Are You Crazy?

It doesn't bother me when people ask about our having a large family, but I've never quite known how to gracefully answer the question, "Are you Crazy?"  Mostly because I like being a bit flippant and saying, "A bit, yes."  It throws them off. 

But there is a real answer to that question because I understand what they are really asking.  They see the dollars, the size, the weight, the laundry, the homework, the schedule, the everything.  I don't blame them.  Absent the actual experience, I'd be scared too.  I learned about 4 children ago not to think about the loads or the work or to call it difficult, not because it wasn't the reality, but because calling it thus poisoned my spiritual well and made doing the labors involved in serving these people much harder.  So I tell myself, this is simply what is required.  It is baseline.  And whenever it gets to be too much, I know it is time to focus on individuals, rather than groups.  When I do this, I resee my own children as the ages they are, the stages they are, the individuals they are and I get stories. 

For example:

Two days ago I took my youngest son shoe shopping.  We were in desperate need of new tennies.  I'd been rather bland about it, picking out some solid blue with Velcro straps.  My 4 year old walked over to the display and pointed at the Spider Man and Iron Man sneakers.  The eyes of Spiderman light up.  You can guess what we wound up buying. 

Yesterday my third grader son proved that we made the right call in enrolling him in Cub Scouts. He wore his uniform for school picture.

This morning I brought donuts to my children since they would have to have a morning babysitting as my middle son had baseball and my husband was at work.  I'd thought that I ordered every one's favorite, including two plain glazed for the youngest two to eat.  When my 20 month old saw the other non plain options, she spiked her boring donut on the floor and reached out very definitively to select her own, a frosted vanilla pastry with sprinkles. 

My teen got asked to homecoming in the following fashion.  A boy ran up to her in the lobby of her high school.  "Do you want to go to homecoming with me? I'm a freshman. I'm 15."  She said yes.  He said "Great, see you there!" and left. She does not know his name. 

My kindergartner went to a birthday party today. She knew it started at 2:30. So at 1, she started staring at the clock.  "Change clock! When are you going to change? It changed Mommy! It now says 1:04.  Is it time now to go?"  This went on minute by minute until she was distracted by the need to wrap the present. 

I love these sorts of little stories that bubble up in the process of living.  I also love that they are all as unique and singular as the individuals in them.  Part of why we have all these stories is we have all these characters and the interplay and weaving of their thoughts and talents and interests and even their flaws make for the ebb, flow, drama and grace of raising a family.

They may be work. They may need a lot (and they do), but they also create a lot of memories. The labor is a service and all service is love. So the next time someone asks me, "Are you crazy trying to raise that many?" when they hear I have ten kids, I'm going to say, "I'd be crazy not to."  Then' I'll add, "but a touch a crazy helps too."

I said that?

“Don’t put stickers on the car door!”


“What are you doing?” to a teenager stuffing an entire tortilla into his mouth in one swoop.


"Why are these here?" asked upon finding six dixie cups of frozen water that now adhere to the floor of the freezer. 
“Please, give me the hammer back…Now!”

There are sentences that need no other explanation in the civilized world other than to say, “I am a parent.” Usually, they translate as imperatives that for all sentient beings, would never need be spoken.

Yet I have begun collecting them as samples of what my offspring require to survive 24 hours in my care. While on the phone with my brother, I heard similar utterances from him at his three children. “Put that down! Stop running into the window!” I started to laugh until I had to shout, “Don’t sit on the baby!” Now it was his turn, but we both recognized conversation was impossible and hung up.

My friends started giving me samples too. "At least it's non-toxic." My sister said as her beloved 2 year old sampled playdough. 

“Who told you you could color your arm purple?” from a kindergarten mom. (It was picture day at school). “It’s a free dress day. I don’t have to wear my uniform.” was the child’s explanation.

My personal favorite was “You made dinner?” from a mother who said she’s still finding sauce stains in her kitchen from her fifth grader's experiment.

What is unsaid and unexplained about raising children often transcends what stories are told. Part of the omission is from personal shame. We can’t explain why our child had a three gallon water bottle in the middle of his room. We asked. He didn’t want to get up in the middle of the night to go the extra five feet to his bathroom sink to get a drink. We still don’t understand. 

Part of it is the dim recognition that too much truth may be unbearable. Yes, she colored on the piano with a permanent black marker. Yes, he hid dirty clothes in a drawer until they fermented. Yes the toddler took a bite out of a tomato because she thought it was an apple and spiked the offending vegetable onto the newly clean floor. The amount of labor and property damage in those three sentences alone may be enough to doom the human race if universally disseminated.

When I asked my mom about these sorts of odd phrases that were coming out of my mouth as correctives of my children, she laughed. “I told you about that when you were a kid...” “What was that? Mom? Hold on. Sweetie, stop squirting the instant mop on the wooden floor. Don’t pull your brother on a towel…” “But Mommmmm, we were playing sled.”

"What was that Mom?"
“See dear, you just weren’t listening.” My Mom answered over the phone.

It may be a dodge, but it’s a good dodge. I’m keeping it for when my kids have kids.

P.S. Today I said, and meant with all my heart, "Don't throw the cat at the chandelier." Son was tossing his beanie baby in the empty dining room and it got stuck. It's like they're secretly reading these posts!