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By SUSAN DROMEY HEETER, Joyful Musings

My daughter and I went skating today at Strawbery Banke in Portsmouth. And, as I have a friend in Cincinnati who enjoys the webcam at the rink, I knew she was watching and I waved.  And then Lucy of Ohio took a snapshot and, thanks to the power of technology, I have a picture of myself and my daughter, Jane, skating on a beautiful January morning.  It’s so Currier and Ives, so New England.

Alas, that is where the joyful musing changes to the interminable mother rant of “can I do nothing right?”  After I shared the photo on our Family Group Chat, my two daughters mocked the picture and told me I looked like I was on Law & Order SVU. They made up a story that I’d kidnapped the child whose hand I was holding and created a scenario all about how joyful I looked because I’d finally allowed my basement chained captive a morning out on the ice.

Kids. Really.

And then, I cannot help but muse joyfully if not a bit guiltily about how my own siblings and I would mock our mother – calling her new perms her “Greg Brady” look. We have a pose we refer to as the “Nance Stance” in pictures – where are legs are slightly apart and we reflect on how her varicosed veined legs live on in ours.  

To this day, a friend and I, when technologically challenged, call ourselves “Nancy and Sue” as one of our favorite stories is the time my aunt, my mother’s sister tried to teach her how to work the VCR. My mother died well before the blinking lights went off and never could record anything from the tv.  So Nancy, so Sue.

Alas, I do laugh and am grateful when my children create scenarios that are ridiculously funny – even at my expense.  To laugh is part of the legacy of love that unites daughters, mothers, life. I have a friend who still cannot stop laughing when talking of her mother attempting to use the “Flowbee” haircutting tool on her.  Suffice it to say, her hair took on the look of a “Flowbee” for months.

Oh, let’s face it and muse joyfully, that, as mothers, we are really trying to do our best. Really. And, if we are fodder for an episode of Law and Order SVU?  Well, there you go, bring it on, it’s probably better than a Flowbee do.

Susan Dromey Heeter is a writer from Newmarket who recently let her hair go au natural white. Writing has been her passion since her English majoring days at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst.  Dromey Heeter has lived in The Netherlands, Alaska and currently basks in all things New England, including the frigid winters. An avid swimmer, Dromey Heeter’s great passion is to bring back body surfing as most children have no idea how to ride waves without ridiculous boogie boards.