A Weekend Away

This weekend my son and I drove to Lake Placid to spend a weekend away; a celebration, if you will, to the unofficial arrival of summer. With the added bonus of getting in on the “Elevate Your Rate” promotion at the High Peaks Resort, even this single mom was able to do something special for the Memorial Day Weekend. (The hotel is great and we especially love the bathroom! Isn’t it funny that bathrooms have become so important in our lives; we all want to feel like we are in a spa!)
The weather has been cooperating, as it has not rained for more than a few minutes now and then, but the sun has been scarce, though it has tried to peak through a few times. Nonetheless, we have been able to add to our collection of memories, and pictures to be scrapbooked at a later date. Yesterday, we took out the boats that they have here at the resort, what a liberating feeling as I have not been on a paddle boat since I was about 14. Losing all that weight continues to be a benefit and getting back to the business of life is incredible. Of course, for a 9 year old boy, a paddle boat doesn’t seem to go fast enough but, hey, I was peddling as fast as I could. It took us a few minutes to get the hang of steering it, we did our share of circles but we finally got the hang of it, and traveled around the lake. After the paddleboat, we took out the row boat, which went much faster. It was in there in the row boat that I had my moment. Noah wanted to row the boat, and so I was telling him how to do it. Again, we seem to have difficulty with the teaching / learning relationship. He always tells me ‘I know how to do it Mom.” (Spoken in a very frustrating way.) The more he resists being taught, the more I feel I need to teach, now not just about rowing the boat, but how to gracefully accept direction, about perseverance, about hard work, etc. It gets very big, until the moment happens, that my usually sweet (prior to hitting 9) boy says to me, “Mom, I am doing it and you just keep yapping at me.” Yapping? Yapping? YAPPING? Since when does my son tell me that I am “yapping” at him? I wasn’t “yapping”, I was teaching! I was directing…isn’t that my job??? It took me most of the day, with this word “yapping” in my head to realize that … I was just yapping. Did anyone “teach” me to row a boat, or did I just get out there and “figure it out”. Since my son and I are always together, and I am a little bit of a nervous mother, thinking that something is going to happen to him if I let him go alone, his changes of figuring things out on his own are slim. And being that I love him more than life itself, I am quick to explain to him how I think he should do things, what I think should be important to him, etc. When I realized that I should just allow much more “figuring it out” experiences. With all my great intentions, all I am doing is leaving him with a feeling that he isn’t good enough and robbing him from moments of pride that he did it on my own. My job, now that he is 9, is to sit back and let him do more and more, until he becomes the independent man that God intended him to be. I have a feeling that this will be harder on me than on him! Ah, yet another stage of life.
Its early morning here in Lake Place, another overcast day seems to be what we will get. All is quiet and moments of reflection are a blessing. I thank God today for the blessings that we have, especially these moments away from our regular routine. But later today, we head back to Grandma and Snoopy, whom we have missed with a renewed spirit to carry on.