Bringing Up Mother: Annie's Ssong

A few weeks ago, I sent an email to an ex-girlfriend. "Annie" and I dated almost two years, a relationship longer than all but one in the twenty-two years since my divorce. Annie and my older daughter (only one, back then), Shelly, got along very well.

I got in touch with Annie a few times in the nineteen years that have passed since our breakup; the first time – a year after I'd made like a real (pardon me) rectum and shoved her out of my life – I nearly gave her an actual heart attack; but I'd gone to visit her to apologize sincerely for how rude, insensitive, selfish, and hurtful I'd been to her for most of our time together.

Annie has since had two kids – "Luke", and "Mimi" – and recently she and I began emailing each other. In my last email to her – my third in all, I think; this was a few weeks ago – I included some JPEGs of Shelly, so she could see how beautifully "our girl" has grown up. Here's her response:

Sent: Saturday, March 17, 2007 12:46 PM

Subject: hello

my goodness she looks so much like you!!!!! the pictures were beautiful....or rather she was beautifull in the pictures.

not much going on here in the way of excitement. at this point and time luke in failing the sixth grade, not because he doesnt know it, but rather because he is lazy and doesnt want to do the work. he claims he keeps losing things and forgetting to turn them in. im sorry, i could swallow that story once in a while but not on a consistant basis.

speaking of, i sent you a picture. i think it will get at least a grin out of you.

mimi is improving in school a little bit. i dont know if it will be enough to get her a passing grade or not. last time i talked to her teacher she said it wasnt really a concern for her at that point. it is for me though. seems like most of the papers she brings home are grades of d or f. i told the teacher i feel like she is being left behind, but she doesnt feel that way. guess ill talk to her more about it at the conference.

mom is doing okay i believe. she has a follow up appointment monday so i guess we will find out then how good she is really doing.

as for me, well all i can say is i need to get up off my rear end and do something. i took a class last year and i havent been applying what i learned.....and i learned a lot from it. it was a course sponsored by the coronary health improvement project......c.h.i.p. for short. basically what it taught was how your body reacts to different types of food. the underlying lesson being, if you want to be healthy and live longer eat only foods as grown and nothing with a mother or a face. BASIC VEGETARIANISM. i know it sounds really lame and very 70s but it isnt just a diet, its a lifestyle. i did really well with it at first but lately i have been having a really hard time with it. it is so much easier to throw something in the microwave or order out than it is to stand in the kitchen for god knows how long cutting veggies and all that stuff. and as for the exercise, that is totally nonexistant at this point for me. i was doing it for 1/2 hour every day and had actually lost about 20 pounds. since i stopped i have put half of that back on. and i have been missing the alumni meetings also. not good when you dont have the support of your family.

in addition to that, mimis father dropped a bomb shell on me the other day. he wants to get back together. after about 10 years of just being "friends".....which basically means that i felt like the only reason he was in my life was to spend time with meem and to have transportation......he had a dream. that dream scared him. it was very scrooge-like. he dreamed he died and everyone hated him. his children refused to come to his funeral and everyone that did come to it just spit on his grave. he said when he woke up he made the decision that he needed to tell me what he had been wanting to say for almost ten years. so he called me immediately and dropped the bomb in my lap. he said that he has never stopped loving me, wants us to get back together to the point of marriage and that he is willing to wait as long as it takes. im not all that sure how i feel about that, but it would really be nice to have a man to talk to about it. can you give me a call????? please??????? xxx-yyy-zzzz. there really is no convenient time for people to call so just do so at your convenience and thank you.

anyway, speaking of time. i should get done here so i can do some other things i need to do before i go to work. give everyone hugs for me and tell them i said hello.

hugs

annie

I didn't warn her that her Shift key and apostrophe seem to be broken… although, heh-heh, I would have if I'd thought of it.

As usual, my answer was considerably longer… though I pondered much of it, and had EWTN on beside me as a bit of spiritual energy-boost so I could advise more considerately. Maybe I did, too.

Sent: Saturday, March 17, 2007 7:58 PM

Well, unimaginatively and rather linearly from the top, down:

No, she looks so much more like her mom – Shelly has my mouth and attitude; the rest (aside from some of her metabolism, and the inconsequential matter of half her DNA) comes from her mom. And I think it is the best possible combination… so do the two of them!

Re Luke: do you study with him? Do you give him incentives to remember things? Is it possible he has too many distractions (TV, iPod, etc.)? Too many goodies? I.e., a) has his mom spoiled him with lots more than she had at his age? and b) have you begun taking things away from him as punishment (at sixth grade he's likely too big to go over your knee!)? Other discipline would include further work – e.g., whether additional schoolwork you assign him (based on texts you can buy in any bookstore), or/and work around the house… such as tidying his room? Obviously discipline must consist both of negative feedback (making it very uncomfortable for him to slip) and positive (rewards of restoring things/privileges taken away, of special events, goodies, etc.).

