'Coffee, tea or Bonox?' was an advertising slogan. Both the drink and the slogan originated in the US. We seem to have adopted the slogan in Australia (some time in my dim and distant past), but I don't think many of us took to the drink. I began my relationship with coffee at 16 and haven't stopped to take breath since.
The smell of coffee freshly brewed still brings back fond memories of my younger self. Summer or winter, I greeted each new day with a cig in one hand and a coffee in the other. Usually I’d be sharing it all with the birds and the bees out in the garden. What they thought of second hand smoke I’ll never know, but thankfully for me and luckily for them I’ve given up the former. But I’m still hooked on the latter. Those nearest and dearest to me stay well out of the way until I’ve had my caffeine fix. I still can’t function without that first hit.
Is coffee another habit I should kick? If so, then millions of people world-wide should be joining me. But neither I nor they intend to give it up. Coffee has become an integral part of our lives and until somebody offers us something to equal it, we’re sticking with the devil we know.
Coffee has become a generic term for drink. Even if your guests end up drinking herbal tea or milkshakes you will always automatically offer them coffee. Coffee breaks the ice in a variety of social settings and stimulates conversation. And paradoxically while it is said to be a stimulant coffee also relaxes those first date tensions and soothes down lovers’ tiffs.
Coffee smells like ambrosia should taste, but falls far short of that, what a shame. I do keep hoping and trying. Whenever I grind and plunge or mix blends and dripolate I anticipate and salivate at the thought that I may have got that particular blend right this time round. It’s my holy grail, a mission I intend to follow through to the bitter, smooth, bold and playful, organic and fair trade end.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Friday, December 17, 2010
When is the right time?
When do you let go? It’s a question best answered in hindsight because when you’re in the thick of it, it’s hard to even know that you need to let go. The answer is, begin at the beginning and keep on going. When your child begins crawling, make your home safe, clear the decks and let him (or her) go. By the time he’s old enough to dress himself he knows the difference between hot and cold, so let him choose his own clothes. If he dresses inappropriately, then the next time round he will pay more attention to what he’s choosing. Teach him about crossing roads safely and begin by watching while he practices on small roads. It’s not one large letting go, but a series of them and each one should suit the right time and the right occasion.
In 2008 a mum called Lenore Skenazy wrote an article about letting go for the New York Sun that caused a stir with a bunch of other mums. I first read about her when she came to Australia in 2010 to sell her book, Free Range Kids. The book was a result of the 2008 experience. Ms Skenazy’s child had begged her to ‘leave him somewhere, anywhere, and let him try to figure out how to get home on his own’, and she obliged.
Skenazy had allowed her then 9 year old son to travel the subway alone and make his own way home. ‘One sunny Sunday’ she left him at Bloomingdales armed with 20 dollars, a map, a subway ticket and her blessing. She scoffed at the idea that strangers were lurking nearby just waiting to ‘abduct’ her ‘adorable child.’ It was a strategy calculated to make her detractors feel silly. We must be neurotic is the inference, if we believe that until a child is old enough to protect himself from cunning predators it’s our duty to vigilant on their behalf. I wasn’t convinced by most of Skenazy’s flip justifications and contradictions. She trusted her son to negotiate his way home safely, but worried that he’d lose a cell phone if she provided him with one. It was his first excursion alone but she didn’t think it appropriate to ‘trail her son like a ‘mommy private eye’, New York was hardly ‘downtown Baghdad’ so by comparison NY must be safe. I don’t think Skenazy is a bad mother. I just see her as somebody at the other end of the parenting spectrum. There are the overprotective hovering mums at one end and those like Skenazy at the other. The rest of us are in-betweeners muddling along the best we can. We don’t pretend we know it all; it’s not possible given that we’re rank beginners when our first child arrives. Like any other worthwhile profession, there’s a learning curve involved to good parenting.
Three decades ago my five year old son had already ‘figured out’ how to get home on his own, ‘no problem’, he said, or something like it, I’m paraphrasing as I wasn’t listening at the time. Most young mums tend to zone out occasionally if they value their sanity. We had been walking to and from school all year. It was only a 20 minute walk, but there was a busy highway to negotiate. In hindsight (and ain’t that a grand thing) I should have taken more notice because halfway through the school year, David did walk home by himself.
I was only five minutes late, for heaven’s sake. I took the bus to catch up time and when I arrived, David had left. He had hiked his school bag higher on his shoulder and walked confidently out the front gate along with his peers and their parents.
I scoured the streets then made my way home. My neighbour came out of her house holding the hand of a safe but teary David. He’d been standing outside our front door crying so our neighbour had taken him in and plied him with milk and scones.
