Legal career?

May 2, 2016Leave a comment

Maria called me last Wednesday evening on my way home from work. She talked excitedly about her day. All was going well over the telephone wires until she asked me if she could come to work with me for National Bring your Child to Work Day.
Huh? I had not heard anything about this day being Thursday. I had a conference to attend and work to complete. It fell on a bad day; and besides, she just brought it up to me (could she really have been excited for weeks to come to my work as she alleged?)! I told her I didn’t think I could swing it.

Tears, lots of tears.

She had a rough week with her crazy allergies. And tears. I couldn’t stand it. I caved and told her that I could take her to work with me in the morning but then she would have to stay home and hang with Morgan. She was thrilled.

We dropped off Mario in the morning (he thought we were heading to the doctor’s office – little white lie) and headed to High Street. Ri had on her black boots and vest. She looked more stylish than me (not too hard to accomplish).

We had to head to an 8:30 am meeting. By 8:45, she was begging to go up to my office so she could play on the computer. I made her stay and endure the pain of the infamous “meeting” until 9:10 and then I let her go up to my office. She loved the swipe badge she had to use to get in the office and took every opportunity she had to use it.

We went to Starbucks for a morning beverage after my meeting and then she went to town on cleaning my bookcases – a much-needed task to complete. While she was sorting through binders of junk from 1998 she posed a question: “since its bring your “child” to school day, we should really bring Mario, too. He would be so pumped up, mom.”

Always looking out for her little bro.

So we picked Mario up at his lunch time and took him back to my work. He was pumped. Maria taught him how to use the swipe card and showed him where all my candy was stashed.

They played in my office and continued to clean. Maria wanted me to sit in another office far away but Mario wanted me to stay. I answered questions about what books to keep and toss and posed legal hypotheticals to them. Mario was intrigued with the hypotheticals; Ri not so much. She was wondering about lunch. We decided to get lunch downstairs at the cafe – they had 50% off pizzas, which Ri knew would make me smile. They wanted to eat in my office so we trekked back upstairs and dug into our discounted pizzas. After another half hour of watching me answer email and research, they were ready to call it a day.

“Can we go home now” they both pleaded.

They didn’t last as long as I thought they would but I give them credit for trying. My next career will be much more exciting as a park ranger in Yosemite…

I dropped them off at the house to Morgan and gave them a writing assignment: write a paragraph about whether you think you’d like to be a lawyer when you grow up.

I came home to two paragraphs: one from Ri and one from Mario. They couldn’t have had more different take-aways.

I think Mario was more intrigued with the notion of having his own office and being able to boss people around than actually being a lawyer; although he was intrigued with managing a “case file.” Ri was definitely not a fan of meetings; she still has bad memories of her last “bring your kid to school” experience three years ago where she wrote a poem titled “meetings are boring, boting, boring.” But she loved the perks of an office setting: free food (actually, she didn’t realize that me and others stocked the fridge) and jumbo post-it notes at your beckon call.

Only time will tell what influence this day had on their future careers. I’m perfectly happy if they choose to run faraway from the legal profession or if they choose to embrace justice. I just want them to be as happy as they were when we were in the car driving to my office that morning.

Enjoying the game

February 1, 2016Leave a comment

Maria played indoor soccer on Saturday afternoon and basketball on Sunday afternoon. Her teams lost both games.

She expressed no irritation or anger as she walked off the playing field and court. She smiled and joked with the coaches. She was happy.

I have always been competitive. If I wasn’t scoring a few goals a game, I was mad. If we lost to another team and I played poorly, I would beat myself up over it.

But Ri, she just enjoys the play. She appreciates the time with her friends. She likes the comraderie of the team. She loves hugging her coaches and talking to them about their newest hair color. She’s out on the court rooting on her team mates as they score baskets even if she hasn’t made one after three tries. She isn’t jealous of their success.

I only noticed this after Jon got on me for yelling at Ri during basketball. Ri had went for a shot and missed. The ball bounced off the rim close to her so she could have rebounded and tried for another shot but she got distracted and the other team got it. I yelled (gently) “Ri, go after those rebounds!” Jon looked at me and hinted to cool it. He was right. This is her first year of basketball. Heck, I’ve never understood the plays in the sport ever.

I sat on the bench next to Jon and took a few breaths. I remained quiet for a few minutes (that’s a miracle for those that see me at sporting events). And that’s when it hit me. I saw Ri skipping down the court and placing herself next to girl from the other team. She wasn’t muscling towards the net like a couple other girls on her team. She wasn’t elbowing the other team to get open. But she was in the game, moving around, doing picks to help move the ball. And she was giving high fives to her teammates when they scored. I realized that is a gift. She can play the game and also enjoy it. I needed to appreciate that gift, sit back, and simply watch. And that’s what I did, for the most part….