And a different tack would be to have him tested for issues like AD(H)D and other things that may be making it difficult for him physiologically (chemical imbalance) or/and psychologically (e.g., rough experiences at an early age, causing him, say, to value the security of failure over the unknown world of success). That is – it may be needful to firmly eliminate the possibility that for some reason he really is forgetting these things. More: have some high-quality-time walky-talkies with him – actually schedule personal one-on-one time with him, once or twice a week; encourage him to talk about himself and his world and how he feels he's fitting in it… very little, if any, of this time should be spent in chewing the boy out. And involving a walk means that this would be great exercise for both of you. Speaking of which: what opportunities are there for him to be involved in neighborhood sports? I'd strongly recommend martial arts over soccer. Cost? Unless it's equal to squeezing blood from a turnip, his dad should be expected to pay at least half.

Re Mimi: see all of the above, come to think of it. With her, too, I'd suggest as well that you have some scheduled one-on-one time with her. Between the two of them, now, you should get plenty of exercise in!

Further ideas for both: back to the bookstore, as mentioned above. If there's any decent-sized bookstore nearby (e.g., Barnes and No-Bull, Borders, etc.), there should be a good array of catch-up texts, even some remedial, that can help them along. While you're there, pick up a book on easy vegetarian cooking, another one of "Vegetarianism for Dummies", and one more along the lines of a kids' guide to vegetarianism or/and vegetarian cooking.

There should be a way to kick in some of your rusty old ROTC discipline methods. [Annie attended Naval ROTC in high school.]

How involved are they in cleaning up around the house? They're also old enough to cut up the vegetables, both literally and metaphorically. So start loading, yes, more responsibilities on them, and more of the good (vegetarian) food. Give them up to ten seconds each per hour to whine about it, then finis! My dad's response to whining was: "Tough!" No kid ever died from vegetables, unless brother/sister stabbed them with a carrot stick.

What can they do in their worst classes to pick up extra credit? See to it that they do it.

It's about time they did their own laundry. Shelly was doing hers at ten.

Do not let them believe they run the household (even though their needs determine the lion's share of your actions). They should get one vote for every dollar they contribute to the household bottom line. Make sure they know who Copernicus was – i.e., the universe really does not rotate around them. The house is not a democracy, nor a kid-ocracy; it's totalitarian – a mom-ocracy

Make sure, though, they (and you) don't lose sight of the fact that you love them deeply, utterly, and beyond question. And that your love for them is not contingent in any way whatsoever on their success in school. However, this doesn't mean they can't terribly disappoint you. And it's not "all right" if they fail another test. Because you love them and have known them all their lives, you know full well they can do much better.

Half a year or so before I met you, I was floored when a girlfriend's son yelled at her, "I hate you!", and she fired back immediately and instinctively with, "Well, I love you! I just don't like you very much right now! Now, go to your room!"

Wow. This I took to heart.

Thanks for the good news on your mom! [Annie's mother is well into her eighties, and there was a recent scare with her over pneumonia. Incredibly, Mrs. Annie still remembers me, the poor woman. Still, it had been a delight talking to her on the phone several weeks ago, after finding out she was still alive!] As I probably said before, take good care of her. You and I are both running out of parents, so we have to make it work out right this time! Continue to make her waning years good, and warm; at the least you'll build up some heavy karma you can cash in later… and at best, you'll have an advocate to stand beside you when it's your turn to shuffle off the mortal coil, goil.

Good for you, re the vegetarianism! Do your best to hop back on that wagon… think of the example your stick-to-it-iveness will be for the kids. So at least do it for them: to lengthen your life, and to show them that "tough" doesn't equal "impossible". You've toughed out stuff much harder than that anyway. If you're going to stop heeding your kids' whining, you also have to ignore your own.

Vegetarianism isn't lame; the concept is sound and good – make sure, of course, that the proteins (and other nutrients) you'd ordinarily be getting from meats are being made up for through other food-items. And work with your doctor! Descendants of animals, we are physiologically configured to live off animal proteins. But we can also detour around that, as long as we aren't missing out on what the old bod needs. And allow yourself the occasional "relapses"; forgiving yourself makes it so much easier to forgive other people.

I might have said Shelly was vegetarian for several years, after reading up on Paul McCartney's vegetarianism. She was flexible enough to eat chicken and seafood, and we had some great, fun quests for things like meatless hot dogs, burgers, and so on.

PS: support of your family is great on difficult challenges, and you'll be doing this for your kids. But you're a grownup, and know by your own experience that you can do plenty even when every other person is telling you that you can't.

Re bombshell: I know where Mimi Sr. is coming from. There's someone I'd still get back together with and marry in an instant – even setting aside the seminary/monastery for that – if she should get down on a knee and propose to me; shoot… I'll even spring for the rings. But she won't; we settled that almost fifteen years ago. I simply never got my heart back.

