Motherwise Cracks

Adding boyfriends and girlfriends to our happy family brings on some new and strange emotions. While I blush to admit it, I have some uncertainties about this as I notice the changes that things bring on like: Your kids will act uncharacteristically nice around an impressionable new “other” for quite a long time.

• * Your kids will act uncharacteristically nice around an impressionable new “other” for quite a long time.
• * Suddenly they want you to brag about them – it’s very confusing.
• * Shhh you, when you are just being yourself.
• * Think the house isn’t cleaned well enough, a complete turnaround from prior standards.
• * Your meal menus change to please someone who is not related to you (yet).
• * Shopping trips now include their favorites (some of which no one else likes).
• * Another birthday to remember and buy for is added to your already failing memory.
• * Your vocabulary and comments may have to be “adjusted” until they get to know your style. (They might not know when to take you seriously and when you’re just kidding.)
• * Eventually, they want you to meet the other set of parents and you haven’t done that since you dated yourself.
• * Trips may take two cars because you only bought the model that fit the same number of people in your family.
• * Photo ops get awkward as you wonder if you will remember who that person is in your family photo in 10 or 15 years.

Then you remember your own boyfriends and how your parents got along with them. It was no secret how Dad felt when one of them picked his toes in our den as we watched TV. You know what they say, “You can pick your friends, you can pick your toes, but don’t do it in front of your girlfriend’s father.” I broke up with him right after that.

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“A friend will tell you she say your old boyfriend – and he’s a priest.” ~ Erma Bombeck