Tag Archives: Humor

Eyerollingmom’s 3 (Foolproof!) Tips For a Happy Marriage

This past year my kids have seen a few surprising divorces happen within their friend circles.

While kids rarely notice, I don’t know, anything? that doesn’t directly affect them, I can tell the unpleasant new normal of these lovely families – families they’ve been close with for years – has left them a bit shaken.

Perhaps I’m overthinking their pensive stares when I shake my head (All. The. Time.) at their father’s TV volume. Maybe I’m imagining their arched eyebrows every time I grunt with frustration when their same father arrives home having forgotten (shakes fist) the one thing I’d asked him to pick up at the store. And okay, it may be possible I sometimes scream-talk too much in front of them when showing their dad a better way of doing, you know, everything.

In the event any of my aforementioned actions are making them nervous about the state of their parents’ union, I feel I need to tell them to relax and ignore the eyerolls.

Calm down kids, I want to tell them, we be good. Yeah, we good.

I’ve been sharing a bathroom with the same man for more than three decades so I know a few things about disinfectants and commitment. When we hit our 30^th anniversary a few years back my better half endured some slings and arrows after I spilled some tea on him (collateral damage being married to a blogger) so I thought as we celebrate again this year, I’d take a minute to look under the hood of what makes us run so smoothly most of the time.

Kids, put down your phones for six minutes and pull up a chair.

Finding a mate is an ordeal. Finding a really great mate is a coup because, honestly, romance is ironic: you need a partner to keep things adventurous (!) and exciting (!) but you also need someone to waft contently with through boredom because (plot twist, newlyweds) there is a lot of boredom in a happy marriage (zzzz). Like, nobody ever tells you one day you’ll reach the level of matrimony where you’re super excited to have a toilet light. See?

Like many, many others I keep my better half around for balance – to do all the things I don’t ever want to do. I need him to run a generator, do the airport runs, work the lawn mower and fix the things (I am a grownup who knows very little about living in a grownup house). The tradeoff: I have to feed him, provide clean sheets and overlook a whole lot of annoying stuff, like the TV volume. Finding a soulmate who will ignore your unreasonable (um, fear of home invasions is hardly absurd IMO) quirks while keeping up with oil changes is clutch. So he gets to stay.

We’ve ironed out a kilo of kinks throughout the years and in addition to the obvious factors (yawn: compatibility, respect, agreed division of chicken wing sections, blah blah blah), I’ve come up with my top three (perhaps slightly unorthodox) tips for a happy marriage:

Tip 1: Spend as Much Time Together as Humanly Possible

*For bonus points, throw in a pandemic and add in work-from-home conditions for (deep breath) both of you.

I know this sitch isn’t for everyone but hear me out. If you follow this rec, there are huge benefits. Not only does every separation become euphoric (Golf with the guys again? Super! Have fun, honey!) but you can now say NO to pretty much everything your spouse asks of you at any given time. I’ve clocked in so much alone time with my husband I don’t ever have to do another damn thing with him ever again if I don’t want to, especially (kill me) errands. Example:

Me: I’m running out to the store.

Him: Oh, you want company?

Me: To Target? No, not now, not ever. See you in six hours. Byeeeeeeeeee.

This is power. Trust me.

Sadly, we don’t have the means to go all-in like the celebrities who are consciously uncoupling into separate bedrooms. This is a great flex and definitely a fun something to bring up at parties but for those of us who logistically just can’t swing that, separating as much as possible (whenever possible) is a very satisfying anecdote for soothing the rage of too-much-togetherness.

Tip 2: Feign Interest. That’s right: Pretend. A LOT.

Sharing interests is (obvs) paramount but there’s a special spark with a partner who can drag you out of your comfort zone. My man is a sports addict. I pretend to like football and I attend one game once a year. He is also a ski fanatic. I pretend to enjoy skiing and I go multiple times a season. I love neither of these silly pastimes.

Now I know my cos-playing the Perfect Wife puts a smile on his face but the down and dirty is that honestly, without his prodding, I would barely leave this house. I’d stay happily home most weekends doing crossword puzzles, organizing closets and scrolling and saving cooking videos I’ll never try.

Without me, he would never attempt questionable karaoke, he’d fail at trivia and he wouldn’t be able to stick to Whole 30. So there.

Throwing each other an occasional bone (fine therapy, call it compromising, whatever) is a mutual win. We make each other’s worlds a little larger when we put on our half-assed happy faces and we never have to admit that sometimes doing their stuff is pretty fun sometimes (shhhhhh).

Tip 3: Pair with a Partner Who’ll Say You Ain’t All That

Listen, I love lounging and living atop the pedestal my fella places me on (have I mentioned he’s super intelligent?). I, in turn, am his biggest fan and most devoted supporter (but never for his impulse buying – legit, that infuriates me). Anyway. We are A-plus when we’re in sync but we have tsunami-level differences all the time. Who better then to tell the other when they’re being less than er, pedestal worthy? If you’re fortunate enough to find a partner whose words you value and trust when you’re both on the same page, it’s probably smart to pay attention to them when they’re (gently, patiently, privately) calling you out for conduct unbecoming.

So kids, rest assured, your folks are good. Plus, we’re a pretty formidable parenting duo (look at all you contributing members of society!) even when we come up short (how did we successfully raise boys who don’t wear baseball hats all the time yet fail miserably at the ‘Cool it with the tattoos’ warning? Ah well, 10 points for Slytherin). Clearly we’ve got continued work to do so we’ll keep stoking the fires.

Will my guy lose his credit card three times a year? You betcha. But is he going to single handedly save Mother’s Day every single year when ~~four~~ three kids blow it? Every time.

Am I going to insist on bingeing Gilmore Girls instead of watching the nailbiter AFC Championship game with him? Most definitely. But will I sit at the Moose Lodge with him drinking two-dollar drafts and playing Keno because he loves it? Sure (I might bring hand sanitizer but sure).

So long as our laughs keep outweighing our laundry piles, we be good.

33 years and counting — onto next year, lovah!

