Year One

Year Two

Year Three

Year Four

Year Five

Year Six

Year Seven

Year Eight

Year Nine

Year Ten

Year Eleven

Year Twelve

Year Thirteen

This is the final blog in the series.

Jr. High is usually the time when most kids become interested in the opposite sex.  For Teddy, I did not notice much of a change. That’s because he has ALWAYS liked girls.  As young as preschool he would tell me about the girls he liked.  This has continued throughout his school years.  There has never been an “icky” period.  I worried this would be a problem when on the first day of kindergarten he ran out of the classroom telling me he wanted to invite a particular girl to his birthday party.   “Ok, bud.”  I said, wondering if he was aware his birthday was six months away.  “You met a nice friend today?”

“Yes,” he said, “I like her face.”

Skip ahead a couple of years to third grade when he and I were playing a flash card game. One card had a letter on it and another one had a category. On his turn Teddy had to name “something hot” that started with a particular letter.

Well, the letter he picked just happened to be the first letter of the name of a girl he liked.   He got a look on his face and I just knew exactly what he was thinking.  No, I thought, he’s nine.  There is no way his mind would go in that direction.  Sure enough….”I’m gonna take a risk,” he said.  And he said her name and collapsed into a fit of giggles.  “I can’t believe I said that,” he shrieked.  “Mom, you know I was thinking of the other kind of hot, right?”  Dear Lord child, yes, I knew you were thinking that kind of hot.  It’s what worries me.

Later on he was still talking about it as if he were embarrassed. “Teddy, it’s ok that you like girls,” I said, trying to reassure him.

“Good,” he replied, “because I do!”

Modesty came late for him and as I have already outlined, he was comfortable speaking freely with me.  So because of his transparency about girls, I was not expecting any embarrassment or discomfort when around 5th grade I handed him The Book.

Nope. I am NOT talking about the Bible.

“Here buddy,” I said as I handed him The Body Book for Boys. “Check this out and read the first chapters. We can discuss any questions you have after.”

Suddenly I witnessed a reaction I hadn’t seen since I made him eat chicken pot pie a few years prior.

“I don’t want to read this! I know everything! This book is stupid!” I stood dumbfounded observing the weeping and gnashing of teeth.

I tried to be sensitive. I tried to minimize things. Honestly, this book was the EASY stuff! Body odor, body hair, self-esteem, friendship.  It didn’t even cover the awkward parts.

He was not having it. I gave him space. I went back to revisit. Nope. It wasn’t going to happen. I told Ted he was NOT READY.  Ted decided I just hadn’t done it right.

SIDE NOTE:

Right now you are probably wondering why I didn’t have Ted present him with The Book in the first place.  Well, mostly because I am the primary caregiver.  I had found that up until this point he had shared more with me than with his dad.  Secondly, as you will soon see, when Ted DID make his attempt, things didn’t go so well. I won’t say I had a premonition this would happen but…

So when Ted became annoyed with me and decided to take over, he strutted confidently into Teddy’s room. The man of the house would take care of this.

He was gone and back in under a minute. “He doesn’t want to talk about it.”

No kidding. Well at least you tried your very best in that 45 seconds.

Later that evening when Ted and I tucked him into bed we made one last attempt.  Except the book was nowhere to be found.

“I hid that book where you will never find it. I hope I forget where it is and one day when I’m a grown man I’ll find it and say ‘Eww!'”

About a year later we did find it. It was in the pocket in the back of his armchair. I didn’t even know that chair had a pocket.  And I wish I could say we never spoke of it again, but that would be a lie.  In fact, by then he had attended the Robert Crown puberty presentations and we had already discussed everything.  And I really wish I could share THAT part of the story with you because that part has so many laughs (and a few tears); unfortunately, that’s more of an NC-17 post and I’m afraid that’s not the kind of blog I write.  But if you ever see me and ask, it IS the kind of story I will tell in person.  😉

PS. Like me, he either has no problem sacrificing himself for a laugh, or is self-assured enough to share his funny and embarrassing stories. Either way, rest assured, he gave me full permission to post this story.

Above: This is 14.

