He just wanted banana bread. Eager to please and to get us out of the house, I obliged.
We sat side by side in a bustling Starbucks, stealing a moment together before work and school. My son slurped apple juice and nibbled at his bread. I sipped my coffee, barely tasting it. Eyes glued to my phone, I scrolled and scrolled for answers I knew I wouldn’t find.
Irritated, I looked up. That’s when I noticed my son staring down every visitor walking in the door. Morning sunlight framed his sweet face and curious blue-green eyes.
Before I could smile, the door swung closed and I took a breath. What was I thinking bringing him here? It’s not safe here. It’s not safe anywhere anymore.
Last Saturday somebody strode through the doors of a Walmart, gun loaded with hate. A Mommy and Daddy died shielding their baby from his bullets.
A day later, news broke of a second shooting closer to home, then word of more violence in our city. Blood-soaked, lifeless bodies on linoleum tiles and hot pavement. Lives cut short. Hundreds of families shattered forever. With trembling hands, I balled up our trash and swiftly rose.
“Jack, we’re leaving now,” I announced.
“Uppy, uppy!” he pleaded. And even though he’s perfectly old enough to walk himself to the car, I didn’t hesitate. I hoisted him in my arms, busting outside.
I punched the start button on the car. Elmo’s upbeat alphabet rap blared through the car stereo, but I couldn’t stop thinking of Brian Bilston’s poem “America is a Gun”:
England is a cup of tea.
France, a wheel of ripened brie.
Greece, a short, squat olive tree.
America is a gun.
I gripped the wheel hard. I don’t know how to tell him why we rushed out or why, a week later I won’t bat an eyelash when I bring him with me to get groceries.
America is a gun. The sentence tumbled around my head as I turned into the Montessori parking lot. The need to offer my son an explanation pressed on me and I took my time unloading him from the car.
More than anything, I want us to live in a place that reflects the values he’s learning in school and at home: That there is more than enough for us all, if we share. That everyone deserves to be treated with love and kindness. That we all have a right to live — without fear. How can I tell my son those ideals have been compromised by our nation’s leaders? And fellow citizens?
I don’t want to shield him from the violence of the world, but the need to shield him from crippling worry feels more right.
After lacing up his shoes, this is what I did: I bent over and kissed my son’s cheek, twice. Then I repeated our weekday morning benediction, “I love you buddy! Have a good day!” before he entered his classroom. And, with a prayer for peace pounding in my tender heart, I opened the door and stepped out into the daylight.
The blare of my alarm snaps me out of a dream. Eyes half-shut, I roll over to silence it, then consider my options. If I get up now, I can write. Maybe. There’s always a chance I could wake my son, a light sleeper, and lose the gift of time. Or I can sink back under the covers and steal another hour of delicious rest. The rhythmic drone of my husband’s snore propels me out of bed. Today I rise.
Step one: Shower. I creep across our creaky floorboards, steal into the bathroom and twist on the squeaky faucet. “Shit,” I mutter, then mouth a prayer: please please please don’t let him wake up, God, just let me have this morning for myself. I’ll be extra good today, I promise. I step in the shower. Scalding water washes over me and baptizes me with possibility. Next: Soap. Rinse. Dry. Dress.
Step two: Coffee, mixed with a dash of cream. I tip-toe into the kitchen, retrieve my mug, the one with a pug on it, then pour the time-brewed coffee into my cup. The aroma of blonde roast fills my lungs and rouses my sleepy mind. I take a sip and savor the just-right temperature. Pure delight.
Step three: Write. I sit at a spare desk in our family’s dining room, coffee on my left and a ticking clock to the right. The time reads 6:20 a.m. I glance at my son’s door. If I’m lucky, I can eke out 40 minutes of writing before he wakes up. I flip open my laptop and begin.
When I became a mother, I needed writing because it allowed to grapple with the giant identity shift happening inside of me. My too-big emotions and broken, achy body overwhelmed me. Psychiatrists call this matrescence, a period in a woman’s life when her body and mind transition to a new role — caretaker. In those early days, I hard and fast, scrawling out ideas before my son summoned me for another feeding.
Bleary-eyed and tired, I wrote sporadically. Yet I kept returning to my journal because it both grounded me and brought me back to life. Etching out my story helped me stitch together the woman I was before giving birth with the woman I was becoming. Sharing it online with others — on my blog and eventually in other publications helped me feel less alone.
Two and a half years later, I sit at my desk, clicking letters and letting my thoughts play out on the screen.
What’s different is that the season of motherhood allows me the semblance of a writing routine. A few days a week, whenever everyone is healthy, I rise early to brainstorm, blog or tackle freelance assignments.
The fact remains: I still need writing like I need water. If I go too long without it, I feel parched.
On the page I belong to no one but myself. There’s no crying to comfort, no milk to fetch, no bottoms to wipe. No texts to return, emails to answer, calls to make. Here I am nothing and I am everything. Line by line, I uncover my identities — wife, mother, sister, daughter, employee, neighbor, friend, believer.