*****

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and has been featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone” presenting her popular essay The Thinking Girl’s Thong and her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series. That said, she still places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements (next would be as the $100,000 winner on that home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as Eyerollingmom/Tina Drakakis on Facebook, Instagram & Threads. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)

London Table for One: Learning, Living & Leaving (or better) Mom Needs a Pint – Stat

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I traveled to another country with my daughter and I left her there.

In the cab on my way to the airport in pre-dawn darkness with her apartment – excuse me, flat — fading from view, I went over the past week in my head. It seemed I’d blinked and suddenly all the planning and problems and logistical hiccups had passed and now it was time for me to go.

Oddly, I felt good. Better than good, I felt calm. Better than calm, I felt genuinely excited for her new adventure. She was going to be just fine.

I didn’t always believe this. Oh, hell no.

In fact, when she asked me to accompany her my knee-jerk reaction was an emphatic NOPE. You made this crazy, impulsive decision, my crushed heart shouted to my brain, I am not helping you with this. I was hurt. She was already living 2,000 miles from home. How far was far enough?

But this wasn’t about me. Knee-jerks aside, I knew that.

She’d accepted a London position within her company and immediately began purging her possessions, returning home to finalize her transition and prepare.

For the first time in nearly a decade she shared our home yet none of our past skirmishes – the hair in the shower, the food under the bed, the sleeping until midday – surfaced. She cooked dinners and hung around with our friends and managed all the details of her departure with a skip in her step. It was as if we both knew our time was fleeting and the petty spats of her youth remained mocking memories.

It was indeed awesome but not without headaches – or facial tics.

For six weeks I bore witness to how a millennial plans things. Fun fact: it’s a wee bit different than how a mom does. As her exit loomed, I became increasingly anxious at all the open loose ends of her international move but she was having none of it. At the risk of having my plus-one status revoked, I zipped it and ignored my growing apprehensions.

I took a deep breath and stole a mantra from my bestie who’d declared, at the start of her very first year as a new divorcee, a Year of Yes: 365 days of saying yes to every invitation, social suggestion or life opportunity that arose. Well, if she could do that, I marveled, sensing my own whine, and put on my Big Girl panties.

I declared this trip my own Week of Yes and went along with everything – and anything – that came up. Despite my daily dread or dogged reservations or downright disagreements with her many decisions, I went with the flow – her flow (Mom, it’s FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINE) – and forced myself to chill out.

We left as soon as her Visa came – without her replacement bank card having arrived yet, without a guaranteed – or signed – lease and without any idea where we’d be sleeping on Night 2.

There were at least a dozen other unresolved open loose ends when we arrived.

She closed them one by one, taking some lumps for a couple of impulsive decisions, but in the end, everything worked out.

I allowed her to adult her way through every obstacle and steered clear of Mom Mode, resisting the urge to whip out a credit card for every expense or offer unsolicited advice.

I forced myself to stay silently in the background, left my phone turned off for the week and became, simply, the weighted blanket in the room.

While she researched and placed calls and signed reams of documents I read and did crossword puzzles and sat in the café chair facing the room like a mob boss, happy to people watch while she did her thing.

The many logistics were overwhelming. Selling all her life’s stuff, moving across an ocean and (oy, don’t get me started) coordinating shipment of a beloved dog was intense – as well as fraught with false starts and wire transfers and problems we didn’t anticipate.

I followed her around all week while she mastered the tubes – both over and underground.

I helped lug all her bedding (via the tubes) back to her place.

I drank as many pints as was necessary to become accustomed to all the neighborhood pubs near her new home address (this task, no surprise, a cinch).

I uttered not a syllable of complaint about sharing tiny beds or rooming with massive spiders (come on Brits – install window SCREENS!) and laughed it off when a lock of my hair hit the ground, burnt straight off using the wrong blow dryer.

It turns out, my calm demeanor proved to be a salve to her frazzled brain.

At the conclusion of the week over some wine, she thanked me for letting her figure it all out without any judgement.

So while I rode away in that cab, I found my initial throat-grip of worry had simmered to a slight buzzing beneath the surface that I embrace pretty much every day for all my children, regardless of their ages. Truly, that’s motherhood. Just another day I suppose.

She’s one of the most competent young adults I know, a rarity, for sure.

But it was still hard saying goodbye.

I tackled a myriad of feelings that week, mostly fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of leaving this tiny and beautiful creature in a place without knowing a soul, fear of everything Keith Morrison and Dateline duly taught me. But I never felt doubt.

I left her with an old photo of the two of us, in it her tiny toddler face radiating with badass confidence and fearlessness and I wrote on the back We Do Hard Things.

Because we do.

And we did.

And will continue to.

From BFFs to Frenemies to Crazy Ex-Girlfriends: Female Friendship is True Love OG

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Happy Anniversary to my best friend!

Today, I’m marrying my best friend!

My best friend said yes!

Ewww. Stop. Just stop. Please. Scrolling through these sentiments always brings up a little bile.

I’ve been with my husband for 100 years and sure, he’s a keeper, but there’s no way he’ll ever be my top seed on my friend list. Father of the Year? Yes, no question. Great Guy 4eva? Absolutely, without a doubt. Party Starter Jazzy James & the Jazz Hands? 100 percent, can confirm. But sorry babe, there’s only so much a fella can do.

Girlfriends are the OG of pure, supportive, true love and if there’s anything more important in a woman’s life than her girlfriends, I’m ready to debate. I mean, spouses are great and kids, yay, but are they ever going to really be interested in how much I saved on those shoes? They ever ask about the coupon? Nope. Have any of them ever immediately answered a 6am text? Do they share in the fury of my white whiskers or my fifteen year-fifteen pound ‘baby’ weight or my frustrating inability to understand crypto? No, no and no. But that’s okay, really. I don’t need them in my corner for all that ~~nonsense~~ very important stuff because I’ve got my girls. I’ve been loving and leaning on my girlfriends my entire life and – can’t lie – I side-eye the gals who don’t.

Before the internet, and before cell phones, and before overscheduling ruined every weekend girlfriends hung around and did pretty much everything – and absolutely nothing –together all day long. Do they still? I often wonder, hopeful that technology, TikTok and the Vanderpumps haven’t annihilated one of life’s grandest treasures: genuine girlfriend love.

