A Whole New (Wednes)Day

I am never hesitant to say how much I love Wednesdays. Wednesdays are one of my two part-time days, and for the past year, I have taken the morning off. I wake up knowing that it doesn't matter what I put on or how my hair looks. I don't rush to make my coffee or hurry myself into the shower. I have more patience with Sadie and with Daisy. After dropping Sadie off at preschool at 9, I go for my long run of the week and usually run 70-80 minutes. Then I come home and take Daisy for some ball throwing or a walk. I play around on the internet a little bit. I dilly dally while taking my shower and getting ready. Sure I look at the piles of projects that need to be done, but I don't think I have spent a Wednesday morning yet accomplishing anything major. It is just a nice slow time. It is time for me.

Tomorrow my Wednesdays will change for the summer, and I am excited. Sadie's school has finished for the summer and while she has 6 weeks of camp starting later this summer, she is largely living the summer of freedom that I still relish in my memories. Swim lessons for this week and for next week. Ballet camp for a week taught by her best friend's nanny. Maybe an art class. And our beach trip. But generally, nothing stressful. And our nanny, who is was nothing short of an answer to our prayers last Fall, has her own life, her own marriage, her own long to-do lists, her own sanity to preserve too. I am thankful that she is motivated by so much more than larger paychecks for more babysitting hours. And so, I am taking Wednesday mornings and Friday afternoons and devoting them solely to Sadie this summer.

I am excited about this honestly. While I need my own time,  I have seen more and more in the past few weeks how Sadie will react to the moods that Mark and I project. She has watched the rocky rides that have pulled Mark out of town on trips twice or three times a week to visit his mom or dad and manage their heathcare issues. She has seen me worry about Daisy, worry about work, worry about the house, worry about her own ears. I have heard her say things about herself being "stressed out" or equating my stress with being super strict like my own mother was.

And I have learned that I can create my own time in windows with Sadie, and windows alone. That's the beauty of being 4. She doesn't ne

You asked, I answered.

On my morning off today, I woke up to Sadie in bed next to me, crying that Mark was not there to play with her in the morning. Daisy wanted to go out right away, and Sadie did not. I sent Sadie next door to Gran Fran's, and Daisy and I walked the alley for 10 minutes while Sadie colored at Gran Fran's house. We talked to Daddy on the speaker phone to learn that Granddaddy, who was released from the hospital yesterday after a week there and moved to the nursing home in their assisted living community, was taken back to the ER at the hospital last night for his heart.  Got Sadie out the door to preschool, and went for a 7 mile run. The sun was shining and my run was strong and fast, both rare occurrences for this 3 day a week jogger now. Home to shower and change, took Daisy out for a short walk, threw some tennis balls to her in the alley all the while checking my blackberry. Hit Tropical Smoothie Cafe, which is my Wednesday lunch spot, on my way into work, and met a man who described himself as wearing a blue and white striped shirt at 11:45, at our appointed spot.

My meeting with said man was set up by a call from him to me last week. One of our former neighbors who lived next door to us for a year or so, 3 or 4 years ago, was applying for a Top Secret Security Clearance with the U.S. State Department, and he listed me as a character reference.

This would be fun, I thought. I used to have a Top Secret Clearance when I worked at the State Department back for the summers in college. My brother, my sister in law, and my brother in law also all worked for the Government and all had Top Secret clearances for their jobs. I know what goes into these labels, and I thought it would be neat to be on the other side of the questions.

I met the man at our appointed spot and he shook my hand, promising that our conversation would take between 10 and 15 minutes. He started with his questions -- they were not simple yes or no questions, and I had to think back hard to remember things like what year did I meet our neighbor, what was his job then, etc. I made sure that the interrogator knew that my meeting our neighbor came at the same time as the birth of my child, so I was sleep deprived. I can't remember if I ever knew what he did for a living. He had a dog, we had a dog, he had a child, we had a child, neither child was sleeping so we often talked a lot when we were both drew the lucky straws to walk the dog.

