For once I would like to know the ending to one of my six-year-old’s stories.

She comes home from school with the most amazing anecdotes. They have all the elements of great yarns -- comedy, tragedy, interesting characters. Her delivery is punctuated with “ums” and “uhs” that only serve to propel the building tension to its supposed conclusion.

Many times she will merge two different narratives into one glorifying epic that leaves me breathless with anticipation. But more often that not, I am left to my own devices when it comes to the outcome of these dramatic sagas.

Like any good storyteller, she reels me in with a great opening: “Mom, guess what happened at school today?” (Sorry, Charles Dickens, I am a mother anxious to glean any information from my child, so this rivals, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”).

“What?” I say encouragingly.

“We were at PE and Mrs. Philips -- the PE teacher -- told us to get into line…then...um...then Will cut Anthony in line. Then…um…Anthony pushed Will...and…uh...then Natalie started crying and we were all saying stop, stop…and you know, I thought my glasses broke, but it wasn’t my fault.”

“Wait!” I say backtracking. “Did you get pushed? Is that how your glasses broke?”

“No…um…they didn’t really break, but Mr. N told me when I was looking at this thing on the blacktop…um…to go to the office so they could check them.”

“Who is Mr. N?”

“Oh, just this guy.”

By now I am mentally biting my nails. Whatever happened to Will and Anthony? What exactly made Natalie cry? What made her think her glasses had broken? What was this thing on the blacktop that caught her attention and who is this mysterious Mr. N?

Suddenly distracted, she points outside. “Look mom a squirrel!” And she’s gone.

It will be impossible to have her revisit the subject now that she’s lost interest. So once again, I am left hanging onto the anti-climatic edge of my seat.

By Tania Malik

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My first miscarriage seemed to go on forever.

First, the spotting, and then the ultrasound to confirm the loss. Next, the wait for my body to expel whatever was left in me. The cramps, the blood. And finally, a D&C was still needed to finish the job.

I had no idea that miscarriages could drag out over several days.

My therapist recommended that I plant a bush or shrub to mark the end, to add closure. I didn’t feel like I needed any more markers. But in an effort to try to move on, I planted a green shrub in a shady corner of my front lawn. The lack of light did not make this a prime spot for growth. Next to the plant, a scraggly acacia already struggled to produce small blossoms each spring.

That fricking plant flourished. I flashed an evil eye at the green mass when I came home from a doctor’s visit confirming my second loss.

After the third miscarriage, I had to transplant the damn thing because it was strangling the acacia. I really wanted to toss it, but could not bring myself to kill it.

Eighteen months later, I got pregnant. I’d given up. I was forty. My doctor had told me I was considered barren. I wasn’t tracking my cycles, wasn’t taking Clomid, wasn’t pushing Progesterone suppositories up there every month, wasn’t taking pregnancy tests that I knew would be negative.

That darn plant died in the fourth month of my pregnancy. As life surged in me, it drained from that plant. The plant drooped, turned brown and was dead. After three years of irritatingly lush growth, it had died.

Strange but true.

I have no explanation, but somehow found it comforting. I took the plant’s demise as one more sign that this pregnancy was meant to be (and it was!).

By Marianne Lonsdale

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I was at the doctor’s office today with my daughter. I was so congested; my voice was nearly reduced to a whisper.

As I sat in the waiting room my doctor brought out an elderly woman named Millie and said it was fortuitous that we were meeting: she had been reporter and writer nearly her entire life and so had I.

While my daughter played, and the receptionist called a cab for Millie, we talked. Her heart was beating at twice its normal rate and she was being sent to a cardiologist because she refused to go to the emergency room.

“I am NOT going to the hospital,” she said firmly.

Millie was ninety-one and forty of her years had been spent writing for newspapers and magazines, then for another thirty she was a free-lance writer.

She was fashionably dressed in a black overcoat, dark stockings and bright pink suede flats. She was stylish, feisty, and totally independent.

Millie had two husbands; one had been an editor, the other an artist.

“Both Irish,” she said. She turned her whole body and stared at me. “Not a drop of Irish blood in me, though. Are you Irish?”

I shook my head. “No. Jewish. But my stepfather was Irish,” I added, hopefully.

She turned away and stared blankly ahead.

Though her demeanor was brave, her fear was palpable. She exuded calm, but inside her heart was literally racing. I knew as a former reporter she was already thinking ahead to the cardiologist and then the hospital stay that might await her.

“Millie,” I said, “are you afraid?”

She didn’t hear me.

I could deeply sense not only how scared she was, but how alone she was, too. After all, a taxi was picking her up. A stranger was going to take her to another doctor. She knew something was very wrong with her. And she didn’t want it to be. Damn it.

As I looked at Millie, I wanted to take her to the cardiologist. I wanted to be with her when she got her final diagnosis. I wanted to go with her to the hospital if she needed to, and to take her home if she did not. More than anything, I wanted to allay her fears.

Just then my six-year old daughter jumped into my lap and insisted on reading Dr. Seuss. I was torn. Trying to help someone who I sensed needed it, or be with my daughter who required her mother’s full attention because Mimi always knows when I’m only partially engaged.

I helped Mimi with her words. She has been having trouble with her reading, but recently she has been making some progress. Mimi needs lots of encouragement and re-enforcement. Needs her mother, too.

Just then a man arrived. His hair was wild, hat askew, and while his outfit was khaki -- it should have been camouflage. The politically incorrect musician Ted Nugent came to mind.

“Are you from the cab company?” asked the receptionist.

“I am the driver,” he said. “That’s me.”

Millie immediately stood and this proud, accomplished woman walked right over to him and grabbed his arm. Once she did, I saw him pull it out further and nod his head toward her. He wasn’t a character. He was a gentleman. And by her gesture, Millie showed that she was not too proud to ask for help.

As my daughter and I sounded out words, I watched the two walk out the door arm-in-arm. Two strangers about to become friends. While I knew Millie’s story, I wondered about the cab driver’s. Being a good reporter, I had no doubt Millie would learn it. And unquestionably, the cab driver would learn about Millie.

By Dawn Yun

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I was gardening in the backyard one day, picking the dead geranium flowers from the stems of the plant, when I noticed my four-year old son come outside.

He was kicking about on the lawn, lost in his own reverie, the way four-year old children often are.

I called over to him. “What are you doing, Aidan?”

“Oh, I’m just enjoying the journey,” he replied with the calm certainty of a Zen master.

What did he say? Did he say I’m just enjoying the journey? Where the hell did he get that line?

I couldn’t help but turn my head away and laugh to myself. I imagine he had seen Yoda say it in an episode of "Star Wars." Or perhaps he heard a New Age woman in line at Whole Foods say it to the checker.

Wherever he picked up that wise saying, I found myself giving it some thought, and I looked at my little four-year old boy with new respect.

Then I went back to picking dead geranium flowers – and tried to just enjoy the journey.

By Lisa Nave

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Rule number. 1: No Whining - at all.
Rule number 2: No Wine alone.

In a nutshell, these are the rules that I give most weight in my life.

Rule number 1 is carried over from my own childhood. I don’t know how I failed in asserting its importance in the first four years of motherhood, but it has recently been bumped up to number 1 priority. I cannot tolerate the pitch that my 4-year old achieves in his voice, and it seems to always be about things that I could never dream to have as a kid. Games, television, even food. As a child, I knew this rule and unquestioningly abided by it. There was no argument about it: No whining.

