Life Lessons: Making the Best of a Bad Situation

I may have told this story before, so if this is familiar to you already, I apologize. I guess that’s how you know you’re getting old – you start re-telling the same old stories, thinking they are new!

Anyway, when I was in the 8th grade, I took algebra from a very funny man. I loved Mr. Larsen – he was hilarious! He’d write equations on the blackboard (we still had blackboards in those days – ha!), demonstrating various problems and their solutions, and then turn around and wink at the class and say, “See that? Smooth as a baby’s bottom!” Or another personal favorite, “Boy, that’s slicker than Vaseline on a doorknob!” Or sometimes, it was "slicker than snot!" He really made algebra fun and (relatively) easy.

For both my 7th and 8th grade years, Mr. Larsen was the only math teacher who taught the more advanced math classes, so I naturally assumed I would have him for geometry in the 9th grade, too. That’s just the way things went. So, I was quite surprised to receive my class schedule just before 9th grade started, and see that I was assigned to take geometry from a Mr. Daly instead of Mr. Larsen. I was devastated.

I complained to my parents, who said, “Give him a chance! You never know, he may be even better than Mr. Larsen!” I was skeptical, but saw their point. The first day of 9th grade dawned, and I (rather sullenly) went to my geometry class, fearing the worst but hoping for the best.

It turned out to be even worse than I had feared. Mr. Daly was a huge man, shaped like a mountain. Or, maybe that was just my perception. He only seemed like a mountain due to his partiality for wearing brown corduroy pants and green plaid, flannel shirts that made his lumpy, close-shaven skull look like the snowy peak of Mount Baldy as it sat on his wide, sloping shoulders. I craned my neck up to watch his face as he paced the front of the classroom. Like Mount Baldy, Mr. Daly seemed just as cold. He wore wire-rimmed glasses that slid down on his nose as he tipped his head back to survey the class, and his face was set in a permanent scowl.

Knowing that looks can be deceiving, I tried my best to be optimistic. Maybe it wouldn’t be that bad…. That thought lasted just as long as it did for him to call the class to order, and hear him say, “That was once…” when no one complied. He called us to order a second time, and was met with only partial success. “That was twice,” he said. He tried one more time to gain the classes’ attention, and then BAM!!! Out of nowhere, a yardstick slammed down on Mr. Daly’s desk.

Everyone jumped! As we all turned in our seats to face him, we were shocked into silence. “That’s three,” Mr. Daly said, his grim smile showing small, neatly-spaced teeth. I already hated him.

Over the next few days, I would hear stories from my friends who were lucky enough to be in Mr. Larsen’s class, about how much fun they were having. They would tell me how funny Mr. Larsen was, and how he picked on this person or that person, and made this joke or that joke. Meanwhile, I dreaded going to Mount Baldy’s class.

After the first week, I begged – literally begged – my parents to transfer me out of Mr. Daly’s room. I couldn’t stand it! Please, please, please, please, please?!?!?!

Finally (probably out of sheer self-preservation) my parents agreed to go talk to the school counselor about getting me out of that awful class. I had high hopes that I would soon be back with my beloved Mr. Larsen.

We went into the counselor’s office and sat down. My parents explained that I was having difficulty with Mr. Daly and wanted to be in Mr. Larsen’s class, instead. The counselor asked me why. Well, because!! Mr. Daly was big and scary and stern and not nearly as nice or as funny as Mr. Larsen, and all of those other things that seem terribly important to a 9th grader.

I will never forget what that counselor said: “Well, a lot of times in life, we don’t get to choose our situation. We’re just handed what we’re handed, and we have to figure out how we’re going to deal with it. But even though we don’t get to choose our situation, we do get to choose how we’re going to handle it. You have to figure out how to make the best of what life hands you. When you grow up and get a job, you can’t just quit your job if you don’t like your boss. If you do, how will you pay your rent, or buy food to eat, or gas for your car? Nope – you have to figure out how to make the best of the situation. So, this is as good of a time as any to learn that the one thing that determines what kind of experience you’re going to have, is what kind of attitude you choose to have going in to it.”

At the time I was upset. I could see the counselor’s point, but that didn’t mean I had to like it. But my options had been exhausted. So I ended up staying in Mr. Daly’s class. I even managed to have an OK time, eventually – occasionally catching a glimpse of a rare smile from Mount Baldy when we did particularly well on any given geometery lesson.

