Tag Archives: children

Fantasy Football Undone

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Remember the intro to “ABC’s Wide World of Sports”?  The announcer gravely intoned, “the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.”

Fast-forward 30 years, as I sit with my young son after an awesome first half of the Jets-Colts game.  Awesome because the Jets were ahead and it was his team!!  He does like Peyton Manning, the Colts QB, but my son IS a New Yorker, after all.

Then came the frustrating second half in which the Colts players showed themselves to be too much for our Jets.  Aggravation, disappointment and helplessness in a sports game generally means that older boys (as in 20s and up) drink away their sorrows.  Not so for a 7.5 year-old.  He has to have a tantrum the old fashion way — whining, being obstreperous, fresh and generally miserable company.  At some point, he pushed enough of my buttons — some I didn’t know I had.  I maxed out on the tantrum and matched his yelling with my yelling.  At this point, POB (partner of blogger)  — G-d bless her — ushered our son out of the room and said, “I have to separate you, two.”

So, there it was.  POB actually has two children but only one is really able to use age as an excuse (hint: not me).  Ok, so my homework is to figure out how to help my son channel his agony of defeat in a way that works better for him (and me) and how to stand tough when my son can’t.

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Fantasy Football and Real Life

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My son’s best friend is wild about football.  So, my son is now, too.  This is an awesome event because my son has had trouble connecting to peers in the past.

So, football.  Ok, two women raising a boy and he wants to watch football.  My son, who learns through reading — books, websites, whatever — said to me, “E-Mom, we need to fire up the iPod with serious football apps!!”  Ok, how did he know there were football apps?  So now we have THREE football apps on two iPods but because they are not iPhones we cannot play together.  Uh-oh.  I am feeling an upgrade on the horizon.

When kids want the next new gadget (or at least the gadget they’ve recently discovered) and are feeling extra deprived (as only spoiled children can feel), they no longer make references to the Stone Age or pre-WWII Europe, like we did or our parents did.  My parents would quote their parents, as in, “when we were starving in Europe, we only asked for food and water” to which I remember responding, “gee, sorry, can I get Frye boots anyway?”

No, our kids say things like, “we’re being raised like the Aaaa-mishhhhh!!”  As I remember, Kelly McGillis was very hot in that movie with Harrison Ford, “Witness,” about an Amish boy who witnessed a murder in Port Authority or Penn Station.  Ok, so I am missing the point of the intended scathing analysis of our child-rearing techniques.  Never mind.

It is important to listen to kids because they are experts in being children and being childish.  If they are happy all of the time, then you are a push-over, the moral equivalent of a chump, and, ultimately, a bad parent.  I hear tell of a magical zone where good parenting meets the right level of whining for proper childhood development.  This may be a myth (actually, I know it is because I just made it up). But there are books written about errogenous zones that exist only on runway models and elixirs of youth, so maybe I have found my way out of the daily grind by discovery a new theory.  Hmmm. 

What does this have to do with fantasy football?  Work with me here.  My son is into football and I have a fantasy that he and I will both survive his childhood and adolescence as high-functioning individuals in environs more luxurious than Amish.   Also, part of my fantasy involves my brother-in-law watching the football games with my son.  Here the reason why it is a fantasy: he is an artist and in touch with his animus and anima (I think these are Jungian terms) — that is to say, he is too evolved for football and in touch with his feminine side as well as his masculine side.  Bottom line — he is not a chest beater or head-butter.   Which makes him wonderful in general but useless at football.  Maybe he is a closet alpha male.  (Don’t tell SOB — sister of blogger — because she will un-alpha him in a NY minute.  She IS tough but gentle and uses her powers for good.)

