As you now know, after the last letter or so, your sister is a CEO. I have these routines now that must be firmly adhered to around here…lest the planets un-align themselves and I find myself struck by a comet by week‘s end.
Whites suck, as there is at least sixfold the amount of work to do. Literally, haha. My new rule is that everyone must fold their dirty socks together before tossing them into the hamper. The family had slowly bogged down into “a situation“ : Everyone had suddenly become all defensive (typically at 6:15 a.m. in the morning) cursing and calling out “sock thief!”, all boiling down to the masses (James included) accusing ME of actually being the leader of the sock-thieving ring. So the CEO threw the accountability back at their accusing little faces…by making them do the new sock thing… And that is just the way I roll now (finally…
As a result, I’m staring at about 60 bundled up, semi-damp socks right now. There. I showed them, didn’t I?
Speaking of thievery…my vast network of liars and backstabbers (and I) got together in Brenham (home of Bluebell ice cream goodness) for a little bluebonnet-gazing, antiquing, and familial note comparison last weekend. It proved to be, as usual, estrogen gold. It typically starts something like this…we all set our families up with junk food, an endless supply of buffalo wings, video rentals and toilet paper… and trickle into Brenham, to a friend’s “country house” by Fri. night. I’ll spare you all of the half-assery that takes place (I’ve been sworn to secrecy anyway) but it all ends around 2 a.m. with the annual swearing-off pledge to never…again…touch a Mai-Tai. Last year it was Pina Colada. A few short hours later, we roll out of our bunks and hoist ourselves up by our bra straps. We march painfully, but bravely, into the antiques fair. By 10:00 a.m., we are all having berry cobbler and Lite Beer. Breakfast of the elite effete’, haha!
While there, I saw many, many treasures…of which I knew immediately which wholesale market they had come from, so I just couldn’t justify any purchase. Well, except for the non-mandatory (mandatory) gift exchange that takes place among the liar and backstabber clan that night. My purchase ended up being an amazingly cool vintage cowgirl postage-stamp necklace with a pearl dangling from the bottom. (which I coveted, by the way) I ended up getting a plastic rooster that looked like a “Far Side” character -- and of course which everyone ooohed and aaahed over. Yet that was just my opinion, and it seems lately that suddenly my opinions don’t exactly jive with the rest of the world’s. Pass the beer nuts.
I think that means…
I have viciously clung to my vanity -- and thankfully do not look like a sun-dried Magda (remember “Something about Mary” -- the binocular scene??) I am also not embittered by all of the bleached-out “Brittanys” or “Paris’s” or a myriad of other coveted STDivas we see on every TV now. It’s like tuning in to Telemundo anymore here in the states. However, I have spent, unfortunately, too much of the last few years rocking along between indecision/outrage… indecision/outrage…indecision/outrage. I blame that not on the bitter aging process and the STDivas that we are supposed to “live up to“, but on The Horror that is Bringing Up Teens.
I’ve almost gotten through them. My oldest is outta here, just in time for my sweet boy to transition into his spot (my cute little baby boy has become a smart-mouth that smells like onions and coconut shampoo -- a byproduct of his hatchelling hormones, forgotten deodorant and trendy hygiene choices.) God willing, my daughter will graduate next month. (OMG!) Reading that on my computer screen has been like finishing a chapter and going on to another…
Well, doesn‘t that just beg a segue??…
Chapter 2: How My Daughter Got Her Groove Back…
Well, sort of…
One day, after a few short weeks of promoting myself to CEO, and at the conclusion of another exhausting, mental ass-whippin’ of a day, I posed a question to my tearful, woefully sad little Wolverina: “Honey, are you ever going to get tired of frightening away nice people?” To which she responded with another round of tears and rants and homicidal doodlings in her sketchbook.
Well, sh*t. Again, through my vast network of liars and backstabbers, I was able to ascertain the name and number of “The Best Teen Psychiatrist” in town, so I called to set up an appointment. I was promptly informed that Dr. X would not have an opening until three months later, (wha!) but that my daughter could be seen by on of his associates’ associates, or something like that. Long story short, she and I end up in the associates’ associates office. There is riveting dialogue taking place. Something like this…
B: My mom is ridiculous.
