A Letter To Santa

Hello... please come in.  I am a little sad today.   My friend Maryanne Webber just gave me a copy of a letter her cousin sent her in her Christmas card this year.  Would you like to read it?  It might dampen your Christmas spirit.


Dear Santa,

My wish list for Christmas might seem a little strange. I don't want toys, video games or candy. I'm not sure I even know what these things are. All I know is that they are important to my parents.

I would like some time… a minute if you have one… so I can give it to my mommy. When I ask her to help me with my homework and she says, "Ok, just give me a minute." I will have one to give her. If she says she would read me a bedtime story if she only had the time. I would have some to give her and not be so scared at night.

If it is not too much trouble, I would also like a round tuit. I need it for my daddy. I know he really would like to take me fishing or teach me how to ride my bike, but he needs a round tuit first.

I know you are very busy making toys for the other children. I can help you if you want. I have a lot of toys and stuff I never played with. My mommy and daddy give them to me whenever they miss my school plays or can't take me to the park or any other fun stuff. I really don't mind giving them to you. I can always get more toys from my mommy and daddy, but I can't get the time and a round tuit I need to have my parents play with me.

If you can't get these things for me, could you make us poor? My friend Billy is poor and his mommy is always home and bakes cookies for his lunch and goes to his school plays. His daddy taught him to ride his bike. It's an old bike with only one gear, but at least he knows how to ride it. When I get bored with my video games I sometimes look out my bedroom window and see Billy playing tag with his brother and sister. My nanny won't let me go over because she doesn't get paid enough to worry about me getting hurt playing with those noisy little rascals.

Don't worry if you can't get a round tuit or don't have the time, I’m used to it by now. You can still have all my unused toys... give some to Billy. I can watch him play with them from by bedroom window.

Merry Christmas.

Love,
Jamie

Pick Your Battles

Dear Bella Nonna,

Please help!  My five-year old twins are driving me crazy.  Don’t get me wrong, I love them to pieces, but everyday feels like a war zone.  I thought the terrible two would end by their third birthday… but things are getting worse instead of better. 

Everything ends up being a battle… from what to eat to where they are going to sit in the car.  My biggest battle is over what they are going to wear.  We are always late getting to kindergarten, family functions and social events because they want to wear something totally inappropriate.  We go round and round arguing over what they are going to wear… nothing works.

Battle Fatigued in Baltimore

Dearest Battle Fatigued,

I'm a firm believer in giving children choices in their lives.  It gives them the opportunity to express their unique sense of self and helps to develop their decision-making skills.   But anyone who has done battle with a toddler because she wanted to wear her party dress to make mud pies, his cowboy boots to wade in the pond, a new winter coat to the beach or footy pajamas to Granny's 80th birthday party will agree that there has to be limits placed on those choices.

To make life simpler and a lot less stressful I gave my guys the bottom drawer of their dresser to put all their favorite playtime outfits in.  On days when we stayed at home with nothing special going on I allowed my sons to pick out the clothes they wanted to wear from their bottom drawer.  When we were going out or were having company over, I would pick out two or three outfits of my choice and let them decide which one they wanted to wear.  If it was an extra special event I would tell them I need them to wear this outfit.

The most important thing to do is to talk to (not at) your child.  Explain why some days he/she gets to choose whatever he/she wants to wear, some days you need to limit the choices and other days you need him/her to cooperate and wear what you pick out.

My thoughts and prayers for peace are with you.

Bella Nonna

P.S.  Here is a little English lesson I learned from self-help books… the word need implies you require something, it is necessary.  The word want implies you desire something, it is a wish.  

I Love You

Dear Little One,

I wish I could be there to give you a big hug.   Even though I am not able to physically be there, I want you to close your eyes and feel me hugging you. 

Love has no boundaries.  I want you to know wherever I am you can still talk to me ... any time, any place.  All you have to do is think of me and I'll be right there ready to listen ... all you have to do is talk. 

Please know that although you feel lonely and misunderstood by your parents, they really do love you.  Sometimes parents get caught up in their adult lives and forget how to listen.  They spend all their energy trying to give you all the material things they feel you deserve that they unfortunately forget to give you the most important thing ... their time. 

My sweet child, it breaks my heart when I think about you feeling so invisible in this world.  I know it often seems as if no one really cares about how you are feeling or what is happening to you.  People today see worry as weakness and so your parents end up pushing you to succeed.  They want the best for you and worry they won't be able to give it to you.  They don't have all the answers and worry you might find out and lose respect for them. 

Sometimes parents push you away when you feel you need them the most.  It is not because they don't love you, it is because sometimes your problems remind them of their past.  When you are hurting, they see themselves in your pain.  When you are being bullied, they could be reliving the pain they felt when they were bullied.  Maybe they were the bully and seeing the pain your eyes makes them feel guilty for the pain they caused someone in their past.

Everybody shows love in his or her own special way.  Some people can come right out in the open and show it.  They aren't embarrassed to give you a hug or tell you how proud they are of you.  Some people have trouble expressing their feelings, so they do thing for you. 

I have no trouble expressing my feelings or giving my immediate family and close friends a big hug when they need one, but I feel uncomfortable with everyone else … so I just bake them some sort of goodie. I guess I got that from my father.

Let me tell you about my dear father. When I was little, my father would take us to fun places like amusement parks, the beach and the movies.  He would tell us stories and sometimes he would play games with us.  He would fix people’s cars and help anybody that needed him without looking for anything in return.  I loved to sit and listen to my dad when he was chatting with family and friends.  His eyes would twinkle as he told jokes and funny stories.  He was a hard worker.  He was a good audience when you wanted to tell a joke or rehearse your part in the school play, but he was very hard to talk to when it came to expressing feelings. I always felt he was keeping me at arms length, never letting me get too close to him.

