Domestic Psychology

ice cream does not equal murder

// March 27th, 2009 // 3 Comments » // life, parenting, people, politics, TN

Several times a year and in multiple environments, I have to pull out the tired, old dinosaur statistic that murder rates go up when ice cream sales go up. Eventually, everyone will recognize that statistics are not enough. The “most single parents live in poverty” statistic ignores the fact that people with severe mental or physical health issues are far more likely to be single. Families come in all shapes and sizes. There is no “ideal” family.

If TN politicians really want to “help” children, they should not allow custody war parents to have personal lawyers. They should instead have a lawyer for each and every child and create an individualized custodial plan (ICP instead of IEP) that serves the best interest of the child. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to two or more people fighting over a human being.

FWIW – I do not recommend spending the morning researching pending legislation, especially if you are looking it up by sponsor. Waaaay too much pandering to extremists instead of helping all people. Why doesn’t HB0822 include discrimination against gender or sexual orientation? Oh, wait . . . a quick scan of the other bills answers that question. How exactly is he representing ME?

family traditions – stockings

// December 18th, 2008 // No Comments » // holidays, relatives

In our family, the adult children (my two brothers and I) give our parents stockings every Christmas morning. Every year when we were children, my brothers and I would bounce out of bed and open our stockings to pass the time while waiting for other relatives to arrive. One year when my brother and I were teenagers, we began to realize that Christmas wasn’t just about ourselves. We decided our parents should have something to look forward to every Christmas morning. From that point on, we made sure our parents had stockings on Christmas morning. There are no rules to filling their stockings. Practical, absurd and everything in between is fair game for stockings. The only rule is that it doesn’t matter where they are or who they are with, our parents have stockings on Christmas morning. The joy is not in watching them open them, it is in knowing that they get to experience what they made sure we experienced our entire childhoods.

the family vote

// November 1st, 2008 // 9 Comments » // parenting, politics, school, teenagers

I have always liked the excitement of voting on election day. It’s political junkie Christmas. This year, with the college freshman voting for the first time, it just seemed wise to be early voters. As always, we loaded up the entire family to visit the polls. “Why do we ALL have to go?” “Because it’s important.” The grandparents called and joking tried to discourage us from canceling out their votes. “The lines are HUGE. You’ll be there for hours. You should wait and vote Tuesday night after 5 pm.” They sincerely offered to watch the two youngest children while we voted. I decided that taking feral child to the polls was more for me than for him, so the children played with their grandparents while the rest of us voted. Well, Doug, Tommy and I voted while Noah looked bored and Sarah complained.

Doug asked for a demo machine that Tommy could practice on despite the fact that Tommy went into the curtain and got a lengthy lecture from me while I voted last year. “Anytime you have a question, you stop touching the machine and ask for help.” There was no practice machine and Doug was further irked when they said the machine directions were printed and taped to a table in the back of the room. I am over it, but still annoyed that high school students don’t use the machines for student body elections. I even asked the high school if a sample machine could be brought in for all the special ed students to see, but that idea was rejected. We’re beyond that now. Tommy calmly walked off and voted without any assistance.

Noah went with Doug and Sarah went with me. Sarah did her very best to play by the 15-y-o girl rulebook. She acted bored, complained a lot and argued with everything I said. I tried to distract her game and told her to work the machine for me. “Turn the knob to put the numbers in the machine.” Sarah was horrified. She tapped all over the screen, determined to prove to me that the machine couldn’t possibly be so archaic as to have an old knob instead of a cursor or touch screen. I tried to be nonchalant while mentally having a mini panic attack. “Oh no! I tried to engage my daughter in the political process and she thinks I’ve taken her to a primitive campsite where you have to rub sticks together to make fire.” She worked her way through the ballot until we reached the review screen which I always stare at and read several times. Then, she pushed the big button. I stepped away from the machine with a nervous buzz. Did I follow the directions exactly? Will this machine be one of the machines that eats votes? Sarah went right back to her ‘this is totally pointless and boring’ behavior.

