The Crab Chronicles

Young and Stupid

Yesterday I was reminded that I said a lot of stupid things when I was young.

I often joke about the days when I was "young and stupid" because it has taken me a long time to get to the place I am now. Not that I'm perfect now - Lord have mercy, far from it. I do [usually] have enough sense to keep my mouth shut when I need to though, now. Not always, but usually.

I got an email yesterday from a woman I've known since third grade, and we've been friends since high school. There were a number of years, though, when we weren't friends, and I was puzzled by that. She finally friended me on Facebook a little while back, and slowly we've been reconnecting.

She said in her email yesterday that I deserved some unsolicited parenting advice since I'd given it to her many years ago. When I first read her email I was astonished. I had NO recollection of that. Then I thought about it a bit. Yep, I'm sure she's right. Much to my regret, of course she's right.

You see, I used to think I KNEW EVERYTHING. I used to think if people would just do what I told them, their lives would be awesome. [Actually, I still do that to some extent, but only to a few unlucky folk that I actually adore.]

I am fortunate to have a number of friends who have known and liked me for many years, and I think the reason those friendships endure is because they ignore a lot of my unsolicited advce, or they tell me I am just wrong, and I hush up. Sometimes we squabble, too, but the basic friendship is still there, to the point where they are like family to me. 

When I was 19 years old, I vividly remember my dad putting me in the car so he could give me a lecture. The lecture started out with him saying this: "You're just like me, unfortunately. Your mouth is always going to get you in trouble."

I was furious.

He was right.

When it comes to giving advice and/or being bossy, I tend to shoot from the hip, and let the chips fall where they may. I don't know if that's from arrogance, stupidity, insensitivity, or what. I just know that over the years it has cost me.

So here's something I've needed to say for a long time, and I want to make sure that it goes out to everyone who needs to hear it. A lot of my Facebook friends have known me for many years, and I'm sure I've said stupid and/or thoughtless or inappropriate things to them at one time or another.

I am SO sorry if I said something at any time in the past that was arrogant, thoughtless, mean, or even bullying. I was young and stupid for a long time, and then I was middle aged and stupid for a while. 

I hope you can forgive me. If not, I understand.

This is me, every time I remember saying something stupid in the past...

Parenting Rant

Rarely does anything make me truly, righteously angry, but being told how to parent will do it every time. Give me suggestions - fine. Offer advice IF I ask for it - fine. Commiserate with me when I am kvetching about overwhelming parenting moments - fine.

But DO NOT tell me how to parent.

Progress reports came out two days ago. Michael made two C's, one of them in English. Now, Michael is good in English, normally. And he can handle the work in his elective class just fine, normally. But lately, things have not been normal.

For the past few weeks Michael has had a 3 hour wrestling practice every day after school. Then he has come home, showered, eaten supper, and gone to bed. Exhausted. Too tired to do homework.

Plus, he's growing. I'm not going to make him stay up and study all evening when he needs his sleep.

I reminded him at breakfast Monday [I had checked grades online] that our deal was, he could wrestle only if he kept his grades up. So I was pulling him off the team. I told him several weeks ago to get those C's pulled up to B's, and it didn't happen.

So I emailed the coach Monday night. He offered to let Michael cut practice short and do a study hall. I knew that wouldn't be the solution, though.

Monday afternoon. I am at work. Mother is here to talk with Michael when he gets off the school bus. She reports to me that he is happy and smiling, and in a great mood. She tells him she's happy to see ihm smiling again.

See, he had gotten to where he was dreading each day. He got hurt at almost every wrestling practice. Bruises all over him. Bruised ribs. Some kid he sparred with kept falling on his leg - over and over. He was dreading going to practice every day.

I was dreading the meets - many hours of watching him stand around and not wrestle? Driving all over town?

Then there's the weight issue. Michael was expected to stay 122 lbs. or less. Right now a good weight for him is about 126. So he was expected to diet down to 122. The first time he told me he had to lose weight, it ticked me off.

All these things aside, if Michael had pitched a fit on Monday and said "Mom, I really love wrestling. I really want to keep doing it. Can I please have another chance??" I probably would've caved and said OK. He didn't do that. He was actually in a good mood when he went and played tennis Monday afternoon.

Anyway, Monday night I get a call from a team mom about food for the next match, and I tell her my son's off the team. She puts her husband on the phone. He's a huge supporter of the team. He proceeds to tell me how I shouldn't let Michael quit.

I explained about his grades, his needing sleep, his need to grow, and eat normally - all my reasons. I found myself defending my decision - to a total stranger who doesn't know me or my son.

What I was told, several times, was "He needs the discipline of wrestling. He needs to get away from the TV."