Rule number 2 is an afterthought, something that I have developed since joining Motherhood Nation. Something about red wine makes me happy and less aggravated by whining. Maybe it is my legacy coming from a long line of alcoholics; maybe it is that one sip can immediately readjust reality. Somehow it doesn’t seem to matter if they watch an extra 10 minutes of television -- or if they suck on a lollipop while doing it. Once, my husband worked late and, I had a glass of wine with dinner. It was too much of a rewarding feeling to not judge my motherhood so intensely -- to give myself a break.

It was too addictive: Rule number 2 was born: No Wine Alone.

By Jennifer O’Shaughnessy

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Until last month, my main job was being a mom to my son, Walker, and daughter, Elena. I filled nine years with nursing, changing diapers, sweeping Cheerios, preschool and play dates. Although I always worked part-time as a tutor or elementary school science teacher, I made sure that my kids' schedules came first.

Now, I'm teaching high school biology full-time.

I'm responsible for other people's children, and my kids go to before and after school daycare every day. My husband wakes Walker and Elena up and makes their breakfasts and lunches, because I have to be at school by 7:30.

When I pick up my kids as the sky is getting dark, I'm exhausted. Some days, I'm just too tired to help them with their homework or play a game with them. Instead, I ask if they want to lie next to me on the couch and watch "Sponge Bob" and "The Fairly Odd Parents."

Driving back from daycare one day, Elena reported that her friend, Anna, told Ms. Bruner's second-grade class that she wanted to be a mom when she grew up. Walker snickered and said, "Being a mom isn't a real job."

I stopped the car, so I could turn around and glare at him.

"Being a mom is one of the most important jobs in the world. Do you know how much work it was to feed you, potty train you, and keep you happy?"

"But now I go to school," said Walker

"Your school would fall apart without all the moms who give their time, for free." I gave a dramatic pause. "Who do you think drives on those field trips, organizes those October fundraisers, or volunteers to help with math?"

"But you work, and you're still a mom," said Walker.

I felt like saying, ‘Yeah, but now I'm a cruddy mom who does take-out for dinner and forgets to prepare my kids for Friday spelling tests.’

I wondered if Walker knew that I couldn't name more than three kids in his class. When he was in second grade, I volunteered once a week to help with science or math, and I knew every child's name and face. I thought of how I no longer knew how much organic smooth peanut butter we had in the refrigerator, because my helpful spouse had taken over lunch duty.

I thought about how long it had been since I had culled the too short pants out of Walker's drawer, or dusted anything. I thought about the two withered house plants that had paid the ultimate price because of my lack of domestic concentration.

I thought of the scratchy pencil sketches Elena had drawn for her homework cornucopia project, while other mothers had lovingly supplied tempura paint, glitter, and magazine clippings. I didn't even know Elena had the assignment.

I thought of how I paid VISA two weeks late, because it had gotten buried in my To-Do pile on my dresser.

"Being a parent is a full-time job, Walker. We just don't get paid for it. "

I felt like continuing, ‘I have TWO full time careers now and I'm not doing a great job with either.’

Instead, I said, "You probably both will have lots of jobs when you are grown up. Just remember that the value of the work is not how much you get paid, but how much good you do. Being your Mom is the most important work I'll ever do."

By Beth Touchette

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Okay, so I am reading the book, "The Secret."

Duh!

It's not that I don't believe in positive thinking, being optimistic and creative visualization. I do! But I am so comfortable in my old "expect the worst, and you will never be disappointed" philosophy – that it always works!

I know that when I am down and focus on negative things, things tend to go downhill from there. But I figure: what the hell, I was rolling down that hill anyway!

I can barely commit to something long enough for it to work. If I do try to be positive, unless results are INSTANT then I have doubts. Which bring on more doubts. Then I am sure things will go badly. And they do!

But when I do try to be positive, I am so afraid it is not going to work that I am afraid to even try. Plus, I can never be consistent in my positive thinking.

Perhaps I am afraid it WILL work and feel guilty for really trying to get something by putting my desire out there.

Do I concentrate on helping others?

Dare I be selfish?

Maybe I will start small, like with parking spots.

By Cathy Burke

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It happened the first time I ventured out alone with my firstborn.

“What’s your husband?” the lactation consultant asked as she scrutinized my two-week old’s face. “Huh? Oh, um… Chinese,” I stammered, wondering what this had to do with breastfeeding.

“Oh, mixed babies are so beautiful!” She went on to tell me how her cousin married a Japanese woman and they have the most exotic-looking children. Sleep deprived, I just sat there, nipples burning, with no idea how to respond.

As I left the appointment, the woman at the front desk took a peek. “Oh, he looks just like his father,” she commented. Since she’d never meet my husband, I was a little confused. By the time I got home, my initial confusion had been replaced with sadness. Would navigating insensitive comments become as much a part of my new mothering experience as sleepless nights and painful nipples?

The comments happen everywhere -- the park, vacation, at preschool, restaurants, the pediatrician’s office, and waiting in line at Starbucks. There are the well-meaning strangers, who without even saying hello, ask, “Where did you get him?” like my child is a miniature horse in a 4-H exhibit.

Other questions I’ve been asked include, “Is he Oriental?” like he’s a rug. And, “What’s his nationality?”

Then there are the comments about the supposed special beauty that “mixed” children share. If I was to approach a random Swedish mother and gush about how beautiful Swedish children are, she’d round up her kids faster than you can say “creepy.”

I have become proficient in the smile-politely-and-change-the-subject routine. However, there is one question that always gives me pause.

“What is he?”

Yes, I really have been asked this question. It happens infrequently enough that I never remember to answer, “A hyper Labradoodle.”

Strangers don’t see the ways my son is like me. His toothy smile curves to the right just like mine. The similarity of our hair color and texture amazes our hairdresser. We gross out Daddy by wiggling our double-jointed thumbs. We share a passion for books with interesting characters, dark green treasures and baking (and eating) “yummy stuff.”

It doesn’t matter that strangers don’t see these things. What’s important is that I navigate the inevitable questions confidently and help my son build a healthy self-identity. But, I think it will be awhile before ethnicity becomes an issue.

For now, I’m just trying to convince him that boys can play with pink toys.

By Maya Creedman

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A Thanksgiving I’ll always remember:

Ann was born! Scotty had died! What are we thankful for?

The children spoke differently that year. Perhaps for the first time.

They were aware that life and death were givens, were equal, were part of each other.
Grandpa Scotty was gone, but Ann was here, a newborn.

The beginning and end of life collided in time. Suddenly, all present felt blessed by both.

No elaborate ritualistic grace at this dinner. Always in our house we went around the table and said our “thank yous.”

Voices of eighty-year olds blended with voices of two-year olds and this year the occasional demanding cry of the newborn. We placed Grandma’s turkey on the table garnished by great-grand mom’s dressing recipe.

The “thank yous” began.

“I’m thankful for turkey,” said Jennifer.

“I’m thankful I’m alive,” reflected Heidi.

“I’m thankful for Ann,” purred Alison.

“I’m glad it’s Thanksgiving!”

Around the table we went.

We came to Helen, the bereaved widow. She raised her water glass and without a tear in her eye, and with great celebration, looked upward and proclaimed, “I’m thankful for you, Scotty, without you and what we created together, none of us would be here tonight. Thank you! Happy Thanksgiving to all.

"We are blessed.”

By Ruth Scott

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It never fails.

Whenever I feel sad about something that might be happening in my life, I see somebody worse off.

Usually it’s a physical impairment.

I saw a woman in her mid 30s, very attractive, moving along the sidewalk in her motorized scooter. She was missing both legs and both arms, but for a small portion of her right one that administered the controls that allowed her a degree of freedom.

“What’s wrong with her, Mommy,” my six-year old daughter asked.

