Celery, Guns N Roses, and a Fight

You would be amazed at the solid connection between 80's pop and the stage of independence and rebellion we are in right now.  Let's take Twisted Sister,  We're Not Gonna Take It: 

 

We're not gonna take it
No, we ain't gonna take it
We're not gonna take it anymore

We've got the right to choose and
There ain't no way we'll lose it

 

My children are in a developmental turning point and I am in a gestational turning point.  Simultaneously.  There is a seriously large lot of emotion in our house of late.  My husband is fortunate that he is working mandatory overtime right now as usually things are all cried out by the time he walks in at bedtime and the snuggly, doe-eyed daughters have returned.  His wife, well, not snuggly or doe-eyed, but usually not planning the demise of anyone either….anymore.

 

Both girls are working through a struggle for independence.  For those who have met my daughters this is more hostile, hysterical take-over than mere "let me do it myself".  What is particularly hard to watch and live through is that often their need to assert independence comes when I most need compliance.  For example, Little One wants to dress herself, but with one arm in the neck of her shirt and trying to put the other in through the cuff first, it is blisteringly hard to refrain from just taking over and doing it myself.  This is often happening as I stand at the door waiting to leave for work, with a meeting looming on the horizon.  (Also important to know that the clothes have been on offer for nearly an hour and frequently I have had her dressed once and she is naked again for need of one more ballerina twirl in the fairy princess dress.) 

 

Miss Six is struggling with the natural step down that comes from being too big to curl up in my lap completely or be toted around on a hip, but still needing that cuddly time.  She is simply not satisfied by an arm around her shoulder while we read or holding her hand as we grocery shop, etc.  She wants to be in my lap.  (A lap which is gradually less present than the week before these days.)  For her, independence comes from alternately pushing me away and then begging to return to babyhood.  It's a somewhat scary push-pull to be in the middle of.    I know that much of what I'm seeing is her search for an answer as to who she is in our changing family dynamics, but there are times when the foreshadowing of her teen years shows through and my blood runs cold…( and  not because …"my angel's in the centerfold".   Sorry, I digress, Pandora is running on 80's pop)…  I know it's normal but it doesn't take away the sting of sarcastic, know-it-all.

 

Sweet Child O Mine, was a song I loved in high school and while I know it was not written from the perspective of a mother watching her child, try for a minute to abandon what you know about the song and think about watching your child grow and become someone other than your little girl.  Try to allow it to encompass that moment when you see her for the person she is becoming and not for the small bundle you brought home from the hospital. 

 

…She's got a smile that it seems to me
Reminds me of childhood memories
Where everything
Was as fresh as the bright blue sky
Now and then when I see her face
She takes me away to that special place
And if I'd stare too long
I'd probably break down and cry…

 

The Mr. is lovingly referred to as "the stubborn one" in his family.  The horror stories of his childhood are often bandied about over family dinners.  The phrase "I hope you have one just like you." sounded funny until the realization hit that this also meant it happening to me, and lately mostly to me because of our schedule.  Little One is apparently the legacy in the co-ed fraternity of "Stubbornousity".  The potential for pushing the line, digging in the heels and forcing Mama to make a decision about which hill to die on seems endless.   Some days I applaud her and want to bow at the feet of the master and other days and I just want cry and scream and have a tantrum myself.  If Little One had a theme song, she would likely channel REM with I Won't Back Down.

 

Well I won't back down, no I won't back down
You could stand me up at the gates of hell
But I won't back down

Gonna stand my ground, won't be turned around
And I'll keep this world from draggin' me down
Gonna stand my ground and I won't back down

 

Which leads me to my own turning point.  We are soundly in the second trimester, lovingly alluded to as the one where your energy rebounds.  HA!  Not for this Mama of two approaching her fourth decade and working full-time.  You know that celery that gets lost in the bottom of the crisper drawer and comes out bent into a hairpin yet still green?  That's me.  I still look like myself on the outside but I have the structural integrity of wilted vegetation.  By 5:00 I am dicing my vegetable likenesses and hoping that I remembered to turn on the burner under the soup pot, (and not the one under my cutting board),or standing at the fridge door with carrots in one hand and no clue what I needed them for in the other.  Or I find myself staring at my old friend Shiraz and wishing we lived in France where a daily glass of wine is not frowned upon during pregnancy.

 

In a moment of reflection on my own childhood, I remember a commercial that came on in between adult shows that used to catch me by surprise because it made my stoic mother cry.  Sometimes I play it to remind myself that time is fleeting and my children are only temporary in many ways.  They will always be mine, but not always as they are now.  And so, while this song may have been written any time, it is a song of the 80's for me because that is when I became aware of it.  Grab a tissue and enjoy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9Tn-H251Uc