control

Posted on December 12, 2012 by Kate

Violent isn’t really the word. Physically active isn’t really it, either. Isn’t scary enough.

my babies

The Hubs picked up Emma from riding yesterday. Just as a matter of filling up dead air space as we waited to leave for Ben’s wrestling match, I asked, “How was Emma’s riding today?” See, yesterday was the first day I hadn’t ridden with her since August. When he didn’t look at me right away and started with, “Well, when I got there…” my eyes started getting wide.

“She came off, ” I said quickly. “Was she spinning or running? She was running, wasn’t she?” He rolled his eyes.

Yes, she fell off, apparently. She said she “flew” off. Said she remembered her hand getting tangled in the reins first, then the horse’s mane, then her opposite foot coming out of the stirrup, then hitting the dirt. I remember the first time I fell off, too, just like that. It’s a slow-motion memory. But, she was fine. Jumped right back on and kept going. Later, she said she was glad I wasn’t there. Said I would have squealed. On the inside, I started squealing back at “Well, when I got there…”

And, speaking of squealing….

I went to my first wrestling match. Ben is on the JV team. First time ever. Talk about sensory overload. The outfits? Whoa. The slamming on the ground? Double whoa. The gasps from the Mama Section in the stands? Bring on the Xanax. It was violent, but controlled. It was rough and tumble, but with finesse.  I do not understand the rules or how you score points, but I have a new respect for the sport. And, if that boy had not removed his entire body from the entire backside of my boy’s, I was going to have to go get the plastic bat-like thing from that cute timer girl and do more than just tap-tap that referee.

Maybe Control is the word I’m looking for regarding yesterday’s activities. Emma certainly controlled herself enough to climb back up in the saddle with no apparent hesitation. Ben controlled himself enough during his match to have no penalties and fight a fair fight. And, I controlled myself enough to:

1) not drag Emma in my lap to hug, kiss and cuddle her for an extended period of time

2) not drag Ben out of that gym for wearing that leotard in public

3) not punch The Hubs in the nose for his unspoken or undiscovered role in the day’s activities.

So, yes. Control is the word. And, as long as I can stay in a warm and padded room until the memories fade, I’ll be fine. Until this afternoon when Emma rides again and Ben wrestles again.

Lord, help me. And The Hubs.

 

 

 

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cent, cents and no sense

Posted on December 10, 2012 by Kate

I try not to hold a grudge. Particularly when it comes to my children. They do try hard to be good. But. He has been known to catch his hair on fire. And laugh about it.

And I’m NOT talking about the one on the left…

Ben (11) and I were piddling around in the kitchen when he asked, “How do you use the word ‘cent’? I always wanted to know that. No one has ever taught me that. Is it ‘cent’ or cents’?”

He always wanted to know? No one ever taught him that? Uh-huh.  Just like no one ever tells him it’s time to leave for school when the clock says 7:30am. Because it changes every day. Uh-huh.

As he stood in front of me looking directly in my eyes expectantly, palms up, head tilted, I froze. What were we talking about before this? Were we getting close to the topic of his grades? Chores? His dirty jeans that he probably doesn’t think I notice under the dining room table? I think this is a diversion. He’s trying to get me off his scent. I really don’t think he cares at all about how to use the word cent. 

I squinted my eyes at him. And forged on.

“You use the word ‘cent’ just like ‘dollar’. When you are referring to more than 1, it gets an ‘s’. You’ve probably heard people say ‘That piece of candy is 25 cent’, but that’s not right. It should be ‘That piece of candy is 25 cents’. And, that rapper? The one named 50Cent? That’s wrong. His name is actually grammatically incorrect.”

“Mama Joe!” he yelled and his feet started moving around without real purpose like boy’s feet do when they get excited. “Hi you know ’bout a rappa?” he said.  And, ps…He started calling me Mama Joe a couple of years ago and I have no idea where it came from.

“I just remember it because it’s wrong”, I said matter-of-factly. He nodded his head a couple of times and let those boy feet take him out into the den. See? He didn’t care about how to use those words. He’s done something. I just don’t know what yet.

But, that little exchange with Ben left me thinking. Surely that rapper didn’t choose his name because it’s wrong and that fact alone would make people remember him. So, did he choose it to be cool? To be hip?

I think I would die if I had to carry around a grammatical error on all my legal documents. I wonder if he’s ever had to explain how he knows it should be 50 Cents, but he just likes it better without the ‘s’. Of course, that’s assuming he knows his name is wrong. I guess it’s possible nobody ever taught him or Ben how to use those words correctly.

Choosing to be wrong in order to be cool? It doesn’t make you cool And it doesn’t make you right. It makes you some other things, but right is not on the list. You don’t have to strut around being bad and breaking rules to get people to like you. It’s just not necessary to go to that much trouble. You’d be surprised at what a simple smile can do for you and your reputation. Learn how to start a conversation, for heaven’s sake.