“Wait until she passes and then we’ll talk about it,” I said. “And please don’t say anything until she goes by.”

Mimi complied.

I said I did not know how the woman lost her limbs. She may have been born like that. Perhaps she was in an accident. But her life could not be easy. She needed someone to feed her, help her go to the bathroom, help her to into bed, help with the ordinary things that we do without thought.

“Do you ever feel sorry for yourself, Mimi?” I asked. “Like when you disagree with a friend, or Mommy won’t buy something that you want?”

“Yes,” she said, staring up at me with her yet to be hurt by the world eyes.

“Well, imagine those situations, plus you don’t have any arms or legs and you need someone to help you most of the time. Wouldn’t that be hard?”

She agreed.

I wanted to teach her about appreciation and gratitude, but in a way that she could understand.

I also wanted to show her that life can have its challenges, yet they can be met and even overcome. I pointed out that the woman was going down the street by herself without anyone helping her. She could still have a degree of independence.

I explained to Mimi this phenomenon I have long had: whenever I feel sorry for myself or sad about a situation that I, a friend or a family member are facing, I see someone much worse off. And when I do – I am appreciative for what I do have.

“What does appreciative mean?” she asked.

I love her curiosity. And I love answering her questions.

“It’s when you're happy with what you have. Are you happy?”

She hugged me as we swung hands and walked down Fourth Street. “I’m happy to have you.”

“And I’m happy to have you!” I said and gave her a very big kiss, which she immediately wiped off with one hand, but clung tight to my arm with the other.

I thought about the woman in the scooter. ‘She has her emotional problems and then she has to deal with her physical ones.’

That’s not to minimize my own situations, or discount my problems, but it does put those concerns into context.

Sometimes it takes seeing others in difficult situations to visualize how good my life truly is.

By Dawn Yun

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I’m not proud about the Saturday night I drove my six-year old son to the San Rafael Bus Terminal and dropped him off saying, “Find a new mother.”

God knows why he pissed me off to the point that I put him in the old burgundy Corolla and drove north fifteen minutes to give him away.

I remember the dark night decades ago, my rage pounding through my foot to the gas pedal, pulling the car past the western shadows of Mt. Tam and feeling out of my mind, unable to call Brian’s natural father who never saw him and would never be there, hadn’t been there since I left him when Brian was six-months old.

Out of the corner of my eye, Brian looked straight into the darkness ahead, rolling in the only car his brain called into memory, listening to me scream about how, “I can’t take it anymore!”

Dark night.

Silent son.

Raging mother.

Lonesome inside the loss of my freedom. Lonesome without a father to share the painful confrontations between a son and his single parent mother when the boy only wanted his way -- only wanted to talk back, not pick up, yell or whatever he did to drive me toward my desire to be rid of him.

As he sat there, I needed to follow through. I screamed -- he needed a new home, a new start, the whole new family.

What was he supposed to do?

I’m not proud that I pulled the car up to the bus stop kiosk and commanded him to, “Get out!” He did, and stood there facing the car. I pulled away from the curb and made a right turn, instantly remorseful, I’d gone too far. In the rear-view mirror I saw him. He stood there; I made another right, panicked that I could no longer see him. Another right turn convinced me he’d been picked up by some perpetrator and taken to East Hollywood as a sex slave. Third right turn and I knew he was dead. Far beyond fear, I operated from adrenaline’s primordial “Where’s my child?” angst.

By the time I pulled up in front of the kiosk again, Brian hadn’t moved anything except his head. He stood rooted from the spot I made him stand. Less than ninety seconds and a thousand years passed since I last saw him. I stopped the car in front of him. “Get in.” He didn’t say a word. Silent from the gigantic abandon I pitted against us both, I drove back home.

When did I become so rigid as to flip into desertion, frustrated incomprehensible confusion at my own controlling issues about what I wanted from my only son, my light and my future?

Brian forgave me for my human frailty and grew up to be a solid American citizen. The crisis only lasted about an hour in real time, but survives an eternity as deep knowing that my parenting skills weren’t top-notch.

Small comfort in forgiving myself decades later.

By Pru Starr

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I didn’t want to do it. I had plenty of excuses. We’re in the midst of a kitchen remodel. The baby won’t take a bottle. I was leaving on a trip the next day. We wanted to take the kids to the Goblin Jamboree. But, most of all, I hate asking for money.

If I was going to participate in the Juvenile Diabetes Walk, I would need to ask for donations. I had to. My sister lived with Type I diabetes for over twenty years. Now she’s gone. This was an opportunity to do something productive in Nina’s honor.

So, I signed up. That took three minutes online. Then it was time to e-mail out the dreaded donation letter. I reminded myself that the money goes towards finding a cure for the disease that had forced Nina to stick her finger and give herself injections multiple times each day, almost killed her when she ran out of insulin in the Amazon and had been an unwelcome consideration that she could never escape – not even for an afternoon.

But, asking for money was still hard. I e-mailed new friends, old friends, Nina’s friends, family friends… basically anyone with an e-mail address. I reassured myself that I never mind being asked for donations for a charity walk. My husband reminded me that the money was for charity. It wasn’t like we were asking friends to fund our kitchen remodel. Still, I felt embarrassed and apologetic.

Until, I thought about Nina.

Even as a kid, Nina never hid her disease. She didn’t retreat to a restroom to give herself injections. She would just pull up her shirt and plunge in the syringe in an airport, classroom or restaurant ignoring the stares. One of her graduate school friends recalls the first moment he met Nina. She sat down next to him in class, pulled out her insulin supplies and gave herself a shot. When she caught him gaping, she just smiled and asked “What? Do you think that’s kinky?”

Nina never made apologies for her illness and she didn’t let it stop her from traveling to third-world countries, backpacking in remote locations, playing on a men’s soccer team, or doing anything else she desired. The only thing that she couldn’t do was make her Diabetes disappear. Even though she tried to make Diabetes seem “cool,” as her big sister, I know that she wished for a cure over every set of birthday candles.

In the end, I received over $1,000 in donations for the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation along with encouragement and support from people I barely knew. I also learned something from Nina. Don’t make apologies for the way things are. Just live it.

By Maya Creedman

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Today I find myself in the unenviable position of having to entertain guests in my home. These are not just any guests, but guests I haven’t yet personally met.

Three weeks ago I placed in ad on craigslist announcing my intention to start a parent-run childcare co-operative. At the time, I felt at the end of my rope parenting my toddler alone day after day. I suspected there were others out there who felt similarly and that they would be as reluctant as I am to pay for a daycare service. Through the Internet my suspicions were confirmed and I was able to electronically communicate with parents who responded to my ad and who were interested in building this thing with me.

Tonight is the night we will meet in my home, and there is only one problem: I don’t feel ready.

For one thing, there are dirty dishes in my sink. Also, my carpets are grimy and overdue for a steam cleaning. Oh, and there is a basket of laundry I wanted to fold and put away before welcoming strangers into my abode. And I stink. Did I mention I didn’t have the chance to take a shower today? Which means that in addition to stinking, I also have greasy hair.

What will happen when these mothers come to my house and see my greasy hair and dirty carpets? Will they feel that they couldn’t trust their children with me?

When it comes to art, my aesthetic is to value that which isn’t perfect. I adore the handmade ceramic bowl with an out-of place blob of color that splashed up when the potter lowered the bowl into the glaze. Sculptures crafted from rusty, decaying bedsprings that have been ‘reclaimed’ and reborn as art. Abstract paintings that look so primitive and simple, a child may have painted them.

