Just a warning. The google calendar, on which I’ve lavished much praise for its organizational assistance, is only as good as the person inputting the data.
Kindergarten called. Apparently 6 is sitting in the office, because there was no school today. The woman in the office was unmoved by my excuse. (”Google told me it was tomorrow.”) At least it wasn’t his sister.
I’m not afraid of bugs. I’m not a bug-lover by any means, but I can deal with the occasional creepy-crawly. This has proven useful in my life. If you need someone to step up to the plate and take out the nasty spider, or steer the buzzing bee out of the house, I’m your woman.
Unfortunately, if a trait such as this is genetic, this gift did not pass down to my increasingly girly four-year-old daughter. She hates bugs. And she’s not afraid to show it. If, for example, she sees a fly or gnat in the bathroom, she will shriek, sob and run from the room in the kind of panic most of the rest of the world saves for something a bit more serious – like nuclear war or armageddon. She will then boycott that particular bathroom for several days until I can persuade her that the nasty beast has departed. (more…)
In my work life I have always been easily describable as a “yes man.” From what I have read in my glossy-covered magazines, women on the whole suffer in great number from this syndrome. It seems we have a desire to answer all requests positively, to meet everyone’s demands, and to be all things to all people. I suppose I’m no exception.
As a young associate I’d rarely turn down a request for my time or work. Should a partner wander into my office, all matters were moved to the side, the legal pad was out, and I was tuned in. It was a rare a request for immediate work or emergency assistance would be met with anything other than “Absolutely. No Problem. I am happy to help.”
It went without saying … Of course I can cancel all my personal plans – my plans to shop, date, bake, sleep, read, bathe and paint my toes. Back then, usually flipping through those magazines, I would think I really need to learn to set boundaries. I really need to learn to say “no.” I just wasn’t sure how.
Turned out the answer was simple: Have children.
Fast forward three children later …and if I had a nickel for every “NO” or incarnation of “NO” I say during a day … well needless to say I wouldn’t need to contemplate whether to stick some Google Advertising on this blog for extra cash.
“No you may not have [insert totally inappropriate sugar coated or filled item] before breakfast.”
“No, NO, NOO, [Kong], you may not [insert random, dangerous, life-threatening activity here].”
Of course, some “nos” are unavoidable and necessary in the job of protecting my children. Certain requests (e.g. jawbreakers at 6 am or games that include sticking silverware in electrical outlets), simply cannot be accommodated. But lately I’ve realized that my chorus of ‘nos’ seems to have grown to full harmonic proportions. A woman who’s had past trouble drawing the line, I have now apparently grown more comfortable with setting the boundaries, and I wonder – at what cost?
“Mom, can we get out the paint stuff?”
“Oooh, Maybe tomorrow… that’s so messy.”
“Mom, You want to play Barbies?”
“Sure, guys, but can you wait just ten minutes until I finish this [insert any task on the Google Lists.]
Or consider my reaction to my children entering the room while I’m chatting on an important personal call. Imagine if a partner had come into my office and I had said “Oh, Hold on one sec, sis,” and then moved the phone away while snapping something like … “You can see I am on the phone right now, what do you need?”
There’s no doubt my obligations have grown and the time for myself for the shopping, dating, baking, sleeping, reading, bathing and painting my toes seems to continually shrink. But, still, I can’t help but wonder why it’s sometimes much easier to draw the boundaries at home than at work. I never would have guessed I’d someday aspire to be more of a “Yes Man.”
A good calendaring system is imperative to working as a lawyer. If you miss a filing deadline, there are consequences. If you’re late to a hearing – consequences. And the consequences can be brutal: Default judgments. Angry judges. Upset clients. Malpractice. Suspension. Termination. Luckily, thanks to good calendaring systems, good assistants, and my own highly-developed internal sense of organization, I have never blown a deadline. At least, not in my work as a lawyer.
This morning I picked up my daughter from pre-school, as I do every Tuesday and Thursday morning. Normally, when she’s dismissed, she runs toward me, arms out, poised for the hug, “MOMMMEEEE!!!” she squeals with glee.
Normally.
Today as the teacher dismissed her, she walked slowly toward me, shoulders hunched, eyes down, arms limply at her sides. Instead of the usual enthusiastic hug, she brushed by me, hefting her shoulder toward me and nearly knocking me backward with the size of the chip upon it. In my mind’s eye, I caught a quick glimpse of the teenage years. I swiftly pushed the vision from my mind.
“What’s the matter, Crabby Patty?” I asked her.
“DON’T call me Crabby Patty.”
Clearly her sense of humor was gone. ”That’s okay,” I thought, giving her a moment.
As we packed up her school papers, I tried again. “Did you have a good day today? Who was the VIK?” (At my children’s pre-school they have a V.I.K every day: a Very Important Kid. The V.I.K. gets to do things like be the line leader, work on the computer and, most importantly, bring the treat for the day.)
At this question the anger began to bubble furiously out of her. “I was the VIK,” she spit at me venomously, ”and YOU forgot to send the treat!” The word ‘you’ hung in the air dripping with disgust.
I laughed inwardly. (As I noted above, I have a tremendous internal sense of organization. I don’t miss important dates and deadlines.) “No, honey,” I replied lightly. ”You weren’t the VIK today.”
She looked at me crossly and heaved her backpack over her shoulder. “Yes. I. Was.” she said confidently. ”I was the line-leader, and I played on the computer, and I got to do the weather calendar.”
In my family, coming to grips with our own errors takes us some time. We started walking toward the car, and I plodded on in ignorant denial. “The VIK must have been gone today, honey, they must have just let you stand in,” I said with diminishing assurance. “NO!!” she shrieked, now very near tears ”It was MEEE!”
