A slippery slope…

Something funny has happened to me in the last few weeks. I can’t quite pinpoint it, nor can I explain why it’s happening now, but there’s been an escalation, if you will, of my ageing. Or more precisely, in my descent transition to my Mother.

Now we had our trip to Italy. My Mum has a strong passion and love for Italy. She lived there for a few years as a teenager and has travelled back there many a time over the years. She can speak Italian well, but does tend to sometimes just speak English with gusto and with an Italian accent which I have spent many a year taking the piss out of her for. Until recently when we were there and I found myself doing the very same thing. Rob pointed this out to me many, many times. And it’s true, I did the very same thing and I couldn’t stop myself from doing it.

When we were driving around the Tuscan countryside I found myself relegated to the backseat to console Maggie who was very unhappy. So Harps and I would be squashed together me having to pat Maggie on one side and console Harps on the other as she suffered with car sickness. Occasionally when the Kwells would kick in and she’d be feeling OK she would point out to me that I had a hair growing out of my chin. And we spent quite some time trying to remove it. Man I really used to make fun of my Mum for that when I was a teenager. I mean HAIR. OUT OF A CHIN. How gross and embarrassing. Teenage Beth, if only you knew…

Whilst travelling I found myself searching for napery and tableware in shops and momentos. Not cool clothes, but NAPERY. Of course the only 2 things I bought when we were away was an apron and a plate. Which I promptly put up on the wall when we got home.

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What? It reminds me of that round piazza in Lucca Rob.

Yesterday I was thrilled that I found some roses on the cheap at Harris Farm. I seemed to have over pruned my ice berg (can you even DO that?) and it’s dead. It’s very sad so it needs to be replaced and these two did the trick. Look at the colour! Look at me saying things like “look at the colour!”

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And the biggest sign? The thing that I KNEW was really the beginning of the end? The thing that when I took it counter to buy it I actually said “well this pretty much is the complete transition to becoming my Mother”…

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A WHITE COTTON NIGHTY. Because it’s hot, and I feel the need to be able to be cool at night.

When I laughed it off to the older woman who was serving me she said “Well your Mother might have learnt a thing or two in her life” and I then proceeded to apologise for my humour and tell her that if I ended up like my Mum then I would be doing very well indeed.

I remember when I was home from the hospital with my first born Daisy riddled with self doubt and panic that this baby was in my care and I had to keep it alive when I called my Mum in floods of tears. I remember sobbing down the phone “Oh Mum I am SO sorry. I get it. I finally get it. All you every wanted for us was the best. You only were ever trying to protect and love us. I’m so so sorry for everything I put you through!” It finally clicked, looking at my own little girl in front of me, future years flashing before my eyes. Gulp.

I’ve had a few times this week we’re I’ve seen glimpses of the teenage years ahead of us. Jetlag and tiredness has brought out the worst in all of us and there’s been fights and tears and miscommunication between us all. I hope we can make it through the hormones ahead of us without our eyes falling out from that excessive rolling. I hope that the girls know that we only ever want the best for them: for them to be the best people they can be, fulfilling their potential and being kind and open minded, challenging themselves, being loving and generous…gosh there’s just so much we want for them isn’t there? I know I’ve now become that Mum, the one that likes roses and wears cotton nighties and hangs plates on walls. I’m also the Mum that adores her own Mum and is thankful every day that she’s been such a good role model for me. She’s taught me to work hard, to be true to myself, to be generous of heart and home. And to wear a good cotton nighty in the summer, because dammit, it’s hot.

Have you started to turn into your Mother?
Or are you already there?
Own a white cotton nighty?

Comments

  1. Oh beth I get it!!! I am my Mother too – the words that come out of my mouth.
    Then I look at my beautiful 5yr old and go OMGOSH! She is just like me…..

    How lucky are we to have such amazing role models and….. we have learnt alot and bended alot because of what we learnt from them too – and put our on spin on being a Mum

    xoxo

  2. I love that! I’m only a mum to two fur babies…. but get told I look like my mum. I used to watch her hair turning from brown to white – “wow mum your hair is going salt and pepper!” It is now a beautiful silver…. I have just turned 50 this week and I have silver at my temples and realise not only am I like my mum – people actually pay to get that done to their hair! I have begun to collect the china at mum’s as there is no one else who really likes it… I love that the things you write about resonate with me……

  3. Hi Beth, what a lovely post. I too have a 5 month old and we’ve recently had to relocate from Canberra to Melbourne for me to have treatment for stage 4 bowel cancer (diagnosed when Violet was 12 weeks). We’re living with my mum who is just amazing! I’m constantly amazed at her warmth, care, energy and optimism. We are so lucky to have wonderful mums. (P.S. I have plates hanging on my wall as does my mum!)

  4. I don’t have a white cotton nightie (yet) but I do have a chin hair and a couple of plates on the wall. Oh, and I also sing in the supermarket much to my children’s horror – I remember feeling the same horror when my mum did that! The circle of life huh??

  5. Oh Beth – toooooo funny…. I didn’t buy a white cotton nighty (although I would love one) – but I did buy a pink and white striped t-shirt nighty from k-mart the other day and thought to myself “Oh god, i am buying nighties…. what is happening”. ha ha ha – but SO COMFY!!!! I am pretty sure Sue is a bloody legend so you should be happy to be turning into her.

