Have you seen the commerical for Nature Made vitamins where the little girl is sitting on the steps and says...
... "mom's are superheros...'cept no one even knows it...they are secret superheroes...(dramatic pause)...that's powerful"...
I thought how wonderful it would be to know that my kids think of me as their hero. Will they ever?
Will Brendon think I'm a superhero when I have to choose paying rent (that is already late) over his Washington, DC trip? I got a paper home last night that the final payment has to be postmarked by January 19th. I love that term "final payment", love how it implies I've actually been the dutiful mother the last 5 months and had actually been paying the $200 a month payments the trip cooridinators set up. I think I may have paid $200 overall toward the whole $1000 trip up to now. I have no idea where I'm going to come up with the rest considering I finally broke down and put the Durango in the shop today after the "Check Engine" light has been on for almost 2 months.
I'm pretty sure I already fell from superhero status when Dallas didn't get the big boy/girl birthday party he asked for.
This certainly isn't how I wanted to live my life. I wish I didn't have to choose between rent or a class trip, between Christmas for all three or a big birthday for one, between second hand or the mall. It doesn't feel very superhero-y. It feels pretty bad.
Now some would say if it really is a choice between rent and a class trip then it's a no-brainer and the kid will just have to understand that a place to live is more important that a place to visit. And I know that too in my head but I remember how crushing it was to be the kid who never got to go on any of those trips. Who even 20 years later when the friends who got to go reminisce stills feels bad they didn't get to go. Who remembers how embarrassing it was to still be wearing Lee straight leg jeans when everyone else was wearing Lee pinstrip jeans (80's reference). To always be one trend behind the times. I wanted to be the mom who could give more to my kids and I'm soooooooo not.
It does make me wonder if my mom felt this way. Did it break her heart to have to say no the way it does mine? Of course back then I thought they were heartless for saying no. But I did get to go on one trip and it was actually a big one. I did get to go to Mexico for a week for Spanish class the summer between my junior and senior year. As I've been trying to figure how I'm going to pay for Brendon's trip, I found myself wondering if all my friends who went to DC when we were in jr high knew what it cost their parent's for them to go. Probably not. Or did the same kids who got to go to Chicago in high school know what it cost? Probably not. Do I have any idea what it cost my parents for me to go to Mexico? NO! I'm sure that was more costly than DC or Chicago especially in a summer that when it was over my dad had lost his battle with cancer.
I've long known that my parents and even my brother sheltered me from a lot of my dad's illness so that I could experience high school. But did they ever know they were superheroes? Probably not.
So, you see, history repeats itself in many ways. Not only do I have no more money than my parents did to provide the extra things for my kids but also my kids have no more idea than I did back then what my parents went through to provide what we did have.
So what truly makes parents superheroes? Is it the extras they can provide or sheltering their kids from the struggles of providing what they can?
Who are the superheroes in your life? Do they know?
3 comments:
Super post, and I see where you are coming from. Almost all of us raised by a single parent or Grandparent know exactly where you are coming from. You never appreciate these things in the NOW only when they are in the past and you are living it.
I felt like crying when I read this...it is so unfair.
You are an awesome Mom,and,yes,if your boys feel the same way I do about my Mom,they may not tell you so now,but someday,when they are a starving college student,or,even better,a parent themselves,they will thank you for all the things you did for them as boys. Even those decisions that they didn't understand at the time.
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