Mom in the Mirror

The crossing

I've always found it endearing that Colter crosses his legs when he sits in a chair (my cat crossing his paws may be as cute). Sometimes Colter crosses his legs "Indian-style," but more often he crosses them the way many women do. I find it particularly adorable because he didn't learn it from me. I often perch my feet, side by side, on the bottom rung of the chair; sometimes I cross my ankles. Or, I put my feet on the bottom rung of Colter's chair, next to me at the dining room table. It's rare that I sit with my legs crossed. Although, occasionally I do a weird manuever where I cross one leg under me along the chair's surface and throw the other leg on top, facing in the opposite direction. Maybe it's a subconscious yoga move.

Do you cross your legs when you sit?

I'm not a "raindrops on roses" kind of girl, but...

I was on my way to work yesterday morning and realized I was driving toward a rainbow. This wasn't a technicolor movie rainbow, this was a translucent arc of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet like my son draws. As I headed toward it, I realized it was a clear day, after much recent rain here -- inside and out. It didn't matter to me what was at the end of that rainbow, just seeing it, following it was enough.

Right up there with real rainbows, one of my favorite things is opening a fresh jar of peanut butter. I can't explain the effect, but just one whiff fills my nose with sweetness and my soul with calm. For dinner last night, Gary made matzo ball soup and peanut butter sandwiches on fresh, mushy white bread. How lucky am I?

What are your favorite things?

There's no place like home

As a kid, I never wanted to go away to camp or even to sleep over at someone else's house. As scary as my childhood sometimes was, there was also something safe about being home.

Once my parents divorced and my dad remarried, that feeling intensified. And much to my father's dismay, I preferred to spend evenings and weekends on the couch watching TV with him or in my room reading a book. I had no desire to be out with friends constantly.

As I grew older, my home became even more sacred to me, and socializing was something I did a few times a week.

Once Colter was born, I found that I needed to run around more during my free time. There were errands I couldn't do during the day, so much more shopping we needed done, and his activities to consider.

And as I got busier and had less time at home, I resisted his impulse to stay put. I felt like it was my responsibility to take him to the park, the museum, even the movies. But he can be unmoveable and I didn't understand why.

It finally occurred to me this weekend: we're a family of homebodies. And that's OK.

Are you a homebody?

What is a parent? What is a family?

A story in The New York Times this weekend made me think about what makes someone a parent and what makes a group of people a family.

The story was about a woman who donated her eggs so they could be combined with an anonymous donor's sperm in vitro, then implanted in her female partner's uterus.

The two women eventually split, leaving the egg donor with no legal rights as a parent, even though she and her partner had together raised the twins for almost six years.

Here are some interesting statements made in the article:

...In this age of conceptions ... using egg donors, sperm donors, embryo donors, surrogates, even posthumous sperm -- defining parenthood has become dizzyingly complex. ...

"...genetics and parenthood are different issues." ...

Typically, ... only one partner is the biological (or adoptive) parent; the other relies on the evolving notion of "psychological parenthood."

Certainly, mere biology does not make someone a parent. And the opposite is also true: someone can be a wonderful parent in the absence of a biological tie. So, what makes someone a parent? What makes someone a psychological parent? And what does that mean about the nature of families, their evolution and dissolution?

I'm a little teapot

Just before I turned 16 years old, someone decided I liked unicorns, and I didn't object, so that birthday I had a unicorn cake, unicorn gifts, unicorn everything. After many years, I have finally shed most of that unintentional collection. The only thing I have collected on purpose (other than books, bookmarks, and pens) is teapots.

Colter has collected trains, dinosaurs, Pokemon and Yu-gi-Oh cards, and Bionicles.

What do your kids collect? What do you collect?

Conversation interruptus

My husband and I have not had an uninterrupted conversation since 1996, when our son was born.

We've had some long talks late at night, but most of those end with one of us snoring or saying to the other indignantly, "Are you falling asleep?"

Anyone who lives in a house with a child knows that conversation interruptus is more common than an ear infection, and nearly as painful.

But even before we had a child, my husband had trouble completing a sentence -- let alone a series of them -- during a conversation with me. I have a genetic predisposition to interrupt.

Discussion: Are you more likely to interrupt others while they're talking or be interrupted by others?

My parents interrupted me. Their parents interrupted them. I'm pretty sure if you follow our family tree all the way back, you'll find that my foremother, Eve, actually interrupted God before he fully explained about the apple. (Ignorance is no defense, of course.)

In my family it was a compliment if someone interrupted you. It meant they understood. If they could complete your sentence it meant they could complete your thought. They somehow completed you.

