Experience

"Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted." - Italian Proverb

Boy do I have alot of experience! What I want to do now is figure out how to translate those experiences into useful tales for my children. Sort of the African American mother's version of Aesop's Fables. Sometimes there are morals, sometimes not. Sometimes I just feel the need to make a point.

I have met 22 year olds who have multiple children and a phlethora of baby daddies. And still they have no idea of their self-worth. They give themselves so easily. A valium. Lortab. Vicodin. A Happy Meal. In the meantime, they are being observed. There are eyes watching, ears tuned in, examples being set. Then comes the worry that the children will become somehow bad of their own volition. These parents refuse responsibility for themselves or the role they played in the behaviors of their children.

I have tried to sit with these young girls and explain as plainly as I could that the trail they are walking, was blazed years ago. Many have been down that path and many have tried to turn around and go back only to find that they had reached the point of no return. It takes too long to turn them around and after a year or so, it stops being about them and starts being about the children. These young girls don't know that their children love them no matter what is occuring.

Experience has taught me that the dishes can wait, but a child on a sled is right now. Even in this economy, children would rather feel that you love them more than your job. So when you walk out of the house or drop them off at daycare, look remorseful, no matter how happy you are that they're not in your life for the day. Remember who gave birth and that the responsibility lies with the parents. Us caregivers are just here to help make it easier.

Experience has taught me not to leave my children with just anybody. It's not beyond my paranoia to have a background check done. We homesch0oled our children. I couldn't trust that they people in charge were up to the standards that we had set for our family. And besides, people are too nosey. They want to know more about you than you are willing to disclose. This BFF stuff is ridiculous. You've known me 12 minutes and because I've decided to watch your child, I'm now your best friend? I don't think so.

Someone said that youth is wasted on the young. How true. If I knew how my life would turn out, I would have made better choices, much much better choices. At 22 I wouldn't have children and being an "exotic dancer" would not be a career choice. What ever happened to trade school? college? skillbuilding seminars? Did the money dry up once Bush decided to spend 87 billion in Afghanistan?

Save your money. Avoid frivolity. Live like this is the last breathe you will take. Who knows? It just might be your last.