You Are 55% Normal |
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While some of your behavior is quite normal…
Other things you do are downright strange
You’ve got a little of your freak going on
But you mostly keep your weirdness to yourself
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A few years ago — around the time when I started to “get a little of my freak going on” — a mommy-friend of mine gave me a gift. Nothing fancy — it was a refridgerator magnet – just a small token in friendship engraved with eight simple words:
“Normal is a setting on the washing machine.”
But, as anyone who truly knows me will understand, her simple gesture had a huge impact on me for several reasons — one of which was that it was given to me at a time in my life when I started to feel as if I was losing control of everyone and everything that I ever loved – but, more importantly, I finally began to understand that perhaps it was okay NOT to feel…so okay…all the time.
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Afterall, I grew up in a family that had some of the weirdest shit going on, one person’s normal is perhaps another person’s…well…let’s just say that, even though I felt as if other kids’ troubles were nothing compared to the bizarre behaviour being accepted in my house…it would be ludicrous for me to even consider questioning the difference.
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So, I learned at a very young age to just…go with the flow…and I quickly established my rank in the adult world as simply being, “an enigma.”
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Frankly, it was very easy for me and — because I didn’t have to try very hard – I enjoyed the lightness of being a free spirit.
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Then I started having children and then all bets were off.
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Though I truly loved being a mom and believed that I was pretty-gosh-darned good at it, then BAM! — I quickly found myself thrown back into a world filled with confusion and chaos — and there I went again, dedicating nearly all of my time to making things better, and thinking that I was the biggest shithead on the planet, because surely I was the only one losing control, yes?!?
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Then came the magnet.
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And now — like, spending the last two days in the emergency room and next to my mother’s hospital bed — I don’t worry about my husband taking time off from work to take care of our kids, while I spend the night taking care of my father, or worrying about other people thinking I’m nuts for spending my weekends running my kids back and forth to their grandparent’s house, and still be able to keep such a crazy schedule.
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It’s what I know — and you gotta to be able to do, what you gotta do – you know.
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And it was pretty much my wake-up-call to being able to accept myself…first…before I can even begin to understand others (namely my family) and the crazy shit some people can do.
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Like, why the frig is my mother cooking soup for us — right this friggin’ minute — only having been discharged from the hospital…what?
[checks watch]
Like, an hour ago?
[glances at refridgerator and sighs heavily]
Well, I guess she’s just crazy like that — and it’s the only way we know how to keep sane!
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Comments
8 responses to “Eight Simple Words For Understanding Your Crazy Mother”
Because its normal for her, and all any of us want are little pieces of “our” normal. Normal is a relative term, unlike the fact that society is always trying to tell us the opposite. Normal for your mom is cooking soup for her family. She couldn’t do it in her hospital bed, but now I bet it makes her happy.
Happy Sunday Elizabeth
Because its normal for her, and all any of us want are little pieces of “our” normal. Normal is a relative term, unlike the fact that society is always trying to tell us the opposite. Normal for your mom is cooking soup for her family. She couldn’t do it in her hospital bed, but now I bet it makes her happy.
Happy Sunday Elizabeth
{{{hugs}}} Glad to read that Mom is doing better. You’ve GOT to call me when you guys are headed down this way! Hey – when do the kidlets have spring break?
{{{hugs}}} Glad to read that Mom is doing better. You’ve GOT to call me when you guys are headed down this way! Hey – when do the kidlets have spring break?
Glad your mom is feeling well enough to cook soup! My mother wanted to stop at the grocery on the way home from knee surgery. 😉 Everyone’s definition of “normal” is different. Ya just gotta go with the flow and be happy in the midst of the undertows and currents. Hope your Tuesday is better! 🙂
Glad your mom is feeling well enough to cook soup! My mother wanted to stop at the grocery on the way home from knee surgery. 😉 Everyone’s definition of “normal” is different. Ya just gotta go with the flow and be happy in the midst of the undertows and currents. Hope your Tuesday is better! 🙂
I think I need to get me one of those magnets!
Meanwhile, {{}} for Mom & Dad.
I think I need to get me one of those magnets!
Meanwhile, {{}} for Mom & Dad.