Monday, December 3, 2012

What will they remember you by?

I'm an avid mommy-blogger-reader.  I read probably 10 mommy blogs each day (interspersed with Twenty-something girl blogs, innappropriate humor blogs and real estate blogs) and a recent blog entry on Cup of Jo about how your eyes should light up when your child enters the room, and it brought me back to this memory I have from when I was probably 10 years old. 

At that point my mom, stepdad and I were living in Austin, but I still visited my dad in Houston regularly.  We had a very close relationship with my aunt, uncle and cousins who lived in League City, and we'd hang out with them pretty much every weekend I was in town.  On this particular day, my aunt and uncle had just bought a brand new Suburban.  The second my uncle pulled into the driveway, we were all out there checking out this huge new car.  It was awesome!  And huge!  There were so many doors and seats and as I climbed from the front seat to the back seat (there was no center console installed yet) my uncle screamed at me that I was ruining his new car.  I was shocked and stunned and froze up as he continued to yell at me about his nice, new car that I was messing up by crawling through where the console would eventually be installed a few days later. 


Why is it that this memory is so vivid in my head?  It wasn't supposed to be a life changing experience.  I was just getting yelled at by my uncle for doing something that he didn't want me to do.  Adults yell at kids all of the time.  But I still react the same way to someone yelling at me to this day.  I freeze up.  I take it.  I take the yelling in my face (and this is much more rare of an incident as an adult) and I cry.  Ugly crying with big tears to where my face swells up.

And the more I think about it, the more I realize that I remember my uncle as angry.  I don't see him any more because of family drama reasons that I won't get into at the moment, but my main memory of him is this incident when I was a child.  And I don't EVER want to be remembered as the friend/significant other/daughter/aunt/wife/mom/whatever who is angry all the time.  Or who is mean to others.  Or makes anyone feel bad.  I don't ever want to be remembered that way by anyone I come across in this life.  I want people to remember my happiness and laughter and jokes and meals with friends and love and caring, deep hugs and everything that is good in this world.  I want to be remembered by that. 

Going back to the Cup of Jo post, she suggests your eyes light up when your child enters the room so that they know they're loved.  My eyes should light up any time a loved one comes in the room.  I want my loved ones to remember that about me.

PS: Don't yell at people.  It's just plain rude!

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