This used to be a mommy blog

And it still is because while I am many things–geek, reader, cat lover, wife–on the day the Bean was born, Mother became my chief identifier.

I have always been independant. I’ve often gone my own way, usually uniquely attired. I didn’t just march to a different drummer, but a different orchestra. I didn’t identify as somebody’s girlfriend or wife–but happily married now–I don’t mind telling people I’m J’s wife and I love it at school when one of her friends calls me “Mrs. Emily’s mom.” I can feel my teenaged and twenty somethig self shaking her fist at me and I smile indulgently at her.

At the same time, this isn’t a Mommy blog. Miss Bean is at the stage where she doesn’t need me like she did as a baby and toddler. Now she needs me to help her match her clothes in the morning, talk to her about meangirls, make sure she does her homework. Her all consuming need for me has abated and it is truly bittersweet. I will always miss the fact we couldn’t have another child, because that cocoon of need that a small child creates in a family is, while tiring, lovely.

Nope, being her mom, while it has become and will always remain my first best identifier, well there’s a bit more room for me now. Of course I haven’t quite figured out *how* to write about my job–how to exult and complain without it being a problem or how to write about traversing the very different friendship issues that arise when you are adults (it’s way more sticky than goth scene politics, just not as dramatic). And it will still be a few years before I can freely write about my past and what I have come through–because it’s honestly just easier on everyone that way. But there’s more room to ruminate over these things now than when she was younger.

When Bean was a baby and a toddler I remember feeling how I’d lost myself and didn’t know who I was anymore. And after being so into my career for many years–being a stay at home mom messed with my conception of myself. Now I have more of that identity back and I feel more like myself but now I miss that time when there was more her and less me.

it’s like when you are a kid and you start first grade and you want to go back to kindergarten–you liked it better, because it is easier to use a glue stick than write a sentence, everyone was nicer (or at least it feels that way) and it felt safer.

The terrain keeps changing. I guess that’s what is supposed to make life interesting. Me–I like routine and predictability, I’ve had more than enough of the converse in my life. So I guess I need to learn to feel safe in change. I’m better than I used to be, but then there really is a solid foundation to life now and I have the beautiful faces of J and the Bean every day (and yes those crazy catheads) to provide the love and refuge as I hope I do for them.