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1-9-1-4
Did you know that dialing any combination of 9-1-1 connects you to a 911 operator? It’s true.
For instance, if, let’s say, you are a nine year-old kid and your mom has a cell phone that has a 914 area code and you live in an 845 area code, when calling her from your home phone, you have to dial 1 (for long distance) 9-1-4… to reach her. At nine years-old, you may not be too land-line savvy. You might be a little slow on the dialing or you don’t always remember the “4” fast enough because you have to remember the 1 at the beginning. If there is any hesitation in getting to the 4, just dialing the 1-9-1 combination connects you to 911. And if you’re nine, no matter how many times this happens, you just think the call isn’t going through so you hang up and try again. While you’re trying again, the 911 operator is calling you back to make sure everything is “Okay” but you’re not answering the second line because you are calling your mom again on the first line, remember?
Did you also know, that when you don’t answer a 911 operator’s call back, in New York at least, they automatically send law enforcement to your house. And when they come to your house, in addition to making sure everything is “Okay“, they request to see and speak with the 911 caller.
How do I know this?
They’ve been coming to my house for years. It used to be once or twice a year since the time my son was a toddler and would find his way into our basement office and “play” with the fax machine. I never heard the return call on the fax machine from the 911 operator so, a police officer would be dispatched to our house. It took three visits before we figured out it was the toddler and the fax machine. I used to think it was only local police that responded to 911 calls but lately, it’s been a NYS Trooper. And over the past several months, the Troopers have come to our home so often, that last month when the Trooper pulled up in front of our house and my son saw him from the bay window in our living room, he simply called out:
“Hannah! Someone’s here to see you!”
Yes, it’s my nine year-old Hannah, who is responsible for our more recent meet and greets. It seems that nearly every time she tries to call my 9-1-4 cell phone, a NYS Trooper ends up at our door. No kidding!
And as of this month, it’s not just our door either!
A few weeks ago, when I went to pick up Hannah at school, I noticed a State Trooper pulling out of the parking lot as I was pulling in. I’d say that would raise a curious eye brow for any parent picking up their kid but it was me who the “porch” teacher met at my car. He came bearing the news that after trying to call me from the school phone unsuccessfully, 911 was accidentally called by my daughter. Hence the State Trooper, who apparently had a “nice little chat” with Hannah. This, was so not surprising. And it’s probably a really good thing that I work there three days a week.
I think it’s important to nurture a sense of independence in children. I think they should feel they can be trusted and shown that you have confidence in them. And it’s only in the past several months that we’ve felt comfortable enough to resume moving forward in this effort. So, I was pleased when Hannah opted to stay home alone for the 6 minutes it would take me to drive my son to his tennis lessons and come back, about a week ago.
Ah, I should have known. I hadn’t even shut the door behind me after returning when I glanced over my shoulder and saw the all too familiar, navy blue vehicle with yellow lettering pull up onto my front lawn.
“Hannah?”, I called inside the door, “Any idea why the State Troopers would be coming to our house?”
“Oh, um, yeah” she said, “that could be me.”
Between the tennis run last Friday and a quick jaunt to the post office a little later this week, the Troopers were at my house, twice. Yes, that’s twice in one week’s time.
I wonder if calls from our house are somewhat expected now or have become part of the training program for the new guys? A different Trooper comes every time. The last fellow that came was awfully, young. I suspect it’s also possible that our address has been “red flagged” for other reasons. Either way, it is always a State Trooper and, they come fast!
I never get rattled though, when I see a Trooper pull up to my house. In fact, I don’t think it’s the worst thing for my neighbors to see the company I keep. Besides, I find things like a 6ft cardboard cut-out of a vampire and NYS Troopers at my front door, comforting these days.
I also happen to be a bit partial to NYS Troopers and to one in particular, whom I will forever be indebted.
To all the other Troopers that are perhaps, taking turns coming to my house, meeting and speaking to my Hannah, I thank you for your service to our community and most especially, to my family.