Now, if you’ll excuse me. I need to go check on the dog and find Emma’s spurs. I know Ben has done something. 

 

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the picture of having done it

Posted on December 7, 2012 by Kate

Do you ever reach the end of the week, the end of a month, the end of a project, the end of a list and wonder what really got accomplished?

I just want to show you what a sense of having done something you set out to do looks like:

This picture was taken on the day Emma got her braces off and on the day her training ramped up a notch. As her mom, it was fun to watch her enjoy what she’s been working toward for a long time. Along the way, I’d watched her struggle with decisions that led up to this very day. To eat popcorn or not to eat popcorn, for example. And, don’t minimize that type decision…big impact or (seemingly) trivial, any decision that can impact a bigger picture or a long-term outcome requires a certain way of thinking. I, for one, do not always possess that way of thinking.

Go to riding lesson or go to after-school meetup with friends? Quit when I don’t think I can get that 1200 lb animal to bend to the right, move forward and drop her head all at the same time or keep working at it?

And this relaxed posture you see she has? That’s not easy either. It can be hard to make yourself let go and let down enough to exhale and enjoy what you’ve done. Looking back to re-hash and re-live can be a trap unless you use that perspective to make the next project work better.

So, here we are. The end of another week, another project, another year. At first glance, you may not think you’ve accomplished much, but don’t be fooled by that ridiculous and insipid inner voice. Getting out of bed each morning and facing the day is an accomplishment.

We’ll get to those worn out shoes you insist on wearing every. single. day in another post.

 

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what’s the real reason?

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Kate

It started when I woke up yesterday morning. The hunger.  For food.  I’ll make this next part fast and try not to smash your image of me as controlled, deliberate, svelte, unshakable.

I started with leftover, cold and stiff strawberry muffins. Two of those. But they were minis. About two hours later, a cream cheese danish from Walgreens. Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. At lunch, Taco Bell.  I was craving something cheesy. Nachos Bell Grande plus a small side item did the trick. Three small Hershey bars left over from Halloween about 4:00. That tied me over til dinner. Spinach fondue, fresh bread dipped in olive oil, caesar salad, roughly 10 bites of The Hubs’s salad, and lastly, ravioli.  Ok, fine. Lastly was the roughly 8 bites of Ben’s chicken alfredo.

Between the chocolate and the fondue, I detoured (away from food) through Dick’s Sporting Goods. On my way to the back right corner of the store, I passed through the women’s running section. The posters of tight and toned ladies with determined looks and sweating brows….I should be a runner, I thought. For about the 1,815,738th time in my life. It’s the clothes! I want to wear running clothes. Click on this link. You’ll understand what I mean.

I would be a runner if I could wear these clothes, I declared. The colors are bright and cheerful and those stretchy pants look divine. Maybe I was thinking about how comfy they would be as I lounged in front of a fire on a chilly afternoon.

But, it would be really expensive to outfit my new running self since I would have to start from scratch. Oh well. Another opportunity to take on another day. I guess it’s just not something I can do right now, I concluded breezed through the Under Armour to the register where I slipped a Whatchamacallit to the checkout girl.

Yeah. Right. The reason I don’t run is because of budget concerns? Not a chance. I don’t run because I don’t like to run. It hurts. All over. I want to say I’m a runner and I want to have runner’s legs. Thighs specifically. And, I want to travel all over going to races wearing those cute clothes. But, I’m kidding myself if I try to say I don’t run because I don’t have the right clothes or it’s a pocketbook concern.

There are probably other things I don’t do for reasons I make up and have no real bearing on the decision. But, yesterday’s food expo interrupted by a trip to Dick’s had me thinking about the excuses we come up with to justify our preferences.

Therefore…..this morning, as I chose my outfit, I chose to wear bootcut jeans, a cardigan over a button down shirt and flats. The flats are so I could jog from my car to the front door of Walgreens for my breakfast. It’s not a stretchy getup with Pain Is Good written in neon across my chest, but it’s a start.

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Monday mornings

Posted on December 3, 2012 by Kate

It has been a Monday morning around this house. And it’s barely 8am. A tad grumpy laced with a touch of unorganization…add in a headache for one and a pair of tennis shoes that became (apparently) unbearably too small overnight for the other. A gym bag whose strap finally broke – on the way out the door – and about 8 too few strawberry muffins and, well, it’s a Monday morning.

However….

Seems we have this preconceived notion that Monday mornings are or will be bad. But, that line of thinking is a little off base. Why does Monday Morning get such a bad rap? It can’t help it that it’s the first morning of a new work/school week. And, we have this opinion only because we have been conditioned to think this way. It’s what we’ve always heard, been told or read.

I think it’s time we scratch this whole Monday morning whiney thing.