In elementary school my friends and I spent endless hours in each other’s basements writing Saturday Night Live skits (because Gilda).

We recklessly threw crooked roundoff back handsprings on our front lawns all weekend long (because Nadia).

We lounged next to oversized speakers on ugly shag carpets listening to Rumours on repeat and planned our (please oh please oh please mom, say yes) co-ed birthday parties for that year (because Stevie and well, hormones).

And we wiled away entire summers dreaming and scheming and lifting each other up. All the time. We created the World’s Perfect Girl, made up of all the best parts of us: Joan’s eyes, Nancy’s legs, Kristi’s teeth, Barbara’s nails, my hair. I may be muddy on the details of everyone else’s attributes but I absolutely remember mine because the absurd irony isn’t lost on me, as I now scoop handfuls of my thinning mop out of my sink every morning. Sad today but my Farrah feathers back then? (chef’s kiss) Epic.

We went on to be junior high friends, whose older brothers bought our beer and got us high and made sure we appreciated the whole album – not just the radio tracks – of the coolest bands.

Then we were high school friends and survived the shared, conflicting and competing distractions that always befall teenage girls that age. Even without the tether of social media to keep us connected, we hung tightly until distant states summoned after graduation. We still check in from time to time.

I struck girlfriend gold again in college, where the random luck of a dorm decision had a serendipitous effect on the caliber of friends willing to join me diving headfirst into sex, cigarettes and other poor choices. Our make-believe adult lifestyle was bound by good times: Friday happy hours that lasted until Saturday, all-nighter cramming sessions on Speed and one memorable season of intramural softball (unfathomable champions, given the aforementioned Parliaments and $2 pitchers but true story indeed).

After four fun filled years we Working Girl’d ourselves into real life and assumed the rowdy tables at each other’s weddings. We all learned how to text while nursing babies and made it into the 21^st century intact. There are godmothers amongst us.

In the course of adulting I’ve continued to add to my female flock throughout the years thanks to a myriad of jobs and neighborhoods and pee wee football and a well-traveled life. Many have settled into enjoyable social connections, but some – those who unexpectedly walked through the door of my mother’s funeral five hours away — cemented into forever status.

Being a grown woman with amazing, authentic friends is one of my greatest triumphs and the most appreciated treasure of my life – it’s also a damn good thing for my daughter to see. My closest friends keep me real and (fine) don’t shy away from calling me the B word every now and then (in my defense, just because my husband thinks I’m a bully doesn’t mean they should chime in but I allow it). Being real works for me.

Keeping real friendships isn’t always easy. Some friendships, while solid at first, do sour after time. Turns out, women have very different expectations of what friendship looks like. Finding girlfriends that share yours is a beautiful and tremendous thing.

From a Barry Manilow concert this summer I texted my girlfriend Kristi to let her know I was crying. She guessed as much. We met in fifth grade, almost 50 years ago.

Last year my Gage Hall girlfriends met for a weekend in the Catskills. Despite the years of divorces and career course-corrections and cancers our affection proved solid nearly 40 years later.

Today, my core group keeps a daily group chat going for dumb things and I love yous and the occasional I hate my husband-kid-co-worker-oven rant. It is the highlight of my day.

My friends know I will never be caught dead at a Paint Night. They know I will sometimes be persuaded to pop a gummy. And they know I will always, always be there to reply to a 6am text, praise the sale price and agree that their husband, kid, co-worker or oven is an idiot.

So I keep them close. Really, really close.

But to all the girls I’ve loved before, I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t an itty bitty piece of me that still does. That’s the best part about the time passing textbook – you can choose to bookmark and highlight the good and leave the not-so-good – the betrayals, the fallouts, even the crazy – right there on the page for the ink to fade away with the years.

“I found out what the secret to life is: friends. Best friends.” – Ninny Threadgoode, Fried Green Tomatoes.

Agreed, Ninny, agreed.

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and has been featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone” presenting her popular essay The Thinking Girl’s Thong and her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series. That said, she still places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements (next would be as the $100,000 winner on that home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook & @Eyerollingmom on Instagram. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)

Kids, In Case of Emergency Um, Find a Printer?

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I recently went on vacation out of the country. As if the stress of wrapping up work, packing, losing 15 pounds and organizing international paperwork wasn’t bad enough, I found panic and anxiety creeping in as the days ticked off to departure.

It was unavoidable: God Forbid mode was setting in.

Now, I’m not typically a person concerned with planes nosediving into the ocean. Quite the contrary. Despite being a fangirl of Lost I keep my faith firmly rooted in engineering and science and pilots. I choose fascination over fear when it comes to air travel (window seats always!) and feel flying generally works out for the majority of us. So it definitely wasn’t that. But reality and what ifs loomed heavy in my racing mind: being in a foreign land – with the time difference a half day ahead in the future from any point – I started to worry. I’ve seen many a Dateline. I suppose a lot could happen. Damn you, Keith Morrison.

I realized quite terrifyingly that – God forbid – if anything ever happened to my husband and me my adult kids would have zero idea about anything. I mean absolutely nothing. Face it. Their generation has lived primarily paper-free, with all their immediate needs and necessities accessible right in their pockets. They’ve barely touched paper money. The idea of a master file of, I don’t know, important documents, might likely be incomprehensible to them.

I needed to get my act together before that passport got stamped.

I shudder at the memory of cleaning out my mother’s house when she was dying. There was stuff everywhere. Papers tucked into nightstands; stacks of mail bound by brittle rubber bands in shoeboxes piled high in the closet; important deeds sprinkled in with toaster oven instructions and my grandfather’s army discharge papers. If her bedroom was her hidden-in-plain-sight salt mine, her filing cabinet was a Narnia wardrobe to decades gone by. Day after day of shredding every phone bill from 1991 and squinting to decipher handwritten notes and faded ink left me adamant: never would my children ever have to go through this nightmare.

So I started off hot. As soon as I returned home from her funeral I went through my own files and tossed out all the junk and nonsense. I have four kids; there was a lot of nonsense. I managed to collect everything of importance into one lone box, hauled my own filing cabinet to the dump and felt pretty good. Then I forgot all about it.

