The other day, the Son of Never Stops Eating and I were on a walk with the family mutt, enjoying the beautiful outdoors. Anyone who knows me knows that I am always on the prowl for pictures of cool things like butterflies and fungi and when I see something really good, I get hyper-focused on that and it's not really a good time to ask me questions about anything.
My son was talking about some TV show he had started watching that was about a boy with ten sisters, and I was only half listening because I'd heard it before.
Son: Mom, the Loud family has eleven kids.
Me: Um-hum. That's interesting. Wow, eleven kids.
Son: The boy has ten sisters!
Me: Oh, look! Is that a cloudless sulfur butterfly? (pulling out iPhone to take picture while attempting to avoid poison ivy)
Son: Hey Mom, how come you don't have eleven kids?
Me: (dropping phone in poison ivy)
Several years ago, I was at the gym with my daughter. She had just gotten approval to walk on the treadmill. We were both watching TV, and as I was in my zen zone, she taps me on the shoulder.
Daughter: Hey, MOM! MOM!
Me: What?
Daughter: MOM! What's a S-E-X scandal?
Me: (nearly falling off treadmill)
Me: What?
Daughter: MOM! What's a S-E-X scandal?
Me: (nearly falling off treadmill)
That was the same gym where, a few years later, my son- who lacks a filter- pointed to the TV, where some candidates for political office were speaking, and said, loudly, Hey, MOM! There's that orange man again!
My kids have always had that impeccable timing, but as they get older, the questions get harder to answer. When they were little, I was presented with such challenges as "Do hamsters go to heaven when they die?". I was trying to avoid getting smashed by speeding cars on the freeway at the time; I also think my check engine light was on. The Mom of No does not do theology, so I referred that one to an appropriate subject matter expert: a member of the clergy. I think he enjoyed the conversation.
Now that I have teenagers, I get the big questions of life, including but not limited to sensitive social and political issues. The problem I sometimes run into with these questions is not that I mind answering them, because I don't. It's that sometimes I don't quite get what's being asked. For example, my daughter was asking me my thoughts on certain LGBTQ issues, and I was surreptitiously Googling the term "cis-gender" while attempting a coherent discussion. Fortunately, I wasn't driving at the time.
As a mom, I want my kids to feel like they can ask me hard questions. I don't mind having intense discussions about controversial or sensitive subjects.
I just don't want to do it when on hold with the IRS, trying to find my work ID, wondering if that thumping noise is a flat tire, attempting to determine why the GPS has me driving through a lake, actively performing any kind of home maintenance or repair activity, trying to discern why I hear water running in the house when I know that no faucets are on, or at the same moment I realize that I have put a tablespoon instead of a teaspoon of salt in a recipe.
Side note: These are also not good times to ask Mom for money. Never ask a woman plunging an overflowing toilet if you can have $20.
Have mercy on me, kids. I'm not a good multi-tasker. Wait until I'm lounging on the sofa. Just make sure I'm not watching the Walking Dead.
My kids have always had that impeccable timing, but as they get older, the questions get harder to answer. When they were little, I was presented with such challenges as "Do hamsters go to heaven when they die?". I was trying to avoid getting smashed by speeding cars on the freeway at the time; I also think my check engine light was on. The Mom of No does not do theology, so I referred that one to an appropriate subject matter expert: a member of the clergy. I think he enjoyed the conversation.
Now that I have teenagers, I get the big questions of life, including but not limited to sensitive social and political issues. The problem I sometimes run into with these questions is not that I mind answering them, because I don't. It's that sometimes I don't quite get what's being asked. For example, my daughter was asking me my thoughts on certain LGBTQ issues, and I was surreptitiously Googling the term "cis-gender" while attempting a coherent discussion. Fortunately, I wasn't driving at the time.
As a mom, I want my kids to feel like they can ask me hard questions. I don't mind having intense discussions about controversial or sensitive subjects.
I just don't want to do it when on hold with the IRS, trying to find my work ID, wondering if that thumping noise is a flat tire, attempting to determine why the GPS has me driving through a lake, actively performing any kind of home maintenance or repair activity, trying to discern why I hear water running in the house when I know that no faucets are on, or at the same moment I realize that I have put a tablespoon instead of a teaspoon of salt in a recipe.
Side note: These are also not good times to ask Mom for money. Never ask a woman plunging an overflowing toilet if you can have $20.
Have mercy on me, kids. I'm not a good multi-tasker. Wait until I'm lounging on the sofa. Just make sure I'm not watching the Walking Dead.
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