Today is the last day of my 30s.
I wake up to the smell of dog pee on my carpet. Again. And before I even open my eyes, I’m doing mental calculations. How much will the vet bill be if she actually has a bladder infection? What if it’s worse than that? What if she has cancer? I can’t afford to treat dog cancer. Wait. What am I thinking? I don’t care about the money. This is my beloved PET! But… how much money are we talking about here? Maybe she’s just getting old. Am I going to pay hundreds of dollars for the vet to tell me she’s old? When should I replace the carpet? How much will it cost to replace the carpet? Is she just going to continue to pee on the new carpet? What about flooring and a throw rug? Am I mentally redecorating for a dog with cancer?
I roll out of bed, clean up the mess, and let the dog out. I make myself a cup of coffee and slice an apple and start my to-do list. I have about fifteen phone calls to make; the tree guy (I’ve been putting that one off for a couple of years), schedule Bea’s road test (this terrifies me, and I’ve been postponing it for weeks), the doctor’s office, the other doctor’s office, the dentist, the hospital billing department (because I swear I already paid that co-pay)… but it’s 6am, and none of those places are open yet, so I set the list aside. I stop writing long enough to rub the sleep out of my eye, and then I realize my mistake.
I have a sensitivity to a few fruits; apples are one of them. I can eat certain types. Others make my mouth itch. But all apples need to go directly into my mouth. God forbid the juices get near my eye. You see where I’m going with this, right? I just rubbed my eye with a hint of apple on my finger and now my eye is itchy and swelling and red and it’s entirely because of my own stupidity.
I leave my list to wash my hands and rinse my eye and on my way back, I get distracted by the unmade bed in my room and then I head upstairs to the linen closet because I really need to change the sheets before I make the bed. A tangle of squished sheets and blankets tumbles out when I open the door, like a scene from a bad comedy. I spend 30 minutes cleaning the closet. I change the sheets and make the bed and pour a second cup of coffee. I spread some peanut butter on a banana for my kid and he spills dry tapioca all over the kitchen floor. I walk across the kitchen with dry tapioca pearls stuck to the bottom of my feet, and I hand him the broom.
This is the last day of my 30s.
For my 30thbirthday, my husband threw a party. He rented a room at a restaurant and his band played and he invited everyone we knew. My kids were 2 and 4 at the time. They danced and ran around and were generally adorable. Eventually, my niece took them home to bed. She babysat and I danced and drank heavily and said some terribly embarrassing things in front of my father. I laughed with my college friends. I reminisced with my sisters. I introduced my old friends to my new friends, and I reveled in being the center of attention. People came from out of town; there was an after party in a friend’s hotel room and we finally passed out in the wee hours of the morning. It felt like I was 22 again. I loved it. That party was epic.
I am almost 40.
I’m not feeling old or depressed or any of those things that stupid movies tell women they should feel when turning 40. I love my life. I’m glad to be 40. Maybe it’s cliché, but I feel like I’m coming into my own. I’m learning and growing. I’m becoming a better human.
A decade ago, I was a newlywed and a new mother. I had beautiful babies and a loving husband and I was living somebody’s dream (mine? I wasn’t sure…) But my whole life felt unfamiliar and I secretly looked forward to those rare nights when I could go out and feel childless again. I read books and I made plans and I was totally committed to doing marriage and motherhood right. I was scared most of the time.
I look back on that young woman and I admire her. I love her energy and her passion and her commitment. I feel her confusion and her struggle and I wish I could go back and give her a hug.
I am not that woman anymore.
I recently picked up a book at the library. It’s one of those funny books about motherhood and it starts pre-baby and tells the birth story and then makes a lot of jokes about sleepless nights and baby poop and all the unexpected parts of new motherhood. I’m finding it mildly entertaining, but totally irrelevant to my life. Because middle-motherhood is a totally different beast.
I’m not a new mother anymore. I’m a middle-mother. My kids are in the middle of their childhoods. I’m halfway done with the ‘raising them’ part (I have no illusions about ever being ‘done parenting.’) I’m not sleep-deprived anymore. I’m not changing diapers. I’m at the point of motherhood where a puking kid isn’t even a punchline… it’s just another moment in a series of moments. I’m at the point where none of this feels new anymore.
Except it is. Puberty and driving and break-ups and college. It’s all new. And scary. But it’s not the kind of scary you can joke about. It’s ‘suicidal teens’ and ‘substance abuse’ and ‘date rape’ scary. It’s real-world, big-person problems. It’s a court date with your foster daughter and a night in the hospital with your teen.
So solace doesn’t come from a funny book anymore. It doesn’t come from drunken, escapist, ‘pretending-I-don’t-have-kids.’ It comes from real, genuine, human connection with other mothers. Solace comes from knowing we’re not alone. It comes from prayers and faith and it comes from all of the mothers before us, who have walked the journey and come out on the other side.
I’m so grateful for the women who hold me up. I have friends, of course, who are wonderful. But I’m particularly grateful for those women who are a generation (or more) ahead of me on this journey. These warriors KNOW. My mother. My mother-in-law. My Aunt Bev. There are a few women in the church who read this blog and hug me afterward in a way that lets me know that they remember all of this. They know. And they will talk me through and hold me up and remind me that I am not the first or the last. I count on these women to help me with the mothering, but they also help me to find the truth buried in all our myths about marriage.
I’m not a new wife anymore. I am no longer operating under the illusion that ‘our relationship is different’ or that ‘all you need is good communication.’ I realize now that a date night won’t fix everything… but it certainly helps. I’m starting to hear ‘staying together for the kids’ as ‘not ready to give up.’ I look at the relationships around me and I realize that we’re all capable of breaking each others’ hearts. I’m starting to understand that any relationship is a series of choices and that you can choose each other or you can choose to leave… but they both require Herculean effort and the only escape is apathy.
I’m starting to replace, “I would NEVER…” with “You never know…” and I’m just a little bit softer. In every sense of the word. My body is softer. My heart is softer. I’m a little less judgmental and a little less edgy. I’m a lot less cool, and I’m seeing more value in simply being warm.
This is the last day of my 30s.
I run the errands and make the phone calls and make a plan that will pull my kids off their screens. I connect with a friend and eat an omelet and use the good conditioner when I shower. I put on my new socks and my favorite jeans. I load the dishwasher and I take my son to the cardiologist.
A decade ago, I would have been terrified. Today, I am confident. The doctor tells me what I already feel- my kid is fine, he needs to drink more and stand up slowly and sit down when he’s feeling faint. An awesome sonographer points out all the parts of my baby’s heart, on a screen so like the one where I first saw his little heart beat. She patiently describes where the valves are and points out how the blood is flowing and my other son rests his head on my shoulder and we are all reassured. I’ve got this. As I listen to his heart beat once again, I realize I’m stronger now than I’ve ever been.
At home, I shave my legs and pluck my chin hairs and pour a glass of wine. I text my sister. I run the vacuum. I read a little and write a blog post.
Tonight, I will get together with a small group of friends. We will eat and drink too much and laugh too loudly. We’ll celebrate our friendship and appreciate each other. I’ll hold my husband’s hand and enjoy his company and I will look at him and remember how far we’ve come. I will hug my kids (against their will) and I will relax into all of these blessings.
Today is the last day of my 30s.
Tomorrow, my fourth decade begins. And I’m ready for it. I’m looking forward to it… even if there’s dog pee on the carpet.