Inspiration for writing this post came from an incredible book I’m reading, “Writing Motherhood” by Lisa Garrigues (a NJ mom herself). Mom or dad, single or not, parent or not, I think this book is required reading not only for bloggers, but for anyone that feels that their creative writing juices are evaporating.
The Silicon Valley Moms Blog and sister sites (of which I write on the New Jersey Moms Blog) is participating in a ‘virtual book club’, and has used the writing prompts of “Rules! Rules! Rules!” or “Good Enough” as our starting point. Be sure to check out the sites to read up on other mom’s take on the book. While I originally started out writing for the Rules! prompt, I see now that it covers a bit of both. Funny, parenting is like that too, you start on one path just to wind up realizing sometimes you need to mix things up to get the results you want
The way a person raises their children, I suspect, is directly linked to their own childhood. For better or worse. Way ‘back in the day’ I was allowed to roam our neighborhood, needing to be back home by the time the streetlights came on. If I couldn’t make it home by then, I would just pop into the nearest house (every third house was a relative) and give my mom a call. She knew how long it would take to get home from each house, and I knew better that to dilly-dally.
We were vagabond kids, with our greatest accomplishment being anytime we made it to the edge of the neighborhood and hit the grocerette for penny candy. We would walk out of there after spending two quarters each and feel like royalty, cramming our faces full of Swedish fish and Bazooka Joe gum from a brown paper bag. To this day I still have to eat the Swedish fish from a brown paper bag or they just don’t taste right to me.
We never asked our parents if it was okay to eat ALL the candy before dinner or told them who’s house we were going to. I never realized as a kid what this freedom meant, it just ‘was’.
Fast forward thirty years and if my daughter walks a few houses down to her friend’s house, I’m on the front porch watching her the entire way. If I call over at 5pm for her to come home for dinner, and she’s not here in 10 minutes, I’m freaking out. Keep in mind we live in a one-street neighborhood surrounded by commercial farms. There is no place else to go but another house on our street. Since we rarely keep junk food in the house, chips and cookies are always a big treat. If I give her three cookies, she will ask me at the start of each cookie if she is allowed to eat it.
How did my daughter get so cautious? It’s my fault to be sure, I’m always making sure she’s within arm’s reach of me or doesn’t go into a public restroom alone. But the bigger question is where did *I* come up with all these new rules? Why am I a stick in the mud when it comes to letting her be a kid and roam the neighborhood and eat candy before dinner? Yes, the world is a big, bad place (bigger and ‘badder’ than when I grew up anyway), but does that mean that danger is everywhere?
Up until now I thought I was doing my daughter a favor by helping her be cautious and aware of her surroundings, more specifically, aware of where I am at all times and teaching her that she needs my ‘ok’ for things to be safe. What I didn’t anticipate was that a good portion of her life would depend on my approval, my ability to make decisions for her. I thought I was helping her make those decisions herself, but I guess when she needed to go to me every time to ‘double-check her answers’ it really wasn’t helping, but enabling.
I’m trying to get her out on her own two feet, but slowly. She is a creature of habit, and will mindlessly ask me for my permission on the most basic of childhood joys, like playing with her friends, standing in the rain during a sun shower, or eating cookies. I’d like to turn her into a free spirit, just like I was growing up. I hope it’s not too late.
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