I was pretty teary myself and immensely relieved. I hugged David then shook him and asked what had possessed him. It was a spur of the moment decision that could have taken a scary direction, one that doesn’t bear considering. The only good thing that had come out of that event was a lesson learned that thankfully hadn’t proved disastrous.
Given a couple of extra years and David would have come home with friends and his younger brother for company, there’s safety in numbers. He would have a couple of years’ worth of life experience under his belt and the road rules down pat.
If you tell a five year old child not to talk to strangers, he will nod as if he understands, except that in his mind a stranger has fangs and claws. Even if you tell him that a stranger could be a smiling stranger who offers him sweets and ice cream a child is used to doing what he’s told to by adults. What hope would he have had if somebody had forced him into a car?
In January this year a man attempted to abduct a 10 year old boy from a car park in Melbourne’s south-east. This boy was waiting for his mother in the family car when he was approached by a man who offered him lollies. When the boy refused to come with him the man tried to pull the boy from the car. He was unsuccessful that time. But if this man had pulled harder or persisted it could have had a negative ending for that boy and his family.
Adults make hundreds of decisions every day based on life experience and even then they can’t count on getting it right every time. How can you expect it of a five or even a nine year old? Every parent has a responsibility to keep his or her children safe until they’re ready to do it on their own.
In 2008 a mum called Lenore Skenazy wrote an article about letting go for the New York Sun that caused a stir with a bunch of other mums. I first read about her when she came to Australia in 2010 to sell her book, Free Range Kids. The book was a result of the 2008 experience. Ms Skenazy’s child had begged her to ‘leave him somewhere, anywhere, and let him try to figure out how to get home on his own’, and she obliged.
Skenazy had allowed her then 9 year old son to travel the subway alone and make his own way home. ‘One sunny Sunday’ she left him at Bloomingdales armed with 20 dollars, a map, a subway ticket and her blessing. She scoffed at the idea that strangers were lurking nearby just waiting to ‘abduct’ her ‘adorable child.’ It was a strategy calculated to make her detractors feel silly. We must be neurotic is the inference, if we believe that until a child is old enough to protect himself from cunning predators it’s our duty to vigilant on their behalf. I wasn’t convinced by most of Skenazy’s flip justifications and contradictions. She trusted her son to negotiate his way home safely, but worried that he’d lose a cell phone if she provided him with one. It was his first excursion alone but she didn’t think it appropriate to ‘trail her son like a ‘mommy private eye’, New York was hardly ‘downtown Baghdad’ so by comparison NY must be safe. I don’t think Skenazy is a bad mother. I just see her as somebody at the other end of the parenting spectrum. There are the overprotective hovering mums at one end and those like Skenazy at the other. The rest of us are in-betweeners muddling along the best we can. We don’t pretend we know it all; it’s not possible given that we’re rank beginners when our first child arrives. Like any other worthwhile profession, there’s a learning curve involved to good parenting.
Three decades ago my five year old son had already ‘figured out’ how to get home on his own, ‘no problem’, he said, or something like it, I’m paraphrasing as I wasn’t listening at the time. Most young mums tend to zone out occasionally if they value their sanity. We had been walking to and from school all year. It was only a 20 minute walk, but there was a busy highway to negotiate. In hindsight (and ain’t that a grand thing) I should have taken more notice because halfway through the school year, David did walk home by himself.
I was only five minutes late, for heaven’s sake. I took the bus to catch up time and when I arrived, David had left. He had hiked his school bag higher on his shoulder and walked confidently out the front gate along with his peers and their parents.
I scoured the streets then made my way home. My neighbour came out of her house holding the hand of a safe but teary David. He’d been standing outside our front door crying so our neighbour had taken him in and plied him with milk and scones.
I was pretty teary myself and immensely relieved. I hugged David then shook him and asked what had possessed him. It was a spur of the moment decision that could have taken a scary direction, one that doesn’t bear considering. The only good thing that had come out of that event was a lesson learned that thankfully hadn’t proved disastrous.
Given a couple of extra years and David would have come home with friends and his younger brother for company, there’s safety in numbers. He would have a couple of years’ worth of life experience under his belt and the road rules down pat.
If you tell a five year old child not to talk to strangers, he will nod as if he understands, except that in his mind a stranger has fangs and claws. Even if you tell him that a stranger could be a smiling stranger who offers him sweets and ice cream a child is used to doing what he’s told to by adults. What hope would he have had if somebody had forced him into a car?
In January this year a man attempted to abduct a 10 year old boy from a car park in Melbourne’s south-east. This boy was waiting for his mother in the family car when he was approached by a man who offered him lollies. When the boy refused to come with him the man tried to pull the boy from the car. He was unsuccessful that time. But if this man had pulled harder or persisted it could have had a negative ending for that boy and his family.
