There are no ugly children.

This post is something that my sister wrote and it hit my heart incredibly hard.

My sister and I are opposites.
This is something that we have always known.
I always say that she sucked up all of the Portuguese and left the Irish for me.

As we grew up our lives took different paths and it finds us at either end of the spectrum.

We both have an incredible zealous passion for our careers. And we speak about them with conviction and intensity while we are together.

We joke that I Deal in creating human beings, while she Deals with putting them to rest.

She is a Mortician, and half of the time I cannot bear the stories that she has to tell.

"Stop. I cant handle this." I mutter at her

"Sorry sister." she replies, but she never has a choice in the matter. She doesn't get to choose which death she has to handle. There is no accepting of one in trade for another.

This morning her words appeared in my FEED. And I simply HAD to share them:

Cindy Tavares

November 16 at 11:29pm ·

 

 

THERE ARE NO UGLY CHILDREN

 

A few months ago, I found myself a bottle of Grey Goose down into a weekend bender. I don't really have a habit of drinking but there are some cases that I need "help" with when I am off call and I have time to think.

 I always need help with the kids.

This particular case was a 3 year old girl. She died in a rollover.

It was the heaviest 35 lbs I have ever felt in my life. A 400 lb case is a piece of cake compared to this one.

 I cried over her body. Her Mother was annihilated emotionally. Gone. Nothing left of this mothers soul at that moment. Void of everything but pain.

Why am I telling you this? 

Because I don't have the luxury of emotional ignorance. I wanted to write and tell you what I see. 

I see these posts OFTEN: "Click share if you have a beautiful daughter".  "Click share if you have a handsome son". 

I am positive that there are many that see these posts and spring in to tears, probably with the thought of "I used to". And they get to go through the grieving process all over again, resentful that someone is throwing it in their faces that their daughter or son met an untimely end.

Grief doesn't make sense. Grief is very personal.

Anything anyone says or does when someone is grieving, can be seen or taken as very personal.

There is no method to the madness.

The mother of the 3 year old little girl has a facebook. I am positive that those posts hurt her heart. I am positive that with the holidays right around the corner, she especially hates these posts. 

"It's Daughter week!" Great! Again. like it was 2 weeks ago (I'm fairly sure that some of these posters make that shit up whenever the mood of that week hits them)

"It's Son week!" Nice. Again. Like someone on facebook told me it was last week. 

Why is there even a son week or a daughter week? I don't get it.  I just imagine loving them every day is probably best. 

But I digress. 

Maybe I am so involved and immersed in my work that I relate more to the dead and the grieving than I do to the living. Maybe I am just more concerned with them and their grief and ultimately their healing, and that makes me appear to be an asshole to most everyone else. 

"Can you wipe my butt?" ....A Pre-K conversation

 



"Hey."

"Hey." I nod back

"Can you wipe my butt?"

"No. But you can."

"No. I definitely can't."

I am standing at the half door of my classroom bathroom.

"I cant either, there is a clause in my contract that strictly prohibits me from wiping the butts of little boys who can build bumble bee replicas out of Legos."

"Oh."

I wait a minute and let his mind work on that one.

"Well I don't want to." He piped up after a minute or so.

"I see. Well I don't want to either. So what should we do?"

His shoulders sank and he kicked his feet.

"Let me go check my contract" I disappeared for a moment.


In my classroom there is a mysterious contract that I bring up and use in some instances like:

"Ms.BEANIEEEEEEE She wont play with me, can you make her?"

"Nope. That is not in my contract, however you can ask Lunden nicely, she is all alone over there and I bet she would like to play with you."

or

"My mommy says you HAVE to do what I say."

"Sorry kid, doing what you say is most DEFENETLY not in my contract. Your mommy is out of luck."

See? It is quite helpful...but back to the kid on the pot...



"Okay, I checked my contract and we have two options."

"Okay." he says, quite seriously.

"You can NOT wipe your butt, but then you will smell like poop and a poop cloud will follow you around and people might actually CALL you poop cloud, which is not going to help with the ladies."

"That's not good."

"No. The second option is that YOU wipe your butt because, after all, it is yours. But that I should teach you because I am your teacher, and that's kinda what I do."

"Let's do that."

So we do.

5 minutes later he washes his hands with "Copious amounts of soap" and joins his friends at the Lego table.
"Hey guess what guys! I wiped my butt!"

"Cooooool" His friends say.

I guess when you are four, wiping your own butt is pretty awesome and it makes me wonder how long that lasts.

I will try and impress my own friends with my butt wiping skills promptly.

UGLY.

 

The other morning, while I was doing my makeup Emma walked in to the bathroom, took one look at what I was wearing and said one thing "NO."

I smiled at her through my mascara wand."What's wrong? You do not like my tube dress?"

She crossed her arms "It doesn't do anything for you."