Just like a chicken scratches away the top layer of useless stuff so she can get to the good stuff, we could do the same thing. Granted, for her, the good stuff is likely a bug. But, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, we’ve all heard, so I say Start Scratchin’!

Go get your bugs, find some seeds! Just put down any preconceived notions that are slowing you down and move it!

But, if you’d like to wait until Tuesday morning, I’d understand.

 

 

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the tail end of the week

Posted on November 30, 2012 by Kate

 It’s Friday. The tail end of the week. That means we either need to be finishing up some things or getting ready for the next things. But, if you’re like me, Friday catches you still working on the middle parts of things. Especially if I started the week with the intention of being finished by now. Those particular tasks are the most stubborn to complete.

Anywhoo. If you catch yourself getting spastic today because you feel end of week deadlines looming, just picture this face. You don’t actually have to grab Friday by the tail and strike a pose, but if it’d help, who am I to stop you?

Make a list, prioritize, delegate (if you can), set a time schedule then stick to it. Before you know it, it’ll be 5:00 somewhere. And it’ll feel good! Just try not to take down your co-workers in the meantime with a case of the I’m-behind-and-trying-to-get-caught-up Grumpies. Smile, take control and get ‘er done!

(I’m sorry…it just popped in my mind…I really do try to keep the redneck out of this blog)

Have a great weekend and Stay Civil!

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just roll with it

Posted on November 29, 2012 by Kate

For the last couple of days, the weather has been dreary here.  Drizzly rain, no sunshine to speak of and pretty darn chilly temps.  Truthfully, I don’t hate this kind of weather…when I can bundle up in front of a fire and not have to venture out. So, Sunday afternoons actually work best for me.  But, since The Big Man does not ask me before he presses some button or instructs an angel or tilts over that bucket of water, I – like everybody – will just have to roll with what comes.

That does not mean, with a big fat however, that we have to like it. Emma and I rode horses late on the afternoon of the great 48 degree misting. First, my hands hurt. Then, my ears starting hurting. Then, my nose started running. It’s awfully hard to look cute riding a horse while the volume of one’s hair expands exponentially in such a short timeframe, one’s bangs curl up Shirley Temple style, and a Kleenex peeks out from the sleeve of one’s sweater. And just a real quick side note:  This very experience is one of the unrecorded examples of the benefits of being 40. At least to me. I want to be cute and try hard to be cute. But, it really is no biggie if it just doesn’t work out. At the horse barn, anyway. Not when and where it really counts. You still have to pull it together for when it matters.

After the second day of this kind of weather and this kind of hair and Kleenex, I began to pine for Spring. Now, since yesterday when I wrote the post that included Madea, I have had a bit of a time shaking her. And when I started with the whole I-can’t-wait-for-Spring routine, she blasted me. And she was right.  We ain’t never satisfied.

If it’s dry, we want rain. If it’s cold, we want warm. If we work 9 – 5, we want 10 – 6. If we have Friday off, we’d rather have Monday. If we get the project we asked for, it turns out to be too difficult. If the deadline is 2:00, we really need til 4:00. It can wear a person out with all this finding fault here, there and everywhere.

Madea didn’t come right out and call me Debbie Downer, but she could have. So beware of finding fault with too many things. Particularly the things you can’t change. Adaptability is very attractive to friends and employers. It does not mean you are complacent. It means you choose to work within the parameters you’ve been given and plan to make the best of it.

So, adaptability is the word for the day. And since The Weather Channel says we’re up for sunny and 66 degrees, that should be no problem. Good luck to you. Wherever you are.

Posted in Business etiquette, General, Making an impression | Tagged | 2 Comments

no she didn’t

Posted on November 28, 2012 by Kate

Get a’load of this…

Recently, I participated in a meeting in which a very young employee (young in years and young in the company) wanted to express some complaints to her boss and, in the same meeting, ask for a raise. Oh, this, I gotta see, I thought while a perfectly clear vision developed in my mind of Madea grabbing her black handbag, swinging it into the crook of her arm and standing wide-legged and ready.

As we entered the room, I got a “Hey, what’s up, girl” while the boss got a “Hey” from the cute little thing we were meeting with.  At least I think she was talking to us.  She never actually looked up from all that tapping she was doing on her phone. As we settled in and prepared to get started, it wasn’t hard to notice the reflection on the framed picture hanging on the wall behind her desk.  Facebook.  It was 2:00 on a workday. In other words, she was on the clock. So far, not much of this is boding well for her, I thought, while Madea shifted in her chair and mumbled incoherently.