Dr.Y: Why do you say that, Baylen?
B: I don’t know.
Dr. Y: No, really. You must have some reason for saying this.
B: I don’t know.
Dr. Y: Okay. I understand.
B: Oh, and my friends also think my mom is ridiculous.
Dr. Y: Which ones?
B: I don’t know.
Dr. Y: Do you think your friends are justified in that opinion, seeing how they don’t even know your mom?
B: I don’t know.
Dr. Y: I see.
B: Oh, and my friend’s parents think that Mom is ridiculous too.
At that point, my ears were starting to bleed. Will somebody please slap me here? Okay, so I’m ridiculous. What now?
Well, my gal is now taking Wellbutrin, and is a totally different creature in God. The aura around that child had gotten so damn gloomy that green mold was starting to creep up and cover the Hardiboard under her bedroom window. And I am not kidding you about that! Jeesh.
I will not burden you with happy stories, as I am a media professional, and that is definitely not the way we roll, but just imagine normal…or something like normal. For at least a good two months now. She has been a nice, cool drink of water after a long drought.
Except for yesterday.
Overcorrecting has always been a problem for me. My vast network of liars and backstabbers is proof that I’m in line behind many other overcorrectors. Overcorrecting is an exercise that seems to work very well with some personalities in a clamoring, ladder-climbing, ambitious society, just not with teenagers. And especially not with my teenagers. That shit always hits the fan around here.
So here we are on Monday. Remember, on Easter Sunday (yesterday), my little venom-dripping Wolverina backed me into a corner. I come out railing on as only an unseasoned and untested CEO will do. And a green CEO that is derailing fast usually decides to come out blazing with ALL of her big CEO weaponry:
* Fine! You can pay for your own damn prom tickets! ($75 apiece)
* I am not buying that nice prom dress for you! Go naked for all I care!
* You are not driving your Jeep (even though she has a job and has to take after-hours English ( because she failed first semester! - and it’s not like she’s a Senior or anything -- Wrong!!)
* I am not buying you another droplet of gasoline (just to see you slam out of this house and screech down the streets of a neighborhood in which every other home has a 6-yr-old outside on a new bike!!)
Like I said, somebody please slap me. Really. I must be doing something wrong…
It is sobering Southern Baptist lore, but it tends to hold true, especially in our household: The devil comes calling on special holidays.
I understand. Reading this letter, it all sounds so ridiculous and avoidable, but it’s really not, once you factor in lots of estrogen fuel and two medicated women. My poor husband and son weren’t having any of it. They quietly went to their respective rocks and climbed underneath.
Perhaps you are wondering if my daughter is justified in this behavior, but I‘ll bet you can‘t quite put a finger on anything. Her curfew is 12:30, extended to 1:00 as long as she calls me. The only chore she has is to keep her room semi clean and her laundry done. She is also supposed to load the dishwasher in the evenings, which she does not do 80% of the time. I know those aren’t many expectations for an 18-yr-old, but my husband and I decided to let up on our expectations a bit a couple of years ago, after she nearly drowned in her little sea of unstable elements. I’m not being dramatic here. She calls it “The B* Ocean.”
To be avoided for sure.
I just don’t know…because just when I start thinking I know a little bit about something, I get my head handed to me on a platter. This is another insecurity that comes with aging. I remember in my 20’s I seemed to know something about every subject known to man. Seriously, the super-colliding superconductor to
Okay. I can’t feel my hands or the tip of my nose now. Mercedes is rooted so deeply into my thigh now that I have “phantom ass syndrome”.
Please forgive me for all of these “words,” and thanks for “listening.” I just have one closing thought. I have always done my very, very, very best for all of them. Good, bad or ugly …parenting teens takes all three.
Sadly, one day very soon, I will turn around and they will all be out of my nest -- and I will probably be left with the pain of someone having ripped three huge band-aids from my quivering little heart, really fast.
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