Day: April 29, 2007

I was angry a lot during the past week. The schedule was tight and I felt a lot of pressure to keep everyone moving so nothing got missed. Children, even older kids like Kiki and Link, run on their own schedules. For kids examining the worm on the sidewalk is just as important as getting to school on time. They would dawdle and I would yell trying to usher us all from one activity to the next.

Today at church there was a lesson on anger. Mostly it was a class discussion on what anger is, what causes anger, and what we should do about it. I really needed the reminder that my anger is my responsibility. Anger is a red flag that something in my life is out of balance. I may not always be able to avoid getting angry, but when I do I should pay attention to what made me angry. In the calm after anger it is my responsibility to figure out what stresses in the situation triggered anger. Then it is my responsibility to try to restructure so that it doesn’t happen that way again.

There are environmental situations that contribute to anger. I am much more likely to be angry and irrational if I am tired. I get angry more easily of the house is a mess. If my surroundings are chaotic I frequently feel overwhelmed and anger comes more easily. There are preventative measures I can take against these things. It is not always possible to prevent all the triggers, but I need to prevent as many as I can as often as I can.

There are specific behaviors from my kids that always make me angry. For example me announcing bedtime and the kids either acting like I haven’t said anything or running away from me. The kids have free agency. I can not prevent them from choosing bedtime-avoidance behaviors. However, I can make sure that I announce bedtime in the least provocative way possible. Giving a five minute warning can make a world of difference. I can also choose a calm time to sit down with the kids and explain to them how frustrated and angry I feel when they ignore me or run away from me. They may still run away and I may still get angry, but at least then I will have done everything in my power to prevent the anger.

When I am angry I have a responsibility to channel my anger into acceptable paths. No matter how angry I am at the kids, I should never hit them to relieve my feelings. I do not think the kids understand how tempting it is to wallop a child who is defiant or oblivious. The anger swells inside me and a horrible voice in my head says that if I just hit them then they’d have to pay attention. That voice wants my kids to fear me when I’m angry. No matter how angry I am I can not let that voice dictate my actions. The same voice would settle for me calling my children hurtful names, but I should not do that either. Deliberately hurting another person does not solve the problem. It worsens the problem or creates a new one. No matter how angry I am, I have to remain in control of these voices in my head.

When I am angry what I must do is give myself the space to calm down. It is so hard to walk away from a situation that feels so urgent. Sometimes I can’t walk away, but if I can, I should. I always find better ways to manage situations when I’m not angry. Even if I can not physically walk away, I can still take a few deep breaths and try again for calm.

Even if I do everything perfectly. Even if I’ve had enough sleep and the house is clean and I’ve prediscussed things with my kids, there will still be things which will make me angry. I have to see the anger, identify the anger, do something about the anger, and then I have to let it go. This last is most important. One of the biggest triggers for angry outbursts is carrying around a load of unresolved anger. I do this a lot. I will be frustrated about a problem with my computer and then Patches will ask me for food. He then gets yelled at for making a reasonable request. I should never do that to my kids, but I do all the time.

During the lesson today my backyard neighbor offered the comment that she comes from a yelling family, but she is working hard to make sure that the yelling stops with her. She wants to control herself and find other ways to manage her kids than yelling. She then used me as an example of a person who manages kids without yelling. I was so flabbergasted by this that I laughed out loud. I feel like I yell at my kids all the time. I feel awful about doing it. She saw my laugh and said, “Sandra does better than she thinks she does.” It makes me feel good that she says that. It makes me feel humble. I don’t believe she’s right, but I hope that she is. I hope that I’m doing better at keeping my temper than my subjective observations would have me believe.

I have a responsibility to these young people who are mine to raise. I have to strive to be my best possible self at all times. Fortunately my kids seem possessed of a boundless supply of forgiveness. Each time after I’ve lost my temper, I go to them to offer an apology. Always I discover that they have already forgiven me even before I asked. I am humbled that they love me even when I’ve been awful.

So I begin this next week with resolve. I will be better this week than I was last week. I will be kinder, more patient, and less angry.

Hairdos:
Gleek has recently become much more interested in haristyles. I think this is in part because she is growing out her bangs and unless we fix her hair, they are constantly in her eyes. One day she fixed her own hair. She took a head band and plunked it on to her head sweatband style. Her hair was mushrooming out above the band and there were some straggling pieces of bangs hanging over the front. My offer to help her fix it was vehemently rejected. In fact I got to watch as she removed the headband and then painstakingly duplicated the hairdo while explaining each step in detail. I studied the final product again and realized that the style she had achieved was very anime.

On a different day I was the one fixing Gleek’s hair. But I had to follow her exact instructions. She instructed me to put two little ponytails in the front. These effectively kept her bangs out of her face. Then she had me put two larger ponytails in the back. She proudly displayed the style to her dad, who as a proper daddy, admired it. He then whispered to me that she looked like a squid. She did a little. Of course she also looked like a girl from an anime movie. She loved the look and wore it to school. I’ve yet to allow the mushroom-headband thing out of the house, but it’ll probably happen sometime. Next thing I know she’ll be asking me to dye her hair blue.

Shakespeare:
Last week I got to attend two Shakespeare plays put on by Kiki’s 6th grade class. The plays, Macbeth and Much Ado About Nothing, were both seriously abridged. Unfortunately the truncation and the delivery of the lines rendered the plays all but incomprehensible to the grade school audience. I’m familiar with both plays and I still got lost. Gleek, Patches, and Link all got to watch with me. Fortunately I brought snacks and activities too help them sit still. They did love the slapstick bits. They laughed with hilarity for those. Shakespeare was a smart man to put the silly bits in with so much weighty conversation.

I didn’t care as much for the slapstick. I found my entertainment elsewhere. I watched all those self-conscious 11 and 12 year olds saying these lines and doing their best to mean them. It was particularly amusing to watch the dancing scenes. A dozen kids stomped out a waltz to the mellow tune of Christofori’s Dream while trying not to actually touch their dance partners. Also amusing was the moment when one boy came running in to announce the murder of King Duncan. He shouted “Oh Horror!” in tones of delight. Howard and I were hard put to not burst out laughing.

It is amazing to me that, despite my amusement and confusion, I still enjoyed the experience. The magic was in the excitement of the kids performing. Each and every one of the performers had spent hours learning the lines for 1-3 parts. They’d also all provided their own costumes. They spent weeks practicing blocking and gestures and light effects. They begged and borrowed props from parents, siblings, and neighbors. They had put in so much time and effort. They loved being up there performing. They were nervous and some of them forgot their lines, but they were there and they did their best. When time came for curtain calls I clapped my hands numb. I wasn’t clapping for the play. I was clapping for the performers who deserved every clap. None of those kids who performed will ever forget the experience. They will forever have an affectionate attachment to both Macbeth and Much Ado About Nothing. Because they love two of Shakespeare’s plays, they may learn to love others. I am so glad that Kiki got to be part of this performance. I’m so glad that the rest of us got to go see it.