I am rambling because my mind goes to crazy places on Friday nights as the work week winds downs and cartoons cometh in the morning.  I feel a good kind of tired — the kind that comes from playing with my son — tackle football, of course, and “keep away” and monkey-in-the-middle with POB.  Then as we wind down to bed time, we have pretend adventures — because my son has an incredible imagination — I am a British tourist to Oregon (who would not set foot in the former colonies) and only goes to place that revolted against the French, Spanish and Dutch and my son is my uncle George.  Then I am a Kenyan who travels to Jamaica in hurricane season (because the airfare was cheap).  Where does he get this stuff?.  Soon to be followed in a slightly altered Fred Flintstone voice as I reprise my “Big Tuna” role in an undersea world where I have a talk show and he is my little ramora whom POB, as Secret Agent Swordfish (don’t ask), saved on her nose as he fell off a whale.   I am exhausted to my core.

Now, my son who is my joy is in his jammies and reading an encyclopedia of something.  Because that is the way he is.  And I love him because he is kooky and loving and kind and imaginative.  And I can take no credit — I am genetically irrelevant to him.  He is like the most fabulous gift that keeps changing and challenging the recipient.  Sometimes, like tonight, I max out from his intensity.  But no worries, he will come charging at full volume into my bedroom tomorrow to wake me up.  Thank G-d POB is following with hot coffee.

I love my family.  I am blessed.  I am tired.

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The hardest part about having kids? Living through their childhoods.

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So this weekend, we went to the birthday party of our son’s betrothed (she turned 8, he is 7.5).  He asked her to marry him at summer camp and she said, “sure!”  We adore her and her parents so life is good so far. And both children attend the same school (but different classes, thank G-d).

Her parents (machertunim in Yiddish) and we went out recently and, among the stories, there was one in which the husband, a gentle giant (did I mention giant?) went — in his own words — ape-shit on someone.  He was justified in his reaction but, still, I thought, I am not sure that I want to tell him about an “oops” that could occur in adolescence if our children are still betrothed.  So, I am thinking about a chastity belt for boys.  All this going through my mind as we listen to jazz at a club and eat great food and wine.  I then start thinking about body armor for my son AND me.

My son is a gentlemen and a hyper-heterosexual young man.  Oxymoronic in the truest sense.  I guess being raised by lesbians will do that.  I am afraid, like any sane parent, about adolescence and what kids can watch on TV and then do in the instant that a parent is not watching.  Case in point: we are watching the Jets game on Sunday and a Viagara commercial comes on.  Try to explain erectile dysfunction to your 7.5 year-old to whom, at age 3, we had to plead “point it down” (so the pee would go in the overnight diaper) after “exploring”.

SO, back to the party.  The birthday girl’s mother says that the leader of their play group, an experienced child expert in something (vays nischt, as they say in Yiddish), thinks they are like brother-sister and not boyfriend-girlfriend.  I am relieved only to the extent that I don’t have to worry about plastic surgery after the gentle giant is finished with me if, G-d forbid, I had to explain about crazy adolescence and hormones (think, military school).  The grandmother overhears this and says, “the way they touch each other and interact, it is DEFINITELY boyfriend/girlfriend”.  Mothers know these things and I am scared once again and thinking about multi-generational living as a consequence of my son’s future indiscretion.  Until POB (partner of blogger) tells me that I am over-reacting.  Then I remember that she thought that the “bad girls” in hebrew school (yes, we’ve known each other since age 10) were still virgins.  I sink into despair.  I check my investments.  I move money to a separate account for contingencies.  I rest easy while searching the internet for his and her matching chastity belts.

This parent thing could kill a person.  I KNOW I was easier on my parents.  Or maybe they were not as crazy as I am.  Maybe they should have been because I did some crazy things.  Ok, I am stopping this loop because only bad things can come of it.

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I’ve lost that blogging feelin’

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I need help.  There are not too many bloggable moments as of late that are not work-related (or family-related with an unappealing message about those still alive and able to read my blog).   In fact, life has gotten, in some ways happily, ordinary.  Even mundane.

