Magic

Do you have magic?  I don't, but I want some.  Apparently there is this thing called "Mother's Magic".  Well, I AM a mother.............   Where is my magic.  Who left that key ingredient out of me when I was made?  Or, does it happen when a woman first becomes a mother? A woman gives birth, and as a reward for doing one of the hardest things of her life, she gets magic.  It sounds about right.  I believe we women deserve it, but well, I'm pretty ticked.  I did all of the hard work, 3 TIMES, and no magic.
I've lived 11 years of being a mom without thinking much about it, and then a couple of months ago I was walking down the street when a new family (mom, dad, new baby) were walking the same way as me.  We were stopped at a stop light when new baby started to cry in the stroller.  The new dad picked up baby and, for about 1 second, tried to comfort baby before saying something about "Mother's Magic" and passing the baby to mom.  My first I thought was, "I'm SO glad I'm out of the baby stage" but my second thought was, "Magic?????".  Fancy this, after the light turned green and we all started walking again the baby stopped crying as the mom bounced and cooed at the baby.  Apparently from the look on the dads face she did have magic.
Ok, I'm not oblivious.  I realize this saying has been around for awhile.  I just don't know if I would go as far as saying moms have magic.  I wish we did, but the fact is we don't.  I do believe men and women are innately different.  We have different qualities that complement each other.  Women have been perceived through out forever as being the nurturer.  Maybe that is our "magic", but do you know what I think?  I don't believe it.  I believe men can be just as nurturing.  I think men invented "mother's magic" so that they could pass the baby off to the one with the magic.  And then what's a woman to do?  Admit to the man that she in-fact doesn't have magic?  I say YES!  It is humbling, but we really don't have it, and we need help.
My first wonderful daughter had colic for 6 months.  I mean horrible, there was nothing I could do, screaming baby colic.  She was born in the summer in Washington State where there are no air conditioners, so my home windows were open to try to cool off.  I would have neighbors come knock on my door asking if they could try rocking her.  See, I had no magic.  Don't worry, they didn't have any magic either.  They just had pity for me after they tried to calm her and couldn't succeed.  To top it off, I had postpartum depression.  This came as quite a shock as I had never felt the affects of depression in my life until that point.  Honestly, the only magic in our home during that time was my husband.  He helped lead both me and my daughter out of that hard time in our lives.  This brings me to my point, did my husband even have magic?  No, he had love and strength, and patience, and I am forever grateful to him because of this.  Mothers are amazing and wonderful, but fathers are just as awesome!
 I love being a mom!  My children are the best parts of me.  I would do it all over again to have these wonderful people in my life, but again, I don't have magic.  I do have a lot of love, and I am stronger than I have ever been, and I learn patience everyday.  Maybe some would call this magic, but I think it's called hard work with a lot of unconditional love.  If you want to call it "Mother's Magic", then there has to be "Father's Magic" as well.  Mother's and Father's are in this parenting thing together, so please don't pass the baby to the mom and say she has the magic, 'cause fathers do too!
Also, if there actually is a mom out there that thinks she does have magic........  I'm Jealous.
Man, what would I do with Mother's Magic?  Make sure they have clean rooms, have them never fight with each other, get them to eat only healthy things, read more, play video games less, go outside to play, do homework right away,  stay in their own beds at nighttime, do their chores, good manners...... the list goes on and on, and all of this with no nagging.   Ah Magic......  I wish.

"Normal"

We were on a vacation recently, and our hotel had the usual complimentary shampoo and conditioner.  Anyone that has walked down the shampoo isle at a grocery store knows that there are many different types of shampoo claiming to do many different types of things.  I am pro-shampoo and all that it claims it can do.  Some shampoos claim it will help moisturize, some add volume, some help dandruff, and the list goes on and on.  My typical shampoo at home has a ton of moisture in it because I kill my hair every other month by having my hair dresser bleach it as blond as no natural head of hair could ever be, but I like it that color, so I have to moisture the heck out of it in-between appointments so it won't break off and fall out.  In fact just writing about it makes me stressed out.  I feel like I need to run and put some deep conditioner on my hair right now.  I believe in using shampoo and conditioner that are right for your type of hair.
I also like to try to save room when I'm traveling with my three kids because I don't love to carry around a million suitcases, so I usually don't bring my big bottles of shampoo and conditioner on vacation.  I figure that, hopefully, my hair can survive for a week with hotel shampoo.  So, on this recent vacation as I was in the shower using the hotel shampoo I squinted down and saw that I was using "normalizing" shampoo.  I couldn't get over this, hence the picture I took of the shampoo.  What in the world is normalizing shampoo.  Who is to say what "normal" hair is anyway?  Don't we all have widely different hair in this world?  Oh my goodness, but if we use this shampoo we will all have "normal" hair.  So, I used it on myself and kids for a week, and I didn't notice a difference in any of us.  Maybe we had normal hair to begin with....  ha ha.  I can't believe they have a normalizing shampoo.  It made me want to rebel and not be normal.  I don't even know what that means for hair, but you bet I don't want normal hair just because this shampoo claims I should.    Who wants normal?  That is just boring.  Be yourself, and love the hair you have.  Of course if it's really dry from bleach please do use a moisturizing shampoo and conditioner.  I can't say enough about them!

When I got home I looked online to see if they sell this, and fancy this, Neutrogena doesn't have this on their website anymore.  I guess they gave up trying to normalize the general public's hair... just the people that stay at certain hotels.  Silly stuff.