All kidding aside, Lauren, my daughter, is wonderful to me. She always has been. From when she was very little, she has been watching out for me. It’s true.

Many many years ago, an astrologer said Lauren was with me in order to interpret the world to me and me to the world.  Lauren is very down to earth, and she knows me very well. She has me on her mind a lot.

I remember when she was fourteen, she was going somewhere for two weeks. Before she boarded the bus, she just blurted out: “Oh, good, I don’t have to worry about you for a while.”

I don’t know about you, but I know people, good people, whose children don’t or won’t even keep in touch with them.

Unlike Lauren, and to my discredit, I don’t think I ever considered my mother’s happiness or what I could do for her.  It’s just how it was.

When I entitled this entry what I did, I am referring to my mother and me, and not Lauren and me. My mother used to say to me: “Just wait until you have a daughter.”

When Lauren isn’t thrilled to wait on me hand and foot, I also remark: “Just wait until you have a daughter.”

Now, it was very different for me with my father. It was happiness to do anything for my father. I would run up and downstairs for him a dozen times happily. I think my brother and sisterfelt the same way too. There was always this element of wanting to be kind to my father and take care of him. It was a pleasure to please him. Probably he was just easy to please. It’s like we always knew we were his happiness. I do not know how to say exactly what it was, but that’s how it was.

When I mention to Lauren how easy it was to do things for my father, her response is: “Emotional bank account, emotional bank account,” meaning that my father gave so much of himself to us always without question and so then it was easy for us to give back to him.

And, so, now, when Lauren isn’t simply delighted to wait on me for the ninetieth time, and I look at her archly, she says, “Emotional bank account. Emotional bank account.”

When she’s really grumpy, she calls me Mommy Dearest — all in good fun, don’t you think?

To see things more from Lauren’s point of view, read her guest entry, Mothers and Daughters.   http://www.godwriting.org/godwriting/mothers-and-daughters.htm