Mother's Day Reflection

When I asked our oldest son last year, pre-college graduation, if he would prefer a large gift or a “book of his life,” without hesitation he responded: “”I want a book of my life.”


I’ve been working on this book for, oh, something like ten years. I can’t admit to starting it when he was a baby, for three siblings of his quickly followed and life got, well, wonderfully chaotic. Nor did I get a move on at the time he told me he wanted this. I have always kept lots of stuff on my kids, photos notwithstanding. My family room chest of drawers is full of recital programs, plane ticket stubs, Playbills, postcards and letters from them requesting money from the tooth fairy. Built-in cabinets hold treasured family photo albums, the Master Copy of our family history. On the floor of my kitchen pantry, I have a large basket containing folders of each of their school years, filled with report cards, progress reports, standardized test scores, certificates of achievement. Recital schedules and sports team rosters reside in yet a different stack of folders in a matching basket next to it. Plenty of fodder for “books of their lives.”


And so I have tried to diligently work on this book on those weekend nights when I was too tired to write or do laundry, but not quite tired enough to assume a horizontal position on the sofa. Happily, almost to the day one year after he donned that cap and gown (the same ones that are now lying in the guest room chest of drawers, I finished the book of my oldest kid’s life. On Mother’s Day. Deliberately.


I wanted to spend this one celebrated day of the year celebrating the growth of my son. For I find few things more satisfying than quiet reflection on my children’s growth. As little as I take time to just sit and be still, I do love to sit back every once in a while and simply reflect back on the moments which make a life. Looking at photos of my baby in my embrace. Or in his grandmother’s arms. The smile arising from his first taste of ice cream. Running in the waves with his brother at the beach. Christmases. And later years, with high school buddies. Prom dates.


As I added to his bulging book of more than one hundred and forty pages of a life full of moments, I was able to recall those times, as well as the emotions that I felt at the time. And I was filled with satisfaction. Deep, enormously gratifying satisfaction.


It’s hard to feel this when one is in the trenches of parenting. When long nights deprive you of sleep, crying babies deprive you of an uninterrupted dinner and curious toddlers deprive you of shower time pleasures. It’s hard to feel this when your teens are going through a particularly annoying, unappreciative phase. When they are ashamed to walk next to you at the mall. Or friend you on facebook.


But by the time they get to twenty-three, they are once again happy to call you Mom. Happy to travel a distance to see you. Happy to give up plans for the weekend in order to have dinner with you on Mother’s Day.


Assembling a book of my son’s life doesn’t make me a better mother. It affirms that my kids were moving swiftly and solidly on their own paths, carving out lives with strong wings, straight heads and bright eyes for their futures. The fact that I made a contribution. Ahh. That’s the joy of motherhood.


It was with this deep, enormously gratifying feeling that l drove my son to the train station to catch his ride back to New York. As I stepped out of the car to give him a full body hug, he said, “Hey Mom, I left three pieces of dirty clothes on the floor ‘cuz I didn’t feel like putting them in my backpack. You can wash ‘em for me, right?”


You can’t make this stuff up.


Happy Mother’s Day.