The new season of American Idol is once again upon us. Idol time, for my sister and I, was “mommy & me” time with our mom. She was pretty much house bound for the last few years of her life and TV and her children and grandchildren’s visits were her main connections to the outside world. For five months, from January to May, my sister and I would engage in lively weekly discussions over our Idol picks with her. I remember timing my trips last year to NY to I include an “Idol night” so we could sit and watch together.
Mom is not with us this Idol season, and neither is Simon. How mom loved listening to “that Simon” as she used to call him. Everything about this Idol season will be different for my sister and me, but one thing that will never change are all the precious things that our mom left us with.
There are certain things a mother teaches her daughters and though at times she exasperated my sister and I to no end, we came to realize that she was teaching us how to raise a family and become moms ourselves. Out of all the lessons my sister and I learned, I think the one that stands out as being the most important, is that our mom taught us, by example, how to love our children unconditionally. As mad as mom made us, or we made her, she never turned us away from our home or used her love as emotional blackmail. It was there, no matter what.
She drove my sis and I crazy always wanting to know where we were. If we didn’t call for a few days, the one of us who DID call would hear “I don’t know where that sister of yours is!” My sister and I always used to joke about who’s the “good” daughter this week. (Mind you we have two brothers, but she never asked us where they were!) I remember one time sitting on the beach with my sister and her iPhone rang with Mom’s picture on it and we looked at each other and said, “Who’s gonna answer?”. Neither of us did, cause we knew in two minutes my iPhone would ring next with her picture on it! Sure enough. We laughed as I answered, “Hi mom” and the first words out of her mouth were “I don’t know where that sister of yours is!” and how all three of us laughed when I told mom she’s sitting here next to me on the beach and we knew you’d call me next, if she didn’t answer. My sister and I led busy lives working full time and each raising two little kids and at times, we just didn’t think mom understood that.
We thought, she’s being unreasonable about us not “checking in” daily with her. Didn’t she get it that we had ballgames, homework, groceries, dinner, bathtime, etc. all after a full days work? Didn’t she know our day didn’t end until well after midnight as we washed that last load of laundry because one of our daughters just had to have that certain pair of jeans for school the next day? Didn’t she get it that we need to sit with our husbands and discuss the schedule for the next day or there’d be a major breakdown in our household if one of us couldn’t go to see our child play in the game the next day? Not to mention the amount of school paperwork that came home everyday and you were a bad parent if your child arrived the next day without the correct number of toilet paper tubes necessary for the class project, the cupcakes you promised for the party, or the permission slip that would make your child the only one in the whole school not able to attend the movie, etc.
Ahh…but she knew. Mom knew alot more than I imagined when I was a young mother in my thirties, thinking I could do it all. The phone would ring at 10 am on a Saturday morning. I’d drop the vacuum cleaner, jump over some moved furniture, kick off my sandals and tip toe across my wet kitchen floor to get to the phone. I’d pick it up and hear, “Hi Lin, what are you doing?” I’d scream into the phone, “What do you THINK I’m doing?” Then I’d start in – the kids, the house, the money, no time, I’m tired – and just as I got to the tired part, the tears would come. Mom never got mad at the mean way I just treated her. When I was done, she’d say what she always said, with such quiet confidence, “Such is life and Lin, it will get better,” and it was better – even before I hung up the phone. I’d replace the receiver and go back to my vacuuming with a different feeling. I’d tic off my tasks for the rest of the day and fall into bed at night happy and accomplished, because there are things only my mom knew.
I cherish the “idol time” and “Idol talk” I shared with my mom last season. I’m just arriving at the acceptance of her passing, after a few hard fought months. (during which I almost killed off my own family, and owe them a huge thank you for their patience.)
Now I can sit among the things she left us, pick them up and use them to be a better mom to my girls. No matter what they throw at me, I will always stand firm for them, and hope they will learn from me and my mom and pass this unconditional love on to any children they may have in the future.
I dedicate this blog to my sweet sister who sits with me this Idol season and shares with me the memory of this special “mommy & me” time. I love you, sis.
And so, as another day goes by, both Mom and Simon are gone, my sister and I will be okay, and…I have written.
It really is genuine that do not determine what we now have got until we reduce it, however , it’s also true that and we don’t determine what we now have been lacking until eventually it comes.