This month I published an essay that brought me to head to head with the crushing weight of my motherly worry. In the midst of a story swimming in fear, my editor noticed a different narrative. She pushed me to resurrect the carefree girl inside of me, the girl I was before I became mother. So I wrote a new scene, and in doing so I discovered this:
“There’s a girl inside of me who loves roller coasters and waterparks and white water rafting, who dreams of visiting Sweden and the Grand Canyon, who’s always up for a little mischief. She runs simply to feel the power of her legs and the wind in her hair. She isn’t plagued by the past or preoccupied with the future. She sees every day as a grand adventure.
She’s brave and afraid. She’s rooted and restless. She boldly pursues what sets her heart on fire. And she’s still here now, aching for a chance to shine. All this time I spent consumed with caring for my son made me forget.”
I stop typing for a moment and sip my coffee. Writing that scene brought me to tears. It reminded me that my identity isn’t just wrapped up in protecting my son. I realized something so important: I need to teach him to live too.
These days, with my son, I’m all in and hands-off. We do more exploring together — last weekend he biked a new path at the forest preserve as my husband and I walked alongside him — and I encourage him to explore on his own. (He’s older and stronger than when I first drafted that essay, so I’ve taken a considerable step back at the playground.) What I’m most grateful for is that writing gifted me with a breakthrough off the page. My prayer for whatever I publish is that my story might someone else with a breakthrough or moment of recognition too.
Fingers to keyboard, pen to paper, I record, reflect, discover. Motherhood unearthed in me a desire to share my stories, but writing, in turn, helps me be a more thoughtful mother.
I hear my son rustling so I only have a moment left at my desk. I save my work and shut my laptop. Tomorrow I will rise again and write — like a mother.
“Wait, you still have to stay in his room at bedtime?” she asked, a hint of pity in her voice. We sharing stories and dinner in my home and my least favorite parenting topic had arisen.
“Yeah,” I said sheepishly. “With all his ear infections and our failed attempts at sleep training, he just never got the hang of falling asleep on his own.” I looked down and cut at my lasagna. “Honestly, it’s easier this way.”
“Oh honey, that’s so hard,” she said. It was definitely pity. “It sounds like you need some time for you.”
There was so much more to the story – how much better his sleep was compared to year one, how most nights I dreaded our exhaustive routine but occasionally I savored it — but I couldn’t bring myself to tell it. I took a bite and nodded, searching for how to change the subject.
“So, tell me about your new project…?” And with that, I steered our conversation forward.
//
There’s something I need to tell you: I’m a bit of an overachiever. I took honors classes from grade school through college. I racked up extracurriculars — choir, cross country, steel drum band, student council — like girl scout badges. For the majority of my short life, I measured my life in grade point averages and activities mastered. The higher, the better.
Naturally, when I achieved my goal of getting pregnant, I began to research every aspect of motherhood. I dove into Expecting Better and my app from The Bump, then lost myself in the mesmerizing world of Mom Influencers. Square after Insta-square they lined up proof of motherly excellence: heart-melting images of swaddled newborns, perfectly styled nurseries and stunning family photo sessions caught at the golden hour.
I wanted that shiny life. Honestly, I still want it, even though I now know those images don’t tell the whole story. Not the back-breaking pain of labor and sleep deprivation or the piercing fear of your child dying. Nor can they fully convey the heart-bursting joy of seeing your child’s first radiant smile or lulling him to sleep with your favorite lullaby, the one dad used to sing at bedtime until you outgrew it.
In 2019, it’s easy to engage in performative parenting — documenting our children’s wins online in exchange for “likes” and a little boost of satisfaction. Raising kids can be so thankless sometimes, and it feels good to be validated. But motherhood is not a race to be won or a course to be aced or a song to be mastered. Motherhood, I’m finding, is terribly difficult to measure. Deep down I know this, but I go ahead and try anyway.
//
“Please eat your peas,” I said, pointing to my son’s plate.
“I don’t want to!” he responded, edging his plate toward mine.
“Please honey,” I pleaded, nudging it back. I could have written this scene a plethora of ways, all varieties of vegetables and moods and tactics, all leading to the same, stubborn answer:
“No!” he shouted, crossing his arms. We sat at the table in silence, glaring at one another. In his eyes I saw his characteristic spark of defiance. Oh please not another tantrum…
“Fine,” I said icily, yanking the plate away. “Let’s get you cleaned up to play.”
I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve tried to push healthy food, how many times I’ve thrown up my hands and accepted my son will eat a medley of snacks for dinner.
At the next meal, I’d try again, hoping this time the broccoli or fish or whatever I was pushing would stick. Some days it worked; most days it didn’t. I didn’t think I was doing such a bad job because I’d heard from moms in my circle that I’m not alone in this struggle. Then I got this text from my husband.
Him: Jack’s underweight
Me: Wait…what
Me: By how much?
Me: What did the doctor say
Him: I don’t know but he is in like the 16th percentile or something
Me: Oh God
Him: She kept drilling me about what he eats and drinks
The revelation brought me to my knees — I wasn’t feeding our son the right food. I wasn’t feeding him enough. I wasn’t . . . enough.
This wasn’t the first time I’d felt like I was falling behind as a mama.
