On The Other Hand, Lessons She Learned

The things the Matron's mother taught her could fill a book.

Indeed, if she wasn't so busy being a bitterly under-employed underappreciated adjunct professor and full-time mama -- while already working on a different book, the Matron could very well pen such missive.

But since she is so over-scheduled, we will skip the book and hit the highlights.

Remember that fierce and significant silence regarding the Opposite Sex? The single mother, as in: single. Without Man. No Tall Dark and Winsome in sight.

Young Miss grew up with the complete and utter certainty that women--specifically mothers--were in charge of Absolutely Everything On This Planet.


If the oil needed changing or a fuse popped, Young Miss's Mother attended to said task. Shoveling? Flat tire? Done.

Income, health insurance, food and clothing for four people even when you originally signed on for Marriage, which meant laundry and lunch and the general domestic shuffle (financed by someone else)?

Got that covered, too.

Not only did the Matron not going looking for a husband or reek of desperation at thirty, she honestly did not understand the entire concept of such Need in the first place. Love sort of stumbled upon her. But she was not shopping for marriage.

Nor did the Matron particularly desire children.


Because Young Miss's Mother was perpetually locked in Desperate Struggle for Survival, children seemed like oh so many roadblocks. Big fat balls and chains, mouths to feed and all that sort of trouble.

Young Miss nurtured this theory regarding children for several years, then approached her mother.

Young Miss: "If you knew then, what you know now --- like how hard it is to raise children alone - -- would you have kept us or given us to Dad?"

Mother: "I probably would've never had you in the first place. Certainly, I would've let your father take you."

Good to have that cleared up now, wasn't it?

That conversation ---seared onto the Matron's memory (and even though she will agree that memory is selective and Freud reigns, that exact exchanged transpired) meant that children were not only unnecessary, but absolute DOOM.

So Young Miss never pined or planned for offspring.

Indeed, after one woozy bottle of wine, she and her new husband had a laughing conversation about Contraceptive Russian Roulette and how everyone else seemed to love children (of course, they didn't).

After ten minutes of serious planning for the future while under the influence of Pinot Noir, they decided that if they did not use birth control and conceived within the next few minutes, they were destined to be parents.

Please do not imagine the phone call three weeks later.

Youngish Miss: "You cannot believe this! I am @$@%% pregnant. Oh my %$#$#% God. I have not finished my #$#%% dissertation! What are we going to do!?"

Silence.

Youngish Miss: "You there! It's your fault, too!"

Another thing the Matron learned from her mother?


You look fine without make-up. There was none of that stuff in the house. The Matron still does not understand mascara. The wand looks like a vehicle of Medieval Torture.

And, you need this:Education was the gold ticket out. Young Miss's mother picked up household and moved across the state to complete her education - a single parent with children 9, 8, and 5. That makes her more of a rock star than Bono.

Finally, the Young Miss understood that no matter how flawed or complex, there was nothing compared to Mother Love.

Forget that sun. Solar eclipse or moon showers.

There's your mama.

The Young Miss was 7 years old. She and her little sister (6) went to the neighbor's house. The parents were conveniently not home. The boys -- ages 10 and 12 -- harnessed little sister and told Young Miss that unless she returned with A BUCKET OF TOYS they would stab that sister and kill her.

This might seem like hyperbole except -- those boys? They were holding butcher knives.

Young Miss scrambled home in terror, looking for bucket and toys. Weeping and shaking, utterly undone.

It took her Mother about eight seconds to figure out what was going on. Mother stormed through the yard, into the neighbor's house, liberated her youngest daughter and turned those boys over her 27-year old knee to render those bottoms beet red, near bloody.

Then, she called the police and had those children arrested.

To this day, the Matron understands the value of terror and maternal rage.

Thank you, Mom.

So when a dear friend's daughter was being tortured -- tormented -- for FIVE years by one mean and unhappy boy-child (who the Matron knew well because she volunteered in the classroom and the Montessori system means you can be with one bad egg for a decade) and dear friend's daughter was so rightfully miserable the Matron nearly wept at her feet. . . . the Matron did this.

The children were heading out of the classroom to bus and parent in one long line. She pulled aside said unhappy and mean boy-child.

Matron: "I know what you're doing to X."

Boy: "So?"

Matron: "I am watching you every single second. Even when I'm not there. I have eyes in the back of my head. If you hurt her, I know."

Boy: "You're lying."

Here, the Matron firmly holds Boy's arm and looks into his eyes with a gaze that makes burning in Hell seem like a fine time, a good idea.

