There are noble ideas I have had of parenting.. Should s, woulds.. coulds.. I have once heard of these as guilt and shame words and if used with judgement .. They absolutely can shackle me with the weight of the world and that oh so familiar feeling of not being quite good enough. So then I try harder.. pulling the self imprisonment of the emotional balls and chains .. along with me.. holding so desperately on to the ideals and loosing a bit of reality.
In my discussion with most of my friends and even some strangers or as I like to refer to them minute acquaintances because who knows maybe I will meet them again..I note that many of us maybe even a majority have had this type of experience.. What feels great is when I drop the weights..I hold the keys or are the shackles even truly locked.
I look at the moment and realize.. gain and good, loss and cost... Don't get me wrong loss is not always negative and gain isn't always good.. (note the 40 lbs this past year gained perfect example of not necessarily good gain). So I move toward emotional gain.. and investment.. And I let go of those "noble ideas"
Noble idea: Ittie needs to go to bed on school nights between 8:30 and 9:00 PM. I hold to this on most days. I am proud of our schedule. As a mom I feel that I am helping my child be prepared for life and be energized for school.. (pat pat on back) However, after a week of Avery having the stomach flu and missing out on making her tree (optional assignment) for class to hang with all the other kids. Other homework and house activities brought us up to the bedtime ritual hour.. As I started to give the nightly routine I looked at her.. At the paper that lay waiting to be cut into a tree. I felt the fight of the noble idea.. She is to go to bed.. she has school.. She may be tired.. yet without the tree.. she will be excluded.. "Ittie brush your teeth, put on your pj's then lets do this tree." I attempt to cut out the tree.. Well lets just say my attempt at realism in artistic expression ends up more like an abstract.. Harriet to the rescue. A perfectly cut 2 foot tree. I pull out buttons and old cards, an extra picture of Papa and Ittie, glue sticks and stone marbles, glitter.. All the things you need to make a paper tree come to life. We cut presents out of wrapping paper. The smile on her face as we create this masterpiece and the pride she has in her work. I know that tonight that the noble idea is more of a guideline.. Tonight its about us, this tree and her sense of belonging, creation and sharing.
Noble idea: I should bake for all the school functions/ parties and just because. Along with becoming the oven master, I need to get up and make breakfast. My mother made the best from scratch sugar cookies. She baked on weekends for us and we devoured the dough, the cookies. She made a mile high french toast pile on Saturday mornings with smoky links to be accompanied by a lake of Mrs. Buttersworth maple syrup. Enough that if you weren't sticky down your chin to your elbows then you hadn't had enough french toast and links. Michelle and I had patterns cut into our pb and j sandwiches. She also held a full time job. It was truly amazing. MY ideal.. I should do this for Avery . What this creates for me is a sense of guilt every time I fail, when I substitute the Eggo for the french toast even if Avery prefers the Eggo. (nutrigrain got to work in a bit of nutrition). I feel bad when I had her a banana to eat as we run out the door in the morning. My reality. Avery isn't me, I am not my mom and this is our life. She likes Eggos. A banana is a good food and Avery has no complaints. I do on Valentines day wake up and make heart shaped pancakes. Some weekends we randomly make cookies, brownies, pie dough cinnamon rolls for the fun of it. I let go of the Idea and the guilt and now I am learning to enjoy us.
Noble Idea: Keeping up with the house..the outside.. the pond must be pretty. Honestly I am pulled to reality with something has to give.. I work 8 hours a day, I come home to usually work around the farm in nice weather another 6 to 7 hours. When Ittie is home and during the school year add time out to help with homework, dinner. any extra curricular activity.. Laundry.. Dishes.. Again something has to give and often its the dishes or floors.. laundry waits until the weekend.. The fridge is a project that happens on Saturday mornings with a strong cup of coffee. And there are still those boxes in the rooms that are waiting for me to go through them.. I am waiting for the first good snow..
I have fretted over and over about being the good mom.. and what defines that.. being the good partner and what Noble Ideas define this role.. At the end it breaks down for me like this.. I am doing all that I can and some days more.. some days I fall short. I assist, I call I try to keep up with my nieces and nephews.. Friends and family. I help with homework while putting something in the oven because that gives us more time then the stove top or grill. Math is practiced while cooking.. Reading is practiced from a recipe as Ittie calls me out on MOM too much Vanilla.. and I say.. well a little extra vanilla can't hurt.. (I have kept that Noble Idea.)
I love earnestly and deeply and hug my kid every night I have her and on the nights she is with her father I send her a virtual squeeze and love. I look over to Harriet.. appreciate that this wonderful person puts up with my neurotic self and the heavy load I sometimes carry with all my "Noble Ideas". I am grateful for her calming presence that refocuses me to say what is possible today.. what is the most important.. She reminds me to balance all of this weight with levity of humor and that it is OK to let go of the ideas of the past and make my own today..
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