Once my son’s teacher reported that he’d been tripping and falling down too much at his Montessori school and maybe he should get involved in some sort of physical activity? That made me feel physically ill. Or there was the time our expensive sleep consultant told me I’d nursed my son for too long, implying that I’d “ruined” his ability to soothe himself to sleep. Gut punch. And, yes, there was that dinner table conversation about bedtime that left me swimming in a sea of self-doubt.
//
Her voice is sharp and judgy; she’s constantly criticizing me:
You shouldn’t have yelled at him that way.
You should have faxed in that medical form last week.
You shouldn’t be on your phone right now — play with him.
You should have been there for his big milestone, instead of at work.
More than any other marker, not the shiny moms on the internet or the ones I know IRL, my inner critic likes to remind me of all the ways I’m not measuring up as a mama. Ever the overachiever, she grades me against her great expectations.
My mom stayed home with my brother and me when we were little. I don’t remember the years well, but I do know she was an excellent mother — kind, patient, generous, slow to anger. Still is. I wish I could give my son what I had growing up, not what I’m actually giving him. Fits and spurts of weekday parenting plus long weekends doesn’t feel like enough to me. Often I feel I cannot keep up with motherhood and my career — the pace, the demands of each is too intense to do either very well.
So how do I address this nagging feeling I’m not measuring up? One option might be to ignore or reject it. Good in theory, but harder to execute. Another option might be to make peace with my inner critic, and maybe even give her a little compassion. It’s only human nature to compare yourselves to others, so why not just accept it? Plus swapping stories with fellow mamas has lent me some fantastic tools and tricks for navigating the grueling early years.
An additional way might be to consider what I’m measuring when it comes to motherhood. Yes, the importance of nutrition and sleep and education cannot be downplayed. (If you’re wondering: My husband and I did make a plan for our son to get his weight back on track. And bedtime’s been getting better.) But what if there was something else I could use as a benchmark?
In my work as a freelance parenting writer, I’ve found one theory of child development that keeps turning up, no matter if my story is about teaching your child to tidy up or to inherit your values. That common thread is: What we model, our children inherit. Children soak up the words we speak and the actions we take and reflect them back to us like a mirror.
Could it really be quite that hard and that simple? On the one hand, this is great news. I hope my son mirrors my commitment to relationships and health and creativity. On the other, I don’t know if I can live up to that sort of pressure. My flaws — my pride, my people-pleasing, my workaholism, my perfectionism, to name a few — are not what I want to pass on to him.
Thankfully, to borrow from a Lutheran pastor I heard preach last summer, “There’s grace for that.”
There’s grace for the mom who yells. For the striving mom who always feels like she’s failing. For the mom who’s angry and overwhelmed and in need of a little validation. For the mom who invests so much in her children she forgets herself. For the mom who misses her freedom and wishes she could be more present. (I’ve been all these moms and more.) The good news?
Graces lift us up when we inevitably stumble.
//
Last week my son and I were in his playroom, sitting thigh to thigh in his mini Pottery Barn chair, chewing on a couple of chocolate chip cookies. Summer sunlight was streaming through the windows, and, as we chomped away, I relished the cookie’s sweetness. Out of the blue he remarked, “Mommy, sometimes I get mad.”
The simple expression stopped me mid-chew. Minutes ago he’d thrown not one but two tantrums when I explained that we could not have a popsicle and a cookie right now, we had to choose just one for dessert. This unexpected utterance made me think maybe all those episodes of Daniel Tiger and conversations about forgiveness were starting to sink in.
“I know buddy,” I answered, rubbing his back with one arm. “That’s normal.”
“Sorry Mommy,” he said, rising to wrap his arms around me, crumbs tumbling off his lips and fingers. “I love you Mommy!”
My eyes smarted with tears. I sure know I stumble often as a mama, but if my son can hold onto this sweetness, I will consider my work excellent.
“Oh honey, I understand,” I said, kissing his cheek and pulling him in tighter. “I love you too.”
If I’m going to measure anything, God, let it be love.
I wrote this post as part of a blog hop with Exhale — an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood led by the women of Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to read the next post in this series “Measuring Up.” Image credit: Phoenix Feathers Calligraphy
She clicks her laptop shut and announces, “Well, that’s enough for today.” She considers her son’s laundry basket, the dirty dishes, scattered hot wheels in the playroom. Working is her default mode; she finds it hard to relax. But the sun is shining through the blinds, and there’s a kiddie pool filled to the brim waiting in the backyard. Finally a dry, hot day after weeks of rain. She will not waste this afternoon checking off to-dos.
“Honey, we have a surprise for you,” she says, rousing her son from his nap. “We got you a little pool.”
“Mama! We’re going swimming?” he says, eyes widening.
“Yes, we are — in our backyard.”
He squeals with delight.
They slap on swimsuits, tank tops, sunscreen. He races into the yard, and spies the pool. She watches him dip his toes, one at a time. Then: splash! He plops in the pool and stomps his feet in the water. She sighs and leans back in her lawn chair. Thwack! He throws a soccer ball into the water, mischief in his eyes — a flash of the future. She wants to freeze time, or at least make it slow down.
Now the sprinkler’s running, and he’s chasing after their neighbor. They zip and zag through matted grass. They spin and twirl under an arch of droplets, little bodies shaking with laughter. It seems deliciously sinful to be sitting here under the sun, with no agenda whatsoever. When was the last time she felt this way? A giggle rises in her belly. She cannot remember.
