it's spring. thank the universe. really, thank you universe. i wasn't sure i was going to make it. i thought we made it through the winter with just a few sniffles and a lot of fun in the snow and i was standing in the first rays of glorious sunshine and thinking wow, we made it through! and then 3 days later (i know, i should have knocked wood...) i started coughing. 2 days later the littles woke up with fevers and coughing. and then we had sick. full on, sick for days, a week, and for me about 10 days. for 4 of those days i was the sickest i've been in over 5 years. i was laying on the couch, letting my kids watch curious george like they have never before, feeling like i would never feel motivated to do anything ever again. oh and it rained, did i mention the rain? the biblical, monsoon that did not allow sunshine. so while i was wallowing in self doubt that i no longer possessed the ability to be a good mother and i would never again feel the urge to actually care if they never stopped watching tv and i would never read them another book or come up with a creative idea and i probably would never breathe through my nose again, it was pouring, gray, damp and cold. i felt as if i had been consumed by dementors. and chocolate wasn't even helping.
but it's over. i feel hope again. i know we are loved. my husband thankfully didn't get sick, and for the first time i can remember i had sick kids and a sick me and someone to help take care of us, instead of someone to tag team with who was as sick as me. that was awesome. and jen. what would i have done without my jen? she is a cooker friend extraordinaire who not only left food on my doorstep but cooked that food with all the love in the world to help make us well. i am so thankful for the people in my life who are so grand. which brings me here to this space and this post. i haven't posted in such a long time, busy yes, two year molars and no sleep, yes, i lost all hope for a while, yes and today i checked out a blog i like to read, http://www.acommonplacelife.com/ and amy, who i have never met, but i am pretty certain we would be friends if we knew each other, was blogging about the importance of the mundane, (and the defense of facebook) and i was thinking she is so right. here i am in my little bubble of motherhood, living in my world and busy every second of the day with my 2 little ones who take oh so much. and i have lost touch with so many people because i just don't have the time. i mean i've even lost touch with myself. i look at myself in the mirror and i wonder who that lady is sometimes. anyway amy is right, the mundane, that's what keeps us woven together. and i know that. i live that. i just kind of haven't thought about it much. my husband does not travel. he could. we could have more money, he could have more opportunity for his career. but he doesn't because he would miss us. we would miss him. it's the everyday that we want together. i want to know that he had a crappy bagel for breakfast and he would rather have the egg sandwich. i want to know that the tie he is wearing is yellow. i want to see him in the morning. i love seeing him for 5 minutes at lunch on his way back to the office. it's a wonderful treat to be in his presence in the middle of the day. i want to see him after work, playing with our kids, laughing with them, holding them and listening to them tell him they blew bubbles today or learned freeze tag. and i want us to experience this life at the same time, everyday. he taught me this. years ago i would work for a few days in a different state, when i came back he would look me over and ask me questions and make sure to take me to dinner and sit and talk to me, he was making sure i didn't change, making sure i was still his tara.he wanted to journey with me, not see the outcome of the journey on my soul, but be there for the transformation. he is wise. and he knew that's what happens when you loose the mundane, you loose the connection. amy talks about how facebook has given this back to us, kept us connected to those who we may have lost touch with in an easy to keep up with format. she's right. facebook was something that certainly kept me sane during this very long winter. even the days i could not write a status, i could follow conversations, see photos of friends, feel kind of connected. motherhood is lonely. i commented on amy's post, i quoted ruth from six feet under. in one episode she said "if my experience is anything to go by, motherhood is the loneliest thing in the world". and it is. even in a roomful of people it's lonely. i got a text today from a friend, which by the way texting rocks. it can connect you and your soul sister in 2 seconds flat and you're both laughing about a drunk carol burnett on a day you thought you might poke your eye out just so you can feel something. anyway so today, right. my friend, she has a little baby who's just getting to playground age, and she said she was at the playground and it was shocking how some people parent. and i replied yes it is. but also that it's lonely. because here you are at the playground, finally, with your kids who if you are me, one of them screamed at you that he wasn't going to have any fun there, and you pretty much dragged him to the playground screaming, and now he's happy as a pig in... mud. and there's another adult! wahoo! and you think i can talk, even if it's just about the weather or the trees or the kids shoes.... the mundane... and then you observe her and her children and that tells you that you don't want to be near her, or her kids. and she's not just having a bad day, you can see this is her 'way' and here you are lonely again, sitting next to a perfectly good adult you just can't relate too. alone. and we are. but we are also not. it's complicated, and fragile but the friends you make that have kids the same age as your kids, that are going through similar things at the same time. that makes the lonely better. bearable. and you find yourself infused with hope once again ready to tackle the day, the day that becomes the next day, which is like the next day and the last day but somehow eventually becomes your whole life.
