Take the very popular wish that almost all men have had in their life. I wish for a son, I hope he’s a boy; I can’t wait to have my very own son. No matter what wording is used, it is a wish, a wish most men have, and one that very definitely proves the saying, be careful what you wish for.

Men want to have a boy, a son, someone to carry on the name, the gene pool, the characteristics he has and cherishes, that he cannot wait to pass on to his mini-me, another version of him to live past his age and grace the world with his presence. All nice ideas, a little narcissistic, but nice ideas all the same, except the men who wish this very popular wish, forget one important factor in the wish, their wives, their future son’s mother.

Women search all their lives for their perfect match, that man they love more than any other, the one they can see as the father of their children, the man who will help share his genes in creating said future children. And we find and choose the one who comes as close to our idea of a Prince charming as possible. However, once the son, the son the husband wished for beyond anything else is born, the father, that as close to perfect as possible mate, is immediately replaced, with the newer, updated version, husband 2.1.

 Our son is the perfect man, not only because he has our genes mixed in there, so of course he has to be better than the original make and model that helped design him, but we can nurture him, mold him, from the moment his beautiful eyes see this world for the first time. Hell, we start the process while we are still carrying them. This is the monkey wrench in the wish men never see coming, but learn pretty quickly once their beautiful bundle is born.

When our husband leaves the toilet seat up, we get annoyed, we scream, we yell, we lecture, we may even grab you by the ear while you are watching football with all of your friends, and drag you kicking and screaming back to the bathroom to put the seat down with your teeth. However, if our son, our perfect male of the species, the one we helped create, the one who has our genes running through his veins does the same thing, we do one of two things;

 A: We just smile to ourselves, and shake our head, muttering, “My little silly boy, when will he ever learn” and then put it down ourselves.

 B: We put it down ourselves, and gently, sometimes even lightheartedly mention to our son, to please remember to put the seat down you forgot again.

 Either one of these scenarios will leave our husbands standing in the middle of the room with their mouths hanging open, and may even lead to the first of many arguments, of which they will never understand or win, that will begin with, “How come you don’t yell at him?”

What men who wish for sons will never understand is that, once you give them to us, you have given us a better version of you. This version is part of us, therefore he starts off way ahead on the curve than you ever did. This version we own, we can control, teach, and mold into what we want, and need. This version is the small version of you, which we can now turn into what we wished you had become, but your own mother screwed up somehow. He is our son, and will forever from the day he is born, come before you. This is the conundrum; men will die trying to figure out.

 Mothers, live for their children, and mothers of sons, are a breed unto their own. We cater, coddle, and burst with pride over the littlest things they do. We fawn over them; we do everything for them and enjoy doing it. Our husbands aren’t our children, they don’t carry our genes, they didn’t come out of our bodies, they are adults, already cooked without our influence, and therefore inferior to the better version they helped us create.

Men, once they have their sons, will forever wander the earth wondering why when they leave toothpaste in the sink, or don’t pick their underwear off the floor, or walk in the house in dirty boots, they are yelled at, reminded that they have been told thousands of times before not to do said thing, and punished usually in the form of sleeping on the couch, or enduring days of not being spoken to. While if their sons dare to make the same mistakes, they will watch helplessly as their wives, gently and almost always sweetly laugh it off, clean it or pick it up happily without a word, or ask nicely for the son to pick it up and then thank them when they do so.

It is a mystery to most men, and as much as I have tried to explain it here, I am not sure if I ever truly can. Having a son is different than having a daughter. A daughter, for women anyway is a way to re-live their lives without the mistakes they feel they made. A way to put out into the world a better version of themselves, and sometimes the only way to do that is to push and criticize.

But with sons, the way mothers mother is totally different. We coddle and baby them, allowing them leeway when they make mistakes, gently correcting them and guiding them, and almost always gushing over them in the process. They are truly are perfect man, unfortunately for us women, in order to get said perfection, we have to help make him. Probably why we gush and fuss and generally beam over our boys. They are the man we always wanted but couldn’t find.

Of course it probably also helps that our sons usually pick up on this behavior of their mothers at a rather young age, and know how to milk it. They will allow the babying and the gushing, because they learn early on if they do, they win in the long run in the form of special attention, leniency, and an overall pass on almost everything they do wrong. So they kiss and hug their mom, they remember her birthday; they tell her she looks pretty and they like her new haircut the day she has it cut.

