Momtras

Everyone has their own mantra.
~ Russell Brand

As a parent, it is certain that there will be times you have to talk to yourself to keep from going mad.  When you've answered the same question seven times (and it's usually a question that makes no sense, has no bearing or importance, and has no great definitive answer), when you've asked your tiny comrade to put their shoes on for the past twenty minutes with no response, or when you're just so completely exhausted and delirious that you've begun to lose your mind...muttering under your breath soooo works.

A mantra can be quite meditative and can transform you to a more peaceful place.  As a mom, I rely heavily on my self-delivered pep talks to get me through the day...or, as I like to refer to them, my "momtras".  Below are the typical "momtras" I frequently draw from:

Slow Down.  I tend to work through my days with the clock as my enemy, in that I cannot get quickly enough to the point in the evening when she is asleep, the house is quiet, the toys have been put away, and I have a glass of wine in hand.  From the moment I wake up, I feel as though I'm aiming at naptime, and once naptime is over, I begin to barrel towards bedtime.  Inevitably, though, once she is asleep at night, I find myself missing her and wanting to wake her up for a chat or a snuggle.  So throughout the day, I try to remind myself to stop gearing for the day to be over, and instead savor the time with her. 

Lighten Up.  I'm an exceedingly anal, Type A personality.  This can benefit our lives in a handful of ways, such as always being on time, never running out of the essentials (fruit snacks, toilet paper, wine), and having an organized home.  However, it also serves to our detriment because I tend to take things waaaayyyy too seriously.  One of my sole desires for Merrill is to ensure that she never takes herself or anyone else too seriously, that she is allowed to have a carefree fun childhood, and that she understands the importance of fun and spontaneity in order to keep some semblance of sanity.  It starts with me, and so I have to remind myself to just chill the fuck out at times and realize that in the grand scheme of things, crumbs and mismatched socks really won't cause the world to stop spinning.

Dig Deep.  This one is kind of a catchall for any variety of situations.  Whether it's my need to find the inner strength to play that game again, read that stupid story for the eleventy millionth time without losing my shit (seriously, why don't I ever remember to get rid of the books I loathe when she isn't looking?), or simply to get through the day without the desire to stab myself in the eye with a sharpened pencil, I have to often remind myself to dig deep...very deep...and find the patience lurking within.

Be Better.  Again, this one is pretty grandiose and wide-reaching.  It has a direct tie to "dig deep", except it relies more heavily on tapping into the ambitious part of me and forcing my lazy side to take a damn break already.  (My lazy side likes to dominate.)  I call on this momtra when I am reaching for a quick and easy dinner option instead of making sure it's nutritious and fortified with something other than sodium and saturated fat.  I repeat this one to myself when I'm tired and feel like doing little more than watching cartoons and pretending they are educational.  This is my go-to when I really don't want to do what Merrill is asking me to do (the 437th game of hide and seek, the alphabet puzzle that drives me batty because she says that every damn letter is a "c", etc.), and this is the one that forces me to be aware of my role as parent, guardian, educator, playmate, example setter, and so on.  This is the one that reminds me to be better for her, because damn if she doesn't deserve it.

                                            You know you're crazy, right?  K.  Just checking.

Peevishness

I don't have pet peeves.  I have major psychotic fucking hatreds.
~ George Carlin

There are just some things in this world that royally piss me off.  Hiccups, for instance, make me irrationally angry.  Imagine my reaction when I was pregnant and Merrill would get the hiccups in the middle of the night.  When it is hot outside, most people sweat and feel discomfort.  I get borderline violent.

I am, when it comes to certain pet peeves, my own worst enemy and a hypocrite at best.  I loathe anal people, yet I am one of the most anal people I know.  I live in a world where the adorable pencil cup on my desk sits empty because the tiny person in my house loves pens, markers, pencils, etc, and thinks they are free reign.  Every time I see that empty pencil cup, I know I should remove it from the desk, as it makes no sense to sit uninhabited...but I can't...because that is where it belongs. 

In no particular order, these are some of the major annoyances that will set me off:

• Rudeness...on all tiers
• Women without bras in public
• Football announcers that neglect to comment on bad calls or blatant no-calls
• Passive aggressive behavior
• People that talk on the phone while in a checkout line
• Perms
• Being tickled
• Touchdown dances in the NFL
• People that are rude to servers 
• Hoop earrings so large they can double as bracelets
• The 500+ page novel with a three page conclusion
• People that change their God-given name...for no real reason
• Poor eye contact
• Indecisiveness (again, ME!)
• Baby talk...unless you're a baby
• People that pronounce "frustrated" as "fustrated" (actually, there are a lot of mispronunciations that piss me off, so that should be its own)
• Bad grammar & spelling in well educated adults (I will let it slide when it's a child, because that can actually be kind of cute sometimes.  Sometimes.)

(Photo courtesy of momvelist.com)

Blog On, Perfect Angel

No fathers or mothers think their own children ugly.
~ Miguel de Cervantes

I so often read blogs that are written by mothers, talking about their kids and how they view parenthood.  They run the gamut from funny to depressing to obnoxious and everywhere in between.  There are a lot of opinions, stories, pictures and notions out there in the blog world...and while I often smile and nod to myself, thinking "Yep.  Mmm hmmm. Been there.", I sometimes have to refrain from getting justifiably angry at a complete and total stranger for the ludicrous and downright dumbass shit people say and do.

Of course, everyone thinks that their child is the smartest/cutest/funniest/BEST.  That is one of the major rules of parenting, right up there with "don't let them chew on cords" and "keep them alive".  You have to stare adoringly at them, with a big dopey smile on your face, even when everyone else in the room is ready to climb the walls, smack you (or, let's be honest, your child) and get the hell away from both of you.  Blogs written by mothers are the electronic equivalent of that big dopey smile. 

