There is a Tween in the House.

Amber became 10 years old on June 16 of this year.  There was a party, cake and presents, but no notification that there would be a tween in the house and all that comes along with that.  To say we were not ready for this stage in her childhood is an understatement.  I have learned that as a parent that I am constantly learning along with my children.  Also, that I have to go through some growing pains, too.  The first time around sucked and this time around I have been able to recognize the suck and do my best to turn the suck around.

Amber has always had drama around her, but add tween moodiness, selfishness, and only wanting to do only the fun stuff in life you have an explosive combination.  At first we didn’t really know what was going on.  SoHubby and I would whisper, “Could it be…?”.  ”NO, it couldn’t be!”  Oh but it was.  We have entered into the first stage of puberty and we have been knocked on our asses.  The moodiness we have been use to for awhile.  The same could be said for the drama.  I have learned to listen, roll my eyes out of eyesight and simply mention that maybe she shouldn’t worry so much about it, because, surely, it will be different by tomorrow.  We didn’t know that the moodiness and drama would be upped.  Another problem, that our parents didn’t face, was the drama gets to continue on through constant communication in today’s technological world. I gave Amber my old cell phone, which might have been a slight mistake on my part.  There was no phone service, but she could still connect to WiFi.  My second mistake was mentioning a free text and phone app.  If I could go back in time and smack myself, I would.  We fought the good fight against her sneaking the phone into her room at bedtime.  What we didn’t expect was her first middle school dance.  I don’t know how much I want to get into it on the big ole Internet, but my hints are boy+friends+texting=total chaos and devastation.  That died down and we went back to regular old girl drama.  Recently, that old phone has decided to not come back on, so, at this point, we will just deal with the withdrawals of not being able to text.  I better find a nice strong belt for her to bite down on.

It is hard being the oldest and being the first to do everything.  Amber was in dance, gymnastics and cheer first, which meant that her brother and sister were use to waiting around for her.  Then Amber got a taste of the waiting game and it has not been fun…for me.  Amber, now, waits for her brother while he is in TaeKwonDo and her sister while she is in dance.  Amber has dropped dance and gymnastics to focus on cheer and has learned that she simply can’t do everything due to time and money.  Oh the time and money lesson is a hard one for just about anyone to learn, much less a 10 year old. During the summer was worse, because there was no homework to keep her occupied during her wait times.  It is not easy, now, but, at least, I have a good answer to the question, “What can I do?”  I still have to “remind” her that she is not allowed to play basketball while Sam is in TKD.  I am hoping that the big guys that normally play basketball while the TKD class goes on will one day step on her and teach her a lesson.  There was much explanation of how her brother and sister have ALWAYS had to wait for her and she could show a little more patience while waiting for them, but that was met with a “how dare you ask me to consider anyone else” look and a huff finished with an arm folded.  Selfishness has just appeared and brought along back up.

I am happy to say that Amber likes school and does well.  However, the business of school escapes her.  She is a 5th grader, now, and that comes with a lot of responsibility, at least, in Amber’s mind.  She has always had to turn in lunch money, signed papers, etc, but, now, there is no teacher collecting folders and pulling it out for her.  Mom isn’t putting it into the folders and then in her bookbag.  Apparently, this is all too much for her.  And it seems this stuff falls onto me, still.  Hopefully, by college I won’t have to remind her to take her lunch money and not to buy extras.  And she will know what the extras are. I, recently, got a bill from the school for Amber’s lunch account.  It said she only had $5.45 left.  The problem with that is that I just sent in a $25 check (I have to stop for a minute and stress NEVER SEND IN CASH!  I know checks are from the dark ages, but if they are lost you can write a new one.  Once cash is lost, it is gone forever.  And kids will always lose cash.  I have heard many stories of Amber’s friends losing their lunch money, and we are not talking $2.  Many parents like to pay a month or year in advance instead of trying to come up with $2 everyday in the rush of the morning)on October 16.  There was no possible way she could have eaten that much in 4 days.  Okay, there is a way she could have eaten that much, but she swore she “NEVER”  gets extras.  So I put on my investigator hat, which luckily sits right next to my chauffeur hat, and went to work.  I talked to the head lunch lady, who had proof that not only did Amber NOT turn in her lunch money, but she does INDEED get extras.  It was all there on the computer screen.  I guess the rumor that the lunch ladies are stealing the kids lunch money and having a huge party with all the food that they have to cook and serve has been forever been proven wrong!  I climbed 3 flights of stairs, with a 30 lb toddler on my hip, to talk to Amber.  Oh the shock on her face when I informed her that 1. she didn’t turn in the check and 2 that she had been getting extras.  ”Oh you mean, the juice, gogurt, extra fries cost more,”  Amber asked.  All I could I do was sigh and do a quick once over of her folder.  Since Amber was rushing off to choir, I resigned to tearing apart her book bag and folders later this evening when she got home.  If I were to venture a guess, I will say that the check will either be found snuggled safely in her folder or scrunched down at the bottom of her bookbag.

