Where's the guidebook?

Years ago, before I had children, I taught parenting.  Essentially my premise was: step back and take a moment, don't be influenced by what others think and go with your gut, there is no guidebook.  Now, ten years later, I wonder, where is the guidebook?

Like the sannyasi who meditates in the cave all alone to abolish anger, then goes down to the marketplace and finds himself immediately angered by the other people, I am away from my two and a half year old for a week and think I am ready to deal with her.  I am almost immediately impatient with her being on another time zone.  I find myself getting irritated, making her tense, and making her tantrums last twice as long.  

HELP! What happened to all of my yogic patience?  I want to say that it is because I am trying to teach her how to act in front of her grandparents, but the reality is that whenever I have my own agenda, ie., getting to the park with enough time between now and nap to really enjoy the swings, I get uptight.  

Wow! That says a lot about me, I thought it was just when I wanted to get everyone off to school or I didn't want to dawdle on six flights of stairs.  Even when it's time to have fun, I am totally uptight.  I have years of yoga practice to do in order to learn how to be present and to not be so uptight.  The problem is that somehow I have to accomplish all of this within a few months so that I don't continue to adversely affect my daughters.  

Om Mane Padme Hum.  The jewel is in the lotus.  Out of the mud grows a beautiful and pristine flower.

Two under two

I see now why families have a separation between children of either two years or less, or of four or more years.  Dealing with the tantrums of a two year old, teaching them self control and handling all of the dramatics that go with the age bracket, lulls you out of the wonder of the under-two child love affair.  Having another who has an inability to express themselves at the same time, just makes your life a concert of wailing.  Sometimes, I just have to start laughing at the absurdity.  

We try to make it to our country house on the weekends in the requisite two hour time frame.  Inevitably, it ends up being more in the time frame of a cross-country road trip.  We hit the road around 6:00 and sometime around midnight after countless pit-stops and lessons in self-control, we arrive.  Tonight as we hit traffic on the Major Deegan, the offense came as Daddy took a banana that was somehow intended exclusively for Irina.  A wailing ensued, "I want that banana", inaudible through tears and snot and kicking and screaming.  We countered with, "just ask without crying", it got louder and worse with each calm encouragement that we made.  Then the little one started wailing.  All I could do was laugh at the ridiculous nature of it all.  We were stuck in traffic, both were wailing, one wanting a particular banana, one realizing that she was hungry and asking the only way she could to be fed, and us helpless in the front seat trying to teach a lesson.  The crying and screaming increased in volume and tenor and all I could do was laugh.  One day they will both be articulate and ask for food without screaming at the top of their lungs. 

 I offer this advice, they are so cute and egoless at 18 months, you want to have dozens at that age.  I bought into it, that's when I got pregnant with number two.   Just wait until they make it past the terrible twos and the "there isn't a catchy name, but it is just as bad, maybe worse, threes" and then think about having the second one.  

My cousin told me when the second one was born, "the next three years are going to be the hardest you'll encounter, but fast forward four years from now, and the following is the scenario; your children prod you awake at some un-godly hour and you say, go play,  four hours later, you slowly roll out of bed to check on them and they are still happily playing".  I think of this blissful moment in the future (how un-buddhist of me, the future) and I make it through the present moment with a small smile cracking my lips.

Have them three years apart, really.

First Post

This blog is my challenge to myself to finish a project that started germination with my first pregnancy, became the offer to submit an essay for a book when my second daughter was born and is now just fragments.  At some point I expect this will become the entire documentary of becoming conscious, of becoming a parent and hopefully for my daughters and others, a reminder that this process, like any spiritual practice is one fraught with frustration, self-doubt, inspiration, practice, love and hopefully, enlightenment.