I think she was referring to my dimpled ass and rolly rolls, so I turned to her and did a fat dance (just for her pleasure)

She sighed at me and started to brush her teeth. I think this was when she realized that I wouldn't dare go into work looking like an encased military green sausage roll. "Well...what else are you wearing with it?" she  asked.

I showed her and she begrudgingly nodded her approval. "Okay." she murmured through the white minty foam and I smiled. (after I stuck out my tongue)

I am known for wearing ugliness. Case in point...my ugly fur vest.

We had gone to the Thrift store to search out an Ugly Christmas Sweater and I found one right away.
"Emma, you go look at stuff. I am going to find TREASURES!"

"Oh my god" Emma muttered and gave me a half eye roll.

"TREASURES!" I screeched as I hurried down the isles, my eyes searching for something fabulous with which to plan amazing.

And I found it.

I gasped and grabbed a vest off of the rack. A woman next to me cringed when she saw it and walked the other way.

"Hello lovely!" I greeted my treasure.

I checked the size, the length and the cut. It was perfect! I hung it on my arm and went to find Emma.

On the way I skinnied my eyes at anyone who dared to look upon my amazing vest with envy. (Okay there wasn't anyone...) But just incase I held it close.

I found Emma "I FOUND A TREASUUUURE!" I screeched with glee.

She put her hands over her mouth when she saw it "OH.MY.GAWD that is horrid."

I looked at her face and back to my vest. "Horrid?"

"Yes."

"I love it."

"No!"

"Yes."

"NO."
"YES! I love it so much, if it had a penis I would make babies with it and there would be fur vest babies walking around!" I stomped my foot for emphasis.

She sighed at me and knew she had lost. I checked the price as we got up to the counter. "OHNO."

"What."

"I don't think I can get it. It is too much."

"Thank God......I mean...At a thrift store?"

"YES. FOR a thrift store, it is too much and I have to get these ugly Christmas sweaters. When we comeback with Brandee, if it is still here, we will see."

My shoulders sagged and my heart practically died. I handed it to Emma and told her to hide it.

"No. I am going to hang it out in the open and I guarantee in 3 hours it will STILL be there, that is how AWFUL it is."

3 hours later....

I rushed into the store with Emma, Brandee and Mandy. I showed Brandee to the Ugly Christmas Sweater Rack and then went in search of my vest.

"I will go get it." Emma rushed off and came back with it. My eyes lit up. "I told you. 3 hours and no one even touched it."

"Well, I cant help it if everyone except me has bad taste!"

"Lets see this vest." Mandy said from behind me.

I turned around and held the vest in front of me like a rare jewel that it was. I expected them to gasp in awe and wonder at its amazingness, but instead their heads jerked back and resembled...

 "Ohhhh MY." Mandy said

"Its awful" Emma muttered

"Ummm." Brandee hummed

Mandy kept looking from my beaming smile back to the vest. Like at any second the vest would turn into something else.

"Isn't it fantastic?!" I moaned

"NO." Emma stated

"Not really Beanie...but okaaaay!" Mandy said

Brandee petted it and replied "Ummm its really....soft." she nodded and smiled at me.

"I cant get it anyways because it is too much." I hung it up and stomped off, certain that My heart would be broken for AT LEAST 6 hours over this.

After leaving I was sad.

I walked with Emma and with each step, my shoulders started to sag.

I was sad.

I needed that vest.

I started to turn around.

"What are you doing?!" Emma hollered as I turned and started stomping back inside.

"I neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed it!"

"No. Mom. Moooooooooooooooom."

"WHAT!"

"Look at Mandy"

Mandy had purchased my vest and held it over her back, like beanie bait.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE" I screamed and rushed at her "YOU love me ONLY!" And I hugged her and squeezed her and snatched at my LOVELY vest.

"Yes I do." Mandy agreed

Hallowen HUSTLE.

"EMERGENCY FAMILY MEETING!" I yelled as I came home from yet another Halloween store.

Emma looked up from the laptop and then over at Shane. She tilted her head twords me and yelled at him "FAMILY MEETING!"

He lifted up his huge honken headphones and replied "Huh?"

"Family Meeting." Emma replied with a bossiness that is apparently inherited from me.

"Ah. 1 sec."

We all sat on the floor of the living room and Karma squirmed on the ground in the middle. (She is such an attention whore...also inherited from me)

"This is an emergency meeting, which means we dispense with the niceties."

"Okay." Both of my children agreed, eager to find out what the emergency was.

"We have an EMERGENCY! I cannot find a peter pan hat ANYWHERE."

Emma stared at me and Shane murmured "Oooookaaaaaaaay."

"Which means that Emma cannot be Peter Pan. Which means that we cannot do our family theme, which inevitably means that my life IS RUINED!"

"Oh my god." Emma stated quite dryly.

"OHHHHH Myyyyy." Shane replied

I lay down on the ground, moaned and Karma excitedly followed suit, Rubbing herself all over the carpet and grunting quite like a pig.

