I have realized that all the wondergarden early waldorf training is true and I am at times just a horrid mom. My own mother was part Indian gypse grifter and the other part Scotts-Irish con woman. I myself am a self -absorbed artist type with to much education and to much spare time on my hands, as they say. Mabey not “Mommy dearest” but I am also not Olivia Walton (yet). I aspire to the levl of “momming” of the mom on Lost in Space. She had willful children but deep down they were peaches. Mine too. I have moments that I just want to scream at my children “What’s wrong with you?!?!”. Plus I get really crazy hormonal.
When I lived in California and the Santa Annas would come blasting through – you always felt a bit edgy. That is how I felt today…(and it is a bit windy).
I was hanging out the blankets to air them out before packing them away and it occured to me that my children are of my own making. I was still fuming at the tantrum episode the two of them (6 and 8 ) pulled while we went to the market for sloppy joe fixens and Pantene. It seems it was sample day and we went before lunch, after breakfast and my boy felt he needed many more samples of the deli pasta dish. Pouting because I said “No”, he was pressing his face against the glass of the frozen food pizzas and I snatched him by the ear to get his attention (after many come on’s) and he pulled back – and I pinched his ear instead of grasping it. I was already feeling like the worlds worst mother with spoiled out of control kids when he started to bawl like a two year old. My kids were always quite well behaved untill they started school. They are now of the minds that they are independant creatures with minds of their own and that their father and I are just there to make suggestions and mac-and-cheese.
“I hate you” my sweet boy said at the checkout. My six year old then said “Well I am being good right?” . This after fighting tooth and nail over who got to push the cart and grabbing everything in site to put into the cart – despite my saying ” Not today”.
No no no no no no. I just bagged everything in our World Market canvas totes and marched those kids out to the car and held my breath and tongue for the five minutes back to the house. I was so glad we had not walked today. Groceries carried into the house and then kids straight to their rooms so they could get busy cleaning them up.
My son came out of his room ‘I’m hungry”. my daughter next same thing. The teenager is at work or it would have been a trio of demands and needs not met.
Kids fed – sent outside to water and breathe, then back to their rooms. I began hanging out the blankets from their rooms. That is when it happened, when I realized my children are exactly reflections of who I am and what I have made them. Somewhere I have once again made them too independant ( my oldest is queen of that) and too sassy and hungry and argumentative. My baby girl is the sweetest child and truly a good girl. My oldest another girl – the same and though she is going through a mean streak of seperation, I know who she is inside, all gravy and frosting.
My son though…I see he has some control issues. My evil truth is that I have not invested enough time with him on what is important – other than video games, math and science. I am stressing him out. I have to look deep inside to see this in me. In the beginning years at Waldorf we are trained to visit each family in their home setting to get a measure of who the family is and who the child is in the family. Each child. That is a lot of visits. After putting out the blankets to dry in the beautiful sun and with the glorious breeze I did a home visit to my own house. I looked at who I am as a mother and who these children are and where they are in the family and I see we need some work but we are all okay. We just need some fine tuning, some better organized rooms and not so much clutter, physically and mentally. To many video games and tellie.
Also, note to self … I need to never again take the kids to the store before they have had lunch and never after a marathon morning of Mario Cart on the Wii.
Connection.
Everything is connecting or unconnecting to bring balance to our worlds. I forgot that for a moment.
The rest of the day we watered the garden and packed away more of winter, coats and heavy wool blankets and pillows, sweaters and toys. It is quiet and now and i have a moments of peace while they clean their rooms (or play). I ordered a book on Amazon – Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance – Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem! (Paperback). I read the first few pages on amazon and laughed the whole time. You have to read this – or of you have already please do share your thoughts. Thank you Charlaine for the referal!
Number one on the summer reading list – 09.
I am currently reading – Living Dead in Dallas, Movie night is tonight and sloppy joes are on the menue as is popcorn and junior mints.
My mood is : cautiously optomistic and pms-ee. I need a spa day.
Though my blog says it is Jan 5th for me in the Midwest it is still Jan 4th 7pm. and Jan. 4th is Jacob Grimm’s birthday and for me there is many a reason to rejoice in this day. As a child I loved reading Grimm’s fairy Tales – as much as Hans Christian Anderson’s lovely stories of brave children and harsh times. Edith Hamilton’s books on Mythology would round out my fantasy world and my parents were lucky if I came out of these imaginary lives for even a moment. I would sit in my club house closet or lay outside on the lawn under the oak trees and read all weekend till it was dark and sometimes with a candle or flashlight. My favorite stories were the ones of Princesses and of little brothers and sisters battling forces to save one another. 
I do rather like the Zenescope comic book “retold” stories of the Grimm fairy Tales and I did like the recent movie though I do not care for Matt Damon one fig – I adore Heath Ledger and love love love Terry Gilliam, and Monica Bellucci whom I have had a huge crush on since the Matrix – she is my “perfect woman” in my imagination. Equal to her beauty is 
Lady of the Lake 