I must admit, however, that the counselor’s lesson has stayed with me far longer than any of Mr. Daly's - and been infinitely more valuable.

Worst. Day. EVER! Well, Almost.

OK, can I just say being a single parent sucks?

Yesterday, I was supposed to go to Cyd's school to meet with her counselor to discuss her classes for next year, then take Mychael to the orthodontist. I printed out Cyd's appointment when I made it on-line, but for whatever reason, did not write it down in my little appointment book. I remembered to call The Tool (easier to write than "my Soon-To-Be-Ex") to tell him about the appointment, though.

And, the orthodontist's office is really good about sending reminder e-mails and phone calls before the appointments, too. And, just as a safe guard, I did write this one down in my appointment book.

So there I was, just going along with my regular day, when I get an e-mail from my friend asking me if I want to go to lunch or dinner one day this week. I get out my appointment book to see what I have going on, and realize that I have completely spaced the orthodontist appointment! No worries, though - I still have about an hour and a half or so before I need to leave work to grab the kids on the way to the ortho.

I am working, working, working, and as usual, leave it until the last possible minute to squeak out of there and race to get the kids. I belatedly realize that I so entirely, completely, just plain forgot about this orthodontist visit, that I didn't even remind the kids about it! So, I hurry and text Mykie on the fly. Or at least, as fast as I can, given my limited texting ability during the best of times, let alone while walking to the car.

Just as I hit "send," I remember Mychael has lost her phone, and won't get the message, anyway. So, I think, "No problem! I'll just call Bretten!" Which I do, and she answers as she is on the bus home. I tell her to tell her sister to be ready as soon as she gets off the bus because I'm on my way to get them to go to the orthodontist.

Bretten says, "Well, Dad just called and says he already has Cyd and he's going to meet us at the first bus stop and take us from there."

"What? Why?" I say. Bretten starts to explain, but I can hardly hear her for all the background noise of the junior high bus. Frustrated, I say, "Nevermind. That's fine. I just wish someone would tell me what's going on," and I hang up.

I build up a head of steam as I call The Tool, all ticked off because, no matter how many times I have asked him to communicate with me directly, it seems he is prone to make plans with the kids, and none of them remember to tell me what's going on - or, I get bits and pieces of things from the kids that I can't decipher and then they feel like they're in trouble when I quiz them to try to figure out what is happening, when. I hit "send" and wait for him to pick up, ready to pounce as soon as he answers.

"Hello?" he says.

"Hi," I say. "What's going on? You're taking Mykie to the orthodontist?"

"Well, yeah," he says. "I figured I'd better. I tried to get ahold of you earlier to see what was going on when you didn't show, and I couldn't find you, so I just planned on doing it."

"Didn't show? Didn't show for what?"

"Cyd's appointment with the counselor."

It had completely, and I mean completely, slipped my mind. The appointment was there, written down on a paper, and I had totally, 100% forgotten about it. Suffice it to say, I was mortified. I hate messing up. I am not good at it. I am not gracious about it under the best of circumstances, though I manage to apologize to The Tool and figure out what's going on now and what I need to do to get back on course.

The Tool takes the kids to the ortho, and shows up at the house about an hour later. We exchange information about Cyd's appointment and Mykie's next ortho appointment, and then he says, "By the way - I forgot to change the direct deposit on my travel checks. They have been going in to your account, so I am just going to deduct that amount from the child support check I give you this weekend."

Not that I don't trust him, but I don't. I went and looked at the bank account, and sure enough, there is a deposit that is just labeled "Federal" but it is a weird amount - obviously not my regular salary. So yeah, I owe him the money. I never did the bills when we were married, and I have been really trying to get the financial crap all squared away because he always told me I wasn't good at it. I had kind of been thinking, "See? I can, too, do it!" because I've gone five months now with no late payments, no bounced checks, etc., etc. I even managed to pay for San Francisco and fit Christmas shopping in there, too, with minimal impact to my savings. And yet, here was evidence that I am not nearly as good as I thought I was, as I will only have half the money I was counting on for December.

So after absorbing that blow, he leaves and I turn to the girls to tell them the plans for the rest of the day. Before I can even open my mouth, one of the twins (I won't say who, to protect the guilty), says to me, "Where were you?!? Why did you forget?!?!"

