The Perfect Mom

We don't need to stop watching television because of the violence, the swearing (I mean really who doesn't slip once in awhile and in a sleep-deprived haze say the F word?), or even for the inappropriate sexual content that our children don't need to be exposed to. (I mean not letting them watch all that on TV is going to stop them from seeing it in reality. Have you ever walked through the Tenderloin?) The reason we really need to stop watching is because of the Carol Brady's, the Claire Huxtables and even June Cleaver. These are the real culprits on television!

Who vacuums in heels and pearls, wearing a dress and her hair and make up all done? Who hasn't spent a day on the couch eating bonbons like Peggy Bundy? These moms have set a standard that all of a sudden mom's feel they need to live up to. A full course breakfast before the kids head out the door, kisses on the forehead as they go to school (OK so we all do those), and the house is immaculate before 9 am. Dinner on the table by 5 pm and then off to clean up, pack lunches for the kids and hubby and then get immaculate looking to go to bed. WTH?!?

Listen ladies (and men because this goes for Stay-at-home-dads too), perfection is not a reality and if it is, your children are suffering and can never live up to it. It's OK to vacuum the friggen house in your sweats and a messy ponytail with no make up! Really it is! No one is going to deprive you of Mom of the year because you failed to look like a princess while cleaning your house.

Crap, you mean to tell me that dinner was late and not on the table by 5? Your children ate at 7? Shame on you! What were you thinking? Why is the laundry still on the couch unfolded? Get over it, it will get done and no one died because they ate dinner at 7! We have children who have school activities, extra curricular activities and we are busy, hell they are lucky to eat at 7! :) As a single mom, ever aspect of their care, cleaning up puke, making meals, cleaning, laundry, bathing (for the younger ones...older ones are on their own) transporting, and all the other aspects of mommying, are up to us, including taking out the trash, mowing the lawn (this is why I opt for a condo in the city...no lawn/yard care. Anything to make being mom easier), and working to pay the bills.

So moms (and some of you dad's), if your hair is messy, your make up not done and you accidentally go to the store in jammie pants and slippers, its OK! Perfection is not the goal,  having children does not mean you need to be perfect. It does not mean you need to have a house so sterile and immaculate you can perform brain surgery on your kitchen floor. The goal is sanity (if that is even slightly possible), confusing your neighbors a little with the noises coming from your house, and having healthy children (no one says they have to be happy) and did you know it is OK and even slightly required to give them chores! ACK! YES! Your little ones can put their own laundry away, sweep the floor and clean up their own toys! Who knew! You sure as hell never saw the Brady kids cleaning nor the Cleaver kids. I'm just saying, at least in my house, that is 4 extra set of hand (for 8 hands in total) that can help do things around the house!

So grab a book, a glass of wine (or cup of coffee) and sit back while you watch your little ones trying to figure out the vacuum and how to fold a shirt just like mom! Ha never going to happen and the drawers might be a little messy....OK that last line was hard for me write, I despise messy drawers, cabinets, cupboards and closets! I also despise messy children, houses and everything else, but I have decided WTH, messy can be good, all those parenting experts agree...messy and dirty = higher tolerance to germs! Well bring on the germs, my children are immune!

Until the next Scribble......

Vodka Reality Doesn't Suck

                Everyone tells you that divorce is liberating, kind of like the feeling you get when you have held your pee in for a long time and finally get to the toilet and let it out. The relief you feel is enormous and liberating. They tell you that you will start over and you are so much better without him (or her), and that you are finally free. No more fighting over who does the dishes, when in the end you know its going to be you. No longer being asked whose house is in that painting you just put on the wall. No idea....I didn't paint and no I don't know the artist. No more of going into the bathroom only to see that his clothes again did not make it INTO the hamper, just IN FRONT of it.  I'd say no more toilet seat being left up, but I have two boys so I am luck if its up and NOT peed on before my tired butt plops down on to it and nearly falls in.

                The first few days, you think maybe they are right. Maybe there is something to what they say. You can do this, you can live alone, raise your children on your own and you can start over and life will be how you always pictured it. Vodka induced pictures of the picture are a lot rosier than reality. Vodka allows you to see a seaside cottage as your new house decorated with shabby chic furniture and décor and the kids cheerfully playing on the beach while you sit in your lounge chair, vodka and Kindle in hand relaxing away your worries.

                Reality paints a whole different scenario, one you can’t change with another glass of Vodka and cranberry juice. In reality’s picture you are being woke up by your five year old toddler at 5 am in the morning wanting to get ready for school. You are stumbling bleary eyed to the coffee pot stepping on the Thomas the Train tracks your son didn’t pick up like you asked him to five hundred times. As you get to the kitchen you realize you are out of coffee and there a no clean towels for your little man’s shower. As you are drying him off with a cotton tee-shirt and getting him ready for kindergarten you suddenly realize that today is not a school day! It is Sunday and you should still be in bed. That cute little cottage by the beach is actually a trailer in the country or an apartment on the wrong side of the tracks, and the shabby chic décor is thrown together pieces of furniture that have no rhyme or reason to it. Relaxing, in reality is an impossibility or resembles something to crashing into bed after an exhausting day of playing mommy and taking care of the house and everything else. The children fighting, teasing and running around the house trying to draw blood from one another, while leaving behind what I assume would be the effects of a hurricane that had ripped through and then turned back around and ripped through again, followed by an earthquake that tossed the items around even more, for a finished look that makes you glad you don’t have the shabby chic décor….

                OK so reality is not as bad as it sounds, but divorce is not as rosy as everyone makes it out to be either. While you were married you lived comfortably, and by comfortably I am not talking about a comfortable house in the posh part of town with a maid and a butler, but life made sense, you had a routine, you had a schedule that worked. Nothing seemed impossible. Marriage, however, is not as great as it sounds either. You have to…ugh…compromise. Ugly word.  Both have their ups and downs and their pros and cons, but the only thing that makes it truly worth doing is, another glass of Vodka and the simple fact that these children make it all worth the sacrifices you have had make….of course there are the days you would take it all back, redo it and pray to go back undo it all just for a little bit of quiet. What the hell, it will be quiet enough when I am dead, right?

Until the next Scribble...... 

               

God's Time...

     It has been a little while since my last post. Some days it seems like there is nothing to write about except the same things over and over. However, one of the reasons I started this blog was because I wanted to get back into writing, so I guess that means that I should post more often.

    School takes a lot of my time and keeps me busy, as does having four children. Life seems a little hectic at times. I get frustrated that nothing seems to change and it really needs to change. I keep reminding myself, change comes because change is wanted, except that its not coming and I definitely want it. Trying to be patient and waiting for God's timing is frustrating. In general I am not a patient person and I want things to change now not tomorrow. I keep reminding myself that God knows the situation and he has a reason for his timing and for not allowing things to change now, however, it also makes me angry that he is allowing this situation to go on, that he is allowing my children to suffer, I could care less about me. Not to say that I don't care about me, I do, but my children are more important. It gets harder and harder to trust Him, and I find that I want to do things my way and in my time, but I know that won't work either.

     So I need to trust more, listen better and pray. Although I see more hair pulling, frustrated tears and silent screaming coming as I work on the first three. 'Good things come to those who wait' well I am waiting...

Until the Next Scribble.....