Month: August 2018

Earlier this week I was listening to one of my go to podcasts, Moms Don’t Have Time to Read Books, where the host interviews writers about their work.  The host hits the high points of authors’ work and highlights the things most applicable to busy moms, and the episodes are in easily-digestible thirty to forty minute episodes, perfect listening for a workout.

The episode I listened to earlier this week brought tears to my eyes while I was running on the treadmill (no one noticed, promise).  The host of the podcast was interviewing Reverend Lydia Sohn, who wrote a blog post called “What It’s Like to Be 90-Something.”  Rev. Sohn interviewed her older congregants about their lives and posted about some of their thoughts on regrets, aging, dying, and relationships.  It was the discussion about happiness that I found most interesting (and that brought me to tears).  Sohn found that:

Every single one of these 90-something-year-olds, all of whom are widowed, recalled a time when their spouses were still alive and when their children were younger and living at home. As a busy young mom and working professional who frequently fantasizes about the far away, imagined pleasures of retirement, I quickly responded, “But weren’t those the most stressful times of your lives?” To which they all agreed. There was no hesitation though, that those days were also the happiest.

This discussion brought tears to my eyes, first because I had a sense of What. The. Fuck.  This week, the first week of school, marks the end of my lazy summer, the first time we’ve had weekly scheduled extracurricular activities for the kids, and the first school year with the concept of tardy.  With my oldest starting in “real school,” it feels like the end of something for me, and the beginning of a new phase for which I’m not sure I’m adequately prepared.  And in the middle of this adjustment there’s also been a simultaneous return of client activity after a nice lull in work.  Looking forward into the near future stresses me out and also terrifies me a little bit.  And this is the best it’s going to be?

But then the lump in my throat was for a different reason, as I realized actually, yeah, this is pretty freaking awesome.  My two-year-old may think it’s amazing to drop his diaper and mark his territory on my walls (and once even on my bed), but does anything beat his deep belly laughs that I can summon simply by crossing my eyes certain way?  Or his early morning cuddles when I wake him up, savoring the last months (weeks?) that he is truly my baby before he transforms into a little boy?  And I don’t know how many times I’ve stepped on a conch shell or accidently ripped a paper mermaid, ruining some sea scene of my daughter’s creation (of which there are many all over my house), and my god, she can stake out a position and hold it like nobody’s business and will not be swayed, no matter how severe or imminent the punishment.  But what can be better than watching her create her little worlds out of nothing?  Or holding her hand as she walks into her new school with a confidence that I only dream of possessing at this point in my life?

Thinking about that and how wonderful this all truly is, I also thought about my church’s current sermon series.  It is based on Anne Lomott’s book, Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers.  In my discussion with my Sunday school class just this last week, I mentioned that I wasn’t so good at the prayer of thanks (not so good at any of them, but thanks is pretty low), so on the treadmill this week, I thought a silent prayer of thanks.

Yes, this shit is crazy.  But it is unbeatably awesome sometimes.  So to that I say THANKS.  Thanks for the pee-stained walls, the bruises on my feet from the conch shell booby traps, and everything they stand for.