The Beginning: a work in progress

The word The is a delicate upturn of the mind. A subtle brushstroke at the beginning of a thought that paints the opening colors of a conversation.

At the end, it ushers out the speaker on a final, gentle wisp of deliberation. A moment that suddenly rings true as the purest bell, and you are startled to realize you've been seduced into intelligent conversation.

Alice at the Palace (Merc Wars, pt 1)

Well, well. Look who decided to show up at her own blog. It's not my fault... really. The toxic pile of laundry became a federal superfund site, and the head wounds I suffered from storming the beach of creativity took awhile to heal. All the feds in HAZMAT suits required a lot of tending, and we lost a couple during the early attempts at laundry containment.

Ah, it is never dull around here. You know, Halloween is coming, and I could use a poltergeist or two. I have a drill sergeant voice when needed and I bet I could whip those ghosties into fairly good laundry minions and dishwashers. Oh, wait. That is what kids are for. Nevermind.

I don't remember EVER (really) EVER thinking I could get away without helping out around the house. For me, helping around the house meant feeding the chickens, the ducks, and myriad other feathered critters, plus the horses, dog, and cat. If I didn't do my chores, living creatures would die.

My girls think it is child slavery to take their dishes to the sink and they suddenly develop leg cramps of crippling intensity at the mere mention of "dishwasher" or "set the table".

Somehow, I fell into that modern parenting trap of indulgence and now am battling to retake the ground I surrendered to my children early on. Responsibility, accountability, and taking no for an answer build emotional competence. My husband and I, for honest and understandable reasons (a whole other story), ended up doing too much for our precious, fragile girls, and now Godzilla and Mothra are ruling the roost and doing epic battle every five minutes, leaving holes in the sheet rock.

We are staring at each other, Hubby and I, going, "When did our little Alice-in-Wonderlands turn into the toughest Mercs we ever saw?" We have realized we were duped by our own reluctance to ask enough of our children, and now we are trying our best to re-educate them, but gently of course.

Although, when they start flipping Kung Fu and Savat kicks at me (from training received at some undisclosed militant location), the hammer falls and those little warriors let loose with piercing, alien shrieks of imminent mortality and all of a sudden it is, "Yes Ma'am. No Ma'am!" pretty darn quick.

So, take heart fellow parents. It is never too late to take back your children from a life of entitlement, but the longer you wait, the bigger battle you have on your hands. And their training just gets better and better.