At the end of the interview, the interrogator leaned closer to me and said "Mrs. Webb, I am going to be honest with you here. You seem to be hiding something from me... I have asked you numerous questions and many times, you diverted your eyes from mine and answered by looking away. Is something on your mind? Because this is a matter of national security."  OK, he didn't say that last part, but he clearly insinuated it.

"Is something on my mind?" I answered him, looking straight into his eyes. "Yes, I have a great deal on my mind. But none of it has to do with my old neighbor Albert." 

- My daughter has parent observation at ballet today and her other parent is not going to be there to observe. We did not warn said daughter about this occurrence, which might very well mean that said daughter will refuse to perform or storm out of the room. Neither will look pretty.

- My father in law is in the hospital again, and my husband is very torn between being the son that takes care of his elders and the parent that needs to care for his young one, especially when his wife is tied up at work. I am torn with guilt and resentment. And I am scared, because if it hurts this much to go through it with someone else's parents, how will I survive going through it with my own.

- And I am hungry, because I haven't eaten my smoothie yet. Because I thought it would be impolite to have the smoothie in front of you while you had nothing. But there it is, tucked in my tote bag, melting away, and this makes me very sad.

- And I have to get to work, because I have a memo due that I haven't started on. And while this time last year I was a partner and had people working for me, this time this year I seem only to work for someone else, and no one ever wants to do work for me, and at almost 42 years old, I am not very good at working for someone else and I was actually pretty good at managing people, and this sucks.

- And it is Wednesday, again, which means that the cleaning lady comes tomorrow and I really dislike Wednesday nights cleaning up for the cleaning lady and why oh why oh why cannot I not for the life of me keep our house picked up so I don't have to go through this every freaking Wednesday night. How can I both love Wednesday mornings and hate Wednesday nights. I feel like it is a bipolar day.
- And my sister is probably going to get married, to a guy who she loves, but who lives in Denver and has 2 young children who live in Denver which means we will not see her for Christmas like we always have and she won't travel as much like she always did and will this be our last year at the beach together, and if so, a professional photographer would be nice,  and while I can understand this and be happy for Sadie, I hurt for Sadie, who I really wanted to grow up seeing my sister a lot.

- And speaking of getting a photographer at the beach, I need to price bike rentals down there because we are so loving the bike right now. And why didn't I write that down on a list, that has been something just in my head for the last couple of weeks. And where is my list anyway? Mark's birthday is this weekend and I have done nothing for him. Actually, I did do something, come to think of it, and ordered two batches of things from the internet and they haven't arrived yet. Which means I need to call and follow up on shipping date. What a pain. Why can't anything be easy. And the cake, I need to make a cake. Come to think of it, I really just want to eat cake.

So this is what goes through my mind during this interview. So I divert my eyes to his questions? Yes, I guess I do. I so crave order, and I have relatively none.

Ordinary time.

I love holidays. We decorate for Christmas to the absolute excess, and I listened to Christmas carols from Halloween through the start of March this year (exclusively). I love hosting Thanksgiving dinners for 15, and all the planning and cooking that goes into them. I love the 4th of July decorating traditions that we had growing up in the Misage household. And, we celebrate every birthday we can in our house... even Daisy is never without a cake and numerous cards and presents on her birthday. Now that Sadie is old enough to paint words for banners, we are rarely without one (the banner she made for me for Mother's Day is still draped the length of the dining room table).  If we can have a party, we will have one. We are celebrators. Mark, Sadie and I... we are all extroverted, all loud (well I am the loudest, followed pretty closely by Sadie), and all very happy to be in a hectic social setting.  We are energized from activity.

But recently, I have really craved Ordinary Time. Time to just be. And that time just doesn't seem to come around. It has been one thing after another for the last year or more. We had a nice "respite" for Christmas where everyone was healthy and happy and Sadie slept until 8:45 a lot of mornings, making us wonder what she might have been resting up for. And then, life just took off this Spring.  One ear infection after another for her. Upsetting drama as we saw Mark's parent's health take very real turns for the worse. Even our wonderful vacation to Disney seemed to have no restful moments.  Then we did a Garden Club home tour, and we were worn out.  And really, in the past two weeks, I have wondered when we will have some time to just be still.