Re Mr. M.: disregard the Dickensian dream of his, real or not. At most, this is his drive and his need; what is yours? A dream is ethereal, and terribly insubstantial a foundation for a lifetime together. Marriage and lifetime together (pardon upcoming cliché) take two; unless you love him very much in your heart, then it is only one person's dream.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't open the door a bit. Decide first whether, based on the last ten years, he deserves the opportunity to make a case for himself. If not, make like the Magic Eight Ball and say, No, Ask Again Later. And if so, then proceed together in little steps. Strongly suggest you two don't get intimate if at this point it is still avoidable (and this is none of my business), since this binds the heart and blinds the head – and right now you need to be able to use your head. At the very least, his shadow over the threshold terribly complicates things. Your attention is already being pulled in five directions (you, mom, Luke, Mimi, and work); to be a good mother you may not have it in you to slice yourself even smaller… since this might call on you to take attention away from your kids, and that is a must-not-do.

One way he could make a great case for himself would be for him to do work around the house whenever he visits. I mean it; if you two are fated to be together, then sharing your life means sharing the workload, today. Make him cut up vegetables. Have him change your oil. It would be a good sign if his presence in your life and home would make things easier, not more complicated; and he could achieve this by relieving you of some of your mundane burdens.

Most important: he must be able to get along very, very well with Luke. If he's going to be spending time with you, he should help tutor the kids. You aren't just you and your heart; you are also your kids, and your mom, and your house; he has to have a good, sound role in all of these. Any less indicates his heart is not in it, and yours shouldn't be either.

Look at it from another direction, too: what else has been going on lately in his life? Has he recently been dumped? Did he get fired? Did someone close to him die? What other reasons might there be (dream or no dream) for him to suddenly turn to you? Around 1984 or 1985, my heart turned powerfully toward a girlfriend I'd had in high school (Spring of 1978)… and some months later my marriage fell apart: the re-attraction to this girl was symptomatic of deeper issues I was hardly aware of.

These are things to consider to help you decide how to respond. And after ten years, nothing says you should respond to him today, or tomorrow, or next week. As complicated as your life is now, you must be free to take the time to think about it – and much of it should be in the back of your mind, while you're doing other stuff. If he pressures you, ask him kindly to back off. If he continues to push, and does not relent, change the "ba" in "back off" to an "fu", if I might be a bit coarse.

There may be other ways he can de-scrooge his life without tying you needlessly in an emotional knot. Right now Mimi is young enough that he can begin, today, to start having a ratcheted-up quality-role in her life, without marrying her mom: have him take her to the library to help her study. Get him to sign her up at the nearest Jiu-Jitsu joint, and to take her there every time she's supposed to be there, and see to it that she's practicing and he's cheering her on.

Bonus points to him if he sometimes – of his own initiative – brings along an occasional something for Luke, and sometimes even takes him along. After ten years he has much to prove… but it's entirely possible he can do so. He should not need you to tell him how.

Hello to you from Shelly; she stopped by for a visit and took over my computer just after your messages had shown up; I told her they were from you. So she says Hi; she wanted to show me a site where her cousin had posted a picture of her (Shelly) red in the face, laughing and choking as she tries to pull a tie off over her head. Crazy kid! She also turns 24 tomorrow; how about that??

Very minor issue: your other email, the grin-maker: uh… with apologies, my sense of humor isn't what it was twenty years ago. With my heart and mind set on the clergy, or avowed religious, well, that image did get me to drop my jaw, but I'm afraid I've lost a lot of my ability to find that as funny as I once did. [It was a startling – I suppose humorous – and graphic image not suitable for children; 'nough said.]  Please don't worry about it; you couldn't know this about me – and if you're embarrassed to hear/read this, then I am grinning! I will admit I do indulge in the occasional innuendo with one of my coworkers, and even snort at something not-quite-G-rated… but I expect that this will wither away in time. It's not judgmentality on my part, so much as being pruned by the divine vinedresser; that's all. Again; don't worry about it.

I suspect you have too little time, but when you can, take a peek at my blog sometime; one running bit is under Humor; look for entries titled "Pundemonium", where I recount the latest stinkers a coworker and I lay on each other in an effort to outpun the other. I think you'll find those postings will remind you most of the A. Gene Childe you recall of a couple decades ago.

Meanwhile, I'll try to give you a call early tomorrow afternoon. This evening Mother and I will be watching a movie (VHS), "The Mission". A friend loaned it to me, and I watched it last week; now Mother wants to see it – and my friend was fine with that.

All for now; as soon as you're done with this email, please give each of your kids (and your mother) a kiss on the head and a hug – they're from you, not from me… and just may startle the heck out of them. All the better…

Regards,

AgingChild