We celebrate grandparents and grandkids in this issue, and it sounds like a lot of fun — at least that’s the word from friends who have them.
What’s fun for me right now is not raising kids. I liked raising kids when I was doing it, and most days I was good at it. But I don’t miss the pressure, especially at this time of the year. Autumn kicks off the kid-centric holiday triad of Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas, amplified by a force I never faced: Pinterest.
I feel for today’s parents. The website for creative and, seemingly, insomniac high achievers makes every birthday and holiday celebration an EVENT. I’ve seen the pins (favorite items) on Pinterest, and they make me anxious. We all know that parenting is a competition; Pinterest is the equivalent of a steroid booster. Everything’s bigger, better and less attainable.
In the early ’90s, someone gave me a box of Halloween outfits, and my kids wore those for a few years. Then, you couldn’t buy a cute Halloween costume for $20 bucks like today. Eventually, I tackled the job on my own with limited success. I inexpertly smeared mascara across “pirate” eyebrows and globs of lipstick on “fairy” cheeks. My kids looked like they were dressed out of the church donation box with a side trip to Sephora’s clearance aisle.
Worse was the 1960s, and now that I think about it, Halloween costume fails may be an inherited trait.
Mom had a lot of talents, but designing creative Halloween getups wasn’t one of them. An early childhood memory is when I showed up at Akron’s Rankin Elementary for the kindergarten Halloween parade wearing a store-bought princess costume with a plastic mask.
Mom apparently didn’t succumb to or didn’t care about the holiday pressure to create. She was raising my two younger brothers while dad worked nights at the Akron Beacon Journal. I’m sure a mad dash to Miracle Mart for a costume was more than enough to manage.
At the parade, teachers and parents fussed over the creative getups that included a boy in a hot dog costume that featured a yellow drizzle of yarn mustard.
Over in Real Ville, my mask’s thin stretchy cord tangled my frizzy hair, and the small eye holes made it tough to see almost anything except my classmates’ homemade costumes. Even at 5, I recognized the cool kids. With my sad, plastic mask, I wasn’t one of them.
If I’m lucky enough to be a grandmother one day, I’m going to skip Pinterest and go retro. I owe it to Mom. For inspiration, I’ll think about our cover story on PAGE ____. It’s about long-distance grandparenting, Pinterest optional.
If you want to see traits you may have inherited from a distant relative (like crummy Halloween costuming) try tracing your family roots. Get started with our story on PAGE ____.
As we transition to fall, keep a good thought for those still in the parenting trenches. At my house, kids with lousy costumes get an extra piece of Halloween candy. Their parents get two.
Have a great fall.
Marie
