When I became a mother I remember thinking how much better I was going to be at the whole mothering racket than my own mother. My children would enjoy my endless devotion characterised by monogrammed cupcakes nestled in bespoke lunchboxes, containing affirmations written on origami butterflies. Instead they ended up with a canteen order for a chicken mornay pie scribbled on a paper bag and instead of an affirmation of I Love U, a request for credit, stating, IOU.
You see, I thought I was smarter, more creative, more switched on, more feminist, and generally more evolved than other mothers. I did end up giving the kids more dads than my mother gave me. Only Ivy, the youngest of my five children, has one dad. The other day she asked with a worried tone ‘Why don’t I have a step-dad?’ Hmm, perhaps I wasn’t quite the mother I intended to be.
Mothers Day is a wonderful reminder of my EPIC Fail. The day when I like to reflect on what I intended to do or be for my children, and what I actually deliver. Like the camping trips. I was going to take the kids camping. That was part of the big perfect childhood plan. I did buy a tent. Two in fact. I have a camp kitchen, complete with a gas cooker, a cupboard, pots and pans, a full set of melamine crockery, a sink, stretcher beds, lighting… still unused in my storage room ten years on.
Truth is, I don’t like camping. So we never went. Two of the kids have already left home, so that part of the childhood dream is a scratching. Oh, hang on. Ivy did camp last weekend. On the verandah. Not really communing with nature, but we did get the tent out. There is one photo. I definitely failed the ‘great outdoors’ part of the mum audit.
Next, school engagement. My own mother never volunteered at school. The only time I remember her turning up was at a school assembly where I was getting some sort of award.
She was wearing one of those batik wraparound skirts that women used to like to wear as strapless dresses in the 70s. A rogue wind lifted her flap, revealing one completely naked breast – the boob is now the image stored in my memory bank in the place where my academic honour was supposed to be.
I tried to volunteer at my kids’ schools, but the reading groups did my head in. I was like ‘It’s “the” you idiot… hurry up. I’ve parked in the bus bay.’ I have never been on a school P&C. I’d rather have my intestines removed through my ear. Canteen duty comes a close second. So on mother involvement in the schoolyard, I also score poorly. Although I do drive past during school sports carnivals and beep. It’s at least encouraging.
I have yelled at my children. I have cried and told them they’re killing me. I have made ridiculous threats like ‘I will leave you at the shop’ when one of them wouldn’t leave willingly without a chocolate. At least when my own mother made that threat to me as a kid she had the integrity to follow through and actually drive off. I was too weak. I said, ‘No. You can’t have a chocolate. I am going now.’ And then I bought them a chocolate.
I swear in front of my children. And when Ivy – who is appalled by my potty mouth – told me the other day that I really shouldn’t say ‘fuck’ at breakfast, I said, ‘It’s Mummy’s job. She gets paid to swear.’ I throw my children’s drawings and craft in the bin because I can’t bear clutter. I decide to teach the kids to cook but then freak out when I see them handling a knife, and do it myself.
I am guilty of throwing small children in front of a TV so I can go back to bed. I have got drunk in front of the kids and done stupid shit like try to do ‘the worm’ on the carpet, or walk through a closed sliding glass door. I have exaggerated consequences to teach my kids a lesson. When Zoe licked a battery she said, ‘Will I die?’ And I said, ‘Probably’. I kind of enjoyed her freaking out a little bit more than I should have.
I have been, and still am, a completely imperfect, lazy, hypocritical and, at times, overprotective mother. But somehow my kids have all turned out to be pretty bloody awesome people. How about that? Maybe it doesn’t have that much to do with us after all. Happy Mothers Day.