As my trip neared, it dawned on me that none of my kids knew this box existed, let alone that there might be fairly crucial things to glean from its contents. Good grief, they didn’t even know my trusty hiding spot for the spare house key. Ohmygod, I panicked, we might be fkkkkked. I sat down and started frantically typing out account numbers and insurance policies and contacts and listings of bills on autopay and – right??? Who’s kicking herself for never having done this?

I debated who to send my missive, aptly titled, Important Information. Should it be my eldest son? I don’t know. I’m pretty sure he hasn’t paid his parking tickets from three years ago. He might be a fugitive. He was out. My daughter? She still calls her dad when the check engine light comes on and she’s across the country. Let me think about that one. The youngest? He’s finishing college so is technically the only one still living home … but he’s literally in the emergency room getting stitched up from stupidity every few months so that’s a hard no. Forget the middle son. I think he still keeps his social security number written on a tiny scrap of paper in his wallet.

My daughter won the short straw and let me be clear, she was not amused. She reacted to the email immediately.

Why are you sending me this? was her curt response.

Just in case, I replied, adding in a fingers-crossed emoji.

I felt better. My husband asked if I’d also sent any of them our flight information. Bless his heart. As if any would ever track our departure or even have a clue what day we’d return. I finished my doomsday to-do list by writing farewell love texts to all my loved ones, took a deep breath and went far, far away with a little peace of mind.

Spoiler alert, we returned home safe and sound. I have every bit of confidence my daughter never even glanced at the contents of the hot potato email but that’s okay. It was hastily thrown together and (rubs hands together) I know I can make it better.

No doubt my kids will be super excited at the idea of more paper.

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and has been featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone” presenting her popular essay The Thinking Girl’s Thong and her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series. That said, she still places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements (next would be as the $100,000 winner on that home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook & @Eyerollingmom on Instagram. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)

In Memoriam: Waving Goodbye to Resolutions

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I overheard an *expert (of what I couldn’t say) on a morning show the other day. This being the week between Christmas and New Year’s, the program was filled with pre-recorded, blathery end-of-year stuff. Round-ups, Best-Ofs, Top-Grossings blah-blah blah. But I did hear one statement and it’s stuck with me. The mystery expert said focusing so much on a new year and making grand resolutions only indicates that you’re considering the previous year a failure, essentially listing all the things, goals and good intentions that weren’t done.

I liked that.

I think it’s fairly common to do a personal year in review assessment and get a little bummed out at all the negative things that sprung up. I was definitely headed in that direction.

So many amazing and wonderful and awesome and fun times happen throughout the year yet we get to December and only focus on the weight gain or the people that don’t like us anymore or an unfulfilling job or the books we didn’t read. Why is it easier to cling to the bad stuff? Maybe because it’s the ugly stuff that keeps us up at night. It’s so, so wrong.

We’ve got to allow the good stuff to linger longer. Keep that dopamine flowing, people!

I’m going to start here. I’m turning my resolutions into respect.

My resolution of I’m going to write more this year (I only wrote five original pieces this year; for a creative soul, this is crushingly disappointing) is changing to Girl, you only wrote five things this year and one of those was nationally published! That’s 20% of all your shttttt! You go!

My resolution of I’m going to get to the gym more is changing to Girl, the weather was so great this week you hit your 10k steps every day without ever having to walk into that sweaty nasty-ass building! Boom!

My resolution of I’m going to eat healthier this year is changing to Girl, look at you! You tossed out way less from that produce bin than you did last week! Ca-ching!

Things like that.

And instead of bemoaning all the sad things that got me down this year I’ll give a beautiful eulogy to all the things that left me:

Gone: Another Kid to Adulting

I know I yapped up a big storm when my next kid was flying the coop this summer. I was looking forward to his new adventure as well as my own. The update on that humble brag is that most days life is actually super quiet and tedious as an empty nester. So many things are different: cooking, not running the dishwasher, sleeping with the bedroom door open. It really kinda sucks. But those days pale in comparison to the moments when I see the pictures of the roommate Sunday dinners and the visiting friends hiking together and all the adulting at work that NEVER happened under my roof. It’s making our upcoming family vacation all the more special since we’re all coming from our different corners to be isolated together for a whole week. CanNOT wait.

Gone: A Zillion Friends

It’s all good, we’re all throwing dirt on this coffin. This was my year for going from Being Friends to Being Friendly with a lot of people. Maybe it has something to do with the Slo-Mo Death of Facebook, something our kids have known all along, but which adults are a little slower on the uptick. To quote a friend, “Ugh, my Facebook feed is super boring now.” Yep. Gal, that is universal. Now that we’ve all deleted our once-submerged-but-now-surfaced political kook friends, and multi-level-marketer pals and the randos we only connected with after our high school reunion, we’ve all come to the realization we really do prefer an intimate circle of people who genuinely care about us. We are all in good company on this one. Being friendly can never be considered a bad thing.

Gone: My Self Respect

I became a fangirl of the show Sex Lives of College Girls this year, which is funny because I am neither a college girl nor even a mom to one. I boldly do not care. My husband, who will watch eight uninterrupted hours of football or Steely Dan documentaries, expressed concern but I still don’t care. The show, having zero to do with my actual life, cracks me up and that’s that. This has subsequently rekindled my obsession with Mindy Kaling (you know her from The Office but I know her as Girl Boss of All the Things). I listen to her books while walking and binge The Mindy Project reruns every night because I laugh out loud. My biggest absurdist dream is that one day Mindy Kaling stumbles onto my work and discovers I’m almost as funny as she is, so every now and then I tag her in a tweet and pray that she notices. Shame, out the window.

But my devotion to Mindy has unwittingly brought me a gift. As the days turned darker (damn, New England, you be grey!) I’m laughing more now. I’ve switched from true-crime podcasts to humor memoirs (laughing aloud while all alone keeps people at a distance-another bonus!) And I’ve found that laughter does indeed boost my spirits. So when I miss my kids or the air outside is frigid or I’m sad about my sister I turn to the funny to turn things around. My husband now joins and we sit, bingeing and laughing together and momentarily forgetting it’s just the two of us. It’s nice.