Um, hell to the NO. He needs time every day to relax. He needs sleep. He needs to spend time with his grandmother. He needs time to be a kid.

I was told that this guy forces his son to take honors classes and wrestle, and sometimes the kid is up until midnight studying.

Wait a minute. You are MAKING your kid extremely stressed out, all the time, and pushing him to the limits of physical endurance, and I am a bad parent?!??

I was told not long ago by another parent that their daughter is so busy, and so stressed out with school and all her activities, that she cries all the time.

Pull her out of some of that stuff! was my instant response. Good LORD.

I was told by a cousin some years ago that she made her teenaged son do several sports "so he wouldn't have free time to get in trouble."

UGH.

Here's what I told Michael yesterday. When you grow up, and finish college, then those will be some busy years. You will have to work really hard, and put in a lot of hours, to establish yourself in a career. Then you will get married and have kids, I hope. That will mean more long hours, and more stress. Life is stressful for grownups. Right now you are a kid. I don't want you to feel stressed out all the time. You need down time every day. You need to be able to relax and couch surf, every day.

For the first ten years of his life, my son had no real family. Now he has one. Now he is loved and cherished. Now he can finally have a happy childhood, even if he is a teenager.

I want my son to grow up and be HAPPY. I want him to be employed, sure, but I don't want that to define him. I don't care if he gets into an Ivy League college.

I care that he likes his life. I care that he is surrounded by people who care about him.

I cannot abide being told how to parent.

Here endeth the lesson.

 

A Glimpse of the Past

One of my Hasty cousins found an old photo on Ebay that none of us had ever seen before, of my grandparents Bob and Wilma Hasty. He emailed it to me.After spending a lot of time gazing at it last night, I wanted to share it here, and give a little bit of background.

My grandfather, Bob Hasty, played for the Philadelphia Athletics [before they moved to Oakland] from 1919-1924. In 1923 he married my grandmother, Wilma Butler, in Marietta Georgia. This must have been made shortly after their marriage. She went to live with him in Philadelphia and went to all the games.

They were total opposites in personality. Papa was quiet, easygoing, meticulous. Mamaw was a debutante and came from a very proper and prominent family, but she was energetic and funny and quick. The complemented each other perfectly and were married for nearly 50 years.

Papa was 6'4 and Mamaw was 4'11. He called her "Doll" or "my little Doll." When I was small, he called me "Doll," a term of great affection.

After 1924 Papa's contract was sold to a team out on the Pacific Coast, which had what was called the Pacific Coast League in those days. He played several years out there, and my uncle Bob Hasty Jr. was born in Oakland in 1927. Papa pitched a no-hitter exhibition game for Los Angeles around 1926.

Mamaw always said she liked California but she missed the seasons. Georgia has 4 definite weather seasons every year. So in 1928 Papa got a job with the Birmingham Barons and they were able to come back to the South.

By the time the Depression hit, a lot of baseball teams were going under. In the 1930's, he went to work for several different companies who had baseball teams, and played on and managed their teams. When World War II hit, he figured the safest place for his family was a farm, and he became manager of a large farm in South Carolina.

After the war, the family came back to the Atlanta area.

This is the family in the early 1930's before my mom was born.

This was made when my mom was small, probably around 1937.Her brother Don is 4 years old, and Bobby was 6 years older.

This was made when I was small, probably about 1966.

This is a poster my cousin Michael Hasty designed a few years ago. Papaw was approached by autograph seekers all his life, and he was always gracious about signing scraps of paper, cards, even baseballs. Oftentimes fans would write to him, and he answered every letter personally, and sent out a lot of photos. Mom said when she was growing up it always ticked her off when they were out in public and he got approached by a fan, because she knew he would stand and talk, sign autographs, and be nice - always.

One time when he was playing there was an obnoxious drunk fan in the stands, and he kept shouting at Papa, and being a jerk. When the inning change came, Papa walked over and climbed up into the stands so he could look the guy in the face, and he said "I just want to tell you that nothing you're saying bothers me in the least. You paid your money to come here, and you're entitled to holler and carry on as much as you want. I don't pay any attention to it."

The man shut up and never said another word during the entire game.

There are lots of great stories about my grandfather. I miss him very much.

The Gift of Faith

I am not a philosophical person, or terribly introspective, but questions of identity always intrigue me. How do you figure out who you are and your place in the world? 

Alesia called me not long ago and asked for information and documents about her birthparents and her adoption. I don't mind complying with her request. It's vital that she start to connect the dots, to see her life with some sort of perspective. It's a tough thing to do, no matter what your life circumstances.

