mother's day and my possibly unpopular opinion

national holidays that land on week days calls for a day off of work. mother's day is on sunday, technically a work day for us moms .. so mother's day should mean i get to take a day off right?

more on this day off concept.

what i want most for mother's day, aside from some sweet acknowledgement of all that i do for our family, is a break. i would LOVE a day where i could sleep in, couch potato, be waited on hand and foot and if i spill something on that hand or foot, someone else would pick up the mess (constantly). i want a break from wiping butts and boogers, house chores, being at everyone's beck and call, AND all the worries that come with taking even a second off from all the mommy responsibilities that i lay on myself. in other words, i would like somebody to take over ALL that i do, with no grumbling, for just a day.

that said, curtis is in vegas with the boys, doing a boys weekend. he told me last week that they randomly came up with this plan. i raised my eyebrows and said "so you're telling me that you're taking off to go have fun. in vegas. with the boys. on mother's day weekend. ... really?" to which he replied with a pause and look that said "oh shit." and before he could even backpedal, i said, "it's fine. go do your thing. but i expect you to make up for this. don't ask me what i would like. what i want is for you to think about how much i mean to you and how much you have to make up for this. compensate in kind. i look forward to seeing what you come up with." and i smile.

nobody be upset with him. nobody commend me for being incredibly generous either. wedding season has begun and he's got a few solo parenting weekends in the horizon. giving him this time is just fair. besides, lunch and or dinner out is a sweet gesture but i cringe at the cost of going to a restaurant on this highly advertised day. and i really don't have the patience for the wait or the number of people that are out and about doing exactly that for all the celebrated moms out there. then there's the usual activity that i would have to do to get the family ready to even leave the house for a day that was supposed to be for me. what would be cool is if dad took the kids out for a bit (after managing all the chores i would have done), gave me the gift of peace which i could spend on the couch reading a book, doing my nails or surfing fb on my phone if i like. then letting me get ready at my leisure to take me out to a dinner (not on mother's day) with or without the kids.

i know that the popular opinion is that kids should spend mother's day with their moms. now that i'm a mom, i think i'll be looking forward to embracing that opinion when the kids are older. at some point they will stop clinging to me and start ignoring me. at some point they will grow up and move out. at this stage of our relationship, however, we are together a lot. their dependence on me is a daily, hourly, minutely thing and it's the definition of our time together. so on mother's day, i want to declare a holiday from them and have some time with me. i love them. i love them oh so much. but do you get what i'm saying? trust me, on father's day, curtis can take the day, go surfing, go biking, go out and do what he enjoys to his heart's content. i'll take one for the team and be home to manage everyone and every thing. i'll even take the trash out and wash the cars.

p.s. camera gear, shoes, phones and smart watches cost a wee bit more than flowers but they last much longer.


just me and the girls on an all girls weekend doing girl things and spending mother's day together...

tears for my little coffee bean

kaya's been getting up early. like 6.30 am early. i suspect it's to spend time with me. so we put her little beach chair in my bathroom. there she sits, wrapped up in her fuzzy robe, favorite toy in hand, watching and hanging out with me as i get ready in the mornings.

this morning as she sat on her little chair, she pointed to her foot and showed me a blister on her toe. she's peeling the skin with a worried look on her face. i tell her it's no big deal, i explain that it's just a blister and her toe is just making room for new skin. that little flap will peel off and new skin will be ready underneath. her face lit up. "will my skin be like everyone else?" my heart stopped. what was this question and where did it come from?

as i tried to recover from the shock and trepidation, i scrambled to come up with something normal to say. i didn't want to alarm her with all the feelings and thoughts that were going through me. my first questions made her clam up even though i was non-challant in my tone. it was clearly a topic that bothered her. slowly she told me that she felt that she was different from everyone else because in her words "my skin is brown". my heart was breaking. 

two years ago i read about children recognizing their similarities and differences amongst each other and using skin color as a method to organize themselves and create associations. i blogged about it here. it's human nature to create affiliations and skin color is an easy method to spot associations just as hair color, eye color or any other attribute is. not to say that bonds or groups are formed over these characteristics but when one of these things is not like the other ... well, then spotting the difference becomes obvious. and we live in a dominantly white community. in fact, kaya may be the only dark skinned child in her preschool. there was an entire chapter on this in that book Nurture Shock: New Thinking About Children. my worries began that day. and although, it prepared me somewhat for the possibility of the issue arising, i wasn't prepared to hear it so soon. i certainly wasn't prepared to see and feel the sadness in my little girl over the color of her skin. it took everything in me not to bundle her up and just take her away from it all. i dug around for something to say. something that would make her feel better. 

