Immunization Realization

                So hands down the biggest monster under the bed for any parent (well minus the very very few horrific people you read about on the news) is having a sick or hurt child.  Anything from a cough and sniffles to something more massive that involves genetic testing can be found by searching ‘hashtag BadDay’.  Even from the first time you peed on a stick and got the news that your life was going to be completely different in the next nine months and counting (whether you bought the urine vessel out of anxiety or anticipation) eventually you find yourself repeating the word ‘healthy, healthy, healthy’ over and over as a mantra on a daily basis.  While it’s been awhile since my teenage terror was a baby bundle of joy but I still remember thinking, “Man I hope I’m having a girl, and I hope she’s healthy.”  Now clearly nature didn’t receive my sex preference in time to make that baby with an innie instead of an outie, but I must say that nature really got it right here.  My son, well he’s kind of incredible.

                I held him the first time and immediately was greeted with an array of creative ways that I would find to accidentally break him.  After all from my favorite coffee mug, to my best jeans, to countless phones (you’re welcome Verizon) I eternally find a way to destroy my finest things.  I’d like to put everyone’s thoughts to rest right now; he’s still in one delightfully willful, sometimes smelly, homework phobic, mostly funny piece.  After I jumped the first ‘don’t break him dummy’ hurdle I moved on to the information hurdle forest.  You could find an article, doctor, nurse, (no phone app or blog, too early for that), or book with just about every side of every argument for or against even the simplest things.  Back to sleep, no on his side, breast feed, don’t breast feed, wash every day, no every other day, rock him to sleep, no let him cry, put him on a routine, no babies tell you when they’re hungry……. This list goes on and on and on.  And really, how does one chose all the right choices?  Impossible.  Find me someone that looks back at their life and says, ‘Yup, I did everything right.’ I’ll drive to that person’s house and punch them right in their lying face (I’m super nonconfrontational so that’s kind of a big deal for me).  I think the toughest struggle for me were the choices that had a lasting effect on my son.  I circumcised him.  If I could do it all over again I’d call that an unnecessary surgery.  I wish I’d spent more time playing with him and less time cleaning the house.  I wish I’d have written more stuff down.  I wish I’d taken more time off work after he was born.  I wish I’d done a lot of things, but what I don’t regret is vaccination.           

                Taking my little innocent in to get inoculated that first time was really difficult.  When the needle went into his chubby little leg (this is truth by the way, my skeleton impersonating son was once the mayor of Chub City, that’s in the USA) I cringed and probably cried as much as he did.  To knowingly inflict pain upon your child is worse than having a cupboard full of whiskey bottles that are all empty.  I did my research and asked the doctor to obtain the shots without thimerosal (which is in almost none now).  The nurses and the doctor went over all the side effects including major and minor (including statistics which were decidedly in my favor.  I mean all medical procedures have a possible negative outcome.  So does using a coffee maker.) before the big moment.  They gave me a nice brightly colored sheet with all the information on it and what to look for if something has gone awry and sent me on my way.  Other than a low fever for a day, general agitation and some swelling my little bundle of poop, spit-up and late night parties was no worse for wear.  It was not until after my son was safely past the toddler years that autism really took off in the news.  Not like a fad of acid wash jeans or anything equally as terrible, but the real stuff of nightmares.  It’s one thing to know your child has a slight hiccup in their development right out of the gate and have time to prepare yourself, it’s another to have it sprung on you when you feel like you’ve already run the race.  Hashtag WorstDay.  I can’t even imagine what those parents go through.  As with all ridiculously unfair seeming happenings we all look for the elusive ‘Why?’, ‘How?’, ‘What can we do to prevent this for others?’  I’m not a doctor, or a scientist, or a researcher or anything else of that ilk.  I am a mother.  I vaccinated my son and he doesn’t have autism.  I don’t know what causes autism; in fact I’m of the belief that many of the kids I went to school with probably would test positive for it, but at the time they had a different name tag of ‘Hello my name is: slow or problem child’.  Saying this and given the resurgence of multiple terrible diseases like measles here in Ohio I am so very very very happy that I chose vaccination for my child (not that he can’t get measles, I know he can, I read the pamphlet).