I think back to when Amber was a baby and how I thought that was difficult.  Now, I fear the unknown of teenagerhood.  Toddler, pshaw!, I can handle a toddler.  Matter of fact, I do all day and it is a piece of cake.  Evie won’t potty trained, but that can be contained in a Pull Up.  There is no containing all that comes with tweens and then teenagers.  I am scared and pray that I make it through.  I figure by the time I have to deal with it with Evie, I will either have learned a lot or am just tired and have given up.  It seems to be the trend with parents, who have multiple children.

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This Ain’t Your Mama’s Hurricane

When I was a kid we didn’t evacuate for hurricanes and, definitely, not for tropical storms.  Actually, we were happy for the breeze and rain.  Sure we had power outages, but I don’t remember them being that bad.

My first memory of any kind of evacuation was during Hurricane Andrew in the early 90′s.  I was working at a downtown hotel and they offered us rooms to ride out the storm.  I scoffed.  Why would I want to be easily accessible for the hotel to get more work out of me?  Young and dumb.  We lost power for a couple of hours after the storm.   The sun was out.  I took a nap and by the time I woke up the power was back.  The second and first actual mass exodus from NOLA was Hurricane Georges.  I had stayed with my mom and sick grandma.  We lost power before the storm and didn’t get it back until 3/4 days later.  There was no generator.  Nothing but total darkness at night and heat during the day.

My kids idea of a hurricane will be extremely different than mine.  We have evacuated for several hurricanes since 1998.  Mostly notably, Hurricane Katrina.  Our first experience with a generator would be Gustav.  To be honest the worst part of that was the mess in the house and living only downstairs.  It was not fun, but it wasn’t the worst.  What made it bearable?  The generator and window unit.  We have since “misplaced” the window unit, so we are dealing with the heat.

People, those who don’t live in these hurricane prone areas, tend to believe it is just easy to pick up, leave and then come back.  If you think sitting in hours long traffic, finding a hotel along with thousands of other people and not knowing what is going on at your house, then have at it.  For most it is a difficult decision to leave.  I am torn.  I am glad we stayed, because I was able to keep up with the driving rain that was coming in under our back doors.  I regret staying, because we are still without power and estimated time of restoration is 5-7 days away.  The main issue is financial.  We could deplete our savings and evacuate and then what happens for the next hurricane.  It is easy to say have an emergency fund.  It is hard when there could be back to back storms, so we take each one based on the information given at the time.  The NHC didn’t know what Isaac was going to do, so how do others out there know for sure what we should  have done.  People made decisions based on what happened to them during Katrina, Gustav, Ivan, etc.  We have evacuated before only to find that not a drop of rain fell.  We made the decision last minute to evacuate for Katrina, because of the information at the time.  You can make the claim that we have so much technology and you have more than enough warning to make a decision on whether to leave or stay, but nothing is perfect and many storms have proven that.  Everyone has to make the decision on their own.  I don’t think we should place blame, but show kindness and a bit of understanding.

The kids have it great compared to my experiences, as a child, without power. We have a generator, which means we can run fans, watch DVDs, charge our phones; laptops; tablet; game systems and have a light to safely guide us to the bathroom.  While we are miserable with the heat and can’t wait to have our power fully restored, it is not as bad as in years past.  Of course, the kids don’t fully understand.  Sam kept asking me why can’t do this or that. And it had to be explained over and over, again, that we didn’t have power to the house.  They don’t understand why I tell them to take a bath or not to use blankets while sleeping.  It is all in an effort to keep them cool and comfortable.

In the end, once our power is restored we will go back to our normal lives.  There will be challenges for awhile, like gas and grocery lines, longer days off of school and no parties on Labor Day.  In the grand scheme of things, it is a small price to pay compared to the price of life that some paid.  I know that the judgments are coming for these people.  I understand their dilemma and their decisions made based on previous experience, like no flooding during Katrina.  This time it was different, like the other times will be different.  Some never lost power, but that doesn’t mean they are saved from never losing power during a storm.  Some will have power restored later than others when they had their power restored earlier than most in previous storms.  We are not naive.  We know where we live and the consequences that come along with that.  There are consequences to everything in life, for some to say dumb things like they have all the answers shows their ignorance.  All I can tell those people is that if you tell me to just move from NOLA, then you don’t know what it means to miss New Orleans and you never will, because it is not simply a town.  It is a way of life and we have chosen to take the consequences because the benefits of our culture are worth it.