Top: Each year on his birthday I take a picture of Teddy in one of Ted’s old button-downs to see how he’s grown.  Some years are startlingly different from the next.  Others I have had to peer at closely to see what was on my bedside table or which comforter we were using for clues.   Although I wish I had picked a different background that was less subject to change and poor lighting, the gist is there.  This is the metamorphosis of my first-born.

This is a reprint of a Facebook post I wrote last year when my sweet boy turned 13. 

I have been looking through old pictures for days. I have been irritable. I have been sad. Teddy asked me twice last week, “Mom, are you going to cry on Friday?” Friday came and went and I did not cry. Yet I was still irritable and still sad.

Friday my first-born turned 13.

I didn’t post about it. I didn’t know what to say. What can you say about your tiny, sweet-faced child suddenly turning into a young man before your eyes?

This has been a year of growth for him; physical and emotional. He is tall. He is lanky. He finally has more hair on his upper lip than I do. He has random pimples he won’t let me touch. He puts his dishes in the sink when he’s done eating. He has polite conversations with adults and makes eye contact. He sometimes wears JEANS instead of track pants!! He showed me a science presentation on magnetism that I hardly understood. I barely know who this kid is that is living in my house.

Everyone tells you the same things: The days are long but the years are short. It goes by so fast. Enjoy it while it lasts. Eye rolling clichés. But all true. Wasn’t it just yesterday that he was listing the names of all of the Thomas the Train engines? Weren’t we just taking mom and tot tumbling class at the Rec Center? What happened? How was I not ready? Why is it so hard to remember those years we spent together, just him and me?

I have been looking at things in terms of years now. Three more years until he is driving. Five more years until he goes away to college and probably never comes back to live at my house permanently. (Okay, we are Greek so that last one might not be true. He may be back until he’s 30 and then that will be a whole different post.)

My Teddy turned 13 on Friday. He doesn’t need me to tuck him into bed anymore. He doesn’t need me to make him a snack. He doesn’t even remember the names of Thomas trains anymore. We took off the cars and trucks bedding and exchanged it with a sports theme. He’d rather be spending time with his friends than with us.

I wish I remembered each and every minute we spent together. I look at the pictures and I wish I could go back and revel in all the moments. The good ones and the bad ones. The thing is, very rarely do you sense you are experiencing one of those moments while you are in it. It’s the reflecting that punches you in the gut.

My sweet boy turned 13 on Friday. And things will never be the same.

This is a reprint of a Facebook post I wrote three years ago.  Teddy turned 14 on February 23rd and I struggled to write something meaningful that I hadn’t already said in the past few years. So I decided to repost two of my past entries because they still seem significant, timely, and entertaining.  I’ll post the next one tomorrow.  I hope you enjoy.  As always, thanks for reading.  

Eleven years ago YESTERDAY my water broke. Of course we called all the requisite people to let them know there would be a baby soon.

“I’m gonna win the pool” my brother-in-law stated.

“Ummm..noooo…you picked TOMORROW as the day” I replied.

“It could happen.”

It was 9am. To this day I blame him for my 15 hours of labor. I hope he enjoyed his $20.

Like any true Greek girl my biggest concern of the day was eating. The one thing I did remember from the countless books and classes was that once we got started there would be no food allowed. I should eat. Should I eat? What should I eat? They won’t let me eat! I’m starving! If my dad were around he would have said (like he always did to me and my sisters when we complained we were starving), “You girls could go three weeks without eating and you’d be fine.”  Clearly this “new age” idea that dads had an influence on daughters’ body image was not for him.

Midway through a day of nothing but boredom, Ted exclaimed with a sigh, “I’m so hungry!” I don’t think I need to explain what happened next, but unbelievably it ended with him bringing a hearty meal back to the labor room and eating it right in front of me.

The day passed with nothing happening and the hours drifting by.  They gave me pitocin and nothing happened.  I had an epidural and nothing happened. Shift-one nurse left and shift-two nurse arrived. Ted decided to risk his life again by complaining at about 4pm that he was “tired.”  One look from me and he realized that if he wanted to be alive to see his child born it was a good idea for him to just stop talking altogether.

Things finally started to happen when the second nurse left and the head of the Gestapo arrived. Third-shift nurse was terrifying. Apparently she thought that by screaming at me that baby would come out faster. When she raised her hands and they were covered in blood like some sort of horror flick she finally decided it was time to call the doctor.

