For the last few years I’ve felt like the private investigator of my own life. I’m searching, patiently waiting, looking things up, trying to remember who this person is I’m researching. Who was she before she got married? Who was she before children? Before this move, that relocation, this drastic life-changing moment?
On the radio this morning I heard a wonderful piece by Betsy Shaw Mackenzie, who is a former world-class snowboarder, and now writer and mother living in Vermont. In the piece, she describes the changes in going from being an Olympic snowboarder (Nagano, Japan, 1998) to becoming a mother who can barely run with a pregnant belly—her child exclaims, “Mama! I didn’t know you could run!” I could so relate, although I have never been Olympic anything.
It’s that sense of things that one used to be, ways that the world used to align itself, and how everything becomes new when one’s children arrive in the world. It’s not that there is a loss of a sense of identity—there are many gains, and additions—but the children don’t know any of it without me telling them about who I was before they came along. And some part of this is humiliating, respective to the size of the ego.
So, tentatively, I rebuild and reclaim whatever it is I think I may have lost. My education, my intelligence? My sense of humor? Friends? Family? Maybe it’s my artistic skills… or my time to use them. Could be any number of things. I’m still researching.
In the meantime, I’ve been working to support River in his Quest to Establish a Career. This has been a long and winding road, such that we sometimes feel we can only turn to his horoscope to figure out where the answers lie. Other attempts to Do What Seems Right lead to murky quarters. The horoscope simply says, “You are a late bloomer.” Okay, so we can relax. Maybe it’s good that he has invested so much time and energy (at the expense of his career?) into developing and fostering a little budding family relatively early in his life. Maybe now he has some more flexibility and time to be that late-bloomer.
But how long am I supposed to wait by the sidelines with my luggage of self-development? For many years I’ve been able to regard motherhood as consuming a large portion of what I “do,” but that is shifting for me now. It is now more integrated into what I do, and I am less a central piece to my kids’ lives than when they were babies and toddlers. I find myself twiddling my thumbs a bit, with that sense of waiting rather than being engaged.
I have had the desire for a while now to get back into grad school. Almost four years ago I set about researching what I needed to do to head in that direction, knowing I’d be on the slow track. It took me nearly three years to get around to taking the GRE, after fussing for quite some time, eventually studying for it over the course of a year or more, signing up way in advance, wringing my hands, and doing well on the written essay portion. (That was sweet satisfaction. I’ve had worries that my brain has atrophied after so many years spent pregnant and nursing. Quite to the contrary: having children does something to multiply new brain cells and increase one’s capacity to think, wonder, and pinpoint concepts with utter clarity: I am very grateful for this boost.)
With the GRE out of the way, I’ve had to think about whether I should be earning dough and contributing to the family coffers, which need the help, or if it’s really “safe” now to proceed with some longer-term plans I have to lay aside the millions of hours spent on volunteer projects and perhaps pursue a Master’s and eventually a Ph.D. and perhaps have a clear path to becoming an educator, consultant, author, lecturer, or whatever lay in store for me. I’m eager, and daunted, and most of all ready to get going with this.
The catch is that River still isn’t quite clear what his vocational needs are. He’s done a lot of experimenting but most of it by necessity; if not for his job, we’d be nowhere. We’ve relied entirely on his earning power to supply a roof over our heads and food in our bellies. The responsibility is a huge one for him—and aside from the need for cash, his happiness in his job is a close second factor, in any given job, to avoid heart attacks and stomach ulcers.
I’m tempted to say I’ve had the easy task in being the primary caretaker for our children, simply witnessing how tough it is to navigate the waters of career ambiguity all while requiring that it actually produce a liveable income for a large-ish family.
There must be some middle path, but the thought of both of us extending ourselves to any degree, or more changes and trauma coming our way in anything but more than single-file, makes me shake in my boots. Are we grown-up enough to take on more adventure?