Gloria Ram

164. MALDITOS TRECE /

THE HATEFUL THIRTEEN

Parte 1/2 / part 1/2

"Visión de túnel" /
"Tunnel vision" 

Fecha / date: 1/10/22

Explicación / Explanation:

Tan pronto guardé el dibujo de mi chica Dodo, me enganché de inmediato con otro que tenía a medias y no acababa de arrancar.

-¡A mi me da que me queda pubertad para rato!..-me quejé en cuanto sentí la tentación de volverlo a apartar.

No es de extrañar, teniendo en cuenta lo poco que me apetecía sumergirme en un tema que ya sufría suficientes horas al cabo del día.

Mis chicos estaban creciendo, y eso era tan previsible como poco grato.

Desde que habían vuelto a las aulas, estaban insoportables. ¡Era agotador!

Compaginar sus rutinas con la mía y todo lo que deseaba realizar al cabo del día, no resultaba nada fácil. Y encima, me cayó encima una tarea extra con la que no contaba: 

"Inventarme" un dossier artístico.

 ¡Lo que me faltaba!

Lo del dossier trajo a mi vida una dosis extra de estrés, y mucho cabreo. 

Estaba enfadada. Primero conmigo, por confiar en la creatividad y buen hacer de cualquiera. Y segundo, con el diseñador, a quién creía haberle dado tiempo de sobra para hacer su trabajo, y sólo me había enviado un borrador, que en mi opinión, dejaba bastante que desear.

Tal fue la desilusión, que me envalenté y le dije que yo misma me encargaría de confeccionarlo al detalle, hoja por hoja, y que su única tarea sería "maquetarlo", o como se dijese, para tenerlo en un formato que pudiese enviar por e-mail. 

Aquello suponía un trabajo bestial, y una putada.

No sólo le estaba pagando a alguien por un trabajo del que me iba a encargar en su mayoría, sino que nunca veía la hora de ponerme (Si al final del día encontraba unos minutos para mí, lo que menos me apetecía era pensar. Lo único que deseaba era relajarme dibujando...)

Pero, lo que peor que llevaba aquellos días no era eso, sino las discusiones con los chicos, que llevaban desde principio de curso echándome la culpa de todo (o al menos eso me parecía).

¡Ni que esta vida la hubiese inventado yo!

La vida era lo que era, ¡y no una conspiración de su madre para fastidiarles la existencia! 

Parecían no entenderlo. Le habían declarado la guerra a un sistema, cuyo principal representante era yo, su madre, esa arpía que no tenía en cuenta sus deseos.

Era como si mis palabras cayesen en saco roto todo el tiempo. Y para colmo,  tenía la sensación de que con ellas, agravaba su rebeldía.

-¡Parece que hablo en chino!, ¿es que no entienden mi idioma?- me quejaba cada vez que me desobedecían.

-¿Qué mensaje estarán recibiendo?, ¿quién no entiende a quién aquí?, ¿yo a ellos o ellos a mí?, ¿pudiera ser que sin pretenderlo me haya convertido en una capulla que no sabe hacer otra cosa que quejarse?-me sorprendí preguntándome justo después de dibujar lo que parecía un capullo de mariposa.

Fueron aquellas preguntas las que me llevaron a cuestionarme si no sería por culpa de los mensajes que emitía que fallaba tanto la comunicación...

Lo mismo les pedía que atendiesen en clase y se esforzasen por llevar las tareas escolares al día, que les soltaba cualquier cosa que se me cruzase por la cabeza en lo concerniente al sistema educativo, y más concretamente, en lo referente al sinsentido del contenido de algunas asignaturas.

Que yo recordase, llevábamos siglos estudiando las partes de las plantas,¡ como si las plantas mutasen todos los cursos!... En cuanto al tema de la flauta dulce, ¡sin comentarios!, ¿cómo podían llamar a eso aprender música?

Sinceramente, me parecía de muy mal gusto tener que ser la encargada de motivarles para que se levantasen de la cama cada mañana. Y encima, pedirles que se tomasen la jornada con humor y agradeciesen el hecho de recibir a una educación, por ser un lujo al que no todos los niños del planeta podían acceder. 

Desgraciadamente, se me notaba demasiado lo mucho que me costaba defender lo absurdo que veía en aquella rutina de lunes a viernes, que incluso les obligaba a llevarse trabajo a casa.

¿Qué tenía que ver lo que hacían a diario con lo que les contaba acerca de ser y pensar por ellos mismos, la búsqueda de la felicidad, la maravilla de viajar para expandir la mente y la necesidad de aprender a diferenciar entre experiencia de vida y sabiduría, acumular riquezas y ser rico, etc...?

¿Qué les enseñaban en clase que tuviese que ver con ser auténticos, cooperar y aprender a ser felices para hacer más grata su existencia y la de los demás?