When I was in college it finally dawned upon me that I had lived a pretty sheltered existence, growing up in the suburbs, with a banker father and a stay at home mom. I had some sad and painful things happen to me, including the deaths of my grandparents, but I never really endured anything terrible. I knew who I was. I knew my father. I knew I was smart. 

Contrast that with Alesia, and so many adopted kids. Whether or not they know anything about their birthparents, they struggle with the identity questions much more than I did. 

There's a great line from the movie Murphy's Romance that I've always remembered. Murphy is talking to his girlfriend's young son and referencing the boy's n'er do well birthdad, and he says quietly, "You can be like him or not, it's up to you." So we have a choice as to whether or not we want to lead our lives copying our parents, or striking out on a totally different path. 

At one time, I thought it would be a great job to be a bartender. I could write during the day, tend bar at night. My dad refused to pay for bartending school and was horrified at the thought of me doing that. Now I see he was right. At the time, I thought he was being hopelessly overprotective. 

How do we make choices if we don't really know what our birthparents were like, though, or if our view was skewed? 

How do we get buffeted along by forces we don't even remember, from early childhood? I've known folks who adopted babies less than a year old, and their babies couldn't attach, were traumatized, suffered night terrors, banged their heads obsessively, etc. Institutions never care for a child very well, particularly not orphanages in poor countries. 

So some of Alesia's earliest memories are of a birthmom who simply wasn't there a lot of the time. At less than 5 years old, Alesia was fending for herself a lot. She learned not to trust. She learned she could only rely on herself. The 6 years in the orphanage reinforced that. Most older kids in orphanages learn very harsh lessons and it's very tough to un-learn them. 

Despite all the love and care I tried to lavish on my daughter, she never trusted me. I did my best to bond with her, but I wasn't successful. I know she loves me, but that's a different thing. 

I am pretty sure she doesn't want to be like boring old mama, who pays bills, doesn't go out at night, never does drugs, rarely ever drinks, etc. I am boring, to her.

So despite all our best intentions, us adoptive moms face huge obstacles in raising healthy, happy secure kids. I don't know any answers to how to do it better. I just know we have to keep fighting the good fight. 

A friend emailed me this morning about a an adopted child who got into drugs at the age of 12, but now she is clean and sober and doing well. Thank God for positive stories like that. I need to hear more of those. 

There's one thing I do know. Faith makes all these thorny questions bearable. 

I was praying about a situation with Michael's schoolwork that presented a knotty problem, and the solution presented itself to me within 24 hours. That's always the way of it. The harder I struggle, the more tangled the web. The more I "let go and let God" the easier the problem gets solved.

If I can't help her figure out her identity or trust me, if I could only bestow ONE gift on my daughter, I would give her the gift of faith. It puts everything else in perspective.

Cold and Trees

We usually put up the Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving, but Bruce and Michael were pretty busy Friday and so the tree setup didn't happen until yesterday.

It's shown below pre-decorated:

We have to put it there because it's literally the only place in the overcrowded family room where it will fit. We just bunch up the sofa, loveseat, and coffee table and end tables to make room. I speculated about some different placements and talked them over with Mom and Bruce, but nothing seemed like a feasible idea. We just have too much furniture. It is what it is, though. We don't like to get rid of things.

So with me still being sick, we weren't able to finish decorating the tree last night, but we got it mostly done.

What remains to be done is that I need to put on the crystal icicles that reflect light and make the tree look shimmery and magical.

Michael said today "We don't have a REAL tree."

"It exists. It's real. It's beautiful. That's enough," I replied, probably too harshly.

I was remembering so many Christmases of my childhood when Dad and Mom would have the yearly Fight About The Tree. Dad balked at the prices of real trees. Mother wanted a real tree, and she wanted it up asap after Thanksgiving. He hated the mess and pine needles everywhere. She refused to have an artificial tree in her house.

Finally, when I was in my twenties and my parents had moved back to Augusta, Dad hauled his last real tree out of the house, and I vacuumed up pine needles for the last time. It was too much work and we were done.We didn't know it then, but Dad had cancer, and it was too hard for him to set it up and take it down.

I like real trees, but I don't like worrying about the needles all over the carpet, and watering the tree, and disposing of it later. I don't think it's environmentally friendly.

I bought our current tree, with its colored lights, a few years ago, after Christmas. It was a floor model, marked down to $50 for a quick sale at Home Depot. A real bargain. The only problem now is that a lot of the colored lights are burned out and I am not sure how to fix that issue.

I will post more photos later of the angels and santas and other decorations. I like to get the house decorated and then take photos.

This was the tree last year.