Well, I'd had it. I got all teary (I usually try to do my crying in private) and just said, "Well, excuse me. I've had kind of a crappy day!"

And of course, the sight of me in tears immediately has her crying, too.

So now I am thinking I can't manage the kids' scheduling crap, I can't manage the money, and I can't even manage to be "The Mom" without falling apart! It seems I can't do anything right today!!

But then I remember some wise words from one of my cousins, who was born and raised in the southeast (North Carolina). "It's okay," she said. "Tomorrow is another day, Scarlett."

It's true. Oh, sure, it feels like the most totally craptastic day, ever. But I'm alive, I'm healthy, I have a house to live in and food to eat. Most importantly, I am surrounded by people I love and who love me back - who remind me that tomorrow is another day, when I need reminding. What would I do without them all?

So it was not the Worst. Day. Ever. Just almost. ;)

Make It A Good One!

I am not the best housekeeper in the world. In fact, I am pretty much a sucky housekeeper. I don’t clean my house at all – I pay to have someone else come in and do it. I manage to keep the surface of things picked up pretty well, but the interiors of my cabinets, drawers, and shelves mostly have all sorts of junk stuffed in them higgledy-piggledy. My desk at work is no better, and neither is my car.

My car is probably the worst of the three, because I have no cleaning company or janitorial staff to take care of it for me or to force me to pick it up in preparation for the deeper cleaning of their visit. In fact, I am often guilty of leaving a half-empty bottle of juice, a handful of receipts, or an unwashed lunch container in my car for several days (geez, I hope it’s not weeks, but time does fly….) at a time. In my defense, though, it’s not just me: my kids help contribute to the mess by leaving candy wrappers, fast-food bags, school papers, and dirty socks in the back seat, too.

So, although it doesn’t happen all that often, it’s also not horribly unusual for me to get in my car, breathe in, and say to myself, “Whoa!! Time to clean out the car!!” Yesterday was such a day.

I picked the girls up early from school for an appointment to go get flu shots. I picked Cyd up at the high school first, and then went over to get the twins at the junior high. I parked in the visitor’s space and asked Cyd if she wanted to go in with me to get her sisters.

“How long will you be?” she asked.

“Well,” I said, “Not that long, but I’ll have to get them checked out and everything so it might be a little bit.”

Cyd decided to wait in the car.

I went into the school and walked to the attendance office. It is run by students so it’s kind of a slow, laborious process to fill out the papers, have the student look up the class, call the teacher on the loudspeaker, and repeat the process for the other twin. Then, of course, both girls are on opposite sides of the school, about as far away from the attendance office as you can get. They finally appeared, and then we had to stop by the locker to drop off books and pick up backpacks, too. So, by the time we got back out to the car, probably close to 10 or 15 minutes had lapsed.

As soon as I got in the car, I immediately noticed a rather unpleasant odor. As I prepare to pull out of the parking lot, I have my "time to clean out the car again" thought and begin mentally running through the checklist of things I may have left in my car that could be the origin of such a funky smell: hmmm, haven’t been through a fast-food drive-in for a while, didn’t take my lunch to work today, Mychael washed her gym clothes over the weekend…what could it be?

Then it dawned on me. “Cydanie,” I said, “while I was getting your sisters, did you make a fartie in Mom’s car?”

There was a long pause, and then she finally replied.

“Well,” Cyd said, “it was only one!”

So, the moral of the story is, if you’re only going to make one, make it a good one – whatever it is.

It's Been A Long Time - Next Time Will Be Better, I Swear!

I have been so busy at work lately - I have sort of fallen out of the habit of posting. I know that I am being paid to actually work while I'm at work, and believe me, I feel plenty guilty that I don't give it my all, all the time. But let's face it: between the stuff at home (kids, cars, house, etc.) and the divorce crap, a half hour or hour at work is really the only time I have to do it, when I also have the energy to do it! I could give you a list of stuff that has happened lately, but it's all gross and I don't want to think about it, let alone write about it.

Suffice it to say that my car broke only 6 weeks after the warranty expired, and it cost me over $200 to get it fixed - it was possessed by something otherworldly, which caused the lights and dials and gauges and stuff to go on by themselves, even when the switches were off. Oh, yeah, and it wouldn't start. On the bright side, it turned out to be a relatively simple problem which was corrected by replacing the battery, and it didn't cost the $400 that the dealership told me it would. But it was still a lot of running around for parts and stuff, and I had to make my dad help me (I still suffer guilt because he is 70 and I should be helping him, not him still taking care of me...).