Husbands don’t do this. They may notice their wives changed their hair color from brunette to blonde eventually, but it will most likely take days. They may remember her birthday, but probably because someone else reminded them, or the fact that everyone is saying happy birthday to her that day suddenly gives them the hint. However, watch said husband the next month when he not only remembers his mothers birthday on his own, but shops for the gift for her himself.

There is a bond and relationship between mother and son that is unlike any other in the world and most likely something that no one will ever be able to fully understand or quantify. I love my daughter more than anything in this world, I would die for her, I enjoy her company and I am so very proud of her. But, I love my son in a different way. I treat him differently, and I know I do, my daughter knows I do, and points it out to me all the time, and yet I still do it. Maybe I will never know why, maybe we are hardwired to do so. Either way, the point I was trying to make when I started to write this, was be careful what you wish for. If you wish for a son, you will have a beautiful boy to raise and love, but you will have also created the man who will replace you in almost every way form the moment he takes his first breath, so be prepared, don’t be surprised and just roll with it, trust me it will make your life easier. Either that, or head to the bar, meet the other dads, and spend some time exchanging stories with the other fathers of sons, who wonder how the hell they ended up playing second fiddle to their own kid.

Needless to say, you couldn’t find another living soul that loves the holiday season as much as I, however I have always had a bone to pick with one particular part of Christmas, actually it is a particular song, one of the holiday standard favorites actually, a song that since I was a little girl never made sense to me.

The song I am speaking of is “The 12 days of Christmas”. For one thing let’s start right off the bat here, with my number one question, why is my true love so fucking weird? I mean why am I dating a guy who would send me a partridge in a pear tree, French hens, and 7 swimming swans? Wouldn’t a nice diamond necklace or perhaps tickets to a show be a little sweeter, not to mention easier to find? Where in the hell am I storing these gifts, I don’t exactly have a lake in my backyard, or a barn, aren’t these a little impractical?  Not to mention slightly unoriginal, one bird ok, but several birds of different types, you couldn’t have put a little more thought into my gifts?

I mean really what stores does this guy shop in? And don`t tell me the Internet has everything, first of all I know it does, I actually googled all of the items in the song, although finding Lord`s a Leaping was not easy, unless of course you were looking for an exotic dancer to dress as a Lord a Leaping, that believe it or not was easy to find. But this song was made long before the Internet was a gleam in Al Gore`s eye, so you can`t use that.

To be honest and fair to this demented boyfriend of mine, some of the gifts aren’t that bad. The golden rings are nice and I guess turtle doves are kind of romantic, sort of reminds me of the guy inthe movie The Birds who is buying love birds for his sister, of course look how that turned out.

However, some are just over the top and completely unnecessary, boarding on psychotic. Why would I want 9 ladies dancing? Do I look like I am in to lap dances; is this a gift for me or for him? And the lords a Leapin? I love gay guys, don’t get me wrong, but I certainly don’t want one for a present from my lover. Let`s talk about the 8 maids a milking. Look honey, if we are dating, the only maid that should be milking around you is me, and that’s only if I`ve just had your baby and you ask me nicely, otherwise this one is just a little too kinky for me to accept.

Then of course we go back to the birds, this guy seems awfully interested in birds. If I was dating someone like this, it would most likely make me think twice about what kind of odd fetishes he may have. Come on, the doves were cute, but then laying geese, swimming swans, French hens and calling birds, my house would look like the bottom of an aviary in no time. I would begin to wonder about a man who kept giving me all these birds if you know what I mean.

Now onto the oddest, or shall I say oddest choice for a lover to buy his girlfriend. 12 drummers drumming and for that matter the pipers piping, although only to a lesser extent. First off, 12 drummers isn’t that a little over kill? I would never hear again, how romantic is that, “Here sweetheart, I have given you the gift of deafness”….actually some men reading this right now are wondering to themselves if that wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Sorry, I digressed.

My point about the drummers isn’t exactly the fact that this would blow my ear drums out, as much as, what would this boyfriend of mine be thinking, giving me 12 drummers? Has he ever seen a rockband, does he have any idea of their reputations? Especially with women? Has he never met Tommy Lee? Are you begging her to cheat on you on with a hot rocker guy with a bigger dick than yours? Actually 12 of them? Come on.