Adults make hundreds of decisions every day based on life experience and even then they can’t count on getting it right every time. How can you expect it of a five or even a nine year old? Every parent has a responsibility to keep his or her children safe until they’re ready to do it on their own.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
The Wheels on the Bus
I was on my way home longing to put my feet up and ready for a cuppa. Browsing at the local shopping complex really takes it out on me these days. Opposite me on the bus sat a woman and her two children. She was perched at the edge of her seat ready to spring into action like the proverbial jack-in-the-box. A two year old girl was in a pram and her brother who looked three or four, an energetic bundle, was busy making mischief. He grabbed his sister’s drink bottle and she shrieked till she got it back; he poked her, she shrieked some more, then he tried to free himself from his mother’s grasp so he could run down the other end of the bus. She threatened to take away privileges, he ignored her.
The two were stuck in that vicious cycle that mums who have more than one child under school age often find themselves. The little boy had misbehaved to get her attention and his frazzled mum gave it to him as he instinctively knew she would. The fact that it was the wrong kind of attention didn’t seem to matter to him. He’d had his mum all to himself for at least two years and now he was forced to share it with a puny, useless little thing who couldn’t talk, couldn’t play games and for some reason he wasn’t able to comprehend, got things her own way all the time. Unfair!
And threats were never going to work on him. At his age he couldn’t conceive as far ahead as the next day or even the same afternoon. ‘You’re going to your room as soon as we get home if you don’t behave’ got that mother nowhere.
An elderly woman sitting next to me implied that if it would all be different if she were in charge. ‘If I had you for two weeks, you’d know what’s what,’ she said. ‘I’m not known as the dragon lady for nothing.’ I visualised a large wooden spoon in this lady’s past and shuddered. The boy ignored her and the mother, at whom it seemed aimed, didn’t respond but I could tell that she felt shamed.
So, what should the mum have done? The answers, never simple, are sure to come to her thick and fast when the children are all grown up, or at least old enough to go to school and give her a break and a chance to think. I usually mind my own business but the poor mum looked so done in I wanted to help.
When my grandchildren and I are out and about I bring along some distractions: a favourite book, colouring book and pencils and the trusty notebook I always carry with me. The latter is used for playing hangman which, for those who haven’t experienced it in their youth, is a game that requires you to think and to know how to spell. Even before she could read, my granddaughter Rachel loved to play ‘I Spy.’ She was most enthusiastic about the game even if she usually got the words wrong. ‘Book doesn’t begin with ‘D’, it begins with ‘B’, Rachel, but good try.’ I made up stories that involved my granddaughters. They weren’t good stories but I don’t think they noticed, children love being the central characters whether in real life or in a story.
I whipped out my notebook book and a biro. ‘Would you like to draw something for mummy?’ I asked. The little boy stopped mid-rampage. I held the notebook out. He looked at his mother who nodded and he slowly took it from my hand. Peace reigned for the five minutes he was on the bus.
I don’t think my actions turned that little boy’s life around or his mother's for that matter. Dealing with the young and the boisterous is too complex a matter for simple solutions. It’s just that as I watched this young mum going under I was overcome with an intense a feeling of déjà-vu. I knew then that whether past, present or future, thousands of mothers have been, are, or will experience the same sort of distress. I imagined this mum sitting on a bus one future day; watching a similar scene playing itself out and nodding knowingly. Perhaps then, she will do as I did and be one mum offering another a lifeline.
The two were stuck in that vicious cycle that mums who have more than one child under school age often find themselves. The little boy had misbehaved to get her attention and his frazzled mum gave it to him as he instinctively knew she would. The fact that it was the wrong kind of attention didn’t seem to matter to him. He’d had his mum all to himself for at least two years and now he was forced to share it with a puny, useless little thing who couldn’t talk, couldn’t play games and for some reason he wasn’t able to comprehend, got things her own way all the time. Unfair!
And threats were never going to work on him. At his age he couldn’t conceive as far ahead as the next day or even the same afternoon. ‘You’re going to your room as soon as we get home if you don’t behave’ got that mother nowhere.
An elderly woman sitting next to me implied that if it would all be different if she were in charge. ‘If I had you for two weeks, you’d know what’s what,’ she said. ‘I’m not known as the dragon lady for nothing.’ I visualised a large wooden spoon in this lady’s past and shuddered. The boy ignored her and the mother, at whom it seemed aimed, didn’t respond but I could tell that she felt shamed.
So, what should the mum have done? The answers, never simple, are sure to come to her thick and fast when the children are all grown up, or at least old enough to go to school and give her a break and a chance to think. I usually mind my own business but the poor mum looked so done in I wanted to help.