"I cannot find Genie Pants for Shane! And we cannot find a single set of popeye arms either! We need to think of something else!"

Emma leaned back on her hands with her arms outstretched. "I can always be Sherlock. All I need is a brown curly wig." My mind raced, but it was not excited...not in the least. "And what about everyone else?"

"Well....you can be John Watson."

"A FAT John? No thank you."

She laughed "You can be Moriarty"

"A FAT Moriarty? My life is practically over."

"Lets see...you could be a Queen."

"Yes. I am a Queen...I could be something fabulous, I could be a roman queen....I could be a some kind of queen....I could be a...."

"Drama Queen?" Emma laughed at herself and I gave her the death stare.

"I will find something for me, you worry about you and Karma." Shane stated, and I didn't doubt it. His room is a veritable costume closet. He has every hat you could want.

"We don't have to match Ma." Emma stated and ran into her room to try out her Sherlock costume.

She looked great and it was decided, after a quick Google search on homemade pet costumes, that I would be an Egyptian Queen (of course) and Karma would be my mummy. All wrapped in bandages and the like.

By Monday I was perturbed because Emma had really wanted to be Peter Pan.

By Tuesday, someone said "Can't you just MAKE the hat. It is simple."

I smiled with grit teeth and thought to myself ...."Why yes I can, while making 37 OTHER costumes and getting home at 7:00 each night and AFTER I make dinner for my children Yes, I am sure that I can."

Instead I just grimaced and walked away, because my stress meter was reaching capacity.I went around the corner, breathed like a whale and went in search of an elbow to pinch or a turtle necklace to rub. (MY stress relievers)

Tuesday night found me in line at Hobby Lobby with a bolt of green felt and gritty eyes.

Wednesday found me with tacky glue beneath my nails and Lego boxes stacked up around me, wondering how in the hell I was going to fucking find time to make a fucking hat.

On Thursday I ran into Walmart and even though I couldn't afford it, purchased brown boots that resembled peter pan.

And on Halloween  morning at 5:00 am, I was sitting on my living room floor trying to cut out a motherfucking hat.

Karma felt my pain. She huffed at me and half rolled her eyes.

By 5:50 pm I was frantically searching for a red feather in all of the classrooms. I ran into the main building and plunked my Peter Pan hat on Juan's head. "You have to help me! Does this look like Peter Pans hat?"  It swallowed his head and stuck out in a weird way.

"Why do I know what Peter Pans hat looks like?" he asked me, pulling up the brim of the hat.

"Because you go to Disneyland a lot! You have to help me!" I moaned "If I don't finish this I will be THE WORST MOTHER EVER!"

I stood back and looked. It looked more like a pirate hat then anything pan-ish. It was horrible!

I swallowed and pulled it off of his head and plopped it on Brandee's.

Juan looked at the hat and then looked at me. He didn't have to say a word."It doesn't look like Peter Pans Hat." I stated and pulled it off of her head.

I cut it down a bit and rolled it a bit and plunked in the 2 feathers that I stole from Jen.

"It does look like it. Emma will be Happy." Brandee stated but I knew right then That I sucked ass at making Peter Pans Hat.

Once we got home, I attached it to Emma's head and I hoped she didn't notice the wonky way that it tilted. I grimaced, patted her shoulder and She smiled at me in the mirror.

I had found Pirate gear for myself and had the wings and Tu-tu for our Tinkerbell Karma in the car.
At every house we went too, I sprinkled Fairy dust behind Karma, but pretty soon my fingers were too wet and I just left clumps of the stuff on the ground.

Unfortunately Peter Pan doesn't wear glasses, so Emma stumbled and squinted in the rain. Her brother guided her to each house and stood behind her at each door. TinkerKarma howled excitedly each and every time her girl came back to her and after an hour she started to shiver, her little green tu-tu wet and limp and her once glittery wings were sodden and tilted to one side.

Halfway through the hour walk, Emma lost both of the feathers, but received a ton of candy because she was one of the only trick or treaters who knocked on the doors.

When we returned back to Brandee's house. I put Karma into the car and said goodbye to my wolf and moo who had trudged the wet night along with us.

On the drive home,  I looked at Emma in the review mirror. She sat laughing at Karma and smiling. I knew that despite the rain and the soggy bra, despite the fucked up hat and the squinting eyes, that next year this will all be another wonderful memory. It will be drawn by Emma in excruciating detail, it will be chortled over by Shane and it will be remembered by us all.

I have decided to get a shadowbox and frame my fucktard of a hat. I will put it up on my weird wall and one day Emma can tell her own kids how their Grandmother created a hat that was so retarted that it was remembered near and far.

Perhaps she will one day create a monstrosity as well, and know that the uneven cut, the giant brim and the much too small feathers, were placed on her head with a mouth full of grimace and a heart full of love.