Off Our Rockers

Today is such an off day for us. Well, perhaps not for Atch, who usually runs perfectly well on autopilot. We slept late, we woke up late, and we had to leave a dawdling Woog who was clearly not in sync with the day's schedule.

Poor Woog was designated to take a jeep to school. When I left him to say goodbye, he was querulously allowing his yaya to give him a quick bath and complaining he had soap in his eyes.

What slaves we are to the schedules we've set for ourselves. What makes it even worse is that we're practically forcing our children to conform to the program.

So what if our son wakes up needing a hug and some cuddle time for a nightmare he must have had. We're off schedule. So what if he whines for some attention while half awake, he struggles with his clothes. We're running late. So what, if near tears, he rushes down to the breakfast table trying to keep up with us. So sorry son, we're off, you go and take public transport to school. Serves you right for being such a slowpoke.

I was quiet on the drive to the office. It was head-bashing-against-the-dashboard time. Couldn't we have at least given him some time to wake up, hugged him and said his morning prayers with him? Nooooo, we had to rush, work was waiting. Onwards to those great hallowed edifices of steel and stone - the great dictating force in our lives.

Couldn't one of us have listened about his nightmare and commiserated with the pounding in his heart and the ringing in his ears? What a time-waster. Instead, we had left him raw and vulnerable to face the day without the armor of our loving support to draw around himself.

At some point, a clueless Atch commented on Woog being such a whiner. Already heavy-hearted from guilt, I lit on him, all hellfire and brimstone.

We're there, but we're not there, I bitched. We spend less than three hours a day with him, and instead of really sitting down and listening to him, we rush him through homework and bath time and bed time. We make a pretense of communicating with him, but what we actually do is lecture him on what he must do and what he must not do. No wonder he craves our attention.

But then, I argued, contradicting myself, if we take all this time to be there for him, we'd go off schedule. That's the thing, see, Atch? We have to strike a balance somehow.

We need to take the time to celebrate him, his being a kid, his being unique: warts and scabs and all. What we don't need is to leave him feeling rushed and somehow incomplete, without building his self-esteem, or letting him know that he is a priority for us and that we truly love to be with him.

I was near tears and near the office when I finally finished my diatribe. Atch was quiet, thoughtful. Commendable of him, quipped my peevish inner dialogue. Even if his silence merely meant he was trying to avoid a fight with me so early in the working day. What valor is there in arguing with a very pregnant and very emotionally distraught woman, after all.

Later, I am going to sit down with Atch and lay down a concrete plan. We need to save us from ourselves and this harried lifestyle we have imposed on our son. We need to allow him to be himself and to let him know that he's wonderful, brilliant, creative, compassionate and marvelous.

We have to. It's imperative. After all, we hold his heart in our hands.

06/30/06