When my grandchildren and I are out and about I bring along some distractions: a favourite book, colouring book and pencils and the trusty notebook I always carry with me. The latter is used for playing hangman which, for those who haven’t experienced it in their youth, is a game that requires you to think and to know how to spell. Even before she could read, my granddaughter Rachel loved to play ‘I Spy.’ She was most enthusiastic about the game even if she usually got the words wrong. ‘Book doesn’t begin with ‘D’, it begins with ‘B’, Rachel, but good try.’ I made up stories that involved my granddaughters. They weren’t good stories but I don’t think they noticed, children love being the central characters whether in real life or in a story.
I whipped out my notebook book and a biro. ‘Would you like to draw something for mummy?’ I asked. The little boy stopped mid-rampage. I held the notebook out. He looked at his mother who nodded and he slowly took it from my hand. Peace reigned for the five minutes he was on the bus.
I don’t think my actions turned that little boy’s life around or his mother's for that matter. Dealing with the young and the boisterous is too complex a matter for simple solutions. It’s just that as I watched this young mum going under I was overcome with an intense a feeling of déjà-vu. I knew then that whether past, present or future, thousands of mothers have been, are, or will experience the same sort of distress. I imagined this mum sitting on a bus one future day; watching a similar scene playing itself out and nodding knowingly. Perhaps then, she will do as I did and be one mum offering another a lifeline.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Better to give than to receive?
I’ve heard that it is better to give than to receive so I tested out that theory last New Year. I combined my New Year’s resolution with the inspirational truism and offered my excess weight to friends, fellow countrymen and friendly strangers but they were having none of it. It was post the festive season and people had plenty of their own to give away. The competition and I gathered on dark street corners, flipping open belted raincoats at the propitious moment. Please sir, was the plaintive plea, take a kilo home for the missus and the kids, they will thank you.
That tactic did not go down a treat, so I decided cold turkey was the go. If I wanted to lose the kilos I needed to give up eating altogether. That didn’t work any longer than it took to wolf down a chocolate croissant. I needed to nourish the brain cells while planning my strategies. The in between meals are even harder to give away than the fat. And pre dinner nibbles are my downfall. That’s why I love breakfast, there’s no thinking involved. It’s either cereal, or eggs on toast with the trimmings. It’s quick to make and easily scoffed down. Just talking about it gives me an urge for a Spanish omelette. I sat al fresco at my favourite greasy spoon munching at a Danish and slugging down a cappuccino and decided I had to give up on giving up food.
A really nice lady took me around my local gym and introduced me to the equipment. It was a vast, intimidating and confusing array of tortured metal. Each piece specialised in toning up different muscles I was told. The only two I recognised from a past life were the bike and the treadmill. I chose the latter thinking it couldn’t be too hard given that I’ve had a fair bit of practice in walking (although not recently). After five minutes of that I felt light headed. Perhaps I’d lost a kilo off my head. Did I want to try out the aerobics class, the nice lady asked? I checked out the taut bodies that had poured themselves into spandex and decided that I didn’t.
When I got home and weighed myself I discovered that I hadn’t even managed that one kilo. Should I try sensible eating and long walks? Maybe once I have been through all the diet literature
That tactic did not go down a treat, so I decided cold turkey was the go. If I wanted to lose the kilos I needed to give up eating altogether. That didn’t work any longer than it took to wolf down a chocolate croissant. I needed to nourish the brain cells while planning my strategies. The in between meals are even harder to give away than the fat. And pre dinner nibbles are my downfall. That’s why I love breakfast, there’s no thinking involved. It’s either cereal, or eggs on toast with the trimmings. It’s quick to make and easily scoffed down. Just talking about it gives me an urge for a Spanish omelette. I sat al fresco at my favourite greasy spoon munching at a Danish and slugging down a cappuccino and decided I had to give up on giving up food.
A really nice lady took me around my local gym and introduced me to the equipment. It was a vast, intimidating and confusing array of tortured metal. Each piece specialised in toning up different muscles I was told. The only two I recognised from a past life were the bike and the treadmill. I chose the latter thinking it couldn’t be too hard given that I’ve had a fair bit of practice in walking (although not recently). After five minutes of that I felt light headed. Perhaps I’d lost a kilo off my head. Did I want to try out the aerobics class, the nice lady asked? I checked out the taut bodies that had poured themselves into spandex and decided that I didn’t.
When I got home and weighed myself I discovered that I hadn’t even managed that one kilo. Should I try sensible eating and long walks? Maybe once I have been through all the diet literature
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Sterilising Parents?