Last night she dreamed she was floating in the ocean, arms spread wide, rocking among the waves. What a gift to be freed from deadlines and bedtimes and appointments to make, from time marching on. What a gift to float — untethered.
”It’s after 5,” her husband remarks, breaking her thoughts. “Guess we better start grilling, huh?” She nods reluctantly, then calls out to their son, “Buddy, five more minutes!”
Later, she crouches in a tiny toddler chair across from her son, who’s lapping at a popsicle — a bribe to come inside for dinner. Ice cream drips down his chin and he closes his eyes, smiling. She pops her popsicle in her mouth. (She needed a bribe too.) A burst of strawberry, tangy and cold, sweetens her tongue. Together they linger, savoring the taste of summer.
This is your Monday reminder that you are not defined by your number of followers.
You are not defined by a number on a scale.
You are not defined by a number in your bank account.
You are not defined by the number of checks on your to-do list.
The sum of these numbers is how the world measures worth — numbers don’t define you.
You are not your career, your side hustle, your workout or your zip code.
You are not your accolades, your relationship status, your diet, your voting record.
You are not your skin, your hair, the clothes you wear, your tidy home, your Insta-squares.
You are a soul, longing for connection.
You are a beloved, gifted creation.
You are light, laughter, mercy, sweetness.
You are the author of a story that’s still unfolding.
They say keep chasing, striving, leveling up — when you achieve it, you will be happy.
They say you are not enough.
I say they’re wrong.
You cannot earn love; you already have it.
You cannot avoid pain by being perfect.
You are flawed, afraid and a little tender.
You are fearfully and wonderfully made.
Just as you are.
Self-love isn’t mediocrity — it’s a catalyst. Self-love isn’t selfish — it’s a revolution. Only when we free ourselves from the lies culture feeds us about who deserves love can we practice radical empathy for ourselves and others.
Are you brave enough to embrace it all — your shortcomings and strengths — and call it worthy?
I don’t think anyone can fully prepare you for how pivotal it is to become a mother. It’s not that they don’t try. In fact, when you’re expecting, you may find everyone from your great aunt to your coworkers to well-meaning strangers dole out parenting advice. Whether they’re parents or not, many know the searing ache, the bliss of parenthood from their own lives and feel the significance of this new chapter of life of which you’re on the brink.
The journey to parenthood is in and of itself a new chapter, one that for many women and men is full of hopes and heartache. I remember this pain well. Several summers ago, while vacationing with dear friends from college and their families, I stood sobbing in a bathroom stall, wracked with envy. The only childless couple on the trip, my husband and I watched as their beautiful children shared hugs, spread joy and spilled Cheerios.
At the time, we were months into trying for our first child, and it wasn’t going great. For one, after months off birth control, my hormones were all out of wack. Getting pregnant was supposed to be easy, I thought. But now, at 30, it had become clear conceiving a child was much more calculated than others let on. I worried that my body was failing me. I worried we’d waited too long. I worried that my deepest fear — that we wouldn’t be able to have a child — might be true. Over that long weekend, while I observed my friends love on their littles, the thought that dominated my consciousness was, “I want that. Badly.”
Little did I know, I had that. I was actually pregnant with my son, and the hormones were making me tired beyond belief and weepy. The next chapter of my life was already underway.
Flash forward to today. Today is Mother’s Day, and I am actually spending part of it alone in a Starbucks writing. Time alone is a true gift for mothers of small children like myself. It’s what I asked my husband for this holiday, and he graciously granted my request.
Now I am two years and counting into motherhood and feel like an old veteran. I know this sense of security is sketchy at best. Like the time after my son began sleeping through the night consistently, but then began to act — as toddlers often do — in new, headstrong ways. Because I’ve been there before, I know I’ll forever be encountering new challenges and delights. Or, as my coworker and friend Karen says, “Bigger kids, bigger problems.” The constant change of motherhood is exhilarating and unnerving.
But going from expecting to birthing a baby, that change, that new chapter of life is monumental. And not just because your baby is changing. You are too. Those early, grueling months of learning to change diapers and feed a baby on demand are a time of becoming.
In her piece, “The Birth of A Mother,” reproductive psychiatrist Alexandra Sacks says it’s “an identity shift, and one of the most significant psychical and psychological changes a woman will ever experience.” I read this piece weeks into new motherhood, and it brought me so much peace and clarity, I teared up. This year I even had the privilege to interview Sacks for an article I wrote for The Everymom. When we spoke, Sacks said it’s time for us to shed light on this major life transition so that new moms know they’re not alone in their mixed feelings.
I only need look back on my posts from the early days of my son’s life — when caring for a newborn was all consuming, when sleep was a battle, when I felt a love so strong it scared me (still does) — to know the weight of learning to mother.
One of my favorite writers, Shauna Niequist, begins her book, Present Over Perfect naming a period in her adulthood in which she experienced dramatic change as a “sea-change, the journey from one way of living to another.”