                Now when it came to any of the vaccinations that were considered ‘optional’ at the time I always opted out until more information was available.  He wasn’t vaccinated for chicken pox until fourth grade and he’s only had a flu shot once and it was a dead virus shot, not a live virus inhale.  He has a history of asthma so shouldn’t get the inhaled version.  Again, I read the pamphlet.  In fact while I’m on the subject of the chicken pox vaccine that particular doctor’s visit for the express reason of needling my son was a pivotal point in his and my life.  The doctor was sitting on a stool going over the pros and cons of what was about to be injected into my son’s arm when he looked at Alex’s ‘flat as we thought the earth was’ feet, then his backwards arms, and after a few measurements he left the room and came back with a second man in a white coat.  Post deliberation they agreed that Alex had enough signs of Marfan Syndrome (if you don’t want to click the link it’s a genetic disorder that causes a breakdown of connective tissue.  Does not sound too terrible at first until you think about the tissue that holds your lens to your eyeball or your tissue that connects your aorta to your heart.  That’s when it starts to become more that just fun bendable arms that creates a Circus Plan B if college doesn’t pan out.)  We took our first of now annual trips to the cardiologist and found that while there’s something there, it’s manageable at this stage with prevention and vigilance.  We also visited a very eccentric geneticist that informed us that while the signs are there the gene is not, so we can call it whatever we want but we’ll treat it as if it is.  So in a way the chicken pox vaccine was responsible for prevention of something that could be very severe.  Thank you science.  I heart you.

               Like all professions I’m certain that not all doctors are good.  Some are probably terrible human beings worried more about their pocket than their patients.  I’m sure there are some police officers that are very much of the same thought wave.  Or a cunty receptionist at a university office refusing to print out one little page.  Or a teacher that makes you pull ten hairs out for each and every passive aggressive email she sends or the four that she never responds to.  Or everyone at the BMV.  What I’m saying is let’s not let the few bad reflect poorly on the majority of amazing.  Really, anymore vaccinating is everyone’s personal choice.  Apparently public schools let unvaccinated kids in now (which is something I’m completely against.  I thought that was one of the few requirements of sending your kids to public school).  No matter, this is simply my story that inoculation may have saved my son from something more.  The best I’ve found to accomplish in parenting is I take the pros and cons, I weigh them and choose.  Following that I hold on with both hands, tie on my problem solving apron and get dirty.  I will not tell others how to parent, only how I do and also that when asked if I’d like to side with science I will inevitably answer ‘Fuck Yeah!’.  Also mom, thank you for vaccinating me, polio looks like an awful way to spend a few weeks experiencing in nonfiction.  I can’t protect my son from everything, but if I have the opportunity to at least prevent a few, in the words of Tone Loc, let’s do it.

Good Hydration..... is Such a Sweeeet Sensation.

                Work.  We all do it right?  Something I learned early on in my adult life was the flow chart of work = money and money is necessary to have a place to live, things to eat, heat in the winter, whiskey in my glass, and water to wash my face (and other places, maybe not my mouth, but whatevs).  So therefore I work.  Oddly enough for someone that tests gravity on a daily basis with anything I have on hand, (i.e. silverware, plates, glasses, wine glasses, sugar caddies, myself……..) I became a server. 

                I understand fully the stigma that goes along with my career choice (notice the word ‘career’ I have almost 19 years of serving under my belt and have worked in my current location for close to eight years, this is not a ‘job’ at this point).  I’ve been asked if I’m just doing this while in school, if this is a second job, I’ve heard people refer to servers as a bunch of drug addicts and drunks, that we’re in it for the easy money, that this is the best we can do, and maybe most offensive is the question of when I’ll get a ‘real’ job (like this one is just a hobby that pays in meatballs (double parenthesis for the Wedding Singer reference.  You’re welcome)).  Answers in order are, no, no, I like booze but pass on grass, nothing about this job is easy, I get paid more than a first year teacher, and this ‘real’ job has paid my bills and helped raise my son.  I assure you my checks and cash spend just as well as everyone else’s.  There are plenty of jobs I am not qualified for and there are plenty of people who wouldn’t be able to do mine, so let’s just call it a draw.

