Joys of Single Motherhood

I am sitting on bleachers watching Little One play tee ball. It's 92 F. I'm not sure the kids--all boys--even know what game they're playing. As with all these activities most of the moms are in there early or mid thirties. One is describing the dismal state of her kitchen and her husband's unwillingness to spend the money either for a new kitchen or a new house. Another can't find the necessary paperwork for replacing the fence around her house. A survey that would placate the city's building department costs $4,000. She'd like a bigger house.too. I remember these days--gabbling about husbands, houses,vacation plans, summer camp or whatever. I was usually bored. Today is Kid 1's 16th birthday and I am waiting for her to call with the result of her learner permit test. She'll give me the official number on the permit and then I'll call Geico. Voila, she's covered. Then the next stage begins...

I just finished cleaning Kid 1's room. OMG. Number #1 on the list--or at least near the top--of the things that a parent should never say to a kid must be "What on earth is WRONG with you? I repeated this question over and over to myself as I picked up a bizarre melange of crap off her floor. Price tags, empty tampon boxes, a single Hot Ball still pristine in its clear wrapper, a dozen empty plastic shopping bags most from H&M and MadeWell, bits of popcorn, used Q-tips (Eewwwww), candy bar wrappers, expensive drawing pads in various sizes, five dollars in change, other assorted trash, a zillion of those low cut brightly colored low-top socks--all balled up, none clean--, dirty underwear and expensive tossed off Victoria's Secret bras--mostly behind the bed. There were piles all fashion mags with additional pages of same cut up and splayed casually. And of course, clothes. Ninety-nine percent of the time I am laid back about the state of her room. Ordinarily I don'

I took my baby driving today for the first time. She turns 16 on Thursday and she will troop off with her father to the DMV that day and get her learner's permit. There is a huge parking lot right down the street that is empty on the weekends. It's the lot for an office complex and it has straightaways, curves, narrow parts, a stop sign, geese that waddle into the road sometimes, and of course a zillion spaces for parking marked clearly with white lines. It's the same lot where I taught her to ride her bike when she was 7 or so. Then all I had to do was run behind her and shout encouragement. She picked it up quickly. I was teasing her today about how when she got her first bike she asked us when she could start taking "bike riding lessons".  As she explained today, "well, there were lessons for everything else. I thought I would just take lessons to learn." Now she'll be learning to drive a car before she takes official driver's education

We have a testing scandal brewing in our town. Three highly respected grade school teachers have been removed from their classrooms pending an investigation by the district attorney's office into illegal coaching during state testing in late April. Details are sketchy but it sounds like some of the 504 kids were coached a little too much. ( Section 504 kids are in essence classified as needing what I think of as junior-level special education services. Kid 2 is classified as eligible for certain accommodations. He gets shorter tests, more time, a seat up-front---all the help that doesn't tend to require a lot more money.) These tests were much more difficult than previous ELAs. This was the first set of state tests that included the federally mandated Common Core Curriculum standards imposed as part of the "Race to the Top" initiative. The "Core" standards are much higher than the ones in place in the schools until November. The teachers had to "catch

Prom has come and gone. Kid 1 looked marvelous and so did her beau. She was the only gal in black. I suppose it wasn't the most "proper prom dress". I can hear the voices of my elderly aunts back in New England...."Black? Black is for funerals. Why would you put a beautiful young girl in black?" My daughter also used to give me grief about all the black clothing she wore when she was a baby and then a toddler. "Who puts a baby in black?" or "Why am I always wearing black?" And I would reply "Because you look great in black. And now she knows that I was right all along. P.S. This morning at breakfast Kid 1 announced that she and her beau had broken up. I asked if she was upset and she said "not really". "Did he give a reason why?" I asked. "Not really, he said something about it not working long term..." We both laughed. "Did he think you were on your way to the altar?" We laughed some more. &quo

Because Kid 2 is now in hospital, my ex-husband and I have been spending more time together than we have since way before we divorced. He has been supportive throughout this ordeal. He wanted our son in the best facility suggested to us--the one that costs a fortune, but is considered the best for adolescents. He will rush around today--as will I--to fulfill the list of requests that Kid 2 made yesterday. Money is a concern, but Kid 2's health is the priority. I appreciate his dedication and his love for our son. Unfortunately, what I have realized over the past two days is that I do not enjoy being in his company. I don't really like him. The feeling is mutual. He has never bothered to hide his basic dislike and disdain for me. If I say "yes", he says "no". There is a natural dissonance, a mutual disconnect. I wonder if he ever liked me or just tolerated my presence for the sake of the kids. If I disagree with him then I'm "not listening"

Every "single/divorced" mother at some point realizes that she's not really doing that great a job raising her kids. I suppose it's easier if you have plenty of resources--plenty of money, loving grandparents who are healthy and happy. It still takes incredible energy if you decide to 'stay in the game'. Relationships are fraught with bumps because there is always a tension between the kids and the boy/girl friend--a competition for attention. It's a juggling act with five balls in the air. Kid 2 is in crisis mode this week, hopefully just this week. I should have deduced that his hilarious rants about his "special" classes and the motley crew of disabled students in.that class might be obscuring a very real rage. Now that rage has earned him a six day stint in the hospital. I was too busy to analyze his anger. Too busy to sit and think for a minute about the details of his life. I was (and still am) racing around trying to figure out how t

