parenting, mindfulness, and the Dude

Here is what my morning was like.  Let me say this first:  I'm not proud. 

I got up at 5:20 to check email and write.  This is what I do every morning.  My husband, who'd been out of town for 6 days got in last night at midnight.  I'd slept okay, but a couple of bad dreams.  I got ready to go to the gym at 6:15.  Before I could go, the dog needed to go out, my daughter needed to go to the bathroom and help dressing her doll and she wanted to chat a bit.  I remembered that I should set the alarm for my husband so that he would get up and get the kids going for school.  I got home from the gym at 7:25.  I made two kids' lunches, showered and dressed, helped my kids pick out clothes and get dressed.  I drove my son and the neighbor children to school.  It was 8:40 when I got home from that, because the traffic was bad.  My daughter is due at school at 9.  I wasn't going to make that, I knew, but I figured 9:10.  I am generally punctual, so it stresses me to be late, but I've given in to the 10 minutes late to pre-school thing.  We're almost ready to go, but my daughter starts being tempermental.  I start being tempermental.  I can't find her mittens or papers for her school.  Now I'm really mad and not acting like a very nice mom.  When I get mad, I tend to stomp around and yell.  I look in the basement for her mittens and find that a cat pooped on the carpet.  I am about to blow my top.  I've switched into quiet seething mode.  We get in the car and there's been a wreck and two lanes are closed on the highway.  I know I'm supposed to think about inner peace and mindfulness and gratitude.  Unfortunately, curse words are what I'm thinking of.  Also, my daugher wants to listen to Les Miserables, the musical, which we have listened to EVERY DAY for 3 weeks.  I say, "let's listen to something else for a song or two."  It must be the electric anger behind the quiet tone of my voice:  she agrees.  The song that comes on:  Bad Moon Rising by CCR. 

This was the game changer.  I get a weird amount of pleasure from that song.  My husband loves the movie "The Big Lebowski," a movie that is kind of a stoner classic, but also promotes the awesomeness of CCR.  I'm just not that mellow of a person, but I wish I was, so I have a hard time connecting with the Dude.  The one part of him that I do connect with is his love of Creedence Clearwater Revival.  I take this as a sign of hope, a sign of balance.  Maybe I could do with a little more Dude influence on my life. 

I don't mean not caring or smoking pot or blowing off responsibility, but maybe a clarifying of priorities and choices.  Today, Bad Moon Rising made me laugh at myself and think about what I could do to alleviate this pattern in my morning, a pattern of stress that comes out directed at my kids and at myself. The solutions seem simple: get up a little earlier, make lunches the night before, have them pick out clothes the night before, make sure all supplies are ready to go the night before. It's not brain surgery. I'll also be a more pleasant mother and person for it.

There's been a lot of coverage of a new book about motherhood recently - Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, by Amy Chua. (here's a review... http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/books/20book.html?_r=1). I haven't read the book, but I've heard a number of interviews with her - her premise is that the American/Western style of parenting that focuses so much on self-esteem can be to the determent of our kids.  She says Asian parents tend to approach parenting from a stance that "my kids are strong, they can take it".  It being 3 hours a day of piano practice or criticism for poorly made Mother's Day cards, etc.  She also says that this style of parenting worked very well for her oldest child (and for her self), but not for her youngest.  She had to change her approach slightly with the youngest child because by adolescence, they were growing estranged.

It takes a lot of creativity and humility to change the game plan. To feel unhappy about something - parenting in particular is what I'm thinking of today - and change what you're doing.  I think this is what is one of the things that is meant by mindfulness - not that you have a state of inner peace, free of turbulence, but that you remain open to all your choices and trying something new doesn't seem like defeat.

So, I vow to be a nicer mom in the morning by being a mom that plans ahead, a mom that realizes that time limits me as it limits us all, to not blame my kids for being kids when I am the one running late. 

Also, maybe I need to download some CCR to my ipod.