That’s a real dog. On an airplane. In a backpack with a sweater on. One of my kids took that picture and later said the dog was chill the entire flight but continued to look “pissed”. 

Back when the 70’s rolled over into the 80’s I began my first volunteer effort. I was new to the ways of the adult world and “giving back”, even before that phase was coined, seemed the right thing to do. 

 

I answered the phone on the overnight shift at Crisis Intervention. It was all about listening in a way that people “felt heard”.  The idea was that people in distress sometimes just don’t have “people” to talk to as they approach the snapping point - the job was essentially triage, then routing to appropriate services. Most of the time, callers could be encouraged to recognize and reach out to their own support groups, sometimes other United Way affiliates could be recommended. 

I never had a “crisis type” call there. My callers were mostly lonely or alone people who wanted human contact (albeit anonymously, over a phone line).

I don’t know if I ever “helped” anyone. 

My outcome was that I began to realize how well insulated from hardships my life experience had been and very likely would continue to be. 

I also began to realize that I actually was quite naïve. 

I began to see that “stupid solutions” seem perfectly reasonable to people when their options are severely limited by new stressors, previous poor choices and compounding difficult circumstances.

I developed an understanding that “choices make choices”. 

Big decisions automatically structure future choices. I had no framework to hang the fact that life rarely offers  “do- overs” on the big, trajectory setting, big life choices are big because they ramify. 

I finished undergrad, started a Masters in Architecture which was interrupted by the reality of the severe economic recession of the 1980s, and started what would become a very satisfying job in outside sales (contract furniture). I don’t see “sales” as talking people into making a purchase, I see the job as being the resource person who is able to find and provide what the buyer already knows they want or need. I was fortunate to find a good fit  career-wise. 

On the idea of do- overs … it probably would have been better for me to stay with that job after I began to have children. Instead, I became a stay at home mother - a job I knew I was, at that time,  ill-equipped for. Additionally, “homemaking” wasn’t an interest nor did it come naturally to me. I clearly remember being on my hands and knees trying to scour “Mop & Glow” buildup out of the textured linoleum kitchen floor. The baby was asleep and I was making every effort to be the perfect wife and mother. 

So weird to write those words. Perfect. 

Most of the time - back then - I really was trying to figure out, to learn, how to be the perfect wife and the perfect mother. 

While I was genuinely amazed at how much I liked my child (and loved, but that’s different), he slept a lot initially. I missed the chase of big installations, I loved making money and I loved winning! I loved the cute clothes, the fancy high heels, all that fun stuff. Lol. I’ve found that the rewards of parenting are far less tangible. I can’t remember gold stars ever. 

Yesterday, the younger woman who I exchange confidences with, asked me if I “wanted” so many children. She is coming up on parenting her first teenager and it’s looking like the minefield that it is. 

Did I? 

I wasn’t feeling the biological clock, (and honestly I’ve never heard it ticking) when we decided to start our family. My husband had a game plan in mind and felt that he was the right age to start a family. I wasn’t giddy about the whole thing … and my mother had continuously expressed doubts about my ability to carry and delivery a child … I honestly half expected to die during childbirth. Really. This goes back to my naivety. 

It must be a primary belief that we will be cared for by the people who’s job that is. I’m still realizing what a “mess” my mother was. My kids were recently teasing me about using the dishwasher as a drying rack (I know I’m not the only one) because nothing goes into my dishwasher without being already clean and rinsed, then I’ll turn it on. My mom held “child me” to impossibly high  standards. I didn’t know that then. I just came to believe that as a daughter I was a failure. I had stopped trying to please my mother altogether by my teen years. I found other ways to succeed and fortunately those activities provided opportunities for better choices later on. 

Side note here - people love to ask old people what their big regrets are, I’m noticing the idea even in advertising lately - I do have a few regrets. 

My relationship with my mother didn’t support me missing her. I was honored to experience the journey with her during her last few weeks, but I didn’t grieve a loss. I regret that I don’t miss my mother. That is regrettable from ever angle. I don’t miss her voice in my head either. I trusted her and she was ill-equipped emotionally. So much beautiful potential in her wasted under the scars of her own abusive childhood. I’ve always said “she did her best” but it’s not until recently that I can see how hard she must have been trying. I regret that time ran out on me telling her that. 

Now I am old. At least oldish. My children are adults. I definitely feel the satisfaction of having raised decent, capable, well- packaged people. I’m glad we were able to provide an environment for them to thrive in and I’m glad they made good choices for themselves. 

Probably the hardest part was letting them make their own “big” choices knowing that do- overs are costly. 

My friend seems to hover over her kid. She doesn’t want her kid to make mistakes, any mistakes, but most pointedly, the same mistakes she herself made. My friend seems to be making her same mistakes over again. She knows she is. 

It’s true and it’s also hard to say/hear that people make mistakes. Children earning responsibilities make mistakes. Adults with responsibilities still make mistakes.

Mistakes represent places for course correction. The consequences of mistakes inform us. It’s wasteful I think to keep on making the same mistakes when you already know not to. 

If I had a do-over starting before I began a family … 

I would have loved to fly more. I’d love to started flying sooner. I’m sure about that but I’d still want the privilege of helping these five people start their lives. 

They actually contributed more to shaping who I’ve become then my own parents did. They “raised” me. 

If I could know then what I know now, I wouldn’t change much. I’d do better I hope, but I’d still prioritize them. 

Everyone I know who flys professionally gets frustrated with the job. It seems to stop being the fun kind of challenging. Parenting isn’t really expected to be “fun”. It’s a sort of life work that is under valued. 

The social climate in my country seems very much as it did in my coming of age years. 

Carter was President then Reagan. 

The economy was in recession. Computers were going to make all the work of life easier, faster, and promised a four day work week. 

Pop culture was teaching us that “more money” was the path to happiness, the age of conspicuous opulence began. We started hearing about AIDS …

It’s popular now to blame the Boomers, placing blame is a sort of a sport now. 

 I was surprised when the country elected an actor to serve as President. I still am amazed by that. Are they all actors now? 

I dreaded moving to the part of the country (in the early 90’s) that had fostered a “Jimmy Carter” type. Yeah, he seems to be a really nice guy. I was afraid that he wasn’t very smart. 

I didn’t like that little boys wore smocked garments and white knee socks. I didn’t like that the illiteracy rate was so high … this is a tangent. I saw the results of the welfare state - it’s like benching an entire group. It wastes lives in my opinion. 

I didn’t like the Deep South but it turned out to be a quiet little place to start my family. My experience there was what I made of it. 

I may have preferred staying naive. 

I think individuals are so largely powerless to affect all except personal changes - and even those deeply ingrained habits and beliefs are hard to change. 

We get so much verifiably false information that it’s almost silly to form an opinion. “Truth” has become relative. Has it always been so? 

I have never been able to see things in black and white without noticing  all the shades of grey but it’s so much harder now.