As usual, I'm living in the past, present, & future all at once. I've been doing a lot of thinking lately (don't I always!), a lot of reflecting. I've been watching a DVD of the first season of The Monkees ever since Davy Jones died, watching every program I can find on him, doing a lot of remembering. My son became a drummer for awhile when The Monkees was in reruns in the 1990s. He really took to Micky. My daughter loves them so much that she went to a Monkees concert last year, even though it was expensive & far from her house. She got her love & knowledge of them through me. They put out an album late in the 1980s called "Pool It" & my kids had to hear my favorite songs, & the entire album, played loudly over & over. Poor kids, I do that when I get in a certain mood, & play whatever strikes me repetitively & loudly.
My son says his favorite piece of music is "Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini" by Rachmaninoff. That's because of me. He was actually born to that piece of music. He introduced his fiance to the movie "Somewhere in Time," where I first heard the piece. It's one of his favorite movies, one of my daughter's too, again because of me. I've already mentioned that some of their favorite foods are things I used to make for them.
My kids are their own people, individuals. A lot of who & what they are they gained from me, but it was never forced. It's a testament to the kind of mother I was that some of their taste was influenced by me. Some of my taste in music & things comes from my mother, the music I heard within the home. A lot of it is all my own, influenced by a vast exposure to music from the times I grew up in & experiencing all kinds of music via participation in school bands & orchestra, being in choirs, even church music. I fought a lot of association with my own mother. There are very few tastes or anything that I willingly associate with her. I'm very proud that my own children feel otherwise. My daughter frequently acknowledges me on Facebook when mentioning her likes, & I love it. I'm always so pleased when my kids take after me in tastes or characteristics.
Speaking of, if you haven't used my Facebook share to read my daughter's sermon (posted on 3/11), please do. She very eloquently & thoroughly wrote a sermon covering an important lesson I frequently touch on in these blogs. As a writer, I'm very proud of what she put together, her words. But I'm recommending it because of how well she covered that subject. She has a great gift with words, teaching, expressing things in a way that you'll easily understand. I've of course never seen her in action as a clinical social worker, but I realize that she uses this skill in her work too. She's developed this all on her own, but it's a trait I also possess so I'm especially proud. I hope that years of listening to me helped her develop her own gift.
I was never a separate person in my mother's eyes. One of the greatest ways she damaged me was by always treating me as an extension of herself. She obviously never liked or loved herself, & I got the treatment she would have heaped on herself & did. I was required to be a little Norma, not myself. She thus violated all my personal boundaries. I wasn't allowed to have any, as a mere extension of herself. This is why I loathe acknowledging any of her in me. I like to say I'm my beloved grandma's daughter. Ironically, that grandma was her mother. One of the things I did best with my own children was not doing that to them. Yes, we treat our kids some of how we were treated, no matter what we do. All parents have opened their mouths & heard their parents come out - the stuff we vowed we'd never say to our kids. With will power & conscious effort, we can change that except in times of the most stress, when we react. But I did always allow my kids their own tastes, tried to nurture their sense of self. I never tried to make them into mini-me. I also didn't have apron strings tied to them. I tried to teach them but didn't try to hold them back. I tried to give them every opportunity to find their own tastes & interests, to try everything they wanted to try doing while they were young & learning themselves. That was one of the good things that was done for me as a child, part of how I learned all the arts & crafts I enjoy.
I see so much of myself in my kids. The older they get the more I see them reflect me, but in their own ways. In good ways & bad, I've seen them reflect me but as time goes on I see much more of the positive reflected back to me. I never see them as true reflections of myself, I only enjoy the ways they do associate with me & my tastes, talents, & interests. I remember when my mother was fixated on an opera singer in the 1990s. I don't like most operative voices & styles. Out of all the music I enjoy, that isn't one. My mother told me it was a personal affront to her that I said I didn't like the singing, refused her offer to give me cassette tapes of the woman! I certainly didn't do it as a personal affront. I'm simply not good at lying or faking it, & the only opera I like is "Carmen." I like instrumentals of some operatic music, just not the singing. Hey, I don't like Chamber Music either, for all the classical music I love. Anyway, I'm very pleased to have been mostly a positive & pleasing influence on my own kids. They are most truly themselves, always have been, always will be. They were born with certain traits & characteristics. My job was to help them find & develop themselves while learning to navigate the world & its rules & keeping them as safe as possible while learning. It was & is also to love & nurture them as they are - unconditional love. I've always given them unconditional love, even when I wasn't the kindest, most effective parent. I wish we could parent in reverse - have the wisdom & insight that comes after they're grown & gone while we're still young enough to keep up with them.
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