I've been pretty bummed out about being sick over Thanksgiving, but I was thinking about it today and I realized it wasn't such a terrible thing. I had a few days off work. My brother was here to handle things. (For instance, he fixed dinner last night.) I've been able to do very little the past few days, and that's nearly impossible with you're a single mom.

I've tried to not hug Mother or breathe in her space, because I don't want her to catch my cold. Michael, however, refuses to acknowledge boundaries. He still needs mama hugs every day, and that's OK. He has such a strong constitution he is rarely ever sick. Knock wood.

I have missed Alesia a lot over the past few days. She was always such a help to me during the holidays, and I just purely miss her company. I've also missed Lesleigh since she moved to Austin, although we email most every day. Then last night Bruce and Michael were in the store and I was outside in the car waiting, and I got a terrible feeling of missing my dad, a nearly physical pang. I held it together and didn't cry, though. There was no Kleenex in the car.

The must be one of the hardest things about being older, missing those we celebrated with during Christmases past. We have to soldier on, though, and try to create happy memories for our children.

This was made in 2007, Michael's first Christmas in America. We put the tree in the living room then.

Black Friday Sick Day

The worst part about being sick is being bored. I hate that part. Yesterday I mostly just coughed all day, and tried to stay awake and not be bored out of my mind.I watched some TV, paid a few bills, and got a milkshake for lunch. Felt good on my scratchy throat.

I did take a nap yesterday afternoon, but not too long. I felt better when I woke up, and in fact was able to make dinner.

Bruce and Michael went out to lunch with a friend of Bruce's and they were gone all afternoon. Here are a couple of cute photos of them before they set off:

I tried a new recipe at dinner, for Brussels Sprouts with Balsamic and Cranberries. Major yummy.

We also had a pork roast that I'd slowcooked all day in a 200 degree oven. It was falling off the bone tender. We like to put out all our dozen bottles of different barbeque sauces and slather the pork with our fave sauce.

I also made a rum cake, for dessert. At dinner, when we were finished with the main courses, I told Bruce I'd intended to make the rum cake for his birthday back in October but not gotten around to it. I think I made a chocolate pound cake instead. Bruce said "I don't like cakes anyway."

Reminded me SO much of my dad, who liked to say "I don't eat sweets." He would only eat 1 cookie or brownie IN FRONT OF OTHERS. At night, after we were all in bed, he'd get up and eat a TON of sweets.

Bruce ate one small piece of rum cake, then asked Michael to get him ANOTHER piece. Ha! After dinner, Bruce and Mike cleaned up. In my house, if you don't cook the meal, you clean up.

Black Friday Book Giveaway

WINNER ANNOUCED-

Linda Harris, you won! Shoot me an email.

*******************************************************************************************************************

I am not a shopper. I don't get all excited about shopping on this, the busiest shopping day of the year. In fact, I avoid all shopping centers and malls this time of year, which is a little tough because we live very close to a mall.

However, in the spirit of Christmas, I am offering a giveaway. As you know if you are a regular reader, I have a story in the new book The Divinity of Dogs: True Stories of Miracles Inspired by Man's Best Friend. It's a wonderful book, and would make an excellent Christmas gift.The story of my daughter Alesia and our Yorkie-Poo, Coco, is only one of many inspiring and awesome stories in the book.

If you would like to win a copy of the book, leave a comment here or shoot me an email [[email protected]]. You will get one entry if you simply do that.

HOWEVER, if you will contribute at least $5 to a local pet rescue group in your town, or any animal charity, and email me a PDF of a receipt (or some kind of confirmation of your gift), you will get FIVE chances to win the book!

I will draw a winner on December 1st.

If you'd like to learn more about the book this is my interview with Jennifer Skiff and it includes an excerpt from the book.

Alesia took piano lessons for about a year, and Coco liked to sit right there with her and listen.

Turkey Day With Cold

OK, well, this is so far a really sucko Thanksgiving for me, as I have a miserable bad cold and cough.. but it looks like all my Facebook friends are gearing up for big gatherings of family and friends. Even if you're only in a small family unit, that's OK.

This is the one holiday that has nothing to do with religion, and so everybody feels included. Hopefully. Obviously there are some Native Americans who view Thanksgiving as a horrible reminder of the genocide of their people, but not all of them take that view.

I think we should simply view it as a day of giving thanks for all our blessings.

I am thankful that my brother is here, because he can fix our Thanksgiving meal as well or better than me. I hate having a horrible bad cold. So I don't need to be fixing food for anybody I like or love.

I was looking forward to cooking these brussels sprouts, and crockpot dressing. We shall see what happens, though. Hopefully Bruce can fix those.