We celebrated Tommy’s first vote with frozen yogurt because I’m not creative enough to come up with an appropriately symbolic way to celebrate. The next day, we found out that his peers hadn’t registered so they could vote this year. I knew their birthdays. I should have sent them voter registration cards. I wonder if things would be different if Tennessee high schools required civics classes. The high school students did have a mock election yesterday. Obama was the students’ choice. Maybe he was their parents’ choice and they were just voting whatever they’ve heard their parents say. Either way, even though the win was uncomfortably close, it’s still a good sign in this very Republican part of the country. While driving Sarah and her friend to Winter Guard practice at another high school, the friend let it slip that the sign in our yard has been a source of annoyance for another parent. I smiled quietly when the friend asked if I had early voted and Sarah answered for me. “We all went and I voted FOR my mom.”

The elementary school is having a mock election on Monday. Amy woke me up at 7 a.m. this morning asking me to help her make a sign to wave at the elementary school election. Since I had been awake past 2 a.m. fetching the high schooler from a bonfire party and packing for the middle schooler to go camping this morning, I begged for more sleep. When I came upstairs, I found a piece of poster board bigger than Amy decorated with clouds, birds and the words “Obama” and “Biden.”

democracy in the family

// August 25th, 2008 // No Comments » // kid quotes, politics

Dad: “Let’s plan this week’s menu democratically.”
Amy: “What’s that mean?”
Me: “It means we fight amongst ourselves.”

sandwiched in the car

// August 22nd, 2008 // 6 Comments » // relatives, travel

Today was spent doing what I hope will NOT become a Friday tradition, driving up to Appalachia to pick up Tommy from LMU. My companions for the day were my several decades younger than me 3-year-old and my several decades older than me father. I thought the day would be uneventful as long as I followed one rule: No discussing politics. We left the house at 11 a.m. I skipped breakfast and I’ve been told that I’m a teensy bit testy when I haven’t eaten. There might be some truth to that. Immediately, the 3-y-o tossed his toys into the backseat. It’s a fun game that is usually not a problem with siblings beside and behind him. Today, the only person not driving was the grandfather who wasn’t about to attempt crawling into the back of the van. The smallest person began to complain. “Dropped phone. Get phone. Need phone. Phone. Phone. Phone. Phone.” “Cathy, you need to get in the right lane and get ready to merge.” “I’ve got it Dad. Evan, do you see any red cars?” “Phone! Phone!” “Ignore him when he’s being bad. Go around this truck.” A rice krispy bar calmed Evan. Grandaddy got distracted by a phone call from Granny.

“So, are you still voting for S____?” “Who are you talking about Dad?” “S____. That’s Obama’s real name on his original birth certificate.” “I don’t know what you are talking about Dad.” “You don’t even know your candidate’s real name. Bwa-ha-ha.” At this point, I was visibly annoyed and that tickled my father even more than the fact that he is so politically wise. He snickered and mumbled that he got me good while I began texting Doug for Internet support. “What are you doing?” “Texting Doug a question.” “Why? Won’t it wait? What are you typing?” I couldn’t get help from Doug because my texting was too obscure and Doug didn’t have the time or patience to go on a scavenger hunt. I could actually see the nerves standing up on top of my skin. “I think this is our exit.” “This doesn’t look right Cathy. Are you sure?” “Sorry, this is wrong.” I hopped back on the Interstate as quickly as I had left it and my father got a phone call from a friend. “Yes, I’m in the car. Mmhmm. Well, I think my daughter is lost. Right. I know. Well, I’d better get off the phone or she’ll have us in the wrong state.” By this point, I had made the correct exit and was on the long, boring road which actually has areas where the speed limit is 25 mph. Do you know what 25 mph feels like with a 3-year-old in the backseat complaining because he wants to watch a different cartoon and the person beside you lecturing that it’s perfectly normal not to know how much property you own? It feels like a new level of hell.

