Often when I think about my role in my family, I think of one of Bill Watterson’s Calvin and Hobbes cartoons: Calvin is standing in a field at night looking at the sky full of stars and yells, “I’M SIGNIFICANT!” He stands there a moment gazing up then says in a smaller voice, “Screams the dust speck.”

I know there is sound coming out of my mouth because the members of my family stare at me when I talk. However, that sound apparently does not translate into sensible words because they rarely do what I ask or advise. All I can think is they either don’t understand what I’m saying or they don’t take me seriously.

This phenomenon became very clear to when my oldest was around three-years old. She just wouldn’t listen. I chalked it up to her age. What toddler listens? Then I put her in preschool.

“Mom, the teacher says we should pick our toys up after we play with them.”

“Mom, the teacher says we shouldn’t hit other kids.”

“Mom, the teacher says I can’t crawl around at school and bark.”

Mind you, at this age, teacher wisdom only applied to school and was not necessarily practiced at home.

Her kindergarten teacher set a bad precedent when my daughter wouldn’t write out her numbers from 1 to 100. She bribed her with cookies. “Mom, the teacher gave me cookies when she wanted me to do something I didn’t want to do.”

Her first grade teacher couldn’t get her to do her timed math tests. Not being one to bribe, she solicited my help during a parent/teacher conference. “You need to tell her to do them.” I told the teacher my directive carried no weight, “I’ll tell her to do them, but I can’t make her because I’m not sitting in class with her.”

When my youngest, entered school, she had a whole new slew of issues I’d overlooked.

“Mom, did you know I should capitalize every sentence?”

“Mom, did you know you can sound out letters to figure out the words?”

I had come to a place of acceptance over all this, even going so far as to ask a teacher to tell my kids something I really need them to hear. By high school, I just gave up. I still said a lot, gave advice, and explained how they should be doing something, but my expectations of them hearing me were lowered. If one fraction sunk in, I’d be satisfied. They were good girls; it seemed like my payoff for trying to be heard.

Now, my youngest daughter’s best friend moved in to finish her senior year. Being far more independent than my daughters have thought of being, she brought a whole new body of philosophies on living life.

Did you know that if they start to bed a half hour before they should actually be in bed, they’d get a whole eight or nine hours of sleep? Did you know that if you go to bed the same time you normally do on a late start day that you actually get 10-11 hours of sleep instead of just eight? Did you know that if you went to bed at a decent hour on a weekend, you’d get up before 1 p.m.? Did you know that you can take raw food and make it into edible food when mom’s not around?

Now why didn’t I think of that? Although, it seems like I’ve heard those ideas somewhere before. Oh yeah, it was from ME. I AM MOTHER, HEAR ME ROAR!

Or should I say, i am mother, hear me roar?

Gretchen Leigh is a stay-at-home mom who lives in Covington. You can read more of her writing and her daily blog on her website livingwithgleigh.com or on Facebook at “Living with Gleigh.” Her column is available every week at maplevalleyreporter.comunder the Lifestyles section.