And that’s exactly what happens when you become a mother. With a newborn in your arms you toss all your old habits and ways of living out the window and learn to live with and care for another person. Your person. You are no longer alone. You trade freedom for a new way of living. You are a mom! Niequist goes on to say this about her major life transition:
“This is a love story, like all my favorite stories. It’s a story about letting yourself be loved, in all your imperfect, scarred, non-spectacular glory. And it’s about the single most profound life change I’ve yet encountered.”
–Shauna Niequist
I could say the same about my motherhood journey. And I’ll add this: loving my son was the most profound life change I’ve yet encountered. Being his mom is one of my life’s greatest love stories, and it’s still unfolding.
About a month before I gave birth to my son, I started this blog. Since 2008, after I graduated from college and became enamored with blogs, I wanted to have my own. I made a few feeble attempts at blogging over the years but in December 2016 I finally committed. In committing to this blog, I not only committed to writing, I committed to myself, to my story. I was beginning to believe that my words might matter to others.
Then, in January 2017, Jack was born and writing our story has been a tool for me to process, heal, share and reflect on all the highs and lows I’ve encountered throughout motherhood. What a gift to be a mother-writer, what an incredible gift. I look back and see my journey of becoming is written in my heart and on the page — of this blog, my journal, other publications.
In writing through motherhood and sharing it with others, I’ve connected with many other parents — a great blessing. Parents of older children often respond to my stories with comments such as, “Savor it!” and “This time goes so fast.” God, if they only knew just how much I agreed with them.
I’m doing everything in my power to savor this time, even when it’s boring (ever watched three episodes of Umizoomi in a row or cluster-fed a hangry newborn?) or hard to be present (when you have a million deadlines to worry about at work and dirty dishes piled up in the sink). That’s exactly why I’m writing through motherhood — so I can remember it. And give thanks for it. Also: I want others to remember too. Ultimately, when I give birth to a story and offer it up to others, I want it to be a gift that they might use to claim their stories as well.
My friend and writing mentor, author Callie Feyen wrote this about her daughter, “I am a writer because of her not in spite of her.” This resonated deeply with me. When I finally took ownership of my identity as a writer — when I realized I wasn’t just a journalist, I had my own stories to tell — was, consequently, when I became a mother. For that, I am deeply grateful.
“Jack got in a fight at school today,” she reports, pushing an accident slip toward me.
I take the slip and crouch down to examine a fingernail-shaped scratch on my son’s head. “Poor buddy,” I say, pulling him into a hug. I look up and ask, “What happened?” “He and another boy wanted the same toy,” his teacher answers. I pepper her with more questions — does this happen often, is Jack getting along with the others, is the other boy hurt — while Jack wriggles in my arms, eager to escape.
Later, as I slip Jack’s red Velcro shoes on his little feet, our eyes meet. “Honey, I’m sorry about your fight. Are you OK?” “Uh-huh,” he nods his head and looks away. I am not convinced. “Fights are gonna happen,” I go on. “We need to play nice with our friends. We say ‘I’m sorry’ when we mess up. And we forgive others when they hurt us.” The words hang in the air and I realize this is only the beginning. In three years, Jack will start kindergarten. Then he’ll face schoolyard squabbles and bullies and even lockdown drills. This thought hits me squarely in the gut.
One of the most painful truths of motherhood is that the more my son grows, the less I can protect him from getting hurt. I blink back tears. I take my son’s hand in mine and we walk out to the car in silence.
Later, at bedtime, Jack rests his head in the crook of my arms as I rock him back and forth. At two years old, his lanky legs spill over the side of the rocking chair. Together, we sing the ABCs, the rainbow color song and happy birthday (his current favorite). Someday he’ll outgrow this ritual, I think.
Despite Jack’s protests, I lift him out of my arms and gently place him in his crib. I kiss his head and whisper, “I love you buddy.” Jack stops whining for a moment. “I love you too, Mommy,” he sighs.
The world is harsh, but it is also beautiful. Although I cannot keep my son from experiencing pain, I can carry him with my love. And though I’ll never escape my unspeakable worries, I can hold onto this moment and let it carry me through the night.
In the two plus years since we’ve lived in our new home, I’ve had a lot of design flops. There was the time we tried an online design service that suggested we order a rustic café table for our bay window. Once unboxed and assembled, the table was noticeably too tall for the space—a big disappointment. (It has since been relegated to the basement.) Or the time I hired a talented interior designer for a three-hour consult session to help us pick out furniture. She came and left in one swooping whirlwind of measuring tape and Pinterest boards. Afterwards, I sat alone at our dining room table, staring at her hastily assembled email of suggestions, overwhelmed at the tasks ahead and by the sense I wasn’t really heard.
Our living room’s been a thorn in my side since we moved in, mainly because in my eyes, it’s still “unfinished.” Anyone who knows me well knows I hate a job undone, a task uncrossed off the to-do list, and perhaps that’s what bothers me most of all – not the stuff in the room itself, just the fact we haven’t gotten the mix of items in it right. For a while, I even let this hold me back from inviting over guests.
Despite the fact that I know I should feel differently, I cannot seem to shrug these insecurities about our home. Though I love guests, I’m often afraid to host them.
