Helping your children talk back on the playground and other fun parenting lessons
As a child, I never knew what to say when kids picked on me.
This quick wit you enjoy is a recent development.
Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, I’d just stare straight ahead and pretend to be deaf. If I went home and complained to my mother, her advice was quaint and ultimately ineffective.
Me: Toby was mean to me today.
Mom: What happened?
Lessons from my grandmother
St. Patrick’s Day always reminds me of my mother’s mother, the original Catherine Durkin. It was her favorite holiday. As I get older, I often think of her and how she taught by example…
This oldie but goodie is for her.
Ode to Kitty
To her nine grandchildren, of which I was oldest, she’ll always be “Nana,” but friends and family affectionately called her “Kitty.”
Every winter for seventeen years, Kitty came to Florida and lived with us. We got along surprising well. Four of us listened, talked, laughed, and digested my mother’s meat loaf in less than 1600 square feet – without killing each other.
My siblings and I will never walk by a cosmetics counter and not recall the woman who insisted on Clinique because “Oil of Olay puts hair on your face.” Through our Nana, we discovered the miracles of Lestoil, appreciation for Westerns, and, especially, how to grow old with dignity and humor.
In other words, the woman ruined us.
Learn how to drive or get off the road: 5 ways to make our streets safer
For some people, driving has become a bit of a challenge. Blame it on Toyota or multi-tasking failures everywhere, but we now hear daily about too many people killing themselves or others in an attempt to get from Point A to Point B.
Oprah Winfrey and overzealous legislators want to change all that. While there is always room for common-sense legislation, regulation, and Queen Oprah’s intervention, most improvements regarding our vehicles and driving laws require people to smarten up.
1. Treat your speeding car like a horny twenty year-old – downshift into neutral and don’t close your eyes.
I haven’t heard the term “unintended acceleration” since college. These days, the phenomenon has less to do with drunk frat boys and more to do with Toyota’s faulty engineering.
The La-La Sisterhood
I spent last weekend in Ft. Lauderdale with friends I’ve known since the early 1980s. We have a ton of memories from our teenage and college years. Now Cathy, Julie, and I are making memories from an adventure known as middle age.
Girl-bonding during a three-day marathon of enjoyable conversation is good for the soul.
Eggplant Parmesan-pizza for breakfast, mimosas all day and wine all night, not to mention bean dip for lunch and dinner, might be a less than healthy day-to-day habit. But, every once in a while, we need this type of gathering, especially when it’s combined with daytime naps, laughter, and a few episodes of reality-based television.
Yes, we miss the men and children in our lives. They nourish us in different ways and we cannot go more than a few days without them.
However, for those few days without them…
A conversation that would normally take two minutes
Talking to a ten year-old boy is a lot like talking to a happy drunk. Both ramble, are easily distracted, and laugh for no good reason.
The other night Youngest told a story that should have taken less than two minutes. Instead, we still weren’t sure what happened after ten. An excerpt:
Me: How was school?
Youngest: Fine. Except for gym. Esther* kicked me in my femur.
Me: Your femur?
(Youngest nodded.)
Me: Will I still be able to have grandchildren one day?
If going away is this much work, maybe I should stay home
Have you ever put aside your wifely and motherly duties for a getaway with the girls?
If not, I highly recommend it. Spending time with cherished girlfriends is life-affirming. Not only will you come back refreshed and at peace with the world, despite a slight hangover and post-traumatic-stress disorder, your husband and children will also enjoy some precious freedom without anyone telling them to use the last of the ketchup before opening a new bottle.
A girls’ weekend away is one of those rare moments when everyone wins.
Except you.
How to be a good neighbor
Recently, my sister and I were discussing a matter of universal importance, even more important than that eternal quest for attention during football season or the ingredients of the 7-Layer Burrito at Taco Bell.
I’m talking about good neighbors. Who are they? How did they get to be so good? Why don’t more of them live near us?
Actually, I’m lucky. My neighbors have always been delightful. Whether we’re talking about the Italians in Boston who knew I was pregnant before I did and asked the moon to protect us or that lovely lady in Wesley Chapel who introduced me to her good friend Dave Andreychuk – I have lived near and around gems.
But back in the day, neighbors used to really know each other. They would sit on the front porch and watch people go by, stopping to chat with friends and catch up on the goings-on about town.
That was also an era when women wore girdles and were encouraged to listen first, talk never. But still, that neighborly thing was nice and comforting. When I was a kid, we felt like the people who shared our street were looking out for us.
After all, just because we got rid of the restrictive undergarments, doesn’t mean we have to stop knowing each other. Maybe we just have to adopt a more modern view of what it means to be a good neighbor.
My sister sums it up nicely. A perfect neighbor is someone who:
When family rides out a storm together, that’s when the wind really starts to blow.
This winter, including these last few days, many families are finding themselves snowed in. Mother Nature doesn’t really care if you’ve got a house full of complaining children who can’t find anything good on television. I’m hearing from plenty of women who want to know how to entertain kids during the 29th snow day this year after they’ve run out of glue, colored pencils, and patience. Other friends are deluged with relatives who can’t leave because the planes are grounded or perhaps because the power or Internet connections back home aren’t working.
When the house is that full, there often isn’t enough wine to go around.
Tough times and all.
Although I live in the South, I am experienced in the art of taking in relatives from hurricane-stricken areas (read: Refu-Jews) and kids stuck in the house because the wind outside is strong enough to mess Mommy’s hair (read: pretty f*cking strong.)
Here’s my best advice for dealing with relatives who can’t or won’t leave your side until the sun comes out again:
My parents go to the movies – look out drivers!
My parents don’t go to the movies too often. They prefer to watch whatever my brother recommends from the comfort of their Barcaloungers.
Why don’t they watch what I recommend? One word: Borat. My dad still isn’t the same.
There are several reasons why they don’t like watching movies in public.
Dad could do without all the talking and texting from other moviegoers. At home, he likes the remote so he can pause movies when he has to use the bathroom or refill his drink.
“You don’t get that at Regal,” he barked. “Here, at least, when your mother starts a conversation right in the damn middle of a murder scene, I can hit the rewind button.”
Mom doesn’t mind watching a movie in public, but she does miss the subtitles.
“But you don’t watch foreign films,” I said. “Why do you need subtitles?”
“What did you say?” she asked.
‘Nuff said.
The “your son doesn’t feel well” call from school and other firsts
When your precious child gets his first fever, it’s hard to tell right away if you’re overreacting when you call 911 and request a Medevac Helicopter.
After all, parenting is not an exact science. It’s more like an art.
The kind of art your kids created when they were three – using clumpy paint, watery brushes, and whatever was in their nose at the time. Yet you applauded, declared it a masterpiece, and still stare at it framed on your wall, getting teary-eyed about the experience.
Unlike many mothers who let these memories fade into the oblivion, I wrote my experiences down and can retrieve them whenever I feel like punishing myself. Want to come with me down memory lane? And then you, too, can applaud and get teary-eyed.
Or laugh at me while I do?
I can still remember, back in 2005, when my kids were in kindergarten. I worked right around the corner, trying to teach teenagers how to avoid felony charges and pay attention for longer than three minutes.
A few days into that school year, I received my first phone call from an administrator…
“Your son doesn’t feel well and needs to go home.”
Catherine Durkin Robinson
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she’s crafty