Nothing to do at this point but admit it regardless, I thought, as I helped her into her seat. But, still in denial, I needed proof. I buckled her in and ran back into school to check the calendar. There it was in black and white. She was the VIK. I grabbed the teacher and started mumbling my apologies. She reassured me, but also shared that my daughter raised her hand during class and asked “What happens if you’re the VIK and you didn’t bring a snack?”
Back in the minivan, humbled, I apologized repeatedly, and then we drove for awhile in silence. After a few moments, I tried again. “Did you get to play outside today?” I asked sweetly.
Bad Move.
“I had to wear the snowpants out of the cupboard. These aren’t my snow pants. YOU FORGOT MY SNOWPANTS, TOO.”
Apparently I am going to need an assistant or a better calendaring system. Turns out the consequences are pretty brutal on this track, too.
Today is an important day. The results will haunt us for a lifetime – there’s no going back, no changing our decision if we don’t like the outcome. There’s no reviewing and revising our strategy once we commit. It’s today and today alone that matters. So it’s imperative to get this right.Yes, that’s right, it’s School Picture Day. (What? You didn’t expect me to deliver on my lofty principles and write about something unrelated to motherhood?!)Today marks my third year of school pictures. The last two years, with my oldest son, didn’t go well. Too much pressure to perform landed me with choices that included – messed up hair, a blurred photo snapped mid-fit, a blotchy red face, a fake forced smiled and some, I kid you not, actual snarling.
Luckily, I’m a quick study.
This year, my 3 year old daughter started preschool. It’s been lovely. On Tuesday and Thursday mornings she gets dressed without incident, brushes her teeth and even lets me fix her hair. She’s that excited about school.
So I didn’t mention one single word about school pictures today.
Unfortunately, kids have a sixth sense for when something’s amiss. My daughter emerged from her bedroom this morning, still clad in her pink Barbie nightgown, stretching and yawning. She sauntered, rather happily, into my room and crawled up on the bed. She noticed right away that something was strange.
“What’s that thing?” she asked, mid-stretch, nodding toward a unique device, a contraption she’d not seen in her three years of life.
“Oh, this is an iron.” I replied, nonchalantly, “I’m ironing.”
“What does it do?” she asked, her curiosity rising.
“Well, it makes it so your shirt’s not wrinkly,” I said.
“I want my shirt to be wrinkly,” she stated matter-of-factly, employing the contrary, irrational and completely unwavering logic of a three-year-old.
“Oh, silly, you want your shirt to look nice for school,” I offered quickly and with as much total indifference as I could muster.
She looked at me with narrowed, dark brown eyes, sizing the situation up, determining how to proceed. I might have been able to change the subject to breakfast, or turned on PBS Kids for a distraction. We might have made it through unscathed, but her big brother was listening, as usual, from the bathroom. He chose that moment to join the conversation. He burst into the room, eager to convey his advanced knowledge, “Yeah, you have to look nice today – it’s SCHOOL PICTURE DAY,” he reported.
There was a quiet pause. It was the slow motion calm you get right before the storm. You know – the eery quiet that exists in that moment during which the child can’t make any noises because her body is sucking enough air into her lungs to successfully transform her into what we call “supersonic” mode. Then the quiet ended and some words came out.
My dogs might be more equipped to decipher what the words were, as the pitch was such that my human ears could only grasp a wailing of something like “Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooopicurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre
taaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaken.”
I’ll spare the details that followed. There was arguing, bargaining, begging, pleading, wrestling and wrangling. We finally arrived at school, late, blotchy-faced with messy hair and a pretty big shoulder chip. But, amazingly enough, I think the pictures turned out okay.
With pictures behind us and preschool underway – I took the boys and headed to the polls because today really is an important day.
We’re a season behind in Lost. During the first season, the show was on at 7:00 pm here. We watched the first episode. My five year old was barely three then. In a – for lack of a phrase that probably does it justice – completely horseshit parenting move, we let him watch it with us. He hasn’t stopped asking about plane crashes since, and we learned a good lesson about his then-newly-developed ability to understand, but not completely process, serious adult concepts.
We did not repeat the mistake. Instead we waited for Season 1 to come out on video, avoided the better-slotted Season 2 because we hadn’t finished the first, and now we are power-watching Season 2. So, at the moment, we’re obsessed with the Losties and their island. And, the other night, after a few episodes, my husband asks me…
“Which character on Lost would you…”
Ooh, fun, I love this game, I think.
“Definitely Sawyer” I quickly interject.
He stares at me blankly.
“That’s not what I was going to ask.”
Oops.
“Really. Sawyer, huh?” he continues. “I thought it would be Jack.”
Then, we have a brief discussion about my bad boy phase… (the thing about my bad boy phase being that I never actually had such a phase).
“While we’re on that subject,” I say “Who would you?”
“Umm. They’re all pretty hot.”
Typical man.
Then I remember ..
“Oh – what were you actually going to ask?” I say.
“Who would you be the most like if you were stuck on the island?”
I found that to be a much more difficult question. Then I stumbled on this internet test. I love internet tests, but I was a little creeped out by the results of this one. For those of you who think I need to reveal a little more personal information, I have copied the results here for your edification:
“You scored 79% kindness, 36% courage, 31% seedy past, and 41% secretiveness!
You are Walt. You’re a kind person who is eager to talk to everyone and absorb all the crazy things that are going on around you. Since you are still so young, you’re not very brave, but your father will be able to show you how to be courageous. Your mysterious psychic powers are kind of creepy, but everyone needs a hobby, right?Your polar opposite is: Sawyer. You are similar to: Claire and Sun.”
Walt? I’m Walt? At least a half dozen beautiful women on that island, and I’m Walt.