CurrentMom

My Mommy Double-Standard

(Un)Tech Tuesday

A few weeks ago my daughter's school had a festival on Saturday. Since she is in Kindergarten and I haven't been terribly involved other than chaperoning one field trip, this was it. My first time to get a real feel for the other moms. Who gets involved? What's the 'mom-culture' here?

I admit to reading other parenting blogs of course, and hearing all about these communities where moms feel intense pressure to be all things to all people - chair PTA, chaperone events, make sure their little Suzie or Johnny is impeccably dressed and comes to school with all their homework - even if it means endangering the roadways speeding back to school when it gets left at home. 

So, you know what? I was feeling a bit nervous. After all, I am pretty much the anti-mom when it comes to that scene. I play video games about as much as my kid does, we watch shows and movies together most parents would probably wonder at my sanity for exposing my six-year-old to. ("Supernatural", anyone?!) I don't watch daytime TV, Deperate Housewives, and generally after a short while I have not much in common with many people. At least, not enough to go beyond making nice. 

I was prepared, though. I figured our neighborhood isn't prep school territory, but there are still some fairly well-off folks around and I thought given they would most likely be the volunteers, I was in for a clique of super-moms. I like to bake, so when the form came home two weeks before, I happily checked the box for bringing cupcakes and researched sugar-free cupcake and icing recipes. After all, having a diabetic child I certainly wasn't going to torture her with not being able to eat our own creations!

After a false start (because I can't read directions) we had twenty-four awesome home-baked and kid decorated chocolate cupcakes with vanilla cream cheese icing. I left the part about being sugar-free off my description but figured I'd tell whomever was in charge of that table in case it was actually a selling-point.

When I got there and saw the table of baked goods on offer I was frankly shocked. Ours were one of only a few home made offerings! So much for super moms I guess. 

One would think I was relieved, right? No crazy expectations for me - I wasn't living in some television-ready suburbia. But no, I wasn't relieved. I was actually upset. 

I'm not a super mom, and I know it. I should spend a bit more time with my daughter's homework after school, take her to the park more often and a few other things. I know I'm not alone in feeling that way, either. But really? In this mini-van, drive-thru dinner culture we live in parents can't even take the few hours it requires to make some actual food with their kids? True, baking is intimidating to some - so buy box mix and throw in the eggs and oil. Voila! I wasn't expecting everyone to have from scratch stuff on offer and truthfully if my sugar-free experiment had failed I'd have been running to the store for box mix, as well. 

I would not have run to the store for a pre-packaged selection from the bakery.

Call me a snob - maybe I am. I don't expect perfection from parents and I understand how crazy busy life can get. After all, I spent all day Thursday, Friday and half of Sunday on a jobsite with my husband. 

We had two weeks notice, though. Two weeks to plan a couple hours on a Thursday or Friday night to spend some hours in the kitchen whipping up one cake, or even just a dozen cupcakes. I fail to see how hard that is. If I can take time out of my hectic, self-employed life to commit to making some cupcakes I can't imagine living in a world where it's absolutely impossible. I don't want that life. 

Yeah, maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe these kids are better readers than my daughter, maybe they excel at whatever sport they were taking lessons for that night of the week. Maybe these parents are so busy being awesome at parenting they just don't have the time to squeeze home made sweets into the mix. 

I doubt it, though. And that makes me sad. I'll keep my line in the sand when it comes to the things that count. No, I don't have her in ballet, soccer and learning some instrument. I have time when I pick her up from school to actually make food from our refrigerator most nights. Healthy, home cooked meals, not box or bag throw-togethers. None of us are perfect and I don't want to live in tv-suburbia hell.

Would it be so bad to live in a world again where family time meant cooking time? Nope. Not in my book.

Photo courtesy of shimelle on Flickr (Yes, I did forget to get a picture of my own cupcakes! lol)

Colorful Caprese: The Taste of Summer

Meal Monday

I know it's trite, overdone and proffered at every pretentious corner trattoria, but I don't care. Nothing says summer to me like an insalata caprese. I am, of course, something of a snob about the five simple ingredients I use to make this classic dish: mozzarella, basil, tomatoes, olive oil and salt.

First things first: NO RUBBER CHEESE! I realize this sounds a bit pedantic, but I only use fresh buffalo milk mozzarella. If I can't find that (and you can find it in big containers at Costco at less cost than a small container from the supermarket), we eat something else. Period. 

Since I do manage to find large quantities of the buffalo mozzarella at Costco, and I then rush to use all the cheese while it is still fresh, we eat a lot of this salad!

