Palm Springs annual Easter Egg Hunt in Ruth Hardy Park. My kids are standing on the right with their friends.
When my kids were young, they’d mispronounce a few words. Sometimes, we’d continue to say words the way they did. Eventually those “words” were adopted into our family’s lexicon.
Take the color “lallow.” That’s how my daughter said yellow.
I pushed my son in his stroller downtown Laguna Beach before little sister was born. He said “high gone” or “Hai Gòn.” I was confused at what he was saying. We stopped in our favorite bakery/deli and I bought him a chicken drumstick. He raised it high in the air and said “high gone!” To him, it looked like a helicopter. Chicken drumsticks became “high gones” in our family.
My daughter kept asking me for chicken when she was a toddler. I’d cook baked chicken, chicken and dumplings and every type of chicken I knew how to cook. She was always upset because it was the wrong chicken.
One day I made pan fried sole. My daughter said, “That is the chicken I like.” So we called sole “that chicken.” We still do.
What words did you or your children use that were unusual?
I wrote this nine years ago. It’s my most read post to this day. I remember writing it while visiting a high school friend in my home town Snohomish.
I understand how she feels. After all, I was once 19 years old. I remember it very clearly.
Everything my mom did, I found unbelievably annoying.
I’ll never forget sitting with her in the car, getting ready to shop at Bellevue Square. She had parked the car. She was fumbling through her purse, making sure she had what she needed. She reapplied her lipstick. Dug through her purse for her wallet to look through credit cards. Searched several times to check where she placed the keys.
Mom and me in the early 90s. I lost her to COVID in January 2023.
Would we never leave the car? Would I be stuck all day? I must have said something to her quite snippy, or flat out mean. A few tears rolled down her cheeks. Which made me more upset with her.
Isn’t it a sad feeling, transitioning from a mom who could do no wrong—from changing diapers, to cooking their favorite spaghetti, to taping treasured colorings on the fridge that were made just for you—to being the person of their abject disdain?
It’s a tough new role. Let me tell you.
But, having gone through these feelings myself, I understand. I’m visiting my mom this week in her assisted living center. I talked about it with her, what I’m going through now, and what I felt like when I was 19. Fortunately, she doesn’t remember me ever being a snarky 19-year-old.
For some reason, I’ve gained more patience throughout my life and that has been a blessing. I’ve also learned forgiveness.
My baby girl years ago.
Something else, I’ve learned through the years of parenting: this too shall pass.
It’s called independence and freedom. We want our children to grow and become separate human beings that can stand on their own. Sometimes they need to separate from us. A good time to do that is during their senior year of high school, or their freshman year of college. It’s a good thing. I keep telling myself that.
However, we also want to be treated with respect, and once again—someday—to be cherished.
A beach day with my daughter.
I wrote more about separating from our kids and the experiences we go through when they leave for college HERE.
I miss my mom. So much.
Why do you think some posts are discovered and read throughout the years, while others are not?
Do you think when people close to us are going through rough times, it’s easy for them to take it out on those closest to them?
On Monday, I was celebrating fun memories of my daughter on her birthday. Then I saw a post by a mother whose daughter shared the same birthday with my daughter. Our daughters knew each other as student-athletes at the University of Utah. I didn’t know they had the same birthday until Monday. I texted my daughter if she knew. She said she did. I remember how devastated my daughter was on the day she learned of Lauren’s death.
As I was rejoicing the life of my daughter, this mother was grieving her loss. I burst into tears realizing how fortunate I am.
The other mom heard her daughter’s death happen, on the phone, while she was talking to her daughter when she was shot to death by a stalker.
“‘There but for the grace of God, go I.”
Lauren’s story is a harrowing event that made national news. The mother has worked to keep Lauren’s memory alive, plus began a foundation with the following mission:
Our Mission
Dating violence and stalking are some of the most pressing issues facing universities and colleges today. One third of all women report dating violence by a current or previous partner. University and college campuses are not trained to respond effectively to these problems. The Lauren McCluskey Foundation was founded to honor the life and spirit of Lauren Jennifer McCluskey by bringing awareness to, funding research for, and providing resources to change the culture that responds poorly to dating violence and stalking on campuses.