We spent an hour getting Tommy and goofing off on the campus. While Tommy showed his grandfather his dorm room, I listened to music blasting across campus and had a small hissy on the phone with Doug. “And you know what he said then?” We finally headed out and I declared that we were making a stop for food. Against my wishes, we went inside instead of using the drive-thru. All I’ll say about the food break is that a lengthy e-mail of complaint has been sent to the franchise. My teenage son and father made sure I knew that if we had stopped at the place we have stopped every single time we have been to LMU, there wouldn’t have been any problems.

The bad fast food experience was only aggravated by a complete absence of phone signal inside the restaurant. When I hopped back in the car, I decided to take a moment and check in on the Twitter chatter. “What are you doing on the phone again?” “I’m just checking news and local stuff.” “On your phone? You need the radio. I know the talk radio schedule.” While I was trying to read Twitter, my father was fumbling with my car radio. “Where’s the AM button?” “Stop it. Don’t touch that. I don’t want the radio!” “Well, excuse me for trying to help.” My father turned into Milton and went on a long mumbling tirade while I spent all of three minutes catching up on Twitter. I finished, got back on the road and tried explaining that I had XM plugged into the radio and that he should have changed channels on the little XM box. Bad idea. I should have just let him push the buttons and search out his favorite radio show. We got home at 4 p.m. and my brain feels like mashed potatoes. Not a good feeling.

Sunday, Tommy will need a ride back to school. Granny is taking him. I’m staying home.

glitch in the matrix

// August 14th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // blogging, life

This has been one of those weeks that is so bizarre, I could write a dozen posts and not cover everything, but I can’t sit down yet. Eventually, I want to write about pencils, bike helmets, bus stops, adultery, multiple personalities, marital aids, dead cars, cigarettes, boys and tantrums. Among other things.

this is a part of life too

// March 8th, 2007 // 13 Comments » // relatives

Maedelle Hearington Evans was born May 12, 1918 in Wildersville, TN. Her mother died when she was 10 and she spent the rest of her childhood helping to raise her younger siblings. While most of her family left school early to work, she graduated from the University of Tennessee. She married Rex Evans while he was still in the Navy. She lived in California, Cuba and wherever her husband’s military career took them. Mrs. Evans was a High School home economics teacher for most of her life and an employee of the State of TN later in life. Her first grandchild was born on her birthday and she loved to tell that grandchild the story of how she proudly wrote her birthday present’s name on the chalkboard for all her students to see. She made most of her own clothes and many clothes for her only daughter and granddaughter. She was an avid gardener, growing the family’s fruits and vegetables. She loved to tend to her rose garden, but her family remembers her spending most of her time in the kitchen, carefully preparing food for the people she loved. She leaves behind recipes for strawberry cake and Thanksgiving dressing that her family will prepare in her memory every year. One candle on my birthday cake will always be hers, in memory of the many, many birthdays we celebrated together. She will be missed but never forgotten by her daughter, her three grandchildren and their spouses and her 8 great-grandchildren. This weekend, her family will gather from all over the country to celebrate and not to mourn.

meet the family

// October 28th, 2004 // 5 Comments » // blogging, Doug, me, relatives

Inmates in our little asylum -
Cathy – me, wife, mother, sister, daughter, S.A.D., watches too much tv
Doug – husband, father, brother, son, I.E.D., O.C.D., severe romanticism
Tommy – age 14, Aspergers and teenageritis
Sarah – age 11, severely normal but seeking teenageritis
Noah – age 8, A.D.D., tender hearted, champion nosebleeder
Amy – age 2, stubborn, funny, extremely verbal
Molly – 6 month old German Shepherd who would be perfect if she’d move from paper trained to housebroken
Lucy – very old golden mix, semi-deaf, semi-blind
Plus 2 cats, several fish and extended family members to add to the insanity.