Don't Try So Hard
quality time
moments that matter
Last week, we got a foot of snow. Like the UhMAYzing Mom that I am, I decided to embrace it. Sure, I hate cold weather. Sure I was stuck in a house with two toddlers for three days straight. Sure, work was piling up and piling up and piling up. But dammit, we were gonna have a good time.
Snow Day
Kodak moments here we come
After 30 minutes of hype, getting coats zipped and feet wrapped in Saran Wrap (we don't get snow here often enough to actually own snow-appropriate shoewear) finding lost mittens, and so on, we finally stepped out into the soft, deep white.
About two seconds later, both my kids started crying.
The baby was confused. The snow was about as deep as his legs are long, and so one step in, he was up to his jewels in foreign, cold white stuff. He didn't really know how to take another step, and he didn't want to just stay there being cold.
My three-year-old was just discovering that all the toys in her water table were now frozen in place. "But I want them," she wailed. I tried--in vain--to explain to her the principles of state change.
Not one to let a little snot and salt water hold me back, I persisted. "Let's make a snow man," I suggested. My daughter was game, but the snow was not. The beautiful dust was probably perfect for skiing but not so much for building. Every time we tried to mold it into shape, it slid out of place like sand. Then, just in case there was any semblance of a ball shape, the baby would stomp on it.
Teeth gritted, I suggested a walk. "Walk," my son proposed. "Walk," he stated decisively. He is ready for a walk anytime, anywhere. Until we got out onto the road, whereupon he stopped. "No walk," he told me. Resigned, I said, "OK, let's go inside." "No," my daughter wailed, "You said we were going for a walk." "No inside," my son returned. "OK," I said, jaw clenched, "let's take a walk."
"No walk," my son said, and began crying again.
That's when it happened: my anticipated Kodak moment devolved into one big parenting DON'T, with me yelling to two weeping toddlers: "You guys are a bunch of whiners!!"
A few days later, the weekend fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinalllllllllllllllllllllly arrived. The snow days had messed with a plan to take my daughter out to breakfast before daycare one day (her love language is Quality Time). So, on Sunday, I promised her a post-nap trip to the coffee shop, complete with treats and puzzles (she loves puzzles). All goes well, until she finishes her cookie. She slips out of her seat, stares off into the distance, and it takes me a few minutes before I realize I'm the only one doing the puzzle. I keep going (notice a theme here?), but finally it dawns on me that something is just not working. "Is this puzzle too hard? Should we do another one?" I ask her. "Yeah," she says. I clean up puzzle number one and start on puzzle number two. A few minutes pass. My daughter falls out of her seat again. "Do you not want to do puzzles?" I ask her. "Yeah," she says. "Oh," I say, joking, "should we just go home?" I'm expecting her to protest, but instead she says, "Yeah."
"Really?" I ask her. "Yeah," she says.
So we go home.
Mother daughter date = total fail.
When my hurt feelings finally subside, I notice the common theme in these two incidents: my expectations and a pressure I put on myself to make every moment with my kids as **FABULOUS** as possible...leading to disappointment and frustration on my part. Maybe, I thought, I shouldn't try so hard. Hmm.
I wrote the title for this post, a few notes on what I wanted to write about, and walked away.
Yesterday, on the recommendation of a co-worker, I started listening to a new book, called The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F#@$ by Mark Manson. The title of the first chapter: "Don't Try."
The not-so-subtle art
of being a potty mouth
The serendipity didn't quite hit me until I logged back in today to keep working on this post. But there it is: the universe, in many guises, is trying to tell me to take my foot off the gas.
There's a name for this: "intensive mothering." It's the notion that the best way to parent our children is to be there, really really BE there at all times. For the most part, I agree with this premise. If it comes down to being present with my children or scanning the Internet for funny cat videos, I'll take (A) every time--not necessarily because it's what brings me the most happiness in the moment, but because I believe in the long-term pay-off: happier, healthier kids who know they're loved and with whom I have a deep connection.
But there's a price to all this Super Momming. Firstly, of course, it's exhausting. Secondly, I'm waaay behind on my cat videos. But thirdly, maybe it's a little bit too much pressure, for everyone involved. Maybe being present in the moment isn't always about crafting the moment to make it "perfect," but rather accepting the moments as they are: snot, sub-par snowballs and all.
