Bragging On My Kids

We’ve all gotten those Christmas card letters that are chocked full of all the good news from folks mostly bragging about their kids and their accomplishments and where they went on vacations, etc. Well if you hate reading those letters then stop now because this post is going to be in a similar vein.

I’ve been blessed with three beautiful girls. ‘Course they aren’t girls anymore, now they are women! They’ll always be my babies though no matter how old they get. My youngest, the actual baby of the bunch, gets crazy when I call her my baby. She’s been known to go “waa, waa, waa” in response. I can’t help myself though….when you carry someone inside of you for 9 months you get attached to them and think of them as your baby. "It’s a fact, you can look it up".

My first born baby is a hospice nurse. She’s been a nurse for 11 or so years. She’s worked mostly with the retarded and Alzheimer and dementia patents and for several years now she’s worked hospice. She says her job is to make someone’s last days as comfortable as possible and her the other concern is helping the family to cope with the inevitable. She amazes me for the things she deals with on a daily basis. I’m the original “feet don’t fail me now” gal when it comes to death and dying. I have to grit my teeth to attend funerals! I’m a total klutz when it comes to hospital visits. I’m the type that will trip over the IV tube or step on the bag that holds all the urine! I tell my daughter all the time that she didn’t get “that” from me. She loves her job even when she's on call and a quart low on sleep. I’m so proud of her and admire her so much!

My middle daughter is gifted. She is an artist. She sees things that I don’t. I can’t explain it since I can’t see it the way she does, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the eye of the artist is crafted differently than the eye of the rest of us. She recently had four of her painting on display and sold two of them for 5 bills each! She blew it off as her rightly due, but I was over the moon with joy and awe. Like most artists those pictures are not just her work they are HER babies. She loves each one and can recall the motivation and feelings that led to their birth. I think on the one hand she’s thrilled to make the money and the acknowledgement that someone other than her family values her work, but it’s got to be hard to cut that invisible umbilical cord and know that painting is “lost” to you forever. The good part is that there’s plenty more where that one came from. She’s certainly not a factory, but the way this gift works is the more you create the more you can create. I’m so proud of her and admire her so much!

My youngest daughter aka “the baby” is talking to “me” even as I type. She’s coming across loud and clear on my Bearcat scanner. She’s in training as one of HPD’s newest dispatchers. ‘Course they don’t call them “dispatchers” officially….but that’s what they are. She’s only been training for 9 days and she sounds GREAT to me. She sounds exactly like all the other dispatchers! And by that I mean like she’d been broadcasting for years and years. She says there’s a tremendous amount to learn and she has to read so much her eyes are tired, but I know she’s also excited to be learning something new. From what I can see, HPD does a bang up job of training folks too.....its not like she's the first one to go through the system. They are still hiring too! Check it out. The chance for advancement is far more reachable at this job than any of the other jobs she’s ever had. Better pay, better benefits and more interesting work are all the reasons why she’s happy to be working for the city. I’m so proud of her and admire her so much!