Mac’s teacher recounted a cute story about him where apparently all the little boys were telling her how nice she is and Mac gave her a big smile and said “Yeah, Mrs. Wooten, you’re as nice as a crab”. She thought it was so sweet and funny and had to share it.
I thought it sounded suspicious so I asked him “Mac, are crabs nice?” to which he responded “no” so then I asked “well, if crabs aren’t nice, then why did you tell Mrs. Wooten that she is as nice as a crab?”.
A huge smile came across his face as he looked me in the eye and explained
“I didn’t say she was nice as a crab, Mom, I said she was nice as crap”.
Ah, yes, that sounds my like my child. Big brother of the little devil who grabbed the heavenly host out of the Priest’s hand as he was giving me communion on Sunday and yelled “I want the Jesus!.” That wasn’t embarrassing – or a one way ticket to hell – was it?
The behavior of my sweet little ones has me thinking “what’s wrong with kids today?”
There was an incident at an exclusive all-boys private school near where I live that involved boys setting up a “fantasy sex draft” where they each picked girls from other local schools for their “fantasy team” and gave their teams really vulgar names like “the south side slam pigs”. Then they threw parties inviting girls from their teams and earned points for “scoring” with them. Are you kidding me? Who are these kids and how can they possibly think acting this way is acceptable?
A couple of days after reading about this incident in Bethesda Magazine, I watched School Ties on cable and pictured Matt Damon’s obnoxious prep student character as one of the fantasy sex draft boys. Could it be that elitist schools produce assholes? Possibly, but assuming that all kids who go to those sorts of schools are dicks is as bad as them assuming they have the right to step on other people so I’m not going to go there.
Is it because technology has turned kids into maniacs who think they’re above the law? The texting, the sexting, the overload of information on the internet – maybe it’s all too much.
Is it because their idols are all idiots who are in and out of relationships, trouble or jail on a daily basis? And the ones who haven’t gone to jail are just stupid. Have you heard that ridiculous Ke$ha song where she samples “there’s a place in France, where the naked ladies dance?”.
That’s like me writing a blog where I spend the entire time quoting “there once was a man from Nantucket”. It’s bad enough she spells her name with a dollar sign and wakes up in the morning feeling like that loser P Diddy, but now she’s bogarting my dirty childhood limericks as song lyrics? And kids look up to this tool. No wonder the youth of today is going down the crapper.
My kids have the cutest little faces and exhibit the absolute worst behavior in town. Mac bounces off the wall, pouts, shows off and apparently uses foul language when speaking to teacher’s – though in his defense he’d heard his Dad say “as crap” and didn’t realize that crap means poo so lesson learned there, I hope. Charlie looks like a little angel – an angel who is filled with crazy rage. Lucifer, perhaps? I don’t think there’s been an angrier angel than that guy, right?
But the thing is as “bad” as my kids are – and trust me they are pretty bad – it’s all kid stuff. Inside they are still sweet and innocent and desperate for everyone’s approval. So how do I keep them from changing? How do I keep the core of goodness in my children from being overtaken by their obviously devilish nature? What makes some kids turn out like Taylor Swift and others turn out like Lindsay Lohan?
I’d like to say it’s the parents (yes, Dina Lohan, I'm talking to you) but I’d hate for anyone who sees me carrying a raging Charlie over my shoulder to judge me so I don’t know. I guess all we can do is keep trying and pray the best parts of their little souls will win out. The battle between good and evil is a tough one but if anyone is up to a fight it's my kids. Go Mac & Charlie!
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Thursday, September 16, 2010
My Mother
My mother never thought she played a big enough part in my life – or anyone’s – which is ironic since losing her is what defines my life now. It’s at the center of everything I do. I base my every action on making sure I never make anyone feel the way she made me feel on our hard days and that I never let anyone suffer alone the way she did on her worst days. I am grounded and empathetic and resilient – all because of her. Being forgotten is something she always worried about, but she shouldn’t have because I miss her more every single day that she’s gone. And I would trade almost anything to have her back. I write about my mother a lot because she still plays such a huge role in my life but due to how difficult our relationship was my memories of her aren’t always happy. The thing is because she was an untreated manic depressive the bad times with her were excruciating and the good times were unbelievably wonderful. And most days I only think about the good side so I don’t know why I refrain from sharing it more. Here are some of my good memories of my mother.
