COLLEGE ISN'T FOR SISSIES

We have talked about college a LOT in our house!  I am a college grad.  My son and daughter are both in college right now.  And not long back, my husband regretted not finishing college and went back (well past his educational prime, shall we say) and got his Associate's Degree from our local community college.

In addition to wanting to prove something to himself - especially since he has endured two brain aneurysms! - Roy also wanted to be a role model to our kids and his fellow students. He was an excellent student, finishing with a 3.75 and being invited into two honor societies. It was a proud day to see his hard work, sweat, and sleepless nights converted into a degree!

Our son, Tyler, has taken the rough road toward his degree.  He scored a 30 on his ACT. He was an incredibly brilliant but incredibly lazy student in high school.  But with that ACT score and a decent GPA, he received top level funding from TOPS, a Louisiana fund that helps with tuition (and sometimes a stipend) to many students.  He also had Distinguished Freshman and marching band scholarships.  The university was practically paying him to attend!  But before the first semester started, he decided to quit band and switch to an incredibly grueling major.  He ended up with a .1 GPA for that semester, losing all of his aid and scholarships. But he did bounce back.  After a few more major changes, he is set to get his degree next May after 5 years at the school.

Our daughter, Jess, is a sophomore.  She is at the same university as Ty,  She also had a Distinguished Freshman scholarship, middle level TOPS, and a marching band scholarship as part of the Colorguard.  Jess is also my ADD child.  She is very smart, but doesn't feel that way at times.  On the upside, she knows how to work.  She puts lots of time and effort into school.  But she takes it very hard when she doesn't do as well as she hoped.

Her father and I have tried to tell her that sometimes it is a matter of the teaching style of the professor that you have to adjust to.  Sometimes, to be honest, the teacher isn't that good. And I believe that you ask for help - like the free tutoring offered - when need be, though Ty and Jess are not big fans of that!  I appreciate the fact that she wants to do her best - and that she doesn't want to follow in her brother's footsteps as far as his grade roller coaster went.  She has also switched majors a couple of times, but not to the point that it should delay her graduation.

After getting a lower grade than she (and I) thought she deserved on a paper, she was ready to quit school.  Some parents may have yelled or threatened, but I understood.  At the same point she is now, after three semesters of school, I quit college.  I was working in my chosen field of radio and wanted to keep at that.  So I took three semesters off when the bug finally hit me - I wanted my degree.  I went back to school and plowed through, even doing two summer sessions each summer.  So, even though it took me 5 years to get my degree, I was only actually in college for 3 1/2 years.

Will Jess' father and I let her take a break from school?  Yes - we both did.  Do we want her to get her degree?  Absolutely!  She has to make a decision that works for her.  I have wanted her to be a strong, independent woman in every way.  I had to make a lot of very important decisions about my education, career, etc., and she will have to also.  I will listen, offer advice if she wants it (and maybe even if she doesn't), but at the end of the day, she has to decide what is right for her, and she will have to own and live with that decision.

Like life, college is NOT for sissies!

HURRICANE SEASON

Today marks the anniversary of Hurricane Audrey striking Louisiana and Texas in 1957. That was before my time, but I have had my share of dealing with hurricanes, going back to Betsy in 1965.  I was really young, so a lot of that time is hazy.  I do remember having family members come over to our house to ride out the storm. Our house was near the Mississippi River levee in the suburbs of New Orleans.  New Orleans is shaped kind of like a bowl - being near the levee there puts you higher up on the rim of the bowl.  

I remember taking a bath the night before it hit, while we still had power. I remember the adults tying back trees to lessen the harm that they could do.  And I remember trying to sleep on a cot with the winds making a tremendous amount of noise. 

I don't remember how long the storm lasted, or how long we were without power.  I do remember walking around the neighborhood, looking at the damage after it was all over.  And I remember having to go to school on Saturday to make us some of the missed time.

I remember Hurricane Camille in 1969.  We were at my grandmother's house in North Carolina when it hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Driving back to New Orleans, we saw a lot of the damage that had occurred.  And New Orleans had gotten a lot of rain.

Hurricane Andrew was heading for New Orleans in 1992.  I was working at a radio station in New Orleans that overlooked Lake Ponchartrain and was on the air the night that it was headed our way.  My husband of just a few months came to work with me so that I didn't have to face it alone.

But Andrew did not hit New Orleans head on as predicted - it veered and careened into the Baton Rouge area.  I was supposed to have a job interview with a radio station in Baton Rouge that had to be postponed.

Of course, the big one for Louisiana was Katrina in 2005.  In the suburbs of Baton Rouge, we lost power for just eight hours.  I spent the day reading to my 8-year-old daughter, and we all ate ice cream to keep it from going to waste.  

