Author: Jackie Pick

Jackie Pick is a former teacher and current writer living in the Chicago area. She is a contributing author to multiple anthologies, including Multiples Illuminated, So Glad They Told Me: Women Get Real about Motherhood, Here in the Middle, as well as the and the literary magazines The Sun and Selfish. She received Honorable Mention from the Mark Twain House and Museum for her entry in the Royal Nonesuch Humor Writing Competition. Jackie is a contributing writer at Humor Outcasts, and her essays have been featured on various online sites including McSweeney's, Belladonna Comedy, Mamalode, The HerStories Project, and Scary Mommy. A graduate of the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, Jackie is co-creator and co-writer of the award-winning short film Fixed Up, and a proud member of the 2017 Chicago cast of Listen To Your Mother.

Motherload — Lessons We Don’t Want to Have to Teach — July 23

· Leave a comment ·

J. was acting off this morning. Angry. Silly. Combative.

He finally said, “I don’t want to go to camp.”
Me: “Did something happen last week?”
J: “Yes. But he said I can’t tell you or Daddy.”

My heart stopped. This was the worst moment of my life, or was about to be.

It took a long time to get it out of him. It turns out that one of the older kids has been punching J. in the head at camp for a few days.

Thank God it’s “only” that. I thought he’d been molested.

We had a good talk about when to keep secrets (when the secret will make that person happy…like a surprise present) and when not to (when keeping the secret makes you feel bad and/or someone gets or will get hurt.)

I hate that this is the world my kids are growing up in. I hate that I have to teach them to wear SPF 30 (at least) every day. I hate that I have to teach them about water bottles (and why to only use reusable ones). I hate that I have to teach them about good strangers vs. bad strangers. I hate that I have to teach them how to feel safe in a world where more and more people want the average putz to carry a gun. “For safety.”  I hate that people are debating the parenting choices of the folks who brought their babies to Aurora Cinema,and so many are so damned quick to not blame our gun laws. I hate that I have to teach them about internet safety.  I hate that I have to teach them about stranger danger and x and why it actually is a bad idea to ask for and/or accept a blow job when in middle school, because any middle school girl who is willing to do that probably has a lot of sorrow in her life and this isn’t going to help either one of you.

I hate that I have to teach them that Real Housewives, Kardashians, Brittany, Miley, and most female local newscasters are not ideal women.

But I will teach them.  I will teach them the Fred Rogers Quote:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

I will teach them to look for the helpers.

I will teach them to be the helpers.