But when it comes to my home and my appearance, my aesthetic takes a radical departure. I envy the washboard-flat; slightly concave abdomen flashed by a supermodel over the tire that is my own abdomen. I lust after the light, airy, and uncluttered homes I see in “Sunset” magazine, complete with rooms painted in impeccably matched earth tones. I voyeuristically observe the dinner parties featured on its pages, the Pacific Rim cuisine looking delicious, the napkins on the table matching the ceramic “accent” vase poised on the mantelpiece. This is how entertaining should be.

Yet, I’ve rarely been entertained this way. I’m sure the food at such a gathering would be amazing, but would I be able to tell an off-color joke? Drink one too many glasses of wine? Break into an arm-wresting match with my husband and son, bystanders shouting their bets over us? In short, would it be that much fun?

There is a simple remedy for all my imperfections-throwing money at the problem. A housecleaner can sterilize my home and put it into order. Laser treatments can zap the errant hairs from my chin, and a tummy-tuck can help me approximate the concavity of a movie star’s belly. So I can work, and spend, and become perfect, but to what end? Would there be a medal at the end of it all, or a spread in Sunset? Would I win the envy of my peers? Because “perfect” is only perfect when there is imperfection out there.

A perfect home is only enviable because most homes aren’t that way. Most people at some point value their time, their relationships with others, and their lives too much to spend all their time, and money, on making their bodies and homes appear perfect.

The truth is -- I’ve never been close to those who are perfect. I find it impossible to enjoy intimacy with some one unless I can see that they are imperfect, human, and vulnerable. In turn, I cannot expect others to feel intimate with me unless I am willing to be vulnerable with them. Which may mean I have to let them see a dirty dish in the sink. Or notice that when I smile, my teeth are stained yellow.

Tonight I hope to embark on an imperfect relationship with imperfect people. I expect to feel nervous when they enter my living room and see the carpet. But I hope that despite their own imperfections, they are able to sense that I am really nervous because I want them to like me, I want this co-op to work, and I want to like them, too.

And from there we will move forward.

Ellen Catalina

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It should be easy. I notice something and the words come to mind so quickly.

Sometimes there is magic. My fingers are like magnets on the keyboards; the words a continuous flow from brain to digits. It is almost as if I’m not involved. Not to go all woo-woo here, but it is something akin to channeling.

Ah, but then there are the other times. The times when the sentence is all wrong. It might sound good but, really, it makes no sense. There is no meter or flow. If I were playing an instrument it would be off key.

I can look for excuses and do! E-mail!!! Oh, what a pain. There are so many. (Oh, good, there are lots to answer so I have no time to write!)

The phone rings. Not again. (Perfect! I have someone fun to talk to about anything – except writing!)

Sometimes, there is dusk on my desk and there is simply no way I can write with that grime. Who could? I make a pledge to Pledge the desk. There! It is clean.

And there – is my empty screen.

So much to write. So much to say. No idea where to begin.

At the beginning. Just start. Go ahead. Do it.

This is the hardest part. The empty white space of the computer represents the possibility of letting out everything I have been holding inside for a year and a half.

I have never been more afraid to write than I am now.

For too long I’ve skated away with humor, funny lines.

As I sit on my comfy mesh chair, my brand new, black, MacBook ready to support whatever it is I have to say -- somehow I have to gather the courage to let go, open my deepest wounds.

A box of tissues is already on my desk, waiting to be pulled. Ready to collect my emotions.

Once I can do those things -- then I will find the words.

By Dawn Yun

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Subsequents was a term I learned from my online searches the week after Aaron died.

I guess it was an easier way of saying “having another child after losing a child.” But there was something about this clinical-sounding label that lent a controversial tone to the chat rooms in the various bereaved parent sites.

I never weighed in on any of these conversations. I’m not the online chatting kind of person, frankly, which makes this site a bit ironic for me. The issue of subsequents had a long response chain, with parents, mostly mothers, offering their perspectives on how they were preparing for (and worrying about) their next child, and on their process behind considering the “right amount of time” after their child’s death.

There were also practical considerations: what to do with their baby’s clothes, the crib, their fears, the statistics of having it happen again in the same family. And then there were the naysayers. The ones who interrupted these discussions with haughty, holier than thou (can you hear my bias?) diatribes against their decision against having a “replacement child.”

I wondered how families whose firstborns died from SIDS felt about that. Part of the grieving process is coming to terms with your own changes as a mother, as a family, as a woman. We were a family of five and then we weren’t. Not technically, anyway. Aaron still held his position in our family, and we loved to rehash the special moments with him: his perfectly timed grunts in church, the magical effects of “Yellow Submarine” that would stop his screams in his car seat.

We talked about how much we missed him, but we acknowledged this loss as a move to a different location, not as a removal from our family. Tyler, who was only three when his brother died, was Aaron’s ardent supporter and would quietly correct me with, “Mommy, you have two boys” when people asked about our family.

But Aaron’s memories didn’t count when we were in line for movie tickets or planning a family vacation. I couldn’t let go of the reality that we were supposed to be a family with three children gathered around the Christmas tree, driving to Disneyland, arguing in the grocery store about who could sit in the cart. Call it zone defense, call it one man down, call it slightly out of control -- I was desperate to return.

I felt like a fraudulent mother of two.

By Kimberley Kwok

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Once again, it’s me and my husband against a hostile world. Or, to be fair and accurate, we’re cocooned in shared hostility against a world of blithe hilarity. We’re sitting in a darkened theater watching Dan in Real Life, which earned a man falling out of his chair in the pink section of the San Francisco Chronicle.

People all around us are falling out of their chairs, too. We sit there stone-faced and silent. Just like we did at Amadeus, Forrest Gump and countless other highly acclaimed movies. There’s nothing more intimate than swimming upstream together against the torrent of popular taste. We also love movies everyone else hates. And it’s not just a matter of simple snobbery: Miss Congeniality and Legally Blonde are high on our list.

We even devised a foolproof rating system for couple’s compatibility based on 10 most loved and 10 most hated movies. Movie taste in the middle tier doesn’t affect the ratings. This allows my husband to indulge his craven appetite for Die Hard 3 and me to favor movies about dying mothers without triggering a call to an attorney specializing in divorce. However, we once ran into trouble with a serious dispute over a real movie, The Piano, which my husband mistakenly disliked. All is well, though. We decided to jettison our theory -- instead of our marriage.

Come to think of it, our first fight was over a movie. Emerging from The Breakfast Club, which he had loathed and I had merely disliked, I asked, “Why do they make movies like that?” Jonathan replied, “Because people like you like them.” It was the meanest thing he’s ever said to me.

But our first dates were also movies. I remember The Marriage of Maria Braun. Or, to be fair and accurate, I remember nothing about it except the mutual groping and falling into lust and love.

Now it’s just as likely to be mutual griping, which is every bit as fun.

By Lorrie Goldin

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Smooth Satisfaction

Yesterday, my day was occupied by the extremely rare all-day date with my husband. We made romantic eyes at one another over the roar of the outside world. We flirted with each other using strength and varying body positions. We were happy to have the other’s sweat land on our bodies.

Yes, romance after seven years of marriage is not dead. Due to a last-minute cancellation by his parents, who were coming to stay with us, my husband was left with the extremely rare pre-scheduled day off of work.

I pictured him saying, “Let’s rent a convertible and cruise up to the wine country, tasting wine and eating delicious food during the cherished four hours that the kids will be in school.” I waited excitedly in anticipation while he took two days to decide what he would do.

Finally, he approached me and said, “I think that I will take Monday off…,” my heart is beating faster with romantic anticipation, “…to sand the deck.”