She let us drink pepsi pretty much from birth and when I went to elementary school and it was frowned upon for small children to drink pepsi she didn’t bow to the expectations of teachers and other parents – she just wrapped my pepsi can in tin foil as if it was some kind of disguise and sent it in my lunch box anyhow.
In the car she listened to 8 track tapes – some Barry Manilow, some broadway musical soundtracks and a bunch called “oldies but goodies” with 50’s and 60’s music. When “Duke of Earl” would come on she would sing “Duke, Duke, Duke; Bo & Luke, Luke, Luke; Uncle Jessie and Sexy Daisy” which we thought was hysterical because we were huge Dukes of Hazard fans. My kids have never seen The Dukes of Hazard but I taught them both that song and they love it.
She also had a cb in the car during the time that Smokey & the Bandit was popular. She called herself “Speedy Mama” and would talk to all the truckers while she drove us to school. Picture a woman 5 foot 2 with big perfect Doris Day blonde hair and a little tiny body wrapped in whatever preppy gear was popular holding her own with truckers in a car always filled with at least 5 or 6 children under ten and that was her.
When she was hung over (which was rare) she told us she had the Irish Flu. My brother and I thought it was something you could actually case – like the Swine Flu so we’d stay as far away from her as we could until she miraculously recovered the next day. Brilliant.
When I was a teenager she would buy me all the cutest clothes from whatever movie was cool at the time and if I didn’t want to wear them because I was always so insecure she would put them on and wear them out herself until I’d seen her in them enough times to feel like I could pull it off and want them back. She always looked better in them than I did even though I was 26.5 years younger.
My mom had charisma. She thought she was great and she was excited to go anywhere and when she walked into a room you felt her enthusiasm and you were drawn to her. She was always laughing the best laugh. And she made everything fun. We look exactly alike but I’ll never be her because she had something special that can’t be replicated. Marianne McCarthy brought the party just by walking in the door.
During dinner if conversation lulled or she was bored by us, she would start quoting from her favorite movies - The Sure Thing, Seems Like Old Times, or Night Shift. The quotes wouldn't make any sense in the context of what was going on but she would laugh so hard at herself that none of us could help but laugh either.
She made everyone feel special. My mom died when I was twenty seven years old. It had been fifteen years since I left elementary school and I hadn’t been back to that school since. But at my mom’s wake all of my elementary school teachers showed up. They didn’t all still work there and they hadn’t seen my family in a decade but they were all there. I was holding my own until I saw them and it just killed me. She was such a good mother, such a good person that no one ever forgot her. It was one of the most profound moments of my life.
My mother loved being Irish. She never said so but I think a big reason she fell for my dad was the great last name. We celebrated St. Patrick's Day like it was the Fourth of July. And we all felt proud to be McCarthy's.
My mom came on a lot of field trips when I was in elementary school and everyone always wanted to be in her group because she was the most fun chaperone. When we’d drive into DC on the bus, all the other moms would point out the monuments and the things we’d seen a thousand times. My mom would point out “there’s where Pa got mugged” and “there’s the liquor store where Uncle Jesse bought his beer” and then she would laugh and hand out secret M&Ms to everyone while the teachers weren’t looking.
My mom threw the best birthday parties that all involved some kind of hoopla like 15 little girls in the back of the station wagon going to the Ice Capades at the Capital Center on a school night.
My mom judged people pretty harshly but the people she loved she really loved. When she made me a memory book for my twenty fifth birthday and it asked who were her favorites of my friends she wrote Nancy and Patrick my two best childhood friends. I’d made so many new friends since then but I’d held onto Nancy and Patrick and so had she because for both of us that time in our life was our best time together.
When we got our first betamax, my mom would rent movies from the Photomat and borrow a neighbor’s betamax so that she could hook them both up and record bootleg versions of our favorite movies to watch again and again. She didn’t think it was illegal because she would fast forward and not start recording until after the FBI warning.
If I curled my bangs under too tightly in high school she would tell me I looked just like Sister Miriam who if you went to my high school you know was not the best looking nun ever.
