Lord Knows Why #2: Daughters

Lord knows why I keep thinking about this, but I do know why I started thinking about it: what do I want to teach my daughter as she grows up (if I ever have one).

When I was 15 or so, I saw that a mother who was dying of cancer video tapped herself recording life lessons for her 2 year old daughter. I thought that was a great idea. And thought if something like that would happen to me I would record several tapings to be aired when my daughter was an appropriate age....bras at 12, shaving at 13, boys at 14, etc. (btw. can you tell I have no idea what age does what?)

yes, yes, I know that is morbid, but I am a boy scout in many ways: Always Prepared. Not in the perfectionist-Bre Van DeKamp/Hodges way, just wanting to be emotionally ready for what life throws at me so it won't be as hard (yeah, you can tell I've had it easy so far).

Since 15, I would think about this a lot...and ponder what things I want to tell my daughter to do or not to do or what I did or wished I did when she gets older. And let me tell you, it has helped me make some decisions when peer pressure came calling. Not to say I was an angel, but I always wanted to tell my daughter that I was able to wait till I was 21 till I drank, so she can too. That picking at your zits will make your face worse. That you can always say your sorry but you can never really take it back.

A lot of this really just means, in my head, what are the things that I hope that my daughter (or son) learn from me. What can I tell them? Whether they take this information and use it is up to them...I just hope that they can learn from it.

My own mom was great at this. She loved talking to me about everything. We talked about sex at a young age and throughout my life (she was a big advocate of not making it a mystery...there are a lot of stories on that one...remind me to tell you later). She taught me the importance of saying I love you to the right people and meaning it. How to be a good friend. How to be sweet and strong and creative and different and loving. These are things that I want to be able to share with my kids. I am not going to fluffy coat things and say my mom and I were always best pals. We fought like cats 90% of the time from age 13-20. But she never stopped teaching me what was what. And I would like to think I helped her figure out things from a different perspective too. We still have our cat moments, but they are fewer between (thank Gawd!), and I hope with all my heart that we continue on the path of being great friends.

So on today, Mother's Day, I am contemplating starting a series of posts about "What I want to teach my kids." If nothing else, it puts it down on "paper" so I can look back and remember all the ideas I had...and your thoughts about them too. What do you want teach your kids? Or what did you teach them? Or wish you did?

I'll leave you today with a pic of me and my mom from my friends wedding this past Thanksgiving. She's pretty neat, huh?

Maybe I'll do a post tomorrow....extolling all the cool things about my mom, so you Internet peeps can start to get how cool she really is.