So it's often been an early sign of friendship to me when a new acquaintance can find the words I mean and voice them before I do.

I like when speech overlaps during conversations. When one person's beginning flows into another's ending, the rhythm feels right to me. It feels natural.

Clearly, this is not true for everyone.

My husband forgets what he is going to say if I interrupt. And our son forgets what he is going to say if he doesn't interrupt.

Of course, we're not the only family with this dinnertime dilemma.

Two researchers studied "dinnertime narratives" and tabulated the results by categories of conversational etiquette, including total talking time, turn-taking violations, and supportive interjections (like "uh-huh" or "go on"). Good thing they didn't visit my house.

I've been conducting my own, less systematic, study of the subject and have discovered that other families consider it rude to interrupt, presumptuous to think you might know what someone is going to say, arrogant even.

In fact, sociologists Candace West and Donald Zimmerman say that "interrupting is a way of exercising power."

A leading conversation expert, Deborah Tannen, says that interrupting shows a lack of interest or support and an effort to take control away from the speaker.

In other cultures, interrupting is polite, even though "people of Northern European or American extract might mistake this kind of conversation for argument and hostility."

I understand. I spent several of my formative professional years in a TV newsroom, where the only conversational rule seemed to be: She who yells the loudest gets the floor.

Since leaving the newsroom, I've been adjusting to a whole new set of conversational rules.

Though I still sometimes succumb to the temptation to interrupt, I'm better at tempering my tendency to speak my mind before others have finished speaking theirs. I'm learning to curb my enthusiasm for my own thoughts and show a healthy interest in others' -- sometimes more important -- thoughts. I've come to value silence.

In addition to showing respect, this change has reminded me that I don't know everything that's going to be said or done before it is. Life is full of surprises, if you let it be.

I'm finding that if I let life unfold, and go with the flow, it carries me along, without interruption.

This LifeFiles column originally appeared on about 70 TV station websites managed by Internet Broadcasting Systems.

How did you learn about sex?

I remember being 4 or 5 when my mother read me the book, "Where did I come from?" to teach me about reproduction.

I looked at it a few years ago when Colter started showing interest in his own body, but decided to get him something else instead. Together, we read "What's the big secret?"

The book is by Marc Brown, who created "Arthur," and his wife, who is an educator. It is part of their series "Dino Guides to Family Life," which also includes books on death and friendship that we've read.

What I like about "What's the big secret?" is that it covers a wide range of topics, some of which we could skip and return to when Colter's older.

So, he's understood for years the mechanics of how babies are made. What I wonder now is how in the world I'm going to help him learn about relationships when I'm still learning so much.

How did you teach your kids about sex and relationships? How did you learn?

The 5 stages of planning

You've heard the expression, "Man plans, God laughs," right?

I'm a devoted planner nevertheless, and have come up with what I think are the five stages I go through when trying to tackle a project.

1. Optimism


2. Collaboration (sometimes used as procrastination)


3. Decision (or indecision)


4. Action (or inaction)


5. Frustration (also known as panic)

Am I missing a stage? Are you a planner?

Thank you, Mrs. Schick

Colter just received his teacher assignment and school supply list for 2nd grade, which begins two weeks from today. (I can't wait to go shopping for school supplies!) I hope he has a teacher like Mrs. Schick, one of my grade-school teachers at Bay Harbor Elementary. She asked us to keep a journal, and I've done so ever since. Thank you, Mrs. Schick, wherever you are.

What teachers do you remember fondly?

I hear you knocking but you can't come in

We were visiting some friends at their house today when I realized -- after a long, satisfying adult conversation -- that I hadn't seen my son in about 30 minutes. I wandered around a bit, went upstairs, then spied a closed door I was pretty sure led to the room of the 9-year-old boy of the house.

I paused, debated, then knocked on the door.

Colter opened it a crack. "You can't come in," he said. The boy whose room it was said, "She can come in." So, they let me in and showed me this incredibly offensive website they were viewing. I told them it was wrong to talk about people the way the website did, even if it seemed funny. The boy who lived there quickly appeased me and showed me another website he liked, which had a picture of Sesame Street characters holding guns, knives, and other weapons. When I wasn't satisfied with that one, he hugged me.

I asked Colter to come downstairs.

And remembered why (a) he has no computer in his room (b) I never knock on his bedroom door before entering. The element of surprise is my friend. But I wonder when I will grant him the privacy he probably deserves.

Do you enter your child's room without knocking? At what age did/will this change?