So while I won’t be making any resolutions, I’ll try to be more mindful of the bad takes I could definitely kick to the curb, not because it’s a new year but because I’ve realized some habits are draining me (looking at you, SCROLLING). Really, how necessary are the endless stoooooooooopid video reels of people cleaning toilets and throwing blocks of cream cheese into crock pots and folding sweaters the right way gahhhhhhhhhhh! Just. Stop. It. Getting sucked into the vortex of wasted time is one major habit I am definitely going to work on.

So Happy New Year friends, but more importantly, Happy Old Year! We’ve had 365 days of smiles, tears, hellos and goodbyes. How lucky we are to experience all of it!

(And Mindy, if you’re reading this … call me!)

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and has been featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone” presenting her popular essay The Thinking Girl’s Thong and her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series. That said, she still places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements (next would be as the $100,000 winner on that home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook & @Eyerollingmom on Instagram. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)

Outsmarted by Mom? Pfft. Always.

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My childhood played out in the 70s and my adolescence was fine-tuned in the 80s so despite a legitimate fear of the ocean thanks to fictional cinema, I grew up a genius.

Okay maybe not an actual genius but definitely brilliant – especially compared to my kids at that age. Diplomas aside, I’m sorry, what in the world happened to street smarts?

I grew up knowing things. Cool things. Important things. I could Name That Tune in three notes. I could get anywhere with directions taped to my dashboard (because my friend’s neighbor’s cousin had just traveled there so I knew which Sunoco station to pass then make the next left). I knew precisely how fast I’d have to run home to make curfew for every minute I’d chosen to overstay my good time. I’d mastered public transportation by age thirteen (that was just sink or swim – seriously, whose parents were driving them anywhere?) The things I didn’t know I just sort of figured out, usually by spying on the older kids making out under the street lights.

My kids most definitely could never have swung a covert six-hour road trip to a Genesis concert at the Syracuse dome without GPS OR alerting any parents. They wouldn’t know how to stash two friends in the nearby bushes while hitching to a movie (ooh, big disclaimer here: kids, do NOT try this today. There wasn’t any crime back then and no internet to scare us about it if there was, so this reckless act would definitely not be considered brilliant today). Our refrains of the Reagan era remain to this day: How are we even alive or better, Did we even have parents?

When one of my sons (birth order has been redacted to protect the humiliated) graduated high school he texted me at work to ask if I had a template he could use for his Thank You cards. Wait, wut?

A friend told me her son sent cash to the DMV to pay his $400 speeding ticket. The worst part? They actually accepted it so now he thinks his mom’s a nagging lunatic that needs to chill out.

Another’s kid peeled out and sped away from the police after being pulled over – then he forgot to turn off his headlights after he’d successfully ducked into a random driveway down a side street.

Good lord. Am I the only one with concerns?

My kids fully acknowledge my stealth upbringing ruined them. Getting past me with red eyes or minty breath? Not a chance. Skipping school? Fuhgeddaboudit. They were doomed from the start.

They can keep their TikTok; I will forget more in my lifetime than my kids will ever learn.

Good thing they’ve got itty bitty computers in their pockets. If only those were ever charged.

***

Worse Than The Mean Girls? The Angry, Angry Adults.

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I have been trying my damnedest to turn away from negativity but I’m finding it no small feat. It would be a lot easier if nastiness wasn’t (accurately) everywhere but it seems it’s become the norm to express anger the moment it’s felt. Have keyboard, will spew. It’s insane. And getting worse.

The spewing has been gaining in momentum and rising in vitriol for years. How have we not managed to reel this in? How is there still so much bullying going on?

When I appeared on Trading Spaces the producers emphatically warned: don’t go onto the internet. Of course I did and it was awful. The message boards were brimming with horrid comments and insults because why, total strangers found good fortune? What in the actual hell. That was 2003. Almost 20 years ago.

I recently watched the amazing Amy Schneider’s thrilling run on Jeopardy (who? give it a Goog). I just read that she, too, was counseled to do the same and in fact, went so far as to delete all her social media accounts for the duration of her record-breaking reign. How sad.

Clearly we have not come a long way, baby.

It used to be we worried about our kids being bullied – or worse, being bullies. My daughter was a victim back in eighth grade. That was 2008. Not physical (thankfully) but traumatic all the same. While I was alerted at the start, the other parents were only brought into the loop days later – after confessions were tied up in a neat little bow and receipts for vandalized possessions were printed.

At the time I thought more about being the other parents and getting that call out of the blue. Can you even imagine? I would’ve been distraught.

I think about years ago when my husband worked for a real pompous ass (I know…who hasn’t, I digress). One night we channel surfed onto a national news program reporting on a hazing scandal at a prestigious prep school nearby. It was worse than bad. (Think locker room, cocky jocks and (sorry) bananas. Horrific.) One of the perpetrators was the son of the pompous ass boss. Seriously. I couldn’t help but feel utter devastation for him.

Our kids have always had the ability to change the direction of our lives on a dime with One. Stupid. Move. One poor choice. One thoughtless act. As parents, all we can do is brace ourselves for the unexpected and try to do our best to keep things on the right track and pray that common sense prevails. We’re not masters of the universe though. Kids are still being horrible and social media has ignited an entire breeding ground of cruelty. It’s an anonymous wild west of venom and a whole new playing field of warfare. We get that (prayers to parents of emergent tweens. Shudder).

But adults are bringing unkindness to a whole new level.

Remember when the worst display of adults behaving badly came from contempt shouted from the bleachers? (*Sighs wistfully) Those were the days.

I’ve written about this before but it’s only gotten worse in the years since that posted.

I had a recent piece published on a national platform (wait, what, you missed all my shameless plugging? Fret not! It’s right here ). The gist was simple: closing chapters on friends that no longer reciprocate affection or attention. That’s it, nothing earth shattering. It was a personal essay, not a declaration of my opinion of politics, air fryers or, worse, Yellowstone. Yet – holy fkkking shtttt, – out came the villagers with torches. Incredibly (in the you have GOT to be kidding me file) most of the naysayers were men who apparently have a lot to say about female friendship.

