Saturday, March 26, 2011

And...I'll see you guys Friday.

Just so you guys know, I probably won't be back in the Blogosphere until Friday. If you could all promise not to post anything until then, I would love you forever. But I know that my wish is in vain. Which means I will be spending most of Friday trying desperately to catch up on everybody's posts and leave comments.

It's okay.

Am I tell you why I'm going away? No. Padawan and I are just going...away...for a few days.

I'll be back to my bright and bubbly updates after I return, I expect.

It is not a vacation. That's not until June. Or maybe July. Or September. I don't know when our vacation is. We haven't really discussed it.

I'll leave you with a story.

My mother and father desperately wanted a son. My sisters and I are the result of four pregnancies, only three of which were successful. The fourth pregnancy wound up being her last. It ended in a miscarriage that left her unable to have more children. They were stuck with four blond haired daughters and no hope of ever having a son.

Daddy tried to make the best of it. All the things he wanted a son for he tried to do with the four of us. Learning to play baseball was the first thing he tried when the twins were four, I was five, and Relly was six. Let's just say his dreams of putting us on a Little League team turned to ashes in front of him when he realized none of us could pitch, I was too afraid to catch the ball, Relly couldn't swing a bat to save her life, and the Twinkies preferred to try to catch bugs than to actually pay attention to what he was trying to teach us.

When he tried to teach us how to ride bikes he met with better success. The Twinkies and Relly took to it with ease. I was...a disappointment and a failure. Family bike rides would never be possible because I could only go forward in a straight line, and my breaking ability was...not great. However, I could put a slipped bike chain back on with no trouble.

That inspired him to teach us about cars. Relly and I learned basics like changing tires and the difference between the transmission and the engine but the Twinkies refused to go into the garage to learn anything because it smelled bad and "cars are dirty." 

Then he moved his attention to building an Olympic Swim Team. (Yes. That was seriously his goal.) It broke his heart that none of his daughters were strong swimmers. We were slow, awkward, and complained of being too cold within an hour of getting into the water, no matter how hot it was on those Florida days. But he moved from Swim Team to Diving Team.

Huge problem.

  1. I was afraid of heights and refused to jump off of even the low dive board.
  2. Relly would jump off of the high dive, but she wouldn't do it head first in a dive.
  3. The Twinkies would not consider jumping head first off of anything. 
Next Daddy tried basketball, though it was becoming very clear that none of his beautiful children were athletically inclined. Amazingly, though, all four of us took to basketball with surprising ease. We found it interesting, fun, and despite our height challenges (we were all small and undersized for our ages) we played well.

That was that. Daddy was going to train us to be in the WNBA. We would play in middle school, high school, and get full ride scholarships to whatever colleges we wanted because we would be that awesome. It had taken him five years, but he had finally found something he could do with his daughters that he would have done with sons. 

The only obstacles to his dreams were our weekly asthma attacks in which one or all four of us would be rushed to the hospital for breathing treatments, which were held in what I would always call "The Metal Room." (For years I thought The Metal Room was a dream, a horrible nightmare created by my young mind in my childhood. It wasn't until recently that I asked my mother about it, and she explained that The Metal Room had been a real place, and that I had always fought the doctors when they tried to put the ugly green mask on my face.)

To Daddy's excitement, though, the four of us grew out of our asthma, and I really think he would have kept going with it if he and Mom hadn't started having really awful marital issues. When he finally left and we didn't follow, Mom sent us to Texas with Memaw and Papaw, and only the Twinkies stuck with basketball. I migrated towards track in middle school. Somehow I had inherited Daddy's running ability, but that was a short lived glory. My heart problems will forever bar me from any sports. Relly played volleyball for a while, then tried cheerleading, (we'd both done peewee cheerleading for Mom's sake when we were five and six, but it hadn't stuck because I hated standing outside in the hot sun cheering them to GO! FIGHT! WIN! Beat to the win! WHOO!) and finally settled on Band and gave up Athletics altogether. 

Brat and Wheat stuck with Basketball through the end of their Freshman year of high school before giving it up because, let's face it, it was really hard to be an Emo Kid and a sporty blond. Also, the other girls on the team were pretty bitchy and kind of stupid. 

Daddy was disappointed that we all left the world of sports, but he was mollified when Relly and I took an interest in music, which was something we could share with him. Wheat and I also showed a talent for drawing and water colors, which we also got from him. Brat...well, she didn't really stick with anything. No interest in music, art, or sports she was his biggest let down until Wheat eloped and married a man Daddy hates. 

