I want to be able to express how I feel about parenting even a fraction as well as Kira does. You have to read her post to her teenage son, Tre. It’s title doesn’t give a clue to the depth and love it contains, “A note for Tre.” Sigh.
Archive for » April, 2008 «
28
Apr 2008
On my last trip to the library, I picked up a few books. When my oldest daughter saw my selections,she was a bit surprised. The books were: Fat Girl (a memoir), The Fat Girl (an old YA book from the 80s) and a fiction novel titled Beautiful Bodies.
I have tried to read Beautiful Bodies, and I am not liking it. It is supposed to be about six friends having a dinner party and talking, but the first few chapters are each of the characters time before arriving at the party, and it is boring. Very boring. I don’t think I’m going to read anymore. This is progress. I used to keep reading books that didn’t appeal to me.
I haven’t read the YA book yet (or tried), but I did read the memoir Fat Girl by Judith Moore. This is a book that I have thought about buying more than once, but I didn’t because it is a tiny book and expensive by comparison.
It is also a depressing book. I didn’t learn anything interesting or different about fat issues. There was a lot of self-loathing, and I forced myself to finish it. One review called the book “breathtaking,” but I didn’t get that at all.
One book that I did like recently, and I liked it because it offered a new perspective as well as lots of good stuff about weight — Life in the Fat Lane by Cherie Bennett. It is a YA book. It really makes you think, I think. Or at least it did me.
And that’s my review. I am going to avoid weight-related reading for a bit. Next on my reading list: Peace Like a River by Leif Enger.
Category: Memoir Writing
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27
Apr 2008
I would have to say that I prefer free range, and I am pretty sure I am free range. Not sure what I’m talking about? Then you haven’t read this article in Newsweek: Are Modern Kids Coddled?
Helicopter parents hover over their children with the idea of fixing everything and smoothing everything before the child ever makes contact with it.
Free range parents is a newer term, one I never heard until I read the article above, but it means you let your kids have “free range.” There is even a blog about it.
With Little League, track and work, it can be difficult to arrange after school logistics. I can pick up Amanda and Autumn at 5 p.m. on the dot because the time I get out of work coincides with the time I have to pick them up (I could actually get them at 4:30, but I use that extra half hour to do some reading in the parking lot as I wait). If Maxine needs to go somewhere, I can ask her to wait for me in the library, which is right by the school. But if Justin has to go somewhere, I have to be there exactly when school gets out (3 p.m.), and I have to have sent a note with him to the school to say I would be picking him up. After I arrive, I have to wait in line to sign him out.
I don’t mind doing this because I understand it can be important for little kids, but if I think Justin is old enough to walk to the library by himself, or that his older sister should come and get him, it does bother me that the school says no. That isn’t possible. This means sometimes, I have to send Justin home on the bus to a home where no one waits for him because his sisters were all staying after school with various projects.
It isn’t that bad since Steve’s parents can meet Justin at our house and pick him up when the bus arrives there. It is just that they shouldn’t have to. I should be able to say, “my son is 9 and responsible enough to walk over to the library and wait for a half hour.”
The school has some weird ideas. For instance, it is “too dangerous” for my 12-year-old seventh grader to walk across the school parking lot between the middle school and the high school. Next fall, however, this same 12-year-old will be an eighth grader at the high school, and she will be expected to walk through that parking lot on a daily basis to get on the bus and/or go to her sports’ practices. She will still be 12, but somehow she will be magically transformed because the school says so.
In other words, I don’t think it is always the parents that are doing the coddling. I get pretty frustrated when the school interferes and forces coddling. When my kids were younger, they frequently forgot to take things like boots and gloves to school despite my reminders. I would get phone calls asking me to bring this or that. After a couple of times, I refused to bring them. I thought my kids could learn the natural consequences. It didn’t happen. Instead, the school supplied boots and gloves for my kids. What does that teach them?
25
Apr 2008
My mom has spent the last couple of weeks in Arizona. She even finally made it to the Grand Canyon (she was raised in Arizona, gave birth to two children there and yet she still had never been to the Grand Canyon).
Today, she is on an airplane whisking back to Indiana and eventually she’ll head home. I did not want to tell her yesterday that there was a fire raging within a mile or so of her home. I didn’t want to tell because I didn’t know a lot.
I first learned about it around 4 p.m. with an e-mail sent out to all the staff at Kirtland. I arrived home to see a newscast that was shot from the tire store on my mom’s road, about 1.7 miles away from her. The shot showed the Elks lodge, where I had my wedding reception, and behind it in the distance you could see the smoke and flames.
The fire burned 1100 acres and threatened a gas station and hotel right where you come into Grayling from I-75. More than 50 homes were evacuated from Karen Woods, and at least six homes were damaged if not destroyed. This came way too close to my mom’s house. From what I can tell, the fire started on the same side of 75 as my mom lives, and it went northwest. If it had gone north, my mom’s house would have been in the path.
I went to the web sites for TV 7&4 and TV 9&10 to see photos, but television web sites rarely keep information up for long.
I had photos on this blog from the tv stations, but I only put them here for my mom to see while she was gone. She is home now, so I removed the photos….
Category: Family
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24
Apr 2008
or more evidence that I have actually lost weight….
I have lost between 35 to 40 pounds, and I have about 60 pounds that I still want to lose, but I am already noticing the impact my weight loss has had. As I mentioned earlier this week, my clothes are looser and sometimes too loose.
But I think the thing I noticed the most is that I am no longer invisible.
When I weigh a certain amount, I become invisible to most of the male species on the planet. As I go about my day, males look through me or around me but not at me. I don’t mind this since I tend not to notice them either no matter what they weigh. I’m just not looking.
But since I’ve dropped 40 pounds and managed to keep my D-cup breasts, I am no longer invisible. I am getting second glances from men I pass. More often than not, I will also get a smile, a wave, a hello, or some other line. I tend to still not be looking, and I end up startled as a stranger says something to me as I’m lost in thought, or I notice the person I am not really looking at is smiling at me and saying hello. I panic momentarily wondering if I know this person, but I usually don’t. This has happened more to me in the last month than it has in the last two years.
And I wonder is it because I feel better about myself and it shows, or is it because I am invisible when I weigh over a certain amount, and I am no longer invisible. I’m not sure. I just know it is happening now, and it wasn’t then.
Category: Weighty Thoughts
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