Memories......some meandering

So the past few days I have not been a very nice mother. It has to do with the number of times I've had to vaccum and pick up after people. Don't raise your eyebrows, it happens to all of us at times. To the likes of me, more often than others. I have rolled my eyes too when I go with my kids to other people's houses and the Mom's shout - first put away this toy and then take anything else. I insist on them tidying up before they go to bed.

This (request first, and then an order later) generates a lot of protest. "But I have only two hands, I can't carry it all." "Help me, Mama, you are only standing." "And I did not take this, she played with this," etc... Relent a little and disorder reigns. The morning after, I spend a good amount of time picking stuff from all corners of the house and into their places. And my mornings are precious to me.

So when there is reluctance I tend to be stern, or shout or resort to sarcasm. Stern gets me nowhere, it's only voice modulation accompanied by a solem expression. They laugh in glee. Shouting makes for sullen kids who form a union to my face and even defy me. Sarcasm - ah, only I get it. Then to top it all, I sulk and become a bit grumpy. So how do you guys make children clear up and willingly? All suggestions welcome.

But as a child I was far from perfect. Come to think of it, my parents were pretty strict too, especially my father. I don't remember to get on his wrong side ever for being disorganised. I remember he could not stand blunt pencils. Or the daily disappearance of the eraser. For which I never had any good enough explanation. I used to be such a dreamy child. So they resorted to a lot of measures. Cutting up an eraser into 4, tying it with a thread on my pencil. But the one I remember well and hated the most was having my eraser deposited with the class teacher and having to draw up my desk and chair next to hers for dictation and writing o:O

The amount of times I have been told to close my a's. I just did not care to do it.
Or the spelling of banana, with two times na. I would write nas till the end of the line, difficult to believe that is me!! The biggest fear I had every Sunday when nails would be examined. I used to bite my nails and also the skin around. But sometimes, I would leave a couple of them un-chewed, which never impressed him:(

Or my realisation, whilst sitting on the red-floored verandah in our house in Salem, with my mother trying to teach me double digit addition and subtraction  Carry over 1 would involve a sharp pat on the head, so you don't forget to take it into consideration. Really, for a long time I found Maths easy but unnecessarily painful.

The one and only time in my life that I had to take tutions - for Hindi. And how I had to be bribed to sit for them by my grandparents - a chocolate or a nail polish. Good to know I was girlie girlie types then. And how I would excuse myself for long toilet breaks! The 4 'o' clock siren signalled the end to the tution and I so waited for it to ring. I was considerate enough to not keep looking at the wall clock:)

Someday, Big G who gets more of my brunt of anger (guess I am the one who posted this  and feel like a big fraud now) for her open questioning of my authority and behaviour, should read this to know that compared to their mother, so far, these kids are pretty much sorted people. And I hope when they look back at their childhood, the mad screaming mommy bit is a little bit blurred or downplayed.