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Life’s Terms – Not Mine
I was at work when my cell phone rang and I could see from my contact list that it was “Parole Officer – Diane” calling. Diane had been assigned to our case last Spring and had interviewed me for several hours. She was the only person that I encountered within the judicial system, in the five months that passed from arrest to sentencing, who actually took the time to listen, really listen to what happened to my family and understand how much it effected us. During the sentencing in June, she stood in between me and the assistant district attorney prosecuting our case. To my right was the defense attorney, next to him, his client; the offender. We were standing before the judge’s bench when Diane reached up and touched my arm because my right hand had begun to tremble uncontrollably when I started to speak.
It’s not like I’ve never spoken in public before, I have, many times but this was different, very different. It was personal. I was talking about my children. The gentle reminder of Diane’s presence calmed me, enabling me to continue to read aloud the 3-page, typed statement I’d prepared. The court calls it a Victim’s Impact Statement. For me, it was a bearing of my soul, exposing my innermost feelings and fears, in public. Difficult. Painful. But as any parent can relate, when it comes to your children and in particular, their safety, your own comfort is inconsequential. You do what you have to, for them. You do ANYTHING. Diane gave me strength that day to do what I needed to do, so when I answered her call and she asked if I would speak on a Victim’s Impact Panel, I said, “Yes”.
This would be the second time a panel of this kind was held in our county and the second time I would speak on it.
This past Thursday, the panel gathered in a small room off to the side of the community room at our city’s police station. We met with a victims advocate who is also a psychiatrist. She gave us breathing techniques and other ideas on what to do if we got anxious while speaking. We introduced ourselves to each other and briefly mentioned the type of crime that had effected our lives. The woman next to me was one of three of us from the first panel. It was oddly comforting to see her again. Hers is a powerful story. She and her husband were attacked by her daughter’s ex-boyfriend. He had machetes hidden in his jacket when he entered their home and cut them both, badly. Her husband lost a thumb. He was a carpenter. He turned to alcohol. They’re separated now.
Shortly after the introductions, we took our seats at the front of the community room and watched the parolees shuffle in, one by one, sitting three at a table. There were ten, maybe fifteen tables. Questionnaires had been placed in front of each seat and they were instructed to fill them out at the end in order to receive “credit” for being there. Five officers were strategically placed throughout the room.
Like the last time, Diane introduced me first and rather abruptly, the room went from chatty and busy to silent while all eyes settled on me. I took a deep breath and began to recount what happened to my family and how it has effected our lives. After a while, even though I could still hear myself talking, a part of me seemed to detach from the speaker and I also became the looker, the watcher, the observer; scrutinizing the bodies that sat before me. I found myself noting what they were wearing, how they sat; their demeanor. There were men and women of various ages, although the majority of them were young. They were dressed in every fashion, whether it was proper attire, or not. Although, they were told to remove their hats before we started. They were black, white, Spanish, Asian and other. It was a mixed crowd and unless you knew what brought this diverse group of people together, you couldn’t guess what they had in common. I didn’t have to. Other than the fact that they were all here by court order, mandated to sit for the next 2 hours and listen to our stories, I knew that each one of these people was a convicted felon, having committed such crimes as aggravated assault, battery, arson, fraud, attempted murder, burglary, illegal drug use or sales.
Like the last time, I found the audience to be quiet and respectful. And again, I was honestly taken by how attentive everyone was. Really. You can’t fake eye contact and most of the people there seemed genuinely interested in what we had to say. For many of these offenders, it was the first time they came “face to face” with real consequences of their actions.
After revisiting the life-changing event that brought us to this room, we were escorted back into the smaller room to “debrief” and discuss our experience with the psychiatrist and other law enforcement agents that were there. About ten minutes later, Diane came in holding the questionnaires that the parolees were required to fill out and handed them to us to look at. It was interesting to learn what crimes these people actually committed and fascinating to learn what, if anything about our stories had an impact on them. I was curious to see what they would say to their victims if they had the opportunity, “I’m sorry”, was the most popular response.