Matron: "No. I am magic. You will never understand. I know what you are doing to X and if you do it again, I will come after you. I will get you. I will make sure everyone in the world knows how mean you are to X. I will get you. And it will be horrible."

Boy: "uh."

This was totally unacceptable parental behavior. Politically incorrect. Mean. Really, we should have called his mother.

He never, ever bothered that little girl again.

Thank you, Mama. Dearest?

Things My Mother Forgot to Teach Me

The things the Matron's mother forgot to teach her could fill a book.

Indeed, if she wasn't so busy being a bitterly under-employed underappreciated adjunct professor and full-time mama -- while already working on a different book, the Matron could very well pen such missive.

But since she is so over-scheduled, we will skip the book and hit the highlights.

First, there are functions of the Body. Yes, that Matron cuts right to the chase, does she not? When the Matron was a Young Miss and about 9 years old, her Mother found her reading this:

Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret.

Seizing the moment, the Mother took this opportunity to give the Young Miss her most intensive, intimate discussion of Body and its functions, ever.

Mother: "Did you read the part about where she gets her period?"

Young Miss: "Yes!"

Mother: "Well, that's all true. Isn't it past your bedtime?"

Things picked up quickly after that. Later that same year, the Young Miss stumbled across this book.

Because this was a 'grown-up' book and Young Miss generally compliant (then), she asked her mother if she could read said text. The Mother flipped through same pages and gave Hard Thought.

Mother: "Yes. Actually, it's a good idea to read this. Everything you need to know about sex is in this book. It's good, it's beautiful, it's true."

That was the complete sum total of discussion regarding sex. To this day, the Matron recalls "it's good, it's beautiful, it's true" and remains puzzled. The book or sex?

Brief digression to the next book the Young Miss stumbled upon:


Rather than ask for permission to read what she knew would be forbidden, Young Miss hid the goods under her mattress and did the most dangerous thing in the entire Universe: that nine-year old read The Exorcist at night, in the dark, with a flashlight in a bed (that could start shaking at any second).

For better or worse, those two books shaped her world view. Lest one take that statement in jest, remember that she named her only daughter, Scarlett.

Another slice of life that didn't enter the Mother's radar was this:



Dating.

The Young Miss was raised by a single mother who seemed pretty happy with the adjective, single. Indeed, not only was there no dating or romance, there was a fierce and significant silence surrounding the entire topic of the Opposite Sex.

This one-time conversation took place just before the Young Miss left for college.

Mother: "You're living in a co-ed dorm?"

Young Miss: "Yes!"

Mother: "I guess you can just go ahead and shack up with somebody right away then, huh?"

Thus schooled in elements of good decisions and sound judgment, the Young Miss pretty much did just that.

While in college, Young Miss also signed on for Counseling Services, of which she was very much in need (considering all that sound judgment). During one session, she made an offhand comment about her hair, drying split ends and all that.


Counselor: "Why don't you use conditioner on your hair?"

Young Miss: "Conditioner?"

True! Young Miss missed that lecture on personal hygiene. Other topics would include shaving your legs and wearing underwear when you ovulate.

While some children may learn basic culinary arts in their mother's kitchen, one Thanksgiving Young Miss feasted on this:


She remembers going home with a friend from college and being puzzled by the Martian-like entities cluttering the kitchen counter.

Friend: "Mary, that's squash."

Young Miss (in Foreign Tongue): "S-q-u-a-s-h. "

Friend: "Haven't you ever seen squash? You know, you cut them open and bake them?"

Young Miss: "With a knife or some kind of saw?"

Before the Young Miss met her future husband, she thought the following items were as close to home-grown, real food as it could possibly get. Indeed, John is fond of reminding her that when they met, this was all she had in her cupboard:



While the Matron's culinary skills--and palate--have greatly expanded, remnants of childhood render her unable to cook these without setting off all of the downstairs fire alarms:



Matron: "What do you guys want for breakfast?"

Stryker: "Where's Dad?"

Matron: "I can make pancakes."

Scarlett: "I want Daddy."

Matron: "Eggs?"

Merrick: "Me need Daddy."

Matron: "I can make pancakes."

Silence.

Stryker: "No offense, Mom, but we'd rather you didn't."


Nary a cooking secret was divined to that Young Miss, although rumor has it that her sister learned how to make peanut butter cookies.

Because we are just hitting the highlights (and--big secret! The Matron has a self-imposed rule: no more than 30 blogging minutes a day and that timer has been ringing), here's the final entry.


Generally speaking, if you were a single mother of three in 1967 (especially one whose former husband pretended to sell encyclopedias for a living) you were not exactly raking in the dough.

