November 22nd

This is one of those posts I'm writing for my kids for when I am gone, so if you don't want to read it, this would be a good time to move on.

For lots of people, November 22nd will always be foremost the day John F. Kennedy was shot, or maybe just a reminder that Thanksgiving is only days away.   For me, it is my mother's birthday. Today, she would have been 83 years old.   She died in 1970, so there have been lots of November 22's that have come and gone, and each one I have thought about her.

I was 8 when my mother died.  I can remember that when my oldest,  Jack, reached the exact age I was when my mother died, I felt a sense of relief...I had made it for there for him.   Each child since then has been a small victory...I lasted longer for my child than my mother lasted for me.    Lily is already 8...I made it for all 5 of them (although technically, as Timmy would point out, Lily will be the age I was when my mother died in February...you get what I mean, though.)

A lot of what I do as a mother is because my mother died when I was young.  I always get their photos taken professionally because after my mother died, I had no pictures of me as a child.  I always said that if I died while my children were young, I wanted to make sure that my children had childhood pictures of them.    I take them to the dentist every 6 months...to the day.  After my mother died, I didn't go to the dentist for over 5 years...and I am still suffering from poor dental care when I was young.   I think this is what mothers do.   I never had that.

With my two daughters, I have that relationship I never had.    And I think I have it with my sons, also.  I can remember being in the childbirth class with my first pregnancy, and the nurse who was running it announced that all the moms should go on one side, and the dads should go on the other side.   I said to Chris "I can't believe people bring their moms to these things..."  because I was always the one without a mom, and I was always the one who would cringe inside when moms would do things with their daughters.   Chris looked at me and said "Leslie, you are the mom", and at that moment,  I realized that I would never have that feeling again.....I was now the mom, and not having one would be slightly more tolerable.

When I was a teenage, I can remember my friends complaining about their moms...I couldn't imagine having a mom, much less having one who was driving me crazy.   It didn't make me mad, it just made me wonder what could be so bad about HAVING a mom...even one that drove you crazy.

I think having my children would have been much easier if I had had a mom.   Not the obvious thing, like having a babysitter you trusted, because my Aunt Phyllis helped me out a lot, but also just to let me know I was doing it right.   Because I have always had to go on my own instinct.

 It seemed ludicrous when the pediatrician told me that my 12 month old baby needed to be taken off the bottle...that was absurd.  Seriously, insanely crazy.   I remember looking at the doctor, and saying "no."   That isn't going to happen.  My oldest, and all subsequent, loved their bottles.  I mean love.    Serious love.  I tried to imagine someone taking away something I loved, and I thought, that would really piss me off, and I didn't want to do that for my children.   As a result, all 5 of my children had their bottles for years....until the bottle fairy would come, or they would just decide or their own to stop.   It hasn't hurt them at all.     Between the 5 of them, I think there have been a total of 4 cavities, and two of them don't need braces (jury is still out on Lily), so all that baloney the doctor told us about cavities and braces was absurd.   My kids are unbelievably well-adjusted, and happy.  Maybe because they didn't have something they loved wrenched away from them when they were 12 months old!   None of my kids used pacifiers or blankies, but you can guess that I would have let mine carry them around for years, also.

I had a conversation a few years ago with a friend who lost her 85 year old mother when my friend was 50.  She was devastated.  She said she had not been particularly close to her mother until she reached her mid-40's, and she was devastated that her mother was gone.   She and I decided that neither of us had it better than the other...whenever you lose your mother, it is never a good time.  I have spent my whole life (or that which I remember), negotiating the world, without feeling like anyone cared or was on my side , and that I was on my own (that sounds worse than I feel...I think).    My friend said she felt suddenly as if she had no compass....maybe that is what moms do for you.

Anyway, I guess I made it out okay.  I got married, made it through college and law school all by myself,  had a great job, and now have 5 amazingly happy, smart, fantastic kids, largely because I have been the kind of mother to them that I wish I had had while I was young.     But things would have been different, and probably better, if I had had a mother.  I think that is what moms do...make your life better.