Category: Middle Sister

The Enforcer

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Middle Sister decided today that she is giving up her hair straightener for the rest of Lent.

Good for her hair, although not for her mood. She hates that she has wavy hair that doesn’t always behave as she wants it to.

But she handed me her straightener just now with the instructions that I am to hide it from her and not tell her where it is no matter how much she begs.

In other words, I have to be The Enforcer for her Lenten penance. I’m less than thrilled over this, because it’s not teaching her much self-control if I have to be the one to keep saying she can’t have what she wants. Plus, I have to be the Bad Guy, which I do enough of already, enforcing my own rules–never mind the ones she inflicts upon herself.

I’m Giving Up Basketball for Lent

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Much as I love basketball, I am relieved that, except for the upcoming (but as yet unscheduled) playoffs, Middle Sister’s season is over for the year.

Watching her basketball game was a near occasion of sin for me today. We’re supposed to avoid those things, right?

No, I wasn’t swearing. I was tempted, but I didn’t. I signed that CYO basketball agreement that said I would keep my language clean and encourage my child to do the same. Swearing wasn’t the problem.

However, the problem was holding my tongue. I did it, but it wasn’t pretty, and I wasn’t proud of the struggle I had to go through to do it. Jesus spoke about the intent being as bad as the sin itself (Matthew 5:28) and if it weren’t for the fact that my daughter was out there on that court playing her heart out, I could have easily gotten up and walked out.

No, I wasn’t yelling at the refs. Plenty of parents were–and most of those were from the other team. At one point I thought that the refs were going to kick out one kid’s dad, who wasn’t satisfied that an intentional foul was called against one of our players who had mugged his daughter, and that she had 2 shots on that technical foul. (What did he want? Should our player have been arrested for assault and battery? The kid is a 7th-grader!)

I spent an awful lot of time during that game trying to keep my mouth shut. OK, I did yell stuff like “Good defense” and “Great job” because that’s what I do when I watch basketball. I am not the coach. I am not the ref. It is not my job to tell the girls what to do, or to call the walks and fouls and back-court passes. But there were a lot of parents sitting on the bleachers today (close enough so I could hear them) who were trying to do the refs’ job.

Let me tell you, those refs don’t get paid enough for what they put up with from the sports parents.

Anyway, I was trying very hard to keep my mouth shut during that game. Because I wanted to shoot back at those parents who were yelling about my daughter who was working hard on defense, covering the player she was assigned to cover. Yeah, sometimes she covered a little too, well, physically. But there was plenty of ugly to go around on both sides. Middle Sister didn’t foul out (she had four, before the 4th quarter) and, like the rest of her team, she never gave up. Those kids fought hard right to the bitter end of this game. They lost by 15 points and the other team’s parents were still busy going on about how our team “needs to learn to play basketball” and was “too physical.” But the Mama Bear in me was struggling with whether to open my mouth and tell those other parents to stop dissing my child and her teammates, or whether to keep it charitable since I had just been to church.

I was outwardly charitable, anyway. But that was a really hollow victory. And I’m still really upset about this whole thing.

CYO basketball this week has been fairly ugly. After Thursday night’s game, as Middle Sister and I walked through the parking lot to our car, a girl from the other team mouthed “You suck” at her through her car window. Nice. Did I mention that this is a CYO league? And then today.

Middle Sister has a bad taste in her mouth after all this; she claims that this is her last season of basketball. And while I think that she’ll do well in track next year, it’s a shame that she’s leaving the sport on bad terms.

It’s only a game. Why do people have to make so much of it? Why can’t they just let the kids play, and learn, and listen to the coaches and refs? These are 7th- and 8th-graders–this is not March Madness. Get a grip, basketball parents!

By Someone’s Standards

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Years ago, before we even GOT a Target around the corner, I remember seeing someone refer to the Starbucks inside a Target as a “Stargetbucks.”

We have one of those now, right around the corner.

Today Middle Sister and her BFF wanted to go sledding, but the sleds were in the back of TheDad’s car and he had gone to help a friend with a computer problem.  So they decided to take a walk.  They just got back.

“Guess what, Mom!  Today I ordered my first-ever coffee at Starbucks,” she reported.

I asked what she got.

“Well, first I got a coffee,” she began.