So here is my list, much more modern and if I do say so myself, a definite way to win my heart. I wont keep repeating them all as the song does, I will just go from 12 down, if you want to sing it be my guest, otherwise just read and enjoy. Oh and Merry Christmas.
12 – copies of Star Wars on Blu-Ray
11- Tape recordings of my son doing all his funny voices and skits (because the kids cracks me the hell up)
10-dozen anti-bitch pills for my daughter( if you knew her you`d understand)
9- Life size Stormtroopers from the J. Peterman Catalog (don’t ask, you probably don’t want to know why)
8- Machine Guns for the front of my car (so I can shoot the shit out of everyone else on the road, because they don’t know how to drive)
7- laptops (because you can never have too many, and I can never be more than four feet from a computer)
6-pocketbooks (because I always put way too much in them and they break three days after I buy them)
5-books for each room in my house (because I am obsessive and must have a book within arms reach at all times)
4-divorce attorneys (because apparently I am always in need of one)
3- weeks of vacation away from my kids ( this one I think is self-explanatory)
2- full scale models of the Millennium Falcon (again, don`t ask, I dont think you want to know what I want to do with them, or more to the point in them)
and Harrison Ford naked and tied down to my bed.

Ok, so you spend the first half of your life being yelled at by your parents, do this, dont do that, etc, and then you get a nice middle piece of life where you are on your own, no one to really tell you what to do or how to do and so on.

Then your children become teenagers and suddenly you spend the next part of your life being yelled at and told what to do and how to do it, and what you can say and what you shouldnt say by your own KIDS!! How the hell did this happen, and where was I when it did.

So basically i had a few good years sandwiched in between my parents telling me what to do and my kids telling me what to do. This sucks! Makes you say to yourself, I had these kids why????? lol.

Of course I`m kiddin, I love my kids, and I know exactly why i had them. They are great at getting the TV remote for me when I accidentally leave it across the room, and Luke is fantastic at lifting heavy things and killing bugs, and Carole-Anne is great at spying and tattling on every single aspect of Luke`s life while I am not there to see it, its like having real-time camera footage with her around.

Ok, thats it, felt like putting that out there. Time to work.

I wish I had the talent to do these, they are awesome.

Last night I attended the wake for my cousin June, and tomorrow I will attend her funeral. She was 38 years old and died after a long, brave battle against ovarian cancer. She wasn’t really my cousin, but we grew up calling each other that, and calling each others parents aunt and uncle. She was one of those “fake cousins” we all have in our lives. Close friends of our parents who you grow up with and become as close to you as the cousins you are related to by blood. My mother and father met my Aunt Sue and Uncle Roy when they were both young married couples living in the same apartment building in East Rockaway, NY, which my mother is fond of telling people I always called Easter Rockaway. Give me a break I was like 3 at the time. 

Anyway, Sue was pregnant with her first child, Marianne and my mom was pregnant with my sister. Then when Sue was pregnant with June, who we all affectionately called Junebug or Juney, my mom was pregnant with me. Sue then later had Craig, my parents stopped after me, of course if you knew me you would understand that after me they probably never wanted to have sex again, but that is a story for another time.

We grew up together, trick or treated together, June and I were even baptized together. There is nothing like the memories you have of your early childhood and those first friends you shared it with, and I have many memories. I can remember spending the summers at their home in Oceanside, while Sue and my mom, both stay at home moms, although back then we just called them moms, were in the house chatting or doing whatever adults did back then, we weren’t really interested or paying attention. As long as they weren’t noticing what we were doing that is all we cared about. We were outside, running to the ice cream man or the deli where June and Marianne taught me the art of freezing a Charleston Chew so you could crack it later and eat it, a much more superior way and from that day on only way to eat one. Of course now they are hard to find, as are Chuckles, FunDip (sugar coma on a stick) and Chunky bars, all favorites from my childhood; but I know from this day on whenever I see a Charleston Chew I will think of June.

Its funny the odd things you remember and cling to from that time in your life. I remember going up stairs to their bedroom which at the time was an unfinished attic and playing with their tap shoes, and loving the clicky sound they made on the wood. I remember going downstairs and making ceramics, because Sue had a ceramics studio down there. I still have the little bunny rabbit June made for me when we were about 7 years old. An odd looking brown and pink bunny with paper mache on its ears, something for whatever reason I always kept, house to house, move to move, and now will hold dear to my heart and cherish fondly, a gift from my cousin, my first childhood pal who taught me how to curse (my parents never used bad language around the house) and always seemed to have the games I wanted but didn’t have like Cats Eye (seems an odd thing to be jealous of now) and why I remember that I don’t know.

