Progressive Wednesday

Monday Morning Motherhood: “Huh?”

May 21st, 2007 by Melissa Brannen

My family thinks of me as unconventional. That is, they don’t think I’m unconventional only because I’m a single mom, but rather because I am, well, unconventional. My path in life has deviated from what was expected of me by my family and enforced by my upbringing. Maybe it’s middle-child syndrome. Maybe I missed a few of Piaget’s developmental steps. Or maybe it’s just that I’ve always enjoyed being a pain in the ass.

Any way you shake it, I know I’ve disappointed some members of my family with the choices I’ve made. I almost flunked out of high school, a very expensive and well-regarded high school. I left college to have a baby — without (gasp!) a husband. Not exactly the life my elders envisioned for me. And I fully admit that, way back when, I didn’t it either. In the here and now, though, things are different. I don’t have a house in the suburbs, I don’t belong to the Country Club, I don’t stay home with my daughter, and I don’t have a gas-guzzling SUV. My home is the upper apartment in a house in the city, I work at an office everyday so my daughter is in daycare, and I take the bus to work. This life, this path, works for me.

I also know I’m not the type of parent they think I should be. I know they think I’m a good mother, and that my daughter is well behaved and wonderful, but there’s no doubt they think my child-rearing skills are a little “different,” to put it politely. I think, at times, it honestly confuses them. I don’t spank my daughter: I use time outs. I try to expose her to different cultures, hopefully broadening her horizons.

The results? She asks for certain Indian dishes by name, and for six months her favorite restaurant was a Thai place in my friend’s neighborhood. One day she told my very Catholic grandmother that she was drawing a picture of “Temple, where Jeremy goes” (Jeremy is, obviously, Jewish). Her friend Connor has two fathers, and in a 4-year-old appropriate way, I explained why. Last summer, she had a ball at the Violent Femmes concert I took her to, and the Albright-Knox is one of her favorite places. She knows the words, and sings along to “Jessie’s Girl” by Rick Springfield, but also loves Frank Sinatra, Rod Stewart, Neko Case, Bobby Darrin, The Velvet Underground, Norah Jones, Wilco, The Killers, and The Fray. She and I — we’re not your “typical” household. We’re messy, loud, and fun.

Much of my family doesn’t quite know what to think of us, and they don’t really understand why I do what I do. Alright, sometimes I don’t either, but there is a general reason to it all. I want my daughter to know that there is a big world out there, a lot to see and do. I think, for the sake of progress, I need to teach her that variety and diversity are good, are important.

The predictable, soccer-mom path would probably be easier, in some ways. At times I even wish for it, and the security it offers. Right now, though, I’m okay with being who and what we are. This is us — faults, strengths, disappointments, but mostly victories.