“Looks like we’re going to have to do a C-section. Your hips are just too small for a baby to come through.”

Hips. Too. Small. Was I delirious?

Woo hoo! I have small hips! Can I get that in writing please?

But then the cold chill of reality hit. No, not that I was going to be cut open. But that my hips were small. INTERNALLY. I was not “big-boned.”  Which could mean only one thing about my hips EXTERNALLY: My dad was right. I really could go three weeks without eating and not starve.

Panic set in. A C-section? This was not in the plan. I had at NO POINT considered a C-section as even a possibility. My sisters’ had seven babies between them and hadn’t even needed epidurals. For crying out loud, one doctor had actually told Chris to reach over and pull her own baby out! Why did this stuff only happen to me? First braces, then glasses, now this!

I looked at Ted and shouted “They never told us what to do about a C-section!!”

“Yes they did. You just always skipped over those parts in the books and videos.”  Dear Lord, did he really just say that? This man was either the bravest or stupidest man who ever lived. I vowed right then and there to raise my new son differently. He will NOT make stupid comments when his wife is in labor or at any other time of his marriage.

It was 11:35pm. This doctor had 25 minutes to get this baby out so Bill would NOT win this pool and come out on top. Well, obviously it took longer. And I’m sure that at this point I am supposed to say that “all the bad memories of the day were wiped away.” But as you have just read, clearly they were not.

But what I will say is that he was beautiful and perfect and worth the day and every horrible and wonderful day since then. Happy birthday my dear, sweet, sarcastic, must-have-the-last-word first-born: This is the story of your birth.

Okay…maybe not silently.

If you know me, then you know my disdain for poor grammar.  I realize that makes me sound snobby.  I will even concede that there are times when I am not always perfect.  But I try, readers. I try very hard. ( I also realize that just writing a blog about grammar is going to trigger some of my journalist/writer friends who can have whole conversations about their loyalty to the Oxford comma and how to sign your name on a Christmas card).

I also have a hard time refraining from correcting others. My mom was an English teacher and it shows.  What is interesting is that while my mom was teaching me that “forte” is pronounced “fort” not “for-tay” (Yes! Unless you are referring to music, this is really how you are supposed to say it!), my dad was asking me to make him a sangwich or hangabur. I once saw a list he made where he spelled breakfast “breakface.”

I am the person other people roll their eyes behind.  I’m sorry.  I like English and writing and reading and grammar and all sorts of things to do with language. Here we go…

Language: Grammar

This topic comes up for me especially around Valentine’s Day. It is amazing to me how many grown adults say Valentime’s Day. I do not understand this. I do not understand how educated and intelligent people say things like “supposably.”  Supposably is not a word, no matter what Joey from Friends thinks. After you read this blog you may be disoriented but I guarantee you will not be DISORIENTATED. (By the way, spell check on this entry has been a nightmare).

“I should of ordered an expresso.” Actually, you SHOULD HAVE ordered an ESPRESSO…. so you DIDN’T look like a DUMBASS.  “Him and I will have the orange sherbert.” Nope. Him won’t be ordering anything I’m afraid. Especially a SHERBERT. How about a SHERBET instead? Listen, it is never ever ok to say Him and I.  Never ever ever. I don’t care what Halsey says. I mean, it’s a catchy tune, but a GRAMMATICALLY INCORRECT catchy tune. Conversely, don’t throw in an “I” just to do it. “He wanted to take Jill and I to the store.”  Nope again. I’m sorry. You don’t sound intelligent you sound like Jethro trying to fit in around Beverly Hills.

Language: Corporate Speak

This is something that has gone too far. Can we stop with the corporate speak?   It’s annoying to me and I don’t even have a job where I have to endure it every day.

Circle the wagons? Dude, you make $200K and work in the Willis Tower, you don’t even know what a wagon looks like.

You have to get your ducks in a row?  What exactly is this a reference to? Carnivals?  Are we going hunting?  Does PETA know about this?

Ping her.  This one is my favorite. I mean, come on.  Is ping that much faster to say than text? Did we really need an alternative? Aren’t you just trying to sound cool at this point?

Low hanging fruit.  This makes me imagine something low and hanging all right but it’s not fruit. I can’t even say what it is in this blog.

