Dear reader, just to counterbalance yesterday's warm and fuzzy post of parental triumph, I feel I should mention over the weekend I had one of those murkier moments of parental sabotage. You know? The one where by default you learn of your daughter's missing history assignment, leading to greater (albeit reluctant) disclosures of more missing assignments, leading to the tour of a terrifying crime scene (her bedroom), a smoking gun (her knapsack), and resulting in a stiff sentence that stipulates a complete and total overhaul of life on this planet?
I mean, it wasn't that dramatic...but then again, yes, it was. We're talking about a twelve year old here (referring to my daughter and/or my inner child).
And you know the worst part of it? I was in no position to condemn her. Who am I to lecture anyone on shoddy competence? Who am I to rail against a lack of focus? Who am I to enforce a stringent code of exactness and order?
Nobody, that's who.
Fetch my smelling salts, dear reader. I just gave myself a headache writing out so many adjectives for being organized.
There's nothing like looking your daughter in the eye and telling her how improper it is to read a book when items of greater priority, such as homework, languish by the wayside. How drawing a picture instead of attending to one's studies is not a recipe for success.
Oh, hypocrisy. You go down like a brackish clump of hair and nail clippings dredged from the sewer, chased by a greasy shot of battery acid.
Oh, moments of swearing I would never say things like recipe for success: go ahead. Rub your salt in my wounds.
And that, dear reader, is why being a parent is sometimes a total buzzkill. Because maybe ninety percent of the time you can walk the walk and talk the talk, and at night you put your head on the pillow and sleep the sleep of a conscience that is pure before heaven and earth. But then there is the remaining ten percent, that confounded ten percent which skewers the soft underbelly of your sanctimony with its inevitable, unerring precision.
And in that moment, when you are looking into your child's face and lecturing her on something that happens to be your own personal mea culpa...I mean, I hope you have a taste for irony. I hope you saved your appetite. Because that moment is like one giant filet of irony, rare and dripping, served with a nicely reduced ironic sauce. Garnished with fresh ground irony. Followed by a big ol' slice of homemade ironic pie.
And don't think you're going to sleep well tonight, after eating all that.
...............
p.s. All humor aside, I would say I have been trying lately to be more organized. There is a slow, quiet revolution going on in this house, because in order to tidy up my studio, guess what? I actually have to start in the garage. And work back to the guest bedroom. Don't ask...it will scare me off to try and explain what's going on.
It's just...what did I think was going to happen when I had kids? That the apples would fall far from the tree? Well, maybe one of them did. But the other two practically grafted themselves against my trunk. And now I have to try all the harder to model skills that just don't come naturally to me. Sometimes I can't believe I'm the mom. I can't believe I'm running this show.
And now I'll refer myself back to yesterday's post to remind myself how glad I am to be doing it.