Just like last time, it was the effect the crime had on my children that made the biggest impression on the offenders that were impacted by my story. Perhaps it was the fact that I was too distraught to put up a Christmas tree for my kids or that my 9-year old daughter was having nightmares and wetting her bed. Maybe it was hearing that my son (who had just turned 11) was a primary suspect and upon learning that, I instinctively refused to sign the complaint statement that would allow the detectives to pursue their investigation, leaving us effectively, on our own. Or, it could have been me telling them, that for most of November, December and January, my boy would sit outside our house, in the cold, for over an hour after school, waiting for me to come home from work, rather than go inside by himself because he was too afraid, that struck a chord with some.
One man who commented on my story said he felt “helpless” while listening to me talk about what happened.
So did I — at the time.
And just like last time, I remained unemotional and composed, throughout– until I got into my car to go home.
I realize, you can’t let an event in your life define who you are. It’s not what happens to you but what you do when something happens that becomes part of your character. It’s recognizing what you would do differently and what you did well. It’s about trusting your instincts and finding the strength to do what you know in your heart is right, even when the person closest to you is trying to dissuade you.
Ultimately, it’s what you learn from the event that helps shape who you are.
I’m not quite finished dealing with the aftermath of this event. It’s opened up a Pandora’s Box in my life. It’s put me onto a path I never expected to be on. But I’m Okay with where I am today and even though it’s not a very comfortable place to be, I believe I’m where I’m supposed to be. I think that’s true for the rest of my family, too.
When I ask myself if it was a good thing for me to speak and tell my story, again and when I wonder if it made a difference or mattered to anyone, I can honestly say, “Yes, it did”, to me anyway. It helped me put things in perspective and reminded me that I am living life on life’s terms, not mine and of how far I’ve come from feeling helpless and not being able to put up a Christmas tree.
Posts related to this topic by this author: Unsolicited Journey, My Edward, Impact
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Sometimes Boys Just Need To Be Boys And…
Cedar Falls' Cassy Herkelman, right, and her opponent Joel Northrup, left, of Linn-Mar High, stand at the scorers table.
It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare. ~ Mark Twain
I have a younger brother. We are two and half years apart. We were the best of friends and enemies growing up and did our fair share of fighting, “like cats and dogs”, as my mom used to say. No matter how bad the fight got however, there was always that one golden rule that was never broken: “no hitting girls”. Okay, I admit I took advantage of the fact that I am a girl at times and there’s no doubt, I brought the boy, to the brink more than once or twice but the rule was a steadfast one, in our home, boys did not hit girls.
I’m a huge proponent of equality in education between the sexes, girl power, independence, women being all they can be, couples sharing in the responsibilities of raising families, keeping house and house hold expenses but I’m also realistic. Let’s face it, men and women differ, physically. I am all for women wrestlers, boxers and hockey players but these are very physical sports and quite frankly, I think it’s silly to think our bodies should or could compete equally against each other. We just aren’t “made” the same. Our body parts are different! It’s science yes, but I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to figure it out. There are certain circumstances where the game calls for girls to play with girls and boys to play with boys. And if there isn’t a playing-field for the girls to play the game on, there should be.
So, “kudos!” to Joel Northrop, the high school, home-schooled, sophomore and stand-out wrestler with a record of 35-4 for Linn-mar High School, for forfeiting an opportunity at the Iowan State Championship, by refusing to wrestle his female opponent, Cassy Herkelman. Herkelman is one of only two girls to make the state tournament in an 85-year history. Hmm.
Wow! Expressing respect for her accomplishments and having the courage not to succumb to the pressure of liberal correctness.
Now that’s a boy, behaving like a man, if I ever saw one.
Photo Credit: AP
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Hello, Mother Ship? Please, Come Back! Pick Up Your Alien Child And Return My Son!
I have a boy. He’s twelve. I don’t write about him much or post too many pics of him because a) he does not want me to and b) I suspect the boy living in my house right now, is not really my son. My angel boy I believe, was abducted by the Mother Ship and an alien child has been left here in his place.