If Merrill were to write a blog entry, it would probably look something like this:

"This morning, I woke up to a dark room, only illuminated by a night light.  Not caring that it was not yet light out, I yelled out for my mom to come rescue me from the dreaded shadows (shadows!!) softly hitting the walls from said night light.  She didn't come immediately.  In fact, she actually let me call her name three consecutive times - yes, THREE - before she entered my room to greet me.  She looked sleepy, and she was only half smiling when she hugged me good morning.  Not impressed.

I gave her the grand gesture of giving her 95 seconds before asking for cartoons and breakfast.  How amazing am I??  And when I requested cashews, ice cream and chips for breakfast...you would have thought I wanted her to whip up something ridiculous in the amount of time it took her to say "yeah right".  Seriously...what is this?

Some days I just don't understand her.  She acts like I'm so unreasonable sometimes.  Ok, sure...I am pretty demanding, and I don't really listen to anything she says, and I repeat myself a LOT.  But I'm cute.  I'm the cutest kid in the world, and the funniest, and definitely the smartest.  My dad said so.  So why can't that be enough? 

Just yesterday, for instance.  You won't believe this.  She was trying to play a game with me, and....oh, you know what sounds good?  Cheetos.  And oreos.  In a bowl.   No, not THAT bowl.  The OTHER blue bowl.  Wait.  Where was I?  Oh, right.  The game.  So we are playing the game, and I saw a commercial on, and it had the coolest most best thing on it.  I didn't know what it was, but I had to talk about it for 45 minutes.  And after about 30 minutes of talking about it, during which time I forgot what we were talking about 6 times and had to be reminded, she didn't seem nearly as interested as I thought she should be. 

But my mom is the best.   She is the best at cutting sandwiches, and at washing hair, and she is really really smart, smarter than ALL the other moms (although sometimes I secretly think she's making up answers when I ask questions that don't really make sense just to test her).  All the other kids at school think that they have the best mom, and they gaze adoringly at their moms when it's time to be picked up.  They have no idea that mine really is the best.  No clue.  Suckers."

All in a Day

If you observe a really happy man, you will find...that he is happy in the course of living life twenty-four crowded hours each day.

- W. Bernard Wolfe

It is relatively easy to go through the days with a mindless mentality, operating on autopilot (such as when I arrive at a destination with no memory of having driven there) and only remembering that which is monumental and of some considerable importance.  If I were to write down every tiny detail of a typical day, it would look something like this:

4:47am - Wake up desperately needing to pee.  Too lazy to get up.  Try to fall back to sleep.

5:32am - Fall back asleep.  Dream am being drugged by a stranger in a giraffe costume.

5:47am - Wake in cold sweat about said dream.

6:12am - Doze back off.

6:14am - Awaken to the sounds of Merrill calling, asking for breakfast/a cartoon/a drink/socks/a book

6:15am-8:35am - Make breakfast. Pack Merrill's lunch for school.  Shower. Watch news.  Refill Merrill's drink...four times. Make another breakfast for Merrill, as first breakfast was rejected.  Get dressed.  Chase Merrill around the house trying to get her teeth brushed/hair brushed/clothes on/shoes on.  Find the one stuffed animal out of eleventy MILLION that she just HAS to have.  Talk.  A lot. About nothing.

8:36am - Announce it's time to leave for school. 

8:37am - Again.

8:38am - And again.

8:39am - Bang head against wall.

8:41am - Wrangle Mer into her car seat. 

8:42am-8:50am - Answer 482 questions (ex: where do chickens pee? why is that car in front of us? what did the dogs dream about last night? who is the lady that is on the radio?), sing 11 songs.  Hear a story about how Mer goes to China every day to visit her friends and drive the yellow car to the big house with a pink couch and lots of sandwiches.

9:00am - Drop Merrill off at school.  Have to forcibly remove her from her freakishly strong monkey grip on my neck and waist. 

9:00am-10:00am - Gym.  Witness woman walking the track at the gym wearing stilettos, carrying a large purse....and a baby.

10:00am-2:00pm - Errands.  Errands.  Errands.  Stand next to wrong car in the grocery store parking lot, trying to figure out why it won't unlock...for 14 minutes. Lunch.  Almost run over man on bicycle.  Curse.

2:00pm - Pick up Merrill from school.  Find out that she ate both ends of another child's banana.

2:15pm - Enter library, where she proceeds to pick out 6 books...in Spanish. 

2:40pm - Assure her that dad will be home soon.  She isn't convinced.

2:41pm-3:27pm - Assure her again.

3:30pm - Realize I've only been wearing one earring all day.

3:31pm-5:59pm - Puppet show. Coloring books. Walk to mailbox. Swing. Piggyback rides. Read the same book 6 times in a row.  Wonder why children's books are sometimes so utterly ridiculous. Consider whether cereal would be an appropriate dinner for a three year old.  Decide yes.

6:02pm - Dad enters, Mom is forgotten.

6:04pm-8:25pm - Dinner. Play. Bath. Books. Bedtime routine. 

8:26pm - Decide an earlier bedtime is warranted due to severe attitude and seemingly evil presence lurking within Mer.

8:28pm - Kiss, hug, kiss, hug, another kiss, another hug, BIG hug, BIG kiss, hug, hug, squeeze, kiss, kiss, squeeze.

8:40pm-10:30pm - Collapse on couch.  Add wine.  Stare mindlessly at tv.

10:31pm - Crawl into bed.  Realize I've forgotten to pee, and will likely wake up at an ungodly hour needing to go...decide it's more bearable than getting back out of bed right this second.

~ Fin ~