I had to be Mommy in the middle of the day — something I secretly enjoy but is still anathema to corporate America.  I picked up my son and his “bethrothed” — the young lady, soon to be 8 years old — to whom he pledged his love and undying loyalty at summer camp — and took them to a play group.  They talked about life when grown up and in the “hereafter” so much so that I suggested that they had long lives ahead of them and the “hereafter” could wait.  They held hands on the walk to the street corner and made sure each other was buckled in for the cab ride to the play group.  As the adult/guardian/interloper, I felt it was my duty to let them converse as they wanted.  They surprised me at the good habits they learned from their respective parents.  Old beyond their years.  Which means wild days are to come.  Be afraid.  Very afraid.  Apparently my son’s betrothed wants a marriage proposal for her birthday.  I was relieved that a ring wasn’t requested.  Knowing what I know about my son’s feelings for this little girl, it would be a BIG ring.  The kind you mortgage your house for.  Luckily, a solid birthday present and a marriage proposal are all that are warrranted.   I have time to save up for the wedding, because by that time, the groom’s family will be paying for the wedding.

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First Family Sunday Brunch of 2010

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So, last week, as I mentioned in my blog, as part of our family tradition, we gather together on the Sunday after Christmas for brunch to kvetch while our mouths are full of food.

Because at that brunch we didn’t kvetch enough or talk enough about our petty grievances against the humanity, the world and the next door neighbor, we re-convened at my house this Sunday.  We hoped the snarky energy that I emit in my home would provide a better venue for the spirit of our gathering.

Unfortunately, my sister couldn’t come because she had to cover for a sick colleague (“Doctor, heal thyself,” I say).  Besides the patients are so used to rounds, they could round themselves.  Still, my sister is a professional and went to the aid of her patients.  So, already, good karma started to push out my snarky energy.  AND IN MY OWN HOME.  How galling.

My brother-in-law came and he is really too sweet to have to carry the banner of acerbic, sarcastic humor.  He also has high blood pressure and a teensy cholesterol problem.  So, I ratted him out in the middle of brunch when he ate chocolate cake by sending the following pictures by email to my hard-working sister:

Needless to say, my brother-in-law is now on a diet of lentils, rice, and anti-oxidants.

Also, our dear cousin for whom my sister broke ground by cooking scrambled eggs, came this Sunday.  If my sister can cook eggs, well, I can, too.

SO THERE!!!

We are NOT competitive.  Really.  Nooooo, sireeeee.

Anyway, another cousin came over, too.  He is really a wonderful kid and it was actually hard to be snarky.  It was an odd feeling to want to be nice and gentle.  Wow, age does mellow a person.

But, let’s re-evaluate tomorrow.

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2010

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Happy 2010!! Is it “twenty-ten” or “two thousand ten”?

My favorite non-starter was “O10” (as in “O9”, even though letters have no place in these numbers).  I think most people have realized that “O10” is non-sensical. It would have been ok had we referred 2009 as “OO9”.  Then we could pretend that it was the year of international people of mystery and be relieved that that movie has ended.  Anyway, I am going off on a scary tangent that will reveal just how odd I really am.

So my first neurotic moment of 2010 happened even before midnight:

We had friends over for New Year’s.  Many were parents of kids about our son’s age.  So, I asked a burning question:  have you told your child(ren) about the danger of electricity and water?  A few nights before I had asked POB (partner of blogger) if she knew whether our son knew about this danger.  She didn’t know and immediately I had visions of our son waking from a sound sleep in the middle of the night, finding an electrical appliance, running a bath and electrocuting himself.  POB promised me, PROMISED me, that she would talk to our son about this.  (Sometimes, my son likes to test me and push back on my warnings and this was one I didn’t want risk.)  POB also assured me that she would call a psycho-pharmacologist the next business day so that I could get the help I needed.

Epilogue:  POB kept forgetting to tell our son.  So I had to tell him and I told him that he couldn’t test my authority on this one.  (Luckily, POB did call the psycho-pharmacologist for me, as one of HER New Year’s resolutions:  for both of us to have a happy, healthier year.)

