From a Distance

Our 2nd annual Cama Beach camping trip was well under way, and I realized that over the past 5 weeks (4 of which have been spent in some fashion with my parents) that I have been somehow softening toward my parents as people, and possibly even experiencing some softening of memories of childhood. I blame this softening, in part, by the joy my parents had in meeting Mari and her husband and their kids when we all went there for the weekend to wine taste. And the joy my parents had in meeting my friend Amelia as she came up for the day to Cama Beach. They want to know my friends. They want to know my life. 

Memory is a strange thing. Because, if I squint hard enough, soften into a deep breath and let my muscles relax, I can remember the feeling of childhood. I might have been an anxious child in ways, but I was also blissfully carefree in other ways. It wasn’t until we moved in adolescents, and I began to feel awkward and misunderstood and took a cynical look at my parent’s parenting. And then there was the un-diagnosed depression and anxiety that clouded my mind. And in college, and young adulthood there was a VERY cynical look back, seeing my parents in all their faults, how I would do it differently, how very misunderstood I was and how much I felt I had to hide to receive their ‘un’conditional love. 

And there I was, sitting on a log watching my parents play with Potamus on the beach and I just felt soft toward them, toward my memories of them growing up. I haven’t gone to the extreme of saying that everything they did was right, or that nothing they did hurt me at all, but there was this settling in to the gray. That my parents annoy me sometimes AND they love my son (and me, yes, I’ll even go that far). It was really a sweet feeling to just sit and be and not feel all this leftover angst that I usually feel when I’m with them. 

Summer in Review

first day of school (work) for mama!

Summer is over, and I am back to work (shh, no I’m not blogging from my desk when I should be putting together packets for the beginning of school). I decided that I was going to handle this transition differently than others, that I wouldn’t begin thinking or talking about it ahead of time. I have noticed my tendency to process, re-process, and then OVER-PROCESS impending transitions, and that actually contributes to my increased anxiety. So this time I ignored the transition. Maybe it was denial, or maybe it was really awesome coping, I’m not quite sure. And while last night I had a touch of restless sleeping, I’m going to chalk it up to that rascally 20 month old lying next to me.

To allay the back-to-work-mama guilt that started to spin my wheels around 5pm (all those ‘but I should have done this’ or ‘is it going to be hard for Potamus to go to daycare 4 days from only 2 days?’ thoughts, I decided to focus on what I HAD accomplished this summer. And it turns out that I was a pretty freaking amazing mom in the past 3 months of summer:

• Road trip to Cannon Beach
• no less than 6 trips to the zoo
• no less than 5 trips to KidsQuest Museum
• Road trip to Cama Beach State Park
• Road trip to Eastern Washington
• Splash park shenanigans
• Weekly lunch dates (with tot-in-tow) with mom friends
• Puyallup Fair
• barbecues with the grandparents
• splashing in our backyard ‘pool’
• endless bubble blowing excursions
• lunch dates to Panera
• driving around listening to Macklemore to get Potamus to take a nap

I mean, the list could go on and on. Where I failed, in my grumpy attitude toward my husband, and resenting him working 3 jobs, I also excelled in rolling with the punches in a lot of cases I re-defined my identity as a summertime-stay-at-home-mom, and am now back to work, and I will miss out on certain aspects of life with Potamus, but I will also gain a lot, as well. I’m trying to focus on what I did, the moments we snuggled, and the experiences of him hugging me voluntarily for the first time, how I’ve really gotten to see him develop into a funny little person with a personality as big as the moon, and a sense of humor to rival any tv comedian. It was a good summer. Yes it was hard, but, like labor, I remember all the good parts, all the love I felt, in betwen all the sandwich making, diaper changing, tantrum avoiding messes. In wistful moments I think of how much of a sweet baby he was at the beginning of the summer, and how a ‘short’ three months has turned him in to quite the ‘little man’ toddler. Sigh. Those hugs he gives me, though…I mean, that’s gold.

How have you helped yourself navigate tricky transitions? Tips for staying sane?