I Got It From My Mama

"Genes aren't designed to make us happy.

They design us to make more copies of themselves."

-- Joe Quirk,

It's Not You, It's Biology: 

The Science of Love, Sex, and Relationships

Mom 9-28-14

"The laws of genetics apply 

even if you refuse to learn them."

-- Allison Plowden

"Got a pistol for a mouth, my old mama gave me that."

-- Gin Wigmore, "Black Sheep"

My mom visited this weekend to watch Leo's football game.

The older I get, the more I see my mother in me. It's like a little sneak peek into what's rolling down the genetic hill in my direction.

There's lots of good stuff. Some potentially bad stuff. And a lot of stuff in the middle.

The similarities we share are startling, sometimes. 

There is physical stuff, for sure.  

But it's the stuff that happens below the surface that really gets me -- our behaviors, our tendencies, even our demons are very much the same. 

There are some of my mother's traits that I'm glad she passed on -- because of her skinny genes, I can wear skinny jeans. 

Others not so much. We both wrestle on and off and on again with addiction. We are both maternally-challenged. We both hate making phone calls. We can both cuss a blue streak (she taught me all the good swear words at a very tender age.)

I guess it's safe to say that this apple didn't fall from from the tree. 

It's a good thing it's a goddamn great motherfucking tree.

A Chip Off The Old Block

"There are certain traits that God puts in each one of us.

There's no escaping them."

-- Brad Meltzer, The Inner Circle

Old cement block, chip, hammer and chisel 4-28-14 

"You inherit all kinds of things that you can do nothing about.

You inherit your identity, your history,

like a birthmark that you can't wash off."

-- Hugo Hamilton, The Sailor in the Wardrobe

Whenever I witness one of my less-than-desirable traits emerging in one of my sons, I cringe.

Be it my anxious mind, my irritable bowel, my twitchy face, my acne-prone skin, my shitty housekeeping skills, my emotional volatility, my food sensitivities -- when I see any one of those little bastards coming down the genetic shit-chute I want to shut it down, stuff it back in the tube, throw a wrench in the works and scream "No no no no no! Not that one!".

And yet for all the crappy traits I wish they didn't get, there are a few gems I don't mind seeing, and am even happy to watch develop and grow as my two boys make them their very own.

From my good stuff, Sam got my quick wit, my biting, sardonic sense of humor, my love of coffee, and my jawline. (Apparently everything else in his packaging came from my husband.)

Leo got my love of exercise and pushing my body to its limits. He got my athletic intensity (which can be a good or a bad thing, depending how you slice it.) 

Leo also got my hunger for reading --  he's a teen boy who actually loves books and asks me for recommendations. [Applause!] I've passed along some of my favorites, books like A Prayer for Owen Meany, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle and The Catcher in the Rye. He gobbles them up and then feels the same heavy sadness I do when a good book ends and he doesn't get to commune with its characters anymore. Love that.

He also got my hunger for art. He draws and paints and likes to meander around the art supplies store looking for possibilities, just like me.  He's a dreamer, just like me. He likes to visit the art museum, just like me. (For a while the screensaver on his iPhone is his favorite Karl Schmidt-Rottluff painting.) He'll roam around the woods with me, camera in hand, just to see what we can see.

Leo also likes to paint birds, just like me. He can get lost in his room for hours, just like me, listening to music and painting, say, a teeny tiny duck on a little block of wood. 

Just like me.

I've been drawing/painting/photographing birds my whole life. The first frame-worthy, rudimentary bird rendering I did at age 10 (of a robin on her nest) hung on the wall in my grandparents' den for years.

And yesterday, Leo's painting of a pair of Cedar Waxwings won honorable mention in an Earth Day student art contest sponsored by our local MetroParks division.

I guess he's a chip off the old block.

And that is just fine with me, aka the Old Block. In fact, it's more than fine. It's really good.

As flashier, trendier distractions vie for my son's attention, I hope Leo never loses his appetite for creating and making and escaping into art. It is a trait that has served me well my whole life long. It's a good thing that I am more than happy to pass along to my child.

Um, sorry about all the other shit, buddy.