I would venture to guess I am not alone in this feeling. There is something about opening up our homes that makes us vulnerable. When we host a visitor, we expose our dusty corners, unfinished window treatments, the bin of wrinkled laundry waiting to be folded. We show off the beautiful parts too. Our guests take in our taste in furniture, books, art. They taste our food, see our family photos. Oh, and our peeling baseboards. Our homes have a way of outing us. And what I mean is simply our homes show we are flawed. Our homes show we’re human. This is really hard and good for a recovering perfectionist like me.
But I realized by inviting neighbors into my home — for a planned gathering or, better yet, an impromptu cup of coffee — I practice bravery. Anyway, is a home really a summation of fancy, good-looking stuff that gets posted to Instagram or is it about the people inside of it?
When I think back on all the times I’ve been invited into others’ homes, I rarely recall if they had a fabulous rug or an unfinished kitchen. I think most about the way being in their home made me feel and how I was so grateful to be invited in.
My friend Megan has this thing with inviting people over — for dinner, snacks, Bible study. All in all, she is an excellent hostess. That’s actually how we met. We were strangers and she invited us into her home for a church barbecue. What I love most about Megan’s hospitality is that it feels effortless. When she hosted us at her old apartment in Chicago, her home looked as though real humans lived in it, not like an HGTV space. The food wasn’t always ready, which was good, because I could help cook or while she cooked, we could sit and talk. Whenever I was at her place, I felt so comfortable and loved.
Like Megan, I love making others feel comfortable, but I’ve struggled with this worry that my home wasn’t good enough for them, for one reason or another. But what I found recently when I invited friends over for a book chat is that none of them were worried about my chipped baseboard or retro light fixture. They were interested in my art and the food and sharing stories. As we sipped Pinot Grigio on that rainy, spring afternoon, I realized how silly it was to fixate on all the unfinished stuff when there was so much to be grateful for. For one, I did have a perfectly imperfect, beautiful home. Furthermore, here was this new group of women who were smart, kind and funny. Making friends in your thirties is hard and I’m glad to have met other women in my neighborhood who are eager for connection.
One of my favorite authors, Shauna Niequist, has an incredible book of stories and recipes, Bread and Wine. She recounts well-loved family recipes — her mom’s blueberry crisp, which I make often — and tales of sisterhood built through a monthly cooking club. I devoured the book when I was in my twenties and thought, Gosh, one day when I grow up and move out of the city, I want to have a cooking club like her. I want to have a community like her. Now I’m in my thirties, I live on the city’s edge and I want this more than ever. Who among us doesn’t ache for sacred community?
In Bread and Wine, Shauna talks about the need for tables, gathering people around them, for ditching our worries about appearance and focusing in on what matters — the brave act of opening up to others. She writes that hospitality “is about what happens when we come together, slow down, open our homes, look into one another’s faces, listen to one another’s stories.”
And sure enough, what happened at my recent book chat is what always happens when you put a table between women and when you’re brave enough to slow down, ask hard questions and really listen. We cracked open a book briefly. We sipped wine. We broke bread. And we talked about work and motherhood and infertility and hope and purpose and it was indeed sacred.
Gosh, I couldn’t have been more wrong worrying about the window treatments in my home. All that really mattered was that my neighbors felt at home enough to share their hearts.
I’m halfway through Ross Gay’s essay collection, The Book of Delights, which has enlightened my gratitude practice. My practice, which I call “evening pages,” is a spin on creative guru Julia Cameron’s morning pages—three long-hand pages on any topic you want, done first thing in the morning. Instead of every morning, I do this at night to unwind.
Often as I write I find myself listing my delights: singing “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah” to my giggly toddler, the first zesty spoonful of homemade marinara sauce, finishing a juicy book, starting a new one (or three), my dog curled up in my lap, 40 degree weather, budding pink tulips (#thegoodlist, ala Erin Loechner).
Gay, a poet, is teaching me there’s room to revel in small wonders while holding pain.
This isn’t a popular hashtag, but there’s a bad list too. You have one? Here, I’ll go first: when churning thoughts lead to sleepless nights, when doubt comes knocking, jealously too, when I’m tired.tired.tired of all the guns and hate and suffering in this world, when my heart’s so starved for good news no amount of praying or Scripture satisfies the craving.
In essay 14, Gay celebrates the tactile pleasure of a cakey, vegan donut while pondering the heavy reality of life and death, joy and sorrow. “It astonishes me sometimes—no, often—how every person I get to know—everyone, regardless of everything, by which I mean everything lives with profound personal sorrow,” he writes. “Is sorrow the true wild? And if it is—and if we join them—your wild to mine—what’s that?”
This idea, that we can carry each other through despair, softens my hunger pangs.
During Lent, the Christian church joins together in repentance while we march, with shaking hands, toward the cross. We mark our heads with ash, a symbol life is always on the cusp of slipping from our fingers. The older I get, the more I notice myself waffling between doubting Thomas and a religious zealot, desperate for the Easter story to be true.
Just when I think I’ve lost my way, hope springs forth in a neighbor’s kindness, in green shoots pushing up from the hardened earth, in the promise God’s making everything new.