Our mission is to let Lauren’s light shine by supporting her passions, including animal welfare, amateur athletics, and by making campuses across the country a place where students are safe, supported, and have the ability to thrive.
My daughter and me in the backyard of a house we used to rent in Laguna Beach.
We rented a house in Laguna Beach to escape the high temperatures of Palm Springs in the summertime. We rented with another family from Memorial weekend to Labor day, splitting the summer in half.
The family who owned the house were school teachers. They took off to Alaska each summer as rangers.
I was worried the first time I visited the house. The backyard dropped off into a canyon. There were railroad ties between the lawn and a cliff. Having a two-year old son, I was worried the yard was too dangerous.
The owner laughed and said she raised three boys in that house and there was never an issue.
Me and my son at the beach in Laguna.
I’ll never forget the first time we rented the house. We told our son we were going to the beach. He grabbed a shovel and bucket and said, “Let’s go!” He was headed to the edge of the lawn and railroad ties, where there was a view of the ocean.
“No!” I stopped him. “We have to drive to the beach.”
Later that summer, I couldn’t find the T.V. remote control. My husband worked in Palm Springs during the weekdays and I was alone with my son except for weekends.
I was six months pregnant with my daughter at the time.
“It’s down there!” my son said pointing to the cliff dropping to the canyon.
“What?” I asked.
“I threw it down there,” my son said, pointing.
I strapped him in his stroller before I ventured into the canyon. I made my way over the railroad ties, clinging onto shrubs for dear life, as I scrambled along the steep incline. Needless to say I was a wreck by the time I made it back up the steep cliff into the backyard. No, I didn’t find the remote.
My son seemed fascinated watching me from the safety of his stroller.
I pushed my son in his stroller into the house, unbuckled him and collapsed on the sofa.
My son joined me on the sofa and fetched the remote control from under a throw pillow.
“Here it is!” he said.
My kids at the Laguna Beach house, sitting on the hearth wearing sofa arm protectors as hats.
To this day, I have no clue why my son told me he threw the remote control into the canyon. I’m sure he was entertained watching me as I held onto branches and bushes to not tumble down the cliff.
What unexpected things have your kids done to make your life exciting?
My toddler daughter at Aliso Beach in Laguna, California.
My daughter called and asked me about a letter from her best friend that I never gave her. I had forgotten all about it. But wouldn’t you know, my husband on a separate phone call with her, brought it up.
“Why would your dad say anything about the letter?” I asked instantly upset.
“Mom, I’m 27 years old. I can handle it.”
At the time of the letter, my daughter was 13 years old. My daughter and her best friend had been together since birth. We (my friend and I) helped each other out with our second children by taking turns having them together several times a week. That gave one of us time to clean, shop or sleep! The older siblings were in half-day preschool.
I homeschooled our daughter sixth through eighth grade when our son began high school. Our daughter’s best friend was at a public middle school and we agreed to pick her up once a week while her mom was at work.
The plan was to have a craft or art project each Wednesday. Sometimes my daughter wanted to hang out with her best friend and not have a designated project. I thought everything was peachy when my friend said she had a letter to drop off from her daughter to mine.
She told me to read the letter before I gave it to my daughter. I was shocked. My daughter’s best friend was ending their friendship and said she was promised an art project on Wednesdays. She hoped my daughter would understand if they saw each other that she wouldn’t speak to her. She was never speaking to her again. I can’t remember exactly what else was in the letter, but it was mean and there was no way I’d let my daughter read that letter and be hurt.
I threw the letter away.
Of course my daughter wanted to know why Wednesdays were off and why she wasn’t going to her best friend’s house on Saturday, or having her over to our house.
I explained as best I could that her friend was going through some troubling times and to be patient and things would go back to normal. There were three major upheavals in the girl’s life that she was struggling through that I won’t share. But they were major and beyond what I thought my daughter needed to learn about at the time. I do think this rejection from her best friend without explanation has affected my daughter’s relationships today.
Their friendship was never the same again, although later in life they became civil.
