Herbie's number = "the need to be against"

My mom’s life philosophy these days is “life is choices”. She utters it snippily anytime someone else says or does something that doesn’t fit into her own scheme or makes a decision she just plain doesn’t like.

Example-- my brother and sister-in-law e-mailed my parents to let them know they would be staying in the Dominican this summer rather than joining them at the beach in NJ for the family vacation/get-together.

Example--one of her friends decides to put their house up for sale and downsize to pay an errant child’s medical and/or credit card bills rather than crack down or cut off the adult child in order to show them "tough love" or teach them responsibility.

Example-- I mention that my brother is having car troubles and the cost of repairs is going to be high—she’ll say something like “all those video games…well, life is choices”.

One day, I had just had enough. I think we were chatting online and she typed that phrase. I wrote back that for the most part I do agree with that, but there are choices we don’t get to make or things out of our control that we can’t just write off, shrug off so easily, and still have to live with and react to gracefully (*cough*...or not).

For instance, I didn’t choose to have 3 children. That is a fact. I have wrestled and struggled with this reality-I-didn’t-choose to no end. And the incredible amount of guilt with being honest with my initial feelings. Especially in light of my belief in God and that as much as I know Him I believe that He advocates life and love. Finding myself sobbing in front of my closet admitting I was experiencing an unwanted pregnancy gave me a chance to be tested, to react to a choice I didn't make, a decision I didn't want, and prove I could indeed react gracefully by looking past the end of my own nose. Now that Addi is here, I realize that she was a choice God made for me knowing I needed her constant smiles and stable, steady temperament to help me get through each teeth-grinding day encumbered by the PPD-riddled waters attempting to drown out who I really am with a little more fight to attain the joy that comes so naturally out of her. But not everything is that simple or ends so “happily ever after”.

What about PPD—I didn’t choose to have PPD. I know Dan didn't choose to marry a girl who would bear children then morph into a vicious, hapless, helpless, paranoid, glassy-eyed stranger for the ensuing year. What about my grandmother’s lymphoma? She didn’t choose that. What about our families—we don’t get to choose them. What about all the crap going on in the world--do you think people choose to be murdered, taken advantage of, victims of disaster, maimed, riddled with agonizing pain or illnesses, have their children kidnapped? Take a minute—make a list of 3 things you don’t get to choose, things that are out of your hands. I could hardly stop once I got started, but put the brakes on as it’s not a very positive vein of thought.

The only choice we have in the matter most times is how we will react to decisions made for us and circumstances that are out of our control.

And sometimes we choose things that are best for us and not maybe necessarily the best for someone else, but we’re allowed to make those choices. We're allowed to screw up and make mistakes and learn and restore what we don't do well or fail at. My mom might not like the fact that we’re not having an all-family get together this summer, but maybe my brother and sister-in-law and their kids need to stay put and be a family this summer. Maybe there’s more to the story than we will ever know, and we need to allow for those things rather than just get all miffed and turn up our noses when someone doesn’t fall into the line that we’ve drawn. I'm writing in "we" because I include myself as the number one audience member to my soapbox spiel.

Mom and I had a bit of a chuckle about our interchange a few days later, but it’s interesting to note that she’s not sharing as much of the “stuff” that’s going on in her or anyone else’s life right now.

I’m glad I was honest, I’m glad she knows I think for myself, I’m glad she knows what I think, what I feel, where I stand, and that I am not a yes-man. I can imagine that it gives her a sense of pride while at the same time breaks a little piece of her heart as well, and I know these moments of realization that my children are coming into their own will happen for me too, my time is a comin’.

Now, my dad’s current life philosophy is “it is what it is”. More on that later. Maybe...