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Chanukah Party

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We had a family Chanukah party at our synagogue this afternoon.  The kids had activities; the parents were just hanging out with only coffee and tea as refreshments.  Someone suggested that we get a bottle of wine.  The rabbi overheard and went into the kitchen and brought out red and white wine and iced vodka.  The senior rabbi produced three kinds of single malt scotch.  We had only Dixie cups and were crowded around a card table with a paper table cloth with dreidels on it.  It was a little like smoking dope in the bathroom while the high school dance is going on downstairs.

Apparently, the wine was for a party later on tonight and the man in charge got into a distemper over our poaching some of the wine, and had a bitchy, chastising tone as he grabbed the wine and said, “I am going to talk to the rabbi about this!”  Ok, so the hall monitor is ratting us out to the principal who gave us the wine in the first place.  NOW, who was going to be in trouble??  Mister Officious-Avec-Attitude came over and said, “the rabbi will go out and buy more wine so HERE.”  Ok, now I was pissed.  I say, “the wine is awful anyway, so don’t have anyone buy more of this vinegar.”  Ok, we were going to have it out, the lesbian mom and the gay man c-list event coordinator.  In the nick of time, the senior rabbi came over wearing a velvet Menorah hat and asked if anyone liked the scotch.  That diffused the brewing cat fight.  Phew.

Ok, the kids never knew what was happening, except the parents were laughing a whole lot more than any Sukkot and Tu B’Shevat parties at the synagogue.

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My father and his daughter, the non-doctor

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SOB (sister of blogger) and HOSOB (husband of sister of blogger) left yesterday for a week in Europe.

The last time SOB left the country for a week, my father was so anxious that his doctor-daughter was more than a mere phone call away that he ended up in the hospital ER at least three times.  I, the non-medically trained daughter, met him at the ER each time, and waited with him until his anxiety-caused shortness of breath, etc., passed.

Dad would apologize for taking me away from my office or my family.  I would tell him I am glad and relieved that he called so I could be there.  He would respond, how else would you know anything was wrong because you don’t call me.  Ok ok ok ok.  I gave him the grandchild whom he sees on Tuesdays and we have him over (along with SOB and HOSOB) every Sunday night and every holiday.  SOB is in charge of daily check-ins.  I am in charge of weekends and holidays.  Did I mention that I provide the grandchild?  (I used to call him every day as well from the cab home, when I worked close enough to home to take cabs after work.  Now I take the subway (no reception) and when I walk in the door I need to spend time with my son and partner.)

Ok, he has hypochondriacal tendencies, but he was 88 at the time.  Now, he is 89 and he does have heart disease now that is making him slow down.  But he is by no means enfeebled.  He is healthier than most people 30 years his junior.

Last week SOB and I discussed which ER Dad would likely go to.  I thought if I could figure it out, I could arrange to have office space and wifi during these ER stints.  One hospital serves free apple juice; the other is farther away but is in the hospital where Dr. SOB is an attending physician, so he would be fawned over. His cardiologist is smack in the middle.  Don’t under-estimate the draw of free apple juice to a son of poor immigrants raised in the Depression.  So, not a clear cut option.

Of course, this is only mildly amusing if nothing is really wrong.  Dad went to the cardiologist on Thursday and Dr. SOB went along to make sure his new medication was helping and that he was in good shape. SOB left the country, confident that everything will be all right.

Dad had something to do yesterday.  We are seeing him today — going to see his sculpture on display at his studio and then taking him to dinner.  So, I knew that all would be okay on the weekend.  It is Monday that will be the test.  Last night, I priced those wifi plug-ins.  One has to be prepared for anything.

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Perspectives

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This weekend, my 45-going-on-85-year-old body announced that it was going on strike.