On Sundays for football she wouldn’t make a real lunch or dinner. Instead she would make a full Super Bowl type spread every weekend including these little sausage things she called “Hog Balls” and we’d eat that ALL DAY.
She went a Bar Mitzvah once and since she didn’t understand Hebrew she was bored during the Torah portion where the boy reads from the Torah so after that whenever anything boring was happening she would refer to it as “the Torah portion”. Like if we were watching a movie and a boring part was coming up she would say “I’m going to run and fold the laundry during the Torah portion, but I’ll be back for the action”.
When we ran for student body offices in school she made up mean jingles about our opponents. Bobby never met my mom but he can sing the jingles because I still do.
Marianne McCarthy was beautiful. And loving. And so funny. She was my mother. And I miss her.
She let us drink pepsi pretty much from birth and when I went to elementary school and it was frowned upon for small children to drink pepsi she didn’t bow to the expectations of teachers and other parents – she just wrapped my pepsi can in tin foil as if it was some kind of disguise and sent it in my lunch box anyhow.
In the car she listened to 8 track tapes – some Barry Manilow, some broadway musical soundtracks and a bunch called “oldies but goodies” with 50’s and 60’s music. When “Duke of Earl” would come on she would sing “Duke, Duke, Duke; Bo & Luke, Luke, Luke; Uncle Jessie and Sexy Daisy” which we thought was hysterical because we were huge Dukes of Hazard fans. My kids have never seen The Dukes of Hazard but I taught them both that song and they love it.
She also had a cb in the car during the time that Smokey & the Bandit was popular. She called herself “Speedy Mama” and would talk to all the truckers while she drove us to school. Picture a woman 5 foot 2 with big perfect Doris Day blonde hair and a little tiny body wrapped in whatever preppy gear was popular holding her own with truckers in a car always filled with at least 5 or 6 children under ten and that was her.
When she was hung over (which was rare) she told us she had the Irish Flu. My brother and I thought it was something you could actually case – like the Swine Flu so we’d stay as far away from her as we could until she miraculously recovered the next day. Brilliant.
When I was a teenager she would buy me all the cutest clothes from whatever movie was cool at the time and if I didn’t want to wear them because I was always so insecure she would put them on and wear them out herself until I’d seen her in them enough times to feel like I could pull it off and want them back. She always looked better in them than I did even though I was 26.5 years younger.
My mom had charisma. She thought she was great and she was excited to go anywhere and when she walked into a room you felt her enthusiasm and you were drawn to her. She was always laughing the best laugh. And she made everything fun. We look exactly alike but I’ll never be her because she had something special that can’t be replicated. Marianne McCarthy brought the party just by walking in the door.
During dinner if conversation lulled or she was bored by us, she would start quoting from her favorite movies - The Sure Thing, Seems Like Old Times, or Night Shift. The quotes wouldn't make any sense in the context of what was going on but she would laugh so hard at herself that none of us could help but laugh either.
She made everyone feel special. My mom died when I was twenty seven years old. It had been fifteen years since I left elementary school and I hadn’t been back to that school since. But at my mom’s wake all of my elementary school teachers showed up. They didn’t all still work there and they hadn’t seen my family in a decade but they were all there. I was holding my own until I saw them and it just killed me. She was such a good mother, such a good person that no one ever forgot her. It was one of the most profound moments of my life.
My mother loved being Irish. She never said so but I think a big reason she fell for my dad was the great last name. We celebrated St. Patrick's Day like it was the Fourth of July. And we all felt proud to be McCarthy's.
My mom came on a lot of field trips when I was in elementary school and everyone always wanted to be in her group because she was the most fun chaperone. When we’d drive into DC on the bus, all the other moms would point out the monuments and the things we’d seen a thousand times. My mom would point out “there’s where Pa got mugged” and “there’s the liquor store where Uncle Jesse bought his beer” and then she would laugh and hand out secret M&Ms to everyone while the teachers weren’t looking.
My mom threw the best birthday parties that all involved some kind of hoopla like 15 little girls in the back of the station wagon going to the Ice Capades at the Capital Center on a school night.