And for the record, I will continue to bitch until I have power restored and my a/c back.  If you tell me not to bitch, I might just tell you to shove it.  Understand that might be the heat talking or the fact that I don’t want to hear from you, because you probably have a/c.

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What the Kids Learned this Summer

There is always the concern that while kids are on summer vacation that they will forget everything they learned this summer.  I was not going to let that happen to my little special snowflakes.  They were going to go back to school filled with new knowledge.  I will admit it has been a challenge to keep pushing through with teaching my gifted children this summer.  Sure they protested, but I had to press forward.  It is for their future, right.

Here is the knowledge that the kids will go back to school with this year:

Amber:

Spidergirl lives…in my house.  Future skill, cleaning those cobwebs that I can’t reach.

Evie:

Ah, the legacy of attitude lives on.  Future skill,  she can shake her neck and wave her finger the next time someone tries to cut in front of me at Walmart.

Sam:

 

War has been playing out in my living room for days.  Don’t worry the Disney Princesses have been on hand to take care of all injuries. Future skill, warfare, of course.  Although, I hope he eventually learns that tanks don’t fly and dinosaurs don’t usually take part in war.

Yes, it has been a knowledge filled summer, but it has come to an end.  The kids, minus Evie, will be off to school, soon, and I will learn what it is like to have a clean house for more than 5 minutes and what those people are saying on TV.

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Vacation, a State of Mind?

It is summertime, so you know what that means?  The summer vacation stories are coming out of the mouths of neighbors, friends, and moms of your kids’ classmates.  There are stories of cruises, beaches and lands far, far away.  I listen with a smile on my face to hide my all encompassing envy.  This will be year number 3 of no vacation for us.  It really should be number 4, but we bit the bullet and took a vacation in 2009 for a family wedding and reunion.  I know in the grand scheme of things this is pretty low on the pity list.  And in the grand scheme of things our life this summer is not bad.

To be totally honest I don’t know if I really want a vacation.  Now, I should admit that if someone offered great childcare so that SoHubby and I could go on a fabulous no cares vacation I would be drooling and packed before they could say, “The kids are fine.”  That is a long shot.  Any vacation right now would involve cranky kids, a husband connected to electronic gadgets and one stressed out mom.  Which makes me think that we have been conditioned to WANT a vacation.  Who really wants to pack for 5 people, cram everyone into a car for hours, listen to kids fight over who didn’t touch whom and then do it in reverse with the prize being a mountain of laundry.  Sure there are good times to be had in between, but is it worth the money, time and aggravation to take this freak show on the road?  I say, NO.

My goal for summer, as the kids have gotten older. is to keep them just busy enough as to not want to kill each other.  At the point of wanting to shove the kids in their rooms for the rest of their lives, we are off to a schedule activity or the pool.  Oh the pool, it has miracle powers.  It makes children stop fighting and tired.  Some have said our schedule is crazy.  I say it is the only thing keeping us sane.  We have cabbage ball (it is larger than a softball and hirlarious to watch small children run around like crazed research monkeys who just escaped from the lab), Ta Kwon Do (where small children beat the hell out of each other), gymnastics (the de-energizer) , and library storytime (aka another adult entertains your child while you play on your smartphone).  Then there is the glorious pool.  I joined the fitness center for the pool.  You could easily kill 2/3 hours at the pool and not even blink.  The pool is the saving grace of summer.  The bonus is that if I can throw myself out of bed early enough in the morning, I can have a couple of hours of childfree time.  You would be amazed what an hour on the treadmill watching Will and Grace can do for your mood.  It is no Disney cruise, but our schedule full of activities is making summer much less torture chamber bidding time before school starts and more I can’t kill you today, because it is POOL TIME!

