The Dynamic Duo

In my last post, I gave you a tantalizing teaser about Heather’s room. I feel that in order to fully appreciate this gem of a story, a little background info is in order. Now UltraMom tried very hard to be the best mom that she could possibly be in her children’s formative years, and even in the not-so-formative ones. But noone’s perfect, right? UMom hopes that her children will forgive her for occassional faux pas, such as not monitoring them closely enough when they are “singing, walking backwards with their eyes shut” on a narrow porch. Or tellilng them yes when asked “Can my jump?” off of concrete steps. OR of unfairness and perceived partiality….
There was an incident in young Heather’s life that she(Heather, not UM: UM has totally forgotten it) will never forget, nor it seems, forgive. Picture this: Heather is playing a computer game on the old Commodore 64, but her little brothers want to play too. Heather is really cruising at this game; she is on her way to the score of a lifetime, but little brother wants a turn. Little brother (I can’t remember which one she said) keeps whining UNTIL….......Mom comes in and the game is turned off, because if you can’t play nice, then noone gets to play. The unfairness! Heather is so upset that she writes about it in her diary, and vows to never forget.
Fast forward to yesterday. Heather is feeling very accomplished and virtuous (and rightly so) because UltraMom now has a sparkling clean and empty bathroom and many, many black garbage bags of clothing are awaiting their new home. “Now,” says UltraMom, “Lets go through some stuff in your room.” “I don’t think there is much of my stuff left,” said Heather piously. “Unlike the boys, I took most of my things with me, and you have been using my room for combo cat & litter box and storage room.” All true, but it was amazing what all we discovered in that big closet. More stuffed animals than you can shake a stick at, unless you are a champion stick shaker. Murphy, adorably claimed several for his own. The old cheer leading uniforms. Notebooks from high school biology, business week and career profiles. But the real treasure was the diary!
I have it here beside me; its one of those “one-year” diaries about 4” by 5” with a little gold lock on the front of it. At first we thought we wouldn’t be able to open it because we had no key, but it turns out that the key wasn’t all that important, at least as far as keeping the book locked , and it made the diary look very snappy, and gave the impression, however eroneous, of secrecy. She only kept it for about a week, but I am going to report the entries in full because they are so very charming and cute and, well, funny!
“The property of Heather McDonald. Age 10 (this is crossed out and rewritten as “11”. Apparently these couple of entires spanned a year. Hmmm. Kind of like the regularity of UltraMom’s posts)

January 1:” I feel o.k. I guess. I am pretending that my cabbage patch doll is real and i’m getting tired of it crying.” Isn’t that terrific! I LOVE that entry!
January 2: “We’re coming home from Aunt Debi’s house today.” I guess we had been in Boise visiting.
January 3 ” today is Bobby’s birthday and I feel happy.” Either we celebrated early, or she wrote this one in the wrong date.
January 4“I feel mad because Mom made me take out the doll clothes.” I don’t know about this is all about, but apparently another example of my unfairness
January 5 ” I feel happy because I am starting a letter writing bisness.” I guess she wrote letters for the boys, who were too lazy to write them on their own.

This is all written in pen, but another entry, in pencil, is also on January 4. Heather literally pounced on this one. Here, at last was the fresh proof of UMom’s treachery, the diary entry about the computer game and the whiny little brothers! Making sure she had my undivided attention, Heather trimphantly began to read:
“Dear Diary,
I am mad because on the computer first Johnny killed my guy on space rescueres or something like that and took my guy then on the next game I told Jimmy to let me be cab #1 and he let me and then on the next level he said he had cab #1 so we shut it off. Mom and Dad went to town today and are getting me more fish besides my betta. Love Heather.”

I laughed so hard I nearly cried, and felt totally vindicated. That wasn’t an unfair Mom playing favorites. There wasn’t even any proof that I was the one who caused the shut down. I was the good Mom going to town to buy my little girl some new fish.
Okay, UltraDad has been waiting for me to help load stuff into that wretched horse trailor. I guess my bed is going in first. sad face But I had to get this down while the creative muse was upon me. Maybe I should start keeping that diary again…............mabe after the move.
As Ever,

Ultramom