my favorite childhood book was "the velveteen rabbit." it's about the toy bunny who longs to be real, and the little boy who loved him into existence. every time i think about it i get this dull aching heart and my spirit soars upward, lifting my little girl face to the sky and praying, wondering, if i too will ever become real.
watching my baby boy grow up before my eyes has peeled back the layers of protection i had so carefully placed over all of me, or a moat, a shield, a circle of fire. the drawbridge of my life has opened for the wrong random strangers and left angels outside, waiting. with my boy, i feel as alive i did when i was six, seven, ten, twelve. i want him to know how everything works. he asks me a thousand times a day, "what's that?" even when he already knows the answer.
he wanted to wear his costume twice. he wanted to learn how to knock on a stranger's door and say "trick or treat!" he danced circles in the living room until he fell and hit his head on the doorframe. not to mention the fact of a doorframe, but there, i mentioned it.
so i look at him and i learn how it is that i came to be, after all: my daddy and mommy made me out of fire and food. they bred me. they bore me. and they loved me. just like we. just like i. just like he.
Real
ReplyDeleteIt's not make believe it's real. What did my 3 year old think when out dog killed the bird in the back yard? She knew what he did. It was real. I floundered around with my anger at the family pet who I knew was just doing what dog's do. Do I not want my child to know that death is real? I want to protect her, the one who sings happy birthday to goddesses and angels in her room when she's all alone. She did not flinch. "Why did he do that?" She asks me. "Because, sometimes that's what dogs do," is my reply. She doesn't ask for more this time. "Where do you go when you die?" She asks another day. And then still another question on a different day, "How did I get into your tummy?" (when I was a baby). She wants me to keep it real, but simple. Every day she challenges me to be real, authentic, genuine, to stop hiding behind fear, rules, someone else's answers or standards. I am working on it. Really I am.
Real
ReplyDeleteI'm not a real attorney. Or so a friend of mine has told me, in spite of being recognized as such by the state of Texas. So what am I now? A Mom? If so, what was I before? When I was a loyal public servant, wasn't I still serving my child? Wasn't I still a mother?
My managing attorney used to tell me, when I'd ask her about missing Thanksgiving parties and doctors appointments because of court, how she handled the feelings of guilt and the feeling that other parents judged her for missing so much. It's about quality not quantity, she'd tell me.
But I quit because I couldn't put my 8-week-old infant into daycare as my manager had done with her two sons and as I was expected to do with my girls. I quit because I couldn't stand that my daughters would spent the vast majority of their waking hours with someone else. I couldn't stand the implication that someone would know my daughters better than I do.
So, if I'm such a real mom now, why don't I feel any less scrutinized? My law school friends think I've thrown my career into the toilet. Other friends have forgotten that I once had a career. Either way I go, working Mom or SAHM, not a lot of praise of my decisions being passed around.
But I know that my decision is right for my family. At least right now. So, that's real enough for me.