Multiple Choice Test

After I gave birth to my eldest son, Mike, I decided to quit my full-time job as a traveling consultant and found a part-time job here in Helena. I took an enormous paycut (to the extent that when I got my first paycheck, I actually went to the HR people and informed them that someone had made a mistake). My job wasn't much when I started: a quarterly newsletter, an annual report, and an occasional press release or flyer.

But as my husband likes to say, I managed to take a little part-time state job and turn it into something that should be staffed with 2-3 full-time people with a budget that would rival the Department of Defense. Because now, I manage a large number of very big, exciting, and interesting projects that demand a lot of time and energy.

I LOVE my job. I really do. It's busy and stressful, but I wouldn't want it any other way. And my supervisors have awarded me with pay raises, amazing flexibility, and extra hours with resulting extra pay.

That is, until last week. Last week, I received an email that my hours were being slashed due to budgetary constraints.

On the plus side, there will be more time for me to write. For those of you who have been regular readers for several years, you have certainly noticed (and emailed me about) my less-than-stellar posting schedule as of late.

On the downside, however, is the work I won't get to because I have fewer hours.

But the REAL downside, the one that has me staring at the ceiling at 3 a.m., is money. You know, that stuff you use to buy food to eat and pay the bank that owns the roof over your head.

When we had Mike, Brent and I made the conscious decision that we wanted to keep our baby out of daycare. And we renewed that vow when we had Peter. We pretty much decided that even if it meant that we had to live in a trailer, we would keep our boys home.

Not that there's anything wrong with living in a trailer OR with daycare for that matter. It just wasn't for us. So please send your nasty emails defending trailer-dwelling and telling me how daycare is the best thing that ever happened to your kid and how my kids would probably be a lot happier in daycare to some other poor unsuspecting mother. It was a personal choice -- just something that mattered to us.

So Brent and I both have jobs that allow us to alternate schedules to be home to take care of our boys, but pay very little. For those of you who live in real cities and/or have real jobs making over $15 an hour, let me spell this out for you: Our salaries mean that we make enough money to live, but barely. It means that whenever we need to fix our car or if the price of something rises exponentially (i.e. gas and groceries), it has a direct and immediate impact on our quality of life.

We are not alone in this. In fact, I imagine that the bulk of Americans are like Brent and me -- just trying to make our way in the world, making the best choices we can for our family -- barely making ends meet.

The upside is we have options. I can throw in the towell on writing and spending a lot of time with my kids and head back to work full-time. Make that we have an option. Brent, a social worker, will never make any money.

I don't really know where I'm going with this. Maybe I just want to say that this sucks. That I'm willing to live in a TRAILER, people, and that the last new article of clothing I bought for myself was a t-shirt for $2 at Target. And you know what -- we still can't pay our bills. And we have NO BILLS. We have no car payment because we drive an old, piece of junk car. We have a little tiny house payment that is less than most people's rent because we bought an old, piece of junk, very small house that we have been fixing up slowly as we can afford it. We have a fairly enormous student loan payment because we were young and stupid and someone told us that going to college was the way to fame and fortune and look where it got us -- ABSOLUTELY NOWHERE with a giant student loan payment to make every month for the next 30 years. We have no credit card debt because the last thing we bought besides food was that $2 t-shirt and I probably found the change on the floor of our old, piece of junk car.

Will giving up on my dreams of being a writer and seeing my kids for an hour or two a day put us in a better place? Will it put me in a better place? I don't know. I know life is all about choices. Excuse me, whoever is listening? I don't like the choices. I want better choices.

So while I'm waiting for better choices, I'll just chalk up "Make more money" on my list of things to do, along with winning the Powerball, losing 50 pounds, and completing the Ironman Triathlon.

Kiss My Asana

Last night I took the first yoga class I have taken since I was pregnant with Peter, who is now 17 months old.

That's not to say that I don't practice yoga. I do -- on a daily basis. I have a little book and a yoga bolster and every night I do stretches and bends and various odd and uncomfortable-looking poses.

