Mommy Whine
January 23, 2009
No, I do not want to be on-duty today.
When’s Mother’s Day?
Children
Day of Service; or Yes, I am a Bag Lady
January 21, 2009
On Monday morning (Martin Luther King Jr. Day) I took my younger daughter and her BFF to a “Day of Service” activity that Michelle Obama personally invited me to participate in. (“Personally” meaning I got an email from her and since she asked and it did not involve my donating $25 to the election, the inauguration, or saving the banks, I agreed.) Anyway, they—I was expressly told that I was unwelcome—were going to clean up a park alongside the Potomac River in Alexandria, Virginia (which is opposite Washington, DC, where I did not go to watch the inauguration because it was too cold and the closures of roads and metro stations, and the expected traffic and parking issues was just too daunting to try to overcome).
We got there at about 9:15 (fifteen minutes late because I was stuck behind a sand truck that was dumping sand on the road because there was the barest of indicators of snow flying through the air). By the time we got there the garbage picker-upper sticks had been picked up by other volunteers (my daughter was so disappointed, she was really looking forward to using one). My daughter and her friend picked up the last two garbage bags. Oh, well.
I walked off in the opposite direction that they went so I wouldn’t be publicly chastised for being within a mile of them and thus infringing on their freedom and ability to pretend that they are mature while swinging their pony tails from side to side as they giggle at the silliness of everyone else while cleaning up a park. When I was far enough away from them I looked at the frozen Potomac and the gulls flying and the geese waddling on the ice, and thought of how momentous the inauguration will be: momentous because Bush will be not be able to inflict any more of his pain upon us and the world any more (okay, he will from all of the rules and laws and judges he has put into place, but at least he will finally be stopped from doing more), and momentous because Obama will become the President of the United States—both him as an individual and him as embodying the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King himself.
I wandered back towards the sign-up desk and saw that a few people were heading out to clean up the park with supermarket bags. At that moment I realized that I can save the day, YES! I have a bag of bags in my car, ready to shove into the recycle container at the supermarket at any time (that is if I remember to take it out of the car). I raced off to my car and picked up the bag of bags which now did not look so much like garbage in the back seat of my car, but a way to save the world. Yes, those bags were greeted with enthusiasm by the volunteers. I took a newspaper bag, and wandered off to clean the park, pleased with myself and my saving ways.
And thus we spent about two hours. My daughter and her friend ended up in bottle alley (a part of the park, right along the shore, where there were enough bottles and cans to fill supersize garbage bag upon supersize garbage bag). And I mulled the need to require all smokers to at least ten hours of community service a year to pick up a portion of the cigarette butts that they toss out of their cars and from their hands as if they were as biodegradable as the air we breathe.
People hold onto your bottles and butts until you get to a garbage can. If we all just took responsibility for our own things there would not be a need for thousands of volunteers across the country to pick up trash. Wouldn’t it be great if we could have spent that time improving the park by adding to it, and not getting it to be the way it should be?
Five and 0! Go Girls!
January 18, 2009
My daughter’s 7th/8th grade basketball team is five and 0 mid-season. Yeah! There are eight girls on the team, with one coach and one assistant coach (two dads, so they need two titles and a hierarchy). One of the girls on the team was a friend of my younger daughter’s, but I did not know anyone else on the team. When I was waiting to pick up my daughter from one of her early practices I talked with the mother of that friend. She told me that there is a girl on the team with some kind of developmental disability but that the coach is playing her like any of the other girls. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of that.
When looking at the team, at first you don’t realize that there is anyone who is different than anyone else. You need to pay attention, to watch this girl, before you realize that she is different in any way. She runs across the court like the other girls, but when they are playing either offense or defense, she looks kind of lost and distracted, and is physically awkward. But she stands where she needs to be and lifts up her arms when the coach calls out to all of the girls to lift up their arms. And she plays as much as the other girls.
Today, she was the last to make a shot during the pre-game warm-up—and she got the ball in. My daughter high-fived her. During the game today, which was played four-on-four (it’s a four-day weekend here so I guess some people made the most of it by getting out of town for the inauguration), for the first time today the girls threw the ball to her a few times and each time she threw the ball back to someone on the team. Again, my daughter high-fived her, and I saw my daughter tell her how well she had played.
And that made me think of the classes that I teach which combine kids with special needs and “regular” kids. On the whole, if you observed the classes not knowing which kids had special education and accommodation plans you would have a hard time figuring it out. It’s not that only the “special” kids need help or a dose of a teacher voice to get them to settle down or focus, but so many of them do.
