Tough Mother

My daughter was given a magic set for Christmas. 225 amazing tricks to wow friends and family.

Both kids were very enthusiastic. They pulled out the foam bunnies ready to make them disappear. 

“It’s not disappearing.”

You have to read the instructions…

“What do you mean you have to do that? Doesn’t it just disappear?”

Uh, no. It’s illusion. You trick people into believing it’s disappeared...

The disappointment was acute. 

The poor magic set has been languishing in the corner since. I suspect it might have its time in a year or two once the scepticism starts kicking in?

So to more prosaic matters…

I was leaving the house pretty early the other morning, when my son stumbled down the stairs.

He gave me a smile and said I love you mum.

I’ll take that at 6am. The discussion about gratefulness has obviously paid off.

He then continued… I’m hungry. Did you know the colour orange makes you hungry? And I face that every morning when I wake up.

Well, I did not know that!

But he’s right, he literally does see it every morning – on his wallpaper. Or the bits of wallpaper he can see at any point in time behind all the stuff crammed into his room.

It’s unfortunate I didn’t have enough time to delve into the scientific basis for his claim. So it looks like he’s stuck with being hungry in the morning for the foreseeable future.

What’s your hunger trigger?

I left on a trip to New Zealand recently. I was comfortably ensconced in the taxi when I suddenly realised how smooth my goodbye was.

This was a remarkable contrast to my trip just a few months ago when the farewell was more of a McIntyrian comedy.

The plan was to leave work at 4, get home at 5 and, after some quality family time, get a taxi to the airport at 7. Admittedly optimistic, but achievable.

That was until ten past four when I realised I was already late executing the plan. That would have been fine, had I not forgotten my security pass to enable exiting my new building, which meant going back upstairs. I then arrived at the underground to see the train doors closing. Ten minutes until the next one.

So I know it’s slightly crazy, but I feel somewhat comforted by telling myself I am not late, until I am actually late. Unfortunately, my husband calls at 5pm – I am late.

I walk into the house about 5.40pm and head directly upstairs to finish packing. My son pops his head out of the bathroom, to say hi and tell me his head is a bit itchy… I find the lice comb and set him to work.

To then discover, I have left my husband’s birthday present at work. I send an SOS to a colleague to arrange for it to be couriered home – I am already in another country, on the other side of the world, on a significant zero birthday, so it seems deserving.

Bag done, I head downstairs to daughter exiting the shower exclaiming (loudly) “no one has brought me my Pajamas”. She bursts into tears at my unimpressedness and wails “it’s just been such a hard day”. No sympathy here as she trails up the stairs, still crying.

My son then confirms he thinks he has found two, lice that is, so I send him into the kitchen to my husband, as my daughter and I have a motivational chat about no more tears.

All calm, we sit at the table for a lovely family farewell dinner. My husband has surpassed himself with his debut of a NZ favourite – bacon and egg pie – for chaos to erupt as my daughter touches the hot dish and knocks over a full glass of water.

Water is applied at one end of the kitchen as I mop up the other, teeth gritted, saying it’s fine, no problem… we all settle down to enjoy the pie when my husband presents me with the lice comb to tackle my daughter’s hair. I now also have to do mine as it is itching in reaction and I don’t think it’s socially acceptable (yet?) to do this on an aeroplane… 

I am half way through my daughter’s hair, and tears again not surprisingly, when my phone alerts me to the taxi now waiting out front. Hussein Bolt would have struggled to move more quickly…

I am so pleased we have all learned from that experience – obviously allowing at least another forty minutes makes all the difference…

So given the monumental moment in British history, it’s difficult to avoid Brexit.

My son recently exclaimed, “I know what the vote is about. They are deciding if anyone needs to leave the U.K.”

Obviously our discussion about Brexit hadn’t been as clear as we thought.

But how to explain it to an eight year old?

The U.K. doesn’t want to follow Europe’s rules any more.

Mum, I don’t like following your rules, can I brexit?

People were concerned about the number of people coming to the U.K.

But mum, you’re not from here. Do you need to go home?

So now they are having to make a plan about how we leave.

My husband drew an analogy to rugby. I thought it might be about redesigning the rules of the game, but he went down the road of we’d been playing on the same team as the EU, now we want to be our own team, so we might need to see if anyone wants to join us to make up the numbers…

Ok, can I watch tv now?

New year, new you?

We’re in the middle of the traditional January refrain.

While I’m still very much a work in progress, I do take exception to the idea that now we should all diet, detox, or exercise more. That last one I can’t argue with, but it’s not a once a year decision and you’re done.

It brought to mind a conversation I recently had with my son.  Very out of the blue, he announced he was going to miss MacDonalds.

Turns out it was because it was his treat with Grandma and I always say no.

I broke the news to him that as a parent, it’s my job to make the little decisions every day, and hope they are mostly the right ones, so that he grows up into a healthy, happy, and nice person. That wasn’t Grandma’s job.

Maybe that’s why New Year’s resolutions seem a bit discordant. While it’s good to have a goal, what are the little everyday decisions that get you there?

