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| photo by gary barnes |
"THE STORY OF A SHIPWRECKED RAMBLER" a documentary about a girl crossing Iceland on her own from Klara Harden on Vimeo.
And I cried. When she says: "... will ask myself why the hell am I doing this? Well I hope that I will still realize that it is worth it. It is always worth it."
And isn't it true. The things we do are hard. I feel happier when I am doing something hard. Challenging myself. But sometimes I ask myself if it is really worth it? But it always is. And if it isn't, then maybe I need to take a step back and figure out what I should be doing that would be worth it.
(I wrote a little something about how I was feeling the last few weeks but I have not decided whether I should share. Maybe you have felt the way I was feeling so maybe it is worth it to put it out there.)
Before the child was born, I was absolutely terrified about being a mother. Flashbacks of babysitting as a teenager haunted my late pregnancy dreams. I tossed and turned, fearing the hell that my child would go through because I had no idea what I was doing. Kind friends would assure me that there was nothing to fear. They told me of my mother’s intuition that would kick in and I would just know what she would need.
But that particular gift or talent or whatever you want to call it seemed to elude me. Billy and I were so lost and confused we even had to ask the nurses at the hospital how to hold her and if we would ever feel less awkward doing so. She would cry and I had no ideas of how to soothe her. Secretly I cursed those who had told me to rely on my intuition; because all my intuition was telling me was that she had a fever (which she didn’t) and that she was lethargic (which she wasn’t). It seemed instead of mother’s intuition I had simply been endowed with eyes that were so tired they would not stay open and endless fears that kept me checking on her all through the night.
As time slowly (and yet so quickly) passed, I started to get to know our little one. I started to hear the subtle differences in her cries, informing me when she was tired or hungry. I knew what position she liked best to sleep in; which toys she liked best to nibble on; which animal noises made her laugh; which foods made her gag. I learned her sleep patterns, her ticklish spots, and how she cries when she is lonely.
I guess I had naively imagined mother’s intuition as a sort of dust that kind little fairies would sprinkle on my head the night before my child would be born. Instead it was the product of time and energy and tears. Many, many tears. It was earned during sleepless nights and showerless days. It came only after loving her and cuddling her and getting to know her.
And then one night she was sick for the first time. As she threw up all over herself and her bed, I suddenly felt like that brand new mother who was at a complete loss as to what to do for her child. I cleaned her up and took her temperature. “She is fine” the thermometer assured me in soothing tones. So we laid her in her bed with her clean, fresh sheets, said a prayer with her and kissed her good night. Not 60 seconds later she was throwing up again. What had been small worries in the back of my head became great fears.
What if something was really wrong. Did I feed her baby food that had gone bad? Had she licked something that had germs on it? The fears quickly escalated to more terrible things, stories I had heard of children with health problems that only showed themselves months after the child was born.
Panic was taking over. Who should we call? What should I do?
After I dressed her in yet another pair of pajamas, I held her in my arms while Billy cleaned up her bed once again. I rocked her and touched her soft little nose and her rosy little cheeks. I said a little prayer in my head, begging for a calm to help me separate what was real and what was simply my fears running wild. I caressed her arms and held her tiny little fingers between mine. I was reminded that, though we are still learning, that we know our little miss Millie. We are her parents. And we can know when something is really wrong. I breathed in deep, smelling her baby smells. She was drifting into sleep again and I could feel that everything was alright.
I sat there and for the first time in my life, I believed in mother’s intuition. I believed in my ability to take care of my baby. It was not something that had come as naturally as I had hoped or been told. It had come with work and time and effort. But it was there and I could and would trust in it.
To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting. . . It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.
~e.e. cummings, 1955
When I was a child, I had an incredible imagination—so my parents say. In a single afternoon, I was a princess trapped by lava monsters, Rogue of the X-Men, a chef making stone soup and mud patties, a mermaid hiding from the humans, and a singer whose voice changed the world. I was anyone, really anyone, because I didn’t know limits or boxes as a child. There was no concept of genres in a seven year-old’s mind. There just was. I just was.
And then I was a teenager. And though I had mystifying periods, I still basically knew who I was… or who I wanted to be. I knew I was kind, that I didn’t like cliques and exclusions. I knew that I loved music, and that the music I loved wasn’t the top 40 pop chart (you know, that’s never changed. Hm). I knew I was an anti-fashionista—my clothes were thrift-store by choice, mismatched by choice, and wrong era by choice. And I knew that I wanted to write great things. I wanted to be a great person.
And then I got lost. I thought it happened later in life than commonly occurs. Most people have their identity crisis in high school/college, don’t they? And then they figure it all out, and they know—for the rest of their lives—just who they are. And I suddenly discovered, after college degrees, nearly five years of marriage, and two kids, that I couldn’t find my self.
The curious part was that I wasn’t sure how it had happened. I couldn’t pin down a culprit for my lost identity. My marriage was absolutely lovely; always has been—and as far as I can do anything about it—always will be. My kids were beautiful, albeit nuts, like all normal kids. I was proud of my education, and I never have regretted being an English major/an aspiring writer.
So where did I lose myself? If everything around me was just as it had always been, where had I gone?
I pondered for months over the lost me, and I made a discovery: I had become uncomfortable with the art of Just Being. How could I just be a college grad, but not be working in my field? How could I just be a wife, and not a trophy wife? How could I just be a mother, and be forever working behind the scenes? How was I not a New York Times bestselling novelist, with a body like Jillian Michaels, involved in daycares and charities, with a home featured on the cover of Better Homes and Gardens? How could I just be?
So I sat down with myself and went through the missing pieces of me, one by one. I realized two things: I was lost somewhere amid comparisons and limits. I was worried that I wasn’t a complete person because I saw others more complete around me. What is the complete person? Is there a template? I am learning to let go of the myth of completeness, because 1) the definition changes for each person, and 2) isn’t that why we’re allotted seventy, eighty years in this life? To learn to become the most complete version of ourselves, unique and separate from the complete others around us? So how could I possibly compare? There is no one to measure up to but my own future self… And so I’ll cross that comparison bridge in a few more decades, when the only person I must answer to is me.
And the limits? I had finally learned about genre, that concept so innocently unknown in my childhood. I couldn’t possibly be certain things simply because I wasn’t that kind of person. I didn’t fit in that box. Where are these boxes kept? And who labels them? And who enforces them? I am learning to let go of the myth of limitations, because only I know what I am capable of. My limitations are only set by the efforts I make. And that is a part of myself I can control/change—it is not beyond me. And really, what if I never publish a book? Then I am not a writer? I am who I choose to be and who I work to be, and that is not determined by the world’s standards, charts, or figures.
So was I lost? I still believe in kindness, in inclusion. I still dress to the beat of my own wardrobe’s drum. I still listen to underground music and shudder at most country songs. I am still intelligent and capable, even if I have no paychecks to prove it. I am a blissfully happy wife. I am a proud, growing mother. I am a writer. I am me.
And I can be anything else… someday, down the road, I will be many other things. Perhaps a professor of dystopian literature; a public speaker/ambassador for the cause of abolishing illiteracy; the front man (woman) of a Heart cover band; a world traveler; a grandmother; an ice cream shop owner. I am learning that I can be anything I want.
And that I can just be.
button by fifth and hazel,
photo by elizabeth blevins