I had some bug that kept me in bed almost all Saturday and then Sunday, all ready to pack two days in one, I had a back spasm that had me on the floor in excruciating pain.  My son tried to make me feel better with many kisses and I was sad that he realized that his remedies were not efficacious.  It is heartbreaking when children grow up in these ways.

Nevertheless last night we had the ganza mishpocheh (the whole family) over for Sunday night dinner.

My father who has newly diagnosed heart disease looked good and was very excited to give us batteries and power bars and assorted other things that he bought at CostCo.  One opened in the city and he takes the bus there and buys in bulk and then doles out to the “kids”:  SOB (sister of blogger), HOSOB (husband of sister of blogger), POB (partner of blogger and) and B (me).  As he was telling us about the good deals he got on all of these items, he stood taller, had better color and didn’t look or sound like a man in heart failure.  It is crazy what a good deal can do for an old man who is the child of poor immigrants and raised in the Depression.

As I reclined on a chair in the living room with a heating pad strapped to my back, I marveled at my father’s energy.  The conversation reminded me of my father’s endless price comparisons.  For a time, he focused especially on the price of bananas.  If he went to Chinatown, where he uses a sculpture studio, he could buy bananas for X cents a pound, but on the East Side of Manhattan where he lives, it is X+10 cents a pound.  I tolerated the banana story for years and then finally — this was when my mother was still alive — I said to Mom, “The banana story has run its course.  Make it go gently into that good night.” Mom nodded knowingly and I knew that was the last I would hear about the price of bananas.  Mom had a way with Dad.

Sure enough, Dad never mentioned the banana story again.  But he did start talking about the relative price of salmon.  I let it unfold for a few years (mind you, it is the SAME story over and over again about saving a few cents on the price of a pound of salmon0.   By then, Mom was gone.  So I said to SOB, “The salmon story has run its course.  Kill it.”  (I ceased to be gentle about these things after my mom died.)

But last night, as I sat alternatively in pain and extreme pain because of my back, I listened to my father tell us the good deals he got on the batteries and the power bars and I looked at him — he looked excited, proud and decidedly not sick.  And, I thought, I can live with these stories for a few years.  Happily, even, as long as my dad looks as good as he did last night.

But, please, no bananas or salmon stories.

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Parenting

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I hope that part of being a good parent is knowing that I need to step away and that POB (partner of blogger) needs to do the heavy-lifting.

My son is a fabulous kid and still a typical child.  He views the world only through his needs and in a disturbing development has been given to tantrums.  We thought we had skated by that particularly taxing aspect of childhood emotional growth but, no, I was maybe too smug too quickly and the karma boomerang provides a painful kick in the head.  (Come on, with all the issues we’ve had, the boomerang hurt too much for my little display of self-satisfaction.)

Our son, SOPOBLO (son of partner of blogger/blogger), pushed everyone of my buttons this weekend.   He usually displays appropriate manners and sensitivity to those around him but recently he has been harder to handle and intentionally testing every limit while simultaneously demanding every “reward”.  I can tell from the side glances that he is testing our (or maybe just my) reactions.  He also wants to exclude me from things as punishment for working longer hours, etc., even though I have less to show for those hours.

I feel my father’s anger at the sense of entitlement and my inner hurt at being excluded.  I remember all the books I read about guiding a child through these periods.  I cannot reconcile the books with my emotions.  I am ready to move out of the city of conspicuous consumption and raise SOPOBLO in a less affluent environment where POB and I have 9-6 jobs.

Maybe he is touching a nerve because the economic downturn has smacked us a bit and I feel the hurt pride of earning less and needing to save more.  But we were never so cavalier about money and toys and the rest.  We are careful about those things.  But, he leads a pretty privileged life, let’s be honest.

I love SOPOBLO so much but I was an emotionally distant parent Sunday.  It was the best I could do.  POB did the heavy lifting for the day.  That is a luxury — having another parent to take the lead.  I don’t know how single parents do it.  I am grateful every day for POB.

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