My mom judged people pretty harshly but the people she loved she really loved. When she made me a memory book for my twenty fifth birthday and it asked who were her favorites of my friends she wrote Nancy and Patrick my two best childhood friends. I’d made so many new friends since then but I’d held onto Nancy and Patrick and so had she because for both of us that time in our life was our best time together.
When we got our first betamax, my mom would rent movies from the Photomat and borrow a neighbor’s betamax so that she could hook them both up and record bootleg versions of our favorite movies to watch again and again. She didn’t think it was illegal because she would fast forward and not start recording until after the FBI warning.
If I curled my bangs under too tightly in high school she would tell me I looked just like Sister Miriam who if you went to my high school you know was not the best looking nun ever.
On Sundays for football she wouldn’t make a real lunch or dinner. Instead she would make a full Super Bowl type spread every weekend including these little sausage things she called “Hog Balls” and we’d eat that ALL DAY.
She went a Bar Mitzvah once and since she didn’t understand Hebrew she was bored during the Torah portion where the boy reads from the Torah so after that whenever anything boring was happening she would refer to it as “the Torah portion”. Like if we were watching a movie and a boring part was coming up she would say “I’m going to run and fold the laundry during the Torah portion, but I’ll be back for the action”.
When we ran for student body offices in school she made up mean jingles about our opponents. Bobby never met my mom but he can sing the jingles because I still do.
Marianne McCarthy was beautiful. And loving. And so funny. She was my mother. And I miss her.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Ready? O-Kay!
So last night I watched the premiere of Hellcats on the CW and my take on it can best be described in a cheer:
C-H-E-E-S-E-Y, this show is pretty cheesey, guys
Cheesey, yes, it’s cheesey!
And I love it.
It’s one part “Bring It On”, one part “Flashdance”, one part teen soap and one part music video which adds up to a great big “Hell Yeah!” in my book. I mean, imagine if the kids on the original 90210 had been snobby but gorgeous cheerleaders and Andrea Zuckerman had been forced to join the squad in order to pursue her educational dreams and the rage she felt at this injustice was choreographed a la Kevin Bacon’s anger dance in “Footloose” until she decided to teach the other cheerleaders how to street dance, they became the best squad ever and at the same time all learned to accept people who are different from them. Oh, you’re also going to have to imagine Zuckerman was hot and underage. Now, can you give me an A-W-E-S-O-M-E on that?
Sure, there are some drawbacks, like how they use a cheerleader tumbling to transition from scene to scene. Annoying. And how once Marti (the townie/college student who loses her scholarship and is forced to join the squad to pay for college) shows up, suddenly everyone not only knows how to dance but everyone actually knows the same dance that Marti is freestyling. She’s not doing the electric slide, she’s just making up moves and not even Wade Robson would be able to pick them up that quick.
Marti’s rival, Alice, the cheerleader she’s replacing because of an injury, is a typical teen drama mean girl who is having just enough of a hard time personally for you to maybe forgive her behavior. Ashley Tisdale is all saccharine sweet as cheer captain, Savannah. Her acting isn’t bad, it’s just that her character could not be more annoying. But Alyson Michalka is perfect as Marti. I’m totally waiting for the episode where it’s revealed she works in a steel mill between classes and practice. Love her.
I’m not sold on the adult story lines yet – Marti’s alcoholic mother? So tired. And Jackie Taylor already did drunk parent better than anyone else ever could so we might as well just give that one up. The cheer coach caught in a love triangle between her hot team doctor boyfriend and the returning football coach she has a mysterious past with? It might get interesting but I need another week or two to decide. And really, who cares because no one watches this kind of television for the grown up story lines.
The best part of the show – for me at least – is that it marks the resurrection of One Tree Hill’s tragic basketball star, Quentin Fields (when they killed Quentin, I stopped watching cause it was just too much sad), and Peyton Sawyer’s stalker, the guy who was pretending to be her brother and terrorized her in the best titled episode ever, “Prom Night at Hater High”. Quentin is now a Hellcat Cheerleader with eyes for Marti and the stalker is now Marti’s townie best bud who may hook up with Tisdale. Whatever happens it good to see those guys working, and, you know, breathing, again.
