Soccer mom

A lot of people have called me a soccer mom in the past few years. I recall looking up the definition once and didn't think it applied to me. Last night, I began to reconsider.

From wikipedia:

a middle-class suburban woman who spends a significant amount of her time transporting her school-age children to activities such as soccer practice and music lessons....
The phrase soccer mom generally refers to a white, married middle class woman who lives in the suburbs and has school age children.^[3] She is sometimes portrayed in the media as busy or overburdened and driving a minivan.^[3][4] She is also portrayed as putting the interests of her family, and most importantly her children, ahead of her own.

Let's break it down.

1 - Middle class -- Yes, please. Military income is not extremely comfortable but it sure beats a student's income... I mean, outgo-and-never-see-again.

2 - Suburban -- Ok, folks, have you actually seen the movie "The Burbs"? Does that look like a happy place? Didn't think so. No 'burbs for me, thanks.

3 - spends a significant amount of her time transporting her school-age children to activities such as soccer practice and music lessons -- This one drew me up short. I take them to and from school, we take them to and from weekend activities to "go have some fun", and last night I took Princess to her first Daisy Girl Scout activity. I stayed with her that first time to scope the place out but the result of a 6pm meeting was a frantic dinner (thank goodness for slow cookers), frantic bedtime, and my dishes are still piled in the sink. The thought of each of the kids having something like this, perhaps overlapping as well, made me weak in the knees.

By the way, does anyone want to buy some nuts 'n' stuff? It's for a good cause.

4 - White -- Most definitely. Except I'm getting a lot of freckles now. So, white with potentially cancerous and permanent brown blotches. -- You know... white sounds better. I'll stick with white

5 - Married -- Yep, and most happily.

6 - School aged children -- Yes, and I'm even considering putting Pebbles into early head start. She's so busy and that little mind is always trying to think of something to manipulate. She can count to 14, say her ABC's, and she's teaching herself kung fu. (but of course the little stinker wouldn't let me take a video of her kung fu, since revealing her skills would violate the kung fu code.)

7 - busy or overburdened -- I know that I bring a lot of it on myself. A personal flaw that I'm working to remedy. I told a friend the other day that I'm a perfectionist. She said she had no idea. I thought crap, I'm not doing it right. How could I be a better perfectionist? Wait!! NOOOO!!!!

8 - driving a minivan -- Um, ok, this is totally me. :sigh: I need to clean ol Hog'n'Bus out.

9 - putting the interests of her family, and most importantly her children, ahead of her own. -- You know, to a certain extent, this isn't as bad a thing as some people make it out to be. Helping Princess with homework is far more important than making sure I have nothing in Google Reader waiting for me. Having dinner on the table is more important than watching another episode of The Office. Besides that, throwing dinner in the slow cooker (my bestest dinner buddy of late) is ridiculously easy. I do put their interests ahead of mine, but not to the exclusion of mine. Balance is tricky but it really does make my life easier.

Am I a soccer mom? I guess I might be.