My parents will be celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary in a couple months. I’m just hoping to make it to my 40th birthday, but it sure makes me think of the years gone by and how different my childhood was compared to that of my kids. When I grew up we were ALWAYS on time, it was almost certain we were early. In my life that is not the case. I am always late. My parents ask when we will be there for dinner and the answer is always whenever I get there. Sometimes that is on time, often it’s a few hours late and sometimes not at all. Planning ahead is non-existent in my life. There are a few yearly buying shows for stores which I try to attend. One of these was a few weeks ago and it wasn’t until about an hour before I left when I was certain that all the trucks would be fixed, no one had the flu and I could actually go.
My parents never forgot a kid (slightly easier when they only had one but my mom did tie orange flagging tape to her steering wheel to remember to pick me up). I haven’t forgotten them too many times but is has happened (not to worry they were safe). The time I had to go buy an estate of firearms and left one at the library stands out in my mind as the worst.
My parents worked 8-5 Monday to Friday. My kids grew up with a mom that worked eyes open to eyes closed every single day with very few days off. For years they got up at 3 am and slept in the back seat of a plow truck until they could be dropped off at school (don’t even get me started on the number of breakfasts that required before they started their school day). They are now used to being constantly asked at school if their mom has 410 shells and mom running all over the province for firearms and ammo is just normal, every family trip involves picking up or dropping something off.
When I grew up my closest aunt had 5 kids. My parents could not comprehend all the food those kids ate and often joked at their crazy attire or lack of it when the children were young and ran free. The tables turned and it is now their daughter who invokes the same questions- what are you wearing and where are your clothes? Camo is acceptable everywhere Ma and Pa, even if you think it’s not. And I believe they have a better concept of the food situation when they hear how quickly my bunch eats a deer, how many pigs we butcher and eat or when they have us over for dinner and there are absolutely no leftovers. It wasn’t that many months ago one of my kids told a friend that we brought chicken for dinner-from the grocery store. To most people grocery store meat is normal but to my kids that’s weird.
I finally had to stop telling my parents how much money I spend at the store because it was worrying them. What I spend in a week at work is more than my family’s yearly income at the highest it ever was before my dad retired. But I mut be doing something right. The store is still expanding faster than I ever could have imagined and as much as I spend it is all coming right back in or going to expanding the inventory.
My cousins were crazy kids but have all settled down as adults. There was once an incident where one of my cousins may have attempted to do something with a sling shot to another standing behind a glass storm door- the door lost the fight. I often think of my aunt’s kids and the fact that they all survived and I know mine will be fine. My parents on the other hand, they had the easy child however their adult has become slightly more challenging. If they only knew how MUCH trouble. My kids’ childhood and mine were certainly different but what was always the same is we always had everything we needed. In both cases we weren’t as rich as everyone thought and there weren’t always extravagances but we all did our best. We were all certainly loved and always will be. At least I hope I will be!