I don’t know how the kids feel about any of this.  I think Amber is the only one that really remembers us taking regular vacations.  Although, Amber and Sam both talk about the family reunion in Tennessee often.  Sam is heavily influenced by the commercials.  I simply pat him on the head and say maybe someday we will go to Atlantis.  Evie has no clue.  I think her first real hotel stay was our recent cheer competition in Biloxi, MS.  That sets the bar really low for her.  It does hurt some to tell the kids that we won’t be doing Disney anytime soon, but look at the stuff I have to distract them with.  The one thing I can say with certainty is that their summers are a 100 times better than any of my summers as a kid.  So we will stay home and keep with our activity heavy schedule to keep us busy during the summer.  If you pass me and wonder what is behind that smile on my face, just know that I am thinking no packing, no mountainous laundry, no long car rides with screaming kids, no cranky off routine kids and I get to sleep in my own bed at night.  It isn’t quite the same as a beach front condo on the beach of Destin, but I know for sure I won’t be eaten by a shark.

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We Don’t Speak the Same Language

SoHubby and I have been married for 11 years this October and have known each other for 13 years.  You would think that we would understand each other, maybe even finish each other’s sentences.  You would be wrong.

Since Sam has, finally, started his own activity (something that SoHubby is really happy he is doing) SoHubby has asked what is our schedule.  This is not to say that he is not interested in Amber’s activities, but her schedule has been about the same for about a year.  We are, also, coming to the end of the school year so things are changing once again.  One thing about kids change is constant.

I tried to explain the schedule, but it didn’t get through.  I will say my fault in this was giving too much information.  Instead of just giving the schedule for right now, I tried to give the schedule for the summer.  That is difficult, because Sam will start Cabbage ball in mid June which will mess with Tae Kwon Do which just made matters worse.  Once I realized my mistake I thought I would make it simple by  pointing to the dry erase calendar I bought specifically for this purpose.  It still didn’t get through.  The calendar, in SoHubby’s words, is hard to understand.  I guess it is because the writing is small (I only have so much room to work with) and I put the things that happen on a weekly basis at the bottom with the day and time next to them.  The kids and I seem to get it, but SoHubby didn’t.  So to help him understand it, he took a pad and wrote the days of the week and then wrote what happened on those days.

All of this got me thinking.  We have always had a problem with communication.  I won’t blame either side.  SoHubby says things and they are clear in his head, but I am left confused.  I say things that are totally clear to me and the rest of the free world, but leave him confused.  I will fully admit that SoHubby will say things and I will promptly forget them.  Hey, have you seen our schedule?  I have a lot going on. I just wonder if this goes on in other homes or after a decade together people just understand their mates better than we do?

I, also, wonder if I really want someone that knows what I am thinking.  I often say that my head is a scary place to be.  I know I definitely don’t want to be privy to what is rattling around in SoHubby’s head, because what he tells me is scary enough.  It will be interesting to see how our communication has developed after we have been together over 20 years.

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Leaving!

We joined a gym.  It only took twice joining the same gym in the span of 10 years for SoHubby to actually go to the gym.  Maybe we have, FINALLY, settled into a routine.  It only took 3 kids and 14 years.

There is always a little bit of guilt when leaving my kids.  Some say it is good for the kids to trust other people and explore other options.  They never talk about mom trusting other people and exploring other options.  I use to know all the age developments, now it is all jumbled.  It is hard to keep up with what is appropriate for age 9 then go down to age 6 and then further down to age 2.5.  You would think that I would have it down by now, but since all these kids came out different and with their own personalities it is hard to know if I am acting silly, if the kids are acting silly or if we are all just going through growing pains.

When Amber was a baby there wasn’t much trouble leaving her and doing my own thing.  That is not to say that I was able to do it often, but there wasn’t much guilt over it.  It helps that I was told that I needed the time away from her and she needed the time away from me.  On child number 3, I am rethinking those decisions and many times I wish I could go back and start again.  I am rethinking so much that I am teetering on whether to send Evie to school for the first time at the age of 5 into Kindergarten.  Almost unheard of in my little world.  The new question I grit my teeth through my smile to answer is, “Are you sending her to school next year?”  *sigh* That might have to be a post all of it’s own.

With Sam it feels like I never left him and I can see where that might have hindered him a bit.  Sam was a different breed altogether.  Where the girls are easy going and only dip a bit of a toe into the waters of battle, Sam does the cannon ball into those waters.  It is hard to have balance when one kid is pretty easily guided and another one fights you toe and nail on everything.  So we settled into our routine of coming home and just playing all day  AT HOME.  I don’t think it traumatized him to where he can’t function and it is hard to tell if some things he does is because I didn’t leave him much or just his bullheadedness.