It became apparent about a year ago when I began to notice this strange being emerge from my little boy’s body. Not quite the butterfly blossoming from the cocoon process, more like it’s reversal. The first real hint I had that something was amiss was when I started to detect a rather foul odor coming from my son’s room.
What in God’s name could that be? I thought.
Not even dirty, sweaty socks could smell that bad and that smell, certainly couldn’t be coming from a human child! The next thing I knew, I was buying Axe’s Phoenix scent deodorant for an 11-year old! Who knew they put cologne in deodorant these days? OUT, is your basic Speed Stick. Then came the request for “boxers”. Boxers!? What was wrong with the super-hero briefs he’d been wearing all these years? Shortly after that, came the hair and I’m not talking about the hair on his head either. Honestly! I don’t think there is a single part of this alien child’s body that doesn’t have hair on it!
Excuse me, but I would like my baby’s smooth, silky, velvet-like skin back! Clearly, this hair ball sleeping in my boy’s bed is an impostor!
The alien child also comes with an attitude and has a frog stuck in his throat! He barely speaks English and when he does, it’s the same two words mumbled over and over again, “I dunno – I dunno”, regardless of the question being asked. Otherwise, I’m lucky if I get a grunt or a nod.
And another thing, I liked it quite better when my boy looked up to me. Literally. Not vice-versa. In the past 12-months this imposter has shot up nearly eight inches and grew a hearty set of abs! In clothing, he went from a size 14 boys to a men’s small! How is that possible? He’s twelve! Perhaps it has something to do with the amount of food he consumes. Six tacos in one sitting! Enough said.
“Hello, Mother Ship? Please, come back!
Pick up your alien child and return my angel boy!”
Sigh. Nothing has prepared me for this shocking occurrence. I thought that when it happened, it would be a gradual, peaceful thing. I thought I’d have more time to adjust and accept. I don’t even think there is a course I could take that could teach me what I need to know right now. I suppose there are books but quite frankly, after reading Alfie Kohen’s Unconditional Parenting, a few years ago, I was left rather traumatized. EVERYTHING he said NOT to do, I had been doing for 10 years. Let’s face it, there’s no undoing that kind of damage!
My Angel Boy
Thankfully, the eternal optimist in me has hope that one day I will see my angel boy again or at least an older variation of the one I miss so much. I have faith that the foundation he was reared upon will help him find his way back, when he’s ready, in-tact and unharmed from this awkward growth period. In the meantime, I realize that even the alien child sleeping in my son’s bed now, needs a mom to care for him, too. So, I will do my best to be patient with his sometimes odd and infuriating ways. And I will try to love him even when I feel like, well, strangling him, in the hopes that somewhere out there, there’s an alien mom on a Mother Ship doing the same for my angel boy.
Tell me, has your angel boy also been abducted by the Mother Ship?
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Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones But Names…Can Break My Heart!
“You know Mom, he’s lucky I didn’t squish him like a bug!”
That’s what my 9-year-old daughter came home saying the other day after spending an afternoon at a birthday party. The “he” who is lucky “she”, didn’t, squish him like a bug, is a 10-year old classmate who was also at the party. “He” is her pal, her chum, her friend. He is her partner at school when pairing needs to be done. He is also the boy who tried to hold her hand when the lights went out in a Star Lab dome, but that’s not why she wants to pummel him.
There are some things you just never forget: getting an award, your first sleep-over, punching a fella in the mouth for asking you to marry him (in first grade!), the soft, warm lips of a shy boy’s sweet and gentle kiss during a game of spin-the-bottle and of course, the first time someone embarrasses you in front of a group of friends by calling you a “name“. For me, it was buoy. And in 4th grade, I didn’t have a clue. So in a naive and unsuspecting way, I asked the boy who had just referred to me as a “buoy”, what that was. “You know,” he said, “it’s that round thing that bounces up and down, bobbing in the water, a buoy!” That was followed by what seemed to me, to be a roar of group laughter. Painful. I forced a smile and walked away. I’m sure I could have flattened him but my heart had sunk to my knees and I was too hurt to react. Sadly, I never forgot that feeling.
