Whatever you call early evening in your household, it can feel like an eternity!
I has affectionately been referred to as the suicide hour. Affectionately, because your kids are lucky. I mean, think about it: it could have been called "the murder hour" and then where would they be? And the way I see it, keeping children alive has got to be the ultimate sign of affection. So, affectiontely, fondly and lovingly, it is.
The only problem is that it's never just an hour....
Yes,, there are days when Mr Golden Sun is hardly down and children are fed, bathed, read to and fall into bed like ice-cream cones on your new carpet. Days when dad is home or help is around; when work has gone well, chores are finished - and children are too. Now, you don't want them so tired as to not actually fall asleep (no, that kind of weeping, wailing and rubbing of eyes is reserved by those who administer the universe for nights when you especially need them to get to bed on time). You want them just tired enough to, well, sleep.
But then there are other days. Days when toys are strewn everywhere, when children are falling from their bikes and Jack Russell's snouts are having lip-gloss administered to them by four-year olds (a favourite one in our house), when fuses are short and tempers are long. Days when Lisa spits food back at me because she is sick and spill drinks into freshly made plates of lasagne - you know, where peas and carrots are out to sea and you wish you were out to dinner.
I don't like those days.
The kinds of days I like are the happy days, the golden ones. They are the days gone by. The days captured in what feels like yellowing images in photo frames perched on your mantelpiece: you on the beach in Zanzibar, you at a Game Farm - not you in the circus or you at the Funny Farm! No, these are the days you relished and cherished. Because these days were not spent counting down the minutes but living for each and every one.
But these are the days that don't exist! Face it: they are history. What is left of them? Nothing. Nada, Zikolo. Those ones where lazy mornings rolled into late breakfasts and early afternoon naps. Where "What should we do today?" was a yawning-stretching question to which doing nothing was the obvious answer and not a command that a breathless four-year old in a Fairy outfit was shouting at you while jumping on your bed - the one from which you have bravely surfaced.
Oh my: the days when spontaneity was an actual possibility. (Note: waiting outside the theater for your mother after an emergency back op does not count as spontaneity). A late movie (now the 8 pm show has you snorting crushed vitamin B tablets over the sink for a week), a last-minute bite to eat ( a fun snack that you zip out for, not an oops-I've-been-so-busy-I've-forgotten-to-eat-so-now-it's-a-cold meal), a quick coffee or a look around a bookstore for something other than your missing four-year old!
But here's the rub, as Shakespeare used to say(or, here's the grub, as you still say to your daughter just home from nursery school): those were perfect days - but not precious days. Those were the days when life wasn't hanging in the balance. When your tummy was firm and perfect but didn't move with the rumblings of a strange new life inside of you. When agony aunt columns were about other people's problems that you read about but couldn't relate to - becasue nothing had ever mattered quite that much. When sad movies were about popcorn and not parenting and didn't wrench at your heart and send you home tiptoeing into your child's bedroom just to stare at her asleep, breathing in, breathing out. Those were the days when dinner parties were frivolous and fun, but where nothing was nearly as funny as the belly laugh of Lisa & Greg laughing at the Mr Bean DVD. When no friend was ever as honest with you as your daughter - a girl who thinks she doesn't have anyone to impress or anything to lose and so she tells you how it is.
These are the days that hurt so much because most of what you have is emotionally invested in the moment that is being a mom. Anger. Aggravation. Fun. Frustration. Motherhood. Madness.
So sit back and wait for it. Because any minute now, some small person will call you: it might be for you to help pull up her panties or wipe her nose. But hey, there's not a small chance that when you fetch her from school, she will run towards you, jump right into you and wrap your neck up in her arm, breathing in your hair as if it is the only thing that smells of coming home.
Ah, these are the days...
.jpg)