A world that acknowledges differences and doesn’t seek to separate because of them is surely an understanding, and maybe a compassionate, world. Something to consider not just for classrooms, but for life in general, across the globe.
The other day I got two new students in two different classes: one student is autistic; the other dropped out of school a few years ago and is back in the classroom, piercings, tattoos and all. I’m thinking that they both are going to need attention, whether they have the papers to attest to it or not. But I am also thinking that their acceptance by their classmates will be critical for both of them. Maybe I need to bring a basketball into the classroom, or at least a metaphorical one.
Did I say that my daughter’s team is undefeated?
Always on Sunday. There’s Always Something on Sundays.
January 12, 2009
He’s yelling at my younger daughter now, and I am in my room hearing his muffled raised voice. If I were a very good mother, I would go down there and tell him to stop yelling at her. But I don’t.
And earlier, when he slammed my older daughter’s door in my face (yes, she was in the room at the time) and he bullied his way into taking her to her college interview which she told me she wanted me to take her to (and she specifically told me that she didn’t want him to take her), I did not protest too loudly. I asked her if she wants me to take her as she sat there telling me not to yell when obviously I was her easy target and not her father, who towered over the two of us, who declared “I’ll take her.” And since I had to pick up my other daughter from where I had taken her earlier, and since I took my older daughter to and from her activities on Friday and Saturday, and he does nothing, I just didn’t want to fight over driving her.
It was claustrophobic in there with him so close to me and so menacing. But her, she was so small on her bed, trying to not enrage him and trying, maybe, not to send me off. I didn’t want to have him yell in my face and I didn’t want to see his red face and spittle flying. I just couldn’t be in the room another second with him. So I left, and I didn’t take her.
I’m sitting here thinking that I should apologize to her for not taking her, but that would be presenting to her on a platter how her mother is still letting herself be a victim. Who am I to expect her to stand up to him when I don’t? Yes, I told him to grow-up and stop, although I did accuse him of stealing toilet paper (where else are all the rolls going?).
Maybe I am not doing the right karma thing or repelling his negativity or channeling peacefulness, or maybe I am holding onto this pain for some unknown psychotic reason, or maybe I need to forgive him or understand that he was what I deserved or whatever other insight there is to explain why I am still stuck here (that does not take into consideration economics and the housing market and the physical state of this home), or maybe, just maybe shit happens and we try to deal with it as well as we can. And we fall short of our own expectations, and certainly our children’s.
I just want to go to sleep and let another Sunday end. I have two books that I started reading today, one promises to be a very insightful but deeply depressing book about a woman in Pakistan and the other a sort of romantic comedy where everyone is beautiful and witty and the challenges are the kind that Meg Ryan could solve. I think I’ll read that one.
But first, maybe I’ll talk to my daughter.
Writing about Loneliness
January 10, 2009
At the beginning of class the other day I had my students write in their journals about being lonely. What does it mean to be lonely? When were you lonely? What does it feel like to be lonely? So you don’t think that I am a prying teacher, this is because we are reading Of Mice and Men and loneliness is a pervasive theme in that very sad book.
My students are all 14- or 15-year olds so I would have thought that by this time in their lives they would understand what it means to be lonely. But most of them wrote about being alone, and they certainly did not talk about what loneliness felt like. Most of them wrote that they had been lonely when they were left alone for four hours at home (oh, mom was home, but she doesn’t count), when what they were really talking about was boredom. One kid wrote about getting lost on his way home from a friend’s house in the dark and feeling lonely; of course, he wasn’t lonely, he was scared. One boy wrote about how he and his friends were hanging out together and only his girlfriend wasn’t there, so he felt lonely; this, it seems, is jealousy and not loneliness. Are kids so un-self-aware? Do they not even recognize what it feels like to not have anyone who understands what they are experiencing? Not having someone with whom to exchange ideas? Not having someone who “gets” them? Not having someone whose company they can take for granted?
There were a few who got it, especially the military kids who have moved so often that every three or four years they must revert to being the new kid at school walking in the loneliness of knowing no one in a building with hundreds of people. But the other kids, there was no real cognition of what it means to be lonely, which makes me think that perhaps they really don’t know what it is to be lonely. Perhaps they are so busy with their I-whatevers, and texting, and Facebook that they are never alone—they really don’t know what it means to be lonely. And even if they are physically alone, they have so many avenues to “call up” people and “meet” people, that the sinking feeling of being the only person in the universe to be so devoid of company never hits them. Even the least gregarious of children can find company somewhere.
