P.S. This is my life

I just thought of something. It's really more than just a postscript. I think it is more of a soapbox. I was sitting in church Sunday listening to a tearful rendition of appreciation from a daughter for her mother's life choices...one of which she was sure, and maybe it was so, was the choice to put her life on hold while she raised a wonderful family. When her last child left home, she enrolled in college and became a teacher. She got her life back. Ok. Lovely sentiments. I respect that.

Only, what if what we so often call putting our life on hold is really not that at all? What if the choice you make to have a family is your life. Oh, I know it is obvious that it is. But I mean, what if all that sacrificing and time devotion was really what you most wanted in life. Wouldn't life look different to you then? You know I am addressing the ubiquitous you. Only it is really all about me.

For me, it was a different era, maybe. I graduated in the late 60s, but being Mormon kept me pretty much out of the revolutionary part of that era. And I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to be the best Mom. I wanted to stay home and never work at a job a day of my children's lives. I wanted my career to be raising them. I wanted to be their best friend. I had no other future goals on hold. I went to College to become educated....but I had little intention of working.

I had good reasons for these goals. I intended to be a better Mom than my Mom. My Mom had to work...she had no choice in the economics of the family situation, but I resented it. My Mom had a career. She was a nurse. She wanted me to be one, but I am not strong stomached enough to deal with needles, body fluids, including blood, and trauma. I barely got through the calamities of children's care...the swallowing of coins, head gashes, dislocated shoulders, choking, and ear surgeries. I tossed a choking child to Grover once, and wished he was around for the coin swallowing, and the head gash. But I digress.

Motherhood seems often to be about trying to right the "wrongs" of one's life. I think it is a little like natural selection...we keep improving on the species. You set the world right and give your all to your children and it makes everything "all better." It seems to be a common goal, almost an unconscious drive.

So, my point is, I didn't put my life on hold. I didn't give up my life for my children. I don't want anyone crying at the pulpit about what I didn't get to do. I got exactly what I wanted. I did exactly what I wanted to do. I got to have 5 amazing children and be their best friend.

I admit that it was a little disquieting when the last one...Emily...left home, because my career felt like it ended. But in actuality it just relocated. Now it is more like an independent study course. The teachers are all far away and you try to figure out how to do the work from afar. Only there is little if any work to be doing. Or maybe it is more like study abroad. You have to go somewhere to visit to learn the culture and be of any help. The culture is your child's new home, and family, or their life at college, or after college. And the challenge of being the Best Mom evolves from being good at cleaning and cooking and driving, and cheering 24/7 to staying in touch, but not intruding, and giving enough of yourself to them and getting enough of them for yourself.

So, this is my life. I wouldn't change it. I am not interested in a new career...since this one just keeps evolving. Ok, you can have your soapbox back.
Love, Mom