Every Mother's Wish

 



Before being a mother, I thought that my greatest wish for my child would be for them to become someone who serves.

Not just at a fast food joint, but really helps others.

Now I really find myself wishing he was the type to brush his teeth morning and night and go above and beyond by flossing.

Wouldn't that be awesome????????????

If he flossed morning and night that would be even more awesom-er!!!!


I mean, I don't even do that and every time I ask J:

"Hey, did ya brush your teeth like I asked?"

I also make him do a breath test.  I am down to the nitty-gritty, Reader. I want clean teeth-

Forget helping people carry their groceries inside, put them away, and start dinner before he heads off to Scouts!

Who cares if he learns to dust first and vacuum after! That mouth better sparkle when he opens it to ask if he can go hang out with his friends.



Oh, and I want him to read and do extra credit nightly while I am wishing on my stars.

kidding, Readers. HOWEVER!

If any of you out there have wee ones that brush their teeth without a reminder, I am so jealous.

I really actually do want him to have more than proper hygiene etiquette.
Serving actually was and is what I hope J learns in the long run.

 Who doesn't like to be served? It feels great. It's a relief.

(My Lone Star in Royal Blue that I lassoed into a rope wreath some time over Christmas... )



It's like when you come home- from where it is that you go when you are a kid and your mom walks over from the stove, carrying a plate full of food, like corn on the cob and mashed potatoes next to soft, tender roast beef. (This is an actual account of what happened to me the other day- minus the corn on the cob cause it is out of season and I can't digest it, and I was actually in bed when she handed me the plate.)

Being served unexpectedly or in a surprise manner always is humbling. These days good customer service is surprising. A lot of businesses are needing to cut back due to the economy and it stretches the employee.

That isn't the case everywhere but it is possible, if I put my computer down for a minute, to watch a person and tell if they are really stressed out.  If they are falling asleep during a conversation- that can be a dead give away.

(I wish the sweater next to this star was my size! Just for toddlers. Dang it. )



The other day J. was looking at what it was he wanted to do and he gathered how much it would cost using the skills of adding and subtracting he has learned at school.

This very useful skill helped him realize that he is going to have to get creative or earn more.

"I don't need a job, Mom. I need a career!" 



(he got to implement this..... and Go Pro helped me see the vistas in such clarity.... pink and blue hues. It was amazing. Thank you, Go-Pro.

he bemoaned one night after researching the internet and watching Red Bull's something something about dirt bike riders competing in foreign lands and then bikers riding down the Arches in Utah.

After assessing the prices on some gear I gave him a good pat on the back and said:


"You are correct, my boy!"

 

 

Thank you, teachers!

For teaching Jaden the basics and that if he is going to get to do what he wants in this world, he is going to have to do more then add and subtract!

This will be tough! Especially at 11!

In this day and age you have to stand out from the rest of the herd if you are going to get noticed. Riding down the arches,  then riding in an ambulance to a place where they can help quadriplegics is one way.





Another is to serve someone.

Really find out what they need and get it to them. Delivering can be hard. Especially if you are sick. You may know exactly what they need- you just can't get to them! That's what I hate.

Which initially is probably going to mean you don't make anything. Taking time for people is the LAST thing we have time for  it seems. Doesn't it?

Back to the basic job for an 11 year old. Or something an invalid can do. It's pretty tough to acquire the ability to sense needs and then deliver.
Especially as a kid.
Or an invalid.
One state, of being young, is that you are in a process of growing and you think everyone is watching you on stage.

The other, being disabled, you are already grown and possibly still growing outward, and you have put yourself on the stage by yourself, or by default your disease has helped you there, and so others can't help but watch the show. I guess the second thing you need to learn after flossing and serving, is how to entertain.



 Being able to discern and communicate is tougher now more than ever despite having devices that make everything as close as the next flu bug flying around!

For example. Padre could flip flop downstairs, put his laundry in the laundry room ( remember, reader, he puts them in the bins labeled specifically for him? I guess so we don't mix ours with his, then commence his ritual of entering the bathroom and finding what we had left when we'd taken our showers.