Like her mom, my girl is made of hardy stock. She is strong, confident and independent. She’s out-going and adventurous. She loves to laugh. Also like her mom however, she happens to be very sensitive.
“He called me fat in front of all my friends at the party” she said. “He embarrassed me. We were laughing about who would make the best Pińata and he said, ‘Hannah would, cause she’s fat!’
My heart immediately sank and broke, for her.
“He’s lucky I didn’t squish him like a bug! And you know I could.” were the next words out of her mouth.
She’s right. She could.
“Well then,” I said, “maybe next time, you should.”
Okay, maybe that was wrong.
Sticks and stones may break my bones but names…..
Honestly, I would have preferred he threw the stone. That wound heals faster.
We spent a long time that evening discussing potential reasons why her friend might have said that about her. Insecurity. Bravado. Maybe he was trying to look “cool” in front of the other boys. Perhaps he didn’t mean it and it was just a poor choice of words. Most likely, he like, likes her. No matter how much we dissected it though, the result was always the same. She could get past the word. She knows she’s bigger and taller than the other kids in her class. She accepts that her body is changing, maturing. It’s the betrayal she is having a hard time reconciling with. He’s her friend.
It was after midnight when she came into my bedroom and crawled into bed with me that night. She snuggled up close and whispered, “Mommy, why did he do that? I thought he was my friend?” Cue the breaking heart again. She slept with me for the first time in years. And it was a big wake-up call to me as a parent and an adult, just how omnipotent words can be. Life is hard enough without us hurting each other with the things we say. And I’m reminded of how critical it is for me to set the example, practice kindness, show compassion and be forgiving.
Words may not be able to break a bone but they sure can break a heart. The flip-side of that is to know that words also have the great power to fill a heart! So in the end, my advice to Hannah was to have, an open heart.
We are after all, only human. We all make mistakes and good friendships are worth keeping. So, when the boy came to school the next day and said, “Hey, I was only kidding. I didn’t mean it that way. I can’t believe you thought I was serious!” That was all she needed to hear to buddy-up again and put it behind her.
Besides, she told him that if he EVER does that to her again, she is going to “SQUISH him– like a bug!”
Photo credit: Squashed Bug, Broken Heart
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Dogs at Their Heels
As a kid growing up in Westchester, I lived in an apartment building on the fourth floor. No elevator. We played kickball in the backyard with the other kids who lived in the building. When the Good Humor ice-cream truck came by, we’d yell up to mom like banshees and if she had them, she would wrap a few quarters in plastic and throw them out the kitchen window. We had chores to do and did them. We didn’t get allowance. The word “no” was not an unfamiliar term. By age 12 we had jobs; babysitting, delivering newspapers or breaking down boxes and sweeping up scraps at the local butcher shop. We also had pen-pals who we hand-wrote letters to. We walked to school, the movie theaters, the mall and the beach– by ourselves. Our family of five shared one rotary phone, the kind that was attached to the wall and stayed there when we left the house. We also shared a lime green record player for our musical entertainment. Our first color TV was 19 inches. I didn’t have a computer and when I went to college, I borrowed a friend’s electric typewriter to write reports.
Behind our building was a trucking company where typically, seven or eight, 18-wheelers stood neatly parked, side by side. The only thing between us and the trucks was a simple 10, maybe 12 foot high chain link fence that was hardly a barrier, let alone a deterrent to kids with a mission. After hopping the fence, we would climb the truck beds, hoist each other up to the roof tops and jump, roof to roof down the line, just for fun. Next to the trucks was a sand and gravel yard separated by a similar fence and guarded by a team of 3 or 4 loose running dogs. Dobermans. It was a game, a quest, a challenge to quietly sneak over the fence, outwitting the dogs, climb to the top of a 15 foot mound of gravel and yell out at the top of our lungs, “I’m king of the mountain!” Of course, this immediately alerted the otherwise outwitted but now fiercely barking dogs to our location and sent us all on the run of our lives scrambling back over the fence in record time with the dogs growling and salivating at our heels. In hindsight, I’m truly amazed none of us ever got caught and chewed to bits as we feared we would. But then again, there was an unspoken code that had a “no child left behind” ethic to it among us. We helped each over the fence. I liken my childhood experiences to the day courses our kids now take at special facilities designed to teach them “trust and team building skills”. What a difference a couple of decades make.
