“[Mom] also drove my sisters and myself crazy by folding the most personal moments of our childhood lives into her talks as further illustrations of God’s hand on us, or to make points about how to raise a family.”
-Frank Schaeffer, Crazy for God
When I read this, a tinge of worry hit me wondering if I might hear a similar thing one day. Things like, “mom, how could you? That’s so embarrassing,” echoed through my head. And although I started this blog as a way to record these swiftly passing years, realizing that these funny moments, questions, and exploratory days are evolving faster into blurred memories than I care to admit, I also recognize that at least at this point, what I write and how I write my kids will be how they, not just I, remember their early selves. I hope that these written encouters will somehow give my kids privy to who they really are, long after the rest of the world has bombarded them with all that they’re “supposed to be.”
Easy for anyone to see, our life is far from a prime time reality show or some other limelight family, so rather than using this space to piously display ourselves as models of how things/children/home/parents ought to be, I offer these public glimpses into our home in effort to authentically share the good and bad alike. Of course, the good is always more palatable for the ego. I imagine that Liam will laugh one day to read about recently questioning me, “Mom, is the penis the leader of the private parts?” Or at some point hearing Burke’s full body chuckle when he reads about approaching me and Mark separately (before we found out we were pregnant) to ask if we could trade Blythe in for a new baby because “this girl scratches and bites.”
But maybe they won’t. Maybe in some unintentional way on my part, they will feel exposed, exploited, or embarrassed. If that’s the case, let me take note here to tell them, “I’m sorry.” (It’s not the first time, and I’m sure it won’t be the last.) But, knowing each of your love for laughter and stories now, I’m anticipating laughter.
Comments
thanks guys. I really appreciate you both (and your “other”) in our lives.
b – have i told you recently how much i love the bethany douglassian paragraphs? i would crunch up these words and serve them over ice cream. dang goodness, lady: keep the good stuff coming.
and, for what it’s worth, i think you do a superb and hilarious job recording the antics of your three extraordinarily funny little people. i’ve met a lot of kids in my days – i have never met three kids who need to be so diligentally carved in stone on a daily basis. they’ll thank you one day. surely, they will.
The key is your apology now. When they are old enough to be embarassed it won’t help, but then in a few years, they will acknowledge it. Also, what a great legacy for them and their children. I know that right now it seems they will never be grown up, but before you know it, poof, they are gone. Keep writing the wonderful things they say, I just wish I had a record of some of my boys’ “great lines”. You and Mark are doing an awesome job. Love you.
Steph – I wish I were in Oregon right now.
Patti – You should read the book, especially knowing that there’s nothing that Frank could say to dissuade you from the amazing Schaeffer couple. Frank certainly has some mother issues though. I don’t want to say too much, but although approaching it in an abrupt and awkward manner, it seems that Frank is trying to redeem and reveal some wonderful things about his parents (father in particular) and who they really were. It seems that Frank may have felt some responsibility for decisions he encouraged his father to make toward the end of his (father’s) career. Decisions that ultimately altered Frances’ image and maybe detracted from he really was and devalued things he ultimately valued. (The ambiguity is intentional.) While he makes no apology toward some of the religious zealots he slanders, the book as a whole felt very redemptive, tender, and . . . apologetic. That’s a brilliant point about Frank actually participating in the very things he despised about his parents. And thanks for the encouragement about Mark’s book. He’ll really appreciate that.
Your earlier post about Crazy for God made me wonder if I’d been too harsh on Frank S. when I had criticized him in a blog post when the book first came out. I have an immediate bias against nonfamous kids who profit by writing books about their famous parents under the auspices of letting the adoring masses in on the secret that their parents were actually all too human. The thing is, if Frank felt embarrassed by his mom’s anecdotes or (as I read in an interview in a magazine years ago) when his parents and their friends would sing songs about Jesus while sitting around a coffee shop table in Huemoz, isn’t it a little ironic that he has no qualms about writing embarrassing things about THEM now? (posthumously in his dad’s case–I thought his mom was still alive.) And what was his real purpose in writing the book? I suppose I need to read it before I make any more accusations but I’d honestly rather read the first person account of the Rwandan genocide that I just read about. Or one of his dad’s books. Or P.G. Wodehouse because he makes me laugh, and I need a break after the long recent trudge of Tess of the D’Urbervilles.
I do always ask myself as I write about my kids if I am dishonoring them in any way in order to be funny. I too, however, have made the blog my default journal/baby book for them (I went to find the journal I’ve tried to keep for Hudson yesterday to write some things down and it seems to have disappeared) and want to make sure I remember these days.
I do love the candor of your blog. And I can’t imagine that your kids won’t delight in it someday too. Though if Mark gets famous after the book is published, look out.
Man, am I thankful that I have a gorgeous Oregon summer right now. By the way, I have started a blog of my own, but who knows how much i’ll actually update it. Here is the link: thisisnotatext.wordpress.com