Visto así, no era de extrañar que les importase un comino mantener ordenada la pesada mochila llena de libros y apuntes que no les interesaban, hacer los deberes, y aprender a "copiar y pegar" con el objetivo de pasar exámenes y no repetir curso.

Tenía muy claro que a los niños no había que preguntarles qué querían ser de mayores, sino animarles a conocerse a sí mismos para que, hiciesen lo que hiciesen, le sacasen provecho a lo que ya eran...

Y sin embargo, parecía que lo único que me importaba era que cumpliesen con sus tareas... Y porque no lo hacían, cada día más enfados y menos risas.

De poco les servía que les repitiese que la escolarización era como una prueba obligatoria para pasar de nivel... No la veían como un reto, sino como un castigo.

¿Y qué me tocaba a mí?, !actuar como el de domador de leones de un viejo circo! Todo el día agitando el látigo, no por gusto, sino por exigencias de un público y sabiendo que hay animales que no han nacido para ser domesticados. 

¿ Cómo convencerles para que hiciesen sus tareas sin que opusiesen tanta resistencia? Lo tenía complicado.

-¡Pobres chicos, les he llenado tanto la cabeza con pájaros de libertad que me odian! ¿Cómo no van a estar cabreados?. Y ahora, ¿qué hago con mis fieras?- me reproché.

-Para empezar, vigílate. Suceda lo que suceda, no caigas en la trampa de juzgarte por tu labor como madre. Eso no soluciona nada. No puedes hacer más de lo que haces. No controlas nada, cariño- me respondí con la intención de darme ánimos, !y me cabreé todavía más! 

Normal, teniendo en cuenta que odio que me llamen "cariño", especialmente cuando me quieren hacer entrar en razón, y porque siempre tengo la sensación de que puedo hacer algo más de lo que hago y mucho mejor.

Y de repente, no sé muy bien como, me percaté de que el tema escolar volvía a ser, una vez más, sólo la punta del iceberg...

No era el pésimo rendimiento académico de los chicos lo que más me molestaba ( por desgracia, ya estaba acostumbrada), sino que me estuviesen despidiendo sin previo aviso de mi labor como mami.

Lo que de veras me irritaba era lo mucho que echaba de menos lo que nunca volvería a ser: A la mamá de dos niños pequeños que había sido una vez y lo que había significado para ellos...

Los roles estaban cambiando.

Los chicos ya estaban mutando y adentrándose en el camino de la "aborrescencia", como yo la llamo.... Esa etapa en la que hasta las mamás más adorables se convierten en ogros, y no queda otra que expulsarlas y acusarlas de viejas pesadas que no saben nada de la vida. 

Y a esta ex mami, recién convertida en una madre pesada más, ¡y encima en plena premenopausia! , le dolía muchísimo quedarse sin el único club de fans que tenía. 

Comprendí que tanto si me hacía gracia como si no, no me quedaba otra que adaptarme, lo antes posible, a prescindir de los aplausos de mis enanos, que dicho sea de paso, estaban creciendo a pasos agigantados...

Cuando me paré a echarle un vistazo a cómo me estaba quedando el dibujo, me quedé perpleja de lo lento que se estaba desarrollando.

En una de las muchas veces que tuve que abandonar la mesa de dibujo para dedicarme a otros quehaceres, recuerdo que lo miré fijamente y apenada le solté:

-Deseando estoy acabarte. Contigo, no veo la luz al final del túnel ...Por ahora, ya me has dejado claro que necesito adaptarme a los cambios, ¡gracias por recordármelo! A ver si la próxima vez que me encuentre contigo me das alguna pista de cómo hacerlo, o me cuentas algo que no sepa...

Explanation:

As soon as I put away the drawing of my Dodo girl, I immediately got hooked on another one that it didn't quite start.

-I am afraid, I've got a lot of puberty for a while!- I complained as soon as I was tempted to put it away again.

No wonder, considering how little I felt like immersing myself in a subject that already suffered enough hours in the day.

My boys were growing up, and that was as predictable as it was unwelcome.

Since they had returned to the classroom, they were unbearable, and I found it exhausting.

Balancing their routines with mine and all the things I wanted to do during the day was not easy. On top of that, an extra task fell on me that I hadn't counted on: 

To "invent" an artistic dossier.

 That was too much!

The dossier brought an extra dose of stress into my life, and a lot of anger. 

I was angry. First with myself, for trusting anyone's creativity and good work. And secondly, with the designer, who I thought I had given him plenty of time to do his work and he had only sent me a draft, which was far from fulfilling my expectations.

Such was my disappointment, that I got up the courage and told him that I would take care of the details, page by page, and that he would only take care of the "layout", or whatever you call it, to have it in a format that could be sent by e-mail. 

That was a lot of work, and a bitch.