Sue and Roy were the fun loud friends. Every month they would be at my parents house playing cards or board games and my sister and I would find reasons to sneak into the dining room to listen to the outrageously off color and foul language filled stories Roy would tell, laughing at the bad words we normally weren’t allowed to hear, let alone say and loving every minute of it. I remember going in the dining room to steal snacks as they played and walking into a haze of smoke as Sue, Roy and my Dad were all heavy smokers at the time, and asking Roy and my dad to make smoke rings, which for whatever reason I always loved to watch and try to stick my finger through the little circle as they blew through the air.

I remember June and I were so mad because Marianne and my sister Dawn both had popular songs that had their name in them a the time, and June and I didn’t, and I remember trying to write one with her with our names in them so we could feel special to. When we were older we didn’t see each other as much, as teenagers tend to stray apart as they meet new friends in their schools and neighborhoods. But then at 17 when I gave birth to my daughter I remember going to Aunt Sue`s one night with my then soon to be husband because Sue had some old baby clothes that she had kept and wanted to give me for my daughter. 

June walked in and ran to me, grabbing me and kissing me and was so excited about my little baby girl, she was the first relative at the time who was thrilled for me, and I never forgot that. Obviously having a baby at 17 wasn’t something I planned or should have done, and I understood my other relatives and even some friends being a little taken aback, not sure how to act around me, but June never stuttered for a moment, all excited for me, helping me plan my wedding, even being a bridesmaid for me, and I never forgot that.

Even now I can picture her bouncing into their living room through the front door as Sue and I sat on the couch talking, her hair all eighties wild with Aquanet, tight jeans and a tight shirt on, she always had a great body and knew how to show it off, and she just jumped on top of me with glee. No matter how much time has passed since then, and its been 20 years to be exact, I still remember that like it was yesterday. I remember June did my hair for my wedding, she was a hairdresser, and I arranged it so she caught the bouquet and her boyfriend the garter. She cut my daughter, Carole-Anne`s hair for years, giving her, her first hair cut, and talking me into going blonde for the very first time.

June was fun, she was active, she was full of life and grabbed every second of it. She was also tough and could tell you where to go if she felt like it and did it well. She fought for three and a half years against her cancer, and never gave up or gave into it, and if it is possible looked better in those days when she was fighting the cancer than she ever had before. She was a fighter till the end, and that end came much too soon.

This year I have attended funerals for two cousins, two people my age, and it makes you reflect and think and wonder, have we gotten to that age now, that age where you start to lose friends and loved ones to cancer, and other disease, and are forced to relive memories that you haven’t thought of in years, forced to ponder your own mortality and wonder where did the time go? Where are those five kids who played together, laughed together, and drove our parent’s nuts making messes in their homes as they played cards together?

I always thought time felt like it was going fast when I would look at my kids and see them turn into little adults. My daughter now 20, makes me feel old every time I look at her, but now, now I see it isn’t my children growing older that makes me feel old and wonder where the time went, it is the death of my peers, my friends, my family at ages far too young, that make me feel that way, make me ponder the big questions and wonder where all the days and months and weeks of my life has gone.

June is at peace now, everyone said that last night, and I know in my heart she is; but that doesn’t make it any easier to picture her gone, to realize someone I grew up with, someone I shared my baptism with and my first steps and all my firsts in early childhood is gone. It`s not fair, it sucks, it shouldn’t happen, but it does every day. Right now someone else in this world is feeling the same things I am, is grieving as hard as June’s parent’s and siblings are, and tomorrow life will, life does have to go on. But now it will go on with cherished memories I haven’t thought of in years foremost in my mind, held close to my heart for my cousin, my first friend.

Some people at times like these, talk about how sad they are for all the things the deceased who died too young will never get to do or see. I don’t think that way. I think of all the things June crammed into her 38 years, all the things she did, all the people she loved and touched, all the moments in a life that although too short, was lived to the fullest and with a smile on her face. And somehow, someway, maybe her father is right, perhaps as he said to be last night, she is up there somewhere having a drink with Patrick Swayze and having the time of her life. I love you June, and you will never be forgotten.

.

Needless to say, much has been happening. I intend to post a whole story soon, and then get back to posting my usual fare of amusing stories about life and the world we all live in. Thanks for your patience and support.

Star Wars A-Team

Star Wars Dukes of Hazzard

Han Solo P.I.

Star Wars MacGyver

Star Wars Dallas

Airwolf Rebels       

AirWolf Imperial

http://www.starwars.com/vault/collecting/20090619b.html

I think I have finally found something harder to watch than the Star Wars Holiday Special. I should have watched this stoned!

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/06/22/donny-and-marie-do-s.html

http://www.doubleviking.com/the-top-15-han-solo-quotes-you-need-to-use-in-regular-conversation-5215-p.html