My apartment is again full of girls. My three daughters who live Stateside all arrived on Thursday and the familiar feel of female hormones is once more in the air. When my husband was still part of our everyday life he used to enjoy showing off his "harem" and regaling his clients with stories of going through life surrounded by 5 women. You could tell by the grin on his face that he did not consider this torture.
Well anyway, today we are still 5 women together but I guess without the man we are no longer anyone's harem. I don't think that MFM is ready to be the head of a harem and besides, I think that position will always rest with the original.......
With her 3 older sisters here I can see that Jane, the youngest, had really become a little "Parisian". The word "little" is used rather ironically because she is by far the tallest of the 4 girls and is quite sophisticated from living in this cutting edge city. I wonder how she will feel after several months in the dorms of her small liberal arts college in the woods that she will attend next fall.?? Life in Paris for a teenager is a dream come true (for them - not necessarily their parents). They can get anywhere by public transportation, go clubbing and buy drinks legally at 16 (and no one cards for ID's here anyway). I have heard many stories of kids raised in Paris who go off to the States for college and end up wanting to get back to Paris as fast as they can after spending months with newly liberated American kids binge drinking and acting stupid with their new found freedom that is totally restrictive by French kids' standards.
It is really fun to be with my grown up daughters. They are all young adults with jobs (of some sort or another) and bills to pay and lives of their own. The cool thing to me is that their lives are all intertwined with each others'. 2 live together with daughter #2's boyfriend and another roommate and the 3rd who is still at University is just blocks away with her own set of house-mates and the kids all make up a big happy and very active family.
But daughter # 4 is not part of this freewheeling group and that makes me kind of sad. She is a bit apart with her own now separate life over here in Paris. And with her 3 older sisters here the birth order hierarchy snaps right back into place. From my current studies in my program I have learned that this birth order issue never goes away! It's effects are felt throughout life. I can see it with my own kids and how Jane continues to try SO hard to distinguish herself from her sisters, and how the oldest naturally expects a certain respect and so on.
Aren't humans funny? We are hard wired to put ourselves in certain boxes and build obstacles for ourselves and develop an identity that places restrictions around some of our own goals and then we have to fight our way through this giant forest of fears and roadblocks or pay a psychologist to help us undo all those years of self defeating construction.
As I watch my own little brood fly the coop and start to build their separate nests I wish that I could just wave the logic wand over their heads and erase whatever limits they are beginning to circle around themselves.
Another example of how youth is wasted on the young. Here I am at 50 finally throwing off miles of barbed wire that I myself put up long ago.......
So along with celebrating our Christmas together here having lots of quality "girl time" with my 4 daughters I also hope to chisel away at any walls that are beginning to go up.
That would be a great Christmas present for mom and daughters both!
They look so happy to be together!!! They are lucky to be spending some time together... ENJOY :)
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Brigitt
Posted by: Brigitt | December 22, 2008 at 05:32 PM