Not only was I paying someone for a job that I was going to take care of for the most part, but I was so busy... (If I could find a few minutes to myself at the end of the day, the last thing I wanted to do was think. The only thing I wanted to do was to relax by drawing)

But the worst thing I had to deal with those days was not that, but the behaviour of my boys, who had been blaming me for everything since the beginning of the course (or at least that's how it seemed to me).

I had not invented this life!

Life was what it was, and not some conspiracy of their mother to ruin their existence! 

They didn't seem to understand. They had declared war on the system, and who was that system? Me!  their mother, that evil woman who had no regard for their wishes.

I felt as if my words were falling on deaf ears all the time. And to make matters worse, I also had the feeling that with them, I was aggravating their rebellion.

-It seems like I'm speaking Chinese, don't they understand my language?- I complained every time they disobeyed me.

-What message are they getting?, who doesn't understand who, here?, me to them or them to me?, could it be that I've unintentionally turned into an asshole who doesn't know how to do anything but complain? I surprised  asking myself just after I had drawn what looked like a butterfly cocoon.

It was those questions that led me to wonder if it wasn't the messages I was sending out that were causing the communication to fail so badly....

I would ask them to pay attention in class and make an effort to keep up with their homework, as much as I would say anything that crossed my mind concerning the education system, and more specifically, the nonsense of the content of certain subjects.

As far as I could remember, we had been studying the parts of plants for centuries, as if plants mutated every year! As for the damn recorder, no comment, how could they call that learning music?

Honestly, I was fed up with being in charge of motivating them to get out of bed every morning. And on top of that, to have the nerve to ask them to take the day with humour and be grateful for the fact that they were receiving an education, because it was a luxury that not every child on the planet had access to. 

Unfortunately, it was all too obvious how hard it was for me to defend the absurdity I saw in the routine designed for children in this theatre called the world, which even forced them to take work home.

What did what they did on a daily basis have to do with what I told them about being and thinking for themselves, the pursuit of happiness, the wonder of travelling to expand the mind and the need to learn to differentiate between life experience and wisdom, accumulating wealth and being rich, etc...?

What were they taught in class that had to do with being authentic, cooperating and learning to be happy in order to make their own and others' existence more pleasant?

Bearing in mind the aforementioned, it was not surprising that they didn't give a damn about keeping their heavy backpack full of books and notes that didn't interest them tidy, doing their homework, and learning to "copy and paste" with the aim of passing exams and not repeating a year.

I was very clear that we should not ask children what they wanted to be when they grew up, but encourage them to know themselves so that, whatever they did, they could make the most of what they already were...

And yet, I spent the day demanding that my children fulfil their obligations and because they didn't, every day there was more anger, less conversation and not a trace of laughter.

My suggestion that they take schooling as a compulsory test to pass a level in this video game called life was of no use to them. They didn't see it as a challenge, but as a punishment.

 

As I thought about all this, I felt as if I were the lion tamer in an old circus, who, while cracking the whip to make the animals obey him, felt sad to demand that they do stupid things for the enjoyment of the public and guilty because he was aware that he was caging animals that were not born to be domesticated. 

What to do with the things I couldn't change, how to convince them to do what they should without being so pushy? Complicated.

-Poor kids, I've filled their heads so full of birds in the wild that now they hate me! How could they not be pissed off? Now that they're tall enough to see the bars, they're not content to live in a cage! What can I do?- I wondered.

-For a start, watch yourself so that whatever happens, you do not fall into the trap of judging yourself for your role as a mother. That doesn't solve anything!- was the answer I gave myself.

- You can't do any more than you do. You're not in control, honey- I finally said to myself, as if I were talking to someone else, and I got even more pissed off! (Normal, considering that I hate being called "honey", especially when they want to talk some sense into me...).

And that's when I opened my eyes and realised that the school was just the tip of the iceberg! It was only the perfect excuse for not seeing the whole situation.

What bothered me the most was not their poor academic performance, but the fact that I was being dismissed without warning from my role as a mommy. 

I realised how much I missed my children and the mum I had once been to them.

The roles were changing and I couldn't help it. 

They had mutated into puberty and started walking on the road towards adolescence, a stage where even the most adorable mums were cast out and accused of being old biddies who knew nothing about life. 

And it hurt like hell for this pre- menopausical bore to lose the only fan club she had! 

I realised that, whether I liked it or not, I had to adapt, as soon as possible, to get by without the applause of my tykes, who were growing by leaps and bounds...

When I stopped to take a look at how the drawing was coming along, I realised how slowly it was developing.

On one of those multiple occasions when I had to leave the drawing board to devote myself to other tasks, I remember looking at it and saying to it:

-I can't wait to finish you. With you, I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel...

For now, you've made it clear that I need to adapt to the changes, thanks for reminding me! 

Let's see if next time I meet you, you can give me some clues on how to do it or tell me something I don't know

Sebastian Bach- Tunnel vision

Visión de túnel