Which makes me wonder: If these children never let themselves step outside of the hustle and bustle of interactions, do they know what it feels like to be themselves? Are their very minds being wired to only operate within a group? Can these kids be individuals?
Me, the woman who has known loneliness create a cavity of separation that all unknowingly step around, thinks that this is not good. From the depth of solitude (which is certainly an aspect of loneliness) so many thoughts finally have a chance to bubble up. Thoughts that aren’t able to come to fruition amidst the clatter of conversation. How can thoughts rise like dough if you haven’t even added flour? If you haven’t had the opportunity to have a thought that isn’t just in reaction to what someone else said or did, then what creativity and innovations can come to you? And if your life is always lived in company, or seeking company, then when do you have time to expand your understanding of yourself? Empathy is good, but how can you truly feel for someone else if you don’t even recognize yourself?
But someone else, not me, who is forward thinking may see that perhaps society—people—will be able to create a better society, a more successful society than the one we have now that is always warring and contentious and competitive and grasping and materialistic. Perhaps this converging of selves might point to a society evolving, and not one that is devolving. Perhaps.
It’s still disconcerting that they don’t recognize that alone, lonely, scared, bored, and jealous are not the same thing. Truly, any society needs citizens who are introspective, at least to recognize what it feels like to be human. And to say that to be sad, happy, or lonely are the only emotions you recognize from within surely reflects paucity of thought.
Lesson Plan for Monday: discuss emotions.
A Divorce Story for Parents and Children
January 06, 2009
The following is a story that I wrote. At first I thought I would write a story about divorce for parents to read to their children. But as I was writing the story I realized that it's more for parents to read to themselves. This story is also posted at StoryRhyme. I would like to thank JC for encouraging me to write children's stories and for publishing them; I encourage you to go to her site and read her original children's stories--and her blog.
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When Corinna’s parents yell at each other, she goes into her room, closes the door and listens to music, or she goes to her best friend Megan’s house. Corinna doesn’t like to listen when her father says mean things to her mother, and when her mother cries and tells her father to stop and yells at him when he doesn’t stop. And he never stops, even when her mother goes into her room and slams the door. It hurts Corinna too much to listen to her parents. Why can’t they be nice to each other?
It hurts as much as it hurts when her teacher tells her that she’s doing something wrong in class, because she hates when something she does is not right.
It hurts to hear her parents yell as much as it hurts when she and her sister fight. But maybe her parents yelling hurts even more because she knows that she and her sister, Amanda, will make up and be talking to each other again, and watching TV together again, and borrowing shirts again. But her parents, they don’t make up, they just stop fighting, until they start fighting again.
They never say sorry for the things they say to each other. They never say sorry for raising their voices at each other. They never say sorry for saying bad words. They never say sorry for saying things she and Amanda are not allowed to say.
Sometimes her mother comes up to her room after they fight and says that she’s sorry to her for having to hear them yell. She says that she’s sorry that Corinna has to hear that. But is her mother really sorry? Wouldn’t she stop if she were really sorry? Isn’t that what she has been taught, by her mother?
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Shopping Trip
January 04, 2009
What would one mother and two teenage daughters get at Target?
Silver nail polish, eye liner, mascara, a tank top, a sweater, bikini undies, chapstick, nail files, and hair dye. The ways of a woman's world. Oh, the hair dye is mine, I decided that as much as I enjoy saying I like the gray, I could do with a break from the gray and all that it makes me think about.
Reading List of a Single Parent
January 02, 2009
In the last week or two I have read the following books:
- Dreams from My Father, by Barack Obama
- Animal Dreams, by Barbara Kingsolver
- Kissing Games of the World, by Sandi Kahn Shelton
- Postcards from Berlin, by Margaret Leroy
There is an interesting thread to these books, three of which are novels and one, obviously, a memoir. Obama’s memoir I placed on hold a few days after the election and my turn (I was number 78) finally came about a week ago. Animal Dreams I read about on another blog (sorry I can’t remember where), the other two I found in the New Books section of my library.
First, before analyzing for that thread, I just want to say “Wow” about Barack Obama. Wow that the man who wrote a book that is so self-analytical and contains such an intense degree of honesty, intellect, inquisitiveness, compassion, and openness will become president is truly stunning. He surely is change not only because of his skin color, but also because of his family history, his desire to understand himself and his society, which is both America and the world, and because it truly doesn’t seem to be about him, but about what he can do and inspire and set in motion for the good of us all.