Seriously?

Staaaaaaaaaaaaaaaap.

What in the world motivates grown-ups to be negative and nasty? Even if a person comes across something upsetting, aren’t there enough kitten pictures out there to ease that temper and turn that frown upside down?

I don’t have a proclamation for my soapbox and I certainly don’t have any solutions (actually if I could brag I’d admit I’m actually in pretty good company: I just saw my good friend Ty Pennington come out with guns blazing over his body shamers) but I wish more people would just stop typing.

Or at least use a dictionary.

Excuse me while I go find some puppy pics to go with this post.

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and recently was featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone.” Her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series yet she places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements. (Next would be the home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook. And @Eyerollingmom on Instagram. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)

A Momoir, Chapter 13: Covid Edition (or rather, Still Not Skinny)

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I started this pandemic the same way everyone else did. Well, obvs not everybody. I mean, I never ranted about wearing a face mask or crazily demanded my right to get a haircut but hey, ‘merica. Like many, I settled in for the long haul and tried to let go of the things that were entirely out of my control. I bid adieu to my colleagues, embraced the return of my college kids and (the worst) said sayonara to my shoes. I stayed-in-place like a good little girl scout and stopped caring about a lot (A. LOT.) of stuff.

Instead, I decided to use this quarantine time to reset. From the get-go I committed to focus on two things: gratitude and improvement. I wanted to see a difference in myself when this was all over and (well, have we met?) sure, make a splash and pop out of a cake at the end of it a better, greater version of Me. Skinnier, blonder, vegan? Who knows, but, dammit, I was going to be ready for my before-and-after close-up when this was behind me.

Well this long haul has turned into a Saturday night Easter vigil mass with four children in tow (ever been to one? Here, little nine-year-old, hold this lit candle for … awhile… GAH, only once friends, only once) – in other words, no end in sight — so here we are.

Since this pandemic is so very far from being over I decided to document a quick update.

I am currently in my fifth month of working from home and (plot twist) am neither blonde nor thin and if you know me (#bacon) will never, ever be vegan.

But I think I am better.

For starters, I haven’t faltered from feeling grateful. I’ve been grateful since Day One, if solely for bypassing that Nightmare that was Homeschool. Holymotherofgod did I dodge a bullet there. Not a day has gone by when I haven’t thought about the remarkable teachers and parents forced to reinvent the education system as we know it and whispered thanks daily for escaping that terrifying ordeal. God bless you all who did the homeschooling thing.

I was grateful for my job, my family’s health, my abundance of leggings (thanks, Steph) and my secret love of being a homebody. Sheesh, I could’ve written that viral piece of Gen X/1980s kids thriving in the seclusion of a pandemic. Stay at home? Keep yourself entertained? All the time? Joke’s on you, life: been there, crushed that. I was all in. Our nightly family dinners returned. My kids were, well, around more. Life became simpler.

Gratitude was a breeze.

So I got busy improving.

I stopped bothering with make-up and started reading — more books than I’d read in the past five years.

I stopped cutting my bangs (sorry, Marie Osmond, you’re left to carry the torch for our 50+ cohort) and started wearing Birkenstocks (I know, right? Ladies, lock up your husbands).

I stopped mindlessly checking my phone and started doing more crossword puzzles (but yes, fkkk those Friday ones. I threw the damn book away when those were all that was left and switched to another).

I stopped driving (once a week only, for groceries) and started walking 10,000 steps a day. When that became normal I shot for 15. Then 20 (again, still not any thinner so wtf but *sighs* we don’t have time to unpack that).

As the world’s pandemic fears morphed into a global awakening to racist injustice I committed to becoming more educated and turned to the people I admire most in the world for guidance: my kids.

I began listening to what they were listening to. Started reading what they were reading. Started watching what they watched (not entirely true. I will never watch that Avatar cartoon no matter how good it may be).

The podcasts getting me through my monotonous daily paces turned political, and I switched from true crime to Trevor Noah. And Pod Save America. And the NYT’s The Daily.

On television the void following my obsessive Outlander binge (oy! 5 seasons start to finish! Droughtlander here I am!), suddenly filled with Netflix documentaries. Stunned to my core by the appalling injustice of 13^th^, I was equally stirred by the peace depicted in Woodstock. The parallel themes of countercultures triggering dramatic change are an eerie nod to our present day cultural discord.

I wandered from the once-fluffy, now-fanatical Facebook and found my way back to Twitter and Instagram, where I started following educated and interesting people that have opened my eyes enormously. (No offense Facebook but you have become the Vortex of Aging Negativity and while you were fun for a while and I do still enjoy seeing the lives of my real (not faux) friends … let’s say there’s a reason the young people never really climbed aboard.

When the shocking behaviors of the country’s racist, caught-on-camera Karens started turning my stomach, I became obsessed with the Internet Detectives, the online superheroes who deftly and immediately expose each atrocious offender by publicly posting their names, addresses, license plates…. (I fanatically love this and cannot lie).

So sure, I’ve been ballin’ but my personal eat-pray-love renaissance hasn’t been all meditative serenity and yoga poses. Please. Far from it. With a son working as an EMT, there’s been a steady stream of mom-worry. I miss him. Also, we were hardly immune to the economic pitfalls brought on by Covid and still find ourselves running in place trying to grapple with financial stress and uncertainty.

Our home, put up for sale shortly before the lockdowns commenced, still sits on the market. While we once dreamed of downsizing, our new normal has flipped the switch on that idea; the oversized house we felt lost in not so long ago is now filled with people on computers all day long. We’ve found ourselves in a perpetual state of pause.

Employment was lost. Worse, it was lost a few months after the quarantines took effect, which means not only were we thrust into an already overloaded, log-jammed system that is excruciatingly flawed but (wait! there’s more!) the “bonus” pandemic money is now used up so ….cool, right? My business-owner friend couldn’t get her teenage employees to return to work because they were making a killing on unemployment. I’m super glad all the kids are making more money than they’ve ever seen in their short lives because fun fact: we haven’t seen a dime yet. If I did have bangs they’d probably be silver sooo….

