The Roles We Play

2016 is half over, and I was just thinking the other day I should send out a blog update.  What should I write about?  I thought through a few ideas.  In the end, what has stood out to me throughout the first half of the year, is how many roles we all play – whether we like them or not.

If you come by our house at any time when our kids are awake, you’ll likely find us involved in some type of imagination game.  We play mermaids/mermen, swim class, school, race car people, rescuers, cowgirls/cowboys, dancers, singers, princesses, and more.  Sometimes I get so confused on who I am supposed to be.  Take, for example, this recent conversation:

Harper: “Mommy, you be Miss Allison (her favorite pre-K teacher), and I’ll be the mom.” 

Me: “So, I’m the teacher and you’re the mom of the kids?”

H: “Well, maybe I want to be the teacher.   How about you be the mom?”

Me:  “Ok, I’ll be the mom of the kids and come bring them to school.  Here we come!”

H:  “Wait!  Mom, you can’t forget Snow White’s (her baby doll) favorite toy.  sigh), maybe I should be the mom-teacher”.

Or, on another night playing mermaids with Rory and Harper (while Rory was proudly wearing a little purple mermaid outfit)

Harper:  “I’m Ariel and we live in a world under the sea!”

Rory:  “I’m Ariel too!”

H: “No, Rory.  You can’t be Ariel too.  You be Eerial.”

R:  “Ok”

Me:   “Alright Ariel and Eerial, I’m Miranda the Mermaid.  Let’s go exploring.”

H:  “You can’t be Miranda, Mom.”

R:  “That’s a silly mermaid name”

Me:  “Who should I be then?”

H:  “How about……..Ree-All?”

R: “Yea!”

I give up sometimes.  It’s too much to remember who I am and what story I’m supposed to be acting out.  But, I do love imagination games.

 In addition to her imaginary roles, some of the other roles Harper plays are:

• ·         Helpful Big Sister – She really is such a good big sister for Rory 90% of the time.  She helps helps him do so many things and encourages him to try new things.
• ·         Antagonizing Big Sister – The other 10% of the time.
• ·         Teacher - she teaches us all what she learns in school daily
• ·         Social coordinator - She’s always asking who can come over for dinner and planning activities for them (Heather & Paul were recent guests at a dance party!)

Rory’s roles include: 

• ·         Easy-going, go-with-the-flow, happy-as-long-as-you-are-with-me little brother – Rory will do things Harper never would have done at age 2 because she is there leading him along.  He’s also very happy and content to try most things Harper suggests (He loves playing dress up!).
• ·         Provoking / Annoying Little Brother – That 10% of the time role all little brothers have to play
• ·         Independent player – Rory will play in the sandbox or with water in the back yard by himself for as long as you let him.  He’s blissfully happy and lost in his own little world.
• ·         Family clown – While Harper is also quite goofy, Rory really takes it up a notch with his dramatic expressions.  He’s learning to tell jokes and he does all sorts of things to get us to laugh with him.

Eric plays many roles in our household.  A few include:

• ·         Jungle Gym – The kids love to climb on him and have him toss them into the air.  I think he secretly enjoys the workout.
• ·         Landlord – We’ve been managing a rental property in addition to our own for the past 9 months.  I’m not sure we have this all down pat just yet, but we’re working on it.  Eric definitely loses more sleep about it than I do.
• ·         Super-Dad / Super-Husband – When an unexpected medical situation arose in February (see below), Eric managed to juggle his work, the kids, and our household.  Quite a feat!  And, thanks to the many friends who helped us out in the process.

To supplement the plethora of imaginary roles I play on a daily basis, I’ve also spent time in the following roles:

• ·         Patient – In mid-February, I had an emergency appendectomy, which required a few weeks of recovery.  During that time, I had to turn off “parent” mode a lot of the time and simply focus on resting and recovering.  It was so hard, but luckily we had a lot of support to get us through the tough parts.
• ·         Out-of-my-league academic advisor – This spring I had two of the most difficult student situations that I’ve encountered in my 10 years advising students.  I felt woefully ill-prepared to deal with the multitude of mental health challenges they were facing.  I learned a lot about my limits and where I can refer students for some of these new situations.
• ·         Determined half-marathoner – Literally days before my appendectomy, I registered for a half marathon with a few of my friends in Deadwood, SD.  Determined to still finish it, I took it slow and eventually worked my way up to running (slowly). I did not set any records in this race, but on the day of the event, the adrenaline and support of my friends pushed me through to the finish.

Whew!  Is it any wonder I sometimes feel frazzled and a bit out of sorts?  I feel like I wear about 5 different hats on any given day – mother, wife, friend, daughter, sister, advisor, colleague, neighbor, etc.

And, perhaps the role that I’ve been thinking the most about lately is the role and responsibility I have in raising my children to be agents of change in this world. Warning:  this may sound a little bit political here, but these things have been weighing on me heavily, and I must share these thoughts.  Read as you wish….  

In the last month, 50+ people were killed at a gay nightclub in Orlando.  In the last week, our country has seen 2 black men killed by police.  Days later, we saw 7 police officers shot during a peaceful protest in Dallas.   The discourse, sound-bites, and national conversation related to race, guns, and law-enforcement is polarizing. 

How, as a parent, do I make sense of this?  How do I talk to my children about events such as these in an age-appropriate way?  And, most importantly, how do I raise them to think outside the dichotomous, polarizing conversations they hear?

It’s not enough to simply raise our kids to be kind individuals.  We can all be “nice.”  We can say we aren’t racist, homophobic, sexist, etc.  And, the fact of the matter remains that our system is unjust.  Equality is far from reality.   The conversations my black peers (mothers of young children) have to have with their sons is heart-breaking.  I’ve been in tears reading Face Book posts from many of them this week.

I don’t want Harper and Rory to be terrified about the world.  I want them to be relentlessly optimistic and hopeful.  I want them to be curious and open to ideas and cultures. 

And, I want them to acknowledge the advantages they have in our societal structure that aren’t necessarily earned (reference Peggy MacIntosh’s Invisible Knapsack if you’re curious).  I want them to see the unfairness of those unearned privileges.  Instead of feeling guilty for their privilege, I want them to use it and speak out about injustice.

So, how do I teach them to use their privilege as white, relatively-affluent individuals in meaningful ways to affect change in our society? If only I knew how to do this……..