But I looked at the calendar today, and saw that we are upon Sadie's last week of school. She will be in Pre-K next Fall, and we will start the process of testing for entrance into private schools. Next Fall we will know where Sadie will go to school from K-12th grade. How scary is that!  And before that, we have swim lessons to schedule, new camps to get prepared for. A trip to the beach which will be fantastic, I am sure. But restful? No way!  My sister Carolyn is bringing her new beau to the beach and all predictions are that they will be engaged and married very soon. More celebrating, more moments to savor. Not moments to sleep through.

Mark was leaving after dinner tonight to head to Williamsburg to see his parents and then to a meeting in Virginia Beach tomorrow. He makes the trek down to Williamsburg 2-3 times a week these days. I am thankful that my own parents are currently in excellent shape health-wise... I am not sure how we would survive dealing with more ailing parents at this stage. But my mother is turning 70 this October. My brother called on Saturday suggesting that we plan a party. Perhaps that will coincide with Carolyn's wedding - wishful thinking - so two gatherings with the Misage family are likely. How fun! How exciting. When to rest? Or rather, what to wear? Can I find a dress like Pippa's by then? Can I find a body like Pippa's by then?

So after dinner, Sadie wanted to finish up some coloring that she was doing on the island. I no longer need to help her with her art... she decides what to do and does it, often with scissors, a glue stick, and a lot of markers and papers. Today she was cutting and decorating a surfboard for a female character that appears to be on Jake and the Neverland Pirates (thank you Disneyworld!). Deep in concentration, she was cutting out a head, a neck, a body, legs, and then finally toes, all to glue on paper where she had glued the surfboard (which was decorated with flower petals). I have never seen this female character (though the theme song for Jake and the Neverland Pirates has been in my head all week), but if she is half the girl my daughter made her to be, she is one lucky surfer!  Bedtime routine is supposed to start at 7:30, and here it was 8:05.

I stopped myself before launching into my "We need to be on-time people, Sadie!" which I seem to say every morning and every night.  Instead, I grabbed the camera from the opposite counter to capture my four year old daughter. This is ordinary time. Lanky legs. A cheerleading costume. The hat I wore to go running last weekend (where was that hat?). A glue stick and some scissors. And her mind going a million miles a minute. She's so independent in her art now, it is hard to believe that she is only 4. She picks out her own clothes, she dresses herself exclusively now. She is her own person. She is no longer mine. She is her own.

Ordinary time. You have to look for it. And it passes too quickly.

Moms and Daughters

I can still remember the exact moment I had at about 16 weeks pregnant when I was swimming laps in the indoor pool at our Downtown YMCA and I had this overwhelming feeling that I was having a boy. Overwhelming, as in THIS IS A SIGN, I had no doubt that this child was a boy. Mark and I had tossed around both boy and girl names (Max for a boy, and Sadie for a girl) and I loved them both. Admittedly actually, I was more in love with the name Sadie than Max, however, because Mark was insistent that Max's formal name be Maximus, which I was not so crazy about. But I was sure, mid-lap that day in the pool in fact, that that baby was a boy baby Max and that was the end of any doubt in my mind.

So I was surprised when our wonderful doctor told me a few weeks later that he was pretty sure that the baby was a girl. Mark and I laughed when the doctor said "Its either a girl, or it better be a boy with a really good sense of humor."  And in hindsight, I wasn't really surprised, given what we knew about "boy swimmers" and "girl swimmers" and the timing of when I actually ovulated that month.
I wasn't disappointed in finding out that she was a girl exactly, but I was worried. While it is laughable now that I thought then that I had any clue about what raising a child of any gender would be like, I was worried about the mother-daughter relationship. 