Indeed, you would be engaged in Desperate Struggle for Survival.

Such struggle rendered money both desirable and utterly unfathomable to Young Miss.

Remember the wise college counselor?

Young Miss: "Well, I have to go now because I have to walk a mile to the bank for a money order."

Counselor: "Money order? Haven't you ever considered getting a checking account?"

Young Miss: "You mean, the kind of thing that comes with a checkbook?"

When the Young Miss and her future husband joined households, she routinely wept over the state of her banking account.

Young Miss: "No! I can't write that check! That will make me overdrawn by $22."

John: "How can that be? The bank statement says you have $4,5601.35 in your account?!"

Young Miss: "Don't trust them. I'm broke."

John took the Young Miss and a decade's worth of bank statements to the actual institution (in the days when people would sit down and look you in the face) and there uncovered the truth about his beloved's bookkeeping methods.

Bank Clerk: "Mary. You actually do have $4,5601.35 in your checking account."

Young Miss: "Mine says minus $22."

Because for ten years, the Young Miss rounded numbers. If she wrote a check for $13.82, she subtracted $15. from her account. Deposit $367? Better make that an even $300, just to be safe.

Guess who manages the money in her current household?

Now that she is a mother herself, the Matron is certain she is cutting her own corners and has already forgotten Vital Life Lessons she planned to instill in her children while she was just pregnant with them, not actually confronted with the real breathing creatures -- whose simple maintenance (eat, bathe, don't cause undue injury to sibling) leaves her in a state of shock and exhaustion.

She's certain she's doing her part to insure that some day, years from now, her children will chortle and snort over what they missed out on! Those poor dears. But she is already nailing those discussions (multiple! frequent!) regarding sex. (as God is my witness, I will never go hungry -- or perpetuate fear of Bodily Function, all sort -- again!)

The Matron can't even imagine what that would be like--to miss out on a vita life lesson-- now, can she?

Things your mother forgot to teach you, or lessons you're planning to skip?

The Matron's Favorites

The Matron has a confession.

She rereads her own blog posts. And essays, short stories, and novel chapters--over and again. She chortles, weeps and sighs with pleasure when the prose is deftly done, just so.

You see, she enjoys writing -- the process and result, even when it's not all that good! She never tires of this process. Indeed, she never tires of herself! Some people are simply self-absorbed. The Matron likes to think that, while she may also be self-absorbed, it is in a way that is very interesting to others.

This is not necessarily a desirable attribute, but, it is the Matronly state.

Thank you, John, for living with this and loving her.

Of course, the writing don't always work out. Sometimes the message falls flat or prose putters and dies. Still. She enjoys the journey.

So while the Matron tools through the center of contemporary civilization (sorry, Paris), here are a few of her favorites, for both nostalgic (in real time) and writerly reasons. She picked lots from the early days, so go ahead and get to know her better.

The vacation ends Monday.

John shops for the Matron's Birthday

200th Post

How the Matron met her man

My Cinderella Story

On a somber note, but so beautifully done (if she says so herself)

Books the Matron was reading this week

Merrick's Birthday Party

Stryker (this one and the linked within)

Recent, but she really likes the Hip Mama analysis.

Real comments from student evaluations

Raven and her lost brother

Better Stage Mother moments

Scruffy and the Hit Man

Just what a kind and diplomatic teacher she is

Mom, Can I call you Missy?

Grandma Mary

Way to go, John

Behind the scenes with a stage mother (this one)

The Real Story, So Far

No, the real story is not about this leg of the journey. Funny how the iPod vending machine -- you know, a screen-like entity that pops out Product -- caught Stryker's eye. Long term. Good thing we got there early AND the flight was delayed so we had a leisurely three hours in the Minneapolis airport. A fine use of time.

Nor is the real story about this, although this is lovely:


This is the view, up, near Century 21, the stampede-like low-brow department store near Wall Street. Can you say elbow to elbow, consumer herd?

Yes! The Matron and Stryker spent the day Downtown, in the financial district. While those acquainted with the Matron's understanding of, and interest in, Finance, might be surprised, she was visiting her brother who works for the Federal Reserve Bank.

Actually, he is an Officer of said Staid and Important Institution. As an Officer, he is allowed to bring guests deep into the bowels of the Bank vault for a private, high security tour.

The Matron? Those hands held a solid gold brick worth $400,000.

Stryker had a hard time letting go of the brick, even though it weighed 50 pounds! He staggered and clung. He actually took fingernail to surface, trying to see if he could scrape off some bling.

Nade.

