Jen is a work-at-home mom, parent to three, and she’s been a stepparent for over 15 years. She is well-equipped to discuss and write about the great, and the not-so-great, details of all-things-parenting. Along with spending quality time with her family, Jen enjoys music, chocolate, camping,relaxing and laughing!!
Eighteen years later, I still remember “that skirt”.
My mom saw a gypsy-like skirt while we were shopping at the mall, and she fell in love. I clearly remember my mom’s adoration of this beautiful garment, and her unwillingness to buy it.
“It’s too expensive,” she said. “It’s not really ‘Me’. No, I just can’t. It’s too much.”
Teri Hatcher, actress formerly of “Desperate Housewives”, wrote a book titled, “Burnt Toast: And Other Philosophies of Life”. In “Burnt Toast”, Hatcher referred to something Moms especially fall into: Giving others, namely their children, the “good toast” while eating the “burnt toast” themselves. And furthermore — somehow feeling like a “good Mom” for sacrificing the good toast to their loved ones.
I think of “that skirt”, replay the scenario in my mind – my teenage self, wearing cheerleading tennis shoes that I needed twice a year (costing twice as much as that skirt), mouth full of braces (worth 50 skirts) and a name-brand outfit on, no doubt. I’m sure we continued on that day to buy me another outfit, or three, while my mom passed on “that skirt”.
Her Burnt Toast.
Aspiring to teach my children balance and promote self-esteem – as you are, too, and every parent under the sun — it seems obvious that I must avoid burnt toast on principle alone. I must show that I am worth “good toast”, thereby teaching my children that they are, too.
Ahhh, the beauty of parenting: Even improving myself somehow ends up being for the children. And, alas, as all parents know: Sometimes, we eat burnt toast. Sacrifice is somehow, mystically and wickedly, attached to parenting. We want the best for our children, and often find “the best” worth sacrificing our time, money…our Selves.
But I always wonder – as my children look back on me, will they remember me only eating “burnt toast”?
Will yours?
My Mom, who deserves skirts in infinite numbers — not only as a mother, but as a grandmother, friend and female, always learning …Thank You. For eating the burnt toast sometimes, and sometimes not.