Life takes us down some pretty
tricky paths before it decides to dump us by the wayside, leaving us wondering
what box of Cheerios we gave it permission to piss in. We are at that age when
we are starting to lose our parents, illnesses are catching up with our once
invincible bodies and our own children are becoming young adults. Take a good
look in the mirror and yep, you guessed it; we have become our parents. Those
very traits we couldn’t stand growing up have crept into our own fibers of
being. I’m sure we all have unknowingly or knowingly adopted some ways of our
parents, good or bad. I know I have.
My father wasn’t around much when my
parents divorced, after watching years of fighting between the two; I don’t
think I cared too much. I remember wanting to be that daddy’s girl, I wanted to
still dance on his feet as he played Sam Cooke and the Impressions on the Hi-Fi
(yes kids, we had a Hi-Fi). I wanted to learn to work on cars with him and
learn HVAC to work alongside him. I wanted him at my basketball and softball
games. I wanted him at my choir concerts. He only lived 10 minutes away for
goodness sake! If you were to meet my dad, you would hear stories of him
carrying me around on his shoulders, or him having me and a diaper bag wherever
he went. What isn’t told is that these things happened before I was 10, after
that; the stories stop. I love my father, but he is the biggest chauvinist I
know. I learned to work on cars, I even learned a little HVAC and I became a journey
level carpenter; without my father. Lesson my father taught me without knowing
he taught? Be strong.
It’s true when they say a girl meets
a fellow similar to her own father; and yep I sure did. My son’s father, after
a bit of coaxing, was quite attentive when he was younger. As he got older,
they bowled together, hung out on Father’s day and generally just hung out
period. Then it started to slow down. Father’s teach their sons many things.
They teach them how to throw a football, play basketball, how to ride a bike,
the facts of life, how to tie a tie, how to fix things. My son learned all
those “manly” lessons, but he learned them from me. I was my son’s first coach
and he played basketball for me. It was my mom that got him his first set of
plastic bowling pins and got the bowling alley to let him in a league at the
age of four. He won a 9pin-no tap tournament and was in the paper. Once he
started showing promise on the track, both his father and his grandfather (my
father) said he ran like them. I guess it didn’t matter that mom was the one that
was the jock in the family and mom was the one that was emotionally and
monetarily involved. These two men saw a chance to beat their chests. Too bad
they didn’t see him really shine. They didn’t see this young man had learned to
be strong without either of them around.
I don’t think my son has seen me
weak. Yea I cried like a baby during the whole leaving for college time, but he’s
my only kid and I had to give him to the world now. That’s a piece of your
heart that you know you have to share one day, but you want to hold on to it
just a little longer. With that being said, I've tried to teach him to be
strong no matter what. Never let them see you hurt. Believe me that is one
thing he has learned a little too well. I wouldn't change anything, but I’m
thinking I should have sprinkled in a little “it’s ok to not be strong
sometimes”. Maybe that’s a lesson we’ll
learn together, ahhh yes an evolution for the both of us.
I saw a former classmate put a
rather disturbing status on a social network site. She didn't really seem to be
in a good place at all and was basically just venting and probably seeking some
type of reassurance that something good might happen for her. I read through
the comments that were left for her and stopped at the one where she was told
by a friend be glad she has her health, she woke up and things will get better.
Besides, she was told, there are people that are worse off. Really!!!! If I
could have reached through the computer to slap the stupid out of the person
that said that, I would have slapped her twice. Firstly, this is a person that
has always had to be strong through quite a bit of adversity, sometimes you
break. Secondly, telling someone that they will get over it or that there is
someone in a worse predicament does not make a person feel better. How do you
know someone else is in a worse situation? Think about it. Maybe at that time,
my former classmate decided she couldn’t be strong anymore and that heartless
off the cuff remark just could have been the proverbial straw that broke the
camel’s back. Sometimes being strong is just listening.
I don’t put all my business on
social sites. Why should I? No matter what you put, there’s always going to be
that one person that says “Oh that’s nothing, I have….” Then it becomes all about
them. Everyone has that friend that wants all the attention focused on them, so
no matter what illnesses or issues you have, they will always try to top that.
What I will say is I’m not as strong as you may think. I get pissed off when I
see people using benefits they don’t deserve when I can’t even get insurance. I
get pissed when people utilize systems they really don’t need and brag about
it, when I can barely put food on the table. Like my former classmate, I do break.
The lessons of being strong went out
the window when I finally got the diagnosis of MS. As I write this, I’m still
trying to wrap my head around the concept that one day, my son will have to see
the woman that used to carry him on her neck and do pushups with him her back,
using a walker or in a wheelchair. I hear his seven year old voice standing in
line at school telling his friends that his mom is stronger than their dads
because she can build condos. At seven, I don’t even think he knew what condos
were, but he knew his mom had to work high in the air and build stuff. Bouts of
depression overtake me, yet I don’t post it all over the internet. Pain is a
daily way of life, but I don’t write about it all the time. I try to hold my
head up, although not very high. Through
all the things my father inadvertently taught me, I think I've learned the
opposite; I’m not always strong. ~ Just my two cents
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