Tales from the Steppes

2006-09-29

10:07 a.m.
Friday, September 29

With one wish
we wake the will within wisdom.
With one will
we wish the wisdom within waking.
- Dead Can Dance

I got to be the big blue meanie last night. The EM wanted to go off with a friend for part of the weekend but I was not happy with where her grades are, so I said no. She negotiated the SU to an "it's ok with me if it's ok with your mother", pointing out that staying home for the weekend will not fix the past. While this may be true, it did not change my assessment of the situation, so I got to "ruin" my daughter's weekend. I did the mom thing and point out to her that it was not I that ruined it but her. Somehow I think my words were wasted, yet I felt compelled to say them.

I have been trying some new tactics with the EM this year and the results are mixed. Basically, I am removing myself from as many points of conflict as possible. She is responsible for her homework and her grades without my interference. Unless her report card looks bad and then we will be right back to my helping her manage things. Every night. So she has incentive to take responsibility for her schoolwork.

The EM is also responsible for getting herself to dance class with all of her stuff. I am not involved at all. No arguing that she wants to go play. No more am I leaving work early to pick her up, only to find her not ready. So far this has been going quite well. She takes her various dance things to school with her every day but Thursday and walks to her new dance school after the school bus drops her off. If she has time before dance, she does her homework or reads a book. Often she will wait for me to pick her up after work or she can take a bus home. No more arguing, no more me leaving work early to sit in traffic driving to ballet. Woot!

The other thing I have been doing is more of a long term strategy. It completely pushes my buttons when I am talking with someone and they start getting wound up and upset. I can see and hear it building up - the voice gets higher and louder, the body language communicates great tension. It can be a casual conversation but the other person has gone into the spin cycle because they do not like something you are saying. This is the EM when she is unhappy. And then she is no longer talking but squeaking at me, like an overgrown hamster. It becomes a full-blown drama scene. Bugs the living shit out of me.

So recently, I started singing opera back at her. Ok, opera-esque - this is me singing we are talking about. Whatever she shrieks at me, I sing back, dramatically. "I hate you! I hate you! You're ruining my life! How can you do this, do this, do this. To me?" The MM and YM find this hilarious and have no qualms about joining in. Pretty soon, even the EM is laughing at the spectacle and there is a little less drama in the world. My hope is that if I do this enough, she will realize how silly she sounds and try modulating her tone without my (slight) exaggerations.

I also get less irritated at the situation than I used to. It is hard to say how much of my annoyance comes from listening to her noise or being annoyed at the fact that I have allowed this to irritate me. One of my most cherished self-delusions is that I do not have that many emotional buttons. Experience has taught me that this is a complete crock of shit but yet I choose to delude myself. Hence my irritation at the reminder of my falsehood.