Today I learned that it is dumb to play "plumber." I can solve just about any clog but don't be sucked in by anyone who tells you that taking off the commode is easy.  It's not easy and within minutes the water line that I thought I'd shut off was spraying water like a garden hose turned on full volume. Just a few minutes more and water was cascading through the ceiling below and then down to the basement. I called my ex-beau because I knew he'd know where the main valve was. No answer. I flipped out which is something I rarely allow myself to do. I stayed completely calm through breast cancer but watching that water pour down made me feel helpless.  Then the Mountain Mensch called and guided me to the shutoff valve and I was calm again. Kid 2 was home and he very quickly got the idea to catch some of the water flooding the front hall with pots and pans. It turns out that I have a ton of cookware.

Remember that old advice for getting your kids to expand their palates--"keep on trying, make the same recipe over and over and eventually they may grow to like it." I'm not really quoting any one source but if you have toddlers it's likely you've read this gem in more than one "raising kids' Bibles". My kids have never, never eaten the same dish twice. No matter how much they claim to like it the first time around. "Oh, this is good," Kid 1 will say with just a pinch of surprise in her voice. "Should I make it again?" I ask. (I should say I "used to ask") "No, that's okay," is the reply. Kid 2 will rarely even try a new recipe. "That's okay, I can tell I won't like it." I blame it on the Internet Boom. Back in the time of the Boom, we ate at restaurants constantly. Nice restaurants and we took Kid 1 most of the time. You can do that on the West Coast and no one shoots you dagger looks

I love baseball. I love the intricacies and even the sound of a solid hit. I am also a great believer in that oft-ridiculed adage 'It takes a village'. So is it weird that I actually enjoy going to see my friend's boys play Little League baseball? I don't think so. I actually watch their games. I don't sit and chat with the moms whose kids are actually playing and I don't spend most of the time consulting my smartphone. I'm sure the other parents think it's weird but I don't care. I suspect my friend's husband thinks it's weird too. I actually ran into him at a game recently. I cheer for every hit and every catch. I root more for the game than the teams. I definitely root for my BFF's friends the most. They're fun to watch and I enjoy seeing them improve each season. My own kids don't play team sports--period. When Kid 2 was in first grade he said to me very solemnly "Mom, you know I'm never going to play any kind o

Yesterday on our way to the CVS, Kid 2 and I found ourselves in traffic beside an unusual car. It was a Ford Fit--tiny car--adorned with just about every gun lover's creed. "If You're Honkin', I'm Reloadin'',  "Eat and Sleep AirSoft", "My Other Car is a Ford GT" and a carefully altered Starbucks sign that said "guns and coffee" instead of whatever it usually says. There was also a bumper sticker that read "I heart Piranhas" along with the requisite buxom babe that one of the Dukes of Hazard eventually married. Oh, and there was a monster truck decal too. There may have been a tiny sticker that said "Please Hate Me" but I might have misread that one. The car was driven by a grizzled guy in his mid-fifties. His left arm hung out the driver's side window, his hand dangling a cigarette. His passenger was in his early thirties. He too had his arm out the window with a cigarette in hand. There were no p

Just about every parent of an elementary school student has heard of the Common Core. It is based on a federal mandate designed to put in place higher standards for grades K-8. That means the work gets harder and there's more of it. It's particularly difficult right now because the kids are 'supposed to catch up' so that their learning is up to snuff with the core standards. And that brings me to the "Tastes Terrible" part. The five-year old Cutie who I watch three afternoons a week, is stuck with a pile of worksheets each night, along with a book and sight words once a week or so. It's too much work for him even though he's a super smart little guy. School must be taxing when you're that little--especially for boys. It must be hard to sit still and stay focused. Then you get home and all you want to do is sit back and watch "The Regular Show" or maybe a little bit of "Sponge Bob". Then you play some Lego with some make-belie

We have "Prom Fever" but not in the conventional sense. We did not buy a $300 dress and she did not rush home from the shop to post a photo of it to the specially-designed Web site set up to eliminate the chance of two girls showing up in the same dress. The Junior Prom is May 17th and my daughter is going with her boyfriend Pudding Dragon. We got her prom dress two months ago or so. It was $60 and I think it's Balmain or some other musty, but once glam designer. There is a designer consignment shop in Port Chester that is often gold for fancy dresses...also jeans. (I recently scored a pair of AG Stilts in my fat size for $35 there. I saw the same pair for $158 at Bloomies the other day) When I think of "prom", I think of this--  http://www.prettyforprom.com/prom-history.html   IOW, Dork City. Only cheerleaders care and the dresses are hideous. I'm such an awful mother...) Her dress is black and strapless and has a lace skirt with a velvet bow on one hi