Trying to Find My Rope-A-Dope

Kurt Vonnegut once said, "True terror is waking up one morning to discover that your high school class is running the country."  I had this quote on my fridge for about ten years, because, I'm a Gen-Xer.

 Let's face it, I don't do delayed gratification.  Thanks to Sesame Street, the Electric Company, and Schoolhouse Rock, I'm a visual learner. Lots of us come from "broken" homes. We were labeled materialistic, disengaged, and slackers.  We survived the Cold War, Ronald Reagan, the Challenger Disaster, the AIDS terror, Black Monday, and Chernobyl.  We watched the Berlin Wall come crashing down.  We watched "Red Dawn" then had to cower under our desks on Monday because of the Red Scare.

But really, I think we're the change generation.  We're more accepting of social diversity...races, religions, sexual orientation.  We hold the highest education levels when comparing age groups.  Compared with other generations, we have the highest volunteer rates.  We strive for long-term institutional changes, rather than the revolution our parents' generation tried to achieve. We're labeled the MTV generation that was more interested in philosophizing than settling for a white picket fence, yet study after study shows us as highly family oriented.  We change jobs more than our parents rearranged the furniture.

I look back, and I'm really not that worried about my generation running the country.  In fact, I'm convinced we'd be better, because there is a part of us that has never, and will never, put down our boots and say, "To hell with it.  If you can't beat 'em, join 'em."  We're good movers and shakers; we organize.  We believe in a better world.

I'm not worried about my generation, because, see, back in my day (yeah, I'm old enough I can say that now), you didn't really get to be a slacker and sing "I'm a loser baby," like Beck did, unless you were also successful.  It was only cool to say you never cracked a book if you still got straight-As.  It was only cool to get drunk in a hot tub the night before the state scholastic competition if you could wake up with your head feeling like it was the size of Manhattan (why did you have to say "Manhattan" *gag*) and your mouth tasting like a dumpster smells, have a latte, and still kick some ass.  It was only cool to skip two weeks of Organic Chemistry in college to hang out in your dorm room with a towel under the door listening to Ravi Shankar if you could show up for the test and still blow the curve.  We made nerds cool.

I'm now the mother of a 16-year old.  THIS I find terrifying.  Terror is waking up to Justin Beiber wailing down the hall and coming face to face with his mug every time you are knocking on the door to tell her to turn it down.  I had Pearl Jam, The Lovemongers, and The Screaming Trees for God's sake.  My dad would sit on the stairs outside my bedroom, tell me to turn it up, and ask, over and over "WHO is this again?" 

I'll tell you what terrifying is.  Terrifying is when the smartest kid in class shows up to pick up your daughter for a date, and he doesn't understand WHERE, exactly, a belt goes.  Just in case a young whippersnapper is reading this, it goes ABOVE your ass, not below.

Terrifying is standing in line at Taco Bell at midnight, sober as a judge, and realizing the deepest level of philosophy coming out of the mouths of the stoned younger generation amounts to "OMG!! LIKE, SRZLY?!" and "FOR REALZ!"  WTF ever happened to debating the fascist standardization of the size of the lettuce shavings on my Chalupa?  Does no one pay attention anymore?

And, really, what the hell is up with me having to stand in line at Starbucks for 30 minutes, behind some teeny bopper who has 3,000 contacts in her iPhone, "because it pulled all her facebook contacts" (like SRZLY, I KNOW you don't actually KNOW all those people, I monitor my kid's facebook, twitter, and whatever those 20 other sites are that add 5 hours to my day) and she can't find Brittany in all of them to ask if she wants chocolate sprinkles or rainbow sprinkles on her skinny cocoa?  For the love of all that is sacred and holy, the line is 15 minutes long.  You send 16,000 texts a month.  Type in her ever loving name, or better yet, have that shit figured out before you walk in.  LIFE SKILLS, PEOPLE! We old bastards need our coffee to fight tyranny (AKA our parents who still know EVERYTHING *eye roll*) and still find the energy to deal with the Beibs and that Swift girl that can't get her shit together enough to have a normal break-up. Which reminds me, what the hell happened to that Starbucks mermaid's breasts?  Was there a pink ribbon fund raiser I missed while waiting for Brittany to make up her mind?