I STILL don’t know what “put a deck” together means. For some reason, I have this vision of Isaac and Gopher on the Lido deck shuffling cards.

Don’t tell me something isn’t in your wheelhouse.  Just tell me “I’m no good at that.”

Brick and Mortar.  Fancy fancy fancy.  I mean, really? How many of these executives know anything about actual construction? How about just saying “building.” Plus, I just confuse this with pestle and mortar.

B to B?  Back to Bed? Bed and breakfast? Who knows?

Do you know how long it took me to understand that my friends who are in high level corporate jobs were not actually operating at Sea Level? Or were working in a Sea Suite at their company?

When did bandwidth become a word for the general public and not just for the Nick your company computer guy?

Let’s think outside the box..why? What’s in the box? WHAT’S IN THE BOX?!!

Language: Regional Dialect and Laziness

Now, I realize that some mispronunciations are just regional idiosyncrasies.  I have lived in Michigan, Boston, and Chicago; and everywhere is different.  After a couple of years on the East Coast it’s very easy to pick up what I refer to as “lazy speak.”  I started leaving the “r” off of a lot of words because it was just easier. Whatevah.  Whenevah.

I never realized Michiganders had an accent until I lived in other states and people started pointing it out to me.  (I mean, let’s face it.  We are not known for our accents.  You’ve never seen a SNL game show skit about the guy with the hilarious Michigan accent.)  We are hard on our As and smoosh a lot of words together in our own lazy way. garage=grage    mirror=meer   did you=didja  clothes=cloze

In Michigan we go to the bathroom.  In Chicago they use the washroom.  We drink Faygo and get beer at the “party store.” In Boston they drink soder and get beeyah at the packie. Shockingly, you can only order a Boston Cooler at a Michigan Dairy Queen.  I dare you to find it elsewhere.  It’s Vernors pop (Yes..we say “pop”) and vanilla ice cream.  When you ask us where we’re from, we show you on our hand.  Not because we want to, but because we know you expect us to.

We all wear different things on our feet: Chicagoans wear da gym shoes on der feet. Michiganders wear tennishoes.  Bostonians whair wicked awesome sneakahs.

But the biggest difference I’ve seen is how natives give directions:

Giving directions in Michigan: 

Go down Woodward and tayka Michigan left past tha Coney on tha corner.  It’s right next tah Krogers.  It’s about 10 minutes away.

In Boston:

Take a hahd right at the rotary and go pahst the Dunkin Donuts.  Bang a right. 

In Chicago: (except I still haven’t figured this place out yet) I’m in pink:

Hi.  Can you tell me how to get to Jewel?  

The Jewels?  Sure. Take the Eisenhower east—-Okay wait.  Which one is that?  Is that 88?  Can you just tell me the numbers?  I don’t see that name on my map anywhere.   No. That’s the Reagan.  The 290 is the Eisenhower.  Take that about 5 miles.  Okay..like how long is that?  Like when do I know when to look for it?  Is that like five minutes?  No, maybe like 45 minutes? Five miles will be 45 minutes??!!  Yeah.  You gotta go through the Hillside strangler.  There’s a bottleneck.  After you get off the exit go south. Can you just tell me which way to turn?  Is that a right or a left?  I don’t understand “south.” Well the Lake is east. OK which lake? THE Lake!! Ok ok, but there are a lot of tall buildings and I can’t see THE Lake.  Well, first find the Sears Tower.   You mean the Willis Tower?

Thankfully, I have adjusted after 20 years here. There are phones with apps to tell me where to go and where to park. I get to live vicariously through my kids during their English and Reading homework.  It feels like home.

And the corporate speak? Ted uses it often in basic conversation. I find it amusing but also annoying. It just seems a bit pretentious.  But what am I going to do? Ask him to stop? I mean, it’s irritating; but quite frankly, it’s not the hill I want to die on.  🙂

*Clarkston, Michigan.  Home. 

“I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12.  Jesus, does anyone?”

                                            —–Stand by Me

Who decided that our soul mate has to be a romantic partner? Besides my sisters, I can count on one hand the women in my life that I know will be with me forever. No matter what. Time. Distance. Circumstance.  These four women are the people I consider my soul mates.  I see them as an extension of myself.  A reflection back to me of who I am; and usually the best of who I am.

