MAMA: Adventures in Martial Arts and Motherhood

I read a lot of blogs, parenting blogs, martial arts blogs, blogs that simply chronicle the day to day life of someone who I have never met. Every so often a blogger reveals something to the entire Internet that makes me say "Wow. I would never write about that." I like to keep my posts safe, comfortable, essays that for the most part show off all of my strengths, preach about my fabulous opinions, or if I have to show weakness, than at least make it funny. Yes I did make that mistake one time while walking home and Maya didn't quite make it to the bathroom. Yes I do sometimes scream at my child. But mostly, I am freaking awesome. And I am, pretty damn awesome that is. And 99 percent of the time I walk around feeling confident, relaxed and really really happy. I love my life. I love everything about it. Honestly. And this is the me you will see all of the time, because even if I am not really feeling it, I am really good at faking it. So this post is hard for me to wr...

"Adversity causes some men to break, others to break records." William Arthur Ward A little over a month ago I wrote a post condemning the choice to train only once a week. Understandably, I took some flack for it, mostly from people who wanted to train more but were too busy with work, life, kids, distance, etc. Of course, these were not the people I was complaining about, rather my whole post could really be summed up in two words: laziness sucks. If you are choosing to sit on your couch rather than train, I am talking to you. If you are choosing to go out to a movie with your sweetie at 7:00 when you could just as easily go at 9:00 (AFTER class), I am talking to you. If you have three kids with three different schedules and a full time job and you live in Westchester and it takes every ounce of willpower you have to drag your ass here for the occasional class, that post was not for you. You just keep on trucking, you'll get here eventually. Momentum is so so im...

Earlier this week I was chatting with one of the other moms at pickup. She had been at last week's Learning Leaders training session (if you are not sure what I am talking about read this  http://mamommyarchives.blogspot.com/2012/10/just-let-them-bleed.html ) and she wanted me to know that she agreed with me. She also said I was " different from the normal tone of this country" when it comes to parenting. I took that as a compliment. But in truth, I do not think my parenting views are all that radical. I just don't believe in  frivolous  lawsuits. I don't believe that there is a bad guy lurking at every corner waiting to abduct my child. I believe in common sense safety and street smarts. I believe in letting my child make her own choices, and yes, her own mistakes. But I also believe in rules, and respect. I believe in chores. I believe in consistent bedtimes. I believe in kindness above all, but I still want her to work hard to do her absolute best at everyth...

I am usually a problem solving kind of person. If something is not working right I won't stop until I fix it. I have rearranged our apartment until I am absolutely certain that I am making the best use of a relatively small space. I like to plan things. I like to make lists. But some days I am part of the problem.  Some days, I do it all wrong. Some days it is hard to tell which one of us is the grownup, and which one is only four. Like this morning. Maya woke up kind of whiny. Something about a bad dream and falling in the toilet. (Not a bad dream about falling in the toilet. She apparently really fell into the toilet when she got up in the middle of the night to pee. And then went back to bed. And then had a bad dream. Rough night for Maya.) In any case,  I cannot stand whine before coffee. Makes me cranky. Also, I have my period. Makes me cranky. When it was time to go to school she wanted to finish her drawing. I told her we had to go. She started to...

So lately Maya and I have been reading "Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain" ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBDqPOd-eXI ) , which is one of my favorite children's books.  This morning I woke up at 6:30, could not fall back asleep, and could not get this damn book out of my head. (It is quite catchy. Go ahead, try it.) Later, my sleep deprived, over caffeinated self couldn't stop staring at the beautiful sun coming through the brand new windows of the dojo. (Probably while I was supposed to be doing something else. Teaching wee ones perhaps.)  And I was a poet once. Really I was. Hence, this. This is the floor of the dojo. This is the sun, that pierces the clouds and brightens the floor of the dojo. This is the air, all heavy with sound that comes from the shouts of the students around. The crackling air is warmed by the sun that pierces the clouds  and brightens the floor of the dojo. This is the child, only four who punches th...

Today I attended the first training session of the Learning Leaders program which my child's school requires to be a volunteer. At the beginning of the session we all went around and introduced ourselves and everyone said the same things. I want to be helpful to the teachers. Class sizes are so big. I want to be more involved in the school community. I want to HELP. I am not against the program, rather, I think it is a very good one. But I am against the need for such a program to begin with. What ever happened to "Hello child's teacher. I am free most mornings, do you need any help in the classroom?" What happened is frivolous lawsuits. What happened is Jerry Sandusky. What happened is a news media that makes it sound like children are being abducted from street corners and schoolyards every five minutes. Fear sells. And school administrators are buying it. ` It is a terrible terrible thing when kids get hurt. The worst thing. And I am sure that...

Back in May of this year I wrote a blog post entitled "Girly Girl Jiu-Jitsu". ( http://mamommyarchives.blogspot.com/2012/05/girly-girl-jiu-jitsu.html ) The basic point was that there are many different ways to be feminine. That I can wear cute dresses and still know how to choke you out. In other words, don't put me in your little box, I don't fit there. The construction at the dojo is still going on. The hole in the ceiling is gone (thank you Jebus!) but there is still plenty of work to be done. Today there is a nice dude with a hammer and a screw gun, hanging sheetrock and driving nails into the facade. His name is Freddie. Freddie was very helpful this morning. He swept the floor for me. He moved his stuff out of the way so I could set up for my morning class. He had a nice smile. He stared blankly, but politely, at me when I asked him any questions about his work. (Mainly when it was going to be completed.) He also referred to me as "sweetie". I ...

I am currently reading a great book on parenting called Nurture Shock.  http://www.nurtureshock.com/ . The book is being passed (both literally and verbally) around many of the moms (and dads) I know and was recommended to me by the mom of one of Maya's best friends. I am not going to talk about the book, although I cannot promise there will not be a whole slew of Nurture Shock posts in the future, (It is that thought provoking) but its Sunday. Best to not climb too far up on my soapbox on this day of rest and family and football. So instead I am going to tell you about the dream I had last night. It took place at Maya's school. Matthew and I and a bunch of other parents were in her kindergarten classroom in a meeting with her teacher. I am not sure where all the kids were. (Probably running, unsupervised, in a gym somewhere. Lord of the Flies is great.) The teacher was lecturing us on school choice, testing, sleep patterns, and other topics that were clearly in my subconsc...

If you are friends with my husband or our dojo on Facebook, (or if you are actual, real life friends of ours, like in the real world, not just on your IPad) you know that they are rebuilding the storefront of our dojo. If you are not, here is a photo, just so you can get the general idea: Yes that is the front of our karate school. With no walls or windows. It looks better today. So the first day of construction they tore down a giant wooden box that for some reason had been attached to our ceiling, raining dirt and debris everywhere. (Also some dead things. We won't talk about those.) That was ok, they cleaned up most of it. Then on day two they tore off all of the old windows and the old door and put in these: Looking good. Then they stopped working.  We swept and mopped the floor at least ten times but there was still a thin layer of dust everywhere. Also a small section of missing floor in the entryway. And a hole in a part of the ceiling. But things were done enou...

“I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it. People think pleasing God is all God cares about. But any fool living in the world can see it always trying to please us back.”  ―  Alice Walker ,  The Color Purple With the presidential election looming like a dangerous mushroom cloud off in the distance, there has been much debate about the small business owner. In a speech back in July, President Obama said this:  “If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.” He meant, of course, that a business needs other people to succeed. It needs customers. It needs roads for people to travel on and supermarkets to feed those peopl...