Meow!!

How do you see yourself?  Is it different from the way others see you?  Are you thin but think you're not?  Are you ugly but think you're hot?  Do you see yourself as an available confidante yet your friends see you as a nosy gossip monger?  

How many times have we caught ourselves saying to either ourselves or our fellow she-cats, "What the hell was she thinking with that _______?!" (insert outfit, hair, make-up, nail polish color...etc. here!)  Or on a better level, "How can she not see how totally fabulous she looks?!"  How many times have you been in a clothing store and see something so hideous you wonder who in God's name would sport such an outfit?  Unbeknownst to you, 10 minutes later, up walks said 'who' and believe it or not, she makes it work, go figure!  I have a friend who's tag line when complimenting (sorta) is "that's pretty! Not for me, but still...pretty!"  Um, thanks?

I see my 6 year old daughter come down from her room in some really frightening outfit and stifle with every fiber of my being, the urge to either laugh or scream.  Usually I'll say it's either very cool or interesting.  I always say she looks beautiful (not really an endorsement for the outfit) and that she's very creative.  The proud smile on her face makes the heartburn totally worth it!  We do have a deal though; church and dinner out in a halfway decent restaurant must be attended wearing a mutually agreed upon and sometimes boring outfit.  School is a uniform so I get a pass there.  The rest of the time she can let her freak flag fly.  Sometimes she's all in one shade of one color, sometimes one color with many shades...none of which go together, sometimes it's a Christmas dress with chiffon and tulle along with pink leggings and Barbie rainboots.  Freak flag flyin'!

But she thinks, no, she knows, she looks fantastic!  I'd give big money to have that kind of confidence in myself! I hope this self-confidence lasts but it probably won't.  At least not without a sabbatical during the pubescent years.  That's when all the she-cats start sharpening their claws on their fellow felines.  Hopefully she'll come out relatively unscathed or perhaps more importantly, without too much blood under her own nails!  Hopefully the same beautiful, fashion-conscious babe will be gazing back at her through her mirror for her entire life.  I just hope it's a mirror that tells the truth; not the kind that squints at her and tells her what she wants to hear or the kind that sneers at her and validates all of her imaginary flaws.  There are a LOT of those mirrors around....especially in teenagers' rooms.  Maybe that's where a subtle motherly correction or observation will keep the mirror honest so when she grows up and becomes a woman sharing a giant litter box, she'll be the subject of positive gossip as opposed to the "what the hell" gossip.

But I need to step in with caution; with sensitivity to her feelings.  I can't say to her, as my father said to me when I was 16 sporting spandex pants, "You look like 10 lb sausage in 5 lb wrapping."  Ahem.  NOT a confidence building observation!  Or my mom's famous line, "I don't care what the other girls are wearing! You're not shaped the same way."  Um, what?!

~Eileen Cassidy Bishop

Life As We Now Know It

Yesterday two little neighborhood girls, 8 years old, that I know very very well, as well as their parents, came to my door collecting for the American Heart Association.  Because it's one of my favorite charities (close to my heart as I've lost so many relatives, including my dad, to heart disease), I jumped at the chance to contribute.  I asked them in but they said, "No thanks. We're not allowed to go into houses."  I was so impressed!!!  I didn't question it at all.  I told them I'd be right back and closed the door on them so the dog couldn't escape.  It was cold.  They could have warmed up a bit.  But they didn't.  They stood on the porch chatting with each other and giggling at the dog with his nose pressed up against the door's glass trying to smell them.  When I returned and opened the door, they were smiling at me.  I told them how impressed and proud I was of them for practicing such safety rules.  One is a police officer's daughter and she smiled and nodded and the other, my dear goofy friend's daughter, smiled and said, "my mama didn't raise no fool!"  No. No she didn't!

I remember going door to door with Unicef or Girl Scout Cookies or even Trick-or-Treating all by myself way back when.  I remember not worrying even slightly that I could be in danger...unless it was dark; if it was dark I'd be afraid not of a bad person, but of a werewolf or ghost.  I remember going to the public restrooms alone and never thinking I'd meet someone unsafe who could and wanted to harm me.  Not because my parents never taught me not to talk to strangers; they did.  But didn't they just mean the ones who offered me candy from their car window?  Bad stuff only happened in big cities...like the guy from the Covenant House told us about when I was in 6th grade.

Looking back, that naivete of both parents and children was dangerous and could have and did get children in trouble.  Our parents weren't careless with us, they were just raising us the way they were raised.  Yes, you'd hear of kids having gone missing, see their pictures on milk cartons or bill boards, but it didn't run rampant.  It certainly wasn't commonplace as it seems to be now...at least not by comparison.  