What the hell?

Aaah, romance daddy-style: he continues, “We could drop the kids off together,” (all of which fit the picture in my head), “then we could stop off at Hertz to rent some belt sanders,” (now we are veering quite a bit from my vision), “and we could sand the deck together,” (obviously not even in the realm of my brain).

I had two choices. I could do what I usually do and complain about how I never get time off, especially time alone with him and wouldn’t it be romantic to do some old school fooling around? Or, I could do what I decided to do and let him get what he desired without a fight.

Once I had the proper mindset, I was determined to be a deck-sander Bob Villa would want to hire, which would definitely be possible because our deck is bigger than most backyards in Marin.

I got dolled up in my ratty work clothes, being consoled by knowing that my husband would find this sexy. I headed outside to what I was told was perfect deck-sanding weather, partly cloudy, but not raining. I had to admit, the weather Gods were on his side as well, so I hunkered down for some work.

After about ten minutes of brain noise arguing the countless other things that I would rather be doing with my “free” time, I was able to let myself clear my head (the extremely loud noise helped in this department) and be completely absorbed by this activity. I got lost in the beauty of the loud screams of the sander that sounded nothing like my children. I focused on the power of smoothing out that one especially stubborn splinter-causing square inch. Take that, and that, and that, and finally -- smooth satisfaction.

When I hugged my husband today, I had to verbally yelp due to using dormant muscles for four hours yesterday, but my husband has one less thing on his To-Do list and he considers our time together sanding the deck as bonding.

Romance is still alive, if you allow yourself the freedom to find it.

By Jennifer O’Shaughnessy

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I have been swung by my moods ever since I can remember, from the infrequent highs to the more common lows. Each mood pinched me like a currently popular article of clothing that everybody else wore with style, but somehow mine was the wrong material and size.

Not quite right.

As a child I was aware that others were not having the same life experiences as I was but I could not understand why.

I recognized that there were things you could control and things you could not. I put my moods in the same category as the weather. Certainly there must be a scientific explanation but I could never understand it, let alone control it.

I learned how to cope. I mastered matching my energy to the tasks at hand and retreated when I needed to. Being alone was the best way I knew to regain my balance.

But now I have a family of my own and time alone is a luxury. And as a respectable member of the PTA I can no longer rely on my self-prescribed doses of mochas for depression and marijuana for mania. Medicating my anxiety disorder has not worked out so I am trying hard to find my balance naturally.

Trying to parent with my particular brain chemistry is especially challenging. It is not just that I have no patience. It is that I do not understand patience. I share my children’s demand for instant gratification and truly relate to their pain. But I do not know how to guide them through by showing them a better way. I feel unable to set a better example because I do not know what that would be.

How can I teach what I never learned?

I worry that my children are destined to suffer as I have. I want to protect them from everything. I want to shield them from the judgments of others and I hope to teach them not to judge themselves too harshly. I just want them to fit in and be happy. I study every tantrum for evidence of something other than age appropriate bad manners. Are they “okay?” To me, every child appears to have a mood disorder. Almost all of the behavior I witness seems “inappropriate” but can I be objective?

As I watch for signs of trouble I try to be supportive and provide them with outlets for their frustration. I highlight choices we can all make to handle our feelings successfully.

I never got the help I needed as a child, but now I hope that my children and I can help each other.

By Cathy Burke

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Rich Man, Poor Man
Author: Unknown

Rich Man, Poor Man,
Beggar Man, Thief,
Doctor, Lawyer,
Indian Chief.

When my oldest brother was born in 1961 within his trousseau of baby garments was a little white linen shirt with red piping that has “doctor, lawyer, Indian chief” embroidered on the bodice. What was assumed, of course, was that his future opportunities were abundant. This golden haired, bright, blue-eyed babe had the world as his oyster.

Grandparents fawned over him, their first grandchild. A grandson! A faded photo captures a frail, but over the moon, silver-bunned great-grandmother giving his sweet-smelling head a tender stroke while his beaming mother stands in the background.

Life was full of promise.

But then Life’s path diverted and a diagnosis of schizophrenia at mere 14 years of age claimed all promise.

The path stopped.

I wrap my three young children in thick, terry-cloth towels after their bath and nuzzle in the warm smell of their soft skin.

Their laughs send me on a flight of joy.

Their insights into the world around and outer space leave me humbled by curiosity and intuitiveness unhinged by assumption, presumption or doubt.

The world is their oyster. Heavens await. “I want to grow up to be…” is met with an assured, “Sounds good!”

Any opportunity may be granted.

And yet. I think to that now creamed-colored linen shirt tucked away that lay such promise.

Given Life’s twists and turns it’s naive to expect that my children’s unencumbered, free-flowing glorious dreams will need only aspiration to be attained.

But that is my hope. And my blessing. May it be granted.

By Maija Threlkeld

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I clutched my belly, steeling myself for the next wave of pain. “Your uterus is practicing,” the doula said. Her gut and experience told her that I was having prodromal labor.

I’d never heard of prodromal labor. Sounded like something that pregnant dolphins went through. And it sure felt to me like labor, the kind that came after nine months of carrying a little joey inside your body, in a really big pouch.

Besides, her gut wasn’t having a conniption fit – mine was. The contractions were coming on like clockwork, every – five – minutes – I – could – barely – catch – my – breath – and – and – find something to focus on besides the pain.

She suggested that I go about my day, and if things progressed, I’d give her another call. That Saturday, I had a bunch of errands to run, as the baby was officially due in another two weeks. I was going to buy a dresser for the baby. And get fitted for a nursing bra, after being advised that my cup size was going to be larger, thank goodness. Oh yes, my husband was going to take a photo of my pregnant belly, that really pregnant side shot that Demi Moore made famous.

None of that happened, but I did manage to finish packing my bag for the hospital. An hour and a half, and eighteen sets of contractions later, I even managed to finish a collage to pin up in the labor and delivery room. Pictures of scenic places, a serene Buddha, a harbor seal and her baby.

Did seals have prodromal labor? I still wasn’t sure if I was. Now it was late morning, and I lay crouching on my exercise mat, huddled under a blanket, listening to music my husband had prepped for the hospital. Between contractions, still five minutes apart but lasting thirty to forty seconds, I flipped through the worn pages of What to Expect When You’re Expecting and read up on the signs for true labor and false labor.

The doctor-on-call thought I would deliver that weekend, but the doula, after another phone call in the early afternoon, continued to trust her gut and assure me that the real thing could be days or weeks away. Days or weeks of this agony? I was shivering, tired from bouts of pain in the night, barely able to speak as the shadow of another oncoming contraction loomed.

After talking with my husband, the doula went out of town. I stayed huddled on my mat in the fetal position, singing my way through each crest of pain. I regained some strength and ate a bowl of oatmeal, which my body promptly expelled. Here I had envisioned a warm bath, a birthing ball for comfort, a teddy bear of a doula to lean on. But all I had was my Baja blanket draped around me, Paul Winter on soprano sax, and my husband clacking away on his keyboard in the next room. No food in my stomach, although the doula advised me to eat before going to the hospital.

Around three o’clock, I passed a lot of blood. No time to be squeamish now, or to speculate, “Is that a true or false, prodromal or actual labor?” My husband grabbed our bags, helped me into the car, and sped toward California Pacific.

At every traffic light, past every large building that resembled a hospital, I wished I were there already. “Honey, I’m afraid I might have the baby in the car,” I said. Even a warm, dark movie theater would do.

I got wheeled in to admissions, where the nurse informed us that I was nine and a half centimeters dilated. My uterus had galloped along at a good clip, and I was in the ninth inning, bases loaded. The doula was out of town somewhere, sipping a margarita.