On the critical side of things, I could not finish the book; there is just so much I care to learn about his family and its roots and various contingents. I see no reason to know more about his family tree than my own. The Africa part of the book was more touristy or “these are my roots” than the rest which was more reflective, and, I believe, more insightful and worthwhile reading.
Now onto those threads. Obama was raised by his mother, at times by his grandparents, and with a step-father for a few years, but, without his biological father’s involvement. The main character in Animal Dreams was raised by her father, her mother having died a few days after giving birth to her younger sister. In Kissing Games of the World there is a single mother, the father was out of the picture when her child was just a few days old; and a man whose father left when he was still very young, whose mother died a few years later, whose wife died when their child was four days old, they, of course, find each other. In Postcards from Berlin there is yet another girl whose father was never in her life, but here the switch is that the mother placed her in a home when she was thirteen and left the country with her new man. My goodness, unbeknownst to me I picked up three books—and read four—that feature aspects of either being a single parent or a child with only one parent, or none.
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The Beauty of Laughter
December 26, 2008
Progress here: my daughter laughed at me. Laughed, not in the you are a crazy woman and get away from me way, but in the oh mom, you are so silly way. What a wonderful thing a laugh can be.
First Night of Chanukah
December 22, 2008
Sunday night was the first night of Chanukah. My daughters and I celebrated in the subdued way that teens and parents celebrate a holiday that has more meaning in the continuity, in the recognition, than anything else. There were no presents, just presence. For me, for us (I hope) that was more important.
I made applesauce in the morning, and if I may say so, it was the best applesauce that I have made in years. And I made far too many latkes right before the candle lighting ceremony, letting them stay warm in the oven as I fried pan after pan of latkes (I made four big potatoes worth of latkes for the three of us).
About two minutes after my younger daughter complained that she was not hungry, she said that she was ready; and my older daughter dutifully (yes, she apparently is able to be dutiful) came to the table immediately to observe the holiday, together.
My younger daughter put the candles in the chanukiyah (menorah): white for the first night and yellow for the shamash (helper candle). I had strewn chocolate gelt (coins) around the chanukiyah—my version of holiday decorations. No plants, no bows, no angels here, no, just chocolate covered in gold and silver foil to look like coins.
Younger daughter lit the candles, and I said the three blessings. The first praises God for commanding us to do the mitzvot (commandments) and instructing us to kindle the Chanukah lights; the second praises God for performing miracles about 2,000 years ago when our ancestors withstood the intense pressure (life or death kind of pressure) put upon them to worship Greek gods and then made the oil that was only to last for one day last for eight days, which was just enough time to get everything ready to resume proper prayer services in the great temple (wish I had that oil for my car); and lastly, praising God for giving us life, sustaining us, and enabling us to reach this day. This last one, the Shechiyanu is said when a person does something important—does a first, or when we return to a holiday after not having celebrated it for a year.
And I kissed both of them on their foreheads after they sat down. They didn’t want that kiss, but how can a mother recite three blessings and not give the one true blessing—a kiss—to her children?
And then we ate potato latkes with applesauce and/or sour cream. To make the table look fuller, I also put down pineapple chunks and Israeli pickles. I didn’t even bother to make brisket, another traditional holiday food, because we all just hone in on the latkes. Maybe another night.
And we talked for about ten minutes. Around a dining room table, as if it were a normal act and not something that we only do when there is a holiday. Praise God for holidays. There was no meanness, there was no tension, it was the three of us. (he was upstairs in the master suite.)
I am not religious, rather I identify with my religion more on a cultural and historic level than on a conversation with God level. But, I must say, if it weren’t for religion, and for the milestones it puts in our year I would feel even more lost as a parent, more untethered and swaying in whatever moods come upon me as I try to steer some kind of course through this divorce and its undeniably damaging aftermath. These holidays, and the Bat Mitzvah, and the classes that the girls took and take, and the classes I give at temple have helped to tether me, and helped to create a family that I was not able to create at home, or at least not feel like I was able to do alone. It has enabled me to found our lives on more than just ourselves, and for that I am thankful—I could light a candle for that.
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You can read my Chanukah story, “Lighting the Chanukah Lights with Emily,” at: +StoryRhyme.
The Symbolism of a Basketball Game
December 14, 2008
Basketball season has begun. My daughter missed the first game because she was out of town. In the second game, she made the tying basket and then the winning basket, so my concern about her abilities is not the problem. (And she played on an empty stomach, my fault, of course, and in sneakers that are too small for her, really my fault.)
