Now I honestly thought Mother’s Day would be a day of relaxation and doing-nothing-ness, but apparently the popular media and its myths of motherhood (”her” one day to celebrate that thing she does, “mothering”) enchanted me, leading me off into the woods of illusion. Did I expect to wake up to breakfast? Had I hoped that I might land in a spa with seaweed goo pasted on my face and maybe my toes too? Should I have yearned for a hot and sweet cup of coffee (okay, tea. I am not much of a coffee drinker)?
Mother’s Day started something like this: I wake up to humming. Annabelle has plastered her body across my chest. She nurses and hums. I am pretty sure she is trying to fall back to sleep. I lay there for what seems like a long time (but is probably about twenty minutes). Never stir a sleeping Annabelle, this we have learned (the hard way, shhh). Finally she rolls away from me and over to her dad. I am a free woman!
I stumble downstairs and make a cup of tea with lots of sugar. I scoop an extra teaspoon since it’s Mother’s Day and I deserve a treat. Mmmm . . . sugar. Tea with sugar. Oh, I am waking up.
I write a little bit. I make a list of what I hope to accomplish during the day (Discovering Motherhood recommends keeping a schedule and a list of personal and professional goals for the full time mother since [we] often receive little feedback (or none at all) and miss out on fun things like mid-year and annual reviews). Each day I compose a daily list of goals, etc. to keep track of what Annabelle and I are doing throughout the day, what events are coming up, and where I’d like the day to lead us.
The quiet of making my morning list is misleading, deceptive even. The rest of my day, a stormy and chaotic Mother’s Day, lies ahead.
I drink more tea. My friend comes over and we head outside for a walk. I am enjoying this part of Mother’s Day. I tell my friends stories from the week, reflect on my family’s visit, our friends’ wedding, and on what an outstanding husband I have because he is willing to watch our little one so that I might go out and walk.
When I return though, the real Mother’s Day begins. Annabelle screams at the top of her lungs. She rushes towards the door saying “Ma, ma, ma, ma,” and squeezing her fists to sign “milk.” I nurse her. I trust that all will be well with my Annabelle after she nurses. She runs back across the room and returns to playing. Not so bad, but once I go upstairs and start running a shower, I turn around and see Annabelle standing in the doorway to the bathroom with a “How could you?” look on her face. Apparently I am not allowed to shower without her. Ever. So I undress her and we both step into the shower.
While I am changing her back into her clothes, my husband’s phone rings. It is the best man from the wedding we attended yesterday. Tuxes need returning and someone needs to return them. My husband turns to me, “Can we drive “here” and “there” to pick up tuxes?”
We arrange to meet the tux people. We pick up tuxes. Meanwhile my husband has offered to watch Annabelle so that I may pick up a pair of sandals and a bra. He drives me to the shopping center, and Annabelle falls asleep in her car seat. Her pudgy cheeks relax and her lips soften. Asleep, Annabelle offers me a wonderful Mother’s Day moment: peace. Our little one is quiet for the first time all day.
A while later a clerk rings me up and my husband taps me on the shoulder. He and Annabelle are joining me for quality time (they don’t want me to spend Mother’s Day by myself. I foresee a shortened shopping trip). We three venture down the aisles of the store. Annabelle tells us again and again how she feels about this arrangement, “Down! Down!” Now that she is talking in a comprehensible way, we really can’t pretend that her commands are not understood. I release her from her stroller and offer her her freedom, or at least the chance to walk beside me. This game works for a little while until Annabelle becomes distracted by paper tags that she finds on the floor. Then I stop the game because the mother in me fears I will lose her between the clothing racks and shoe aisles. She joins me inside the dressing room but then summons her father for more wandering around the shop. With Dad at her side, she explores more but tires of it and lets everyone inside the store know it by shouting at the top of her lungs. Yes, ours is a loud one.
My husband attempts to calm her and strap her into her stroller while I pay another clerk. I apologize to the clerk who nods at us in a knowing way. We three hurry out of the store, Annabelle yelping and gripping my pinky finger as I walk beside her in the stroller, my husband steering us to the exit.
The fussiness swallows our car. We are all fussy.
So I start thinking about the spa. Why haven’t I visited a spa today? Once home, I find myself back in my bed where this Mother’s Day started. My husband and Annabelle plop down beside me. Annabelle crawls over to me, sits on my stomach, claps and gives me a kiss. She then presses her cheek up against her dad’s face and he kisses her. We then alternate kissing her on the cheeks. For the next hour, we do nothing and everything. We play rough house, we tickle, we giggle, we just let go. I wake up to the reality of Mother’s Day for my life. The day is not necessarily about me and the work I have done to reach this day. Instead it is about my husband and child. Spa, shpa. Hmpph! Mother’s Day is a day for this mom to turn to her family and say “thank you.” And so I did. I thanked my husband and my child for giving me the chance to be “mamma.” All the screaming, all the chaos, all the fussiness. This is just part of my life as mother, a part that is inevitable and yet forgettable. When it comes right down to it, I can never return the happiness my family gives me. So in future Mother’s Days I hope to make more of an effort to honor my family and to forget about cards, spas, and other meaningless stuff. Yes, little tokens of affection are nice, but the people who are my family make this whole “motherhood” experience what it is. And I am thankful for that.
Plus, I did enjoy those hot and sweet cups of tea.
Happy Mother’s Day!
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