You Can Be A Bad Mom And Still Cook With Your Kids...

My time spent in that place where underachievers overachievers go to die live made it glaringly obvious that I am not made of ubermom material. All around me were mothers who seemed determined to joyfully devote every last ounce of their energy to the molding of their children.

"Alton says you need to cover the bottom of the pan
with aromatics, MAWMMM..."
(He did a nice job cutting them carrots, didn't he?)

And whether it was

- participating in the PTA,

- hanging out in the classroom helping some of the most overprivileged teachers I've ever met grade papers, tutor kids, staple shit together, cut out shapes, and chaperone Valentine's Day parties, or

- spending the better part of their afternoons and evenings shuttling their kids from music lessons, to dance or martial arts lessons, to Kumon, and back home just in time to eat dinner, shower and go to bed,

they did it with a smile on their faces, a triple skim milk mochalattefrappucino in their hands, a pair of Juicy Couture sweatpants on their asses, and the steering wheel of a tricked out Suburban or minivan in their hands.

"...so you can use the pan juices for gravy, MAWMMMM..."

And while I was determined not to spend my afternoons doing the same after a full day at the office, I would be lying to say that seeing those moms in action didn't often make me look at myself and wonder if I wasn't failing my children because I only spent half an hour one year typing names into the PTA database, rarely ever showed up in their classrooms, and only enrolled them in one activity at a time, none of them designed to make Ivy League attendees of my kids.

"Don't forget my Balsamic vinaigrette, MAWMMMMM...
And not too much oil! You know I don't like too much
oil in my vinaigrette!!!"

But at some point, after years of questioning my worth as a mother, I realized that every halfway decent parent has something different to offer their children and that, despite some cries of martyrdom, people mostly do what's in their nature and ability to do. That is to say, those parents, unlike this parent, who seem to take joy in rolling around in the grass with their children, really do take joy in it. Those parents who like to sit with their kids and have a reading hour on a Saturday afternoon do it because they themselves love to read and want to impart that love of reading to their children. And those women who devote every waking moment of their lives to their children and take immense pride and credit in so doing do it because deep down, it satisfies them to define themselves by their achievements as mothers.

And so it was at that point that I decided my options were to:

- continue to beat myself up for not being for my children what other parents seemed to be for their children, and/or

- try to be something I'm not and make myself, hence my children, miserable in the process,

OR

- accentuate the positive, share with my kids those gifts and abilities that came easily and naturally to me, and allow other people in their lives with other abilities to impart those gifts to them.

He doesn't eat corn anymore. Weird kid.

And that's why I choose to take my kids to beaches or botanical gardens or on roadtrips while allowing their dad the <ahem> *pleasure* of spending a day at Disneyland with them. That's why I watch Chopped and Iron Chef with them while allowing their grandmother the fun of watching Spongebob DVDs with them (though I am not immune to the occasional outburst of *BRING IT AROOOOOOUUUUUND TOWN!!!*). That's why I try to limit their TV/videogame time to one hour a day and force them to learn how to use their creativity and amuse themselves rather than carpool them from activity to activity.

And finally, that is why I cook with my kids instead of rolling around in the grass or going for bike rides with them (that's the Man's job).

There's a lesson in good bad parenting to be found
somewhere on this plate...

I know some will call me a selfish mother, and that's ok. I'd rather be a selfish mother who teaches my children by example how to be aware and accepting of their strengths as well as their weaknesses than to be a selfless one keeping emotional score on them and waiting for the day they'll thank me for all those years I *sacrificed* to turn them into whatever they were already capable of becoming themselves if they really so desired.

shinae

P.S. I do realize that, in the spectrum of human experience, there must be ubermoms who aren't also insufferable martyrs. I'm just saying that if I were one of those ubermoms, I'd probably also be an insufferable one. :)