In all seriousness, I still feel like a teenager.  I remember it all too well.  I'm known to sing "Teen Angst" by Cracker to my 16-year old when drama unfolds...I need another folk singer like I need a HOLE in my head...and she just looks at me perplexed.  I know she's trying to find herself and what she is and to stand out from the crowd.  Your middle teens to early 20s is all about proving you're different and finding what the world means and your place in it, while having a total and complete existential crisis. I wouldn't relive it if I had a choice, but I get to as a parent.

I'm just trying to find the balance between letting her experiment and knowing when to put my foot down.  I'm trying to walk a tight rope between knowing I've taught her to do right, and finding the faith within myself to know she can do it.  I'm on a unicycle in this Circus of Parenthood juggling when to let her learn lessons on her own and when to step in and protect her.

She's a smart kid. A different kid than I was.  She has different hobbies and likes, and she's outgoing when I was very shy. My only goal, as her mother, is that she is loving, kind, peaceful, and confident. That she finds what and who she loves.  That she learns to weave in and out of the lanes of this rush hour that is life and doesn't take the HOV lane for through traffic.  That she enjoys the journey and finds in her heart what makes this world better for her.

I'm not terrified of her generation.  I'm not terrified of teenagers.  I'm terrified that in all of it, somewhere, I'll fail. Mr. Vonnegut, true terror is realizing you're Muhammad Ali against the ropes, and your rope-a-dope better work. Its a kid that put you there, and you sure as hell better have trained...not you them.

And most of all, they give us hope.  They give us hope that idealization still lives.  They stand in our face and make us have acceptance.  They stand and say, "Embrace change. Accept us...our vision."  We taught them that vision.  We owe them, at the least, a look.

The Haunting

Yesterday was my ex-husband's birthday.  For most people with an ex, it would be a normal day where you got up in the morning and checked the calendar for the kid's activities, took mental note of something that seemed to have happened in a past life, and went about your day.

Most of us ex's would've have bought a small gift for the kids to give, reminded them to call, and probably exchanged kids for the night, if it fell on an off-custody week.  We'd exchange some niceties...ask about the new kids.  How is work?  How is the family? Talk about shitty spring weather; talk about grades, groundings, and stuff that happened during the week.

More than likely, in this past life that once was mine, we'd talk about the latest argument between me and his new wife.  Me always right.  Never once taking into consideration about him being caught in the middle.

I'd probably still have that chip on my shoulder.   That one that always said, "You chose this.  Your actions did this.  You.  You.  You.  You're where the blame lies."  I'd probably still feel the resentment I imposed on myself, but blamed on him.  I'd take it more for granted than I did WAY back then.

Since it was his birthday, I'd feign niceness. Pretend I'd forgotten all the times I was told I'd never be anything without him.  I'd pretend I didn't remember the pancakes and hotdogs and three jobs I worked while attending college, because I promised I'd never give him the satisfaction of thinking he ever helped me do anything while the child support never came or I cuddled a hurt little girl sad her dad didn't show up.  I'd pretend, but I'd hold a smirk on lips that let him know.

And he would know.  He would know because he would fail to look me in the eyes--instead he would stare at the ground and wait for her to get her stuff.  He would make awkward jokes, pretending he didn't know my pain. And, I would make him suffer, again and again.  Over and over.

Because I DID hurt.  When he cheated with my best friend, I hurt in a place I didn't even know I had....despite knowing this thing was over before it started.

I was remarried, but by God Almighty, he'd know the hurt.  I'd remind him...with a look.  I'd hold my head a little higher when he walked in the door.  I'd plan an elaborate vacation--just to say, "Remember how I couldn't do it? Remember?"

