Some more bits and pieces...because I don't have enough brain power to come up with a whole post....
You know all that talk about your inner
child? You also have an inner parent, it's that voice that scolds
you or tells you've done a good job. My inner father sounds a lot
like Clint Eastwood, if you met my father that would make sense.
I'm still getting used to bugs being a
part of my summer vocabulary; when I go for a walk with the girls in
the double stroller invariably I walk by a forest preserve. I find
myself batting my hands about in the air swatting away all those
flies that seem to land in my hair or buzz my ears. What do I hear
my inner parent say?
“It's all those damn hair products
that you wear.”
In a gravelly old man voice.
Welcome to my head.
Last Christmas I was at a library used
book sale. I picked up a copy of a DVD Yoga Conditioning for
Weight Loss. I looked down at pregnant belly and sensed the
girth of my growing thighs and thought, 'I think I'm gonna need to do
that in a little while.' Since it was a dollar I threw it on the
pile. About six weeks after Carys was born I popped it in the DVD
player sat in lotus position and waited to let the weight loss begin.
I noticed that all the ladies demonstrating the poses were well
above me in age. Most of the moves were gentle and some of the
modifications seemed overly easy. After completing the DVD I picked
it up and read the box, trying to discern what exactly makes this DVD
specifically for weight loss. The type on the box gave you
assurances that changes in diet were needed as well, other paragraphs
that were obliquely telling you that doing this yoga wouldn't cause
weight to drop off magically but it would help you on your way. Then
I found this choice phrase, 'modified for the larger body.' Wait...
So this is Yoga for Fat People?
Awesome.
I pulled into our driveway and looked
in my rearview mirror. Crap. Emma was passed out, completely. I
eyeballed our three flights of stairs that we have to get up. Now I
have two children that need to be carried up. Emma wakes up grumpy
and I was pretty sure that waking her up and plunking her on the
ground and telling her to walk up three flights of stairs was not
going to go over well.
I call these my Sophie's Choice
moments.
Which one do I pick? Which child do I
carry up first? Which one do I leave to possible endangerment?
Having to get two children, one who is
still completely immobile, up and down these stairs gives me these
moments more than I’d like to admit.
Then there are moments when Emma is
awake and perfectly capable of walking she just chooses not to
cooperate. So I run up and put the baby down, and then run back down
and haul Emma upward, either verbally or physically. Usually a
seriously uncool parenting moment follows. This makes me crazy,
because on top of being angry at Emma for being oppositional, flashes
of kidnappers whip through my head. Or the well meaning person who
will approach my child, ask her where her parents are, and then
immediately call Child Protective Services on me. This is usually
why I pick the baby first. Because if a baby is unattended in a car
that well-wisher would be on their cell phone so fast...all I see are
blurs. I figure that the conversation with a toddler would at least
slow them down.
Anyway....this always leads me to the
conclusion that Americans do too much alone. We should have more
help.
1 comment:
Love reading your blog. These are the daily choices we face as a busy one. Your a great mom nice to know we all face the ratrace together. More community would be nice as the Moms carry all the bags backpacks lunchboxes into the house as the kids just stroll in what's wrong w this picture. Delegate more.....note to self..
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