For the first half of the game I talked to the mother of the triplets who would be going with her daughters and husband to see a play right after the game. (Speak of conflicted mothers, she had one daughter on each of the teams playing, and then one cheering them both from the sidelines.) Sitting or standing along the walls of the basketball court were fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, grandparents, and friends. For my daughter, I was there. Now it was quite obvious that most of the girls did not have a mother and father watching the game because it was not so crowded; but neither did it mean that they did not have a parent off watching a sibling play his or her game or at some practice. It simply meant that most of the girls had one person in attendance, like my daughter.
But my daughter had me there remembering the last two years of basketball games. Two years ago after her team lost in the finals, ex (with whom my older daughter sat) called me a bitch when I walked over to congratulate her and he was standing by; and last year he didn’t attend a single game, not even the finals, which her team won. He doesn’t even have the excuse of saying that he can’t stand basketball, because that had been his sport. No, the man is such a mental midget that he can’t put aside his feelings of “having to see me” over his daughter’s desire (need) to have both of her parents there.
I know that there are many instances which cause me to regret having married him, but the hardest is to see what a horrible father he is to his younger daughter. He does not ignore my older daughter; rather he has made her into a sort of surrogate wife, which is just too creepy and upsetting to think about long enough to write a post about. But his virtual dismissal of this girl, this charming girl with the beautiful eyes that are so much like his is deeply, deeply damaging and surely must be the cause of intense heartache for her. And there is nothing I can do. Yes, I can be her cheerleader and her punching bag, which I am, but I can never make up for presenting her with a man who is so lacking in compassion, so unable to leave his mental kingdom long enough to nurture another.
During a time out I watched as the coach showed her a move, and then she must have asked him a question, to which he calmly responded. I was thankful that she has at least some positive male role models. That at least some men take the time to nurture their own daughters, and then extend the nurturing to coaching. Maybe she will see her father as one manifestation of a father and a husband, but she will have these other men in her life to think of as well. She has friends’ fathers, her grandfathers, her uncles, her coaches (although last year I was thrilled that it was a woman who led them to victory), her teachers. Please, please, I think, let her not accept a man like her father as the standard, as acceptable.
After the game we went out for lunch, then for ice cream. She told me about her week, told me that I am annoying, even that I was prying when I wanted to know what subjects her best friend was failing. We had a mother-daughter outing, and it was lovely. But I wonder if she would have preferred a father-daughter outing.
Chanukah Story
December 14, 2008
At the request of JC over at +StoryRhyme I wrote a children's story, something that I haven't done in years. When the girls were young, I wrote a lot of stories. But once I stopped reading to them, the writing part stopped too. But it was a lot of fun to think about what children think about. So, first, check out her site, which is a great compendium of original stories, and then check out my story, "Lighting the Chanukah Lights with Emily."
Happy Holidays to you all. Happy Chanukah. Merry Christmas. Happy Kwanzaa.
Bad Mother
December 13, 2008
I just hid a pint of ice cream in the freezer so that my daughters won't find it. What can I say in my defense? "Death by Chocolate" will surely soothe my blues more than it will satisfy their chocolate desires.
Sunday Evening
December 07, 2008
This weekend was lovely in its nothingness. I want to prolong this weekend and the feeling of calm I have attained. This weekend, with some meals in and some meals out, with some time with make-up on and much more time in flannel pajamas, had the right blend of inside and outside. This weekend with time and a conversation with older daughter; and younger daughter away for a brief retreat from which she returned home content. I don’t want it to end.
I don’t want to lose the softness that I attained once I confront my students tomorrow morning when I tell them that it’s time for the pronoun-antecedent agreement test and they tell me that I never told them or they forgot that I told them. I don’t want to break their mood from the weekend, either, but I must. I am so looking forward to the winter break. Break, indeed.
Book Review: Keeping Kids Out of the Middle
December 03, 2008
I was recently asked to review a book and publish my review of it on my blog. Besides the immediate flattery and sense of “having made it” to some degree, I also thought that the book would be a good one for me to read and for perhaps some of my readers to learn about and read. The book, Keeping Kids Out of the Middle: Child-Centered Parenting in the Midst of Conflict, Separation, and Divorce, by Dr. Benjamin Garber turned out to be too tame for my life, or co-parent, in the jargon. Nevertheless, it was a good introduction, I think, to the types of things that a parent could expect when heading down Divorce Alley.
Dr. Garber’s focus throughout was what to do to make sure that you don’t bring in your adult animosities into your parenting. His suggestions made sense, and seemed to serve as a finger-snap to parents—SNAP out of it, think about your child before you say what you are about to say. And I truly wish I had a co-parent with whom I could expect reciprocity when dealing with the kids and discussing me with them. But as I was reading about how I need to not adultify or parentify my children I had a real-life crisis that his book just did not address.
