I think I'm a Mother...

One of my most favorite persons (people? I'm not sure, but she would....a grammar expert). Anyway, a great friend is getting married in September and I am in her wedding. Her bridal shower was this past weekend on Lake Shore drive in Chicago. I drove in by myself, which says that I love her, because I am THE most anxious driver when it comes to Chicago. It's like everyone else woke up that morning and was told some secret about: traffic patterns, when pedestrians would cross in front of you, where to find parking, how to make a garage door go up, which Lake Shore drive to turn on so you don't go 5 blocks out of your way, when Cubs traffic would be infiltrating the roads to make you late for your shower, what type of shoes to wear when you end up being too stupid to figure out the garage and have to park a mile away, and how on God's green earth it is possible to parallel park.  So, that said, I was pretty hyped up by the time I got to the shower, half an hour late.  It was a beautiful shower, and I am so so so glad I was there, but there was a whole gang of school psychologists.  One of them asked me, "so why aren't you practicing?".  I don't think she meant anything by it, but I got the feeling that I was not being quite the professional that she would expect by taking time off.  Even one of my biggest mentors wrote me an e-mail back to a request for using him as a referral (I'm applying to teach a class at a junior college - very very part time) saying "glad to hear you're getting back in the game".  I know none of these people have bad intentions, but I know also that they have this perception of me as giving up somehow.  I know this, because I used to think the same thing of "stay-at-home-moms".  I didn't get how you could spend so much time in school and so much effort to build your career to simply put it on hold.  I guess you wouldn't get it until you became a mom yourself.  Until you looked down at that perfect little drooling face smiling back at you, until you felt like your heart was getting torn out to leave him for a second, until you locked eyes with the future of your existence.  I am so sorry to any mom I judged in the past.  I am so grateful to all of you.  We are not giving up, but daring to stand up against a world that tells us we have to have a job to be worth something.  I fully intend to go back to my career, but for now, I am so thankful that I can spend Hayes' first glimpses of this crazy place with him.  So that I can try to impart on him what very little wisdom I have in just the itty bitty mundane pieces of life.  That said, I think nothing less of moms who can't stay home.  I think you should be respected in so so so many ways!  I know it must kill you to leave your little ones, and I know the pressure that a job can bring.  Not to mention the pressures of raising a child.  Let's just say that my respect for women, rather for mothers, has just been raised exponentially: both to those who get a bad rap for staying home, and those who get one for working.

Song of the Day: PJ Harvey - I think I'm a Mother http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43_fgxwVi_c
Cute Baby Action of the Day:  Extreme grunting = tiny baby turd.