My attempts at swaying the universe with my willpower are spotty at best. Sometimes in our household you might hear Sarah grunting and groaning as she pretends to be Gerald the Elephant trying to dance, Daddy Pig mowing the lawn, a school teacher carrying a crocodile head for a costume, or Circle With A Line Through It giving birth. You will not hear me grunting and groaning in quite the same way, but I assure you I feel like all of those various characters who are trrrrryyyyyiiiinnngg and trryyyyiiiinnngg. My nearest and dearest do get an earful of my ranting, raving, stressing, and worrying about many things. One of the things I am trying to do is perhaps out of the scope of my responsibility, and yet I feel like it is my job. It is my job to get my amazon book review number to 50 (and I should have gotten there yesterday), because that is the magic number to help one’s book get noticed. I am embarrassed by how often I check the number of reviews that have come through. I am embarrassed about how stressed I am about this in a low-level (or not so low-level) way. Of course it is out of my control, and yet, I can keep asking people for reviews, so it isn’t entirely out of my control. But how often to ask? Do I send out mass requests or personal ones? How can I tell if someone wrote one and it just hasn’t showed up or if they show up as Amazon Reviewer? Did I lose a review? because I swear there used to be one by Discerning Reader and that is nowhere to be found. I feel like I should just be able to let this go, but I see other authors published by the same publisher getting more reviews and I think I must be doing something wrong. Yet, it was only a few years ago that I learned how important reviews are, so I’m sure not everyone thinks about it. Most of us have a million books we want to read and we can’t read and review them all at once. Still, I am embarrassed by how much this has taken over my attention. I share it in case anyone can relate to a seemingly small thing taking over your experience or to not being able to control the world. (Also, if you have written a review, thank you a zillion times over.)
On Monday Amy and I drove home from Philly in time for me to take Sarah to her piano lesson and then go to the art show for the afterschool art class that Amy has been taking. Last year the show coincided with Sarah’s school musical so I couldn’t go to Amy’s show (I was Sarah’s personal helper). This year I was thrilled that I could be there, so I was less than thrilled when Sarah had a screaming meltdown just before the art presentations began. I followed Sarah outside, with harsh accusations and complaints issuing from my lips. I was so embarrassed that her screams were probably echoing inside for all to hear, and I was so upset that she was ruining Amy’s moment (from my perspective). Luckily a friend recorded what Amy said so I was still able to hear it. Carl and I traded places so I could go see Amy’s art pieces, and the evening ended well enough. It took a long time for my bad-mom-guilt hangover to abate. I felt bad for not being there for Amy’s moment, for not controlling the situation better somehow, and for being unkind towards Sarah.
On Wednesday Amy was home with a tummy bug which included a visit to the after-hours clinic at the hospital. When Amy woke from an afternoon nap, her vision was blurry for a couple of minutes. When I called the pediatrician they advised taking her to the clinic, so off we went. Sarah is usually content to go along for such things as she likes hospitals and she gets extra time to look at pictures of Granddad on my phone. All was fine, until it wasn’t. Just as Monday’s upset seemed to come with no warning, so too did Sarah’s Wednesday storm go from zero to a hundred in a nanosecond. In the exam room, while Amy waited for the anti-nausea meds to work so she could try eating and drinking, Sarah was prone and screaming when she wasn’t taking off her shoes to throw them or trying to run out of the room. The doctors and nurses came to see if everything was ok and seemed totally unphased when I explained it was an autism meltdown. They also said it was ok to leave before Amy had eaten if she felt like she was on the mend a bit. I wasn’t as tense a mom as I was on Monday, but I still wasn’t my ideal self.
I have been feeling guilty for Amy’s growing up experience being one that witnesses a mom and sister who get in screaming matches, one that witnesses a mom who is often stressed, and one that means she often gets the short end of the stick with regard to attention because she is the more flexible one who isn’t screaming. I know there is more for me to work on to clear my own issues so I don’t get so upset, stressed, and rattled, but I also feel mad at the global expectation that as soon as people become parents they should be the calmest, most mature beings who have figured all of life out. I am still just a person and quite fallible at that. As you can tell, I’m having a bit of a hard time.
On the plus side, Amy’s art show was wonderful. She focused on portraying people wearing different kinds of braces for scoliosis, and she spoke confidently and eloquently. She has come so far in being able to talk about her art without feeling so nervous that she is at a loss for words. She was also in her school talent show on Friday, and her gymnastics routine was graceful and impressive, including a one-handed cartwheel and splits, all while wearing her Whisper brace. If you didn’t know she was nervous because she told you, you wouldn’t have been able to tell by watching her.
Yesterday Carl got out his guitar, and Sarah ran to get hers. They played and sang together as Carl taught her some chords. Perhaps as Sarah and I move through our synchronized periods, our discord will shift and we will return to our more usual alignment. Last weekend was a big weekend for both of us with her retreat and my trip to see family and do a book event. Both of those things were so good, and yet they probably gave us things to process that might not have been visible until they collided with each other in the most opportune of moments.
If you figure out how to bend the universe to your will, please let me know.
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