My son’s eye roll confirmed it’s not the most exciting concept! And, also much easier said than done…

Or is it christmiest?

That was the question my daughter asked as the Christmas Eve service was about to start.

It was almost a very easy question to answer. I’d been feeling smug as we’d wrapped all the presents the previous evening. That’s a record for me by at least 24 hours.

I’d been at work for the day, so while the commute was brilliant, it only registered a little on the festive scale. I then had my bike stolen! Turns out popping in for some last minute purchases wasn’t a great idea after all.

It’s amazing how glaring a space can be when it isn’t filled as expected.

Obviously, the kids weren’t too phased by the loss of my bike. And as I was searching for a way to increase my festive spirit and be philosophical about it, my dad’s words came to mind.

When I crashed the motorbike, put the tractor through the fence, or years later, a car through a different fence, he would ask whether I’d hurt the [insert relevant inanimate object here] and say they’re still making [insert relevant vehicle here]… and at least you can fix the fence.

I translated this to mean extreme relief that I hadn’t done myself a serious injury…

Applying it to the present situation, while gutting, nobody was hurt, they’re still making bikes… and I don’t have to fix a fence!

So while I can’t say I was more excited by Christmas than a six and eight year old, I could at least assure her that Scrooge wasn’t going to visit.

Where did you clock in on the festive spirit scale?

To continue the metaphor from last time, it’s been a bit wavy, but I think we may have hit a calm spell…

Seems crazy to say that in the middle of Christmas chaos but everything is relative.

While working out what Christmas looks like without Grandma, we were told our son might have mild hearing loss for low pitched sounds. Perhaps about the level of my husband’s voice?

There was a moment in the appointment where I knew that things weren’t proceeding as “normal”. That feeling of fading hope that I was reading too much into the hesitation and re-testing.

When the clinician was explaining the results, my son seemed happy he might need to be at the front of the class (when will that reaction change?)! My first thought is thank God, I don’t have to tell Grandma.

While it was difficult to discern, she was very deaf. On the surface, it didn’t seem to stop her. But it was tough. To not trust that you’ll hear the world around you. To need three doorbells. To worry about having the kids overnight in case she didn’t hear them.

So we were back this week for a follow up in the sound proof room. In the absolute stillness, even breathing seemed like shouting.

Luckily, it seemed my son heard it too. He’s ok, although there’ll be more monitoring.

While I know we would have coped, I am massively relieved we don’t have to.

Now we just have to work on listening…

The last weeks have been battering.

I’ve been trying to find a way to describe it without being overly dramatic – perhaps how I imagine it would feel crossing the Pacific in a rowing boat. Not ideal but there would be long stretches of amazing experiences, clear skies and calm seas… and times where you’ll be holding on for dear life as the waves hit.

A friend was killed in an accident. One moment larger than life, the next – not.

Just over a week later, my mother in law died. I was going to say lost her battle with cancer, however, it seems too cliche for the awful but beautiful experience it was to be with her when she died.

And while it feels like “normal” life should stop, it doesn’t.

Homework and work needs to be done.  Shoes put on. Toast may or may not need to be toasted. Now, there are also the holes they have left and the added responsibility of guiding the kids through their grief.  Helping them come to terms with loss and to remember all the things that made up Grandma.

But there has also been lots of joy. Of reconnecting with friends, laughing over horrible jokes, reminiscing, tickles with the kids…

Growing up on a farm, my dad would often say that where there is life, there is death.

Right now, it’s hard to be that philosophical, but the level of support we’ve received has been awesome. I know we have the life vests, flares, and emergency rations at the ready so it will be ok. Even though there may still be some stormy waters ahead.

For the last year I’ve been doing press ups every day. Slightly mad you think?

It was inspired by a motivational talk by “The Burpee Guy“. He was looking for a challenge to raise funds and settled on a 1-365 challenge, increasing the number of burpees by one per day.

One of the guys at work thought it would be a good way to get fit, but wanted to do press ups rather than burpees. I’m easily persuaded to get involved in these types of challenges so signed up for moral support.

I also roped in my husband who made the mistake of saying he’d like to do 40 press ups by Christmas. Queue informercial voice-over of “why stop there, when for just a few extra minutes a day you could do so many more instead”!

Starting with one seemed a bit silly, but it quickly added up to hard. However, it was surprising how if you could do [insert number] yesterday, then what is just one more?

We got to 108 when we decided we might need to modify the challenge – just one more still adds up to a lot of time and sore muscles – so we settled on 100 a day instead.

And yes, it was a bit crazy, but the funny thing is I think it has led to all sorts of changes, including this blog.

Realising you can control one small habit opens up intriguing possibilities…

Particularly when other parts of life remain completely out of (your) control.

We are currently riding the ups and downs of cancer. My mother in law has not been responding to the treatment so now the discussion is what’s next. I can’t do much about the course of that conversation – I’m just part of the support crew on the sidelines.

But, while the rollercoaster makes its giddy descent, I think I’ll be continuing some press ups.

What helps you steer through the twists and turns of life?