Question. Would you have given the letter to your daughter or thrown it away like I did? Why or why not?
Today is my son’s birthday. It was also our big yellow lab Angus’s birthday.
The following story was first published in the Los Angeles Times Sunday paper in the Kids’ Reading Room section. It’s the true story of my son’s second grade birthday party. I repost this story each year in honor or my son and Angus.
My son with the Easter bunny.
A Birthday for the Dogs
“MOM, I’m inviting 50 kids to my party.”
“What, Robert?” Mom said. “That’s too many. Do you know 50 kids?”
I sat in the back seat while Mom drove home after school. My eighth birthday was in two weeks.
“There’s my class, plus Cub Scouts, and playgroup.”
“I can’t afford to take 50 kids skating or bowling. And I don’t want 50 kids in my house. What about the city pool? It’s heated, open year-round, and it’s only 50¢ a kid,” Mom said.
“A swim party, that’s cool!” I said.
“I’ll say yes to the party, but no to presents. Fifty presents are too much for one eight-year-old. It’s decadent.”
“What’s decadent?” I asked. Mom used words I didn’t know.
“Self-indulgent, corrupt.”
I sat silently and thought I’d be sad with no presents. Then I remembered Angus. Mom got him for me as an early birthday present. We were on a waiting list for two years with Guide Dogs of the Desert. He was being trained as a companion dog for people who couldn’t see. We got him because he had poor hips and couldn’t be a working dog. Angus was big, yellow, and I loved him. We shared the same birthday.
“I have a great idea!”
“What?” Mom asked, glancing at me in her rearview mirror.
“I’ll ask for money for Guide Dogs of the Desert.”
“Ah?” Mom made a weird swallowing noise.
“It’s Angus’s birthday, too.”
Angus
In the rearview mirror I watched Mom dab at the corner of her eyes with a tissue, and nod her head in agreement.
Two weeks later, I had a great birthday. Fifty kids came with bathing suits, towels and money. Instead of opening presents after cake, we counted dollars they had stuffed into a large licorice jar decorated with photos of Angus.
Together, we raised more than $1,600 for Guide Dogs. Mom called me a “philanthropist” – whatever that is.
This is the private road through the woods to our riverfront property. We ran across this obstacle on our journey.
My aunt and I made the trek to Robe Valley where our family has owned property along the Stillaguamish River since the crash of ’29. Our mission was to spread my mother’s ashes in a place of beauty that she loved.
At dinner the night before at my brother’s home, we celebrated mom’s life. I was surrounded with love from my brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephew, spouses and children and of course aunt.
I worried about the condition of the road to the river. Would it be too muddy? Would it be flooded? We were told we’d need a chainsaw this time of year to make it to the river.
“We don’t do chainsaws,” I said.
My aunt who turns 80 this year, nodded her head in agreement.
A new gate to our property.
Our first obstacle was a new gate. Prior to this gate, we had a chain across our road. Fortunately, I packed the key that was mailed to me by a distant relative a few months ago. Whew! It worked!
When we stopped at the fallen branches blocking the road, I was able to push and hold them back while my aunt gunned the accelerator and drove through.
Then something surprising happened. A Great Blue Heron (not a Phoenix) rose from a low branch and flew up in front of us. The Great Blue Heron was my mom’s favorite bird. In the 80-plus years this property has been in the family, no one has seen one.
My aunt said “Mary is that you?” (Mary is my mother’s name.)
The heron kept flight directly in front of our car as we made our way down the road. Literally we were looking up and forward.
I’m reminded of Victoria’s post yesterday at Victoria Ponders with these words from her dear friend:
It was a sight or a sign. It was other worldly. I didn’t get a photo or video, but the four-foot tall bird guiding us down the road is etched in my mind.
We reached the river without further obstacles, prayed and spread my mom’s ashes along with blue hydrangea blossoms (blue was my mother’s favorite color and she loved hydrangeas.)
We left in peace knowing Mom was put to rest in one of the most beautiful places that she loved.
Where we spread ashes with snow on the riverbanks and snow capped mountains in the distance.View across the river from our property.
