Belle Needs a Bath

I need a bath. Not that I really smell bad or anything. I just need to go out and I don't like to go unless I'm daisy fresh. I need to go shopping - not exactly what I really want to do but I suppose I will be a wonderful mother and take my daughter shopping so she can find something for her father for Father's Day. There is also a bathing suit she wants (Lord help me) and I thought perhaps we could celebrate my first paycheck by purchasing it. And then of course there is pesky Father's Day to deal with - and I have no flippin' idea what to do for him... neither does daughter. It's a pretty sad state of affairs, the fact we don't know anything about him on which to base buying a gift. Gifts should be reflections of that person, I think, something that they like, or enjoy. I have no idea what he likes or enjoys... I don't even know what kind of food he eats these days. Everything I once knew about him no longer applies. I asked the kids what they thought and all they knew were beer and tobacco products and his local bar hangout. Not a lot to base a gift on...

I really couldn't care less whether or not the ex has a gift, but that's not the point - the point is teaching my daughter to look outside herself... which she does pretty well for the most part. She doesn't feel a connection to him though. She was three when all this started with him, and now she's almost fourteen - that's a long time to neglect a relationship, a long time to let it atrophy. It was a hard, hard thing to let go of - that desperation to "fix" it. I tried for years, that is I tried to keep a connection of sorts between the two of them. I made him look like something other than who he was, I made excuses for him, I put on a brave face. In the end he resented it I think. I guess that makes sense to me, the resentment - oh, definitely misplaced I think, but in the grand scheme it makes sense. I was trying to protect them, I guess from the knowledge he was less than involved, less than plugged into them - us - than he should have been... but who am I to say what should have been?

And I get that now. He had to rise and fall on his own merits, so to speak. When I stopped trying to juggle the balls, when it all fell to the ground, I stepped back and let it go. It was a painful thing, not because of me, but because I had to stand back and watch the kids struggle - I had to watch their pain and accept I had no power to make it go away. And anyone who is a parent knows how that feels. There isn't much we won't do for them. Yeah, we weigh indulgence with lessons - we don't necessarily give them all they want even if we're capable of doing so. We know that creates monsters - selfish adults with a sick idea that the world owes them something. So we balance it all. But when you watch your child in pain, watch your child struggle with the pain, the hurt, the loss... it tears you up, it creates a feeling inside - a feeling of, gee, how to describe it? Frustration? Anger? Rage? An instinct kicks in, and animalistic sense to protect.

And this pain, this hurt my children were feeling, experiencing, it wasn't just life - ya know? It wasn't that a friend let them down, or they lost a competition, or failed a test. Their father hurt them, their father abandoned them, their father rejected them. And there is a difference. Lots of couples divorce. Lots of couples go their separate ways, but they don't walk away from their children. Conversely I also know my children aren't unique. There are parents out there - mothers and fathers - who walk out doors and don't look back. Mothers and fathers who have sporadic interaction with their children, a limited knowledge of who their children are. And you could say there are intact families where that situation exists also - I'm not discounting any of that. All I know is my experience... and I watched my children in pain. And right or wrong I still carry that image in me -

So - not exactly what I had planned on writing but I guess it's what I've been thinking about somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind. Guess I should go shower now, huh?