If I could market whatever scent I emit when I sit down to, oh, eat, pay bills, or poop, the one that instantly attracts my children to me and makes them want to climb on my lap and snuggle at that exact moment...if I could do that and sell it to desperate people looking for a date, I would totally be a gazillionare and I would make Bill Gates clean my toilets with his toothbrush.
Seriously. These children will ignore me until the exact second after I become not involved with trying to engage them in any given activity. The nanosecond after my mind shifts from them to caring for, say, my basic needs, some kind of automatic honing device that was implanted in their brains at birth goes off. They then feel the need to follow me around like a lovesick hound dog (minus the leg humping).
"Enjoy it while you can", they say. "It goes by so fast and one day you will wish they were there doing that", they say. First of all, who the fuck is the nebulous "they" that has so much to say? Ever stop to think that there is a reason "they" are anonymous? Yeah, it's probably because they give really shitty advice. Enjoy being pawed at like a cat while I am trying to eat? Enjoy someone climbing on my lap while I'm on the can? Enjoy a child climbing on my lap, almost knocking my laptop off and causing me to spill my coffee down the front of my shirt while engaged in the already stressful job of "paying bills" (AKA, pretending that I have enough money to pay all the bills).
I am sorry, but there are other things from my children's childhood I will enjoy. I will enjoy the dancing in the living room. I will enjoy the times they want to do my hair. I will enjoy jumping on the trampoline with them. I will enjoy the dance recitals, the art shows, the school performances and parties.
I refuse to fucking enjoy the fact that they instantly want my attention the moment I become engrossed in a task that has nothing to do with them. Goddammit, pooping is a one man (or woman) job. I don't need company for it. In fact, I prefer to be alone. And I do not require cuddling to get me to eat my veggies. I can do that on my own as well.
The book "I'll Love You Forever" gets a bit of a bad rap. Mostly because of the crazy helicopter parenting that goes on in there. Seriously, B&E to get into your son's house when he is a grown ass man just to sing him that song? That's a whole new level of crazy I can only dream of attaining one day. But stop to think about that shit for a minute.
Paybacks, mothafuckers. All those times when those kids crawled into bed with me at night cause "they want to cuddle?" (Sleeping...another thing I prefer to do without help.) Better lock your windows as adults, girls. Mama's getting herself some vengeance.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Sunday, February 16, 2014
Crafty
When I signed up for this crazy thing called mothering, I knew that there would be sleepless nights, heartache, frustration, and various bodily fluids that I would wear at certain points in life. No one told me, however, that it would also require mad Martha Stewart skills.
The explosion of sites such as Pinterest has led to super cute ideas circling the web faster than a line of coke goes up Charlie Sheen's nose. Now don't get me wrong...I love Pinterest and the various ideas that it has given me. Hell, I can wield a hot glue gun with the best of them. What I really resent is the notion that we are going to pile on overworked, underpaid, and perpetually stressed mother's one more "requirement" to feel guilty about. This activates in me some latent Oppositional Defiant Disorder and makes me want to give the universe the finger. Then I feel guilty and sink to the depths of despair, convinced that because that one time when Charlie was three I didn't take the time to make a homemade (insert holiday) treat for her to take to class, she will be forever ostracized and bullied and will then become the next serial killer and end up getting arrested wearing her victim's skin as a fur coat while playing solitaire with a short deck.
Fuck that shit. I sent in store-bought Valentines for the little girls. I didn't even write names on the fruit snacks that I sent into Charlie's preschool class. I felt a bit guilty about sending in those little bombs of high fructose corn syrup and artificial flavorings and colors, but then decided that it wasn't enough to make me look for something else or to create a cute handmade valentine with an organic banana and a card that says "I go bananas for you, Valentine!" I didn't have to feel so guilty about Alexis...her first choice, Airheads, was devoured by Spartacus because he is an asshole sometimes who emotionally eats everything that he can find because his owners don't pet him enough. The second choice, purchased a half an hour before we had to leave for school, was temporary tattoos. Let's ink all those bitchez in the second grade up, fo' shizzle! What can I say; she didn't choose the thug life, it chose her.
If I have anything to feel guilty about, it is going to be my poor parenting choices and the amount of wine I consume to deal with my children's whining. Not some fabricated requirement perpetuated by the craft industry to generate more sales in the pursuit of the almighty dollar. I am going to have burnt fingers, be slightly high from paint fumes, and be covered in glitter on my own terms, dammit. Not because some jackass in marketing decided that I needed something imaginary to feel guilty about...I do enough on my own to feel guilty about. I certainly don't need any help, thankyouverymuch!
The explosion of sites such as Pinterest has led to super cute ideas circling the web faster than a line of coke goes up Charlie Sheen's nose. Now don't get me wrong...I love Pinterest and the various ideas that it has given me. Hell, I can wield a hot glue gun with the best of them. What I really resent is the notion that we are going to pile on overworked, underpaid, and perpetually stressed mother's one more "requirement" to feel guilty about. This activates in me some latent Oppositional Defiant Disorder and makes me want to give the universe the finger. Then I feel guilty and sink to the depths of despair, convinced that because that one time when Charlie was three I didn't take the time to make a homemade (insert holiday) treat for her to take to class, she will be forever ostracized and bullied and will then become the next serial killer and end up getting arrested wearing her victim's skin as a fur coat while playing solitaire with a short deck.
