Predictable. A compliment?

Claire and I share a 10-minute drive every weekday morning. I look forward to it every day.

Some mornings she has gone outside, started the car and scraped off the windshield. The seat warmers are on. The music is tuned to her favourite station (hey, I can put up with just about anything for ten minutes, even in the morning!). Some mornings she is rushing around, hair still wet from a quick shower frantically looking for her computer cord, blazer or school shoes. A quick grab of a banana and a muffin and she's ready to be on the road.

Every morning, I have gotten up and ready, woken Louis and the kids, made coffee, checked the morning news, caught up on my blog-reading, unloaded the dishwasher and hollered upstairs maybe once, probably twice. This month with the daily LOAD challenges, I have more often than not completed or almost-completed a layout and it is ready to photograph.

I digress ...

I know, I always digress! But the point is to show you how different we are in personality. Claire is a typical soon-to-be-full-teenager with energy and enthusiasm and everything is either go-go-go or ugh. I'm, well, I'm just old.

Anyway, during our 10-minute drives there is often a lot of conversation. I know who gets along with who and why, who is dating who and who is upset about it, who was dating who and who is upset about it, who is flunking out, who is a discipline issue, who has parents splitting up, who is doing drugs or drinking, who is thinking they're gay, who is, who is, who is, who is. Pretty heavy topics for first thing in the morning, but I know that she's bringing them up because she's trying to figure them out for herself not necessarily that she is looking for advice.

Then came the "well, I would never do anything like that because I know what you would do".

Really? You know what I would do?

Then came the "of course, I do. You are so predictable."

So I dropped her off at the entry to the school. I got my smooch and wished her a good day with her math test, English round table and French assignment.

My feelings were hurt.

Predictable? Really? Wow. I don't want to be predictable. What a terrible thing to be!

But then I realized, predicable is EXACTLY what I want to be. Predicable is the result of CONSISTENT. The ONLY thing I learned, as the product of a bi-polar whack job, is inconsistency is at best confusing; at worst dangerous. I have done my level best in the thirteen years of Claire's life to be consistent.

I marveled this experience with a couple of girlfriends. Every one of them laughed at me ... okay, with me. Apparently I am not just consistent with my children and husband, but with my friends as well. Everyone knows how I'll react to any given situation. I suppose that's a good thing; after all, I wouldn't want to be one of those flighty types, eh? Better to be exactly as advertised!