I’ve always believed that parenting should be a privilege not a right. I believe that possessing the prerequisite organs to produce children or having access to invitro fertilisation should not give people automatic right to breed. That's my right in a democracy. Unfortunatel democracy works for everyone, even bad parents. Two women in France suffocated their new born babies (several between them). One of them was quoted to have said that two children was enough. Women in this country have dumped babies in cardboard boxes and left them to die. The sympathy is less for the babies and more for the state of mind of these women. Some men are violent to their children or violate them or throw them off bridges. Despite the myths and the emotive issues surrounding parenting, not everyone is suited to it.
That’s why I understood Norman Geschke’s outburst. Geschke is a former Victorian ombudsman who believes that parents who consistently abuse their children should be sterilised. He wrote ‘several scathing reports on child-protection services [or lack of them]. As this was between 1980 and 1994 I assume that he doesn't believe much has changed since that time. Greschke said that 'keeping children with abusive parents is "sentencing" vulnerable kids to a life without proper care.’ My first instinct when I read that he wanted absusive parents sterilised was to want to shout hooray from the rooftops. It was a wonderful fantasy for the two seconds that it lasted. Then I thought it through and I was forced, reluctantly, to disagree.
Love it or hate it, what you get in a Democracy is governments that you can toss out if they do the wrong thing by you and a powerful lobby group called people power. Whenever an issue comes up experts are hauled out to respond with quotes but seem to let it all sink into back into the subconscious once the furore is over. Victoria's Child Safety Commissioner Bernie Geary ‘savaged the concept [of sterilisation] as inhumane.' Stating what’s obvious to the rest of us is one thing, but the public expects more from a Child Safety Commissioner. How much more impressed I would have been had he followed up that statement with an idea for a workable solution on protecting children.
I know about Joe Tucci the Australian Childhood Foundation's chief executive. because he is not only constantly called out for an opinion, but because he is constantly proactively championing for children's rights and pushing for change whether asked for an opinion or not. Tucci doesn’t believe in sterilising abusive parents either, he believes in harsher rules for parents who have a history of abuse. And he wants the rules about terminating rights to be clearer than they currently are. Sounds simple doesn't it?
Here’s an idea. Instead of getting emotive about sterilisation, why don't the experts push for stronger laws that will not hesitate in taking vulnerable children from their abusive parents? No second chances, for heaven’s sake. We jail people who steal money but give abusive parents second chances. How inconsistent is that? Despite the neo-think and neo-babble coming from some quarters, children are not better off with such parents. I suspect part of the problem is that there's not much of an infrastructure in place for those children, which makes it even more reprehensible.
There is a 'paid' and voluntary system of sterilisation in the US, but our democratic rights don't allow for compulsory sterilisation. Sorry Mr Geschke, it’s not going to happen. So now that we have parents' rights all sorted out, why not focus on children. Immediate action without the usual pitty-pattying around political correctness. Surely that’s what most of us want. Why not push for hefty jail sentences? I’m sure the civil libertarians will be up in arms about it all, but let's give them a swift clip across the ears, they will be the first to tell you it didn’t hurt and just maybe it will jog their collective consciences and remind them that the vulnerable are also worthy of their attention.
As I said, it was a nice dream while it lasted, Mr Geschke, but sterilisation is barbaric, it's uncivilised. And for those who disagree, think of this – once you curtail one freedom there’s always going to be some power mad politician taking things a step further. That’s how things get changed, one little step at a time so you don’t realise the intended and or even indirect consequences till it’s too late. Pretty soon, just like Hitler’s Germany, nobody but the blue eyed blonds will be acceptable. And they had better watch out that they don’t get old and grey, because eugenics would be a bright idea waiting to happen just around the corner.
That’s why I understood Norman Geschke’s outburst. Geschke is a former Victorian ombudsman who believes that parents who consistently abuse their children should be sterilised. He wrote ‘several scathing reports on child-protection services [or lack of them]. As this was between 1980 and 1994 I assume that he doesn't believe much has changed since that time. Greschke said that 'keeping children with abusive parents is "sentencing" vulnerable kids to a life without proper care.’ My first instinct when I read that he wanted absusive parents sterilised was to want to shout hooray from the rooftops. It was a wonderful fantasy for the two seconds that it lasted. Then I thought it through and I was forced, reluctantly, to disagree.
Love it or hate it, what you get in a Democracy is governments that you can toss out if they do the wrong thing by you and a powerful lobby group called people power. Whenever an issue comes up experts are hauled out to respond with quotes but seem to let it all sink into back into the subconscious once the furore is over. Victoria's Child Safety Commissioner Bernie Geary ‘savaged the concept [of sterilisation] as inhumane.' Stating what’s obvious to the rest of us is one thing, but the public expects more from a Child Safety Commissioner. How much more impressed I would have been had he followed up that statement with an idea for a workable solution on protecting children.
