I keep thinking about this moment two weeks ago when I was visiting Kate and my two-week-old nephew, Vinny. Kate was sitting on the couch looking so beautiful and serene, and Vinny, her first baby, was snuggled peacefully in her arms. To me, at least, her house seemed impossibly stylish and neat, and all the new and lovely baby things from her showers were lying around, sparkling clean and ready to be played with. Kate looked up from Vinny's perfect little face and asked "Does it get easier?" And all I could do was laugh and moan at the same time. If only she could see our circus of a house, the crusty Cheerios on the floor, the yogurt-y handprints on the tables and glass. If only she could hear the tantrums, the crying, the why? why? why?'s . If she could witness the mountains of diapers--not breastmilk diapers, but solid food diapers--and the backseat of our car, crowded with sticky carseats and socks, and battery-less toys, and juice boxes. Oh, the juice boxes. If she could see the endlessly exhausting days, the chasing and timeouts and spit up and wrestling and lost gloves and potty accidents and mean words and teething... and the endlessly exhausting nights of nightmares and musical beds and diaper leaks and breastfeeding...
But then I thought about those first few weeks of Charlie's life, when I didn't yet think of myself as mother first and Courtney second. When life was scary and different and I started to realize that nothing would be the same ever again. And I realized that if I were to answer her question honestly I'd have to say things don't get easier or harder, just different. Like a weight lifter, the bar seems impossibly heavy at first, but you lift and lift and add a little each day and eventually the big weights feel the way the little ones used to, and there's pleasure in that. And you're tired, but you're strong.
2 comments:
Courtney - I read this post remembering visiting you when Charlie was just a few short weeks old. I remember thinking how calm you seemed and how impossibly neat and stylish the house was. You may have felt these things that you now look back on at the time, but you too were an amazingly impressive new mom. ;)
Miss you,
Nicole
Courtney, Having just spent another week with your "hectic" life style and the kindness and love, even when you are impossibly frustrated and tired, that both you and Billy bestow on your boys makes me so proud of you. You and Billy have always been hard workers and you are attacking parenthood with the same maximum effort that you both have attacked every other challenge in your lives. As a result I get to spend time with my two loveble and challanging grandsons and leave the responsibility of raising them to you and Billy.
I did mt stint as a busy mom of two young children and now I am reaping the benefits of having two grown children who are working very hard, but love the life style choices that they they have made, in part, because like you with your kids, we also always let you two be your own unique selves.
PS Many of my friends who are your blog followers think you might have a future as a writer and I agree. I so love reading your blogs. You, unlike me, have the ability to share lots of information in just a few well planned, funny sentences.
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