One of the twins is not turning in her math homework again. On her first junior high school report card, she got around a 2.9 or 3.0 or something like that. Which I would say was fine, except that I know she can do so much better than that. Her sister got a 3.9, fer pete's sake - all A's and only one A-! I know that one just "does" school better, but still - I would've thought their grades would have been a little closer. That is the downside about having multiples - the regrettable tendency to compare them to one another, and always find one of them "less than" the other. Don't get me wrong, I love them equally! But I catch myself thinking, "I wish this one was as organized as that one," or "Why can't that one be as accommodating as this one?" For me, at least, it is a constant struggle to appreciate them each for their own individual strengths and not always be wishing that each had the other's strengths, too. And this is not helped by the fact that THAT one won't do her math homework!!!

And since I am complaining about school stuff, I might as well tell you that Cyd growled at her Foods teacher (sigh...). I guess I am used to it when Cyd goes "Urgggggh!!!" at me, and I just laugh it off. However, I can see how a teacher might be shocked if she got that noise, just for asking Cyd to copy down a recipe. So, now I can't laugh about it anymore; I need to train Cyd to realize that growling is not "socially appropriate."

And then there's the whole divorce thing. We are still battling over finances and assets and all that. I long for the day when my description of "me" can just be about me, and not include "soon-to-be-divorced" as one of the qualifiers.

I am truthfully less angry with Mr. Soon-to-be-Ex about all the mechanics of the divorce than I am about the idea he seems to have that you can divorce your kids as easily as you can your spouse. Sure, we have been squabbling back and forth about possessions. I continue to doubt his continuing denial of the existence of any type of "inappropriate relationship" with a woman he works with. I am irritated that I have just now discovered a mysterious multi-hundred dollar expenditure in an out-of-state jewelry store that occurred back in April, especially since the person he is NOT having a relationship with (yeah, right!)happens to live in the town where said jewelry store purchase occurred. Hmmm, I think I would remember if I were the recipient of anything from such a store, don't you? But that's all petty crap which, in the long run, doesn't mean much.

However, I am completely bewildered as to how Mr. Soon-to-be-Ex either is not aware, or just plain doesn't care, that his slavish devotion to his own happiness has so negatively impacted his own children in one way or another. I have had to explain to Cyd more than once that the whole concept of divorce means that Daddy doesn't get to have a birthday party at Grandpa Bob's this year, even if Dad's birthday is in December, because that was Daddy's choice. Do you think he's even explained that once?

I have another child in therapy now because she is struggling so much. All the therapist had to do was ask her where her dad lived, and the shaky hold she has on her emotions just burst. She could barely choke the words out through her tears. Why doesn't he get to witness this, and feel the knife twist in his gut the way it twists in mine when I see how miserable they are? The therapist asked her what her dad was like, and the only answer she could think of was, "He's in the Army." You know, I think I could tell you a dozen things about my dad, and never once mention what he does (or did) for a living.

Granted, I am an adult with supposedly better communication skills, but still....I would be embarassed if my kids ever thought of me as such a one-trick pony. And I'd be ashamed if any child of my own grew up to be that way, too. How could I have lived with and loved a man such as this for all those years? Were those years a lie, or is who he is now the lie?

Oh, now look: I wasn't going to write about any of this crap because it was just all too gross, and here I ended up doing it anyway. Next time, if I can't think of anything more fun, I am going to borrow a cute idea from my cousins and make a list of 100 things about me which WILL NOT contain anything about car trouble, kid trouble, or divorce crap.

Can You Say "Stubborn?"

I'm sure you'll all be happy to know that no table slapping was required last night. The next four pages of Foods homework have been completed, and with minimal belly-achin', and we only have three left to do tonight. Woo HOO!

And because there was minimal bellyachin', Cyd earned some free time on the computer last night. Normally, she visits Pokemon websites, Cartoon Network, or You Tube to watch Sailor Moon; Pokemon; The Grimm Adventures of Billy & Mandy; or Trick My Truck episodes. Every once in awhile, though, she'll play a game - usually Pokemon related somehow.