The thing that no one bothers to ask is if I like my job.  The answer to this is also ‘no’.  I love my job.  I love the pace and challenge.  I love the personalities of the other people I work with.  I love the patrons and their individual needs, it’s like a big puzzle and I have to put all the pieces together in time for one to go back to work, and one to make a show, one that can’t have gluten and her friend that doesn’t eat dairy, one that drinks beverages like what in my mind a camel looks like after a long trek through the Sahara, and I have to do it all while smiling.  Sure there are times when I’m burned out, find me someone who doesn’t have those days in any career, but mine are few and far between.  In fact I am so blessed to be a part of some of people’s best moments.  People go out to nice restaurants to celebrate, to enjoy each other, to escape from normal, to not do dishes, to get engaged, to talk to each other, sometimes they make out and I must admit, I dislike that, but I am privileged to be a part of almost all of these things (not the making out part, while I enjoy that in the privacy of my own home, in public and at work is just not the way I roll).  Sometimes it takes less than five seconds to make someone feel special by putting a candle in their dessert, personalizing their tomato bisque, or shaking a gentleman’s hand and thanking them for dining.  ‘So why not do it?’  Has always been my philosophy.  Every day I get to make people feel special.  That’s kind of incredible.

Now with all that waxing about how smitten I am with my job I have to say that those are the very reasons that when I came across this blog last night I was furious.  Spitting mad.  So mad in fact that I sat myself down to write a very concise message about how angry I was (yes Meg you are right.  It’s exactly what I do when I’m mad.)  Now don’t get me wrong I mumble under my breath sometimes and get frustrated at guests, which most time is a miscommunication more than a mistake on either of our parts, but this blog about water was downright offensive to me as a server and as a guest.  Wasting anything is never on my list of things that are okay, but how dare anyone make a guest feel bad about ordering something that is available at every restaurant?!  Now when people get all crazy with it ordering a lukewarm water with three ice cubes on the side, two lemons, two cherries, one lime and four cucumbers I think any normal person would look at them and think, “Seriously?!  Are you trying to get points for creativity?  Like you woke up the Salvador Dali of H2O?” but to say that a server hates you for ordering water is complete and utter bullshit.  That blog made it sound like the people in my profession are in it to see how high they can get your check just so twenty percent is higher.  Like the twenty percent on $2.75 is what is going to put them over the edge to keep the heat on in their home.  What a D bag.  Totally false at least on my end.  I would love to get you water.  I’ll also do my best to fill it as often as possible.  When I go out I will order water myself and not feel bad one bit.

While we’re bustin server myths here I’d also like to state that if you don’t like your food, it’s wrong, or cooked incorrectly please tell me so I can fix it.  I hate when people tell me they don’t want to complain or that they didn’t want to send it back to be a bother.  That’s dumb.  The point of restaurant dining is to have a great meal that you don’t have to cook.  Why would I want you to eat something wrong?  Sometimes it’s my fault, sometimes it’s the kitchen, sometimes the guest didn’t read the menu, but no matter who owns the title to the fuck up the result should be the same, a delicious meal.  As I tell my son all the time, your mistake is not what is important we all make mistakes, it’s your solutions that will make you a success. 

Now I should also say that like in all professions there are poor servers too, ones that worry more about the money than that of doing a good job.  Which if a job you do good money will come.  (Yoda and that voice from Field of Dreams teamed up for that one.)  Although I’m certain that these people exist in all jobs.  Ones that are unhappy with themselves in some fashion and instead of being proactive and finding happiness they allow their own negativity leach into all they do.  So just know that when you have a bad server and you leave them a bad tip to teach them a lesson, they are most likely that person at your job that shows up late for the meeting about chronic lateness.  These are the people who think that the rules apply to everyone but them and carry a cross of ‘victim’ with them everywhere you go.  Instead of feeling angry, feel sad and when you return to that restaurant request someone else.  Those are the few, not the majority.  On the flip side if you have a great server, sometimes it takes only a kind message on your receipt or an extra $3 to $5 to make someone’s day.  A little kindness goes a long way.

Serving is a job that you get out of it what you put into it.  Every day I go in with a smile on my face excited to see what the afternoon will bring.  Will regulars come in for a little chat?  Will I make a new frequent flyer out of a first timer?  I work hard for my guests and my coworkers alike.  I am always looking for a way to improve the day for all.  If you want to drink four waters and seven iced teas I’ll do my best to accommodate, although I do request that as I extend courtesy please do the same to me.  Don’t take your bad day out on me with unrealistic expectations and I will try to fill your drinks and split your friend’s meal five ways while cashing out twenty two separate checks on a party that all need change for a twenty.  Respect, pass it along.  Never let a bitchy waiter cloud your opinion of those of us that do our jobs because we love people……. and water.

