I have this clip in my mind of my daughter at 2. We are at the playground and I have a video camera- this is before cell phone videos- and I am trying to take a video of her to send to my auntie, who sent the camera. And I see her through the lens and she looks at me with what we now call “small mouth”- when she purses her lips and knits her brow and narrows her eyes- and puts her hand up and says “NO! You play with me.” As she grows older, this manifests into more complex grammatically complex statements such as “You’re not the boss of me.” or, “I can do whatever I want.” We hit a real fork in the road with “J and I have decided we want to have sex.” and later in college “I’ve decided I’m going to graduate a year early so that C and I can move in together.”
Her younger brother on the other hand was sweet as could be- rarely challenging anything I said until he turned 12. And then, it wasn’t words with him, which was even harder. When he stopped doing homework, then started skipping school, but wouldn’t talk about it. When he was put on probation in high school, and everyone in the room said to him “You are such a bright and kind young man.” When he started sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night when he was 14 because a 19 year old girl was seducing him into thinking they were in love and sending him sex chats. When he told me he wasn’t going to college, but didn’t have much of another plan.
My stepdaughter came into my life when she was 12. THere’s nothing quite so challenging as trying to raise someone else’s children, or even harder, sharing that responsibility. When I started dating her dad, she would walk by me in the grocery store and turn the other way. I mean it was laughable until it wasn’t six months later. Which of course is understandable, because her mother continued to tell her that her and her father would eventually get back together again. This went on even after we married.
I met my stepson G one night when his mother called me from Europe looking for my then boyfriend G, because the police were trying to break up a party G was throwing at her house while she was away. I couldn’t find his dad and went over to diffuse the situation. He was taunting the cops to arrest him. He towered above most of them- 6’2 already at 16, and when I looked into his defiant eyes I remember thinking, I don’t think I can do this. And I meant all of it. That was before the opioids, heroin and heart failure.
Which of course, I did. I did do all of it, with all of them. And we all made it. Today, my daughter works with me and lives 10 minutes down the road. My son moved out of the house, took his 60 credits of community college accumulated over the years and enrolled at state university to do a 5 year masters in finance. Stepdaughter built their own tiny house and is in a masters program at UCSC. Yes, that changed too- I now refer to them as my stepchild. And the wildling G, whose hold on this world has always been tenuous, is 1.5 years in with his new heart. His professor told him this week that he should change his major from biotech to chemical engineering, because he has an aptitude for what is considered the hardest major.
Tonight most of us will gather with good friends and eat chili and watch the game, and root for the team that has been the underdog for 16 years, hoping for a spot in the playoffs.
— Cristine
Her younger brother on the other hand was sweet as could be- rarely challenging anything I said until he turned 12. And then, it wasn’t words with him, which was even harder. When he stopped doing homework, then started skipping school, but wouldn’t talk about it. When he was put on probation in high school, and everyone in the room said to him “You are such a bright and kind young man.” When he started sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night when he was 14 because a 19 year old girl was seducing him into thinking they were in love and sending him sex chats. When he told me he wasn’t going to college, but didn’t have much of another plan.
My stepdaughter came into my life when she was 12. THere’s nothing quite so challenging as trying to raise someone else’s children, or even harder, sharing that responsibility. When I started dating her dad, she would walk by me in the grocery store and turn the other way. I mean it was laughable until it wasn’t six months later. Which of course is understandable, because her mother continued to tell her that her and her father would eventually get back together again. This went on even after we married.
I met my stepson G one night when his mother called me from Europe looking for my then boyfriend G, because the police were trying to break up a party G was throwing at her house while she was away. I couldn’t find his dad and went over to diffuse the situation. He was taunting the cops to arrest him. He towered above most of them- 6’2 already at 16, and when I looked into his defiant eyes I remember thinking, I don’t think I can do this. And I meant all of it. That was before the opioids, heroin and heart failure.
Which of course, I did. I did do all of it, with all of them. And we all made it. Today, my daughter works with me and lives 10 minutes down the road. My son moved out of the house, took his 60 credits of community college accumulated over the years and enrolled at state university to do a 5 year masters in finance. Stepdaughter built their own tiny house and is in a masters program at UCSC. Yes, that changed too- I now refer to them as my stepchild. And the wildling G, whose hold on this world has always been tenuous, is 1.5 years in with his new heart. His professor told him this week that he should change his major from biotech to chemical engineering, because he has an aptitude for what is considered the hardest major.
Tonight most of us will gather with good friends and eat chili and watch the game, and root for the team that has been the underdog for 16 years, hoping for a spot in the playoffs.
— Cristine
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