Mommy Sadaams
I don't know about you, but we mom's are alot like benevolent Sadaams (excuse the oxymoron--actually, I say this only because I love that word.) Our instruments of torture aren't as wicked, mind you, although i'll have to say my nagging can put the bamboo livers under the fingernail trick to shame. The whole martyrdom Joan of Arc wannabe thing is also pretty bad. Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah: What we do alot of is spout out orders. Most of us are pretty nice about it, but a directive is still a directive whether you say, "Erik, go get your jacket" or "DAMMIT ERIK, GET YOUR FRIGGING JACKET ON OR YOU'LL FREEZE YOUR LITTLE ASS OFF!" Mind you, if I told my best friend, "Go get your jacket" she'd come back with, "Ex cuuuuuuuuse me?" with all the necessary head bobbles that say "you gotta be friggin kidding." But we mouth off orders right and left like Captain Blye (or General Patton for you moms prone to seasickness.)I don't know what came first, the chicken or the egg. Do we start with our husbands or do we start giving them orders after we warm up on the kids? A rhetorical question, I'm afraid, because we're all so swamped by our relentless directives we can't distinguish one tsumani or orders from the other. (My sincerest apologies to those of you moms now turning various shades of green). I went to Target (which my husband lovingly refers to as the Black Hole because the gravitational pullfrom that store is so great even me and his money can't escape) and while I was going to the rest room (yep, to rest. Shopping for worthless stuff you're going to toss in the trash within the month is such grueling work) I heard a young mom talk to her daughter of about 2 or 3 years old. She said "Okay honey, take your pants down. Alittle more. No that's too much. Now get on the potty. Slide back alittle more. That's right. Now pee. Anymore. Try to squeeze out the last few drops. Okay now try to go poo. Good job. Let's wipe now. Get some toilet paper. Nope, get alittle more. Okay now wipe back to front. Good. Alittle more. Okay. A tad more. Okay now lets pull your panties up. Good. Now flush. Push harder. Okay lets wash up. Put some water on your hands. Now some soap,......" and it went on and on. the kid probably has a pound of cobwebs in her brain from lack of use. Zombie in training. My advice, after being a supremest of all order givers in the mommy world: try to rephrase directives. Example: "Erik, it's cold outside. What do you need to do to make sure you're comfortable at school today?" I can just see those cobwebs flying off in every direction."