Truth, it really (REALLY) sucks but even still, I remain grateful.

We flew our daughter back for a couple of weeks to work from our home (hey, come join us so you, too can complain about the internet!) and we hunkered down some more as an even bigger family.

We’ve been drinking wine, playing games, listening to Hamilton, watching John Mulaney stand-up and just being.

Just being a family.

And it’s been real nice.

What will you remember most about when the world changed?

We remember where we watched the OJ chase.

We recall exactly where we were when the towers fell.

And we’ll all know precisely who we focused on when Covid came to town. The President? Governor? Fauchi? Kimmel?

I was watching my kids.

During this ultimate gift of time I’d be a fool not to.

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and was featured in the 2014 Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone.” Her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series yet she places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements. (Next would be the home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook. and@Eyerollingmom on Instagram.

Missed the start of A Momoir? Catch up here:

Chapter 1, Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2017/07/29/a-collection-of-eyerolls-chapter-1-yes-billy-joel-we-will-all-go-down-together/

Chapter 2, Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2017/08/13/chapter-2-sometimes-kids-suck-a-lot/

Chapter 3, Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2017/09/22/chapter-3-sorry-were-tied-all-kids-are-filthy/

Chapter 4, Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2017/12/02/a-momoir-chapter-4-a-moms-plea-to-seth-rogen-enough-with-the-masturbation-already/

Chapter 5, Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2018/04/20/a-momoir-chapter-5-the-magnitude-of-the-middle-aged-mom/

Chapter 6: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2018/08/24/a-momoir-chapter-6-im-not-always-like-you-mom-but-thats-okay/

Chapter 7: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2018/12/01/a-momoir-chapter-7-hello-happiness-are-you-out-there-hello-hello/

Chapter 8: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2019/06/14/a-momoir-chapter-7-high-school-graduation-my-big-fat-so-what/

Chapter 9: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2019/08/12/a-momoir-chapter-9-parenting-horrific-behavior-would-you-know-could-you/

Chapter 10: Click here: A Momoir, Chapter 10: Coming Clean: The Art of Mastering Uncomfortable Conversations

Chapter 11: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2020/02/22/a-momoir-chapter-11-how-many-back-in-my-days-until-you-officially-morph-into-your-mom/

Chapter 12: Click here: https://tinadrakakis.com/2020/03/17/a-momoir-chapter-12-when-a-teen-up-leaves/

A Momoir, Chapter 11: Parenting Dum-Dum Adult Kids is Stressful – But it Beats the Alternative

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I started writing this blog when my kids were little, way before I started taking joint supplements and sleeping with a white noise machine. The trials and tribulations of our lives have been well documented throughout the years because I’m hoping all the anecdotes will give my family something amusing to look back on when I’m busy haunting them from above (you know, since the whole baby book thing wasn’t exactly my strong suit).

At any stage, parenting’s never seemed a cakewalk but it’s always seemed relative. There was always fodder for material and especially for a blog, there was also a community for figuring things out. There was plenty of shared concern for surviving mystery hives or adolescent heartbreak or getting overlooked for the travel team (the injustice!) and there was never a shortage of advice (and commiseration) over lost homework assignments, kids incapable of getting to school on time or insufferable hygiene. We all muddled through together and motherhood didn’t seem insurmountable. My wise friend Jackie always raised her chardonnay to “Little kids, little problems.”

These days my adult kids have their own array of big-kid problems now but again, it comes with the calendar. They’re drowning in debt, juggling student loans, and trying to make rent. They’re realizing what a paycheck can cover and – more importantly — what it cannot. Dayum, life is expensive, they lament. Yes, it is. News flash: it always has been.

It’s difficult watching your kids misstep in adulting and even harder keeping it zipped when some of their decisions are not, I’ll say, advantageous to them. Poor decisions are tough to watch and even harder to witness when splashed all over social media (*throws head back, raises fists, gawwwwwwd, why is this not sinking in???). It’s also rough because we’ve come to know: if our kids are not asking for advice …. it’s usually a waste of breath offering it. My husband gets frustrated but I’m a bit more meh. Stop solving their problems with a fifty-year-old brain I often say to him. Or, when it’s time for the jugular: You did the same dumb thing when you were that age.

Still, even now, when most of their mistakes have far mightier – and costlier — consequences than a promposal gone awry (*cue Mom’s nagging Pay your fkkkking parking tickets!) I don’t mind this stage of parenting. I look at what’s going on with “little” kids today and I thank my lucky stars that time is behind me. I’m certain I’d be a lunatic trying to navigate motherhood in these times and I’m not so sure I’d agree with Jackie anymore; little kids seem to have way bigger problems now.

For starters, the social media is a complete nightmare. Kids going off the deep end because someone didn’t like their picture? Good grief. My heart goes out to teachers. I can’t even imagine what their days are like.

Add in the bullying, so rampant and accessible with (^^^) social media (Finsta?) and it is outrageously out of control.

Add in the heightened toxicity of enraged sports parents and it’s shocking. Horrible when my kids were playing, they are – according to headlines — downright homicidal now.

Add in the seemingly daily reports of lewd and lecherous adults in positions of authority and you’re left side-eyeing everyone. What. The. Effing. Effff.

Add in the desperation for Canada Goose, Louis Vuitton, Lebron Nikes or anything Kylie Jenner is shilling lately and it seems impossible to keep up.

Add in the school shootings.

And the mean girls now emerging before second grade.

And everything else that has succinctly squashed innocence and I say my kids figuring out how to keep their electricity on sounds way less dangerous.

Kids are getting snatched in broad daylight. I see faces from every state scrolling on my feed every single day. Kids are communicating with complete strangers online. Worse, they’re meeting up with total strangers.

I know, I know. I’m not naïve and I am aware all this terrible, horrible no good scary stuff has been going on forever. It just seems that the terrible, horrible no good scary stuff has reached a fever pitch with no ebb in sight. I’ll take a 30-yo ‘kid’ still living in my house over this any day, thankyouverymuch.

If I was raising little kids today, I’d be swimming against a tide of opposition and I would not be able to let it go and Elsa my way out of it.