Maybe it was because his mother died when he was only twelve. I'll never really know, because he died before I found the courage to ask him.  My father’s death left a small hole in my heart that I feel will never be filled. I can't imagine what it must have been like for my dad to lose his mother at such a young age.

Sweetheart, I know it's hard for you to understand this now, but one day you will feel a lot differently towards your parents ... trust me. When you are all grown up, maybe with children of your own, you will look back on these days and see your parents in a different light.  When you hold your baby in your arms you will feel a special connection; a bond that you have never felt before. 

When times get tough and you feel like no one cares ... remember dear, you are always in my thoughts and prayers.

I love you.                                                                            

Today's Lesson

Hello.  How are you this beautiful day?

I am reading the Harmony High School newspaper.  There is a funny cartoon you might get a giggle over... here take a look.

Today's Lesson

 

           You want to go to the school dance. 

              The school is 10 miles from your house.

               You want to ride to the dance with your friends.

                                             

                                         

Your mother won't let you go with them because they drive too fast... 60 mph.

She wants your grandmother to take you.  She drives 30 mph.

So, it takes your friends 1 minute to travel 1 mile and your grandmother 2 minutes to travel 1 mile. 

That means it would take your friends 10 minutes to get you to the dance and your grandmother 20 minutes... right?

Well, mathematically speaking that would be correct.

But what will probably happen is; a police officer will stop your friends for speeding. While he is writing out their ticket, you and Granny will cruise past them, getting you to the dance much faster.  
Granny will give you a couple of dollars to buy some goodies at the dance.  
Your friends will be sitting in the parking lot fighting over who will pay for the ticket which will ruin their whole night...and maybe their friendship!

That's why I won't let your friends drive you to the dance.  Besides, it will keep Granny out of my hair for at least 45 minutes!

Joke of the Day

What do you call an old teddy bear?  

Teddy Grossa Felt

Weekly Words Of Wisdom

When talking to someone… Remember to:

STOP… Talking

LOOK… At them

LISTEN… To what they are trying to say

Enough Is Enough

Hi Bella Nonna, sorry I missed your birthday.  I have been so depressed lately… time just got away from me. I hope it was a happy one.

Oh Alisa sweetheart, I’m so sorry to hear that you are feeling blue.  What is the problem; is it something I might be able to help you with?

I don’t know Bella Nonna… it is really nothing, I guess.  It is just you know…

Life… it has a way of creeping up on you Alisa and before you know it you are lost in a sea of blue funk. 

Come into the kitchen and sit at the table.  I will make a pot of tea and we can chat.  Maybe find you a life raft or something to help you navigate your blue ocean… sorry about the puns; old age I guess.

I love you Bella Nonna.  You always have just what I need… a little tea and sympathy with a generous helping of wisdom and cheesecake.

How did you know I had cheesecake?  You don’t have to answer that… when don’t I have cheesecake!

We are all set Alisa, what has gotten you so depressed?

I guess I have what the Life Coaches call the middle child or the forgotten child syndrome.  I am feeling kinda misunderstood, invisible and unhappy.

Hmmm… this calls for some of my birthday brownies.  You pour us some more tea and I will be right back with the brownies. 

Bella Nonna you amaze me… you have goodies stashed all over your kitchen!

Well I… yes, yes I do!  But these brownies are special…

BELLA NONNA I didn’t know you…

These are not special brownies you little ding bunny… these are brownies that are special to me. Get your head out of California… marijuana is legal there… see a girl can be savvy about the stuff and never tried it.  You are way too old for the just say no! talk.

Okay where was I before you accused me of baking with wacky weed? 

I was pouring tea and you were getting your… brownies.

Alisa, I bake a small batch of brownies every year for my birthday to remind me of a life lesson I learned on my 40^th birthday. 

Just like you I paid attention to all the excuses the experts allowed me to use for not living my authentic life.  All of my unfulfilled dreams were not my fault… I was a middle child… I had no choice.   Luck for me I didn’t realize I was unhappy and misunderstood with oodles of unfulfilled dreams until I was forty. 

The night of my 40^th birthday I sat alone in the moonlight eating all of my birthday brownies… because all of the loving and caring people in my life had forgotten my birthday and didn’t deserve any … I decided to go on a personal journey to discover me.

According to the experts I spent my life prior to forty in La La Land doing for others and not for myself.  Whoa…I should be really unhappy I thought and WHAM... instant depression. 

I spent the next ten years trying to catch up on all the unhappiness I missed out on while living my, unbeknownst to me, miserable unfulfilled materially deprived life.  I filled up three notebooks with all the advice the experts offered to help me solve my horrible dilemma.  I had page after page of advice on mindfulness, choosing reality over fantasy and how to consciously vibrate at a high positive frequency rather than a low negative one.  I have filled up Love Tanks, crashed through Blocks, kept a journal my dreams, contemplated life’s schemes and relanguaged and rewritten my life experiences.

I searched and searched for the answer; unfortunately I didn’t know the question.  But that was okay because I developed what some psychologists call ‘monkey brain’ and with all the chatter going on inside my brain I umm… What was I saying?  Oh yeah, if you’re happy and you know it don’t go looking for answers to someone else’s questions.  I did and all I got for my trouble was writer’s cramp… and a lot of kindling for the family picnic’s bonfire.