They stood thirty feet below the subway, listening to the rumble and roar, surrounded by 200 billion dollars. Stryker got to turn the wheel of a 270 ton vault door and made the behemoth move.

Later, they lunched with the Matron's brother, in an Executive Dining Room which featured a nice table saying "reserved for Mr. X," which would be the Matron's VIP brother. She is glowing with pride--and also knows this same grown man as the shock-blond skinny mop of a child who named his blanket, Baby Blue.

Here is Stryker on his experience eating in the well-staffed Executive Dining Room: "Every time I put down my fork, somebody takes it."

Reader, so much transpired! Still, we are not at the real story. Not yet.

We saw a lot of this:


And dodged some of this:


We stood at Ground Zero. Lots of trucks and working and rebuilding in place. From VIP Baby Brother's spectacular window, we saw the gaping hole in the middle of the city.

The Matron flashed back to 9-11, the horror and fear and mayhem. She remembered the anthrax plague followed and those uncertain weeks. The lives lost and new fears harbored.

That's an important story, but it's not this one.

Lots of New Yorkers, hustling through all that construction:


Stryker pulled up his hood and blended, like he'd been there a lifetime.



Nor is this the story about the cousins-- how wonderful it was to see the boys and the whole family! Stryker and the Matron were given the warmest of welcomes. Lots of love and happiness and familial reunion.



That might be the most important part of the journey. But the story?

The story is about this 50 lb Play Station 2 game--Rock Band-- that Stryker purchased at Broadway and Park Row, in the famous slice of electronic paradise called J & R Electronics. Yes, Stryker had spending money, New York money, unusual stash of cash (thanks Grandma Mary and VIP Brother). So, the Matron, she couldn't deny his good fortune and fondest desire.


Remember that Matron? Wild-eyed and blind-sided in the big city? She didn't saunter, all hot and saucy through the city. No. She didn't window shop and turn the fifty-year old male eye.

Instead, she carried that box (which felt like the brick of gold) through several busy long city blocks, down the subway stairs, through the turnstile, onto the lurching crowded subway, through Penn Station (where she shot the photo), onto a train and into New Jersey.

Remember her angst about the leather boots and hip look? Nobody noticed. All anybody saw was the box.

And she was sweating.

That's the real story, so far.

Only the Matron Can Pontificate On Vacation

Hip is a slang term, an adjective meaning "fashionably current", referring to someone who is conversant with or deeply involved in a particular trend or subject. "Hip", like "cool", does not refer to one particular quality. What is hip is in constant change. ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hip (slang)


The Matron pondered words like 'hip' and 'chic' as she assembled her New York wardrobe. She spent some time frowning at herself in the full-length mirror.

Hmmm. Brown leather knee-high boots and skinny jeans? Green suede jacket? Or do we go black leather, vintage? Forget the fanny pack; she turned to the Lucky brand black leather purse (thrift store! $7.49!).

You see, the Matron? She did not want to look, well like a middle-aged mother of three from Minnesota, blind-sided and wide-eyed in the Big City. All of which, of course, she totally is.

These musings returned our intrepid life traveler to the phrase 'hip mama.'

The Matron once penned these words in (one of her favorite published pieces) a book review:

***
The past few years have seen an outpouring of books that deconstruct, describe, and frequently denounce contemporary maternity. Recent celebrated titles reveal much of the genre’s slant: Faulkner Fox’s Dispatches from a Not-So-Perfect Life: Or How I Learned to Love the House, the Man, the Child and the ever-quotable The Bitch in The House: 26 Women Tell the Truth About Sex, Solitude, Work, Motherhood, and Marriage. These books involve serious self-scrutiny; each author agonizes over minutia and pounds her fists against Ideals, asking how (and why) she fell down this rabbit hole in the first place. Lighter versions include Confessions of a Slacker Mom by Muffy Mead-Ferro and the cottage industry of “hip mama” books by Ariel Gore. No agonizing here. Motherhood rocks, with an “I’m so cool I barely notice I’m breastfeeding” edge. These books offer lots of witty repartee (even between toddlers!) and thoughtful indifference to expectations that other memoirists deconstruct.

***

The Matronly profile would indicate that she has given this hip mama stance some studied consideration.

First, she encountered literature. She enjoyed every last bit! Things like Ariel Gore's Hip Mama Corporation and the sweet book, The Big Rumpus. There are the Park Slope moms who write and are written about, with their Bugaboo strollers bearing babes in Hanna Anderson.

But as she read, she came to a profound realization. A turning point, of sorts.

Hip mama-hood is artifice.