I don’t want to know a thing about TikTok.

I don’t want to debate anti-vaxxers.

I don’t want to give to a Go Fund Me so your kid can go to Germany. Trust me: mine have never been and they are A-OK.

I don’t want to see breastfeeding or working or exercising or stay-at-home or ANY moms get shamed for doing ANYthing. This is total bullshit. Why does everyone feel entitled to expound negative opinions on anything that has absolutely nothing to do with them? It is 100% maddening.

Please. There’s even stupid stuff I wouldn’t be on board with (settle down, Target, no, I am not interested in buying decorations for the trunk of my car at Halloween. WHAT IS THIS?).

I just want things to go back to normal before I have grandkids, that’s all. We haven’t depleted all the normal in the world, have we? (Quite possibly: just got an early morning text from my bestie, alerting me that kids at her local university got in trouble for having a Corona virus party on campus –get it? Corona? Lol yes, but also: Sigh. Thank God there was no internet when we were in college.)

These be crazy times and my observations are neither new nor illuminating. I’m just glad my worries about pedophiles on the other end of video games are in my rear-view mirror and for that I am grateful. To all the moms of little ones fighting the good fight every day, you have my sincere respect, my best wishes, and my appreciative props. I’m sorry you must send in the list of ingredients on your bake sale brownies but I’m not sorry I missed that either.

If it’s any consolation I hear help might be on the horizon. There’s talk of lowering the voting age to sixteen (that’s a super good idea, right? she mulls, reminiscing about her own 16yo fashion choices in 1982) so maybe soon we’ll be saying Here comes Kanye to the rescue!

You guys can chew on that while I go hound a kid about the perils of late payments.

(Disclaimer to the Mom-Shamers: no humans were harmed in the writing of this blog, which was meant strictly for tongue-in-cheek, exasperated entertainment only. If any part of this this has angered you in any way, please: be better than me. Be Elsa.)

A Momoir, Chapter 8: High School Graduation – My Big Fat So What

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As my youngest’s high school graduation loomed recently I became increasingly thrown by the emotional parent posts ramping up on my Facebook feed. While I continued to post equally enthusiastic OMG!s over every Game of Thrones episode, I started to realize I wasn’t nearly as wrapped up in the upcoming milestone as the other moms.

At my attendance at each of the requisite senior assemblies I watched as these other moms passed around tissues – while I checked my watch, gauging my arrival to work.

I scrolled my feed daily, seeing one heartfelt sentiment after another.

Where did the time go???? (multiple punctuation marks)

I just can’t believe it! (multiple sad emojis)

So proud! (picture, picture, picture, pic…)

And there I sat, silently wondering Are we all talking about high school? Um, isn’t this supposed to happen?

I was neither sad nor melancholy and quickly suspected there might be something wrong with me. Sure, sure, sure I’d been at this rodeo three times already. But had I become world-weary? Jaded? Cynical? I mean, for a school *career, my kid had a pretty great run. He – like many of his friends – did well academically, had impressive moments on the field and on occasion, even garnered a few local headlines that at times made his head swell. Of course I was proud of him.

But (again) this was high school. My overall sentiment percolated under the surface: okay, great, kudos, nice job, way to go.

Now, move on.

I’m sorry (not sorry) it’s just never been something I’ve ever thought was a big deal. In fact it’s been unconditionally expected for all of my kids. Getting through high school was their only job and while I enjoyed every moment in an auditorium or bleacher and duly scrapbooked every news clipping, I’m ready to put it on a shelf and start a new one.

With a whole life ahead of them, I’ve always been more excited to see what my kids will all do when left to their own passions and inclinations.

Now, before the knives come out, really, I have not lived this last year of high school without all emotion. Far from it (Facebook can confirm). I have enjoyed and embraced his every memorable moment and even have a favorite.

Unbeknownst to him, there is one particular Mom Moment I will hold onto for a very, very long time (you know, until the moment gets taken over by this kid running NASA or curing cancer or I don’t know, taking out the trash without being asked).

My paramount takeaway from my final kid’s high school experience was actually my own experience during his last hurrah, at his last assembly. As the graduating class walked in, swishing by in their robes, past the parents, and onto the stage, I (looked up from my watch, naturally and) caught a glimpse of some other parents as he walked by them.

We live in a small Norm-from-Cheers town, where everybody knows your name and most, if not all, parents know each other by a history of six degrees of K-12 separation (or siblings). Many of these parents – better than me, who’d arrived early and had scored the enviable, photography-worthy aisle seats (unlike myself, sitting in the back, closer to my car) watched as my kid walked by. As he did, and since I had the panoramic of the auditorium from my vantage point in the back (totally planned) I caught sight of some parents and saw their smiles broaden as he passed. I scanned some more faces and saw it repeated, and witnessed the creases in their crow’s feet deepen, too. Some others applauded more heartily and fist bumped him as he neared their aisle seat. My insides swelled. There was such tremendous and genuine affection and fondness in their expressions I found myself only watching the crowd as he passed. Those that know him were beaming and it was a vision I will never, ever forget (memory be damned – it’s in a blog now — #internetforever).

I don’t think anything could ever make me any prouder as a parent.

(In fact as soon as those wet towels are picked up I am soooo posting about it.)

Without question, I highly recommend reading the room whenever your kid walks in. It just may give you all the validation you’ll ever need in life.

And – at least for me – that milestone will most definitely outshine a high school graduation every time.

# # # #

Tina Drakakis blogs at Eyerollingmom and has been featured in Huff Post. She appeared in the Boston production of “Listen to Your Mother: Giving Motherhood a Microphone” presenting her popular essay The Thinking Girl’s Thong and her work has been featured in NPR’s “This I Believe” radio series. That said, she still places “Most Popular 1984” on top of her list of achievements (next would be as the $100,000 winner on that home improvement reality TV show of 2003 but her kids won’t let her talk about that anymore). A witty mother of four, she takes on cyberspace as @Eyerollingmom on Twitter and Eyerollingmom on Facebook & @Eyerollingmom on Instagram. Her collection of essays, A Momoir, can be found here (agent interest ALWAYS WELCOME!)