My daughter, who was 230 miles away from her father, and was with her mother (that would be me), and her sister, and her grandparents but was abiding by what her father had told her to do when she was with me, which means that he was telling me how to parent and telling her that she had to listen to him, not to me. I didn’t recall Dr. Garber getting to this situation, it was all so “normal,” how each parent has his/her own rules and you need for the child to understand that. He did not address one parent telling the child only to listen to him. I don’t know if Dr. Garber would have sanctioned my “I don’t care what he told you” scream in the face of her fear of not doing what her father wants and completely dismissing what I told her to do, but there is a point that us adults cannot be touchy feely and we cannot be wiped off the face of the parenting earth. Okay, maybe I really am a bad parent and now I know it even more. But I will try, I promise, to be more understanding of her bind. But I will not be complicit in any arrangement that makes me sensitive but invisible.
Maybe I am too blinded by my situation to see that it really is like so many “normal” ones he gave guidelines and suggestions to, but it didn’t feel like it. I felt even more out there, since I had passed the point of only speaking nicely about their father with them when the instances of his speaking against me kept multiplying, because trying to be a good parent when the other parent hasn’t read any parenting books is darn hard. At a certain point you need to stand up in the face of so much negative publicity from the "co-parent."
His helpful suggestions and commonsense tips, and setting out what to expect in different situations were insightful, gave me a sense of what others are dealing with, which is always a good thing. The surveys and self-tests, and even tables were useful, if only to think about what I should try to do on my own, and to get a sense of what to expect from my daughters and the legal system, and their father, to some degree. I did miss having stories; Dr. Garber is more of a clinician than a storyteller, too bad. I always like an anecdote to illustrate a point (can you tell?).
Garber, Benjamin D., Keeping Kids Out of the Middle: Child-Centered Parenting in the Midst of Conflict, Separation, and Divorce. Deerfield, FL: Health Communications. 2008.
For additional information you can go to: www.healthyparent.com and www.keepingkidsoutofthemiddle.com.
Thanksgiving at My Brother’s
November 30, 2008
My two daughters and I went to my brother’s house for Thanksgiving. In attendance were: my parents, my brother, his wife, their two kids (both teens), her parents, both of her brothers, one with his wife and two sons (teen and tween), the other with his wife and baby son (until it was time for her to leave and go upstate to her parent’s house where she really wanted to be), one of her two sisters and her husband, and the son of the other sister (who spent the holiday with her boyfriend—“when will she get the ring?” was the question of the day, and his young daughter). It was a full house. Oh, and a teen friend.
In accordance with tradition, my sister-in-law cooked far too much delicious food. Let’s just say that she had an entire 14-pound turkey that was not even carved as part of her leftover feast.
One brother-in-law regaled us with stories of his eating adventures in China. These included: leeches, dog, and (I think) monkey brains. But he did have some insight into more than just his food forays when he said that he wanted to give these impoverished “restaurateurs” a $20 tip for serving him the best meal he had in China in their extremely bare home/restaurant. First he told them (through his employee, who was taking him around the country) that it was a wonderful meal. As part of their thank you, they gave him three bottles of bottled water (which, he said, are very expensive there). When pressed, his employee told him that he couldn’t give the $20 to them since they wouldn’t be able to give him anything in return, and that would be unbearable to them. I, of course, joked that he could take one of their children who were sleeping on a plywood slab on the dirt floor. That broke the levity, but it was a moment of insight into the importance of self-respect and what it means to give, and to give back.
When he and his wife left, the news fluttered out that he just found out that he has cancer.
One of the sister-in-laws told me that her parents, in their early and mid-80’s are not doing well and that she spends her days tending to them, and her sisters tend to them on the weekends.
And my sister-in-law’s parents looked better than last year, but they’re both suffering from a medical book of illnesses.
And my parents are starting to look frailer.
It was weird, all of the “children” are in our 40’s and 50’s; our children are teens, going to college, applying to college, or heading into high school; and our parents, somehow, became our grandparents. We all moved up a rung on the ladder, and we are now in a position of responsibility (at least in regards to our families). We are who we are. While I still have illusions of grandeur, I am also this divorced woman, who is a teacher, who lives in the suburbs, who says “uh huh” and “oh, I’m sorry” much more often than I am consulted on issues related to girl’s self-esteem, women’s need to not listen to men and their lectures unless they offer a few lectures of their own, and how to break the cycle of control and abuse.
