Stuff to Do

My firstborn is just like me. She's clever, imaginative, more than a little bit 'spacey', very friendly, likes painting and other messy pursuits, has a hard time with finishing something before moving on to the next thing, and so on. To observe her, is to see me, 32 years ago. And at times, I find it exasperating. If I looked in the mirror, I'd see the exact same expression on my face that my mom used to have. I've heard myself saying exactly the same things to C that I remember hearing as a child. All through school, a recurring theme to my report cards was "has trouble focusing in class", and "does not finish work on time". I was always in my own private universe, and it was like no one knew how to get there. She is much the same. Occasionally, I get glimpses into her world, but most of the time, it's a place I neither understand, nor could hope to inhabit. My wish as a parent is that I learn to appreciate her for who she is, spaced outedne...

Come in, sit down. Let's have a chat about identity. Specifically, as it relates to before and after marriage/offspring. Before I got married, I had this life. I had this great apartment, with matching towels, matching dishes, lots of framed photos on the walls, trips to the bookshop that almost always resulted in some novel or other jumping into my basket. I had a cat, who now lives with my mom. I loved beautiful things. Not expensive, necessarily, but beautiful things. I had girlfriends with whom I'd go out to dinner, or shopping, or what have you. I painted pottery. In short, it was fun, and largely carefree (although in a head-in-the-sand kind of way). For the longest time, I felt that getting married and having kids was the end of all that. Forever. I mourned (and sometimes still do) that life, that person, for she was now dead. And in her place was this new person, but I didn't know her. I still don't quite know who she is, and I'm still in a place where I...