My mother gave 100% of her own life to raise three daughters and one son, and today, I have tremendous respect for that. But our dynamic has never been ideal, and perhaps that is saying it nicely. I never remember a time of not fighting with my mother, not back talking to her, not having my feelings hurt by her. Not wanting her love and approval, and not feeling like I was ever getting it. I was obstinate, strong willed, "horrid" she would later tell me laughingly, like in the nursery rhyme about a girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead "...when she was good, she was very very good, but when she was bad, she was horrid."  Even as adults, it is still my father who I turn to for affirmation and a listening ear. If I want a fast lecture, my mother is always ready to give it though.

I was worried that this girl baby would have the same relationship with me that I have (or lack) with my mother, and would prefer instead her father. What if I screw her up, I often thought.

Yet, one thousand times since the day she was born, I have thanked God for giving me just the daughter I deserved. I have no doubt that it is her love of me that has made me a great mother.

Just this morning I noticed something that something that has been developing over the last few weeks - and that is a true team mentality of "Girls Rule" in our house. You can see it in the picture above where Sadie is just over-the-top to have both Tyler and I there together. She adores her father, and she is the first one out the door for the promised Daddy Daughter Daisy Donut Dates that seem to happen about every other week at Krispy Kreme.  But just in the last few weeks, she has started this funny way of seeking affirmation that she and I have a bond because we are mother and daughter. This morning she went to go to the bathroom before we were leaving for preschool and saw that Mark had left the toilet seat up. She came to the kitchen and this is what transpired:

          Sadie [with head cocked to the side and eyes a little bit squeezed, as if we were gossiping]: Mommy, Daddy left the toilet seat up again today!

          Me: Well did you just put it down and go tinkle?

          Sadie: Yes, but Mommy, we really need to do something about this. He has done it a few times now. We need to send him an email and tell him that there are more girls in our house than boys, so we get to make the rules, right? OK Mommy?

I am getting a lot of "Right Mommy?" these days, at the end of what she is saying (which, by the way, what she is saying doesn't appear to ever end really... it is a series of long diatribes but interspersed throughout I, she will redirect me with a "Right Mommy? or "OK Mommy?" and I nod, and she can move on with her story). Last night Mark joked with Sadie that he had eaten the rest of her Easter Candy and she turned to me and said "He's just joking, right Mommy?"  Again the side head tilt, the eyes squeezed together, as if to suggest that she and I are on the Side of Truth, and Daddy is stuck in the Land of Silly.

I admit that I love this. I love it with all of my heart and soul and mind. I have no doubt that boys have a wonderful bond with their mothers, or that daughters are also very bonded to their dads, but I just feel like ours is so incredibly wonderful right now. My daughter pretty much had ear infections consistently from March 17 through May 1 and, even with the magic of a multi-thousand dollar trip to Walt Disneyworld thrown in there, had her share of horrid moments over our difficult spring. But the last couple weeks have been so full of sunshine and love and laughter and bonding with us.  In the midst of getting seven shots at her four year check up the other day, when the doctor gave her two purple lollipops to cheer her up, she held the other one in her hand and said "this one is for Tyler." What kind of kid thinks charitably like that?

I still lay down on Sadie's bed every night when I put her to sleep. When she was an baby and in her toddler years, I feel like we tried every sleep training method under the sun. But ever since she has moved to her big girl bed at about two and a half, I have given in to the reading books together in bed and then laying together as we say our prayers and share our reflections on the day, in the dark, and she eventually drifts off to sleep. Sometimes it takes 2 minutes, other times it might take 15, but never more than that.

She's my only child, and I have 15 minutes to give her. The only thing waiting for me is generally housework, or television, or work emails. All of the other tasks eventually get done, though I complain about them all a lot and I never feel organized or on top of all the things I am supposed to be handling at work or at home. But I love our nighttime routine, and I kind of hope that we do it for a long long time. I love laying there and feeling like my daughter thinks that she and I are a wonderful team. As I said before, she makes me a wonderful mother.