Cupcake war

November 23, 20153 Comments

Maria obsesses over the show Cupcake Wars. Absolutely loves it.

Yesterday, we had some down time between having friends over. Ri was shuffling through the boxes in the pantry and found a box of chocolate cake mix and icing (because we are the family that never is without sugar). She looked at me with her Maria smile and sweetly asked “can I do a cupcake war in the kitchen?”

Yes, it was her against herself. She retrieved all the ingredients and cupcake pans, and placed them on the counter. She wrote down the names of all the neighbors she’d give the cupcakes to and totaled the numbers. She needed 26 cupcakes. I stood at the oven and calibrated the timer to one hour and thirty minutes.

She yelled “go” and I started the timer. She whipped over my way and preheated the oven. Then she poured her batter and mixed her eggs, water and oil. She was in a mad frenzy from the start. And she loved the thrill. I acted as assistant reacting to commands she belted out.

“Open the icing and put it in the plastic dispenser! Make sure the silver decorating tip is all the way down!”

As I did that, she poured the mix in the cupcake cups. She only had enough mix for 20.

“Assistant, you need to run to the store and get another box of mix! And I need a topper. How about cherries or bananas?” I darted out of the house to Kroger’s. I had 18 minutes.

I grabbed a bunch of bananas and a box of mix. I also grabbed a can of frosting, in case (smart move in the end). Then I saw some decorative colored balls of chocolate so I grabbed a green and blue package. I thought Ri would love them.

I arrived home to a daughter who was flying around the kitchen.

“Thank goodness you are home! We need more mix made into batter! Did you get the bananas?”

I gave her the bananas and then brought the two packs of chocolate balls from behind my back to surprise her.

“What are these?” She made a scrunched-up disgusted face.

“I thought you’d like them for your cupcakes.”

“Ahh, mom, they do not at all go with my theme. Thanks though.”

Theme?!

She proceeded to sprinkle crushed graham cracker on her cupcakes. She sliced four bananas out of the six because she calculated 7 slices per banana. Glad her math is up to par.

She kept on me about the mix until I had stirred it up enough to bring it over to her. She poured it quickly (chocolate everywhere) and threw the pans into the oven. She dictated my next task: put the icing into the plastic decorating tube.

There was 6 minutes left when Ri took out the cupcakes. Some were finished but some were not. This led to a scolding from Ri about how I needed to buy the same kind of mix. My mix required a 25 minute bake time and Ri’s required 20. This meant they needed 5 more minutes – that would only leave one minute to decorate! Agh!

I took the fully cooked cupcakes out to decorate and Ri threw the remaining cupcakes into the oven. At two minutes, she made an executive decision and took the cupcakes out of the oven – ready they were fully done or not!

She topped the cupcakes with icing and I moved them over to the table to sprinkle with crushed graham cracker. She finished and put the bananas on top. We had 1 minute … she placed the last banana on the last cupcake and we were done! We high-fived each other and breathed a sigh of relief.

I could have eaten this girl up from head to toe as we stood there looking at her creations. She amazes me with her independence and strong will. She has a gift for design and a love of food. A pathway to executive pastry chef is beginning to be carved out….

Now, if she can just learn how to CLEAN UP!

Homemade pizza with my girl

January 7, 2015January 7, 2015Leave a comment

I picked up my girl last night from her friend’s house at 6 pm. We were both starving. I asked her what she wanted for dinner and she responded “let’s go buy some healthy stuff at the store and cook.”
Pretty sad when your nine year old daughter needs to endorse such an idea.
We walked into Kroger’s as we goggled “healthy chicken recipes”. We were coming up with too healthy of recipes – salads and fruit – and we didn’t want to quite go to that extreme…. Then I saw Naan sitting on the shelf near the donuts.
Ahh, donuts….
But no, we need healthy.
I remembered my girlfriend heating up a homemade pizza with naan bread at work a couple of weeks ago.
“How about homemade pizza?” I asked Ri.
She was all in. And God love her – she agreed to broccoli and peppers and mushrooms on her pizza.
We gathered all of our ingredients and snagged a Luna bar on the way out to tide us over. Maria spread the pizza sauce and pesto on our naan. Then cheese. Then chicken and the veggies. Ri got out her mittens and slid the baking sheet into the oven. Ten minutes later, ta-da!

They tasted heavenly. Ri made a video as we ate about how good the pizza tasted. She wanted to send it to all her family to let them know how to make it (little does she know all her family knows; its her mom that is behind the eight ball a bit…!).