I know about Joe Tucci the Australian Childhood Foundation's chief executive. because he is not only constantly called out for an opinion, but because he is constantly proactively championing for children's rights and pushing for change whether asked for an opinion or not. Tucci doesn’t believe in sterilising abusive parents either, he believes in harsher rules for parents who have a history of abuse. And he wants the rules about terminating rights to be clearer than they currently are. Sounds simple doesn't it?
Here’s an idea. Instead of getting emotive about sterilisation, why don't the experts push for stronger laws that will not hesitate in taking vulnerable children from their abusive parents? No second chances, for heaven’s sake. We jail people who steal money but give abusive parents second chances. How inconsistent is that? Despite the neo-think and neo-babble coming from some quarters, children are not better off with such parents. I suspect part of the problem is that there's not much of an infrastructure in place for those children, which makes it even more reprehensible.
There is a 'paid' and voluntary system of sterilisation in the US, but our democratic rights don't allow for compulsory sterilisation. Sorry Mr Geschke, it’s not going to happen. So now that we have parents' rights all sorted out, why not focus on children. Immediate action without the usual pitty-pattying around political correctness. Surely that’s what most of us want. Why not push for hefty jail sentences? I’m sure the civil libertarians will be up in arms about it all, but let's give them a swift clip across the ears, they will be the first to tell you it didn’t hurt and just maybe it will jog their collective consciences and remind them that the vulnerable are also worthy of their attention.
As I said, it was a nice dream while it lasted, Mr Geschke, but sterilisation is barbaric, it's uncivilised. And for those who disagree, think of this – once you curtail one freedom there’s always going to be some power mad politician taking things a step further. That’s how things get changed, one little step at a time so you don’t realise the intended and or even indirect consequences till it’s too late. Pretty soon, just like Hitler’s Germany, nobody but the blue eyed blonds will be acceptable. And they had better watch out that they don’t get old and grey, because eugenics would be a bright idea waiting to happen just around the corner.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Letting go
I have deleted the original and totally re-written 'When do you let go.' This the great thing about a blog. Once you send your piece off for somebody else to publish, it's no longer your call what happens to it or how it's edited. Hope you like this version better.
When do you let go? It’s a question every mother since the dawn of time has asked herself. As far as I know, no one has come up with the definitive answer yet. Neither had I one Monday morning many years ago. Or maybe it was a Tuesday. When one day merges into the other it’s hard to tell. Whatever the day, my routine was set in stone. I would have been busy counting, changing and soaking nappies. After that I’d feed my child, play with him, clean up after him and prepare his evening meal. The conclusion I came to when a stray thought interrupted my busy routine, was that it was no time to philosophise, there was a seemingly endless vista of years ahead of me, lots of time to work things out. I put off the question, till I could give it my full consideration.
No time to do that on my first child’s first day at kinder. I was too busy dealing with my stressed child. David cried and clutched my hand. I gently disengaged it with some soothing words about our meeting again soon. I did some weeping myself on the way home and wondered why I couldn’t take a leaf out of our cat’s book. We had found a home for her kittens. In only a matter of weeks Toffee had no trouble at all turning a disinterested back on her frolicking children. Given a couple of months more and she wouldn’t have known them had they had passed her in the street. I wiped away the tears and went home to clear up the chaos and get ready for the next round. I didn’t have time for self pity.
There was excitement at the local primary school on David’s first day. We were surrounded by mothers and by hyperactive children. Others, first timers, stood around quietly watching as the veterans gathered in little groups talking and their children who obviously also knew each other played chasey. Not knowing or caring that there was an etiquette to these things, David tried to extricate himself from my grip. He was raring to go and meet these children. He wanted to make friends, and he instinctively knew that hand holding wasn’t what a school boy did. Anyhow why was I keeping him from that big adventure that his dad and I had been preparing him for? I looked at the well scrubbed young man; his usually unruly curls were damped, his crisp white shirt already needed tucking in, grey shorts exposed two skinny little legs, a scabby knee and several bruises. It was obvious that David was ready for school, but was I?
I pushed that thought back into the subconscious void where all uncomfortable thoughts go. My husband and I thought we had prepared for it all, but we hadn’t counted on our own reactions when David came home chattering about the best little teacher in the world. From that time on it was, Miss Smith said, Mr Brown said all the way through primary school. David continued to consult us, but we became increasingly aware that we had competition. Our son’s horizons had expanded and a host of Miss Smiths were going to be vying for our boy’s attention.
