Slacker

I haven’t just been a blogging slacker the last few days—I’ve been slacking at everything. There are piles of laundry in the basement, dishes in the sink, thank you notes that may never get written and tons of email and phone calls I haven’t yet returned. I am struggling to be interested in work, and I feel like I’m not playing an active enough role as a parent. In other words, I’m doing nothing well and am starting to wonder if “slacker” is just another term for “working mom.” I know it sounds antithetical, but how can you do anything well or feel you’re doing anything well when you’re trying to do too much? I feel like a slacker on all accounts.

That’s been the source of a lot of last week’s (and who am I kidding—this week’s) turmoil. I thought I had found a quick-fire way out, a way to keep working but also spend more time with darling C., but money is and will always be a limiting factor for us, and I’m not sure now is the best time to venture off on our own.

One of the most surprising things I’ve come to realize the last few weeks is how profoundly motherhood has changed me. I know everyone is full of the “Having a baby changes everything” wisdom, and I instantly saw the effects it had on my life, my schedule, my marriage, my friendships, etc. I saw that it opened me in many ways I could never have imagined, how vulnerable and yet fierce holding a little baby that was my own instantly made me. But now that we’ve really settled into things and the crisis-management mode in which I survived the first months of motherhood is over, I’m seeing these much more profound shifts in the way I see and relate to the world. I am a mother, and I’m starting to wonder if anything else matters quite that much to me. I’m not saying that it is or should be the only thing in my life, but I am coming around to the idea that something will have to change here in order for me to feel like I’m doing at least one thing to the best of my abilities. Maybe it’s just my perception that needs to change, but it’s gotta be something.

So here I am wrestling with all this, and that’s taking up yet another portion of my energy and day. But you don’t need to worry about that. Let’s all just think of Clementine for a second. She is more and more beautiful every day, and she’s got some new tricks under her belt, too. For one thing, her first tooth, quickly followed by her second, has emerged on the bottom, which has provided her with a little relief. She has been testing the darn things out by biting me a few times, and it really hurt—those are some sharp bastards. Also, she is doing the baby sign for milk, despite how bad we’ve been about reinforcing it. We really must get on the sign language bandwagon, for I worry a lot about how much she doesn’t enjoy books (except to eat them). I want her to love language! Finally, she has taken a few daring stabs at standing on her own. She usually falls down right after the attempt, but I think there is hardly any doubt she is aiming to walk within the next few months. She sure is driven!