Saturday morning, Jose came into the bedroom and lay down for another brief morning nap. If you’re not a morning person, then you are probably unfamiliar with the morning person sleep in. A morning person will still have to wake up at 4:30 a.m. to pee. No matter what. And once up, then you’re up for an hour or two. It’s a really nice time of the day. It’s the time that I use to watch whatever late night shows that I’ve DVR’d – the shows I can’t normally watch because I’m asleep or some cartoon network, star wars, sci-fi or dinosaur video is taking over the television. About the time that everyone else is beginning to stir (around 8:00 or 9:00) I’m ready for a nap. Which actually works better because then Jose (who is not a morning person) will get up and want to clean (something that is as bizarre a Saturday morning ritual as … well I can’t think of anything as bizarre as wanting to clean first thing on a Saturday). So while he cleans, I go hide in the room. My mother would tell you that this is not a new pattern for me.
Anyway, back to the story. Jose came into the room and laid down while I was reading. He was drifting in and out of sleep – as evidenced by the occasional snore and the slow motion of his foot back and forth. Suddenly, he asked if I wanted to go to eat breakfast at Cracker Barrel with the gift certificate that we had gotten. I said sure, let’s wake up the kids. And he responded, that he thought we’d just go together. “Like a date?” I asked. And then we spent a bout 10 minutes discussing how we felt guilty if we went out somewhere by ourselves. And it’s true. I don’t really want to go anywhere or do anything too fun unless the boys are with us. It seems unfair to not let them enjoy in the moment. Now, I have seen on television and read about those parents who will often leave their children and go to the movies, or go out to dinner, or go away for a weekend. And I just can’t quite get my head around such an occurrence. It seems to me that actually having children is not unlike signing a contract that says you will forgo the right to pee alone, bath alone, have a long meaningful conversation on the telephone for the next 20 years or so. At least that’s what I signed up for when I decided to have children.
And Jose, ever the pragmatic said “Well, they are just going to leave us anyway.” Which really isn’t anything to ever say to a mother. Sure, we realize that eventually they will leave – but we don’t think about it. And of course that’s why when they do leave, mothers are in tears and walk about lost for days, weeks and months on end. It is perhaps the only argument for teen age pregnancy – as those mothers who were afraid to lose their children to the real world, now have someone else who needs them. And really, after a few years of having to pee with an audience, it’s almost impossible to do so alone. In fact, I believe that when all three of my boys finally leave the house when they are 30, that I might have to start peeing on the front porch just so I’ll have the company of the passersby.
I realize that with a 3 year old, I have quite some time before I will have to worry about an empty nest. And with the economy and college, I’m sure that my boys will be living her for quite some time. Shoot with the Hispanic heritage thing going on, I might even end up living like the Waltons with everyone’s family. And you know, that’s not a bad idea. I can think of things that are a lot less appealing than living on a family compound so to speak. It sort of goes against the Broadbent/ Cameron frame of existence – but my dad and his brother live across the street from each other – though I don’t know how often they see each other or talk.
All I really know is that knowing that they will someday leave to live with some substandard woman who presumes that she knows everything – you wait, she’ll be just like that – makes me really focus on making each day, argument, whine, and giggle something to be cherished. I have long believed, said, postulated that life is about making memories – and I hope that we are creating some good ones.