Evie is only 2.5 years old and her personality is only starting to emerge.  She definitely has her opinions, but she seems to know when not to push.  Today she tried to push.  It was our second day at the gym, which means it was her second day at gym childcare.  Yesterday, she was fine.  I think she was in shocked and was all, HEY, there is Mickey.  Today, she was not having any of it.  She cried and I watched as my minutes of my one hour of childcare ticked away.  I stayed until she was fully into Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.  I was never into the sneaking away while my kid was distracted.  The whole time I worked out I wonder what was going on.  Since I was not called over the PA system, which still brings memories of terror of being call to the principal’s office, I figured all was good.  After my 30 minutes (you don’t realize how little an hour is until you have to drop off, pick up and get settled before you can begin) of working out, I found Evie sitting in the same spot as when I left her.  At least she wasn’t cowering in the corner and lived the ordeal to tell the tale.

As I picked her up and even before we did our first drop off I wonder if I should really do this?  Should I find another way to get to the gym instead of dropping Evie off each morning?  No one can answer this for me and I am sure I will look back in a few years and discover the answer, but for now it is one more item added to my list of my mom guilt.

 

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NO PRINCESSES FOR GIRLS!!!

I am so sick of this debate, but this controversy over the new Lego line has me fuming.  You can read about it here, because I just can’t take it, anymore:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/15/lego-friends-girls-gender-toy-marketing_n_1206293.html

Let’s tackle the ad from the 1980′s.  Does anyone remember Legos from back in the day?  They were primary blocks that fit together to make whatever the child wanted.  It was a truly neutral toy that helped child with a multiple of developments.  Then something happened.  I am not sure, but I know I was perplexed when I first started seeing the specific sets where it seemed you could only build one thing.  I remember thinking where is the fun in that?  I didn’t make a huge fuss. I didn’t stand on the nearest train table in Toys R Us and scream, “Why are you denying girls the joy of Legos?!”  You know why? Because I had sense to know that not every child is the same and not every girl played with princesses or, hold onto your hats for this one, some girls liked playing with both princesses and cars.  Oh the horror, letting the kids choose which toys they could choose.

Somewhere along the way, Princesses became the enemy.  How dare girls pretend to be princesses, play tea party, nurture dolls or the other evil things that have been sent by the all mighty toy companies to get our girls subservient to The Man.  Then it went further. It has now become a social status for parents, mostly Moms, to shout from the rooftops that their sons play with dolls and paint their nails and their daughters are playing in dirt with cars and trucks.  All over the Internet you can find mommy blogs proclaiming how great they are, because their children have no gender.  There are parents going so far as not letting others know the exact gender of their child. What I want to know is why?  Are we so ashamed of boys that we need to turn them more feminine?  Do we hate all things girly that we just have to breed a generation of girls that are more masculine than the boys in their class?  What is the point?

The problem with this is that these parents are forgetting that kids have choices, too.  What prevents a little girl choosing an alien to build from the many that Lego offers?  I don’t remember any toy police in the Target toy section telling me my girls weren’t allowed to look at these toys, much less buy them.  I don’t remember Amber getting tackled and having the Harry Potter Lego ripped from her hands when she made the purchase a year ago.  So why the big fuss?  As far as I can tell Lego has, finally, opened it’s eyes and given girls more choices.  I will admit I was drawn to the new Lego Friends toys, myself.  I liked the colors and the cute little kitchen and spa.  Amber not so much.  She is more interested in her Liv dolls with the spa, she recently purchased on Black Friday at Target last year.

I have the perfect little Science experiment going on in my home.  I have an older daughter, who went through the princess phase, but was given the choice of what she wanted to play with.  Sure her toys were mostly pink and girly, but there were a few cars thrown in there which she chose.  Now as a 9 yr old, she is the only girl playing the trumpet in her music class in the sea of boys playing the same instrument.  She is in cheerleading.  Loves Harry Potter more than any boy I have met.  She still loves to do her hair, her dolls’ hair and have her nails done.  I don’t see her love of Princesses hurting her in the least.  As a matter of fact, a recent event showed that she has no problem speaking her mind when she told some boys from the neighborhood that she was done playing with them, because they kept cursing.  If anything the choices that were afforded her gave her the strength to continue to make her own choices whether they went with the grain or not.