Genetics

I love hearing my longtime friends see something in Sadie and say that it reminds them of me from way back when.  For instance, the picture to the left made a college friend comment "I recognize those moves!" remembering me dancing around one sorority party or another. I hope it is not an ego thing (I love to dance, but it is clear that I am not talented in that area).

Over the last two weeks, both Sadie and Mark have come down with wicked colds. Mark's promptly turned into a sinus infection, as it has the last 5 years according to his doctor's records, in the very same week.  He started his second round of antibiotics yesterday. Sadie's drained into hear ear and her eye, and today she started her second round of antibiotics. While I love that the four year old has learned the skill of blowing her nose (instead of letting it drip out, which is what happened for the first three years). But Sadie loves blowing her nose, so much that she mostly does it without a Kleenex in hand and then runs to me and yells "tissue!" for me to wipe it. More than once I have thought (or probably uttered) "why did you have to get your father's sinuses??"

I have had very few sinus infections/colds over the years.  But Sadie and Mark... they both seem to catch every cold and it always escalates.  She clearly has his genetics here.

But I have been exhausted from it all. Because generally, I am the one that gets up with her at night, feels the forehead, and gives her Tylenol.  And then after she falls asleep in our bed, I am the one that lays awake on a 9 inch wide place in our bed worrying about why she is getting sick again. Or worrying about how I can schedule a doctors appointment and fit it in with everything else going on the next day. Or wondering how we will survive the plane flight to Disney on Sunday if she still has ears full of fluid. It isn't that Mark is not inattentive to these issues (so he tells me). But what sense is it to have both of us fretting away?

This is one trait that I honestly hope I don't pass down to Sadie. I have no comfort at all with living in uncertainty. None. Zilch. Nada (those who know Veggie Tales will know that I sound like A Pirate Who Doesn't Do Anything).

I believe this is different than being a worry wart -- I have come to realize the distinction just recently.  Because I don't fear bad news, really, at all.  I am actually much more comfortable with the receipt of bad news than I am in the grey zone of waiting for the good or the bad. Once the bad news comes, I don't fear the consequences of it... not really. I make my plan accordingly and then act. I am honestly very comfortable once the unknown is... well... known!  Good or bad. Remove the uncertainty, and I can get moving in the necessary direction. But in the land of grey between black and white, the nighttime when I lay awake obsessing about the signs of viral versus bacterial infection and debating which it could be, when it started, how she seemed fine when we were reading a story but didn't eat anything for dinner... the area of wondering is where I find myself in full blown obsession.

I simply hate the lack of certainty.

Once we got to the pediatrician again this morning (I say again because we were there two weeks ago tomorrow at 6 pm for an ear infection, and then at 9 am the next morning for pink eye), all of my angst disappeared. This was now in the hands of someone else. A medical professional. I would soon know what to do. The grey phase was gone, and this was to become black or white. And it was -- another ear infection. Another prescription, a stronger medicine, the recommendation for a pro biotic and also a script for a nasal steroid spray. We had a plan. I was relieved, in the best mood I had been in a week (as this new cold had been slowly taking over). Sadie sensed my feeling of control and was also happy and lighthearted, notwithstanding that she has very little hearing out of her blocked ear and is blowing yellow gook every few minutes.

Living in the grey zone... that is something that I wouldn't mind she inherit from her father. He does it far better than I do. He doesn't dwell or worry like I do. And he can take the time to live in the grey to let the black or white outcome slowly... come out!  Not me. I will hurry along the answer just so it will be an answer.  Doesn't really matter if it is right or wrong, as long as it is resolved, I rarely look back. I have accepted jobs like this, bought cars like this, even bought houses and moved away (and back) like this. My positive spin is that I am perfectly comfortable with spontaneity.  Mark's not so positive spin is that I can't live with uncertainty and act rashly sometimes.  So far I haven't gotten burned.  He delays and thinks everything through for a long time (note that we got engaged after we dated off and on for many years).  Maybe we provide a nice balance to each other.

I do hope that Sadie learns something from Mark's way of action (or rather, inaction), and doesn't fear the grey stage between black and white as much as I do. But if there was anyway to change what has already happened... I would give her my sinuses in a heartbeat.