Family gatherings, a time to gather and to gather insight. Also a time to quiet the discontent and simply flourish being with people who love you because you are family, and since we have been family for so long, we are all related to the first degree (us Italians and Jews, it’s all the same by now).
(Oh, and I’m thankful that mr ex isn’t around to make any snide comments about anyone. It truly is liberating not to have an arrogant man around.)
(I just wrote “snide comments, and a woman at the next table in Panera’s said “snide comment” about ten seconds later. The universe is an interesting place.)
Thanksgiving List
November 27, 2008
I am thankful that I am not a bitter woman, or that I am not letting my anger and hurt and pain consume me. Or that I do not feel that I am a bitter woman.
I am thankful that I still believe that people are basically good and compassionate, and a reason to go out in the world every day.
I am thankful that I have two daughters who I was able to raise to the best of my abilities.
I am thankful for my students who have forced me to learn the eight parts of speech, and to identify a thesis statement, and who have made me get outside of myself for hours a day—and night—because, indeed, it is a village and I like the realization that I am a part of something, that I receive even more than I contribute.
I am thankful that Barack Obama will be president in less than two months.
I am thankful that there is a chance the war in Iraq will soon be over.
I am thankful that I am healthy (at least I think I am).
I am thankful for discovering blogging, which is a world of reading and writing and written conversations--and new friends and acquaintances. What more could a person want? (Rhetorical question)
I am thankful for my parents who have stood by me and held me up and listened to me cry for countless cellphone minutes.
I am thankful for Poops, who snuggles next to me and makes me remember that I am not alone, and that I am snuggly.
I am thankful for my friends because life would be so pale without them.
I am thankful for the beauty that is before me every second of the day.
I am thankful for my daughters.
I am thankful.
Divorce and Custody: Virginia Style and American Style
November 24, 2008
This is what I found when I was searching the name of one of the bastard lawyers my nice lawyer told me about: the Mommy Go Bye Bye blog.
And this is the paragraph that stopped me:
Virginia judges say a father may hurt the mother of his child, by abusing her, without hurting his chances of gaining custody. Judges surveyed for Influences on Judges' Decisions in Child Custody Disputes in the Commonwealth of Virginia, a 2001 Virginia Supreme Court study, also reveal that children over five go to fathers more than they go to mothers when cases go to court. The study explains that judges in Virginia believe #1) mothers have “more problems” than fathers and #2) mothers are “less competent than fathers. Pages 4, 6, 7, 20, 21, 23, 24, 29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 41, 53, 55, and 57, however, are especially relevant to the current trend of giving children to fathers who are abusive, violent, and dangerously controlling men. Those pages are excerpted and contained in my compendium "The High Price of Conscience-free Justice." Or you may look for the study on the Virginia General Assembly website.
And then there was this:
Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories — a powerful new PBS documentary that chronicles the impact of domestic violence on children and the recurring failings of family courts across the country to protect them from their abusers. In stark and often poignant interviews, children and battered mothers tell their stories of abuse at home and continued trauma within the courts. Co-produced by Tatge-Lasseur Productions and Connecticut Public Television (CPTV), this one-hour special also features interviews with domestic violence experts, attorneys and judges who reveal the disturbing frequency in which abusers are winning custody of their children and why these miscarriages of justice continue to occur.
This program is made possible by funding from the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation. One of the most effective ways an abusive father can inflict pain and declare his domination is to take custody of his children away from their mother. As Joan Meier, an attorney and professor of clinical law, explains, “To win custody of the kids over and against the mother’s will is the ultimate victory...short of killing the kids.” While there may be a perception in society that the family court system has a maternal preference, statistics show that, in the past twenty years, fathers are more often being awarded custody. Furthermore, in family court cases where mothers allege battery, fathers are given custody two-thirds of the time.
And if that was not enough, there was this:
“U.S. courts remain incredibly reluctant to punish men for crimes against their families," Silverman observes. "In this country, family violence is still seen as a private matter.”
“Men could beat, maim, and murder their wives with impunity until this century,” he continues. “Until the 1990s, it was legal in some states for a man to rape his wife. Like slavery and racism in this country, violence against women and children is the legacy of longstanding legal and social structures.”
