I decided to take a day off and garden, and do fall cleaning and organizing.
Sure I’m a Vampire but what do you want me to do? I don’t spend all of my time stalking unsuspecting people and drain them of their blood. I don’t sleep upside down all day with bats. I don’t sit around doing ancient rituals. Who the hell does that? Get off of my back.
Yesterday my husband, daughter, and I took the day off from all news, politics, and pandemic crap and went wine tasting. We are fortunate to live 45 minutes away from one of the most spectacular wine regions in the entire universe. It was a perfect day.
Tomorrow my daughter is going back down to Southern California.
Yesterday was a perfect day. Today I am so stressed out that I feel like my head is going to explode.
Having a so-called empty nest doesn’t get you off the hook for parenting. My kids are so stressed out by the state of the world, school, work, and everything else that it is stressing me out. As a mom I am their sounding board. I am not complaining. I’m just feeling useless because there is nothing I can do but listen. Listening isn’t useless I tell myself because it is true. Listening is NEVER useless. Listening is one of the greatest gifts you can give your children.
I’m just so damn worried about them. They’re smart. They make good choices. I’m good with that. That said, they are angry. They are discouraged. They are questioning everything.
With the election so close and no good choices for young people (just two old guys most of them don’t really support) they are frankly disgusted. They are loud and clear about their opinions.
Then there are our family dynamics to deal with. Mine are easy.
In my family we talk a lot about everything. We keep in touch. My kids talk to me or text me every single day. They don’t have to. They want to.
Don’t even get me started on those who think “self care” will solve anyone’s problems. Really? Right now autopilot is what is going to save me.
My fucking bank just merged with another bank (it was taken over by another bank) and now that is a huge cluster F. The lines at the bank are horrible. It took me five hours online to get everything half way working.
If anyone out there thinks being a Vampire or something other than what you are will help you please THINK AGAIN. Nobody is exempt from the modern world unless you want to be come crazy living up in the hills or out in the desert “off the grid.” Or you could live in a crypt, but in that case I doubt if you have a bank account. Shadow creeping Vampires who live in crypts and other unsavory places usually have dusty old attorneys who take care of their money, or they have a stash buried somewhere, or they just steal everything they need. Don’t even ask about how Zombies are living right now. Holy shit, this is 2020 and there is still a few months left for the Zombies to poke their rotting heads out of their hidey holes.
But I digress, we need to get back to parenting.
Right now is an extremely difficult time for parents with children of all ages.
My nephew and his wife just had a baby. I haven’t seen him yet. Any other year I would have been right over to San Francisco to meet my new little nephew. No such luck.
Our kids from pre-school to graduate school can’t go to school. Everything is online. Yes, there are a few online classes but that is more of the exception. Many trade schools are closed. Job opportunities are few and far between for our young adult kids who aren’t going to school.
At the same time our adult children are applying for college, jobs, trade schools and other programs. They feel totally screwed by the generations before them. To their credit they are doing better than they know. They’re strong. They’re getting organized. They’re loud. They’re fierce. I hope they will be force to be reckoned with.
My message to parents and to young people is DON’T GIVE UP. That is my message to everyone. Old, young, normal, unusual, weird, creative, uncreative, or whatever you are – DON’T GIVE UP.
I know I must sound like I’m rambling. My work at the museum is all online these days. I’ve been there in person once since March. I’ll go again on Friday and meet with a young person I’m mentoring. How cool is that? Extremely cool. I’ll be giving online tours with a docent friend. We’re over the moon happy about that.
So I’m fine. Teddy frustrated is fine. Our kids are frustrated but fine. My brother Aaron’s kids are frustrated by fine.
I guess the whole purpose here, aside from my gratuitous TMI venting, is to say that we’re all feeling a lot of pressure as parents. Just be there for your kids. Talk to them, but most of all just listen to them. Support your kids. Support their dreams.
SUPPORT THEIR DREAMS. Now is not the time to shoot down dreams or tell they can’t do something. Now is the time to just listen, be it by phone, text, Zoom, in person, or however you’re communicating these days.
I might get to gardening. I’ve spent the entire day in Zoom meetings, checking election results, taking care of banking BS, and being there for my kids. I’ll get out in the garden in an hour or two. My poor dog is feeling totally ignored.
Thanks for dropping by. Wishing you all peace of mind. Stay safe. Stay calm. Stay positive. Wear a mask. Talk to your kids. Listen to them. Check in on those who might need extra help, and those who are alone. Don’t allow anger to get the best of you – leave that for the brainless Zombies and nasty Ghouls.
Take care,
~ Juliette aka Vampire Maman
Vampire Maman 
Remember all those decades of parents feeling exactly like you and kids feeling exactly like they do today. Every century has it’s unbelievably insane weirdness.
I remember knowing, *absolutely knowing*, that the world was going to go up in a nuclear fireball before I reached high school. I talked with my siblings and some of my friends and they felt the same way. But we didn’t. Then I knew that the earth was going to implode from an unchecked population growth. But we didn’t. I could go on about how Africa was (and still is) going to die of war, pestilence and starvation. It hasn’t (yet). I could go on and on. The point is that this year seems like there’s been nothing worse but in my memory, those other times were just as bad. How did I hear about all of these horrors that scared me to death? The media.
I did an interview on the news last Monday about if the local Arts District was going to shut down and board up all its windows in fear of rioting due to the election results. WTH? Why would we do that? We all saw that there were some groups in other cities preparing to riot but we didn’t want to send a message of fear to our community. We were tired of living in the fear that the media spins. No one in my district would talk to the news because they always spin the words to match their desired story and the story de jour is rioting and destruction. As the representative for the area though, I finally said “yes”. I spent an hour before hand talking with the news casters about the reason why none of us in the Arts District will talk with them anymore. I told them they are they have the responsibility to not spin up the public. They have the responsibility to report the facts and not try to sway the public to their sensationalist platform. I said if they clip my words to seem like we are living in fear of their their current story of rioting they will hear about it later. They agreed. I did the interview. They did a neutral story. We didn’t riot. It was a beautiful normal day and night in the Arts District. Everyone was so proud that we finally didn’t get a biased report on a local story. My point is that there have been horrible times in the past and we live in a world that thrives on sensationalism. You do a great job reminding us of the wonderful things in the world so be proud that you are part of the solution and not part of the problem.
This is a bit off subject to answer here. Send me a private message with more details.