OK this is another ' Michelle has been thinking'..........

I was reading either OPRAH magazine or Chatelaine and they were talking a lot about the complex relationship between mother and daughter the trials and tribulations. How when the daughter grows up and has her own little family the mom likes to butt in BLAH, BLAH, BLAH. It's something I really can't relate to thank goodness because this has never been my case. As a child my parents were my parents, once I moved out and on my own it became a respect on both our sides and a friendship developed. It has remained that way. It got me thinking about not only the mother daughter relationship but also the FAMILY relationship. I don't understand how so many families do not have respect for each other as different people.
As brother and sisters we come from the same blood/parents, we have the same upbringing (in most cases) but that doesn't mean we will be alike, have the same views, have the same religion or even have religion in our lives. We will probably have different views on politics, but doesn't that just make us more interesting and able to have good discussions at the dinner table. I don't know maybe I was brought up in a strange, weird family were my brother and I were taught that we had to respect each other , including our parents. We were taught that it's OK to have different opinions than the next person. We were allowed to disagree with our parents. I remember many times begging them to let me stay out later than my curfew because of a party or whatever and many times they would allow it because I asked and sometimes I would get pissed off at them because they would say no, I would pout and stomp off and think it wasn't fare....My parents weren't interested in being our friend. Might sound harsh but it was true. And I agree with it. I liked my parents ( loved and still do love them ) but even when I was 15 and had a curfew, even when they grounded me I still LIKED them. They were strict. They had rules, but I felt I could always talk to them, I never really felt the need to rebel, OK rebel REALLY bad. I was bad with curfew, really bad. I dated a few guys they didn't like but they never told me I couldn't see them they probably knew I would sneak out anyway. I remember a few times they voiced their opinions on one or two of them but they were always nice to the guy even if they didn't think they were right for me.
My parents knew that I went to parties were there was drinking and that I would be drinking, they gave me a few words and let me figure it out. I know I've made decisions that they haven't liked or have thought it was a bad idea. Sometimes they have told me how they felt. Sometimes I'm KNOW they have held their mouth shut with a lock and chains and thrown away the key as their heart plops into their mouth with things I have done and still do. The times that I have made a bad choice or wrong way it has never been thrown back at me or I've never been told "I told you so."

I don't understand parents who turn away on their kids because of the choices they make. So my child doesn't have the same political views, they choose a different educational path than we were hoping, they take a different view on religion, this one seems like a HUGE one for a lot of families. I personally hope that our boys have A FAITH in SOMETHING it may not be what we have but that's OK (as long as it's not a cult I think I will be OK) or GASP (sarcasm) our child child is gay. We just want our boys to find real LOVE and acceptance and respect with someone how could love be a bad thing even if it is with the same sex. We want our boys to meet as many different cultures and people as possible. I don't want them to be surrounded by white people with blue eyes and blond hair forever. I want them to mix it up. How boring would it be if the whole world was vanilla??? I love that our African neighbour wears her traditional clothes. Beautiful colours, beautiful hair.....she's proud. Our other neighbour plays a lot of Spanish music in the summer and I hear them singing and laughing and using instruments. Were kinda boring, really.....if our boys married a woman of another culture I would LOVE it. I would LOVE celebrating her holidays and including some of her traditions into our family. That's what families DO. You accept each other for who WE are.
I know the boys will make dections that we don't agree with or we don't like and I'll probably have a zillion heart attacks because of it over my LIFETIME. It's what we "signed" up for the day our boys were born. To love then unconditionally. To guide them in what we hope is the right direction. To be there when they really make a shitty bad mistake. We need to be there to tell them that maybe we don't agree with their decisions but we support THEM. We might not like what they DID but we LOVE THEM.
Bill and I will make mistakes and we will screw up I know that, I just hope that they won't be real bad screw ups!!!!! UHHHHGGGG. We will keep saying "sorry" to the boys when we do make mistakes. We say sorry now to them if we embarrass them or give them crap for something they didn't do and we thought they did or didn't say. We try very hard to respect them. Some days I feel like I yelled too much, didn't spend enough of the day with them, some days I feel frustrated. But one thing I know these 2 monkeys know is that we LOVE them, we LIKE them, they mean everything to us and we like to tell them 110x's a day we love them and we give them A LOT of kisses. I hope when they grow up they will see we did our best, we loved them no matter what and there is NOTHING in this world that they could do that would turn us against them. NOTHING.
I've had pretty awesome teachers!