5 a.m. ~ The sound of chimes, my iPhone alarm, breaks my dream. My eyes dart open. The bedroom is bathed in darkness. My dog is snuggled up against my husband, who’s snoring blissfully on the other side of the bed. I wrestle myself out of bed; the cool air shocks my body awake. I’d much rather retreat to warmth of my covers, the delight of my dream. Instead I rise. Time to start my day. First, a shower.
5:30 a.m. ~ A few mornings a week, I set aside time to tackle freelance projects and write for myself. My wet hair is drying and I’m dressed for the day, so I flip open my laptop and get to work. I prepare an invoice for a story I wrote for The Everymom and answer a couple emails. I scroll my Instagram feed a bit. OK, enough. I set down my phone and switch back to the laptop.
Finally I start to write. I’m workshopping an essay about my tendency to hover parent and my son’s tendency to stick close to me. I type: He is always in my orbit — I’m the earth, he is my sun. I pause and think. Maybe it’s the other way around? I go on: I’m barely done with my meal and my son is already tugging my hand toward his playroom. He wants to sit in my lap and play with his blue playdoh, make snakes and snowmen and pretzels with it. He wants me to be in his orbit, and honestly, I do too. So why do I feel so ashamed of this?
I keep writing, thinking, writing, grasping for the story.
7:08 a.m. ~ “Mom-my, Mom-my, Mom-my, Mom-my!” My son’s squeals derail my train of thought. I haven’t finished the essay but I’ve made decent progress. I stand, satisfied, and head to his room to start our day. (I don’t always feel satisfied. Some days I feel annoyed, reluctant to leave my work. Sometimes I skip my morning writing altogether in favor of sleep.)
I open the door to Jack’s room. He stands at the end of his crib, ready for breakfast. “Good morning, my love,” I say, striding toward the window. I open the blackout curtains and light spills into the small space. “Mommy, I hungry!” Jack shouts. Before we head to the kitchen I heft Jack up on the changing table, which faces the window, and give him a fresh diaper. He whines and rubs his eyes as they adjusts to the morning light. I change his diaper easily, thinking soon I’ll be doing this less and less, once we start potty training. Now we’re ready for breakfast. My husband is stirring across the hall, but I see Gus, our dog, nestle deeper under the covers, unready to face the day.
Breakfast of champions.
7:45 a.m. ~ After munching on Eggo waffles and fruit and washing it down with milk (his) and coffee with cream (mine), then getting Jack dressed, it’s time to pile on our winter gear and head to Jack’s Montessori school. This, along with getting dressed, is one of the most difficult parts of the day. It’s hard convincing our strong-willed toddler to get ready when he’s too busy exploring the world around him. Today he’s decided to scatter his sock collection around his playroom like confetti. Never a dull moment here.
8:10 a.m. ~ We are finally out the door and en route to Jack’s school, after kissing my husband farewell. Kissing goodbye and hello is a ritual in our family — we try to do it no matter what, even we’re fighting or having a not-so-good day. It’s those times especially when I think we need the physical affection, a little reminder to be softer with each other and ourselves. I turn on NPR and drive cautiously; the roads are icy today.
8:20 a.m. ~ This morning while dropping Jack at school, I meet his new teacher. Now that Jack’s two and talking lots, he’s transitioning from the toddler to the twos classroom. Jack stands waiting at the door to go in his classroom. “Hug and kiss?” I ask. He nods and I wrap my arms around his little frame and kiss his cheek. “I love you!” I shout after him as he bounds toward his peers.
8:57 a.m. ~ I’m logging into my computer now, prepping a file for my one-to-one meeting with my supervisor. I only have a few things on my list for her so it should be a relatively quick conversation. That’s good because my editing list is quite long — it’s deadline day for our magazine’s features and I have several stories to file and another meeting to attend.
Werk, werk, werk, werk, werk, werk, werk.
9:20 a.m. ~ I hunker down in my cube and pull up my first story to edit. I’m refining a second draft of a story about medical justice. The copy’s fairly clean, just need to tighten up a few more turns of phrase here and there. Editing requires one to cut and rearrange words to make a story more clear while maintaining a writer’s voice. It’s a fun job, one that consistently challenges me. I dig in, losing myself in words.
10:35 a.m. ~ It’s time for another meeting, this time with my coworker Allison. Allison runs our brand’s social media accounts and I’m lead for my publication’s social media, so we try to meet on a monthly basis to discuss relevant content for our shared audiences. As we walk through the building, I list off our best articles from our February issue so Allison’s team might share a few on their Facebook account, which has a sizable following.
11 a.m. ~ Back to my desk for another hour of work. I have another story to work on, plus emails to tend, which keep me busy until it’s time for lunch.
12:15 p.m. ~ My coworker Michelle and I use our lunch break to run a quick errand at Target. I have to make a return and pick up a few toppings for dinner tonight — turkey tacos. She has to pick up supplies for a presentation. We move quickly; lunch and work await us at our desks.
Wearing my smarty pants glasses today.
1:30 to 4:30 p.m. ~ I eat a salad at my desk and finish editing my last story for the day, then I write and work through more emails with writers. I’m finishing my last assignment for our May issue, and starting on preparations for June. I look out my fifth floor office window. There’s still snow on the ground. The sky is gray. Summer feels light years away.
