i lied to wingman the other evening and was questioned by the duke about it...
"mama, you lied to him"
now see here is one of those moments in parenting when you can go one of many ways...you can do the whole huffy puffy i am the parent do not question me! way or you can be an actual adult about it...
something i am not too familiar with, this being an adult thing...
but i gave it a shot...
"you're right i did lie...i told what i would call a white lie...it's when you tell someone something that is definitely not true, but does not harm them and in fact may spare them some pain"
"but it's still lying"
no flies on you, kid...
"yep, you're right...it is still lying...but as a parent and an adult sometimes you have to make a decision to bend the rules a bit...it's something you have to earn...wingman wanted to stay up and watch t.v with you...by telling him you weren't going to watch t.v he was satisfied he wasn't missing out...if he knew you were watching good eats and he had to go to bed he would be very sad and cry himself to sleep...he's tired and doesn't feel well and misses papa, i want him to go to bed and get some rest...not cry himself to sleep"
"so you told him that so he wouldn't be sad"
"right, it's still a lie...it still is not right, but it's a decision i felt i could make...because i am an adult and a mama and i was concerned for his feelings"
that seemed to be it for now...
accountability...wow, as these kids get older they really come into their own in the bullshit detector department...it's frightening this idea that i must be accountable as a human to my kids...
we assume as parents that we are *in charge*...and that's just the way it is...but it isn't...it isn't as kids grow and mature just like we want them to do....work so hard for them to do...but as they grow into their own people, they become part of the family in a way they weren't as babies and toddlers and little kids...they become part of the community of family...we expect accountability from them, and they expect it from us...
and this is how it *should* be (in my humble opinion) in a family...every one is accountable and therefore responsible for their own behavior...it's what makes a family work...
but it doesn't mean i like it...i don't like being under a microscope...i don't like being questioned or judged or told what to do or have any kind of comments made about my behavior or how i conduct my parenting, etc...
basically i am bitchy and controlling with a very healthy ego and my children's adolescence will likely kill me...
moving right along to today's $1 menu tao
time
the river, surging course,
uninterrupted current.
headwater, channel, mouth.
can they be divided?
each moment, whether it be from the past, the present, or the future is all part of a whole...we need the balance that comes from the continual flow of time...just as a river cannot be divided, nor can time be...
how do we know where we're going if we don't know where we've been and where we may end up?...
i would very much like to have a conversation with bush and cheney about this very subject...
that and how they manage to survive the adolescence of their own used to be teenaged children...i don't know much about cheney's kids but good lord those bush twins seem like they were quite a "handful"...
happy st. nicholas day...patron saint of children and all around good guy...in honor of him, go do something nice for someone today...
x.
p.s. don't forget a charlie brown christmas is on tonight at 8pm on ABC...it would NOT be christmas without it!
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