It was a completely different world in the New Orleans area where my mother and in-laws lived.  My in-laws evacuated - no easy task!  But my mother refused to leave and rode it out.  My mother didn't have flood waters to contend with, but her power went out in the heat, and she could not get groceries, go anywhere or do anything.  It was horrible.  No phone service, so I could not even talk to her.

As soon as we were allowed in the area - there were checkpoints going into the city - we went and got my mother and her old dog. We did not give her a choice about coming to our house, though she would have rather stayed put.  She stayed a week or so with us, but wanted to go back home, power or not.  Luckily, when we took her back, there were some stores and restaurants that had reopened.  And while we were there, the power came back on.

As far as I am concerned, Katrina was the beginning of the end for both my mother and mother-in-law.  My mother never recovered mentally.  She developed Alzheimer's.  Every time it thundered, she knew it was a hurricane.

In 2008, Hurricane Gustav decided that New Orleans had had enough, but the Baton Rouge area could use some destruction.  It moved in on Labor Day.  We watched the rain and winds kick up - and watched the neighbor's trampoline come rolling over our fence & stop just short of the tree my daughter planted in the backyard.  Our power went out and stayed off for six days.

You don't know how dark nights are until your whole area has no power.  We didn't have a generator, so when the power went out, we were in pitch dark.  I grew to hate the sound of neighbors' generators, reminding me that they had some light, maybe some air conditioning, perhaps some entertainment.

During the day, I was fine.  I read all day, every day.  My kids whined.  They were hot; they had no TV, no computers, no hot meals.  We were able to get ice and MRE's from a designated location.  I preferred to live off peanut butter and crackers than the MRE's.  They were just plain nasty.

We did have some fun - we played card games and hung out in the backyard with the dogs.  My husband was able to cook some of our food in the freezer on the barbecue pit, so we did have a couple of hot meals.  We tried to make the best of a horrible situation, but you could not have seen happier people than when the power came back on!

We were lucky.  Some people we knew had no power for more than two weeks.  We had no major damage, and of course, our family was safe.  In other words, it could have been a lot worse.

I guess I have a little of Gustav still inside me.  Sometimes when the power goes out at night, or if I hear the sound of a generator running, it takes me back to 2008.  But perhaps the memories will get hazier, as they did for Betsy.

LETTER TO MY DADDY

I guess I am a good Southern girl.  No matter how old I get, my father will always be my Daddy.

(This was a part of my Daddy's life that I do not remember - he loved to fish.)

This week, I heard someone on a radio show read a letter she had written to her father who passed away a few years ago.  I started thinking about what I would say in a letter to my father.  My Daddy passed away at the age of 86.  I was a part of his second family, and he was 59 when I was born.  I was 27 when he died, so he has now been gone more than half my life.

(Daddy with his only son, and his son's only son.)

Dear Daddy,

I have a lot of good memories of you.  You had such a great sense of humor.  (I got it from you and Momma.)  I remember hearing - and repeating - your Cajun stories a number of times.

You were generous to a fault!  There is nothing you liked better than to give something, especially something that you made yourself.  I admired the things that you made - various crafts from cow horns, birds from peach pits, walking canes, snakeskin belts, and the wooden birds.  You started making these things after you went blind, and that was pretty amazing!  Of course, you were a slave driver when it came to painting those wooden birds!  Something I enjoyed going out to your workshop and painting Blue Jays, Orioles, Scarlet Tanagers, and Redheaded Woodpeckers.  It was like a production line out there!  And other times, that was the last thing I wanted to do.  But you wanted to make sure you had some gift in your pocket to give a child at church.

I said generous to a fault because you would give things away even if Momma and I wanted them.  She would get so mad when you gave away one of her favorite horn birds.  And I was non too thrilled when you gave away a litter of kittens and a dog at different times while I was in school.  Broke my heart!

You loved cow horns, and would seize any opportunity to bring more home.  I remember one time, we were hauling some home - most likely from Uncle Leo's house - and they had gotten wet...so they smelled really bad.  Momma got a speeding ticket because she was trying to outdrive the odor!

Uncle Leo also was a co-conspirator when it came to your love of snake skins.  I remember stopping on some country road in Georgia while the two of them skinned a snake.  Bad thing was that they squirted liquid from it into my eye.  My mother was terrified that it was venom and that I would be blinded.  (It wasn't and I wasn't.) 

I definitely inherited your love of all animals.  We must have had just about every pet when I was a child.  You raised beagles.  We had dogs, cats, rabbits, hamsters, birds, gerbils, guinea pigs, ducks, a rooster, a skunk, and monkeys.  The monkeys were mainly conversation pieces for you.  Anything that would help you start a conversation with anyone, anywhere, was great for you.  (And I still tell people NOT to have a monkey as a pet!)  You were a sucker for any stray that I would bring home.  The trick was to do it before Momma got home from work!  All I had to ask was, "Daddy, can I keep him?" in that sweet voice.  You could never say no.