We finished our pizzas and walked upstairs to get in our pjs. I was darn proud of myself for cranking out a healthy, wholesome meal with my girl. Yea, Ri only had to wait nine and half years but it was worth it, baby!

My caretaker

December 8, 2014December 8, 2014Leave a comment

I took Rocco for a run yesterday morning. Our regular Sunday trot together. The kids will allow me to do that on Sundays but no additional running or working out because it is our day to chill together. I got a call as I approached home. Ri chirped “when will you be home mom?”
I told her I was five minutes away and she hung up the phone on me. I came home to the spread pictured above.
“Mom, I know how you like to eat healthy so I made you eggs and your toast you love with just a little jelly and pineapple and yogurt. And guess what I put in your coffee?!”
Yep, she added my milk and cinnamon and sugar just the way I like it.” She is proving to be quite the caretaker, and gives me hope for when I’m 95 and finally in need of assistance.
In furtherance of her care taking duties, she also got on me this morning because she came downstairs and found an empty ice cream container that had not been opened when she went to bed last night.
“Mom! This is wrong! You ate the entire container of ice cream?!”
What could I say? I fessed up to her and admitted I did it.
“That is ridiculous,” she responded throwing the container away.
Who takes care of who in this family?! (I did make her dinner last night, though – so BAM!).
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Party planner

October 7, 2014October 7, 2014Leave a comment

Ri has a career in party planning…starting now. She is hilarious with the things she thinks of for the parties we host – she’s much more creative and daring then me.
I picked her up from her friend’s house at 11:30 am on Saturday and we worked until 4:30 getting the house together for Sarah’s Kickstarter fund-raising party. The night before, Ri and her friend created bookmarks to give away as gifts to the women that came to the party. They wrote Vela in all types of styles and designs and the words “thank you.” They also added peace signs or words (“Vela is awesome!”). We stuffed the bookmarks into little paper bags and wrote Vela on the front of the bag. Ri explained that we needed a different design on the bag than on the bookmark because that livened it up more. She also thought we should add chocolate to the bag so I dutifully bought some chocolate squares to throw in.

Ri moved on to arranging the chairs in the living room for optimal talking space. I told her we needed a sign for the table where guests would lay down their books for the book exchange. There was no where to tape it on the table or wall so she created a sign to tape onto a book and then stood the book up on the table. Simple but creative. I love her so much.
She couldn’t wait to babysit Elena and another little girl, Sophia, whose mom was coming to the party. She did a good job as always in that area.
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Her girlfriend, Henley spent the night, and I learned she is just as crazy as Ri. I came home from a quick walk with Rocco and found her with dangling earrings hanging out of her braces. All I could think was her mom was going to kill me when I called her from the ER.>

Taking care of business

August 27, 2014Leave a comment

I came home from running this morning and there was Ri and Mario eating Lucky Charms. Ri had poured a bowl for her brother and herself. Thank the heavens I have a self-sufficient girl. I can avoid getting up at the crack of dawn in order to be home by 7 am to get them ready and instead get up at a reasonable hour when the sun is rising and it’s not jet black outside.
She also has absolutely zero desire to have me walk her up the street to meet her friends. She wants to walk all by herself. So, I could wake up even later and make it home solely for Mario who doesn’t have to leave for school until a half hour later than Ri; but that would entail me missing a goodbye kiss and hug from my girl. She still humors me with such love when I ask her. And I will lap that up until it is no more.