Artifice. ruse: a deceptive maneuver (especially to avoid capture)
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn


Please, do not misunderstand the Matron! She tried to be a Hip Mama. She embraced the concept, the ruse, the dream. Remember, this is the woman who took her first newborn to his inauguratory well-baby appointment dressed nearly head to toe in black leather.

Yet she does not own a motorcycle. Or ride on them.

What the Matron discovered was this: hip mamahood was work and hip cost money. Hip mamahood meant careful consideration of wardrobe, both mother and child. Organic hemp diapers? Sounds hip. Casual, just tossed-together lunches (protein, fruit, wheat-free cookie, rice milk) spontaneously by the lake, with children flapping about in hand-made cotton caps? That seemed hip. But for the Matron, casual and without thought translated into: studied.

She finally realized that Hip Mama did not mean casual. Hip was contemplative. One needed to be up to date on trends in (or the revolt against), pacifiers, clothing (mother and babe), diet and accessory. Hip seemed, well, sort of like simple consumption.

On the other hand, artifice meant more than clothing as cover. Cover. Ruse. A deceptive maneuver? Perhaps there was something in the Hip Mama stance that appealed because it made Mama separate from child. The ruse was that the Hip Mama was unimpeded by motherhood. Saucy, tapped in, tuned in, chic--yet unassuming. For those of us (Matron too), swamped by maternity, this individuation seemed not only appealing, but life-affirming.

But the problem for the Matron was that Hip + Mama configuration. There is no Hip Mama without the Mama. Motherhood. Being the mother.

And the Matron? She worries. She ponders these three creatures who started leaving her the day they were born. Who are they? What are their gifts, their fears, their dreams? Their lives will be wild and unknown to her. This oceanic interior that the Matron feels in herself? Theirs will be entirely different. So, the Matron gets these few years of their long, textured lives -- this tiniest bit. And it matters to her.

So she is in New York. Waxing philosophical. She strutted her stuff in the skinny jeans, leather boots and vintage green suede jacket. Hip? She hopes so. Hip Mama?

Looks good on someone else, but not her style.

The Matron and Her Xanax

Tuesday, the Matron tested half a xanax in order to determine it's impact on her nervous system.

She felt nothing.

Not one blip, not a bling, not a soothing moment.

So today, she plans to pop an entire pill, maybe two, as she flies with Stryker to New York City.

If she were telling you the truth, she'd say that she's visiting her brother and his family, who live in New Jersey. She is. She's very much looking forward to seeing them, especially her adorable nephews.

But that Matron? She is going to NYC, as much as possible! This is the type of place she loves. Put her on a hilltop or ask her to take a stroll?

Ugh. The Matron is not actually fond of 'nature.' (yes, she likes her clean air and environment but let hers be urban)

She will stroll, shop and dine with her firstborn, the smart kid with the wicked wit.

And! She is bringing her camera and laptop. There will be blogging. See you in the city. . . .

Bonus Post, Inspired By Love

Dear Congresswoman Michele Bachmann,

Today, I read in the newspaper that you have introduced this very important bill: "Light Bulb Freedom of Choice Act."

What an inspirational title!

Just last night, I tossed and turned, full of fear that I might not be able to enjoy my God-given right to purchase the light bulb of my desires. Thank you for leading this fight. Our liberty is at stake, after all.

Only you would have the acumen, grit and foresight to prevent the government from phasing out conventional light bulbs in favor of energy-efficient compact fluorescent lights.

How dare that selfish Big Brother government attempt to eliminate household items that use much less coal, thus lowering greenhouse gases and mercury. After all, my individual right to have a good old-fashioned coal-guzzling light bulb illuminating my bath mat is more important than breathing.

The audacity! I blame that big old Al Gore for stirring up all this trouble. He should just move to Tibet and hunker in with the Dalai Lama. China can take care of them both.

Thank you for having the courage to say that human contribution to global warming is "voodoo, nonsense, hokum, a hoax." My children and I sleep easier, knowing you are making key decisions regarding our well-being and safety.

I will definitely be joining your fan club.

Would you please do me a great big favor, pretty please? We need someone like you to take her perky little self up to Antarctica, where an ice slab seven times larger than Manhattan just collapsed.

All those ridiculous scientists and scholars (you know, those who can't do, teach) claim this is linked to global warming and they blame us! They're blaming us decent, gas-guzzling, McMansion-maintaining Americans. I could weep.

Thank you for your time! I hope you got your Presidential hug and kiss today, honey. I'm off to run every appliance in my household before driving two blocks to buy the bananas that came from Guatemala.

Sincerely,

The Matron