and then it hit me.

I was trying to get the breakfast dishes cleaned up, oy, so many of them, and really, it was just a few scrambled eggs and toast so how come there are 8 bajillion dishes anyway?  As much as the stupid dishes needed me this morning, someone else needed me too.  More.  Augh, I just wanted to finish cleaning them up and get them out of the way, compartmentalize and then move onto the next thing of my day.

I promise, I told myself, that I will focus 100% on you guys as soon as this is cleaned up!   


"Isla, Isla baby, I will pick you up in ONE minute, just let me get this put away!" I sidestep the baby reaching up for me.  She cries harder and puts her arms up, trying to catch my legs.

And then, like some mystic voice from the ether of a million mothers from times long past, I have the realization:  She won't be reaching for you for long.  Soon she will be walking away from you more and more.  Soon you won't be able to simply scoop that tiny child up into your arms and feel those little hands cup your face and nestle her head under your chin.  All too soon she will be grown and you will wish you had just left the dishes.  


I picked her up.

Don't grow up too fast, my baby

Musings on Motherhood

Some quotes I found inspiring on this otherwise uninspiring Monday morning:

"By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacationless class." -- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

"Women do not have to sacrifice personhood if they are mothers. They do not have to sacrifice motherhood in order to be persons. Liberation was meant to expand women's opportunities, not to limit them. The self-esteem that has been found in new pursuits can also be found in mothering." -- Elaine Heffner

"Motherhood brings as much joy as ever, but it still brings boredom, exhaustion, and sorrow too. Nothing else ever will make you as happy or as sad, as proud or as tired, for nothing is quite as hard as helping a person develop his own individuality especially while you struggle to keep your own." -- Marguerite Kelly and Elia Parsons

"Becoming a mother makes you the mother of all children. From now on each wounded, abandoned, frightened child is yours. You live in the suffering mothers of every race and creed and weep with them. You long to comfort all who are desolate." -- Charlotte Gray