For New Old Moms to Learn Old New Tricks
Since I am This Old Mom, and today marks me as a whole year older– the unsurprisingly unsexy age of 53– I am going to make a birthday confession. When we first adopted Grace, I felt like I was pretending to be a mother. While the physical aspect of the baby transplant was a success– a brave young pregnant woman walked into a hospital, induced…
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When my smart-ish phone died on a Thursday, I had a full-on-princess-problem-anxiety-aneuyrsm. The Do Not Resuscitate App* that suddenly appeared on my nearly ancient iPhone 5 tipped me that it was time to secure hospice care. Admittedly, I had been dancing with fire. My phone had lived a very full and rewarding life for nearly three whole years. So, it powered down one last time,…
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Which super power would you pick? Invisibility or flight?” It was a useful first date question, if conversation had stalled. If a guy played along, and had a thoughtful or funny answer to the question, a second date might happen. I always chose invisibility, until I learned invisibility sucks when you can’t turn it off. I was 42 when I noticed I was no longer…
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I think we become parents long before we have children. I know I was a parent long before I even was sure I wanted a child. I mothered all my boyfriends, pets and friends, and a few strangers on long lines at Unemployment, Disneyland, and airports. But I never had to mother a family member until Alex Trebek came along and fucked it all up….
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In my ever-crunchy attempt to create a present and aware child who lives in the moment as opposed to say, a tiny, tireless consumer constantly clamoring for my phone to endlessly loop the Chipmunks cover of ‘What Does The Fox Say?’ on Youtube- let’s just say I’ve made a few tactical errors. I thought I was smart ( and knew I was being lazy) by…
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1. Look back and examine how your racial attitudes were formed. Maybe you are an oldster like me and you remember Senor Wences or Speedy Gonzales and you didn’t realize these caricatures shaped how you see people. You also grew up loving What’s Happening, Good Times, Sanford and Son, Sammy Davis, Jr., The Jackson Five, Stevie Wonder, Ella Fitzgerald, and Jimi Hendrix. But you also…
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“There is not one thing that woman accomplished that she couldn’t have done as a white woman.” — Dave Chapelle “Everyone wants to be black until it’s time to be black.” — Paul Mooney I’m still pondering the magnitude of what Rachel tried to pull off. She attended Howard University, the predominantly black university, as the whitey she was born. Apparently Howard University doesn’t have…
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Old is the new young. I keep waiting for that to be the cover of Vogue, Cosmo, or even More magazine. Well, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration. I’m not holding my breath for age to be considered cool, sexy and desirable. But when you are my age and have a girlfriend calling you to rave about an article in the latest issue of AARP magazine,…
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Thank you, Little Bully for hurting my daughter. I mean it, Little Bully. I appreciate you teaching me how much I need to teach my little girl. Thanks, Little Bully, for waking me up to how violent, mean and intimidating we are all capable of being at such young ages. Even though you are not even five, Little Bully, thank you for teaching me that…
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1. When your child/client makes unreasonable demands, such as “But I want to eat toilet paper!” or “Can you score me some crack?” – you don’t say no- you just find diplomatic words that sound like yes, but essentially mean no. 2. Fall gracefully on child/client’s grenades. If they show up for an important meeting 4 hours late & Xanaxed out of their brain or…
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