Y’know, an Easter egg hunt would probably make a lot more sense on Mother's Day than it does on Easter Sunday, right? Just a thought…
I try not to talk too much about my aches and pains with my mom. She’ll tell me again, how I’m getting old.
I’m all about making her tell me about HER aches and pains, but there’s a catch — I’m going to make her get up and move around and figure out if there’s something we can do about them.
I still don’t want her to tell me about getting old — it’s a given, it’s an excuse, it’s boring…
I heard this dude on a podcast, saying how once he’d had kids it made him look at all the adults around him differently. It made him think -- as annoying or messed up as this person might be, this was someone who was a baby once, whatever might have happened after that.
Said it made him less reactive, more patient with other people’s BS.
Maybe that’s a common insight? Dunno. I’m not a parent.
A couple of years into college, there was this course I took, and this book I barely remember. By some lady from Britain, about her messed-up childhood.
It was a more somber version of the memoirs that were popular at the time -- all of these people with traumatic-but-quirky upbringings. Entertaining enough for a string of bestsellers & speaking tours, for a couple dozen writers who were 5-10 years older than me.
Those books looked like easy money -- get an editor and don't worry about having to let your imagination do the heavy lifting. If my family had just been more of a disaster, maybe I could’ve been famous enough to never have to work again...?
Anyway, the discussion in class brought up this question: “what is a ‘good enough’ mother?” Enough. Not perfect, not some ideal that everyone’s going to fall short of.
The question made me pause. I imagined my parents at my age at the time. They already had two kids. There were going to be two more. I was suddenly able to see them eye-to-eye -- as young people trying to figure things out, not looming authority figures or caretakers that I might please or disappoint.
Life was going to get bumpy for them very soon.
I thought about how I was bumbling around, sarcastic and insecure, with a chip on my shoulder, trying to 'be cool,' no idea what I was doing. That was… sobering? It made me shed some of my childishness, at least.
What is “good enough?”
It’s doing the best you can with what you’ve got. And being able to recognize that effort in the people around you. And being grateful for them.
Happy Mother's Day!