Days of Our Lives

The Days of our Lives. In an era of motivation, and a mass hysteria of “do forward thinking or be less than human”, I think the value of ‘live simple, work with your hands and tend to your affairs’ is a sore lost balance.

Now I am not coming from a high plateau of accomplishment- I cannot coach or teach you the finite of winning for I come from the starting point of try it again… I am sorry but I feel I’ve lost half of you now as I am a non- accomplished.

One of the straws on my camel’s back is my relationship with my son. Compounding this is the fact is that parenting is not a single entity but a trinity (at a minimum-you, the child, and your environment). Also, I have to respect boundaries that reflect the culture my family is in search of- especially when you’re not on the same page as your spouse, but your values are the same- you are same but different and sometimes loud and full of obstructions and non- support.

For me personally is the burden that my mother had a difficult relationship with her mother, I had a difficult relationship with my mother, and now I have a difficult relationship with my child. It’s been even a bigger challenge since I am now a grandmother. And I was determined not to have the same relationship with my grandchild… but knowing what not to do does not in any way give you the assumptive powers of what to do. Causes and unintended effects ripple through our waters up stream, down- stream, and at center. So, I got caught red- handed one day, and a stranger asked me what I was doing and I said, “practicing to- be a grandmother”. And so, I did. I spent close to $3000 dollars since 2009 (as price impacts vary on date economics) every workshop I could get my hands that included having creative fun play time with children.

As result my grandson and I have some wonderful moments. One of my favorite was New Year’s day and I had one shot at playground time and it was damp and chilly- perfect for get the grandchild sick- so what to do? We bundled up, and going out the door I grabbed a towel. As we hit the playground, my grandson made a bee- line for the dinosaur and stopped for me to help him up. As I approached him, I handed him the towel and I told him he was the dinosaur’s vet for the day and he would need drying off before climbing on. By the end of our time I drug home a wet filthy towel and a tired happy junior vet/ astronaut. If this can be classified as accomplishment, then I should get back my readers I lost for I was accomplished.

I truly believe my child and his family try to do the family thing and so do we, and it never fits right. But they truly had me feeling that respect for family was passé and because we are who we are, and they are who they are we were not worthy of blips on their radar because they discard anything we give them or do not acknowledge it- (this is truly personal and hard to relate but I am (totally) not so good at people being too obtuse with me, so I give you this personal not- obtuse thought of mine). And this was the norm till last night and there was a knock at the door, and it was unreal who was at the door.

Before I tell you- so you get the magnitude, my child is in his second marriage and as he put it, in his first marriage he wanted family, and she wanted a career. He told us not to contact her (seven years as our daughter in law) because of … and I don’t remember but we always try to support our son (like in those commercials where parents are not perfect but they try).

Anyway, our first daughter in law was there on our doorstep with a gift, tears, apologies, love, respect, family and offers. We cried for an about an hour and left with hopes of reconnect that’s all. She remarried a father of 4 boys and they have a little girl between them. She has a fantastic career and was in town for business and was afraid but wanted to stop by. I am still reeling from the impact. Her hugs left her imprint of hair, hands, love. I just don’t know how I missed it up so bad with my son. Love to you all, and up with family.

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