I do have some not-so-pleasant memories also.  I remember how we would argue like crazy.  You and I were a lot alike in many ways.  And I am pretty sure you knew that I liked to argue just for the sake of arguing.  Even you would say that if you said the sky was blue that I would swear it was green!  You told me that I would make a good lawyer because I liked to argue.

You were the king of the guilt trip.  Whenever I had to leave to go home after spending a few days with you and Momma, you would get so sad and tell me over and over again how you hated to see me leave.  I tell my kids now that I am immune to guilt trips because I was raised by the master.

I also remember how hard you could be on Momma.  You would quiz her about every penny she spent at the story, and about every conversation she had on the phone.  "What was so funny?!" you'd ask if she happened to laugh on the phone.

I also inherited from you the ability to hold grudges for inordinate amounts of time.  I saw you get mad over something one of your brothers-in-law said (I never knew what it was) and you refused to ever see him again.  I am not quite as bad, but if someone burns me bad enough, they are as good as dead to me.

I imagine your eldest daughter inherited this "gift" also.  She was not please that you married my mother and wound up turning her back on you.  Neither of you let go of this grudge to make things good before you died.  In turn, my half-sister has never wanted anything to do with me.  Kind of a shame.

I feel I have missed out on a lot on your side of the family.  I am just getting to know a few of them and am grateful for that.  

I don't even know where to start with your son who is now gone also.  I don't know where the blame lies in how he turned out - a womanizing alcoholic. I still hate the smell of beer because he would always have too many when he visited.  I think he truly loved you, though he could also push your buttons and make your furious.  I believe he truly appreciated everything you and Momma did for him.  But he made all kind of promises to me that, as a child, I believed, and was in turn very disappointed.  And I am still bitter that he took a chunk of the house that you and Momma bought and raised me in.  But it is what it is.

I would love to have a chance to sit down and talk to you now.  You would really liked my husband and would have adored our kids.  I am so sorry that you didn't get to meet my family.  I believe that you know what a wonderful family I have and am proud and happy.  And several years ago, Momma joined you, and I hope that you two are fishing together in Heaven.  

Daddy, I am proud of a lot of qualities that I received from you, and just want you to know that I appreciate you.

Until we meet again, I love you!

Your daughter,
Margaret

THE NAME OF MY BLOG SAYS IT ALL

I have a confession.  I know it's going to be hard to believe, but...I am not a natural born parent!  There - I said it.

My mother was an awesome mother.  Of course, she was the oldest of ten, and grew up during the Great Depression, so she had a lot of mothering experience.  She also had a career in the U.S. Navy, so she was a mature, take charge kind of a woman.  Because my father became handicapped, my mother had to go back to work when I was a toddler.  She worked full-time, and worked hard at home taking care of my Daddy and me.  I have always respected the heck out of that amazing woman!

Yes, I did play with dolls as as a little girl.  From the looks of them, I wasn't good at mothering them!  I had no little brothers or sisters.  I didn't babysit infants, just older kids...and not much of that either.  So I had no experience with babies until I had one.  And I wasn't a young mother - my son was born on the eve of my 35th birthday.  (What can I say?  The love of my life didn't make his appearance until I was in my 30's!)  

After enduring Bell's Palsey while I was pregnant, I was finally handed this innocent, helpless, 7 pound 11 ounce infant, and I had no clue what to do with him.  I gave birth - we named him - isn't that enough for now?

Tyler wasn't a healthy infant.  He had a rough entrance to the world via C-section and became jaundiced.  We went home with a bili light that Tyler spent most of his time under, and visits from home health nurses.  He needed supplemental bottles and refused to nurse, increasing my post partum depression.  And I discovered that I do not do well with very little sleep.

Before Ty was born, I had these daydreams about my wonderful maternity leave with my perfect baby.  We would rock in front of the fireplace in utter bliss waiting for Daddy to come home to complete the ideal family portrait.  It wasn't quite like that.  Tyler would wake up at about 1:30 a.m. and would not go back to sleep until sometime after 5.  I watched a lot of "Mystery Science Theater 3000" during that time.

In addition to the jaundice, Tyler had a condition called Pyloric Stenosis.  It's a condition that primarily affects first born male babies.  He had a blockage that blocked formula from getting to his small intestine.  He would take a bottle, spit up, and then cry because he was hungry.  It idn't help that the pediatrician thought I was overreacting - I must be a frantic new mother who was feeding her infant too much.  After an entire night of feeding, spitting up, and crying (both of us), thank goodness the pediatrician sent us to a surgeon - just in case.  It took her ten seconds to diagnose the condition and he was rushed into surgery.