Happy Fourth Birthday

My baby turned four at 7:48-ish this morning.  It feels like decades, and yet just moments, have passed since the most wonderful doctor in the world greeted Mark and I at 7:30 am on the first floor of Henrico Doctors Hospital with his confident grin and assured us that Van Morrison indeed would be playing on cable radio in the OR for my entire C-section and that he was about to present me with a beautiful healthy baby girl, completely pain free. And he was right!

Such a remarkable contrast to dark memories of just about two years earlier when I laid on a similar hospital gurney curled up into ball onto my side as a wonderful, but far less cheerful doctor performed a spinal tap and then quietly told my husband that I was very sick. It took a long time to recover from meningitis and all that came with it. It took a long time to trust that God had a plan that had more than pain and shortcomings meant for me.

And then randomly one July evening in 2006, with no pre-planning, no supportive studies, no doctor visits, no proven techniques... I took a pregnancy test and saw the undeniable line that literally and figuratively started the path of the journey for the rest of my life. With that line, my life that was all mine ended and was replaced by a life whose most important job was to lead a unit of us.  A cohesive unit unified in all purpose...? Mmmm, not always.  Not during the moments when she wanted to be awake in the middle of the night and I wanted to be asleep! Or the moments I am trying to get the bed time routine accomplished and she is trying to explain a make-believe story taking place in her mind. Or when I am trying to get us out of the house to go to school in the mornings and she is baking a pretend cake in the oven that is almost ready, and then simply must get frosted and not in a hurried sort of way mommy, and I need to learn to be patient.  Some days I feel nothing more than a lamppost, lighting the way, or maybe even a guardrail on an interstate, with my job to be to keep just one car on the road (but withstand a lot of slamming into during bad weather).

I love so many things about my Sadie at four years old.  I love her steel trap memory and keen observation skills, I love her empathy toward animals (both real and stuffed) and vegetables (also both real and stuffed), and friends. I love that she has a sense of performance and vigor (for shows often in front of said animals and vegetables); I love her love of learning and adventure. I love that she asks why some people say "I don't care" and then says "Caring is what you are supposed to do, silly!" I love her look of determination when she rides her bike down steep hills and overcomes certain fears. And I the grin that appears on her face when we compliment a picture she has recently drawn or a list of words that she has written. I love the look on her face every night moments after she falls asleep, when she takes her thumb out of her mouth and rolls towards me unconsciously and I can study her eyelids and her cheeks and her hairline from inches away, and her sweet mouth that still relaxes in a sort of smile just like it did when she slept as an infant in my arms. I love that when Mark asks her to stop growing up so fast she looks at him thinks for a minute and says "Well Daddy I have to grow up, but I will stay little awhile longer so don't be sad OK?"

And I love that she has made me a better person. I love that after 37 years of putting myself first and my own goals and successes first in my own mind, I am no longer identified by them, or even guided by them. Now, even if fail at numerous other things in my life, like professional accomplishments, a clean and orderly house, a svelte and healthy body, etc., that I can go to bed every single night knowing that I succeeded at something far greater than those other things combined. I played some role in raising my daughter for another day. I assisted on her journey for another day.  I kept her on the interstate and out of the ditch.

Yesterday at Sadie's school was dress as your favorite Bible character day. There was no doubt in our minds that Sadie would choose to be Jonah, or rather, Archibald Asparagus dressed up as Jonah from the Veggie Tales movie. Sadie loves the Veggie Tales and we spend every day reading the stories and listening to the CD, but Jonah has an especially high ranking in her mind. Interestingly, she actually understands the most difficult concept for me as an adult which is at end of the movie (or the end of the Bible story which we all know) in which Jonah really doesn't learn much after all and still wishes that God would wipe the people from Nineveh from the face of the earth. While she loves the middle of the story, and its lasting messages, where a team of angels with incredible voice and singing talent tells Jonah that God is a God of second chances, and knows every word to that song, she has this really great way of understanding that at the end, Jonah still has a hard time understanding that God is the God of second chances. And so do we.

