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Are You Still Getting Proud Announcements?

Writer's picture: Maggie StewartMaggie Stewart

In the last couple of years, without me noticing,  I stopped getting Proud Announcements first.


Proud Announcements are phone calls, texts, statements you make to the person to whom you can brag.  The person who will scream with delight and be SO HAPPY for you!  Happier, maybe, than you even are for yourself.


As a mom, these happened all the time as the boys grew up.  I was always the first to get the news.  The frog found.  The first viewer of the finished Lego project.  The eyes on me in the stands when the goal was saved.


And me?  A walking heart.  A hand clapping, praise singing, swooning chorus of joy.


In the most recent years, instead of tiny fists grabbing me, or teen eyes sneaking my approval - I would get a text from where ever they were.


I got the job!

I got a HUGE tip!

I hung these pictures on my wall - what do you think?


If Apple tracks how many times I have texted “OMG!!! LOVE IT!!”  - it would be a cathedral full.


And then, like a church candle snuffed out  - I am no longer the first to hear.


“Yeah,” My older friends with married kids nod at me, “you are moving down the totem pole.”


Ouch.


I am not jealous - I tell myself - of the girlfriend, work partner, office buddy, neighbor…..whoever.  I don’t think I am.  Maybe I need more hobbies, or need to take up Spanish again….whatever.  As we said in the 70s: get a life.


Maybe, I just need to accept life moves on.  The kids are still here.  It is just life that is moving on.


The Japanese have a phrase for the sense - and some of the sadness - of the fleeting nature of life.  And the recognition that it is ok, it is beautiful, it is right.  “Mono No Aware”.


And it IS ok that my boys are meeting the loves of their lives, or friends who mean everything to them.  These new Proud Announcement recipients will get the splashes of news and happy proud moments first.


I will get the news eventually, no doubt.   And I will still feel the joy and do the happy dance and scream.  I will tell them, in a mono no aware way;


“OMG!!!  YAY!!”  And then, “sounds like all is right in the world.”

Gone are the days when one of the boys would come screaming to me - first : MOM! LOOK!!!
Gone are the days when one of the boys would come screaming to me - first : MOM! LOOK!!!



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5 comentários


checkeloliver
30 de jan.

You are a walking heart. And a keen observer. I want to remember that the bottom part of the totem pole is the foundation. Less sunlight, but stronger roots. I am now mixing metaphors.

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hrij
30 de jan.

You,just keep getting beter. You are amazing.

Thank you❤️

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Maggie Stewart
Maggie Stewart
30 de jan.
Respondendo a

Thanks Herm 🥰

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nu2
29 de jan.

maggie dear ...really enjoyed this one !! ... interesting japanese term mono no aware. i looked it up and read about it...there was even an audio of how to pronounce it! 😅! .... hey, don't fret... I am pretty sure that 'round two' of "mom, mom look at this" is in your future. you will know it immediately the first time you hear, "gramma, gramma look at this!" ❤️u , joan dear

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Maggie Stewart
Maggie Stewart
30 de jan.
Respondendo a

Hahaha!! I can’t wait!!! And so cool you took a deep dive into mono no aware!!! Xoxox

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© 2018 by Maggie Stewart

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