The next two weeks more new shows (and the return of some old ones) will be rolling out so although I’m giving Hellcats a big old thumbs up right now, they’re gonna have to get in there and fight for my viewing time. But, come on, they’re cheerleaders – who better to compete?
C-H-E-E-S-E-Y, this show is pretty cheesey, guys
Cheesey, yes, it’s cheesey!
And I love it.
It’s one part “Bring It On”, one part “Flashdance”, one part teen soap and one part music video which adds up to a great big “Hell Yeah!” in my book. I mean, imagine if the kids on the original 90210 had been snobby but gorgeous cheerleaders and Andrea Zuckerman had been forced to join the squad in order to pursue her educational dreams and the rage she felt at this injustice was choreographed a la Kevin Bacon’s anger dance in “Footloose” until she decided to teach the other cheerleaders how to street dance, they became the best squad ever and at the same time all learned to accept people who are different from them. Oh, you’re also going to have to imagine Zuckerman was hot and underage. Now, can you give me an A-W-E-S-O-M-E on that?
Sure, there are some drawbacks, like how they use a cheerleader tumbling to transition from scene to scene. Annoying. And how once Marti (the townie/college student who loses her scholarship and is forced to join the squad to pay for college) shows up, suddenly everyone not only knows how to dance but everyone actually knows the same dance that Marti is freestyling. She’s not doing the electric slide, she’s just making up moves and not even Wade Robson would be able to pick them up that quick.
Marti’s rival, Alice, the cheerleader she’s replacing because of an injury, is a typical teen drama mean girl who is having just enough of a hard time personally for you to maybe forgive her behavior. Ashley Tisdale is all saccharine sweet as cheer captain, Savannah. Her acting isn’t bad, it’s just that her character could not be more annoying. But Alyson Michalka is perfect as Marti. I’m totally waiting for the episode where it’s revealed she works in a steel mill between classes and practice. Love her.
I’m not sold on the adult story lines yet – Marti’s alcoholic mother? So tired. And Jackie Taylor already did drunk parent better than anyone else ever could so we might as well just give that one up. The cheer coach caught in a love triangle between her hot team doctor boyfriend and the returning football coach she has a mysterious past with? It might get interesting but I need another week or two to decide. And really, who cares because no one watches this kind of television for the grown up story lines.
The best part of the show – for me at least – is that it marks the resurrection of One Tree Hill’s tragic basketball star, Quentin Fields (when they killed Quentin, I stopped watching cause it was just too much sad), and Peyton Sawyer’s stalker, the guy who was pretending to be her brother and terrorized her in the best titled episode ever, “Prom Night at Hater High”. Quentin is now a Hellcat Cheerleader with eyes for Marti and the stalker is now Marti’s townie best bud who may hook up with Tisdale. Whatever happens it good to see those guys working, and, you know, breathing, again.
The next two weeks more new shows (and the return of some old ones) will be rolling out so although I’m giving Hellcats a big old thumbs up right now, they’re gonna have to get in there and fight for my viewing time. But, come on, they’re cheerleaders – who better to compete?
Monday, September 6, 2010
Home Sweet Home
The last few weeks have had me feeling like I’m in high school again – and not in a good way.
First, I let Charlie hold the car keys while I was opening the garage door and he pushed the “trunk open” button which resulted in the trunk getting caught on the garage door, sparks flying and our car needing $1500 worth of repairs. The next day, while driving a car with bungee cords holding the trunk closed, my crappy depth perception resulted in me hitting one of those white support poles in the mall parking garage. Suddenly, I was sixteen again, having to tell my parents that I’d rear ended someone on West Street or hit the tree on the way out of our driveway. Bobby was a lot more understanding that my parents ever were but I still got the sinking feeling in my stomach that reminded me of everything I hated about growing up.
Then I went to a friend’s bridal shower in the neighborhood where I used to live. Driving there was like watching an old movie again for the first time in years. Everything is familiar and sort of sentimental but it’s not yours. It was like driving into someone else’s life. That is until the bride’s mom got mad at her and yelled at me in front of a room full of people and all of a sudden I was seventeen years old again trapped in my mother’s kitchen with nowhere to hide from the insanity. Being yelled at by someone you consider an adult when you’re actually an adult yourself is not fun because even though I’m forty years old, I still wouldn’t dare talk back to one of my mom’s friends so I just stood there and took it just like I did when I was a kid. Which reminded me about how home was never a place I wanted to be for long.
