Monday, May 9, 2011

Mother's Day Update

I don’t know if the African man who works in the supermarket near my house read my Mother's Day blog, but he stopped me as I was shopping for groceries on Saturday to ask me if I was a mom. When I said no he asked me what I was waiting for. I asked him how old I looked to him, because I like to tell myself that I look young.

He told me that I didn't look old, but as he waved his finger at me, he gave me some words of wisdom. "Don’t pass the time." he said. "Because if you pass the time, it's going to be very bad for you." I laughed, but he replied. "I'm serious. If you pass the time, it's going to be very bad."

I only went to the supermarket to buy some ground beef and green onions so that I could make burgers for lunch, damn it!

Sheesh, I promise, I won’t 'pass the time.'

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Mother's Day

The news of my book release is not so new anymore, so it’s time that I start giving my blog, some attention.

With Mother’s Day approaching there were some things I wanted to recognize about my mother and about motherhood.

Because loving nurture comes so naturally to me, it only makes sense that I should me a mother. But I have strange feelings about motherhood.

Nearing my mid-thirties, I am well aware that the quantity of the eggs that I was born with is withering away. But in my heart and soul I am glad that I am not a mother right now. I recognize the urgency of my biological clock, but when I’m sitting on the couch doing nothing, but staring at the television, I sometimes breathe a sigh of relief that at that moment, I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do. I don’t have to do anything for anybody but me. And 'me' is lazy so I don’t have to do much.

I have quite the imagination and I’ve played myself in motherhood plenty of times only to end up with an overwhelming feeling.

There is a water park commercial that plays over the summer. During that commercial, I start thinking about how much effort and energy it really takes to take your kids to a water park. I begin worrying about whether I packed enough. Did I bring enough snacks for the trip? Did I pack both baby and Lysol wipes? Is there enough gauze, band aids and ointment to go around in the case of an injury?

In the hotel room, will my husband and I have to sneak to the bathroom for some kinky alone time? If one of the children wakes up and begins screaming when they realize they are in the room alone, do I stop humping my husband, or do I selfishly continue while yelling through the closed door for my child to go back to bed, or else? Is there even kinky alone time on trips like these?! Will I even want to have kinky alone time after the day I’ve had?

Am I a pervert for wanting to have sex on a family vacation?

My mind goes through all of these overwhelming thoughts and feelings until I remind myself that it was just a commercial and all I’m really doing is sitting on the couch. I am immediately rewarded with relief. The same thing happens to me when I see car commercials for family mini vans.

I know that I will get over these feelings when motherhood is a reality to me and I stop daydreaming about all of the bad things. Maybe this happens to me because I had a slight taste of motherhood when I was a teenager and my brothers were still little. I just keep flashing back to the day I went shopping with both of them and one of them disappeared; playing a game of hide and seek by hopping from one clothing rack to another. I was not a participant in this game so I just had to wait until he tired himself out and made his appearance. The pissed off expression on my face only added to the entertainment of his solo game of hide and seek.

I remember thinking to myself, ‘Wow, you can’t even go shopping by yourself if you have more than one of them.’ But that was a different situation. My brothers knew they didn’t have to respect or fear me, because I wasn’t their mother.

On the flip side, motherhood is one of the noblest things a woman could do. Being a mother is almost Christ-like. Some of you don’t believe in Jesus. I do. Poo-poo to you. With Easter being a little over a week ago, I think about how Jesus gave his life for us. Moms kind of do the same.

If I was cold, my mom would give me her jacket and shiver so that I could be warm. If I was hungry, my mom would go hungry and give me her food so that I would be full.

I remember being out somewhere and feeling like I was going to be sick and my mom cupping her hands together in front of me so that I could vomit in her hands.

I remember when my brother’s wet, baby poo leaked out of his Huggies or Luvs, whichever one he was wearing at the time, and she had to walk around with a brown poo stain on her jeans because we weren’t home yet. The stain stuck and her jeans got ruined because Oxi Clean hadn’t been invented yet.

These are gross memories, but they show the selflessness it takes to be a mom. I love a lot of people, but there isn’t a human being on the planet that I would allow to vomit or poo on me and allow them to get away with it.

My mom taught myself and my two brothers to read and write before we went to preschool. She did homework with us, and book reports for me (Shhhh.) She read to us. And never with a lazy demeanor. She read to us with energy. She made every character in those books come to life. She gave the characters separate voices and made up songs that went along with the stories. She gave me a childhood full of imaginary adventure, comfort and life.

When I finally do become a mother, I will be a great, fantastic mother because of the mother my mom was to me.

I write this blog, for my mother, for my friends who are mothers and for my friends who are about to me mothers.

Thank you for having us, thank you for loving us, thank you for sacrificing for us.

Happy Mother’s Day!

~Louise C.