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Showing posts with the label #motherhood

Dear Dad

I don't have a dad. I never have. The S.O.B. is out there somewhere. Just nowhere I've ever known about. I've only ever been Debbie's daughter. I was briefly a step daughter - by law - to a very cruel man that my Mother married when I was a child. Father material, though, he was not. The only positive male role model that I can remember early on is my Grandfather, Inez. And when he was around, which wasn't too often because we lived far away, I'd feel like a princess. Still do. (All his granddaughters do. He's our hero.) So, when social media is saturated on Father's Day with images of loving, attentive, present Daddies, I find myself in foreign territory; somewhere on the outside looking in on a strange exhibit. I equate it to going to a history museum and staring blankly at a scene set in olden days. I can't relate. That's how they lived? How strange. I'm not sad, really. Or jealous. Anymore. I'm at an age where I can take...

There's No Place Like Home

The only constant I have from my childhood is that things were always changing. We moved a lot. We changed addresses the way some other families changed seasonal decor. Seriously. I counted once; 17 times before I graduated from high school. I often get asked if I was an "army brat." No. I wish I could say our gypsy lifestyle was due to something that honourable. The truth is, I really don't know (although I suspect) the reasons. I only know I was ALWAYS the new kid at school in a sea of kids who had all mostly known each other since Kindergarten. I made friends, of course. But, sometimes just as quickly as we'd get comfortable we were packing up again. I wonder now why we even unpacked at all. For my child it would be different. Two weeks ago we  moved. For Isabel, it was a first and she was nervous. Under any circumstances, moving is stressful and scary. But now I have to do it with a big smile for my 8-year-old. As a parent, I like to think I've done my j...

Mommy Dearest

"Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children."                                                                                        - William Makepeace Thackeray Yeah....no pressure. Today as I'm getting ready for work, applying my makeup and straightening my clothes, a little voice in the distance says, "You look beautiful, Mommy." She's told me this before and I always thank her and accept the compliment. This time, however, it struck me particularly hard because as I was looking at myself in the mirror, I was thinking everything opposite to her sentiment; I am PMSing=bloated, I have a zit on my chin, I need to wax my upper lip and I perpetually want to lose about 20 pounds. Yet somehow, with all my insecurities, this sweet little sou...