Last night we attended my husband's company Christmas party -except it was in January so they called it a "Winter Bash." I was grateful. December is always jammed packed, so this was much better. It was a good excuse to dress up and go downtown for a free dinner.
I wound up sitting next to my husband's co-worker and his wife. They have 3 kids: an elementary aged kid, a toddler and a baby. They talked about what life is like - waking up in the middle of the night, sippy cups, changing diapers. We listened as they lamented about how expensive it is. I feel like parents of young children don't look at us like we are "real" parents anymore. We are not in the trenches. I have not wiped my kid's asses since Facebook debuted.
You WANT to tell them that it gets easier. But let's be real....it's all downhill from here. The minute parenting stops being physically exhausting it automatically flips to be emotionally exhausting. Diapers, wipes, and daycare are expensive......but that doesn't get better. Between paying for sports, instruments, cell phone plans, clothing, summer camps. It's rough. Now we really need to plan ahead because we'll have to pay for driving school this summer for my oldest and car insurance for her. There will be ACT/SAT test prep, there will be yearbooks and class rings and proms. The next 3-5 years will be pricey and then we get to help pay for college for the next 6 years after that. We have just surrendered ourselves to it at this point.
When they become fully functioning independent adults we won't even know what to do with ourselves. We're going to think we are Rockefellers.
After we talked about the children, we talked about our houses. This couch that they hate that eats everything. The HVAC unit that was installed wrong when the house was built. Flood insurance. This is adulting. You start having opinions about things like flood insurance and property taxes. You have a favorite burner and a junk drawer with rubber bands, a screwdriver, and some loose batteries. You frown when you notice the layer of dust on your baseboards.
I am a suburban mother. Through and through. I wake up in the morning and make breakfast and pack lunches. I shuttle kids to school. I carpool. I cook nutritious dinners and I bake cookies. I tend to the flowers in the hanging baskets in my porch. I kiss my husband when he gets home from work in the evening. I am completely ordinary.
I don't mind it, really, but I find it amusing. Sometimes I wonder what my life would have been like if I didn't marry my husband.
I would have attended college in North Jersey. I would have been a little wild. I'd move to New York City and be happy there for a while. Overtime, I would grow weary of the cold weather and people that take themselves so seriously. I'd find myself in some small mountain town in North Carolina.
I'd write trash novels with a lot of mystery and a little bit of sex. I'd live in some studio apartment above a hipster coffee bar. The floors would be pine and covered with oriental rugs. The place would be bright and cheery and I'd have shelves and shelves of books. I'd have a small balcony with a worn rocking chair and wind chimes hanging. I'd wear tea dresses and sandals and have long hair that I'd wear in a bread and a tiny, silver nose ring.
I'd have a grey cat named Scarlet who I want to be a lap cat but she just sits on the edge of the couch and just looks at me with resting bitch face. I'll have one good friend. His name is Tom. He is tall, gay and teases me for my fashion choices. I adore him. I'd exist on coffee and antidepressants. I text my family with vague promises to visit them, but I won't. I do send birthday cards to my siblings and nieces and nephews to assuage my guilt.
I take lovers. We drink wine in the evenings and they confess their love for me but I just laugh. We make love with all the lights on but I kick them out of my bed in the morning without even offering them a cup of coffee. I'd be loney but not too upset about it. I'd smile at babies in the grocery store and lament that I'd never have children of my own because I know, deep down that I would not be a good mother.
Some people will read that and think I'm just some rambling, crazy person but others will understand what I'm tying to say.
I am living the life I am supposed to be living, and it is a good life. I am grateful for it but there are little pieces of this free spirit inside of me. Living in suburbia is good for the children. It's a perfect place for families but the banality of it can wear on you sometimes. There is this sort of quiet desperation in the suburbs. Wives with monogramed tote bags and SUVs who are annoyed with their husbands for not helping enough around the house. Husbands with grills, that spend their Sundays watching football, who complain about their wives not giving it up enough. Bless us all.
I try to do things to keep myself entertained. Sometimes I'll just put on a fancy dress and dance in my living room, or say the f-word when I'm not supposed to, or try to convince my husband to park the car in some wooded area and make out with me. When the kids were young - we'd blow bubbles, walk barefoot in the grass, play in the rain, and make so many wonderful messes. It used to drive my husband crazy. He came home once to my kids covered in pudding paint. "They are just leaning and tapping into their creative side," I told him. I want to eat curry in India, and hike to waterfalls and feel the sun on my face. Being alive is so wonderful. I do try to FEEL alive, even if I'm a little weird and ridiculous in the process. I try to balance my free spirit and suburban mom side of myself and most of the time they co-exist just fine.
A few months ago, I was laying in bed with my husband and we were laughing about something. He laid his head on my shoulder and said, "I could never be married to someone logical," he said. I wasn't offended. I understood what he was trying to say. I smiled at him. "Well, thank you."
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