So, though she plays her Nintendo DS every once in a while, games aren't really her "thing." Imagine my surprise, then, when last Saturday at Target, she brought me a computer game called "Cake Mania" and told me she really, really, really wanted it. It was only $10, but I was thinking that's kind of a lot of money for just a treat for no reason. But then, the twins saw it and chimed in, too. "Ooooh, Mommy, yes, yes, yes!! We love this game!! It is soooo fun!!!" they said. "Please let's buy it, OK, Mommy? OK?!?"

I figured $10 divided by 3 kids was less than $3.50 per kid, which is a more reasonable amount for a "treat." So I looked at Cyd and said, "Well, OK, but if I buy it, you have to share it with your sisters, OK?"

She looked back at me, and said in all seriousness, "Why would you want me to do that?"

We have been working on this "sharing" concept since she was 3, so I am used to explaining "why I would want her to do that." So I explained it to her once more: the game was $10, and it was kind of a lot of money, so if I was going to buy it, then it had to be for all the girls, not just her. That way all the kids could play with it and enjoy it, and not just her.

"But I don't want to share it!" she whined. Really? I hadn't guessed!! But sarcasm is lost on her.

So instead I said, "Well, you can pay for it with your own money, then."

I get the big, heavy sigh. "But Mom, you know I'm saving my money so I can buy a vehicle!" (see my post of September 9, 2008)

I repeated my earlier explanation of $10 being an expensive treat for just one girl, and if I bought her a $10 treat, I'd have to buy a $10 treat for Bretten and a $10 treat for Mychael, too, so that it would be fair. Then that would be $30 in treats. But if all the girls shared the game, then I only had to buy one $10 treat, and so on.

She gave me a look full of disappointment and disgust. "Fine!" she said, and stomped off to put the game back.

I called her back over, and tried to explain that sharing the game might not be as fun as owning it all to herself, but even if she had to share it, at least that meant she still had the game, and that would be better than not having the game at all, wouldn't it? But she was having none of that.

"Mom, I told you, I just don't share."

Well, the twins had observed this exchange, of course, and were jumping around and yapping at me, afraid their slice of the $10 was going down the drain. "Mommy, Mommy!" they cried. "Don't let her put it back, Mommy. You said we could get it. Can we still get it, Mom, huh, can we? We like it, too!! Please, Mommy, please, can we get it, huh?!?!"

"Fine!" I said, and they ran happily off after Cydanie to get the game, anyway. I figured that once we had the game home, the temptation of playing it would help Cyd get over her aversion to sharing and she would end up enjoying the game, anyway.

Flash forward to Cyd's free time last night. I noticed that one of the twins had left the Cake Mania game out right next to the computer as Cyd came in and sat down in front of it. I stealthily tried to observe her as she logged on, while trying to look like I wasn't observing anything (if she knows I'm watching her, she gets irritated with me). I was fully anticipating that as soon as she got started, she'd go ahead and put the CD in and play the game and act like she'd gone along with this "sharing" business from the start.

Imagine my surprise when, instead of putting the "Cake Mania" CD in the computer, Cyd Googled "Cake Mania," instead - and then began playing the free version via the internet!

The internet version has fewer levels, fewer rewards, and runs a lot slower. But apparently, in Cyd's world, it is better to play an inferior game on the internet, than it is to capitulate and actually share a better version of said game with your sisters!

Can you say "stubborn?" Grrrr!

If All Else Fails, Slap the Table

My oldest daughter (the one who has autism) goes to school in what our local school district calls a “self-contained learning center.” That’s a fancy name for what is, essentially, a class room that is set apart from the main school. It has its own lockers and a restroom so that the kids in that class never have to leave it during the school day. All the core subjects are taught there, and my daughter and her classmates only leave to attend whatever “mainstream” classes they might have, or to go to lunch. They wouldn’t even have to leave for lunch necessarily, if they bring their lunch from home.

Anyway, these types of classrooms generally have two teachers and only 10 to 12 students, all of whom have some kind of learning disability and/or sensory or behavioral problems. The small pupil-to-teacher ratio ensures that the kids get the extra academic help and support they need. The fact that this also limits the amount of time they are swimming with the all the neurotypical (i.e., “regular”) kids in the main hallways helps them, too, by minimizing what could be overwhelming sensory input/stimulation, thereby reducing the chances of conflict with any less-than-tolerant neurotypical students.