I think over the years he got over not having any sons. If it had been that important to him he would not have remarried a woman who had three daughters and was also incapable of having children. I think he's pretty satisfied.

12 comments:

  1. Have fun on your not vacation.

    I am right there with you on the Dad wanting a son thing. I'm the oldest of 4 girls and my father desperately wanted a boy. As it was he takes me to the shooting range, another sister does archery with him (I got twanged one too many times-that shit hurts!), the other he goes fishing with (I have no patience for that nonsense) and the youngest did softball when younger and basketball through college. He's a happy man all in all and we try and be as into his interests as possible. I don't think he has any regrets now.

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  2. Hurry back. I do hope this is a pleasure trip and nothing bad is going on.

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  3. Jewels, thank you.

    You have to feel really sorry for Dad's who want boys and wind up with girls. You know they just sit their blaming themselves while they're trying to make it work since men are the genetic deciding factor in whether a child is male or female. At least you and your sisters succeeded in picking up sports. I'm happy you guys found your balance.

    Asha, it's not a pleasure trip, though I will be resting up which is good. It's not necessarily bad, though. I'll be back on Friday. I promise.

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  4. My dad got 3 girls before he got a boy, and was disappointed when that boy ended up not being into sports AT ALL. About 6 years later he got another son, who does sports, but is of the personality type that seems to think: "Yeah, that was fun, but I've been there and done that so now I'm moving on." Then came my youngest sister who is WAY into soccer. Go figure. However, my dad is all about his daughters. Yeah, we're all pretty awesome. :)

    I hope you'll be able to get some good rest, wherever you're going. Get back safely, and we'll be here on Friday.

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  5. You got to drive out to the desert and bury the bodies. That's fine. I know how it is.

    I've had places like "The Metal Room" you mentioned, places that I thought I dreamed about when I was little, only to find out they were real.

    As you most certainly and obviously know by now, I have a daughter. I think it's great. I never once felt like I'd rather have a son. Not that I would have minded having a son, of course. But I've never really understood this male preference for having sons. Well, I understand it, I guess; I just never felt that way at all.

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  6. P.S. We'll feed your fish while your gone :D

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  7. Cars are dirty.

    It's funny not one of you turned out as a tomboy. You figure the odds would turn out at least one tree-climber.

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  8. I've tried living up to other people's expectations of what I could be and do and it never worked out. Not I'm fairly content with who I am and if other people are disappointed, oh well. A great man once said "I yam what I yam and that's all what I yam." That pretty much sums it up. Enjoy your down time, dear. I'll try not to be too prolific in your absence.

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  9. So even despite my current affair, yours is one of the blogs I still checked daily. Even if comments didn't get posted. Now I have nothing to read. Feel free to come back before Friday.

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  10. Enjoy your non-vacation. We'll be here when you come back. Promise!

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  11. My parents wanted a girl. The worst thing is when they tell you what they would have named you: damn you, "Laura," damn you to hell.

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  12. Candice, pshaw. Sons are so overrated. Who needs a lot of sons when you can have beautiful daughters who will typically not lose their minds after puberty and try ever stunt possible. We girls are SO much better. Plus we smell nice.

    Bryan, I'll never tell you where they are. Never.

    I'm glad I'm not the only one on that count. My sisters don't remember it at all.

    Seeing that I am not male and and don't like children, I do not understand the thing either. I could understand King Henry. He wanted sons to pass the throne to because at the time women were considered weak and unintelligent and not fit to rule. But today? Nope. Can't fathom the importance. As I said, girls smell better.

    And thanks for feeding the fish. I was worried they would starve.

    Doug, you're right. I'd never thought of it before, but one of us really should have been one. Statistically it would have made sense, especially given the fact that he tried to make us like boy things. I guess I was the closest to a tom boy. I collected baseball cards with a passion. That counts, right?

    Darev, that's a very good way to look at it. Popeye was a smart cookie, wasn't he? So much better than the morals cartoons teach today. Which is no morals because children today are mostly too spoiled to care about morality. It's good to be yourself, though.

    Ms. Jenna, I'm sorry I did not come back earlier. I am flattered that you check my blog daily, though. Whoo! I promise never to do this again...until I actually take a vacation. But then I might try the whole post via e-mail thing. Or phone. Or something. I'll experiment.

    Johnny, oh my gosh. They told you they were going to name you Laura? I've never asked my parents what they would have named me if I was a boy...I'm going to call my mom and ask because you've made me curious. You know, in an alternate universe, Laura was born. I'm sure she loves you.

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