4:45 p.m. ~ After saying goodbye to my coworkers, I head toward the elevator. It’s time to pick up Jack, and my heart feels light. I also have a 30-minute drive to look forward to where I can listen to a podcast. This evening I choose Modern Love. I’m catching up so I select last week’s episode, which is a replay of the essay, “You May Want to Marry My Husband,” written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal before she passed away from cancer. It’s a beautiful, funny, poignant story, and the reader does an exquisite job capturing the complex emotions in her story. Tears build up in the corner of my eyes when the essay reaches its climax. Eventually it ends; I switch to NPR as I navigate a tangle of traffic.
5:20 p.m. ~ I’m at Jack’s daycare. His teacher opens the door to his room and yells “Jaaaack!” He comes rushing toward me, smiling. “Mommy!” he says. “Hey buddy!” I wrap him in a bear hug and kiss his cheek. “How was your day?” I ask.
5:45 p.m. ~ I unlock the side door and usher Jack into our warm house. I smell turkey tacos, Jay must have started dinner early. I hear Gus whimpering and scratching, anxious to greet us. We remove our winter layers — first scarves and hats, then jackets, finally boots — and Jack is chattering away. “Daddy?” he asks and I see Jay open the door at the top of the stairs. Jack lumbers up the stairs toward his father. We are home.
6:30 p.m. ~ Dinner’s finished and Jack and I are in his playroom, building towers of red, green, purple and yellow plastic blocks. It’s time for Jay to go to the gym. He lifts Mon/Wed/Fri when he’s not traveling for work, and I practice yoga on Tue/Thur, when he’s in town. I feel dread sink in my stomach. Lately evenings with have been hard. Our son doesn’t want to go to sleep, and I struggle with all my might to convince him to do so. Bedtime antics are at an all-time high, “I want milk,” “I want a snack,” “More stories,” “More songs,” anything that will delay sleep, my son will try it. I don’t want to do bedtime alone.
I try to smile as I say goodbye to Jay. I try to focus on the fun I’m having with our son but inside I’m anxious. I pull out my phone and distract myself as I scroll through others’ highlight reels on Facebook. I stop on an article from The Atlantic about “sharenting,” I begin delving into the story, then bookmark it for later and switch attention to my son, who is currently scaling his little gray armchair like a little daredevil. (I finished this article later and instantly checked myself by setting my Instagram to private, but I’m still pondering how I can respect my son’s privacy while also sharing meaningful stories about our lives with friends, family and followers.)
Scenes from The Velveteen Rabbit.
7:40 p.m. ~ I’ve successfully executed the first leg of Jack’s bedtime routine, which includes: bubble bath; diaper; “jamas” (tonight Jack selects a dinosaur pair); teeth brushing, which Jack and I do together; and an extra glass of milk. Now it’s story time, my favorite part of the evening. We select three different books: The Book With No Pictures; The Velveteen Rabbit and Jack’s Winnie the Pooh storybook. Jack snuggles in my lap and we read together in his rocking chair, Gus curled up like a cat near my feet.
I love reading to my son, and sometimes he even joins in repeating words and phrases from his favorite books. I love children’s books; my favorites are the ones with actual stories not just rhymes — The Snowy Day, Corduroy, Where The Wild Things Are. In this moment, reading to my son, I feel happy and present and loved. After we finish I will sing to Jack and place him down gently in his crib. I know this will be hard. I’ll ask him to lie down, and he’ll resist. I’ll lie down next to him and sing some more, encouraging him to quiet his mind and go to sleep. I’ll try to quiet my mind, too.
So. Tired.
9:10 p.m. ~ Finally I retreat from Jack’s room to mine, exhausted. Some nights I go straight to bed after this, others I read for fun and do what I call “evening pages,” essentially journaling stream-of-consciousness to get out all my errant thoughts, write prayers, record special moments during my day, especially with Jack, and make mental notes of to-dos. Tonight I rustle under the covers next to Jay, who’s munching a bowl of Raisin Bran and drinking a protein shake, eager to tell me about his latest PR at the gym. Gus snuggles up between us in the bed. I try to listen but I slowly nod off to sleep. It was a long, full day. A good day.
This busy life of mine — raising a toddler, nurturing a marriage, juggling full-time work and freelance gigs, working out, connecting with family and friends and making room for me — reading, journaling, prayer, a hot shower — is such a blessing. I thought writing this diary-style blog might make me feel exhausted and burnt out and overwhelmed. Instead it made me immensely thankful for the life I’m privileged to lead. Writing my story summons within me a deep gratitude for everything God’s given me. That’s what I try to remind myself anyway, even when the day feels not-so-good, wasted, ruined, dull, unproductive. Each day is an opportunity to learn, grow, encounter grace. Each day is a gift.
What does a regular weekday look like for you? I’d love to hear from you.
She clicks her laptop shut and announces, “Well, that’s enough for today.” She considers her son’s laundry basket, the dirty dishes, scattered hot wheels in the playroom. Working is her default mode; she finds it hard to relax. But the sun is shining through the blinds, and there’s a kiddie pool filled to the brim waiting in the backyard. Finally a dry, hot day after weeks of rain. She will not waste this afternoon checking off to-dos.
Erin Strybis 