Having reached the stage in life that is the equivalent of "between a rock and a hard place", I more fully appreciate how interesting life becomes when your parents are old enough to require more significant amounts of your help, even as your children grow ever more needy of rides, counsel, and cash. In other words, being part of the current "sandwich generation". My mother is now healthy and happy. Recently, though, she did have health problems that necessitated regular visits to the hospital for procedures in day surgery. I was her principal means of transportation to those appointments, which often required arriving at the hospital before 6 a.m. At the same time, my daughters (I have four of them) needed rides to the various activities that constitute life as a teenager or pre-teenager these days. It was not unusual to take my mother to the hospital at 5:45 a.m., hustle to work to get a head start on the day, go back to the hospital at 8:30 to be with my mom until she was ready to return home, head back to my office, and then leave there early in order to get a daughter to her dance lesson. Or theater class. Or rehearsal. Or athletic event. Or pick her up from school after she missed the bus. You get the idea. Of course, there are times that being the sandwich generation is funny, too--or, at least, ironic. I accidentally discovered that my mother knew the father of the singer/songwriter James Taylor quite well. She worked with his father when James was a boy. When I discovered this, I asked her about having worked with the man (he was a doctor and professor at the University of North Carolina in the mid-50's). She remembered him well. When I pointed out that James Taylor was his son, she innocently asked, "Who is that?" I thought my eldest daughter, now 20 and about 15 at the time, would enjoy this little story, so I described to her how her grandmother had worked closely with James Taylor's father. What was her response? Yep. The very same "Who is that?" It's enough to make me go back and check my CD collection to prove he really exists! One aspect of being a prime helper of my mother, even as I am shepherding my daughters into and through the teenage years, is the confusing draw on two wholly different parts of myself. As I help my mother, I still feel the feelings of a son, that sense of wanting my mom's approval and seeing her happy. Then, I whirl around and become Dad, the provider of parental wisdom and driver of the dad-cab. One moment good son, the next disciplinarian Dad. It can leave one fully exhausted"or maybe I should say it can leave two (son and father) spent. My detailing of difficulty is not meant to overshadow the great enjoyment and fulfillment I gain from having my mother here to care for, and having my daughters here to raise. It fills my heart to be able to do for my mom what she has done for me all my life: to be there and be ready to help. My daughters are, collectively, the single-greatest miracle of my life. I managed to get them this far without ruining them, and they now are all of an age that they respond to my words of wit with exaggerated rolling of eyes. This tells me that they are able to move onward toward adulthood with good minds and confident bodies"and an inability to recognize a great humorist when one is right in their midst. In a way, as I describe the challenges of being in the middle, I am celebrating the opportunity. My kids will grow up very soon and still need their dear old dad, but the need will be different and less frequent. My mother will go away, too, after what I envision as many more years of seeing her family grow around her. So this time, while challenging, is very special to me. It is a fleeting time when the first half of my life and the second half overlap in a fashion that is, at the same time, full of joy and full of frustration. It's the joy I will remember, though. |
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