Occasionally parents could still be useful, helping out with homework, ironing uniforms and moonlighting as chauffeurs. And what did I think of this or that girl, David wanted to know. He felt a bit awkward and unsure. I took it to mean that I had a mandate to express my thoughts and did it, constantly. But one day he stopped asking or listening. In fact he discouraged any sort of dialogue on the matter. David was making up his own mind about girls and life and the universe. It was devastating to be demoted from a proactive parent to a figurehead, devastating but not sudden. The indicators that my son had become independent of us had been there if I had chosen to take notice.
I'm much wiser after the event. I know now that parenting is a series of letting go. Children know it instinctively, but it’s such a slow process that it takes parents a lot longer to pick up on it. When you begin with vulnerable and reliant children and have committed you life to them for years or even decades, it's hard to notice when they have finally stopped needing us. When they finally distance themselves from us and our windmill arms it's only natural that we are left bereft. I know now that if we play our cards right and constantly remind ourselves that our children are on loan to us only, we could have a life after they have left us. Well, we could have a life till they haul us out of retirement for babysitting duties, but that’s another story.
When do you let go? It’s a question every mother since the dawn of time has asked herself. As far as I know, no one has come up with the definitive answer yet. Neither had I one Monday morning many years ago. Or maybe it was a Tuesday. When one day merges into the other it’s hard to tell. Whatever the day, my routine was set in stone. I would have been busy counting, changing and soaking nappies. After that I’d feed my child, play with him, clean up after him and prepare his evening meal. The conclusion I came to when a stray thought interrupted my busy routine, was that it was no time to philosophise, there was a seemingly endless vista of years ahead of me, lots of time to work things out. I put off the question, till I could give it my full consideration.
No time to do that on my first child’s first day at kinder. I was too busy dealing with my stressed child. David cried and clutched my hand. I gently disengaged it with some soothing words about our meeting again soon. I did some weeping myself on the way home and wondered why I couldn’t take a leaf out of our cat’s book. We had found a home for her kittens. In only a matter of weeks Toffee had no trouble at all turning a disinterested back on her frolicking children. Given a couple of months more and she wouldn’t have known them had they had passed her in the street. I wiped away the tears and went home to clear up the chaos and get ready for the next round. I didn’t have time for self pity.
There was excitement at the local primary school on David’s first day. We were surrounded by mothers and by hyperactive children. Others, first timers, stood around quietly watching as the veterans gathered in little groups talking and their children who obviously also knew each other played chasey. Not knowing or caring that there was an etiquette to these things, David tried to extricate himself from my grip. He was raring to go and meet these children. He wanted to make friends, and he instinctively knew that hand holding wasn’t what a school boy did. Anyhow why was I keeping him from that big adventure that his dad and I had been preparing him for? I looked at the well scrubbed young man; his usually unruly curls were damped, his crisp white shirt already needed tucking in, grey shorts exposed two skinny little legs, a scabby knee and several bruises. It was obvious that David was ready for school, but was I?
I pushed that thought back into the subconscious void where all uncomfortable thoughts go. My husband and I thought we had prepared for it all, but we hadn’t counted on our own reactions when David came home chattering about the best little teacher in the world. From that time on it was, Miss Smith said, Mr Brown said all the way through primary school. David continued to consult us, but we became increasingly aware that we had competition. Our son’s horizons had expanded and a host of Miss Smiths were going to be vying for our boy’s attention.
Occasionally parents could still be useful, helping out with homework, ironing uniforms and moonlighting as chauffeurs. And what did I think of this or that girl, David wanted to know. He felt a bit awkward and unsure. I took it to mean that I had a mandate to express my thoughts and did it, constantly. But one day he stopped asking or listening. In fact he discouraged any sort of dialogue on the matter. David was making up his own mind about girls and life and the universe. It was devastating to be demoted from a proactive parent to a figurehead, devastating but not sudden. The indicators that my son had become independent of us had been there if I had chosen to take notice.
I'm much wiser after the event. I know now that parenting is a series of letting go. Children know it instinctively, but it’s such a slow process that it takes parents a lot longer to pick up on it. When you begin with vulnerable and reliant children and have committed you life to them for years or even decades, it's hard to notice when they have finally stopped needing us. When they finally distance themselves from us and our windmill arms it's only natural that we are left bereft. I know now that if we play our cards right and constantly remind ourselves that our children are on loan to us only, we could have a life after they have left us. Well, we could have a life till they haul us out of retirement for babysitting duties, but that’s another story.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Quitting
I woke up one morning to find both nicotine and oxygen jockeying for first place in my affections and the nicotine was winning hands down. It wasn’t unexpected the indicators had been creeping up on me for years: coughing up phlegm, developing a gravelly voice and coughing fits when laughing, no laughing matter, but I had ignored them. That morning had been a scary one, I had finally reached what gamblers and alcoholics call ‘rock bottom.’ My lungs seemed to have packed it in and there was nowhere left for me to go. That was the day that I went cold turkey and stopped smoking for good.