The staff wheeled me right up to a delivery room, no questions asked. A nurse guided me through the final phase of pushing. It was like an elephant trying to come through the kitty door. If that sounds like an exaggeration, just ask any mother who has given birth to a baby -- whether seven pounds or 70. It took only forty-five minutes of pushing, and then a precious little body, gelatinous and warm, slipped out. My son, whom we named Alex, had large blue eyes and a rosy complexion. We held our first-born, beaming, proud, and teary-eyed as any first-time parents. His Apgar score was a nine out of ten. Excellent! Our son did well on his first standardized test.

As for the doula, we’re glad we didn’t trust her gut. We got to the hospital in time. And by that point, the doula was superfluous. She professed that she’d done right, and didn’t take responsibility at first for her mistake. She thought she was doing us a favor by charging a hefty retainer fee for her services. “You didn’t call me when you went to the hospital,” she said defensively. Her advice: keep practicing. Or maybe we should have waited for her to arrive from wherever she was while I had the baby in the car.

It amazes me how doulas fall outside the medical system, which frees them from responsibility beyond their own ethics. Of course, I can’t argue that a lot of women have benefited from doulas. One of her clients called her a “divine doula.” But how about “doubting doula” or “dubious doula?” Or, as one mom exclaimed, “damn doula!”

In the end, what really mattered was that I could trust my body. Every five minutes, it told me exactly where I was headed. And when the time came, a precious little being came into the world, without drugs, without divine doula intervention.

What more could a new mom ask for?

By Li Miao Lovett

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I’m in spin class, trying to focus as the hyper-perky instructor barks out orders to “make smooth, full circles with each pedal stroke!” But as a funky remix of an old Sarah McLachlan tune blares, tears slide down my cheeks. Luckily, the room is dark. I duck my head, pedal harder, and hope no one will notice it’s not just sweat making my face glisten.

In my head, McLachlan’s soothing voice is drowned by the harsh sound of two words that pound over and over again in time to the music: atypical behavior, atypical behavior, atypical behavior. . .

I’ve been hearing them since I left a meeting at my five-year-old’s school to discuss her behavior problems.

“So I guess we can all agree that this is atypical behavior for a kindergartner and that the next step is a complete social and mental evaluation?” the principal asked, looking around at the others in her office: Phoebe’s teacher, the school counselor, a child psychologist, and another child development professional.

They nodded and smiled sympathetically. Phoebe’s teacher had just finished describing her behavior in detail.

While her classmates sit quietly and listen, my daughter’s teacher explained, she frequently interrupts with loud, often random remarks. Other times, she lets loose blood-curdling screams that are way over the top in relation to the minor mishap or verbal slight -- real or imagined -- that elicited them. She fails to pick up on social cues that are obvious to others. She’s oblivious, for example, to body language that clearly says “back off” when she puts her hands on her hips and practically mashes her face into the face of another child to make a point.

I wish I could deny seeing similar behavior outside of school. But I can’t.

It was painful and hard to hear my precious girl -- who is also known for her lively, funny, super-imaginative ways -- described as atypical; to know that she will likely be diagnosed with a behavioral or mental disorder that could affect her for life.

It was also a relief.

Perhaps now I can stop second-guessing what my heart and gut have been telling me for so long -- that something’s not right with my child.

Perhaps I can let go of some of the guilt I feel for somehow causing her behavior. Perhaps instead of wasting energy worrying about her, I can focus on working with a caring team of educators and child development experts and get into action to help her.


By Dorothy O’Donnell

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When you get the perfect perch in a tree, you’re cradled.

You straddle a thick branch while the coarseness of the bark works like Velcro or the sticky backside of a postage stamp.

There, you can lean back against the upstretched limb behind you, or you can lean forward to the branch reaching sideways in front of you. If you’ve got your notebook with you, you can rest it on that side-reaching limb: nature’s desk.

From the vantage point of the tree, you can see the horizon further than you could on the ground.

But if you’re 37, you’re not really that high up.

As a kid in the Pacific Northwest, you used to climb the Douglas firs, tree sap snarling your brown braids and staining your jeans.

But this tree’s different.

It’s not a fir; it’s a gangly pine in northern California on the Pacific Ocean. You’re about six feet off the ground and you haven’t had to get into the needles yet. The thought’s occurred to you to go higher, to let the needles catch in your hair. To grab a pinecone, toss it across the lawn, let the cone sap gum up your fingers.

But you’re different.

It’s been 25 years since you were that serious tree climber along Pipeline Road, higher than the power lines. Recovering from a bone break now doesn’t sound so exciting – it wouldn’t be such fun to see what your friends would write on your cast; it wouldn’t be such fun to see how you’d manage life with two kids, a job, and a third floor apartment.

So you’ve met this tree, this old friend, halfway.

You’ve climbed up her trunk, found one of her low-reaching and welcoming branches and hoped to have another 25 years of her at this level.

You try not to think of brown braids gone gray and coiled atop your head. You try not to think of yourself in the slow rocker your grandkids might drag out to the base of the tree, so you can watch them climbing above you to the tippy top.

Instead, you close your pen cap and shut your notebook, dropping them to the grass with a ting and a thud, and lean across nature’s desk to simply take in the crash of the waves and the squawks of the fish-greedy gulls.

To watch from above is what the tree offered from the very, very start, after all.

By Anjie Reynolds

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After a long six weeks culminating in a disastrous conference with Eric's kindergarten teacher (and his principal!), we decided to pull him out and try again next year. They were pretty clear that he was not ready and we finally had to agree. I already figured he would repeat next year but it hadn’t occurred to me that he wouldn’t make it through this year.

I have known from the start it was not a good fit. I never warmed up to the teacher and it didn't help that Eric kept insisting she thought he was "stupid and the dumbest one.” While I am pretty sure she never said that to him directly (and by the way he is not!) the fact that he sensed that she thought it is a clear indication that he is pretty bright, but unappreciated.

In a way I feel vindicated! For once I wasn't just being hysterical! He really is immature!

I mean, I knew he wasn’t ready “academically,” but I thought he would have all year to get that stuff and I truly believed that his spunk would be his best attribute instead of his downfall. Because he was so “behind” the rest of his class, he was frustrated. This, plus his tenacity and an unsympathetic teacher, resulted in tantrums and inappropriate behavior and led ultimately to regular trips to the principal’s office.

The bottom line is that he was miserable and so was I. His spirit was broken and hearing daily that he hated school broke my heart.

The good news (finally) is I found a preschool that seems just right. He is now with his peers and loves school again. He is learning, but not under constant pressure.

I have finally stopped feeling like I am a terrible mom and am back on track. Now I am doing extra pushups to get my chest ready for that mother of the year award I finally deserve. I had pretty much forgotten about it, what with torturing my children daily with too much TV, sending Eric to kindergarten too early, and constantly screaming at them.

But things are so much better now.

Eric is finally where he is supposed to be, even though this was not in our plan (or budget). I wanted him to be ready to be in kindergarten because I was ready for him to be in kindergarten. But now that I got over that (okay, I finally realized it is not all about me...) I can do the right thing.

He is so much better off waiting a year. Thank goodness we are going through this now and the result is another fun year of learning for him versus not paying attention and pushing him too soon.

Plus now I get to spend more one-on-one time with both of my sons. Who knew I would enjoy that? And I actually get more time to myself. Eric naps at his new school and stays there till 4:00. Then I pick up Paul and drop him home before getting Eric. We're all more relaxed.

