Odd Kid (and Parent) Out

“How come we don’t have cable TV?”

“Why won’t you buy Doritos?”

“How come I can’t have a game system?”

These questions are most commonly followed by, “Everyone else has them!” and sometimes, “Why do you have to be so weird?”

I’ve given up imparting my reasoning for all of these parental decisions, because my kids have heard it before and all it elicits is groans and eye rolls.

My husband had a conversation with my daughter this weekend that led to the unveiling of a reason even more compelling than my desire for my kids to grow up physically, emotionally, and mentally healthy. To my mind, these are perfectly logical reasons for cleaning the cupboards of junk food and not allowing someone else’s idea of “entertainment” in to my home, but to my children they are simply more evidence of my questionable mental state.

This weekend, frustrated by the snack and entertainment options, my daughter cut to the chase and asked, “Why do we always have to be so different?” My brilliant husband replied, “Do you want to be like everyone else?”

Herd Bound

I apologize that the following post is a bit long and wandering. I have had a hard time corralling my thoughts this past week. But I’ve grown weary of thinking about this, so I share my untidied thoughts: 

I was reading details of last Friday’s nightmare and one fact struck me. When asked about the shooter, a former administrator who had known him in high school said, “Did you find a best friend? Did you find any friend? You won’t. He didn’t have any.” The young man had no friends. Not one. Now, I am in no conceivable way excusing his actions, nor even trying to explain them. I’m just noting this fact. 

Every time I open Facebook, another beautiful face appears. These are the faces of the children who were killed at their Elementary School where they should have been safe from a maniac with a gun. Seeing their perfect, precious faces brings fresh tears to my eyes again and again. I can’t fathom their parent’s pain. All weekend long, the world felt out of sorts for me.  

And now today, alone in my house, I feel even more out of sorts. As a mom, you know all too well the worry that goes with parenting. But there are times when the worry you feel for your children is cranked up, and other times the worry recedes, like background music. Normally, by 9am on a school day, I can relax. If any of the school buses carrying my children were to have crashed, I would have heard about it by now. My children are safe at school. There is a break in the worry until 2:45 when they board a bus again. I am out of sorts because I can’t stop thinking about the path a crazed gunman might take in my own children’s school buildings. I wonder whether the fire doors could be automatically closed off to protect them. I consider that the Middle School seems safest because the classrooms are so far from the entrance. These are not thoughts that usually torment me on the average week day.