I had tried every other trick in the book, that’s why I knew it had to be cold turkey. I slept in thinking that a later start would drive some of that nicotine out of my system. I sat in my arm chair and knitted or read or watched TV and kept myself distracted as long as possible. I once had an idea that if I took half the cigs out of my daily packet I could decrease my intake till I was down to none.
Those ideas were bound to fail. I hadn’t been able to make a move without those cigarettes for four decades. Whatever the occasion, I had to have something in my mouth. My pals and I, together, first thing in the morning out in the garden, last thing at night we were inseparable enjoying the sunset, and all those other occasions in between. From first puff to last gasp. There wasn’t a thought or an action without my constant companions along for company. Something more drastic than feeble ideas based on desperation was expected. I knew what I needed to do but I was in denial and not ready to do it.
There were no patches back then, but they wouldn’t have helped. Like gamblers and alcoholics and like overeaters, I had a compulsive personality and would just have got hooked on the patches. I was that good girl who cleaned her plate at dinner; I ate all the chips then worked my finger round the pack to find the crumbs and salt hiding down the bottom, I finished all that I started. It was impossible to leave a cigarette unsmoked, I had to suck up every leaf of tobacco and would have inhaled the butt if I could.
Even though not another cig has passed my lips in over a decade since that day I can’t say I was an overnight success. It took a forty year journey of stops and starts to get me to that place and two determined years before, to paraphrase other compulsives, I ‘let go’ of those cigs.
Fear for my life had stopped me cold and anger was what kept me going until all that nicotine was flushed out of my system. I used to hear what those chemicals were doing to me but this was the first time I was experiencing them first hand. It must be different for everyone because my mother stopped smoking and was cranky for a whole week, then it was over. She never looked back. It took me a couple of years. Getting rid of the nicotine was painful. My chest constricted, a cartload of spiky heels did their daily cha cha up and down my body. I was determined to eject that nicotine.
A recent Cancer Council advertisement tells people not to give up giving up. It's positive and encouraging. Each smoker has to reach the rock bottom stage and decide for him or herself what it will take to quit. There isn't a universal panacea but like the Cancer Council, I think that anyone can do it if they keep on keeping on.
I had tried every other trick in the book, that’s why I knew it had to be cold turkey. I slept in thinking that a later start would drive some of that nicotine out of my system. I sat in my arm chair and knitted or read or watched TV and kept myself distracted as long as possible. I once had an idea that if I took half the cigs out of my daily packet I could decrease my intake till I was down to none.
Those ideas were bound to fail. I hadn’t been able to make a move without those cigarettes for four decades. Whatever the occasion, I had to have something in my mouth. My pals and I, together, first thing in the morning out in the garden, last thing at night we were inseparable enjoying the sunset, and all those other occasions in between. From first puff to last gasp. There wasn’t a thought or an action without my constant companions along for company. Something more drastic than feeble ideas based on desperation was expected. I knew what I needed to do but I was in denial and not ready to do it.
There were no patches back then, but they wouldn’t have helped. Like gamblers and alcoholics and like overeaters, I had a compulsive personality and would just have got hooked on the patches. I was that good girl who cleaned her plate at dinner; I ate all the chips then worked my finger round the pack to find the crumbs and salt hiding down the bottom, I finished all that I started. It was impossible to leave a cigarette unsmoked, I had to suck up every leaf of tobacco and would have inhaled the butt if I could.
Even though not another cig has passed my lips in over a decade since that day I can’t say I was an overnight success. It took a forty year journey of stops and starts to get me to that place and two determined years before, to paraphrase other compulsives, I ‘let go’ of those cigs.
Fear for my life had stopped me cold and anger was what kept me going until all that nicotine was flushed out of my system. I used to hear what those chemicals were doing to me but this was the first time I was experiencing them first hand. It must be different for everyone because my mother stopped smoking and was cranky for a whole week, then it was over. She never looked back. It took me a couple of years. Getting rid of the nicotine was painful. My chest constricted, a cartload of spiky heels did their daily cha cha up and down my body. I was determined to eject that nicotine.
A recent Cancer Council advertisement tells people not to give up giving up. It's positive and encouraging. Each smoker has to reach the rock bottom stage and decide for him or herself what it will take to quit. There isn't a universal panacea but like the Cancer Council, I think that anyone can do it if they keep on keeping on.
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