Sunday, March 27, 2011

Blog Challenge - Day 26.

Day 26. What would you like your Grandchildren to remember about you one day?

These questions are getting intense! Apologies if they're too serious, but I wouldn't be doing them justice if I wasn't sincere. If you've read back the past month or two, you know that we've had a heck of a winter, and I'm not talking about weather. Lots of illness, a few real scares, and a Hubbie working around the clock leaving me to go solo much of the time. I've reoriented quite a few fundamentals of our life, and been pretty pleased with how we've fared. But I had a Eureka! moment about a month ago.

You see, I'm a consensus builder by nature, and I'm always trying to make as many people happy as possible. But consensus building doesn't work when you're hanging by a thread, and there were too many decisions that just couldn't wait until the next time I got to see or even talk to my husband. Much less actually have a long conversation with him.

So I started just acting without consulting, and it dawned on me one night that what this family needed was a Matriarch. A good, old fashioned, this.is.how.it's.done Matriarch. No nonsense, no consensus needed. (That doesn't mean he doesn't have a say, but it means he trusts me to know when he really wants to have input. Funny - turns out he did all along.) Matriarch meaning there are things we do, and things we don't, and that's the end. Not by making it about me personally or what I want, but by sheer force of will.


So of course I want my Grandchildren to think of me as warm, and kind, and involved. As always, always available to them; as a shelter in a storm. But I think I'm going to need that mantle of the lady that held it all together. Although if I'm truly successful, they shouldn't ever know that I had it.

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