By 8:15 this morning we were off kilter. School had been cancelled the night before do to a forecast of snow. I wrote notes for the girls, knowing they would wake with a start and the grumps, angry I had not allowed enough time for some mind sucking television. I was hoping to start the day right, to pretend we were normal for 30 minutes. That waking to our new reality did not have to be a dramatic situation. It didn’t work.
While there was no school, there was also no snow. It was cold and grey, the sky pregnant with promise, but no guarantees. We had family in town and volunteers lined up to help. By 9:15 we were all staring at each other. Dunkin Donuts had run out of munchkins and Cheyney declared a hunger strike as determined as Ghandi. In an effort to stay ahead of the day, I tossed Greg’s pants in with Cheyneys sheets, a daily occurrence as she tries to end the pull-up trend. While I removed the belt and searched the pockets, I did not look carefully enough and placed Greg’s phone in the washer with the rest of the bundle. He kindly announced my oversight as I mumbled to myself one should empty their own pockets before placing pants in the hamper. As I stormed out of the house, two children yelled at me and Greg inquired where I was going. “Out” I replied. I felt like a rebellious teenager, armed with a car and attitude screaming get me the hell away from all this that pulls me down.
I circled the regular route wondering where I could park my angry self for a day at the “office”. Since I had already purchased coffee with the donut debacle, I could not stop at my usual haunts. For the second time in a week, I found myself in the public library parking lot. While I searched for a spot, I noticed mothers with children and bags filled with books. I had stumbled upon toddler story time and began to weep.
When we moved to Raleigh 10 years ago, my one child was less than a year old. As my husband set out to work each day, as his own boss with his own parish, I stayed home for the first time since maternity leave. I unpacked boxes and arranged furniture, wondering when I would make a friend, find the perfect park, create my new routine. Somehow I found story time and it became our first regular thing in Raleigh. Sue-Kitty started each week with the same songs about A for Alligator and D for when we all sat down. Coco named her this because of the puppet she used each week, carefully hidden in a basket until the stories were over. Kitty would pop her head out to signal “stamp time” and the children would line up, arms extended and wrists exposed, to see what mark would be left on them. We never missed a week and often stayed at the library for 2 hours, browsing and reading, spending time together because we had nothing else to do. When Anna arrived a year later it became more challenging to arrive on time or stay after but somehow we were still regulars. By the time Cheyney was born, our schedule did not mesh up and we rarely made it to Sue Kitty’s class. Her temperament wasn’t quite right for the quiet solitude reading required, still isn’t. Gradually our names and faces faded from the librarians vernacular just as I had in college. My freshman year I was on a first name basis with Pulitzer Prize winning professors but did not know who I would ask for a grad school recommendation four years later. The distance gradually built up in baby steps. As the Moms struggled to hold hands with their children crossing the parking lot, I was reminded me of simpler times and problems.
How did I get here? A working mother of three -with a husband recovering from bypass surgery – who storms out of the house leaving everyone to sort it out for themselves? One step at a time I suppose. I feel trapped between the kindness of friends who long to comfort and the cold aloneness of no longer fitting in. Of wanting to be part of the happy but not being able to step both feet in. Of knowing that even if things feel okay for 10 minutes it is only because I am too scattered to remember the hell I am living. The kids have lashed out, mostly at me (who else is there?), saying I am stupid and the worst and slamming doors and kicking and screaming. They fight over who has been in the bathtub longer, who gets to use the hairbrush first, who picks the show. I know this is misdirected fear. I feel the exact same way. I don’t want to be living this either. For the first time in my life, I want to go backward not forward. I want to pretend none of this happened and that the rest of our lives will not be forever changed. But the only way out is through. And I suppose that is how we will get out of it, one step at a time.
notyourpreacherswife 
Posted by Julie Brown on January 28, 2014 at 11:14 pm
Love this! I have been there too, preacher’s wife, crazy kids and bypass. Like you said, one step at a time. It does get better, all of it.
Posted by Allison A. on January 29, 2014 at 2:59 am
AS an “almost empty nester” I would go back 15 years to the place you are now without a second thought…not for a “do-over”, but just to do it all again. I would make the same mistakes, I am sure, but I would have twice as many memories of that complicated awful, wonderful time. All I could think of when you talked about the phone were the too MANY times I found tissues in my mother’s pockets (too late)when she required my help with her laundry. Sandwiched between a needy mother, and 3 needy children and you guessed It…a sometimes needy husband, and no one could say I wasn’t needy. B
ut I didn’t know now…or then, what I needed…except no tissues in pockets and an escape hatch! I wish I had known what an escape hatch writing about it could be back then.
And of course, the Sue-Kittys!
You are the “honest toddler” of mothers, only one has to have been there to get the joke.
Posted by Molly Painter on January 29, 2014 at 8:14 am
So eloquently written. Your honesty and acknowledgment is raw and real. Thanks for putting yourself out there. Xo