And so the meeting begins…the boss asking questions, little cutie bantering back vague answers and the occasional eye roll and shoulder shrug.  Little cutie even asked some questions…argumentative and laced with a tone so demeaning a high school football coach would envy her…but, they were questions. For example, she asked, “Like, if I only get 80 hours each year for sick and vacation time, that means I’m supposed to only get sick a few times, right? Like, how am I supposed to plan something like that?” Another question and this was the crowning blow for me: “So, when we met a few weeks ago and I told you I wanted to learn more about [new skill - I'm not saying what because I'm not giving anybody's identity away - plus, I barely understood what she was referring to] XYZ, I mean, I haven’t heard anything more about that. Like, what have you planned for me?” By this time, I was fully channeling Madea, my mouth hanging open, nudging the boss and saying No, she didn’t.

I found myself completely perplexed. How on God’s green earth did she make it through college? And then, is it at all possible that she honestly believes her boss is dumb? Wait, wait, wait.  This is an act! That’s what this is. She wants her boss to think she is dumb, feel sorry for her and give her the raise out of pity. Well, that’s a relief because I was beginning to have old people thoughts about these young people today.

Alas, it was no act. She really thought it was her boss’s responsibility to make her learn and grow in her profession thereby making herself more valuable as an employee and worthy of a raise. So…and try to keep up…as it turns out…it was her boss’s fault for not forcing that growth which denied her that raise.

Humph. Thanks a lot, Boss. You suck. She didn’t actually say that, but the incredulous expression she wore didn’t leave much to the imagination.

The whole scene took me back a couple of years to a horse show I’d watched. Yep, kids…

They were all dressed up like grown ups, doing grown up things, using grown up things and interacting with grown ups. Snatched from a world where they existed among their own kind and plopped into a world where they know not what they do! Not so different from college graduates…

Now. I know you know this. And I know you know this because the average age of the person who reads this blog is 30-something. That means you have been in the working world long enough to know that You are on your own!  If you want a raise, show some kickin’ work ethic, take advantage of every learning opportunity that comes around and prove you’re worthy to have on the payroll. When you get ready to actually make the request, ask for a meeting, and, for heaven’s sake, don’t do it via text message. Show up on time, show some manners and respect for the decision-maker and leave your cell on silent. For this type meeting, this last bit might be the most important thing: maintain good eye contact. This will show you are serious, you are being sincere and you are confident in your request. Nobody is going to make you look good but you, so you’d better know what you’re talking about and how to say it.

Our little cutie? She was knowing not what she was doing. Or, as Madea would say, “Go on. Open yo’ mouf one mo’ time. See what happen.”

 

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the beauty of confession

Posted on November 27, 2012 by Kate

You have probably heard that today is Giving Tuesday. It’s a day during which we are supposed to consider how we can give back. The website is www.GivingTuesday.org.  You’ll find some great ways to get involved with volunteer organizations on the national level and in your own community listed there. So, I had planned to write a post about the importance of involving your entire family in the whole giving back effort.

But, here’s where my mind actually is: my less than admirable parenting vocabulary. I am not going to cite specific examples nor am I going to tell you specifically which words I have used of late. It’s important that you know I am not proud. Nor am I ashamed, however.  I would like to know what – exactly – you might have said if a dirty, smelly, socked foot reached up from the back truck floorboard and massaged your newly washed and styled hair. Or, if you left town to be with family for 3 days only to discover your younger child did not pack any clean clothes; rather, he’d filled his duffel bag with boots.

It’s the unexpected moments that make me forget my upbringing.  The moment I discover I’ve been lured into close confinement with a very large bug. The moment little boney hands reach out from under my side of the bed and grab my ankles. The moment I see all the charger cords in the house braided together and being used as a rope. Or, when a dinner roll hits me in the back of the head. Or, when a snake nearly crawls into the canoe with us.

I know, I know. I’m the adult and I should keep my cool. And, yes, I remember spouting off about being Cowboy Cool. But, here’s my honest-to-goodness opinion: in a situation like any of those above, I (the adult) should not be the one walking away reeling and recoiling from shock. If somebody is going to walk away carrying a lifelong memory, I want it to be the fella who thought he had a good idea in the first place.

So, there. My admission makes me whole again. I am now cleansed and can move forward. That’s much better.

Forget that Giving Tuesday stuff, toss out a recent sin and go forth as whole as me.

I’m kidding. Don’t do that. Go do something nice for somebody.

And hurry before anything you’ve read here sticks.

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the Monday morning stare-down

Posted on November 26, 2012 by Kate

The Monday after a holiday weekend can stare you down. Hard.

And we bring it on ourselves. We leave town as soon as someone blows the whistle indicating a holiday has started and we don’t slow down until we hit the bed the night before real life begins again. We like to play hard. And eat a lot. And stay up late. And sleep late. All the things that make Monday morning work and school appear like a freight train coming around the bend.

Why do we do things that we know will ultimately bring hardship on ourselves? Repeatedly? Just think on that and let me know. While you do that, I’ll be here clutching my cup of coffee. Hard.

 

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