So what do we do?  Do we not let them use a PC unsupervised?  Probably a good idea.  Do we not let them use a public restroom alone until they're a teenager?  Again, probably the way to go.  Do we not let them go door to door without a trusted adult or a buddy system in place?  Definitely.  Even if we know our neighbors, like the two girls who came to my door knew me, these children need to be taught to be wary of everyone unless they are with a parent or trusted adult.  Was I insulted that they didn't come in?  Did I try to convince them that it was safe and they'd be better off coming in out of the cold?  No.  Could and would someone else do this? Yes.  Could it result in horror?  Yes. Case in point, Megan Kanka.  She didn't live in a busy city.  She wasn't lost in a crowded mall or park.  She wasn't approached by a stranger.  She was raped and killed by a man across the street who was, unbeknownst to her family, a known child molester.  At one time, though, before he was caught molesting his first victim, he was an UN-known child molester.

I know this is a bit off my regular genre of writing, but I was so affected by these two neighbor girls I've not been able to stop thinking about them.  Not imagining horrific things happening to them or to my children, but loving the fact that their parents have taught them well.  They've put their own innocent childhood experiences and lack of fear aside and given them the knowledge of how to make sure they don't put themselves in harm's way.  They've done it without instilling so much fear in them that they don't want to collect for charities or sell cookies or trick-or-treat.  They have done their best and so far, so good.  Kudos!!

The older my children get, the harder the teaching gets.  The harder it becomes to choose the right approach and  the right words to get my point across without scaring them.  I know Gene and I will do our best to do this and pray our best will be enough.  I know, too, that we are not alone and that there is a network of parents and people out there just like us to whom we can turn for guidance...thank God!!

As my mom has said, "Sometimes I feel like I'm on another planet the world has changed so much!"  And as I've said in reply, "Then you have to try and change with it."  Now I have to practice what I preach!!

Stay safe all, and keep the kids even safer!!

~Eileen Cassidy Bishop

Ahoy all ye Mateys!! Aaaargh!!

A while back, as some of you know, our relatively new, 9 month-old puppy Buck injured his paw...badly.  Running like a Gray Hound through the yard, we think he swiped his paw across one of those white metal downspouts and gashed, and I mean GASHED the pad of his front paw.  Suffice it to say the porch and deck looked like a mass murder scene.

So at 9am on the first day of the Christmas Break, off I go, with crying kids whining that "Bucky's going to bleed to death!!!", to the emergency vet.  $450 later we're home with a very tired Buck sporting the cutest green wrapping decorated with a candy cane up to his shoulder and wearing the dreaded Cone of Shame around his neck.  He had the full treatment: cleaning, sedation, suturing, "reverse" sedation, adorable wrapping, and of course, lots of TLC from the staff (I'm not sure if that's included in the price but we'll assume it's a throw in).  They were incredibly nice to Buck, to the kids, and to me (again, not sure if I paid for that).

As of yesterday, two and a half weeks later, our convalescent has had 5 bandage changes at $30 a pop.  The act of bandaging is included in the initial $450, but not the actual gauze to wrap it.  You think I'm kidding?!  I'll show you my $150 in receipts.  His first three were routine checks; the fourth was due to Buck deciding to break the gate doing 98 and test the water temperature in the pond out back by dipping not his UNbandaged paw in, but his BANDAGED one!!  Okay, my fault for being stupid enough to think the gate would hold back a puppy jonesing for some backyard play.  After that visit we were sent home another $30 lighter and given strict instructions to keep a watchful eye on the little delinquent and when we can't, alas, the dreaded Cone of Shame!  So short story long, three days later, following our usual Sunday morning routine, we're running around trying to get to church before the priest starts up the aisle.  We get Buck into his crate and off we go (we actually pushed past the priest at the back of the church to make sure we were pewed up before he could start up the aisle before us!)  Sunday obligation behind us, we arrive home much calmer and discussing what to have for lunch when Cat announces while squatting in front of his crate, "Buck took his bandage off!!"  Yep, that's right; WE FORGOT THE DAMN CONE!!!

This is not a battle he will win.  I keep telling him through gritted teeth, "You will not win this one, Buck.  I AM THE ALPHA DOG!!"  I say this as I'm putting him in the car for our sixth visit to Dr. Givemeallyourmoney at 7pm on Sunday.  

They've decided to splint him to a) keep pressure off his almost-healed paw, b) to make it harder for him to lick or bite at the wrapping.  But Buck has a Gene Simmons tongue so we continue with the Cone of Shame.  

Step, step, step, clomp, bang into the wall with cone. Step, step, step, clomp, bang into the wall with cone.  All he needs is an eye-patch and a parrot to complete the Drunken Pirate look!  He's already taken all my gold so he's got the part down!

Oh, and they didn't charge me for the splinting this time...I wonder if it had anything to do with me openly weeping in the office! Hmmm......

~Eileen Cassidy Bishop