Now my only nagging thought is that Eric will be eighteen when he is in high school -- and he could be tried as an adult.

By Cathy Burke

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It happened the first time I ventured out alone with my first baby. “What’s your husband?” the lactation consultant asked as she scrutinized my two-week old’s face. “Huh? Oh, um. . . Chinese,” I stammered, wondering what this had to do with breastfeeding.

“Oh, mixed babies are so beautiful!” She went on to tell me how her cousin married a Japanese woman and they have the most exotic-looking children. Sleep deprived, I just sat there, nipples burning, with no idea how to respond.

As I left the appointment, the woman at the front desk took a peek. “Oh, he looks just like his father,” she commented. Since she’d never meet my husband, I was a little confused. By the time I got home, my initial confusion had been replaced with sadness. Would navigating insensitive comments become as much a part of my new mothering experience as sleepless nights and painful nipples?

The comments happen everywhere – the park, vacation, at preschool, restaurants, the pediatrician’s office, and waiting in line at Starbucks. There are the well-meaning strangers, who without even saying hello, ask, “Where did you get him?” like my child is a miniature horse in a 4-H exhibit. Other questions I’ve been asked include, “Is he Oriental?” like he’s a rug, and “What’s his nationality?”

Then there are the comments about the supposed special beauty that “mixed” children share. If I was to approach a random Swedish mother and gush about how beautiful Swedish children are, she’d round up her kids faster than you can say “creepy.”

I have become proficient in the smile-politely-and-change-the-subject routine. However, there is one question that always gives me pause.

“What is he?”

Yes, I really have been asked this question. It happens infrequently enough that I never remember to answer, “A hyper Labradoodle.”

Strangers don’t see the ways my son is like me. His toothy smile curves to the right just like mine. The similarity of our hair color and texture amazes our hairdresser. We gross out Daddy by wiggling our double-jointed thumbs. We share a passion for books with interesting characters, dark green treasures and baking (and eating) “yummy stuff.”

It doesn’t matter that strangers don’t see these things. What’s important is that I navigate the inevitable questions confidently and help my son build a healthy self-identity. But, I think it will be awhile before ethnicity becomes an issue. For now, I’m just trying to convince him that boys can play with pink toys.

By Maya Creedman

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My daughter and her friend took off early Wednesday morning for L.A. without saying goodbye. In their haste to hit the rain-slicked streets before rush hour, they just forgot. I am stunned.

“I can’t believe you left without saying goodbye!” I want to berate her via cell. But then I imagine her swerving into the guardrail at 70 miles per hour as she digs the phone out of her purse. Not only will it be my fault that she’s gone, but my last memory will be tainted by anger, hurt and guilt. Maybe I’ll just sit tight.

Uptight is more like it. Whenever one of my daughters is on the road, I never completely relax, but this is worse. I crave face-to-face, skin-to-skin contact as much as any newborn. Without eye contact, without that hug goodbye, I feel undone. I could let her go more easily with a goodbye embrace to brace me for the reality that her life is completely out of my control.

I think of the movie, Dead Man Walking, which made a huge impression on me. But it isn’t the astonishing performances by Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon I remember. Instead, it’s the mother of the murdered girl recalling how their last conversation was about how her daughter scotch-taped her ripped hem before she left for school because there wasn’t time to mend it. If she had only known she’d never see her again alive, the mother lamented, she would have said something less trivial.

How many times does the press of morning heat tempers beyond boiling? The mother and daughter in Dead Man Walking didn’t even part on bad terms, just banality. After seeing this movie, I made sure never to pick a fight with my daughters before school. Each morning I’d pack them off with a nutritious lunch and a feeling of unhurried love. Just in case anything should happen.

My daughter calls as they are pulling up to her friend’s house to let me know they have gotten to L.A. safely.

“You didn’t say goodbye!” Now that she’s cut the engine, I can’t help myself.

“I called it out. You were in the bathroom. Sorry.”

We chat about the drive, her plans to cruise Melrose Avenue for celebrities, the news from home, including her grandmother’s best friend dying of cancer sooner than expected, before we had a chance to visit.

“That’s so sad,” she sighs.

Later in the week she calls and leaves a cheery message on the answering machine. I’m glad she’s having a good time. I’m having a good time, too, as I walk the dog, go to work, make dinner. Nobody would know that I am still holding my breath. I barely know it myself.

But I can’t erase her message. Not until I see her again, hug her hello and hear all about L.A. When she’s safely back, the hole left when she didn’t say goodbye will be mended. We’ll be able to forge memories that don’t leave a bad taste, just in case.

Then I can erase her message.

By Lorrie Goldin

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I spent most of my life thinking I was not creative. When others would talk about their artistic endeavors, I’d joke, “I don’t have a creative bone in my body.”

Creativity was not valued in my youth. Making good grades, completing household chores and babysitting my five younger brothers were important.

Most everything else was deemed frivolous.

Then along came my one and only son, Nick. His birth sparked a creative lust. I needed to express more than my breast milk. Creating this beautiful little boy made me feel like I could create other things.

For the first few years of his life, I scrap booked. I delighted in my pages of cute layouts, decorated with stickers and fancy paper borders. I was mostly arranging pre-cut fabricated materials, but it was more artsy than anything I’d ever done.

Then I tried a drawing class. This took guts. I could draw the outline of a house and I could draw a fish. I almost walked out of the first class when it hit me that my fellow classmates would see my scribblings. But the teacher was terrific and somehow made that classroom a safe place. I was soon drawing at home, in parks, on vacation. I didn’t care who saw my drawings.

And then I started writing. My real passion. I was afraid that I’d have trouble finding topics, finding my stories. But I don’t have difficulty discovering things to write about: only trouble finding the time to write.

I like that my now ten-year old son is growing up in a home that values time spent on creative projects. That he sees me sometimes (but not often enough) choose a morning of writing over a morning of house cleaning. He thinks his mom is creative. He doesn’t know he’s my inspiration, my first and best creation.

By Marianne Lonsdale

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Four lovely, nearly teenage girls joined us in the warm pool at the gym today. As the pool is the size of a parking space, it was difficult to give them much privacy in their earnest discussions about their teachers and parents.

We did our best. My four-year old daughter simply let her mouth fall open, to stare in tactful, open worship of big girls. This left Emi, my two-year old, and I some time together to play jump into my arms and spit water.

Within a few minutes, the tweens’ voices grew hushed. I could feel my neck tense up as I caught a glimpse of a blonde twiggy girl doing a hand-covering-mouth gesture while pointing at my child. I turned and smiled at the girls, who looked away and leaned closer together. Some one said, “Did you see it?” and they each started to glance sideways at my littlest daughter.

We had arrived.

The girls were pointing at the long pink scar that descends down Emily’s tiny chest from sternum to mid-belly, highlighted by miniature scars beside it where the surgery thread entered her body. I’d wondered what this inevitable moment would feel like, where some ignorant soul did some rubbernecking at my kid’s marked-up torso. When I imagined it, I thought I’d puff up and feel protective, maybe throw an icy look at the guilty party to punish them.

But there we were, all sitting in the soothing bubbly water. The catty hissing of the girls landing on my unaware miracle child came and went. I felt no need to protect my daughter, no pain or embarrassment. Just a watery pity for people who don’t see her accurately.

The good news was better than I had expected. As long as I know that my daughter’s heart defects and how they are witnessed on the soft surface of her body don’t define her, the petty, rejecting side of social life doesn’t really pose any danger.

She’ll know soon enough that her heart needs extra care. Hopefully, this knowledge will remain just information, aside from her wholeness and pricelessness.