Then I have Sam.  A boy coming 4 years after his older sister.  He came into a world of pink and Princesses.  My feeling is that most babies start out gender neutral, because they don’t really  have a voice for their opinion.  Besides, their main focus is keeping their butts clean and eating.  So most baby to toddler toys are pretty much played by both sexes.  However, once those babies hit toddlerhood they start to gravitate toward their interests.  Sam started refastening many of Amber’s toys into guns, cars and flying objects.  Sure he would pick up a baby doll and give it a hug, then a few seconds later it would be discarded for something he found more interesting.  The one thing I found fascinating about Sam was that he would sit and actually have imaginative play.  Amber wasn’t much for imaginative play.  She used the toy how it was intended and when she was bored she moved to the next toy.  Sam would involve dinosaurs and pirates into his Batman cave.  There would be elaborate stories involving the Batman Cave and the Dragon Castle.  And somehow he incorporated Amber’s Barbie dogs into all this play.  He had a slight obsession with them.   We never made a conscience effort not to buy Sam guns, but he,  eventually, gravitated toward weaponry.  Whether it was his finger or a Barbie doll he would point it at someone and say, “Bang! Bang!”  It would be much later that he would get his first space gun and drive us all crazy.  But don’t think the gender neutral debate has won just yet.  Since Sam was with me most of the time, he would often grab the shopping cart and purple purse and go shopping.  Amber and him would play shopping and he would use his debit card that was pulled from his purse.  Why?  Because it was what he saw.  Sure SoHubby was a little perturbed by this, but I let it go.  I  knew that he was fine and just playing what he saw.  No biggie.  And once Evie came along and Amber decided to dress her up as a fairy, Sam joined in the fun.  It lasted a few minutes and then he went back to what interested him.  Once again, choices.  Now, I have a little boy that wants to be a cheerleader like his big sister, loves to hug the girls and loves to play tag with the boys and all things superheroes.

Lastly, we have Evie.  At only 2.5 years old, she has gone between cars, dinosaurs, superheros to baby dolls, and her recent discovery of the Princesses.  There is a whole playroom for her to choose from.  Never once has there been a line drawn saying these are the BOY toys and these are the GIRL toys.  There has been choices.  Why can’t kids have choices?  Sure there are some people who are adamant about their boy not having anything to do with “girly” stuff, but is it really that rampant?  Then there comes a time when children naturally start pairing off with the same sex parent.  Sam has started doing this and loves to go off with his Daddy.  And why not?  That doesn’t mean the girls are left in the dust.  There are times when Amber goes off with Daddy, too.  I can’t say that I would be comfortable bringing Sam to the nail salon, only because he doesn’t like his nails cut or people putting anything on them.  I can’t say that I would be all that gung ho to have his nails painted pink,anyway, but I am not going to deny him the pleasure of a foot massage or soaking in a hot foot bath.  Why can’t he enjoy those things?  The last time I checked the nail salons weren’t turning away anyone who was willing to pay for their services.

The point is there are 2 sexes (and I know even me admitting this is controversial) in this world and they both have their purpose.  It doesn’t mean that we don’t have choices.  We are bombarded with choices everyday that are made due to our upbringing, social status, financial ability, gender, and a myriad of other reasons.  To say that Lego Friends is teaching girls that they are only pretty and only good for baking, primping and drinking coffee (which I didn’t know was a female sport) is insulting to me as a parent.  It means that I have no influence.  That I am not talking to my kids.  That I am not supervising their growth into this world.  It is saying that I am letting a lump of plastic determine the future of my children.  I hate to break it to you, but I have more influence over my kids then a $20 toy that I happen to pick up on a whim.

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NOLA Culture: High School

Here in New Orleans when someone asks you where did you go to school, you better reply with what high school you attended.  If you reply with a college, we will know you are an outsider.  I went to public school and that is something that I keep to myself.  This is a city of Catholic and private schools.  If you want to be included in certain circles you keep your public school education to yourself.

Being from New Orleans and going to public school, my dream was that my kids would go to private school.  And if the people I have been talking to are any indication, my kids’ dream will be that their kids go to the high school they went to.  Cycle continues.

Amber moved to a Catholic school at third grade. Before that she went to a private school without a religious affiliation.  It was an adjustment for both of us.  She was entering a school where most of the students had been together since they were 3 yrs old.  Now on our 2nd year and Sam joining the school we are in the groove.  Our  newness still comes through on occasion, but that should wear off in a year or 2.  As one mom reminded me, I have 7 years at this school.  I can’t be new forever, right?

What I didn’t expect was the high school talk to start so soon.  You see around 5th grade the kids start looking at high schools.  And from what I am hearing it sounds like the experience that most kids looking at colleges go through.  Amber started her talk of which high school she picked last year in third grade.  As far as I can tell, she had some catching up to do with the other girls.  It scares me.  All the what ifs come flooding in and I am left in a corner sweating clutching brochures to high schools.