My children live in the suburbs. My 9-year old is not allowed to leave our cul-de-sac. There are no sidewalks here. They are driven or take the bus to and from their school every day. They each have their own Gameboys, iPods, cell phones and laptops. They play their Wii games on our 54″ flat screen TV. My 12-year old son carries a pre-paid American Express picture ID card with at least $50.00 on it, in his pocket, in case of emergency. He’s never climbed a fence, let alone been chased by a crazy, barking dog regularly. He prefers to Facebook, Skype or text his friends rather than actually speak to them or meet them at the movies or a bowling alley.
I take responsibility for aiding in the provision of the latest and greatest for my kids. Doesn’t every generation strive to do better and give more to their children? Technological advancement is the key. Isn’t it? With answers literally at their fingertips, academically, my kids are already worlds ahead of me. It’s the life skills and their ability to cope that concerns me. After all, no one is immune to life’s inevitable disappointments, no matter how many gadgets they own. Sometimes I believe my childhood with less in it, may have left me better equipped to deal with life and all that comes with it than today’s youth. I didn’t need to absolutely have to have anything right now or fall prey to the instant gratification disease that so many of our young people now suffer from. I wanted things but I understood that “no” meant “no”, not maybe or tomorrow. I learned to accept that I couldn’t have everything or everything, my way. I have some intuitiveness and self-discipline as a result which has proved extremely valuable during some intensely difficult times in my life thus far. I worry that my kids are missing out on some invaluable, independent learning by not being able to roam as freely and learn to free themselves from a jam, on their own, as I did. I wonder how you can teach them these lessons without letting them or the dogs out. I hope that they will have what it takes to overcome life’s unexpected challenges; the real hard ones. I pray that they will be able to summon the courage and stamina they’ll need to help each other over the fence when the dogs are at their heels.
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Oh, Go Ahead and Cry For Me Argentina!
I am trying to recall the fateful infraction that made my mom go from being awesome to embarrassing when I was a kid. I can’t quite pinpoint the exact offense but I think I was around the age of 12 or 13. Sadly, I think the image change is all part of the natural process of separation and signifies the beginning of our break- away to independence. As a parent now, I’ve been careful to keep the public displays of affection toward my children to a minimum. It’s a conscious effort to prolong the process and hang on to the image of “awesome” for as long as I can. Well, it was anyway. It’s just another pipe dream now. The cruel truth is, nature stops for no one.
Perhaps, the natural process of aging and the separation process, go hand in hand. In the last year or so I’ve started to hear myself saying things like, “Excuse me, can you repeat that please?” or “Pardon me? I missed the beginning of that.” It’s bad enough when you are speaking in your native tongue to not hear everything but now imagine being in a foreign country, say Mexico for example, where I’ve been for the last 10 days and where they speak Spanish and I don’t. My kids do however and I’ve relied on them often to translate for me. Although, there is a certain level of comfortability that comes with visiting the same city for eight years in a row. You pick up words and phrases after a while and feel confident using them. Let’s face it, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to understand simple things like “hola” or “gracias”. Heck, everyone knows that means “hello” and “thank-you” in Spanish. So, when the nice gentleman in the elevator, or the waiter, house keeper, hotel clerk, driver or merchant would kindly wish me a “good afternoon” in Spanish over the past week or so, I simply smiled, repeated back what I heard and went along my merry way, at first anyway.