Last week I went to the beach with my family for our end of the summer getaway, and as luck would have it our beach trip coincided with my best friend from high school’s beach trip with her mother. Rachael lives in Seattle now and we only see each other once a year when she comes home for a few days to visit her family. Before our visit last summer, it had been nineteen years since we’d seen each other in person but the minute she walked into my house it was like 1986 again. So when she called me from a bar to come meet her, I dropped everything. And it was so worth it because what she gave me back was the thing all my memories of late had been missing – the laughter.
See sometimes I’m so consumed with the bad stuff that I forget about the good stuff. I forget about how it felt to drive around in my smooth wood paneled station wagon blaring “Blister in the Sun”. I forget the freedom I felt on a car ride, especially a car ride that involved some version of a faked asthma attack, a Chinese food buffet and a skipped afternoon of school. I forget the easy, giddy laughter that existed between teenaged friends and the strength and hopefulness that those moments gave me.
Seeing Rachael brought it all back with one very important difference. In the old days, at the end of the fun that sinking feeling always snuck back into my stomach because I wanted to go anywhere but home. But on Friday despite how much fun I was having; and how much I loved being reunited with my pal, I wasn’t sad to go home at the end of the night. Bobby, Mac and Charlie gave me the home I always wanted. Or I gave it to them. It doesn’t matter. All that does is that I am finally happy to go home. And that’s pretty cool.
First, I let Charlie hold the car keys while I was opening the garage door and he pushed the “trunk open” button which resulted in the trunk getting caught on the garage door, sparks flying and our car needing $1500 worth of repairs. The next day, while driving a car with bungee cords holding the trunk closed, my crappy depth perception resulted in me hitting one of those white support poles in the mall parking garage. Suddenly, I was sixteen again, having to tell my parents that I’d rear ended someone on West Street or hit the tree on the way out of our driveway. Bobby was a lot more understanding that my parents ever were but I still got the sinking feeling in my stomach that reminded me of everything I hated about growing up.
Then I went to a friend’s bridal shower in the neighborhood where I used to live. Driving there was like watching an old movie again for the first time in years. Everything is familiar and sort of sentimental but it’s not yours. It was like driving into someone else’s life. That is until the bride’s mom got mad at her and yelled at me in front of a room full of people and all of a sudden I was seventeen years old again trapped in my mother’s kitchen with nowhere to hide from the insanity. Being yelled at by someone you consider an adult when you’re actually an adult yourself is not fun because even though I’m forty years old, I still wouldn’t dare talk back to one of my mom’s friends so I just stood there and took it just like I did when I was a kid. Which reminded me about how home was never a place I wanted to be for long.
Last week I went to the beach with my family for our end of the summer getaway, and as luck would have it our beach trip coincided with my best friend from high school’s beach trip with her mother. Rachael lives in Seattle now and we only see each other once a year when she comes home for a few days to visit her family. Before our visit last summer, it had been nineteen years since we’d seen each other in person but the minute she walked into my house it was like 1986 again. So when she called me from a bar to come meet her, I dropped everything. And it was so worth it because what she gave me back was the thing all my memories of late had been missing – the laughter.
See sometimes I’m so consumed with the bad stuff that I forget about the good stuff. I forget about how it felt to drive around in my smooth wood paneled station wagon blaring “Blister in the Sun”. I forget the freedom I felt on a car ride, especially a car ride that involved some version of a faked asthma attack, a Chinese food buffet and a skipped afternoon of school. I forget the easy, giddy laughter that existed between teenaged friends and the strength and hopefulness that those moments gave me.
Seeing Rachael brought it all back with one very important difference. In the old days, at the end of the fun that sinking feeling always snuck back into my stomach because I wanted to go anywhere but home. But on Friday despite how much fun I was having; and how much I loved being reunited with my pal, I wasn’t sad to go home at the end of the night. Bobby, Mac and Charlie gave me the home I always wanted. Or I gave it to them. It doesn’t matter. All that does is that I am finally happy to go home. And that’s pretty cool.
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