Sadie's costume was wonderful and I was so impressed with it all (thank you Tyler who worked endlessly on designing it, I am sure, with demands from Sadie ringing in her ears). But best of all is the scroll which is here. Sadie wrote the words on it herself.

She is, unmistakeably, my message from the Lord.

And I am thankful.

Nearing Four...

Four years ago almost exactly, today. As I tell the story to Sadie as one of her often chosen bedtime stories, on March 7, 2007, Mommy woke up feeling a little bit weird. This was the last picture Mark took right before we left the house to go to the hospital.

Last night Sadie went to bed at 7:45 pm.  Mark had to go to the office to get some things for a presentation he has today, and I had to do two loads of laundry and wrap Sadie's birthday presents.

Last year at this time, Sadie had a double ear infection and we spent the equivalent of yesterday at KidMed. I was thinking last night at 8:15 pm, as I was sitting in the kitchen with a glass of wine procrastinating on the laundry folding, that at that instant one year ago, I was likely cleaning up the puke that had resulted from me giving her Motrin on an empty stomach (this went on for a few days, I was a slow learner of that fact).  We had Sadie's 3rd birthday party the day before her birthday (so the equivalent of today) since it was a Sunday.  A house full of adults and kiddos and my child retreated to her bed 5 minutes into the dinner party for the next 2 hours. She proceeded to throw up while she was opening the presents. All over the leather couch.

Two years ago, for her second birthday, she was also sick with some virus. That year, I had the forethought to cancel her friend birthday party. So instead we went to Williamsburg and a cake that I had made with both sets of her grandparents.

On her first birthday she was healthy, but didn't nap for three days before her birthday at all and pretty much gave up morning naps all together after she turned one. I remember enjoying the day, but being worried sick that she was not getting enough sleep (a running theme for her first three years).

So this year, knock on wood, is a seemingly healthy and relaxed lead-up to the birthday.  Which led me to too much time to think.

I am fundamentally opposed to living life with regrets. I can honestly say that up until Sadie was born, I didn't have any regrets. Because I like to talk, to write, and have never lacked having "the last word" when a last word needed to be said, the periods in my life that had closure... well... they never lacked closure. Often life has been like my training for marathons. I put time into things and they yielded the corresponding results. I honestly didn't have any regrets about anything I had done.

But last night, I could feel loads of regrets entering my mind. Why didn't I savor the days? Why was I so ready for my infant to eat more, grow more, smile more, sleep more? Why did I spend hours in front of the computer diagnosing health problems that eventually often remedied themselves? Why did I keep hoping she would develop some trait faster, enter the next stage, do this or do that, then... then things would be perfect. Where did those four years go?  My mind raced on last night and still is this morning. I am not sure that these are regrets as much as they just are reflections. A lot of snapshots just entering my mind one after the other. A newborn, and infant, a toddler, a little girl... looking bright eyed to the future. And a mother in the background, worried about something or other.

I have recently gotten somewhat addicted to the show called Mad Men. Part of my love is of the fashion, the clothing from the 1960s Madison Avenue lifestyle is just incredible! But part of my fascination is seeing what really was a completely different lifestyle that most of the wives and mothers lived from what I am living right now. I often look back at my childhood with rose colored glasses, thinking that things were simpler then, easier then. But the women were bitter, lonely, and most of them not enjoying motherhood like I think I do.

So, I am not sure if I have regrets now, or if I am instead just finally but tearfully grateful for the moments that have passed.  I find it interesting that Sadie is probably just entering the age now that she is making memories that she will have forever. I remember a few things from then I was four, and then a lot more from five on.  There is a comfort in knowing that the times of the past, where I have regrets about not enjoying them more, are times that she will not ever recall. These times now, the times that I am there more than I am away, the times where we have a rock solid care giver and a great school setting, the days of awesome art projects and fun games and toys... these are the days that she will remember. I hope in these pictures, I will appear less worried. And happier. Because I am.