Using the intercom off the phone in there he would dial up where he thought we were or just do a blanket intercom:

"Ya know. I like a clean bath mat. I have bought my own bath mats and I come in here and find water on the floor, a bathmat wadded up and slung over the bar to dry...."

(He and J. didn't know that I had created a new system for the bath mats. Padre's in one labeled with his name and ours in another. Quite straight forward. But it can be hard when you are singing in the the shower. )

Boy! I miss those days! I had taught J. the post shower walk through before Papa got home and then he just learned to shower afterward.

Having surgery has really put Padre down and out.

He has had to not use his arm- at all. However, he has tried a couple times to do some things, like make ice, after putting a bunch into his mug and chop it up. What can we say? He loves ice!!!!!

(Kurt's, Barely Frozen)



Madre gave him a talking to! And he obeyed! back to finding that job......

Now days we can quickly communicate, that we can't understand, how to help a person in real time.
Heck, an event will be going on in our lives and I am thinking of words and sentences and
I find myself blogging about the event in my head before the scenario is even over. Or scribbling on a piece of paper some brilliant story only to find useless jargon the next day.

(I did that with my journal before I blogged, so maybe it is just an extension of writing on a regular basis and not just my attempt to contstruct a clever sentence.)

 



* sorry, I love this star and the cowboy, rustic look of the wood in J's window. This star stands out among all the rest! WOW! There are so many that are cool and cute but this one will grab your attention. The royal blue is amazing.

back to how you get a job in this day and age and the secret to how ya do that.....


I've gotten a lot of help being in my situation; ever changing struggles that pop up- much like chicken pox in various places all over your once perfect skin, are met with trying to figure out how to figure things out!!

I don't know how people do it! Without individuals discerning certain situation, I would be up a creek.

When I tried to go to college in the winter of 2008, it was so futile. I was pulling my book bag one day across the lone campus, the wheels bumping over the ice and snow already piling up from when some kid had bulldozed what had fallen in the last 15 seconds.

I was in a snow drift before I could get to class. My English professor was behind me and she was the one to talk straight with me. She saw my plight. Heck, I couldn't even get to class fast enough.
However, she herself had lost the use of one hand and learned to type with just one faster than most with two.

She helped me get to the next building and then she helped me see that maybe college shouldn't be in the cards right now. (note- Rexburg is the North Pole college equivalent. So maybe most people, even healthy, should re-think it a bit and just do an online course or something. )

This Christmas there were a couple things that were not right with some orders and the other day I got some compensation. The best part was it was a hand written note from the guy who had been working with me.

He didn't just say sorry, but it appeared he looked into my blog, and I appreciated the words:

"STAY  OPTIMISTIC" .

Which was one of their patch handles.

That's service. And that helped me. I mean it REALLY helped me in that moment.

It felt real and not the same droning hum of people that are doing something repeatedly and have turned into a human Siri.

A Pharm Co. follows the carnage of their product by calling me quarterly. The same guy calls me. We could seriously be best friends after the last few years of calls. Maybe he has a time quota when he calls. And I am not picking on him by saying what I have to say.

He is very nice, efficient, collects the data and we get off our call and I become a statistic. Which is exactly what I don't want to be. When he called today it was difficult to talk. He asked if it would be better if he called later. Wanting to just get the medical survery over, I told him to go ahead.

The questions aren't ones that have the personal touch like: "How are you?"  And really mean he's sorry to hear that I had to super glue one of the the many cuts on my thumb that is so sore and just continually lays open like a peeled back banana.

Nope. They are just questions that state the symptom, where, when, how much. Nothing of the "On behalf of such and such company we apologize. We are truly trying to help you by getting the best of the best to research, develop, find, do whatever, to HELP you.


To help me. 

A mother.

That's my wish.

That somewhere, some person is studying so hard (after flossing his/her teeth) to learn about why my body does what it does and to make it stop. So that I can continue to tell Jaden:

"If you don't brush your teeth the dentist will find cavities drill holes in your teeth until they fall out and then you have to wear dentures. "

-I just had a horrible thought..... what if he brushes them and then just gets them all knocked out while doing the things he loves?