“FIRST?  You had MORE THAN ONE coffee at Starbucks?”

“Yeah!  After that I got a caramel Frappuccino.  It was really good.”

I made some comment about her being unable to sleep for the next three days.

Then she remarked, “This was a pretty successful day.”

“Yeah, for Starbucks,” I replied, thinking that she had just spent $7 on coffee.

Could Be Either

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A little while ago I took Middle Sister to school for an appointment with her religion teacher regarding her upcoming Confirmation.

Just now, I noticed on her facebook page, that she had written: “conformation thing. text.”

My question is: Was that an accidental misspelling or deliberate irony?

If it had been Big Brother, I wouldn’t even have to ask. The answer would most definitely have been “b.” But with Middle Sister, you never can tell.

Impressive

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Today I chaperoned an eighth-grade trip.

My daughter’s class went on a pre-Confirmation retreat. We drove 1 1/2 hours to the retreat house (at the beach), where the students listened to a short talk by the priest who was coordinating the day. After that, they saw a prolife video that showed how babies develop in the womb–and just how soon after conception the heartbeat, brain waves and other functions have already gotten started. Mass was next, followed by lunch, a short activity on the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and then cleanup for departure.

The students were lucky to have as their retreat director Monsignor Michael Mannion, who has not only worked with Mother Theresa and been a campus minister at several universities but also has worked with Project Rachel, a group that ministers to post-abortive mothers and fathers. Msgr. Mannion and my daughter’s teacher strongly believe that it is never too early to teach children about the sanctity of life and the value of each person.

In his opening remarks to the students and later during his homily, Msgr. Mannion explained the difference between “idols” and “heroes.” Idols, he said, are people who may work very hard at what they do–but it is for their own gain. Heroes, on the other hand, work very hard so that others, rather than themselves, will benefit. He challenged this group of 30+ teenagers to strive to be heroes, rather than idols; to use the gifts of the Holy Spirit in ways that will help other people. The day closed with the famous reading about love from St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.

The day was definitely worth the long ride on an unheated school bus. I hope that the eighth-graders were inspired by Msgr. Mannion’s presentation and Mass today.

Young Cynic

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“Have a good day,” I told Middle Sister as she gathered up her school things and headed out to catch the bus.

“No chance,” she shot back.

Nothing like a little optimism with your morning coffee.

She’s nothing if not contradictory

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The same child who doesn’t think that a long-term project constitutes “homework” casually mentioned to me today:

“I’ve got to start thinking of April Fool’s Day pranks. I like to plan ahead.”

Define "Homework"

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Every day, Middle Sister comes home from school and I ask about homework. Usually she has some; not too much. She gets it done and packs it up. So, I think, it’s all good.

Today she was hunting for poster paper, an old magazine, and some glue for a “project” she had to do for one class. It was a kind of scavenger hunt–she had to cut out representations of certain terms. I told her where to find the items she needed, and she headed up to her room to turn on some music and get to work.

Three hours later, she finished her “project.” Then she complained that it had taken her three hours.

“Um, how long have you known about this assignment?” I wondered. “Did your teacher just assign this today?”

“No, she told us about it two weeks ago,” she answered.

“But every day I ask you about homework, and some days you tell me you don’t have any. You could have been working on this.”

“This wasn’t homework. This was a project!”

There when it counts

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As a mom, I worry a lot about Middle Sister. She’s 13, and has the kind of personality that will always choose adventure and risk over common sense. Often, she acts before she thinks.

But yesterday at the funeral, when Big Brother broke down as he read the second reading, Middle Sister really came through for him. She didn’t have to think about it. She just left the pew, walked up to her brother, and stood there behind him with her hand on his shoulder. And when he finished his (mercifully short) reading, she took his arm and walked back with him to their seats.

While the rest of us sat frozen in our pews wishing we could do something to help Big Brother, Middle Sister took action. She showed what she is made of.

I have never been prouder.

You won’t catch me watching this

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Middle Sister is sitting on the couch, munching on a bagel and eagerly watching “Plastic Surgery: Before and After” on the Discovery Channel. As I walked by, I heard the dramatic-voiced announcer intoning: “bandages to cover her open wounds.”

I figure that her ability to watch stuff like that while eating would serve her well in a health-care career path.

I, on the other hand, had to leave the room.