After a few days however and many, many “good afternoon” exchanges, I began to notice bewildered looks, odd expressions, a smirk here and there and the most common; a blank look accompanied by a hollow smile, in return of these greetings. What?? Was there something stuck in my teeth? I didn’t get it. Not until my 12-year old son was with me one afternoon that is. As per usual, with a huge smile and an air of confidence, I kindly reciprocated a store merchant’s “good afternoon” with a very cheery, “Buenos Aires!” Again, the perplexed look and hollow smile was received in return. It wasn’t until we were out of ear shot and the store that my son turned to me with a look of pure mortification on his face and said, “Mom, what did you say to that guy?” “Buenos Aires. Why?” I replied. “Why did you say Beunos Aires?” he asked. After explaining I was just trying to be nice and insisting I knew what I was saying, after all I had been “Buenos Aires-ing” people all week now, he looked up at me with that ‘I am so embarrassed by you’ look in his eyes and said, “Oh, my God mom, come on! Buenos Aires is a city! That’s like someone saying good afternoon to you and you replying, ‘New York‘! They are saying Buenas Tardes not Buenos Aires!” (Apparently, the “t” in tardes is silent. Who knew? Obviously, not me.)
Good Lord, now it all made sense though! Okay, so people were wishing me a good afternoon and I was cheerfully replying with the name of a city in Argentina. Nice move mom. Now my 12-year old son (who has been showing signs of approaching that point of separation over the last several months as it is) won’t even go to the hotel lobby with me. Yes, it seems I’ve lost my “coolness”, at least for the next 5 or 6 years where he’s concerned anyway. Nature set its course and me and my slight loss of hearing were in it’s path. Inevitable.
So by all means, go ahead and cry for me Argentina and all the other parents who are in the same or soon to be same boat! But before you do, please tell me your “I used to be awesome until..” story. You know what they say, misery loves company and I know I can’t be alone on this one.
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Mother of the Year, I am Not!
As a parent I strive to expose my children to culture; music of all types, galleries, museums, plays and the like. The goal of course, is to make them well-rounded members of society able to participate in a wide range of conversations, having a little bit of knowledge in a variety of subject matter. So, when I recently realized last year’s Christmas present, tickets to Westchester’s Broadway Dinner Theater, were days from expiring and having no desire to let $80 a ticket fly out the window, I did what I thought any good mom would do; reserve seats at the show, whatever it was. How bad can it be? Jekyll and Hyde. Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Besides, it was a musical. Aren’t all musicals lighthearted and gay? Question: At the age of 45 and since this tale has been around, oh, since 1886, how is it possible I did not know the plot and ending? Doesn’t everyone know “the work is commonly associated with the rare mental condition often spuriously called split personality, wherein within the same person there is both an apparently good and an evil…” ? Isn’t it common knowledge that Mr. Hyde wreaks havoc (by way of murder) on the streets of london once Dr. Jekyll injects himself with the mind altering serum? Apparently not, not me anyway. It must have been the word “musical” that made it all seem, well, like a good idea at the time. Lesson learned: Just because it has the word “musical” in it, doesn’t mean it’s a happy play.
It never dawned on me for one second that my sweet, sensitive, caring, 9-year old daughter would be so disturbed by the this performance that she would be exposed to the crumbs on the floor underneath our table, rather than the “culture” on the stage for the better part of Act II. You would think one would take note when their child notices she is one of only two, maybe three other children in the theater. But when she asks outright, “Mom, what is this rated? Am I even allowed to be here?”, surely this is a red flag for any parent. Wisdom to impart: Taking your 9-year old to a play that explores man’s internal battle between good and evil and re-enacts the killing of an innocent love interest (among several others) is well, ill-advised.
Hindsight and parenthood. It seems pretty clear now. We spent the hour’s ride home discussing the broader more philosophical meanings behind this sad and fairly gory play and she came away only slightly scarred. I think she gets it now, somewhat. I would have rather had that discussion oh, say, when she was 12 or 13 maybe instead of 9. So mother of the year, I am not but try I can and so I will.
Tell me, have you survived a similar parental faux pas or inadvertently bestowed one?
I’d love to know I’m not alone.
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Where did the Curtain and Lever Go?