Giving back

August 26, 2014Leave a comment

I took Maria to the Van Buren homeless shelter last night to help me serve food to the women staying at the shelter. Mario was going to head over with us but Jon arrived home just as we were walking to the car, and he chose to stay with his dad. Ri was glad. She likes that alone time with me.
It’s been a few months since we went to the YWCA Family Shelter to do crafts with the kids. Ri did such a great job with the kids when we went there on Sunday mornings. She loved when toddlers and pre-schoolers showed up because they let her help them draw and glue and gave her hugs. She soaked it up.
I didn’t know what to expect at this homeless shelter because it was our first time serving dinner. They had told me Ri might get bored because she couldn’t serve food from the kitchen (I did not disclose to Ri that she couldn’t serve food because she had her heart set on it and I didn’t want her to be upset before we even left for the shelter).
We arrived to just a few women sitting at tables in a large room. I introduced Ri and the volunteer helpers welcomed her. The coordinator of the dinner quickly reminded me that Ri would have to stay in the dining area. I asked what we could do in the area and she directed us to a pail and washcloths. Ri didn’t hesitate. She got her washcloth and began wiping down the tables. And the chairs. I know she had wanted to serve food but she didn’t whine or complain at all.
When the women stood in line to get food, the leader brought out pitchers of juice and cups. Ri volunteered to pour the juice and give it to the women after they got their food. And so we did. The women were a so sweet to her responding with “thank you baby” and “aren’t you darling.” She’d take the juice over to the table for the women who had a hard time walking. After all the women went through the line, she walked around the tables to see if she could get anything for them. She didn’t feel awkward or nervous. Rather, it came completely natural to her.
If I’ve done one thing right as a parent, it is installing in her the gift of empathy and helping others. I have always felt strongly that she needs to understand how lucky she is to have happened to be born in a first world country, to working parents who have a home and can afford food and transportation and clothing; and to have such a support system of family who think the world of her. I don’t want her to take it for granted and I want her to respect all people, and understand that everyone goes through rough times. In the end, we are all much more alike than we are different.
It’s always been pretty easy with Ri – she seems to innately understand and be sensitive to others’ feelings.
Sure enough, one of the women was telling Ri about her grand daughter and how much she loves to take her to the park and another woman was talking about dressing up as Wonder Woman for Halloween. Ri smiled as they spoke to her and engaged back with them.
I have grown up with parents and family reinforcing in me that “there but for the grace of god go I.” We are all struggling to make the best of this life; all struggling to find happiness and joy. The woman at the shelter could be me. And she deserves respect and love and compassion.
As we were packing up, a lady called out “Mom, hey mom. Come here.”
I walked over to her. She wrapped her arm around me.

“You’ve got a heck of a daughter there. It’s wonderful that she’d spend her time helping us. She’s beautiful.”

I couldn’t agree more – on the inside and out.

My muscle

July 20, 2014July 21, 2014Leave a comment

My girl is a muscle.

When I asked her to help me with the groceries, she grabbed one bag and then demanded that I “load ’em on!” She slung five bags on each arm and started towards the door. She panted it out and nearly made it (I had to take two at the end).
When Ri was in preschool, she was friends with a teeny weeny little girl names Bell. They were nearly the same age but Bell maybe weighed 35 pounds wet. Ri, on the other hand, weighed in around 70. She is, and always has been, thick and strong – just like her daddy. When other kids would mess with Bell, she’d get in between them and protect Bell with all she had. Bell’s parents loved it and when Ri showed up at Bell’s birthday party, Bell’s dad exclaimed “There’s the muscle!”

It has stuck with her ever since for very good reason….

Life is messy

July 14, 20144 Comments

Yesterday, I sat on the edge of the bathtub reading Alya and Zeno to Ri as she brushed her teeth. Then I made her sit next to me to read the next page. We traded pages back and forth until the end of the chapter. One more down. She ran off to play with her friend as soon as I closed the book.
That’s how it typically rolls.
I used to have idyllic thoughts of Ri and I cuddling on the couch reading Little Women together and discussing what we read after each chapter.

Ri hates Little Women.
Ri hates to take time out from playing to read.

That’s reality. Face it, Mary.

After many months fighting it and fighting Ri to enjoy it (“Damnit, Ri, you have to enjoy reading this book with your mom because I said so!”), I’ve come to terms with reality.
Ri is going to fight tooth and nail to avoid reading. She is going to moan when I make her sit down and do it. She is not going to pick Little Women or Little a House on the Prairie as her book choices.

That is ok.

Life is messy and imperfect. Kids tend to not have your idealized version of a day well spent. They would rather sit on an iPad playing Minecraft or Animal Farm all day than do multiplication tables. I was there at one time, too.

Remember that, Mary.

When we do read together, Ri’s pleasant. She reads the words with inflection and tone. She even listens when I read to her. She engages with me afterwards when I ask her what she thought of the chapter (but that is with much less excitement and one leg out the door).
So I have learned to temper my desires and live with what I got right now. A messy, sighing, exasperated process whereby I have to initiate reading with my daughter and see her tapping her leg waiting for the last page of the chapter to arrive. And that’s ok. Because she’s reading and learning and pronouncing more words correctly even if it’s killing her. After all, how many nights did I sit up with my dad and yell at him for making me do my algebra problem over and over until it was correct? But now I’ve got perseverance and can add up grocery items in my head to know if I’ve reached $50 so I can use my $5 off coupon. The benefits come through eventually. It’s just as a parent it can get difficult to see up ahead. You get caught in the yelling and whining and you think “is it even worth it?”

But then you breathe.

And catch your daughter reading alone (albeit a People magazine).

And you remember how you were and where you are today.

And you keep plugging away at it – through the mess and tantrums – to arrive at another chapter accomplished.

"MOM!"

Adventures in the Life of a Working Mama

Tag: daughter