Everyone has that first best friend.  If she’s still there when you’re 50, consider yourself lucky. I don’t remember actually meeting my first best friend.  She went to my church, which in the Greek community means she was basically family by that fact alone.  We grew up together. A girl with only brothers that became the fourth sister in my family and spent many a night at my house.

When you are 10 or 12, your best friend is your lifeline.  Adolescence and puberty suck, and you need a partner to help you get through it. She was that lifeline for me. We talked about boys, complained about our parents, borrowed each other’s clothes, and went on fad diets together.  We hung out in my bedroom waiting for our favorite song to come on the radio so we could record it on our cassette players.  We argued about who was going to marry Rob Lowe, put Sun-In on our hair, and listened to the same REO Speedwagon records over and over.

We took care of each other in complementary ways.  For as sheltered as I was, my upbringing was nothing compared to her protective immigrant parents.  I taught her all the things a girl who was going through adolescence should know. She taught me how to cook and clean.  Well, not really.  But she tried. She did once make an entire dinner at my apartment so I could pass it off as my own to my boyfriend at the time.

She was one of six people in the room when my mom died.

Your first best friend is like your first love.  You just never forget the details. That girl has stuck with me forever.  Soul mate material.

Coincidentally, I met another Greek girl around this same time also at church. Our grandparents are from the same village, which is a big deal in the Greek culture. I have laughed more with this girl than probably anyone else I know.  Something always seems to go awry when we are together.  When I am with her I know to buckle up because something crazy is going to happen, most of which I can’t print here.

But I don’t discount fun as a less important part of my life.  Our escapades have revolved around some of my most important and influential life events.  And she was there to experience them with me.  The formative things that happened to me before I was married, most of them involving faith and friendship, all occurred with her by my side. We have seen the best of each other and the worst.  We can share the most embarrassing things with each with no judgement.  There are occasions in my life that only she would understand because she was there.   And when someone shares such significant events with you, that is a bond that cannot ever be broken.  Definition of soul mate.

Believe it or not, I actually have some non-Greek friends, too!  On the first day of Jr. High as I was walking to class I noticed a really cute boy in the hallway.  I mean REALLY cute.  Enough so to say to a random group of girls in the classroom, “There is a completely gorgeous guy in the hallway!”   Well, a petite, talkative, extroverted girl went running to check him out and suddenly exclaimed while laughing, “THAT’S MY BROTHER!!!”  And at that point I knew we just HAD to be friends.

Her family became my family.  We spent a lot of time at her house, and hanging with her mom and dad was as normal and fun as hanging with my mom and dad. This one I put on a pedestal that she doesn’t think she belongs on, but she does.  She is always happy.  Always. She adjusts to everything with ease and never feels sorry for herself.  I have never heard her complain once.  She is the example of what your life can be like if you have a grateful and positive spirit.  She is radiant inside and out.  And years ago when I was going through a hard time, she dropped everything and left her three kids to fly across the country to take care of me.

See? Soul mate.

Although I am book smart, I am not so common sense smart.  And on that same first day of school, I realized I didn’t know how to open my locker. Luckily, a freckle-faced girl had the locker right next to mine. Instead of asking her to teach me, for the first few days I just waited for her in between every class so she could do it for me. This is how we became friends.

This one has been with me through everything.  She is the one I admit things to that I don’t even want to say out loud.  She loves me more than I love me.  She sees the best in me.  She makes me feel like I’m worth something.  She ALWAYS knows what to say.  I just feel better talking to her.  And as I struggle to impress how significant she is to me, I can only assume this is because our relationship is such a part of my survival that I can’t even write about it.  It’s like trying to write why your mom is important or why you love your children.  Words cheapen it.  All I can say is she makes me feel safe.  And isn’t that how you would describe a soul mate?

I am forever grateful for these four women.   Through the ups and downs of life, and the friendships that come and go, these girls have been a constant for me.  And I’ll be honest, there is something special and comforting to me knowing they knew my parents.  Because how can anyone really know you if they’ve never known where you come from?   These girls know ALL of me.  And even with all of that, they still love me.

Oh, and in case you were wondering…that brother? Still gorgeous.