Amber has expressed her preference and it seems to be the preference of the majority of girls and moms at the school. It is the “IT” school.  So the talk begins, “Hey Amber, if you want to go to that high school, you better make sure you study.”  ”AMBER!  They don’t accept girls who act like that to that high school.”  I have found the new version of the Santa threat.  Of course, all this perks Amber’s ears for a nanosecond and then she goes back to avoiding that 800 page Harry Potter book she just had to read for her AR test that is coming up in 3 days.

I don’t need this stress.  Public school was simple.  Oh you live there?  You go here.  Sure there were knife fights in the playground and you learned to hold your bladder all day for fear of what might befall you in the bathroom, but, at least, you didn’t have to worry about getting into the perfect high school.  You went to the school you were told and you fell into line like everyone else. There was no worrying about the perfect high school leading you to the perfect Louisiana University (subtle, eh) and all of that leading you to the perfect job where you will lead the perfect life and live happily every after.  One false move and the delicate house of cards based on the right school since birth will come tumbling down and their lives will be doomed forever.  See the pressure I am under.  I just started to relax after my world wind tour of every Catholic elementary school on both sides of the river and now I am back to panic mode.  The happiness of my kids’ lies in my hands.  One false move and they will be living in my house forever and I will never have my dream of a kid home where I get to do what I want and the house stays clean.  Parenting in NOLA is hard, y’all.

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Your Catholic History Moment

The kids go to a Catholic school, so dressing up in their Halloween costumes at school is not going to happen.  In the place of costumes the kids get to dress up as their favorite Saint on November 1, All Saints Day.  Not quite the same thing and it doesn’t get the same amount of excitement, especially when you have to do a report to go along with your “costume”.  But we are here to learn, right?

I don’t have a favorite Saint.  I blame my parents.  The short of the story is that my mom got my religion choice in the divorce.  From the little I learn, I could fake it by saying Joan of Arc.  It is not quite as transparent as claiming Mary as your favorite Saint.  No offense to those who have her as a favorite Saint, but she is kind of a go to Saint, especially for us with minimal Catholic education.  Amber choose Mary, last year, because…wait…for it…she got to bring a baby doll to school.  A baby doll that she forgot to bring.  A baby doll I had to rush to Target to buy along with swaddling clothes.  Do you know how hard it is to find swaddling clothes in this day and age?  Of course, I had to get her the baby, because, “…HOW WILL ANYONE KNOW WHO I AM?!”

This year we got lucky and Amber’s teacher picked her Saint for her.  Her Saint is Barbara.  It seems Barbara had quite a hard life at the hand of her father.  She kept her faith despite her abusive father and was rewarded with Sainthood.  Plus, as an added bonus, God showed her father the business end of a lightening bolt.  Take that buttmonkey!  I am a little confused, because the information sheet given by the teacher mentioned that Saint Barbara is/was the patron Saint of firefighters, but not really, anymore, because we have fire extinguishers.  Then while I was trying to find out dates for when Saint Barbara lived, I came across this.  It appears that Saint Barbara’s true lesson is :

The life of St. Barbara is a vivid reminder that there can be much anger in our world and in our lives. Being in touch with God’s presence in a very special way can do much toward relieving ourselves of our tendency to allow anger to control us. 

Hmmm….could this be a message?  Maybe, but we will put that aside for the moment.  See, not letting all that anger control me. I find all this Saint business fascinating, which means I am learning right along with the kids. I didn’t finish my Catholic education.  There are many things we can learn from the Saints.

Now, if I can find the patron Saint for stubborn children to help guide me through my experience of parenting Sam.  He is not required to dress as a Saint.  I am not sure how many kids in his class will, but I am sure he won’t care if he was the only one to show up in just his school uniform.  Or he could flip out and yell at me as he gets in the car after school, that “he was the only one that wasn’t dressed as a Saint and it is all my fault!”  I thought I had the perfect solution to this problem.  Sam has an Anakin Skywalker costume that I got on sale at Target after Halloween, last year.  All it really is a brown sack like garment that can be cinched at the waist.  Throw in a large wooden rosary and you have yourself a monk.  I am sure there is a monk Saint out there, somewhere.  Of course, this was a no go for Sam.  He is adamant that he wants to wear his Ironman costume to school.  I don’t think I will have much success in finding a Saint that could incorporate an Ironman costume.  I wonder if he still wore a large wooden rosary, if anyone would notice?  I think I will have better success becoming the patron Saint of stubborn children.  At least, I would have earned it.

