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| If this is me someday, please forgive me. |
This made me cry like a little girl before I was a mom. Now it's worse. Not sure why I thought of it this morning, but I have to share.
A young mother writes: “I know you’ve written before about the
empty-nest syndrome, that lonely period after the children are grown and
gone. Right now I’m up to my eyeballs in laundry and muddy boots. The
baby is teething; the boys are fighting. My husband just called and said
to eat without him, and I fell off my diet. Lay it on me again, will
you?”
OK. One of these days, you’ll shout, “Why don’t you kids grow up and
act your age!” And they will. Or, “You guys get outside and find
yourselves something to do . . . and don’t slam the door!” And they
won’t.
You’ll straighten up the boys’ bedroom neat and tidy: bumper stickers
discarded, bedspread tucked and smooth, toys displayed on the shelves.
Hangers in the closet. Animals caged. And you’ll say out loud, “Now I
want it to stay this way.” And it will.
You’ll prepare a perfect dinner with a salad that hasn’t been picked
to death and a cake with no finger traces in the icing, and you’ll say,
“Now, there’s a meal for company.” And you’ll eat it alone.
You’ll
say, “I want complete privacy on the phone. No dancing around. No
demolition crews. Silence! Do you hear?” And you’ll have it.
No more plastic tablecloths stained with spaghetti. No more
bedspreads to protect the sofa from damp bottoms. No more gates to
stumble over at the top of the basement steps. No more clothespins under
the sofa. No more playpens to arrange a room around.
No more anxious nights under a vaporizer tent. No more sand on the
sheets or Popeye movies in the bathroom. No more iron-on patches, rubber
bands for ponytails, tight boots or wet knotted shoestrings.
Imagine.
A lipstick with a point on it. No baby-sitter for New Year’s Eve.
Washing only once a week. Seeing a steak that isn’t ground. Having your
teeth cleaned without a baby on your lap.
No PTA meetings. No car pools. No blaring radios. No one washing her
hair at 11 o’clock at night. Having your own roll of Scotch tape.
Think about it. No more Christmas presents out of toothpicks and
library paste. No more sloppy oatmeal kisses. No more tooth fairy. No
giggles in the dark. No knees to heal, no responsibility.
Only a voice crying, “Why don’t you grow up?” and the silence echoing, “I did.”