I held that grudge and looked forward to the day, THAT look crossed her eyes.  THAT one.  You, know.  Where she looked at him and knew he never showed up when he said he would.  The one where me never saying anything bad in front of her, turned into her discovering on her own.

I never got that day.  I never got that day, and I never got the day me and his new wife were able to speak civilly on the phone.

What I did get is something my daughter never will.  I got an apology.  It was a sunny day in the summer, and I saw the caller ID and almost didn't answer.  I'd let him know the guy I was about to marry wanted to adopt our 4-year old daughter.  No contact for over a year; I didn't need to let him know, but I felt obligated.

I answered because I honestly thought I was going to get my way.  Instead, I heard, "I just want to apologize for everything I've done to you.  I am truly sorry."

I didn't accept that apology, and I didn't apologize for everything I'd done wrong.  And everything I'd done was just as bad as what he'd done. "Paybacks are a bitch," was my motto back then.

I am haunted that I never apologized.  But more haunting, is that my daughter will never get an apology.

My daughter will never get him at her graduation.  He won't be there to drop her off at college.  He can't walk her down the aisle.  She rarely sees his side of the family.

See, he died. He passed away in a car accident when she was nine.  She was supposed to be with him that night, but just like most nights, he had something else to do.  He drank, drove, and died.

I can't even count on both hands anymore the friends I've lost to drunk driving or have been killed by a drunk driver.  And, it all of a sudden slams into you like a car out of control, how much what I've suffered, what I dealt with...how much it doesn't fucking matter.

I was jolted awake at 4:37 in the morning by my husband...I will never forget looking at the clock or the look on his face when he told me what happened.

Despite the hurt we had between us, I was devastated.  I had to tell my daughter when she woke up, after pancakes and after I found the guts, what happened.  Still the worst day of my life.

I'm not supposed to admit it, especially now, that I loved him.  I did.  And, a certain part of me still does.  But, my love has been given to someone else...someone who has always put me and my kid first.  I am not allowed to grieve.

I'm not supposed to remember it was my first love...things I should have worked out after the divorce.  One person  hugged me at that funeral and asked if I was alright.  I wasn't.

Despite my vindictiveness and his absence, we'd become friends again.  We actually were able to come to a mutual understanding about our child...despite my anger.

I still want to be mad.  I want to slap him.  He had a good heart.  He had a problem.  He's missed out on every glorious occasion that wonderful thing we created has done since she was nine.  He missed out on her braces, her graduation from Catholic School, her first formal, her first kiss, her first date.  He'll miss out on so much more, and I want to slap him.  Not for what he did to me, or even as much as I feel it, what he did to her.  He's missing out on things he wanted to be here for.

I want to punch him in the face...not for what he did to me, like in my past life.  But for haunting  the most beautiful thing in the world  with the perpetual what if?  He and I?  We chose our path.  Our daughter didn't.

I look back, now, and know I should've have taken and given an apology.  I know it doesn't mean anything compared to what she has been through.  Its so easy, to be the me generation.

My daughter deserves an apology.  For the time I took from her when I left him.  For the time he took from her when he decided to leave.

My daughter never asked for this.  Part of growing up, part of having kids--means your heart is ripped out and walking around in someone else's body, is realizing your hurts are trivial.

I still have both my parents.  My baby still cries...yesterday and that day in December.  I have no more grudges...except her guardian angel owes her an apology.  The one I got and she didn't.

I know now, how it is to be caught in the middle.  Between someone that has been there for her, and someone that was supposed to be.  I know, now, how little our adult trivialities REALLY matter.

I wish he was here.  Not for me. Not for my grudge or my grief.  I wish I had apologized.  I wish I had forgotten my grudges.  I don't even want to remember or remind him of what we both did wrong.  I just want him here for her...how she remembers.

It haunts me.  My grudge.  My hate.  I'd take it all back to give him to her.  All my tears.  All my heart...all the pain I never got to express that eats at me.  I don't want her to have THAT look I so much looked forward to.  I wish she could have him...here.