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Netflix vs the Movie Rental Store

Netflix has pissed me off for the last time.  My only regret is that I didn’t cancel them completely at the end of August.  Netflix was a great concept, then they got cocky.  Yeah, yeah, you are going to tell me that movie producers and God forced their hand to jack up prices.  Or that they are having contract troubles and that is why their streaming sucks so hard.  I call bullshit.  I think Netflix is big enough that they have some power.  However, I really don’t care.  I maybe the lowly consumer, but I have some power, too.  And that power is to cancel Netflix and go old school.

I am old enough to remember going to the movie rental store.  It was so exciting.  We got to walk up and down the aisles choosing which movie we wanted to see.  Then we would race right home and watch it.  Times were good and I was young without the responsibility of getting the movie back in time to avoid a late fee.  As I got older, life’s checklist got longer and time got shorter, which meant late fees got more expensive.

SoHubby and I decided we would just buy movies.  At some point, most movies make it to the $5 bin.  That, my friends, is a long wait.  Us, being part of this fast paced, I had to have it yesterday world, that didn’t work for us.  Then we heard about this great company, Netflix.  You mean they would deliver movies to our house?  There was no special return date?  There was only one low price?  Hot damn!  Sign us up.  And we had a good relationship for awhile.

Suddenly, Netflix started to see it’s stock rise (literally and figuratively) and in my opinion got too big for their britches.  However, my love affair with Netflix started to wane when we went down to the 1 movie and streaming offer.  SoHubby would go on the website and clog up our queue with crap movies.  Movies that at that moment he would have watched, but would forget about by the time they made it to our house.  Here is the journey of a Netflix delivered to the Southern household: Movie arrives in the mail.  Movie is either retrieved from mailbox that night or the next morning.  Movie would then end up in my mail pile. I would get around to my mail pile sometime that day or the next day.  I open movie, say a little curse over it, because it would most likely be a dumb shoot ‘em up movie that SoHubby ordered and place it ontop of the TV or mantel.  Days would go by.  Days turned into weeks.  Weeks turned into a month.  When all of a sudden I spied with my little eye that little red envelope.  Then another curse as I held it up for all to see asking, “How the hell long has this been sitting here.  When are you going to watch this crap, so we can send it back and get a real movie?”  So as you can see folks, Netflix is genius.  They have developed a company where  men and women pay to fight via movie queue and have a little red envelope sits ontop of the TV for a month or longer  Don’t get me started on that crap they call streaming.  Half the time the movie wouldn’t play all the way through without several stops and starts.  Oh but that is our fault, why don’t you upgrade your WiFi.  Yeah, why don’t you bite my….be nice, now.  Then there was no rhyme or reason to the streaming.  One day a top movie would be on there, the next day some D flick you would have to pay me to watch would have taken it’s place.

After the whole rate hike, I was miffed.  I was calmed down with reasons like they had to do it, poor, poor Netflix.  Okay, we can understand the plight of the business when faced with things out of their control.  The dumb move came in when they decided to divide up the streaming side and the DVD side.  Um…exsqueeze me?  Dildo say what?  You expect me to bookmark an entirely different website to put DVDs in my queue?  Oh hell, NO!  I was done, but what could I do.  I wasn’t going to do that Redbox thing.  You want me to do what with my credit card and then you will do what?  Sorry, maybe it is my age, but I am getting the feeling that technology needs to calm down for a bit.  I thought I could just go down to my local Blockbuster.  Oh, but wait!  All the Blockbusters were run out of town by the evil, yet genius Netflix.  Then a light shone over me and the angels sing.

You see I live in a village, next to a couple of small towns.  And one thing that I am constantly told about these small towns and villages is that we are a bunch of hicks that don’t move with the times.  So guess what?  There is a Blockbuster right down a very long highway, but it is there just waiting for us to choose when to get a movie and forces us to watch that damn movie that night to avoid late fees.  The best part is it seems busy, very busy, which means maybe it will stay long enough to build up it’s force, again.   Who is having the last laugh, now?  Well, not the clerk at my local Blockbuster when I told her all this.  Maybe she didn’t appreciate my fine storytelling skills.  Maybe she wasn’t interested?  Nah, that couldn’t be it.  Or maybe she just wanted to get on with her life and didn’t care why the hell I found myself at the Blockbuster with my over energized spawns.  But I felt good.  I finally got to see The Black Swan and go WTF along with everyone else.  I even promised the kids that we could go back on Friday to rent movies and maybe some Wii games.  Then they ran around like I told them Santa Clause was coming to live with us and set up shop in the backyard.  And now my life has come full circle.  We will be release from our prison of the little red envelope back to the freedom of the movie rental store and wait for our implantation of our movie chips.

 

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