Fuck that shit. I sent in store-bought Valentines for the little girls. I didn't even write names on the fruit snacks that I sent into Charlie's preschool class. I felt a bit guilty about sending in those little bombs of high fructose corn syrup and artificial flavorings and colors, but then decided that it wasn't enough to make me look for something else or to create a cute handmade valentine with an organic banana and a card that says "I go bananas for you, Valentine!" I didn't have to feel so guilty about Alexis...her first choice, Airheads, was devoured by Spartacus because he is an asshole sometimes who emotionally eats everything that he can find because his owners don't pet him enough. The second choice, purchased a half an hour before we had to leave for school, was temporary tattoos. Let's ink all those bitchez in the second grade up, fo' shizzle! What can I say; she didn't choose the thug life, it chose her.
If I have anything to feel guilty about, it is going to be my poor parenting choices and the amount of wine I consume to deal with my children's whining. Not some fabricated requirement perpetuated by the craft industry to generate more sales in the pursuit of the almighty dollar. I am going to have burnt fingers, be slightly high from paint fumes, and be covered in glitter on my own terms, dammit. Not because some jackass in marketing decided that I needed something imaginary to feel guilty about...I do enough on my own to feel guilty about. I certainly don't need any help, thankyouverymuch!
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Frozen
I saw the movie Frozen today. I had heard a lot about it from the whole "prince as savior for helpless princess" thing, and, without giving the ending away, I was pleasantly surprised (though of course there was romance...wouldn't be a Disney movie without the whole idea of a woman needing to be completed by a man, DUH). I was also surprised at the fact that the movie seemed to be a decent allegory in favor of gay rights.
I figured that I could not be the only one who had picked up on this, and when I googled it I saw that most people seemed to get the vibe that Elsa was gay. Now I have notoriously AWFUL gaydar...I have a story from college about that where I found out in the course of a day that FIVE people I knew were gay and I had no clue. At all. And looking back, one was pretty obvious and had basically every stereotype you can think of when you think of a gay man....what I am saying here is maybe that is the case in the movie and I totally missed it. It's happened before, OK?
What struck me, though, was when the king and queen took Elsa to the rock trolls and the grandpa troll asked the king, "Was she born this way or was it a curse?" As is the case with homosexuality, the response was "born this way." Another scene that stuck out for me was when Elsa is building her ice castle and sings the song "Let it Go" and something along the lines of "I'm alone, but I'm finally free to be me". Away from the confines of the kingdom, where her parents literally closeted her, Elsa was finally able to revel in the gift that she was given and be herself.
The persecution and fear that came from the people of the kingdom also stuck out to me. Fear, revulsion, horror...all of what they did not understand. She was something to be removed, hid out of sight...even the gloves were symbolic of her repression. Don't be yourself, don't be different, you are dangerous to our society. If you can't control yourself and who you are, we must eliminate you. Very similar rhetoric that comes from aficionados of Fox News...
What sealed the deal for me was the ending. It was love and acceptance that saved the day. Elsa was still Elsa in the end...still had her powers, still was who she was born to be. The very fabric of the society that she loved, however, was not worse off because of acknowledging her gift. In fact, when she tried to hide and suppress it, she ended up harming not only the people she loved, but also society and causing herself emotional harm. When her kingdom embraced who she was and not some false caricature of who they thought she should be, Elsa was able to enhance life in the kingdom and they all lived happily ever after in true Disney fashion.
I figured that I could not be the only one who had picked up on this, and when I googled it I saw that most people seemed to get the vibe that Elsa was gay. Now I have notoriously AWFUL gaydar...I have a story from college about that where I found out in the course of a day that FIVE people I knew were gay and I had no clue. At all. And looking back, one was pretty obvious and had basically every stereotype you can think of when you think of a gay man....what I am saying here is maybe that is the case in the movie and I totally missed it. It's happened before, OK?
What struck me, though, was when the king and queen took Elsa to the rock trolls and the grandpa troll asked the king, "Was she born this way or was it a curse?" As is the case with homosexuality, the response was "born this way." Another scene that stuck out for me was when Elsa is building her ice castle and sings the song "Let it Go" and something along the lines of "I'm alone, but I'm finally free to be me". Away from the confines of the kingdom, where her parents literally closeted her, Elsa was finally able to revel in the gift that she was given and be herself.
The persecution and fear that came from the people of the kingdom also stuck out to me. Fear, revulsion, horror...all of what they did not understand. She was something to be removed, hid out of sight...even the gloves were symbolic of her repression. Don't be yourself, don't be different, you are dangerous to our society. If you can't control yourself and who you are, we must eliminate you. Very similar rhetoric that comes from aficionados of Fox News...
What sealed the deal for me was the ending. It was love and acceptance that saved the day. Elsa was still Elsa in the end...still had her powers, still was who she was born to be. The very fabric of the society that she loved, however, was not worse off because of acknowledging her gift. In fact, when she tried to hide and suppress it, she ended up harming not only the people she loved, but also society and causing herself emotional harm. When her kingdom embraced who she was and not some false caricature of who they thought she should be, Elsa was able to enhance life in the kingdom and they all lived happily ever after in true Disney fashion.
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