“Mom, where did the curtain go? That lady standing next to us is looking at your paper. Why do you have to fill in those bubbles now?” These are just a few questions my 9-year old daughter started asking me during our voting experience last week. I say “our” because she’s been voting with me since she was a baby and is rather familiar with the process, well she was anyway. Like so many other bewildered New Yorkers this year however, she too wondered…”what the heck?” What was so wrong with the previous system? I actually enjoyed the privacy of the curtain drawn by the lever. I didn’t feel rushed or as though someone was looking over my shoulder like the way someone was literally, looking over my shoulder this time. And it’s not just me, my 72-year old mother openly admitted to looking over her shoulder while voting. In fact she “noticed” that my 70-year old dad, who was in the station next to her, was voting for all the “wrong” people, so she felt compelled to point this out to him and made him erase and fill in the “right” bubbles, right then and there. Isn’t someone supposed to be watching out for this sort of thing? And what if, I mean just what if, he was actually voting for who he really wanted to be voting for? I’m just saying. That would have never happened with the curtain and lever system.
Oh, this new system is easy enough for most and for me, the bottom line is that I am still grateful to live in a country where I can vote but filling in bubbles with a number 2 pencil? Honestly, is that the best we can do for the $50,000,000 price tag the NYC board of elections has put on this leap in technology? That sure is a lot of pencils! I may just be a middle-aged mom but it seems more like a step back in time rather than a step forward in technology to me. And what is the deal with the big cardboard sleeve? It “hides” the ballot while walking from your station to the scanner. “The ballot needs to be inserted into the scanner far enough that the feed rolls can catch the ballot and slide it the rest of the way in to the machine leaving the voter holding the now empty sleeve.” Actually, I felt silly carrying it. It looked silly.
My daughter was ultimately fascinated by this new process and that evening it wasn’t the process by which we voted but the fact that we voted that was the topic of conversation. So what I am truly grateful for is that the act of voting and exercising that right is what had the biggest impact on her. I strive to be a good power of example for my children and without a road map to follow, I don’t always take the right path, so it’s a little comforting to know that while I do miss the curtain and lever, I didn’t miss the mark and the example set on this day, was a good one.
Tell me New Yorkers, did you vote? What did you think about the new voting system? Did you miss the curtain and lever as I did ?
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Moms Picking and Choosing Their Battles
A few weeks ago, Marisol Valles Garcia was hailed by many as the bravest woman in the world. Marisol, a new mom and a criminology student, is the only person in a drug infested mexican municipality willing to take on the role of top cop. That’s right, the new police chief in town is a mom and she’s only 20. Armed without guns and only a 13-person police force, mostly comprised of women, her strategy for this battle is to take a non-violent approach that focuses on building a sense of trust between authorities and the community. “We have to try something new,” says Valles Garcia. Is she scared? Of course she is “…. but I really had the desire to do something for my community.” Where does a 20-year old new mom find that kind of inner strength? How does she conjure up that kind of courage? From a desire to help her community?
She is inspiring. To me anyway and how I might approach my battles. For instance, I have an on-going battle with my 11-year old son. He is addicted to multiple forms of communication. At any given time of the day, he is either texting on the cell phone, talking on Skype or Facebook-ing. Sometimes he’s doing all three at once. Ironically, while he seems to be a master at communicating with the other 11 and 12-year old tweenagers at large, I can barely get an audible response, let alone a nod, to a simple question such as …”How was your day?” It maddens me, frustrates and drains me. It’s a daily battle and occasionally, it gets ugly. I find myself becoming hostile even and the angrier I get, the less I hear him speak, to me that is. So maybe I should take a que from this 20-year old new mom. Perhaps I need to try something new, take a less demanding, more peaceful approach, build trust and draw my strength from a fearless desire to have a relationship with my son. If Marisol has the courage to take on a drug cartel, surely I can get through to just one growing boy or at least try.
I am curious, what’s your battle? Who inspires you? Where do you draw your strength? How do you get through?
Photo Credit: Jesus Alcazar/AFP/Getty Images
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