I've Arrived!

That is - I've arrived on the planet.  As of January 8, 1964 at 2:37am my mother and father experienced the greatest joy of their lives - me joining them on the planet!  Yes it was even better than when my sister showed up 8 1/2 years later.  She knows I'm the favorite, so this isn't news.  Do you ever wonder what your parents thought when you arrived?  Were they overjoyed, scared, relieved (that I was healthy until they found out later that I was crazy as hell as was established in my previous post), or any other myriad of emotions?  When my daughter was born, I was just glad the PAIN was over!  They were telling me she was beautiful, healthy and trying to show her to me.  All I wanted to do was get more of those heated blankets and be SLEEP.  I fully expected that she'd be around a long time so I could get to know her later.  After I finally woke up several hours later and my husband rolled her in the room for me to meet her, this ridiculous guilt set in...I would NEVER be the mother my mother is.  Oh Lord, what to do??!!  I realized, she did not ask to be in the world so I had a profound responsibility to raise her right so that this world doesn't eat her up AND so that she'd be someone that people could not only tolerate but actually like...dare I say adore. 

20 years later, I know her and I like her - actually, love her to death.  She's pleasant, witty, respectful and absolutely delightful.  So I'm going to take a moment and dust my shoulders and pat myself on the back for raising her to be that way.  My mama says most of the problems in the world are because kids are not raised right...and as I encounter God in human form on a daily basis, I realize she's absolutely right!

I've been accused (actually, I've said it) of not liking kids.  What I've realized is that I DON'T LIKE PARENTS!  Well, I don't like the ones who don't raise their ankle biters knowing they will one day be adults - they will not be your little angel the rest of their lives - the rest of us don't see them as angels anyway (especially when they're staring down my throat in the middle of a grown-folk conversation - take your little a$$ outside somewhere and play!).  And when the parents screw up, we just see them as little hellions occupying way too much space and using up our oxygen.

Those of us who got our a$$es beat when we did something wrong; were told "You bet not ask for nothing while we're in this store"; tried to throw a tantrum ONE time and only ONE time because the consequences were so grave that we dare not ever do it again; lost a tournament and did NOT get a trophy because we were NOT the winner - WE LOST; learned something from all of that.  We learned that life is not fair all the time, but it all balances out.  We learned that you will not win all the time; but it's ok and you move on. (BTW, I'm a much better loser than I am a winner - I've not quite got a handle on that gloating thing - sorry Mama.)  We learned there are consequences and repurcussions for our actions (good and bad). In fact, I learned a BUNCH of stuff because Mama and Daddy were in the business of disciplining/teaching me and not coddling/babying me.  Of course they protected me from as much as they could (I believed in Santa for a LONG time).  But Mama also loved me enough to be realistic about the child she had which meant letting me bump my head.  "You don't believe fat meat's greasy" is one of the things I'd hear right before or after a good head bumping.  Mama even let me get married at 21 knowing full well it wasn't a good idea (I asked her after my divorce why she didn't say something and she said "Regardless of what I'd said, you're like your daddy, so you were going to do it - so I just hoped for the best").  She knows me well enough to know that I'm a little stubborn (much less so now than back then).  She knows that I'm a procrastinator (which she NEVER hesitates to remind me about - I'm going to work on that later).  She knows I'm never on time - which she can't comprehend because she's never late (ask her about needing to be at the train station by 6:45am for her 8am train and waking me up at 5:30am to make sure we're on time - I'm still traumatized by that).  She just KNOWS me (sometimes more than I would like) and she LOVES me unconditionally - which is a phenomenal gift.

So as I celebrate this month of my birth, I thank my Mama, Bobbieteen Lavada Bruce Austin (now ask me why she LOATHES Lavada but has NOTHING to say about Bobbieteen-all one word) for doing right by me.  Daddy, Maurice Snipes Austin - affectionately known as Tugga (rhymes with Sugga), had a lot to do with all my FABULOUSNESS too, so he definitely gets a shout out.  They understood the basic principle that child rearing is more than a notion.  There is no manual, so you have to wing it.  But you can start by knowing - the kid will some day be an adult - make them so somebody will like them!