Maybe, most days, she’ll let the shallow, blind reactions of others dissolve like lumps of sugar in a glass of clear water.

By Avvy Mar

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Mateo walks into the kitchen as I’m unloading the dishwasher wearing his red pajamas with the fire engines on them. He turns to the side so I can see his profile, and from that angle he looks like an extremely short, three-year-old Jackie Gleason: all stomach.

“Look, Mommy,” he says. “I have a baby in my tummy.”

He lifts up his fire engine top and there, tucked inside his undershirt, is his stuffed green sea turtle, Tortuga.

“How nice!” I say. “A little baby for Mateo.”

“Baby grow big.” He opens his eyes wide for emphasis.

In Mateo’s world, babies in tummies are everywhere: The aisles of Safeway, the playground, and the pediatrician’s waiting room are filled with babies in tummies. The Lion class teacher and the assistant principal at his preschool have them, as does his speech therapist, Ms. Cydney. Even the substitute babysitter we hired last Friday night showed up eight months pregnant.

But the one tummy that doesn’t have a baby in it is mine. That’s one tummy that’s never had a baby in it.

I turn from the dishwasher and crouch to Mateo’s eye level. He knows both he and his sister, Olivia, were adopted. I tell him the now-familiar tale of how he was born in Guatemala in another lady’s tummy, his Guatemalan mommy. I fill in the details as I know them, ending with the plane ride home to San Francisco. I assure him that Mommy and Daddy love him more than any other little boy in the whole wide world.

After I finish, he crawls into my lap.

“I like that lady,” Mateo says, referring to his birth mother. He calls her by name. “She nice.”

“She is nice,” I agree.

“I want to be in Mommy’s tummy,” he says, pouting. He pushes me to the floor and lifts up my T-shirt. He pulls it over his head and snuggles into me. “I love Mommy.” His voice is muffled.

I hug him through my shirt. He’s such a little boy, but must understand so much. My own life, with biological parents and siblings, seems so easy and straightforward by comparison.

“I love you, too, Mateo,” I say. We sit on the floor for a long time.

By Jessica O’Dwyer

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My five-year-old wanted to be Martha the Hippo last Halloween. Phoebe's a huge fan of the mischievous character from the “George and Martha” children’s books. Like her, Martha doesn’t always behave appropriately. She lights up cigars, skips sunscreen and tells the occasional fib.

I was proud of Phoebe for breaking out of the fairy-princess rut she’s been stuck in for the last three years. Finding a Martha costume, however, wasn’t easy. Hours of surfing the Internet yielded hippo costumes deemed too babyish by my daughter.

Finally, I found one that looked like it might work.

“Ooohh--I like it!” Phoebe squealed when I showed it to her. Too late, I realized it was an adult mascot costume that cost more than my wedding dress.

“Sorry, honey—it’s only for grown-ups,” I said.

“But I want to be Martha!” she wailed, tears welling in her dark eyes.

I hated to see her hopes of being Martha crushed. It was time to step up to the plate. It was time for me to become Martha, too. Martha Stewart, that is.

A domestic goddess I’m not. Yet with Halloween a mere 10 days away, I convinced myself that I could be a crafty mama and whip up a Martha costume. With vague visions of a mask fashioned from felt and pipe cleaners, I drove to the nearest crafts store.

After much trial and error and plenty of cursing, I cobbled together a Martha mask of sorts. It bore little resemblance to the real Martha. Scarred with glue stains, Martha’s face looked more like a cross between an elephant and a crocodile. Her trademark tulip drooped instead of rising perkily behind her ear.

It was Martha to Phoebe, though. And that night she was the happiest trick-or-treater on our block.

By Dorothy O’Donnell

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I knew motherhood would change me in myriad ways, that physically, emotionally, spiritually -- life would never be the same.

But there’s one change I never expected and am not too proud of. Overnight I’ve transformed from a dare-devil to a worry-wart. No longer am I the give-me-a-destination-and-I’ll-go-there-girl, Hong Kong, Katmandu, Rio, all the better.

Now I’d just as soon not drive on the freeway.

It wouldn’t be so bad if I were merely the, do we have enough diapers, wipes, sunscreen, juice and Goldfish? type of obsessive mom-worrier. Really, it’s amazing that I can accomplish
single task, given the list that pursues me wherever I go, the ticker-tape of items I am constantly scanning for, trying to corral along with us.

Nor simply have I become an Infinite Possibility Worrier. Meaning that any small movement through time and space now requires that I deluge my husband with Infinite Possibility questions: Do you think if we X, the baby will nap? Or maybe if we Z, we can ward off a fuss? Or maybe? Pete scratches his head, wondering when this relentless mother replaced the easy-
going wife he thought he was marrying but these are still small potatoes in the Big Leagues of Mom Worriers.

My true confession is that since motherhood, I’ve become fixated with stories of children’s accidents. I know it sounds ghoulish, but really, has there been an extra slew of these horrors? More coverage in the news? Maybe we’ve become too preoccupied to parent, have too many opportunities to multi-task, or the world has just become a more dangerous place. I don’t know how I’ve spent my life not even noticing these tragedies before.

Clearly those days are gone.

Despite my best efforts, I pour over the news of these children, detail by horrifying detail. Swept out to sea by sneaker riptides; abducted by strangers; falling out of un-screened hotel windows; smothered by collapsing sand dunes; suffocated in closed-up cars because the parents “forgot” the child was there. Forgot? Somehow the most unbearable was a 22-month-old who drowned in a pool while his father worked from home. I’m haunted by the image of that young dad, carrying his son in his arms, standing at the end of the driveway, waiting to meet the ambulance. The drive to the hospital. The infant could not be revived, the paper said.

What it doesn’t say is -- what happens next? I try to imagine the unimaginable: the panicked desperate attempts at CPR, the feeling of holding the child’s body grown limp or heavy, the despair, the horror, the guilt.

Reading, I swing from looking for someone or something to blame to the deepest of sympathy. Where was that parent? Why weren’t they paying attention!? To shame. How many times have I made one more phone calls, read one more e-mail, while I only vaguely knew the whereabouts of my young son?

I try to imagine these couples afterwards. Which would be worse, to be the parent who was on-duty or off? How do they ever find their way to forgiveness? To being forgiven? How do they possibly go on?

Because if there’s one thing parenthood has taught me, it’s that no matter what, you have to keep on going. My hope is that this accident-worry adds a dimension of compassion to my cluttered days -- that I always remember that somewhere there is a mother, a family, taking on the terrible tasks of informing the other family members, making it through a funeral. There are surviving siblings who will always carry the burden of loss or compensation as they try to go back to church or school or sports. Somewhere ,there are neighbors trying to find words, wondering if any condolence exists that doesn’t fall hollow.

So when my husband finds me an over-worrying nag, I try to explain. I can’t help it. This hyper-vigilance must be hard-wired into mothers. Survival of the species and all that. My mind crunches out possibilities of disaster scenarios, this calculation of odds and dangers is always with me. I can’t make it stop. If I hold the anxiety on the front-end, I must believe I can somehow ward off the unthinkable regret.

Maybe the best we can do is to use tragedy stories as a backdrop to gain perspective, as a reminder to not take a single moment for granted. That includes the spit-up that’s gone down my back and into the heels of my shoes, the magical melt-down hour of 5:00 pm, the fact that when my husband takes our son out, he manages to lose the ENTIRE diaper bag. On a regular basis. But I’m not going to worry about the small stuff.

In the meantime, I scan the headlines, riveted, holding the accident stories out in front of me
like a talisman, pretending I can keep us safe from harm.

By Mary Beth McClure

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