One of Cyd’s mainstream classes this semester is Foods. Back in the day, we used to call this class “Home Ec.” The name may have changed, but the gist is the same: a couple of days of classwork learning about nutrition and measurements and so on, and then a day cooking in the lab. Cyd loves to cook, so this is, naturally, one of her favorite classes. At the beginning of the school year, I emphasized to Cyd that if she didn’t cooperate on the classwork part, she wouldn’t earn the privilege of being able to cook in the lab part. I assumed she understood, and the school year was just floating along smoothly.

Silly me.

Yesterday, I get a call from Mrs. K, the Foods teacher. She just doesn’t know what to do, because Cyd is missing 11 assignments and is getting a D-, and the term ends Friday. Mrs. K doesn’t want to fail Cyd, but she can’t, in good conscience, give her a B based on labs alone. I panic. I know it’s “just” Foods. It's not like its Calculus or Chemistry or something really hard or even part of the “core” curriculum (like reading, writing, and ‘rithmetic)! But, seeing as this and gym are the only two mainstream classes she has this semester, it's important that she at least do all the assignments and maximize her participation points to help offset any difficulties she might have in other areas. I tell Mrs. K I understand her dilemma, of course I don’t expect her to pass Cyd if Cyd is not doing the work. I ask if there is some way Cyd can make up these assignments and bail her grade out of the toilet.

Mrs. K says sure - all the “assignments” are, are end-of-unit summaries/quizzes that Cyd has just plain refused to do. None of them have more than 20 questions, and the questions are not difficult. But, I explain that Cyd has always had a test-taking "thing" (from the age of 3 and her first autism “diagnostic inventory”), so I am not surprised that when they tried to get her to do these in class, she would just cry. So then Mrs. K said she told Cyd she could just copy them out, giving her the answers and everything, but all Cyd would do was put her head down and pretend to sleep. Why Mrs. K waited to tell me about the problem until the last week of the term, I'm not quite sure, but that’s a different story.

This story is about doing homework with Cyd, and I had to give you all that background so that you could fully appreciate the following:

Knowing that any homework is enough to set Cyd off on a melt-down, I try to be very cheery when I get home and ask Cyd for her papers from Mrs. K. I get Cyd some freshly sharpened pencils and some notebook paper, and set Cyd up at the dining room table. She is ready for business! I give her one paper that has 18 questions on it. They are mostly just pretty basic things, like, “The US Food and Drug Administration recommends six servings of grains per day for optimum nutritional health,” and “Unsaturated fats tend to be liquid at room temperature, and consist of monounsaturated (found in olive oil, avocado, nuts and seeds), and polyunsaturated (found in walnuts, soybeans, and oily fish such as sardines and tuna).” All Cyd has to do is copy these sentences, as the words that were left blank in the “real” quiz have already been filled in for her on this copy.

I explain this to Cyd. “Just write these sentences,” I say. “Copy them onto your paper, just like they are written here. I’ll be in the kitchen, so just holler if you need any help.”

I go into the kitchen to read the newspaper, do the dishes, and just putter. It is dead silent in the dining room. About a half hour goes by, and I go in to check on Cyd. The paper in front of her is blank. She has not done a thing but sit there and stare at it for 30 minutes.

“Cyd! What are you doing? C’mon – get started!” I say. She looks up at me from underneath her too-long bangs, and tears well up in her eyes.

“It’s hard!” she wines.

“Oh, Cyd, you don’t need to cry! C’mon! Just write your name at the top of your paper. You can do that, can’t you? That’s not hard!”

“I just don’t want to do it,” she moans.

At this point, I’m still full of patience and sunny optimism. “I know you don’t want to do it, honey, but, if you don’t do it in school when Mrs. K asks you to, then you have to do it at home. All you need to do is just copy the words – you don’t even have to look anything up or guess. The faster you start, the faster you’ll finish. C’mon!”

All I get is more tears.

Mind you, an hour has now gone by, and she still has not so much as even touched the pencil in front of her, not even to write her name. Tears are dripping off her chin and leaving dimples on the paper. And mind you, she has eleven of these pages to copy!

The minutes tick by. I pull out all my tricks. I bargain: "If you finish one, then you can have a break and get a snack!"