* * *
When I attended the parenting class that I was required to by Virginia law after getting a divorce when children are involved (I don’t think mr ex ever attended a session) there was a mother there who had been a stay-at-home mother, who home-schooled her five kids, who lost custody of her children to her physically abusive ex-husband, who was given the okay by the judge to take the minor children out of state to live. How respectable, daddy dearest was a pilot. The judge then told this woman, who had not worked outside of the home for years, that he better see a record of her going often to visit her children who were going to be half-way across the country with their father, even though she has no money. She, of course, was not given spousal support. This woman also relayed that she was ostracized by her church for getting a divorce.
There really isn’t anything to add, except the horror, the horror. Any wonder that so often we get duped by these guys, they dupe the system, too.
There's this pseudo theory that only the courts have taken a hold of called Parental Alienation Syndrome, which states that the abused parent will turn the child against the abusing parent. In order to prevent that from happening, the courts have decided to simply give the kids to the abusing parent, who, of course, in no way will try to turn his kids against the other parent. How do you say "stupid" in legalese? I know, Parental Alienation Syndrome.
Watch the video, it’s chilling, especially the judge who says that no new evidence was presented although the child had told her mother that her father had sexually abused her after the first court case.
Why, why does the world still go round when children are not listened to and protected, and mothers are not listened to and protected? Why, why does the world still go round when abusers are given license to abuse? Why, why does the world still go round when all that is good is debased by those who have more powerful pockets and mouths?
Note to Parents
November 14, 2008
Parents, please note:
your child’s teacher does not hate your child;
Parents, if your child is telling you those things:
- maybe it’s in your child’s mind;
- maybe your child has done something to disturb the teacher;
- perhaps your child talks during class;
- perhaps your child sleeps during class (oh, sorry, rests his head on the desk and closes his eyes so that he can better concentrate);
- perhaps your child does not pay attention (oh, sorry, focuses well but the way the teacher expresses herself is not understood by your child);
- perhaps your child left the handout in class;
- perhaps your child did not: do the homework, take the homework from home, take the homework out of the backpack, and/or pay attention when the teacher collected the homework.
Does your child clean up his/her room when you ask him/her?
Hmmm, maybe there’s a pattern here that is repeated in school.
But wait, how many children do you have and do you ever get upset with them?
As a high school teacher I have approximately 125 students. Guess what?
- It bothers me when they don’t do their work.
- It bothers me when they don’t pay attention.
- It bothers me when they mock me.
- It bothers me when they try to annoy me.
Yes, it’s true, I am a person.
So next time you want to accuse a teacher of sabotaging your child’s future, go find your kid in his room and speak to him—honestly—about what is really happening in school because it generally is not the teacher’s fault that he got an F, D, C, or B (if you are so grade-greedy).
Signed,
A caring but annoyed teacher.
Mediation, or Sitting around a Big Table with Someone You Hate
November 08, 2008
My expectation for the mediation on Tuesday was that I would get to sit in my own little room, ex would sit in his own little room, and the mediator would shuffle between us. I wouldn’t have to see him, I wouldn’t have to hear him, I wouldn’t have to be in his presence. Unfortunately, mediator man thought that two adults need to act maturely and civilly, you know, be nice to each other.
He forgot that I had told him we were divorced already, not a good thing to forget. Don’t worry, I reminded him of this significant detail as soon as he started asking if there is a way to save the marriage. Um, what marriage?
Did I say that mediator man is in his 70’s, battling cancer and recently had a part of his right ear chopped off? Perhaps his perspective on life comes from the perspective of a man looking back at the follies of people, but since I am in the prime of folliehood I did not appreciate his view from on high.
When I walked into the mediator’s office I was confronted with a very, very big oval table of heavy wood with six chairs around it. I think it was a dining room table transformed into an office table. But it was wide enough so that we couldn’t be near each other.
(Highlight of the meeting: ex’s chair broke. The wheel of one leg fell off, twice. I was gracious enough to not laugh, but my was that lovely. I wasn’t able to look at him, but I could see him struggling to get the wheel back in.)
Is it worth it to go into the details of ex’s presentation of his case? Or is it enough to say that as I listened to him, I could hear how an outsider would think that what he said made sense but it was all twisted, twisted by a perception of reality that is formed in a narcissist’s mind. Apparently the house has not sold for two reasons. First, we had an offer that I rejected. I practically jumped out of my seat when he said that. There has never been an offer, there was a price probe last summer a month after the house was listed that was so low that even the realtor didn’t take it seriously. Second, the carpet in the entrance is old and I refuse to replace it. Yes, a house built in 1977 with the original kitchen, original bathrooms, original windows, original flooring has not sold because of a worn carpet and not because it is priced as if it has a new kitchen, new bathrooms, new windows and new flooring. Please.
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