Do Not Negotiate With Terrorists or Teenagers

                “You should get an award for the #1 Most Unfair Mom in the Whole World!!!!”  My newly minted teenage son stated in a loud aggressive manner punctuated by the very quiet shutting of his bedroom door (this due to the lesson learned when slamming the door resulted in a lack of door for the better part of three days.  That’s right, hit em where it hurts, right in the privacy.)

                “Yes well that’s an award I’d be proud to win.  Just so you know in 10 years or so you’re going to call me and apologize for all the things you just said.”  Let me also state that while I’m not a fortune teller or gypsy I know that I and most others have placed similar calls to parental figures about midway through their twenties.  So by powers of deduction I’m going to assume that while he’s doing a great job of playing a sociopath in real life right now that my son will indeed make it out of his hurricane Hormone and go back to being a normal human being at some point.

                People told me when he was a model citizen at the young age of 3 months sleeping through the night, no ear infections, no colic, no allergies and not fussy that to watch out for the Terrible Twos.  I then watched like a hawk for the chiming of the 24 month bells (which it was suggested for him to currently refer to his age in months to mess with people.  156 is the answer if you’re doing the mental math.)  As they came and went the only change was that he FINALLY got off his lazy behind to walk and then promptly made up his own language.  Even then I was more worried about the dreaded teenage years than anything.  Kids are like dogs, when little bad behavior is cute.

                “Oh my god mom!  I don’t want to spend the whole night fighting about this!  You always do this! It’s so not fair!”  Let it be noted that on the 13^th birthday hormones gifted my son with the ability to end every sentence with an exclamation mark and to speak in constant hyperbole.  It must be exhausting.

                “Well if you didn’t want to fight about it you should’ve just turned your homework in.  It’s already done.”  My calm response.  Like wild dogs teenagers can smell fear.

                “I HATE it when you say that!”

                “Then turn your work in and I won’t say it.”

                “Oh my GOD!  I can’t believe you don’t care about my feelings!”

                “If you turned your work in I’ll bet you’d be feeling much better right now.”  This is a classic case of argument inception.  Eventually he gets so fed up with my continued response that he falls into just a series of grunts and under breath expletives that I’m sure, while offensive, would impress me with their creativity.

                People who speak about the famed Thin Line between Love and Hate, or the other so popular Love Hate Relationship I am convinced have kids.  I visit both these parenting landmarks on a daily basis.  Don’t get me wrong, I love my son, but I also hate him.  No…. I love him.  In fact on this day of being thankful I am the most thankful for him.  While I’m not sharing the holiday meal with him this year he and I share dinners together five times a week that always start with a statement of what we are thankful for.  My goal is that he grows up being thankful everyday and not reserve it all for the third Thursday of his birth month.  Sometimes when he’s sitting at a 13 and I need him at more like a 9 (Patrick said that last night.  Brilliant.) I still am grateful for being his most unfair mother ever.  By using parental context clues they lead me to believe that being unfair is in fact a synonym for parenting win.  After all I’m fairly certain that his idea of fair would involve not bathing, eating only crackers and ginger ale, playing Xbox with no timer, computer gaming with copious amounts of cursing, a room that could make a cameo on the hit show Hoarders, no knowledge of tooth brushing and a vocabulary that is sans the word ‘homework’.  So every time we fight I just remind myself that he is simply taking one more step forward in being a better person and that the traits that frustrate me so very much, being headstrong, solid in his beliefs, unwavering logic, quick thinking and the inability to quit when he feels he’s been wronged, are all things that make asking him to clean his room result in a 45 min audition for university debate club and upping my nightly bourbon intake from two fingers to somewhere around four, will also make him a successful adult.  One that I am certain I will always be proud to claim as my offspring.  Plus it’s kind of hard to hold a grudge against a not-so-small-anymore person wearing a tuxedo t-shirt, singing ‘The Safety Dance’ explaining his thoughts on the Affordable Health Care Act while sneaking in a Step Brothers quote and a well placed line straddling joke that does his momma proud.  Love. 

Creative Problem Solving

                This morning was like most Sunday mornings.  I woke up somewhere in the 8:30s and before leaving bed caught up on both my news and social media.  (Another reason I’d like coffee makers to take up residency in bedrooms where they would clearly do the most good instead of requiring a three room hike all the way to the kitchen.)  Upon my morning Facebook surf I came across this article that was shared by not one of my super smart and interesting friends, but by two!  (Both of which you should absolutely read their blogs and laugh at their attempt at humor.)  Already I knew that this was either about bourbon/going to make my face super happy.  It was the second.

