Raising Children -- Raise The Bar

With great and lasting pride, I can brag that I am a mother of three fine young men.  Having grown up the youngest of three daughters and a younger brother, very much a girlie-girl, preferring Barbies and doll babies, playing dress-up with my mom's shoes and jewelry, make-believe friends, tea parties, frequent baking marathons with my Easy Bake Oven, zero athletic ability (But boy, could I sing!  Yes indeed!  Loud and long!), and raised single-handedly by a divorced mom (with the help of a grandMOTHER), one might expect that I'd have pined never having been blessed with a daughter.

Well, I did, but that pout session was short-lived.  I wanted a daughter when my boys were little ones, before they hit puberty.  I wanted someone to go shopping with, to dress up with bows and frillies (baby girl clothes are and always will be far cuter than baby boy clothes), to buy dolls and Barbies and all that I enjoyed as a little girl.

But then puberty hits.  And that's when I began noticing the behaviors of my friends' daughters.  Ouch.  Mercy.  I actually began to feel sympathy for them.  The never-ending drama!  Girls, it occurs to me, are far too needy.  Too dramatic.  Over the top.  They whine too much.  Too hormonal (I know, guilty as charged!).  They are jealous and catty.  Backbiting bitches.

Boys have their share of vices.  Challenges.  But the kicks and punches -- play on words -- are worth the trade-off.  A mom learns to deal with the struggles of raising boys.  Our skin toughens.  We get meaner.  Cockier.  We take on that whole in-your-face fearlessness.  

I was reminded last weekend of one of the most significant reasons that I'm relieved not to have to deal with the challenges of raising girls in today's society.  Young girls today have few inhibitions or limitations on modesty.  They are incredibly sexually assertive in the way they act, dress, talk, flirt, date.  OMG.  The stories I've been told by other moms.  Girls in their TEENS!  It's beyond shameful.  What has happened?  What about values?  What about self-decency and pride?

I had stopped at a mall over the weekend on my way back from PA, having taken a load of "stuff" to my son at college, helping him to get moved back into his dorm for the fall semester of his senior year (whole 'nother blog post pending).  I was strolling along, zoned off into my own train of thoughts when I saw her walking toward me along with her friends.  She looked to be about 14 or 15 years old.  She was wearing a T-shirt, hideously ugly shade of green, with huge neon letters dancing across the front advertising:

FREE KISSES

So call me old-fashioned.  Call me a stick in the mud.  Whatever.  But why would a young woman send that message?  Or want to?

Lesson Number One:  Self-Values.

I give kisses free.  Anybody, everybody.  You don't need to earn them.   Or impress me.  I'm easy.  I just give it away.  It's that simple.  No standards, no expectations, no substance. I'm free to everybody.  Stand in line, lucky person, for your prize handouts.  

Okay.  Whatever.  At first it was annoying to me, and then I just began feeling sorry for her.  For her and countless other young women of today and where they're headed.

I also realize that not all young women are like this.  Young women raised in Christian homes with honest upbringing and strong morals, though not infallible and just as subjected to the evils of today as any other teenager, stand a far better chance or maturing into responsible, respectable young women of substance.  And as I've seen time after time over the years I've spent as a court reporter and my exposure to the juvenile court system, 99.9% of the time the blame is to be placed with the parents (or lack thereof).

I could have turned out far worse than I did, given my broken home and the struggles we faced.  But my mother, God bless her, was intent on RAISING THE BAR while she raised her children.  She made certain that we knew our Creator, His Son, and believed and hoped in the Gift of Eternal Life with Him as a result of our faith and Christian upbringing.  We knew that to live fair, work hard, and to respect ourselves and others placed us on an unwavering path to success if we held tightly to Our Compass.

Yes, I too would have raised my daughter "in my mother's shoes," and I would like to think she would have grown into a fine young woman of decent morals and values.

But it was part of God's plan that I should have sons.  And I have raised them in the way my mother raised me and in the way that God teaches us in His Word.  I can only hope that that legacy lives on in my grandchildren...

... whether boys OR girls...

And yes, I do find myself STILL hoping for a granddaughter some day.