A Mother's Day Ode to My Daughter's Other Moms

Truth Thursday

My just-about teenage daughter has the great fortune, at a young age, to have the benefits of other “moms” in her life who offer comfort, companionship, and safe and comfortable places to land when she’s feeling a bit at sea.

I wish I had had those when I was her age.

I am the daughter of a mother who decided to turn in her mothering duties earlier than anticipated … and chose to live separately from our family before I left for college, when I was 16 and when my sister was just 11, an experience that shaped me into a mother who is hyper-conscious of the role that moms play in a daughter’s life.

I also have the good fortune as an adult to be the daughter-in-law of a wonderful mother who kept her children in a loving and stable environment under challenging circumstances, and the stepdaughter of a kind woman who has, for many years, generously and lovingly worked to strengthen the bonds between my family and hers.

In other words, I have had several mothers in my life, all of who have taken different shapes and forms. And for that I am grateful.

There is nothing like having a surrogate mother when your own mom is either too close (because you are a 12-year-old-girl), or not close enough, or not present at all.

As for my daughter’s “other” mothers. The first is my next-door-neighbor. She and I, close friends, essentially function as landing pads for each other’s families. The keys to each other’s houses sit in easily accessed places so that the children can always ring the bell if they’ve forgotten theirs. We have gone on trips together, and our kids are all like siblings – except they really like each other and so the fighting is mitigated. She and I rely on each other for parenting advice, work advice, and just advice in general.  We definitely feel like each other’s alternate families, and it is a lovely and loving relationship for all of us to have.

My daughter’s other second mother lives down the block. She is the mother of my daughter’s two really, really good friends, and she and I also have a close friendship forged in the trenches of parenting our girls together. One of the things I most appreciate about my friend is that, given that she has twin girls my daughter’s age, they are almost always going in the same direction all the time, unlike our family, where, with three children three different ages, we are just an inch short of spinning out of control in multiple directions.

Mothers Day and Cheating Dads

Therapy Tuesday

Photo by: www.chromoz.com via Flickr

Cheating isn't anything groundbreaking. Maybe it's not exactly the topic that a woman wants to think about, especially the week leading up to Mother's Day. So it's interesting timing that AshleyMadison.com is "reporting" that Park Slope is one of the most popular neighborhoods for cheating spouses. Closer to home, the same website reports that Washington, DC is the best city for cheating.

Yes, the same men that made these women mothers are the ones that potentially also make them single moms. In this affluent area of Park Slope, New York, where parenting is the ultimate competitive sport, the arrangement of parenting is what is considered to be the causal event of cheating.

A promise that we will also look at the flip side, because it is easy to assume that only men cheat. Let's try to look at some reasons why. Men might cheat because once their wives are busy with babies, there is less focus and attention given to them. The popular saying, "Two is company, three is a crowd" holds true in this case. Often, fathers feel unconsciously rejected by their wives, who are nurturing their babies, nursing them, and tending to their every need. Of course, this makes sense as this is exactly what involved in the early days of baby rearing. Logically, we all know that, but this dramatic shift, especially with the couple's first child, can be emotionally earth-shattering. It is hard to put words to this, as the feelings can be so dischordant with what men are "supposed" to feel about their child. Similar to their wives, they are supposed to offer unconditional love. And this is true, but at the same time, subtle resentment can be happening underneath. Women who might have been sexual and flirtatious in the early days of the couple are now tired with little energy.

I'm not trying to condone cheating. But merely to explain one origin. I'm also NOT saying that this occurs with all men.

But in the spirit of Mother's Day, let's look at women. Why might they cheat? Perhaps they feel bored, undesireable, or underappreciated by their spouse. Or they might be taking a fantasy too far. For women, cheating can begin much earlier than the physical act. The emotional connection can be all that is needed for true cheating to occur. And this emotional connection can produce the same type of guilt as physical cheating.

This is not exactly the conventional Mother's Day Post...perhaps just a reminder to value both members of the couple.

 

Exhausted By The Food Wars

Family Friday

Earlier this week, a fellow Current Mom shared with us how exhausted she was by the "Mommy Wars."  All I could think about was how exhausted I am from the "Food Wars" in my home!  Every day is a battle to get food on the table that is both nutritious and tasty for everyone.  I find myself longing for the days when I was a kid and mom (yes, mom) had dinner on the table at 6pm.  Every. Single. Night.  These days, my family is lucky if they see that kind of action twice in a week!

I happened to be on the phone last night with a friend who was struggling to figure out what to feed her brood.  Perhaps if we weren't on the phone so much, we could actually get around to cooking something.  I told her that my stove (the so-called hearth of the home) was ice cold from nonuse that day.

So what has changed over the years?  I'll tell you!