My fourth grader has a science project due May 4th and a Mission Project due May 18th.
My high school sophomore’s paper on comparing and contrasting the Holocaust to The Rwandan genocide is due after Easter Break.
And then my college senior is graduating May 22 ,2009. The Baccalaureate service takes place the night before, and graduation is 9 am on Friday the next day.
Never mind Mother’s Day is in May.
The life of a writer–who’s also a mom and a wife. I hate it each time I write mom before wife in my life description. Were it not for my husband I’d not have these children. That would be a shame and a great loss. And without him I certainly wouldn’t be living out my passion.
Neither would my daughters have a warm, sturdy shoulder upon which to lean when times are rough between me and them–say like when we’re just not understanding each other. Not understanding each other usually means the part of them that is akin to me is rearing its head and roaring louder than I care to hear.
I’m not such a bad person–or mother.
And they are wonderful children.
That’s why I plan out time to work with them and assist on their projects.
The road to independence is paved with much dependence upon parents.
My mother was not of that thought. Despite all she was present for me in more ways than one–some good, and some not so good.
I try to repeat what she did that worked for me and leave the rest as her having done the best she could. It’s scary when I meet her spirit in fellow mothers who are my age and younger. It let’s me know that our misunderstandings and disagreements had less to do with the huge age difference between me and my mother. She was 4o years my senior.
During my childhood that was a lot compared to the differences in ages between my peers and their mothers. Today I’m younger than most mothers with daughters who are the age of my eldest and middle daughters. And for those mothers who have daughters the age of my youngest that is 10, most cannot believe I have one about graduate college.
Why am I saying all this?
The life of a writer is crazy–at best.
My mother was not a writer. And yet she wrote a lot–speeches she gave at various civic and church organizations, etc. She liked to orate. My mother was a teacher (K-12). Towards the end of her 36-year career she became a reading specialist.
As I have said in many posts prior and comments I’ve left on the blogs of other writers, I have stacks of books beside my bed–and let me add, under my pillows. I love to read in bed.
I suppose my life of writing and reading–and helping my children along in school is my ode to my mother’s life.
How does your life of writing and reading reflect or speak to the influence or lack thereof concerning your parents?
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