Hindsight. You know what they say.
Recently I've been encountering something huge inside that has been welling up for years. I'm growing into a new me by reconnecting with the old me. The original Ms. Nelson is attempting to make a comeback... like, maybe, Ms. Nelson: The Revised Edition.
When I took this shot of Penny she had just celebrated her 1st birthday. It blows my mind to reflect on her physical skills - to know that Ruby and Eloise were taking their first wobbly steps at 12 months, and it would be several months after that when they would even dare to throw a leg over a rocking horse. I believe Eloise finally decided to tackle a playground ladder at 2.5 years - and Penny climbs to the top bunk at 13 months. We all talk about how little Pickle has a lot to look up to, big girls to learn from and model after, but what strikes me as odd is the degree to which I forget how I used to be about Ru and El's "developmental milestones". And to know now how meaningless many of those things can be! I love to look back on what I have learned during this mom gig and laugh. My concerns and paranoia and my "will it ever end?"s...
Hopefully I can be supportive and helpful when my sister gives birth to her first child this September, but I have decided to remind her that in parenting, the advice and wisdom from other sources only makes sense once you have endured the worst: those sleepless nights, the lonely days, the first fevers, the family-wide illnesses, the horrific car rides and the aborted vacations. How about the day I decided to throw away my parenting books? Relief.
And if my mom had told me to stop reading online parenting advice, I would have proclaimed how "it's just what my generation does." In the end, she was right though. For me, the best solution to my mommy-woes was finding friends and shooting the shit.
Perspective.
That's where I'm at these days. The air in the house starts getting colder at around 4:45 pm, and by 7 pm I've closed the windows up for the night. Right about the time when one season ends and another is about to begin I get full of self-reflection and I start completing tasks and getting creative again. I do the big check-in and try to make a step forward... or a step somewhere.
But in reality the end of August hints at fall way too early in these parts. If I could only bottle this kind of productivity and energy and take a shot of it when the Vermonters start to hibernate. Or when my Procrastination Demon comes for an extended visit and Penny has mastered ice skating at 18 months.
No comments:
Post a Comment