“Mom, I told you, I just don’t want to. I don’t do homework!”

“Well, if you don’t do it in school, you certainly DO do homework, alright! That’s the rule – do it in school, or do it at home. Either way, you’ve got to do your work.”

No response except the occasional sob.

So then I plead: "Please, Cydanie, Mommy doesn't like to fight with you – just please do it! C’mon!"

All I get in reply are more sobs.

Now I am losing my cheeriness (!) and am starting to get mad. I threaten: "If you don't do what Mrs. K says and write down these sentences, she won't let you be in her class anymore. Then you'll have to spend all your time with Mr. B! And even worse, you’ll be in trouble with Mom!"

Cyd continues to stare morosely at her pencil.

I am ashamed to say that this is the point at which my last button was pushed. I smack the flat of my hand down on the table, the loud bang making Cyd jump and look up at me. I yell, "That's IT!! You are acting like a baby! Grown-up kids…” Here, Cyd interrupts me.

“I’m not a grown-up!”

I roll right over the top of her words. “…Grown-up kids who want to get driver's licenses do their work when they’re told. But if you want to act like a baby…”

Cyd interrupts again. “I’m not a baby!”

“Well,” I growl, “you’re sure acting like one! If you want to act like a baby, then I'll treat you like a baby - a big, almost 16-year-old baby!”

Cyd interrupts again. "But Mom, I'm not 16. I'm only 15!"

I am all worked up now. I shout, "I don't care! 15 OR 16 - it's too old to act like this! I'm going to count to 10 and if you are not writing by the time I get to 10, I'm going to spank your butt!" I grab her hand and put the pencil in it, and set the point on the top of the blank sheet of paper.

“NOW WRITE!!”

I flop back in the chair across from her, red-faced and breathing heavy, and stare her down. Finally, she starts to write her name. I hold my breath as she starts to copy down sentence number one. She stops midway, and looks up at me. I narrow my eyes and point back to her paper. She goes back to writing.

We continue this way for the next 90 minutes or so. I keep getting the stink eye every now and again. She writes a line, glares at me and complains for a couple of minutes, then writes another line, then glares and complains some more, then writes a line, then glares/complains....

At the end of the evening, we had finished four of the eleven papers that are due Friday. That means four tonight, and three Thursday night, and then she’ll be all caught up. I certainly hope we don’t have to repeat this entire process tonight to get her started on the next batch. I think I'll go straight to the slapping the table part, if so.

Somedays, it's a miracle....

Anyone who has no children, or only has very young (i.e., baby) children, will probably think I am the worst mother in the world when I say this - nevertheless, I offer the following confession: sometimes, one of my children will make me so mad that for at least a minute or so, I think I might gladly be able to peel off her skin and toast her over an open flame.

Case in point: One of my girls, who shall remain nameless at this point to protect the guilty, brought home a paper from school the other day. Mind you, this is a child who tests smarter than 97% of kids her age (this is the honest truth - I am not making up random numbers just to brag). School has only been in session for two weeks, but she brought home a paper from her algebra teacher two days ago that said she was getting a C+ so far - and that if she didn't have at least a B+ by the time mid-terms rolled around, she would be put into pre-algebra, instead. This particular child had pre-algebra in the 6th grade, and she managed to do just fine, so I was both puzzled and concerned.

I therefore went to discuss the matter with this daughter. "What's going on, sweetheart?" I asked. "Have you turned in all of your assignments? Is it just that much harder than last year? What can I do to help?"

"No, Mama," she said, her voice cracking. "I've turned in all my assignments. It's just too hard. I get too many wrong! I don't know what you can do to help because I don't know what to dooooo!!" she ended on a wail.

At this point, my heart is breaking as her tears overflow and run down her cheeks. "Oh, my poor baby!" I think. I fold her in my arms, and give her a hug and tell her everything will be OK - we'll figure something out, because she'd feel bad if she had to go back to pre-algebra, wouldn't she? Yes, she said. She would.

So, being the proactive mom, I e-mail the algebra teacher and ask, "What concepts is she just not getting? Is there anything in particular I can work with her on?"

The teacher responds, and I quote: "The concept of the importance of turning in all of her assignments would be a good place to start!"

Grrrr. Like I said, for at least a split second, I could've gladly squished her like a grape. Somedays, it's a miracle they survive....