i started with ... "you and daddy have the same color". i moved into describing people we know and what color they were. then i asked her if she wanted to be a different color. she hesitantly answered yes. then we talked about what color she would like to be. i asked if she wanted to be blue or green or purple. then we giggled about how silly that would be and how different it would still be. then i told her that summer was coming and so many of her friends would be turning brown from the sun and all that time at the beach. then i told her that i loved her color and that i wished that i was that color too. and THAT made her look up at me and smile. she hugged me with relief. my sweet little coffee bean. 

this is the world we live in. this is the life she has to live.i will do my best to teach her to love her difference and to embrace it. i hope i can stay strong for both of us and not well up with tears as i'm doing now. i hope she will always be able to talk to me about these and any other worries she may have. little dia will have worries of her own. this one may not be one of them but i hope when the time comes, she and i can talk about whatever it is too. 

slow down with that "c" word

when doctors throw out that word "cancer" all the red lights go off...

it started with one spot on my jaw. the spot started growing and puffing up in the heat. i thought it was a rash of some kind. i didn't have time to pay attention to it. actually, maybe i just didn't make the time. then there was more than one spot. in fact there was starting to be a whole bunch of them. i finally remembered to ask the doctor about it and he dismissed me saying it was just age spots. interesting.

the following year, at my annual, i ask about the spots again, there's a few more now and they aren't going away and i'm not sold on them being age spots. he looks at my chart, tells me that i asked about them last year and he really thinks that's all they are (i'm making this guy sound kinder than he was. i really didn't like him but was too lazy to change).

last year, new insurance, new doctor, new opinions. this doctor doesn't want to be too dismissive so we start up on some creams to see what it does. nothing. a dermalogical referral, more creams and a biopsy later....

actinic keratosis aka precancerous lesions on the skin. primarily found on fair skinned people. there's that "c" word! totally buried in the middle of all that. but the truth is, it's NOT cancer. it COULD be, if i left it and didn't take care of it. bummed that i'm susceptible. i guess i'm more fair than i am brown. boo. so, yeah, not panicking. just taking care of it. so if you see me looking like i had a measles or chickenpox explosion on my face... it's just the cryotherapy treatment. it's not pretty but it's not permanent. more importantly it's taking care of the problem.

 

vulnerability and the strong woman

i heard this rumor recently that to have friends, one needs to be vulnerable. ok maybe that was too broad of a generalization but it got me thinking.

at all these weddings i've attended i listen intently to the speeches that the best man or maid of honor gives for these brides and grooms and i consider my inventory of friends. i wonder for myself, who of these people in my life would ever speak about me with such depth? who would shed tears of joy that isn't family? who could say that they knew me thru the good times and the bad?

i don't have a lot of really close friends. if i were honest, i would say that i've only had less than a handful that i can truly call my best friends (outside of my spouse) and their existence in my timeline of life is fairly spread out. and actually, i'm not even sure that those people realized that i considered them my best friends. in fact, i'd say that recently, i've been so far removed from my friends that i probably wouldn't have someone i could run to if i needed running. then that brought me to the thought of "running". when have i ever ran to somebody because i just couldn't handle what life was throwing my way? ONCE. it's only happened once. and then i paused.

i am very rarely openly vulnerable. i'm a fixer. i analyze everything to death. i dissect to the point of ridiculousness and then i solve. i make a decision and it's done. discussing the process or the decision is so unheard of for me that the last time i was told to see a therapist, the therapist pretty much kicked me out. she said that i didn't really need her. i keep things simple in my life so coming across complexities are such rare occasions. i'm pretty content and possibly... boring.

my "friends" who have complexities who decide to share their issues with me seem to come looking for a solution or a listening ear. i've learned that earlier in my life i applied my cold logic to their situation and my solutions weren't always well received. i figured out later that people just need you to listen. so i've evolved. i want to say that these friends look to me as their friend but i'm still not the one they latch on to. is it the lack of reciprocation? i'm starting to think that people think i don't need friends. hmmm..  ponderous.

i recognize that friendship takes work, effort, time, interaction, frequency and maybe even proximity. oh .. and patience. something i don't have enough of. but vulnerability, open vulnerability, is this quality truly a necessity in finding lasting friendships? nobody realizes just how sensitive and vulnerable i actually am. i've worked so hard to be the "strong woman". i've spent a lifetime building the persona, the armor that protects the inner workings of me. the only person that has met that truth is my husband. there's no hiding it from the person that spends everyday with you. but everyone needs friends. friendships are cherished. and hugs should be given to even the strongest of people. if men can have good friends, even great friends, and men are the standard for "strength" then why not strong women? women who aren't openly vulnerable?

ponderous.