobody's business the whole time through with cookie making, tree lightings, movie marathons, shopping for Toys for Tots, seeing the Christmas lights, decorating our home, taking a trip to Edaville and on and on.   I do remember worrying in the beginning that we'd have to keep their birthdays separate from Christmas and for a while we would never pick out a tree until after the 15^th, but really we just needed the boys to guide us and let us know how they wanted December to be One-Big-Crazy-Hoopla of fun! 

And so Merry Birthday and a Happy Christmas to my boys!!!