what's cooking?

I’ve realized a few things. They’re not big things, but I’m at that point where I just say to myself (mainly): I think I get it.




What kinds of things? (I’m not assuming you want to know, but I’m going with this theme and continuing) Here are a few:



I’m getting older and my MRI’s are looking a lot worse with every birthday.




Not that I didn’t know this-but I’m not superwoman. I get tired and I have to pace myself. It doesn’t matter that I could do it in the past, what matters is-whatever the subject, I can’t do it anymore.




Because I’m not perfect and not superwoman-I’ve also realized that I don’t care if those around me don’t like that I’m no longer putting myself in situations where I will wind up exhausted.




I’ve realized that all those years that I tried to do “it all”; the results were that while I did the gamut of being everyone’s everything-I was the one suffering the outcome. Plus, I heard a lot of “well, then why did you do it?”





I’m not talking about any particular incident or subject either-just the usual types of things like trying to deposit my kids to their various sports practices in different parts of the valley (at the same time of course) while loading up a carload of day care toddlers into their seats and then get back in time for their parents to collect them. Then reverse the whole darn thing and re-collect my children.




Or the yearly family religious (okay, our version of religious) dinner event where I spent half of the night serving food and the other half cleaning the hand painted china and good silver, etc. Then would get up at 5 to work an 11 hours day/week caring for all those toddlers. I had no hands or feet left, but do it I would. I usually did it with the help of a bottle of Mobic and Darvocet-but that was beside the point, evidently.





And all those years that I went around cleaning every single nook and cranny on a weekly basis (and sometimes more)only to have someone (be it animal or human) throw up on whatever it was I just polished within an inch of its life.




Of course, there are other efforts that I’ve buried in the very back of my brain-and I’d just assume leave them there.




I’m not being cranky, really. We all do all of this stuff. But have any of you ever asked yourselves why you continue to do it?



A decade or so ago I did. It was after a particularly grueling Seder. My mom, bless her looked every bit of her 70 years, my dad was exhausted and in pain, my brother-in-law, sister and husband were also sitting there like “dead ones” and I’m sure I looked as bad as I felt. Then my husband’s mother-who in all nearly 20 (at that time) years of knowing her and had NEVER helped lift even a fork except to put in her mouth, looked at us (as her son was about to drive her for the second time in a day back the 65 miles to her then apartment), looked at us and said “you all look like hell”.




Really? Ya think old woman?




After she left, I looked at my parents and said very quietly: we can’t do this anymore. Let me rephrase, I can’t do this anymore. It’s too much work. Especially since you refuse to even consider paper plates. I’m going to suffer for the next 2 weeks mom and so are you. The kids didn’t really help and I don’t want to hear a comment from that woman again. It’s up to you of course, but I’m out. I will not be doing this again.





After that-my husband and I made sure that our annual anniversary getaway coincided with Passover.





Also, the “old woman”-I have decided that after the way she’s treated her son and our daughter, my best way to deal with her is to realize that she’s not worth dealing with. This does sound harsh, but she has alienated EVERYONE and the only reason I have anything to do with her is not for her, but for the man I love who needs support and help.




Sometimes, during the course of my latest round of “realizations” is that what I’ve come to realize the most is that I don’t really need to prove anything to anyone.