This parenting thing

I'm just a woefully inadequate mother.

Either that, or parenting teenagers is like trying to do brain surgery while walking through the fun house wearing 3" stilettos and without my glasses.

I'm either doing too much and ruining their lives, or not doing enough and ruining their lives. I haven't figured out the exact perfect balance of supervision and neglect. Something tells when that when I finally do, they will be 23 and it won't matter anymore. It's no small wonder that one of the most popular books about raising teens is titled "Get Out of My Life, but First Could You Drive Me and Cheryl to the Mall".

And I remember being the teen, don't you? I remember when my Mom would walk into the room and ask me to do something and all the hair on the back of my neck would jump to attention. I'd be laying on my bed in my groovy lower level basement room that they had lovingly provided with lime green shag carpeting and white/gold paneling. I'd hear her knees cracking all the way down the stairs (like mine do now!) and I'd get ready for the fight. She'd ask me to do something simple, like fold some laundry, and I'd whine like she had invited the firing squad over after lunch.

My parents would do horrifying things in public, like talk to my friends or yell out the car window to hurry up because they'd left supper on the stove at home. And their CLOTHES! Geez, Dad would get off the lawn mower for a quick trip into town to pick up my lazy ass AND my bike while wearing his sweaty shirt, plaid bermudas, and the sweat rag he'd tied around his head.

Parents and teens. It'll never work

Thoughts on the Mall of America

This past Saturday I took my twin teens and their friends to MOA - that's how we locals refer to the Mall of America. Here are some random thoughts . . . .

1. If you ever have a desire to travel to the Twins Cities to see the Mall of America, I'll save you the trouble. Go to your local mall at 1pm on Christmas Eve and walk by every single store 17 times. Now go to your local county fair and walk the midway another 17 times. There! You've just done the Mall of America.

Instead, travel to the Twin Cities and come to my house - I'll make lasagna.

2. Thoughts upon entering the QVC store: "What the Hell am I doing in here?!?!? I hate this crap!! What's the matter with me?!??!"

3. Thoughts upon entering the Barnes and Noble "OK, getting better"

4. Thoughts on finding an empty table at the back of the Starbucks in said Barnes and Noble with my library book in tow "This is the ONLY way to do the MOA".

5. This year, I gave the teens a set amount of cash for school shopping and told them there would be NO MORE CLOTHING MONEY until deep winter and to fly away to those horrible teen stores with their loud music and leave Mommy in peace. Worked beautifully.

6. I saw many, many struggling toddlers having fits in strollers. Usually I sympathize with these parents, but who in their right mind would take a toddler to the MOA? Those parents should just stay home and hit each other in the foreheads with a hammer and leave the poor baby out of it. Honestly, get a sitter!!

7. Twins and I had a lovely lunch together while they showed me their quite sensible clothing choices. Heaven comes in very small packages sometimes.

The High School Schedules are Posted!!

If anyone in the Northfield region is experiencing phone outages, you can blame my girls and their newly-freshman friends. The word got out that the High School class schedules were posted today. So of course the absolute MINUTE I walked in the door, they were begging me to logon and print. It's done, and there is now a flurry of texting.

Remember those days? When it mattered so very much WHO was in class with you? And if you had to sit next to Smelly Richard or Best Friend Julie it could make or break your year?

My Life as a Sitcom

Ever take a step back and realize your life is like a comedy, but without the laugh track? So I just provide an internal laugh track and chuckle my way through.

1. The CD/Radio in my van is stuck ON. There is no way on God's Green Earth I can turn that sucker off short of ripping it out of the dashboard. And the volume control has gone down too, so it's just loud enough to be annoying but not loud enough to actually HEAR what's being said. And we don't have the money right now to fix or replace it. I've discovered that if I put in a blank CD, at least it's silent.

2. Half of the dashboard lights in the same van have gone down. Think there's a connection? But I can still see most of the speedometer. And we've decided a pen light duct taped to the steering column will do when the whole enchilada breaks. No way will we pay someone to tear out the dashboard for diagnostics on a van with 130,000 miles on it.

3. One of my twins has become like the Tide stain commercial. I'm trying to tell her something and she's interrupting because she's 14 and therefore knows it ALL. Then 3 minutes later she's asking "when are we leaving?", "how do I do this?", and the whirlpool starts again.

4. Today I put in my first contact lens at exactly the same moment an undried soap bubble entered my eye socket. Much cursing ensued.

5. We own three cats, and I'm a dog person. And lately a stray has been hanging around who looks like Mao Tse Tung, so we call him Chairman Mao and the kids hiss at him.

SLAP on the forehead

My kids have the uncanny ability to suck me into activities I just KNOW I'll regret in some way.

Today for instance.

I'm returning to the land of the living after a nasty cold, the sun is shining, and the temps are rather pleasant. My older kids and the 8-year-old BEG me to take them hiking at the Carleton College Arboretum. It's one of my all-time-favorites haunts so I'm happy to oblige.

First we drive north of town to my personal favorite Arb entrance. But alas it's still too icy - about 10 feet in we realized we wouldn't be coming out without a broken wrist or twisted ankle. So we drive back to town to the common entrance with it's nicely paved path. During this entire car trip the kids are fighting over literally everything - dog poop, whether or not the neighbor girl can be called "calm", how to pronounce Arboretum, god help me EVERYTHING! Perhaps I should have driven back home, but such was my mania to get outside and breathe air that wasn't tainted with cold germs and other people's recent exhalations.

The older kids walked well ahead - that's fine - I understand their need to distance themselves from a Mom who dares to wear layers and a HAT for god's sake. I also had on mismatched gloves which just enhanced my eccentric appearance and inflated the embarrassing Mom factor.

The 8-year-old bounded up the path with zeal, and of course stopping every five feet to examine something. I know this form of nature observance has it's merits but I just wanted to MOVE. She pleaded to wander up the earthen paths but I stated "no, it's too muddy, it'll tear up the paths and we don't have waterproof boots on and you'll be miserable" and blah blah blah blather blather blather. She threw caution to the wind and headed up the muddy inclines.

Within 10 minutes can you guess what I was hearing in a miserable whiny voice?
"My boots are muddy!"
"These boots are letting the water in!"
"I'm hungry!" (I offered lunch earlier, she refused)
"My legs are sooooooo tired!"
"If Daddy were here, he'd carry me!"

It was a very, very loooooonnngggg walk back to the car. Somethings just can't be thoroughly enjoyed by adults with kids in tow. And somehow I always forget this, and keep taking them on outings that make me want to drink heavily within an hour. Like our train trip to downtown Minneapolis last summer. But this is what good mothers do, right? RIGHT??!??!?!?!

Kids These Days

I've been doing a lot of subbing at our Middle School and High School. I'm spending the next few days at a Charter school full of what I now understand to be emo and scene kids. Teenagers haven't changed one little bit, except for the outside. They are just as clueless and disabled as we were. Just as gawky, just as awkward, just as annoying, just as creepy as every previous generation. I wouldn't repeat those years for anything. And now I'm the smirking adult who's singing "just you wait 'enry 'iggins, just you wait!" under my breath. Someone ought to tell those boys that tight pants can render them sterile.

The demise of good english

I try to stay positive, really I do. But sometimes I get so irritated that I must speak out. Case in point; the slow demise of good spoken English by each generation. The current youth need to cease with the following:

1. "soo . . . ummm . . . yeah."
2. Dude!! at our house it has morphed into Dude-Mom! Dude-Mom??!
3. Like . . . like . . . like . . . like . . . like
4. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy
5. Every sentence spoken like a question? This is so irritating?