Not being active and bustling around is so hard for me. Feeling like I want to nap all the time is just yucko. The problem is that if I nap, then I can't sleep later. Last night I kept waking up every two hours, probably because my throat was so dry.

SO I will end this whine-fest. Hope y'all all have happy turkey days!!

This is a family gathering in about 1972, in Atlanta. From left, me, my aunt Diddy, Mother, cousin Terri, cousin Frann, Bruce with his lip poked out, and my uncle Bob.

A Traditional Thanksgiving - NOT

Every year I get pissed off with my brother because every year during the holiday season, he just tells us the day he's coming - like "tomorrow afternoon." That could mean 1 p.m. or 4 p.m. - or most likely 7 p.m., which is not afternoon AT.ALL.

Mother is mad at me because I am mad at Bruce. Every year there's this mini-drama at our house.

We never have a "traditional" Thanksgiving at our house. Never have, never will. OMG- maybe that is why we ARE typical Americans.

So here are some of our own peculiarities:

There will be no snow. We will most likely be wearing shorts.

We will have a small turkey, and all of us will smother it with gravy and dressing because none of us like it particularly. Our turkey is a tiny thing, poached. Forget getting up at 5 a.m. or basting ANYTHING. That's not how we roll.Sometimes we just buy turkey and ham from Honeybaked Ham, if we can fight the crowds.

My mother doesn't do "stuffing." We have DRESSING, here in the South. And it's always made of cornbread, celery, onions, etc.It ROCKS, Elva's dressing.

We don't do sweet potatoes. None of us like them, except I like sweet potato chips. I may have a few chips, in a small nod to "normalcy."

We don't make green bean casserole.

We don't watch football on TV. Ever. Sometimes I watch a parade, for 5 minutes.

Often, we go to the movie. It's usually not crowded. We may be the only ones in the theater who speak English, but so be it.

We don't have 20 relatives eating with us. This year it will be just Bruce. I have a cold, and I feel yucko, so we're not up for inviting anyone. Sometimes we invite friends.

In past years we've done some Thanksgiving gatherings in the mountains, but not recently.

We put the tree up the day after Thanksgiving, usually. This year Michael has wrestling practice, so who knows when we will get it up, but it will be within a few days of Thanksgiving. Mother and Michael like to get the tree up early. It's artificial, so it won't dry out and turn into a fire hazard.

I used to envy people with more traditional Thanksgivings, but not any more. If I want to, I can slop around all day in pajamas, and play with the dog, and eat chocolate. My bed head may last all day. Nobody cares.

On Thanksgiving morning, Michael and I will have cornbread crumbled into milk and nuked until warm. That's a great tradition dating back to my childhood.

Y'all drive safe to grandma's house...

This was made in 2007, and was Michael's first Thanksgiving ever. That's my uncle Bobby in the red shirt.

Cornbread

Michael had a dermatologist appointment this morning, so I had to get in my 6 hours at work all afternoon. It occurred to me if I was going to get home around 6:30 or 7 I was not going to feel like cooking.

So I called Mother around 1, and we discussed putting corned beef in the crockpot. Michael did the heavy lifting and Mother supervised.

I should mention that the other day when we were grocery shopping and I picked up this little corned beef, Michael said "I don't like corned beef, Mom!" I assured him he could just eat one slice and it would be fine.

When I started home from work I called Mother. Michael was playing tennis. She said Michael had done a great job, and the corned beef was done, plus green beans and beets.We cook our corned beef in red wine with several cloves of garlic and about half a cup of soy sauce.

He was waiting on me to get home and make the cornbread. We make two kinds, the traditional southern kind and what some folks call "hoecakes." Mother asked Michael which he preferred. He answered her very seriously; "You just can't ask me to make that decision." LOL

At dinner tonight he ate two big pieces of corned beef, and I lost count of the pieces of cornbread. He also ate a ton of beets, and green beans. Russians are fond of beets. (FYI - Southerners are fond of green beans that are soft and cooked with side meat.)

Don't give me any crunchy green beans. Ack.

Don't put sugar in cornbread. Double ACK.

For all cornbread, hoecakes, and corn muffins, we use Lewis Grizzard's mama's recipe:

1 1/2 cups White Lily self-rising cornmeal

1 egg

1 cup buttermilk

2 heaping spoonfulls of Duke's mayonnaise

pinch salt

YUM.

PLUS...

Every time I hear the word "cornbread" I think of this song. It makes me hungry to listen carefully to it, though. Warning! You will want to go to your mama's house and eat if you listen to this all the way through.

 

Good news at the doctor's office - Mike has grown 3/4 of an inch since August! YAY!