                This five minute cartoon read, and then following blog made me stop.  And read it again.  It was a moment when I thought, “Hmm, I’ve never had it put so succinctly as that.”  It’s a mental battle I’ve raged for years about my life’s choices and how I’ve come to find myself in the middle of my autobiography as it stands today.  I am not college educated.  I am not collecting a very high salary with a 401K.  I am not in a tax bracket that causes sleepless nights in the springtime.  My car is heavy on the rust and loud on the exhaust.  My home is ‘quaint’.  My luxuries in life include the NHL package on DirecTV and bourbon once, maybe twice a week.  I can my own food.  My freezer is the home of many styles of bargain priced meat.  You know what though?  I like it.  A friend and I had many a conversation about jobs and how it defines us as people.  I told him that I believed that our self worth is not based on net worth, that where we punch our time card is not indicative of our success, but that if you wake up most every morning happy to be you, then you’re winning.  Of course complacency breeds laziness and we should all strive to move in the forward direction that we so desire, it does not mean that we need to make our forward the same as someone’s vision of what it should be.

               “Angie you were so smart, you know you could’ve done anything.”

                This could be the theme of many a conversation people have with me.  Like the ‘smart’ I had in regards to book stuff as a child and teenager magically dissipated the moment I pushed my son from my most special of places.  Let’s be real though, anything?  That’s a little too broad of a spectrum, and what’s wrong with choosing to be a mom anyways?  Like if I had pro-choiced myself all the way to the clinic and gone off to college would that make my choices better?  Or if I had had my parents raise my son while I went away busy studying to be anything would people call me a success?  Would they use words of description like ‘sacrifice’ and ‘selfless’ and ‘hardworking’ to describe me if I sent my son to daycare and nightcare while I spent 12 hours a day working and going to school?  For what?  To maybe make more money than I do now that I could in turn spend on my son to make up for all the time that he missed out on.  To use money as a way to say, “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for all your parent teacher conferences, for your first day of school every year, to make you dinner, to tuck you in, to watch inappropriate movies, to teach you how to garden and can and do laundry and do dishes and cook dinner and make your bed.  I’m sorry I wasn’t there to discipline you, to read you books, to take walks, to talk about your day, to cuddle when you still wanted me, to help you tackle a friend problem, a word problem, a next day book report, to sleep next to you at the hospital when you’re sick, to make you popcorn when the nurses aren’t looking.  But instead mommy has a degree and can buy you a new TV if you want, does that make up for it?” 

                Oddly while in school (high school that is), I never knew what I wanted to be.  I switched between a marine biologist (it was the 80’s and 90’s everyone wanted to be a damned marine biologist), or something with math, or with science, or history, or English etc.  I wanted to write a book that millions of people purchase/checked out of the library.  I wanted to live anywhere but where I grew up.  I wanted to do big things.  Turns out that I never really knew anything about what I wanted until I had my son (super clichéd and I care not), when I grew up it appears as though I wanted to be a mom.  I’m not sure if I’m very good at that, we’ll find that out at a later date after a myriad of therapy for my son, but I love it.  I don’t care anymore if I write a book that sells a million copies; I’m ok with a blog that seven people read.  I moved away from where I grew up and landed exactly where I was supposed to be.  I like to think that I didn’t ‘drop out’ of college; I just retired before I finished to pursue a more challenging life’s path, parenting and table waiting.  Even on afternoons like today where my voice turns into something similar to Darth Vader and I seriously think to myself, “How long do you choke someone until they just become unconscious?  Not seriously hurt or kill them, just enough to make them stop talking for fifteen minutes or so.”  Now clearly I wasn’t going to injure my son, I was thinking that maybe I needed to cool down and if one of us was going to get to take a nap damnit, it should be me!  I still know I made the right career move.

                So in all this rambling about myself and those pesky ‘feelings’ I hear I’m not skilled at expressing what I’m getting at is that, I’m happy, and if I could turn back time (who’s singing Cher in their heads now?  I know I am, and you’re welcome) I would not do it any different, well except maybe finishing the whole bowl of popcorn last night after Alex fell asleep.  I immediately regret it and am still harboring guilt about the whole sordid affair.  Mistakes are not what make a person, but their solutions and I’m enjoying all of my creative problem solving.