Mother's Day

Nathan and me on our first Mother's Day, 2007.  I think it's obvious I was breastfeeding then.

 

My mom always made a super big deal about Mother's Day.  What would we make her for breakfast?  Where would we go for lunch?  What chores would we all do for her?  I honestly didn't get what all the hubbub was about until I became a mother myself.  

Mother's Day is the one day a mom can insist on putting herself first. 

Sure, we all talk a big talk the rest of the year about putting ourselves first..  We'd like to think we aren't going around acting like big giant martyrs and letting people walk all over us.  But the truth is, when push comes to shove, mothers are almost always the ones who pick up the slack.  And, as Leigh Ann said in a comment last week, there can only be so much putting ourselves first and letting things slide before stuff doesn't get done.  Kids still have to eat and laundry still has to be washed. 

But on Mother's Day, we feel comfortable, just for one day, with letting it all slide and making it about ourselves. 

My problem, though, is that I put too much stock in this one day.  My Mother's Day has to be absolutely perfect.  I have this problem with a lot of holidays, and the obvious result is that I'm disappointed when my high expectations are not met. 

For my very first Mother's Day, Nathan was 11 weeks old.  I remember my present to myself was a nap and snuggle with my sweet baby.  I recall practically writing a poem in my head, something like, Someday on Mother's Day you'll bring me a handmade card you made at school.  Someday you'll be away at college and forget Mother's Day altogether and maybe place a last-minute phone call late Sunday night.  Someday you'll have a wife who remembers to send me a card and gift for Mother's Day, and you'll sign the card without even asking what the gift is.  But today you are 11 weeks old, my sweet baby in my arms.  Today I will remember forever.

Since everything you do with a newborn baby is kind of lame and scaled-down, that Mother's Day we got takeout from Panera and had a picnic in the park.  I think we scarfed down our food before our baby started fussing in his little carrier.  What I remember about that Mother's Day is what I remember painfully from the baby phase: with babies, there are no holidays.  I had to go right back home and feed him and bounce him and change his diapers and get up with him several times in the night. 

The next year's Mother's Day was an all-time low for me.  I was working full-time, and the day after Mother's Day was a most stressful day at work.  See, I worked for a big multi-national conglomerate, the kind of place that is mostly a household name.  Hypothetically, let's call it McDonald-Smith.  And the day after Mother's Day, we were having an office visit from Mr. McDonald.  The entire office had been elevated to a level of frenzy over this person's visit, and so I found myself unable to relax and enjoy Mother's Day.  Bill couldn't figure out what to get me for Mother's Day, so he told me to go to Target and pick out my own gift.  I remember just aimless strolling through the aisles of Target, eventually buying myself a candy bar and some tampons.  The weather that day was ridiculously dark, like the kind of dark where it's nighttime during the day.  I was just two months out of crazy camp back then, so I was really battling depression.  I remember talking on the phone to my grandma, who was also depressed.  She died two weeks later.  I don't have any photos from that Mother's Day, though I do remember taking one where I thought my brand-new haircut that I had gotten the day before looked ugly.  Maybe I burned those pictures.  (Or, you know, deleted the files off my computer.) 

By the following Mother's Day I had quit my job and gotten my shit together.  As a newly-minted stay-at-home mom, I had discovered all kinds of fun places to go with my kid.  One of these places was the zoo, where we had a membership.  I thought it might be fun to go to the special Mother's Day brunch at the zoo.  Now, first off, although I do eat meat, I have a very low comfort level with it, even when I'm not near the habitats of the animals that gave their lives for this meat.  When I was at a buffet brunch in the zoo, all I could think was that we were eating some of the weaker zoo animals.  I guess I did manage to smile for this picture, though:

 

 

Plus after the meal we had to spend the afternoon at the zoo, and a hot, crowded day at Brookfield Zoo is about the least relaxing thing you can do on Mother's Day. 

 

Last year on Mother's Day I finally took stock and realized that I needed to simplify my expectations for Mother's Day to avoid disappointment.  I decided all I wanted was a nice lunch, then to be left alone to take a nap.  It was my best Mother's Day yet.  Here's a picture of Nathan at the lunch, eating a nutritious car:

I don't have any pictures of the nap, but I can assure you it was awesome.

 

This year for Mother's Day I don't want to go out to eat, because I blew all my weekly bonus Weight Watchers points during the trip.  I considered insisting on my customary nap, but when I really thought about it, what I decided I really wanted was just a few hours to myself to think.  I've been feeling totally wishy-washy lately, like I can't commit to any project or get anything done or formulate a plan for my future.  I allow myself to get caught up in the frantic day-to-day tasks so that I don't really have to think about the bigger issues.  Tomorrow I want to sit down and think about what I want to do, not for the rest of my life or whatever, but in the near future in order to feel like a productive, self-actualized human being.  And I'm not being nebulous here about some big secret plan or news.  I seriously have no freakin' clue what I want to do in the future.  

When I look back on the Mother's Days of years past, I can see how each one provides a snapshot of my life at the time.  For my first Mother's Day in 2007, it was all about the harsh realities of new motherhood and coming to accept a whole new lifestyle.  In 2008, I was bogged down with depression and work-life issues.  By 2009 I was filled with a zeal for life and a desire to do everything I hadn't been able to do when I was depressed and working, even if that sometimes meant overly-ambitious activities like spending Mother's Day at the zoo.  The following year, in 2010, I had finally settled into a comfortable pace of life.  And now, in 2011, I find myself restless again and eager for a new phase.  And that leaves me wondering, where will I be on Mother's Day 2012?