  6. a lovely post beth! light bulb moments in time beth!
    bristles on the chin! not so good!
    yes I am already my mother! … her words come out of my mouth!
    it’s only when one has children, that they really understand their own mother!
    that colour of the rose! superb!
    a very pretty nightie too! love m:)X

  7. I’m not just turning into my mum, I think I am her!
    The things that come out of my mouth “brush your hair, you look like the wreck of the Hesperus” I don’t even know what that means!
    “this bedroom looks like a Chinese laundry / brothel / joss house” we used to hassle mum about knowing what a brothel looked like
    “Don’t look at me with those eyes” probably tribute to my spectacular eye rolling ability which is now haunting me through my daughter

    Mums are the best, and even though mine passed away 3 years ago a little bit of her is still going strong!

  8. I keep a pair of tweezers in my handbag now – the car is the BEST place to pluck those damn chin hairs!!

  9. Oh god yes! I go outside every morning in my PJs (no nighty yet don’t like the feeling of my thighs running together!) with a cup of tea to water my babies. And by babies I mean veggie seedlings. I finally planted them yesterday and I go out every few hours to check if they’ve grown. I am un-naturally excited about them which is very like my mother.

  10. I SO get where your coming from. I recently turned 41 and had this very same conversation with myself. Mmmm maybe I’m going a little nuts as well xx

  11. oh yes Beth for sure, but with the things I say and qoutes my mother used to use on us when we were kids!! Its all coming back to me now……and I always vowed I wouldnt turn into my mother! Little did I know I would be doing a great thing by follwing in her footsteps! Its actually my mum’s birhtday today – so a BIG happy day to my mum Fleur!!

  12. At 31 I am slowly transitioning. My mum laughs her arse off whenever I tell her, “I GET IT.” on any manner of parenting topics!

  13. Yes!!! Now where can I get a decent white cotton nightie from?

  14. While in Spain, I bought a gorgeous plate for my MIL from Ronda and one for a dear friend from Seville. Kicking myself HARD that I didn’t buy one for myself. We can slip down the slope together. x

  15. My husband constantly says that I am turning into my Mother – I think he likes to use it as an insult, but I always reply with ‘well, you’d be bloody lucky’. Oh, and I love that nighty {and I’m still in my 20’s} – is that a bad thing?

  16. Such a lovely post. She sounds like a very worthy person to turn into!

  17. That white cotton nighty is divine Beth. Good on you mum! I’m definitely heading down that same path too…..but happy and content to do so. Mums are the bomb. I hope I can be as good a mum to my cherubs as my mum has been to me.

  18. I have a chin hair right next to a giant pimple …I feel confused haha.

  19. I am my mother! I get reminded every time I answer the phone to my oldest friend. I answer the phone in the same high pitched hello. But gosh, if I’m like her when I’m 63 I will be one happy lady. Like you, I have enormous respect for my mum and what she’s done. Especially this week. We lost my eldest brother 18 years ago and Sunday would have been his 40th birthday. I always knew that was a huge life changing moment but it wasn’t until I was a mother that I really, really got the enormous amount my mum has been through. Massive respect and much, much love to my mum and all mums.

  20. Oh, the white cotton nighty!! I took those on with gusto when the babies came – so bloody comfortable and easy access to the 24 hour milkbar I was for a good few years!
    I think that the last time I saw a decent white cotton nighty was down in your neck of the woods – I am not surprised that you have succumbed!!
    I know I am turning into my mother – my first bit of silver fabulousness was my flash from my cowlick – guess where both of those came from! Yet to put a plate on the wall though I’m sure it’s not far away! In depth discussions on birds in the garden, and of course what is in bloom do take place! It’s all good!!

  21. I get told I look like my Mother all of the time. I’ve worked hard, REALLY hard, not to be like her.

  22. For me it is the hair! I have a hair on the side of my face that just keeps growing. Whyyyyyyy???

  23. Beth you’re hilarious- the eye rolling LOL!! For me I remember the slippery slope started at 35. I looked at a pic of me and my 6mth old and thought – Oh good lord who do I look like?? Oh….it’s Nana!! In all fairness she was quite a youthful looking older lady & I do resemble that side of the family, but still the shock of realizing you’ve by-passed your own mother and heading into granny territory, agh!!! By the way, that nightie is gorgeous 🙂 Liz XO

  24. Amanda (Archie Lane) says

    Beth I adore this post. I do believe the tell tale signs of our mothers are, in most cases, all within us, we just choose not to recognize them whilst in our late teens, 20’s and early 30’s – but they happen, its inevitable. My first sign was when my oldest son Jack was complaining about the amazing desserts he gets to eat at “EVERYONE elses house” but his – the words “I don’t care what happens at your friends house I only care what happens in mine ” flowed from my mouth effortlessly. Now well into my 40’s I much prefer lush green grass, stop to admire a perfectly trimmed hedge, greys need to covered at the hairdressers far to often, parts of my body sagging far to quickly for my liking and online shopping for that perfect table cloth – it really is quite lovely though turning into my mother.

    As for the teenage years – you will survive my friend. It is actually the years of I have perfected my fine skills of ignorance and not to take comments said to me to heart. One thing I have never been told by any of my four though is ‘I hate you’, that I am grateful for as I don’t know how I would cope with that said to me. The rest, they can go as hard as they like I just simply wander off to admire that perfectly trimmed hedge and leave them to it.

    The nightie is gorgeous by the way and you know my love for THAT plate!

  25. Roses, wall plates, nighties – what’s not to love?? ☺️

  26. The other day I was waiting in ikea in the return and exchange section. My phone rang. Hi mum, I’m just in ikea returning a chair I bought, I don’t like it.
    Oh my god mum, I’m just like you, returning things I’ve bought.
    My mum is an obsessive return things she has bought to the shops person, and I am afraid I have become just like her!!
    In the past month I have returned 3 things I bought.
    Gulp! It happens.

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