Following the surgery, Tyler bounced back and plumped up quickly.  He was a beautiful child.  And 3 1/2 years later, we decided to do it again, having a perfect little girl.

Once again, the newborn phase was definitely not my favorite.  From the night we brought her home, Jessie had colic.  She had to eat every three hours.  And instead of going back to sleep after eating and being changed, she would get the hiccups that would keep her awake.  At night, my husband would take Tyler and go to bed, while I was on the couch holding a wide awake Jessie, and I would cry.  I was SO tired!

Tyler was not a child who could entertain himself.  He wanted my attention at all times.  That isn't easy when you have a newborn.  Being the good mother that I was, I wound up reading a Stephen King novel aloud so that I could have a little grown-up entertainment and keep him occupied at the same time.

My kids actually grew and thrived.  They are 19 and 22, both college students now.  They are still gorgeous, and they are smart and funny.  But my question is - when do I start really feeling like a mother?

I know I am a mother.  We fed, clothed, disciplined, encouraged, interacted with, and, of course, loved both of our kids.  But I have always felt like I am playing at motherhood.  Maybe it's because I feel like I am pretending to be an adult.  As I near my "golden years" (ha!), I still don't feel like a real grown-up, much less a real parent.  Sometimes I wonder what God was thinking by entrusting the care of two humans to me!  Don't get me wrong - I would not trade my kids for all the money in the world (though I think they have cost that much over the years)!  I adore each of them.  They are unique, interesting, intelligent people.  And while I feel like I am faking it a great deal of the time, being a wife and mother is more important to me than anything else in my life.  

So I will continue to fake it.  Maybe this will make me an awesome grandmother one day!

IT DOESN'T GET EASIER WHEN THE KIDS GET OLDER

When the kids are little, there is plenty to keep you busy - diapers, bottles, colic, vaccinations, etc., etc.  You think that when the kids get older that things will slow down.  HA!  There seems to be a small window of time - between being potty trained and starting school - that things are a little more peaceful.  Yes, the child still depends on you for food and to bathe him, and dress him, and tuck him in at night.  But bottles and diapers are gone, and the kid can actually tell you what they want to eat. Life is just a little easier, even with the whole bath, reading, and bedtime routine.

One the child starts school, life gets just a little more complicated.  You have to get them up and dressed and on the bus or in the car to get to school on time.  You have to remember to pack a lunch or send lunch money.  You need to remember to sign permission slips and the reams of other papers that the school sends home to parents.  You have homework at night, whether it's beginning math or spelling words.

As the kids get older, the schoolwork gets harder.  There are papers to write, books to read, and projects to do.  Nothing is worse than the dreaded science project.  The schools should just charge $1000 for each child who doesn't want to do a science project - no other fundraiser would ever be necessary.

And as the kids get older, the extracurricular activities increase.  We went through karate lessons, gymnastics, dance lessons (very short lived!), marching band, Girl Scouts, 4-H. and Colorguard.  That means Mom or Dad has to drive the kid there and back, and many times has to hang around and wait.  Those activities all cost money, too.  Then when the lessons or activities are over, you still have to get the kid fed, make sure they get their homework done, and try to make them get some sleep.  And the next day, it all starts over again.

Weekends aren't a break.  There are marching competitions, karate tournaments, fundraisers, and more.  I don't want to sell any more jambalaya dinners or raffle tickets!

Now both of our kids are away at college.  You would think that life would be much easier now that my husband and I are alone at home.  In some ways, things are easier.  Meal times are so much simpler - hubby and I are not that picky about food.  Even if we decide to go the fast food route, it is cheaper and much simpler for the two of us.  It's great not to have to wake up a surly teenager at the crack of dawn.  And it's nice not to have a houseful of kids, friends, and acquaintances every day at all hours of the day or night.  There were times we had no clue who was sleeping on our couch.

No one tells you about all of the things that happen while they are away that demand your time ans attention.  There are the wrecks that scare you half to death and make you race faster than the speed of light to be there for your "babies."  There are love or roommate issues that keep you on the phone, listening to your child rant and/or sob for an hour.  There are the times one or the other doesn't feel well and you try to talk him or her into going to the campus clinic, but usually wind up taking them to the Urgent Care.  There are the school supplies, food, laundry products, and hygiene products they need.  There is the help they need in making their financial aid is straight, and the help they need in getting textbooks. There are the times they have dropped and broken their cell phones, or their laptops quit working. There is the doling out of advice when questions such as, "What do I do with my life?" and "How can I make some money?" come up.  There are late night texts and early morning calls.  There are the treats I bake to bring them to remind them how much I care.  And there are the times they just need some money.

But you know what?  As crazy as they make me, I wouldn't trade them for anything in the world.  I helped make them - I helped raise them - and I take half of the credit for making them the unique, awesome people they are today.  And the best is yet to come!