But saying I practice yoga every night is kind of like saying I don't eat sugar -- except for those cookies I scarfed after lunch and that spoon of ice cream I had when the freezer door suddenly opened and the ice cream beckoned to me and then there was that other cookie that Mike didn't eat and I didn't want to throw away.

In other words, saying I practice yoga is a lie that I use to make myself feel better.

Because today I can't lift my arms without feeling as if last night during yoga class I was under the impression that I had in fact been practicing yoga for years -- in India with a yoga teacher who gave me on-on-one instruction. I am one of those annoying "people pleasers" and I very much like my yoga teacher and so to make her like me, I worked exceedingly hard last night to impress her. You could have mistaken me for a contortionist at the circus sideshow with all of the bending and stretching I was doing with my very unbendable body. As a result, I am so sore that stretching my pinky finger to reach the 'p' reminds me that, in fact, to reach the 'p', I must use muscles. Muscles that somehow got used and stretched during yoga.

Tell Me What You Really Think

I recently started writing a column for a local newspaper in town. With my column, they run a photo of me that should say underneath it: SHOWN ACTUAL SIZE. That is how big this picture is. I swear to you that you can see every single pore on my face along with the lettuce that is stuck between my molars.

As a result, I am now often recognized as I stroll the streets of the fair city of Helena. "Are you Sara Groves? Do you write that parenting column in the paper?" I am asked.

Now I know how Britney Spears feels.

The other day a woman I did not know approached me and talked to me about my column and we commiserated about motherhood a bit. After she walked away, Mike turned to me and asked what I wrote about.

"I write about being a mom," I told him.

He just looked at me blankly for a minute, like he was waiting for the punchline, and then he announced his verdict to the world, "BOOOOOORRRRRRRRING!"

Love Letter To My Boys

Being a mother is funny business. There are times, as I walk barefoot through the house and step on stray LEGOs that pierce my foot, when I curse your existence. There are times, as I fold yet another load of laundry, that I think to myself, “Sheesh – how many different shirts can you wear in one day?” There are times, as I struggle to answer the question I hear more often than any other, “Why?” that I snap, “Because I said so! That’s why!” There are times, as I change another dirty diaper, I think, “Hello! I have a master’s degree! Do I need a master’s degree to do this?”

But then there’s the rest of the time: when you run to find me to show off your latest LEGO rocket, out of breath with excitement, just wanting to share something with me; when I am folding yet another load of laundry and I hold up your miniature shirts or socks and I simultaneously can’t believe how small you are or how big you’re getting; when I hear “Why?” and I am able to come up with stunning truths about everything from metamorphosing insects to twinkling stars; when I am changing another dirty diaper and you hold up your little foot for me to kiss as we play our absolutely hilarious toesy game.

The soft slow pace of mornings is the time I love most with both of you. But there are mornings that my alarm clock of your tinny little voices makes me want to crawl under the covers and give my left arm for just one morning to sleep in, undisturbed, and then to have a cup of coffee. Alone. Most mornings, though, I lay awake in bed, listening for the day’s first sounds from you – the cooing and soft babbling of Peter and the sound of Mike softly scolding his stuffed animal for waking him up so early.

Once we’re all awake, I change a diaper, I make breakfast, we eat, we get cleaned up and dressed, I change another diaper, we play with blocks or trucks or out in the sandbox, I drink some more coffee, we fold laundry and pick up the house a little, we go for a long walk and then to the park, and then we come home and it is 9 a.m.

But most days, I am completely shocked that somehow Mike, you just turned four.
And Peter, how did you get to be 17 months old? There are a million clichés about parenting, and here’s one of them: you’re growing so fast. Where did the time go? You’d think after thousands of mornings during which time seems to stand still, I’d notice that you are getting bigger, and that you need me a little less each day.

But still there are days when I just get so tired of being needed. I am needed to change pants, make breakfast, find clothes, give baths, do laundry, squeeze out toothpaste, clip fingernails, wipe noses, read stories, sing songs, make lunch, build tents, comb hair, apply bandages, take temperatures, walk to the park, supervise playtime in the sandbox, rip up bread for the ducks, bake cookies, negotiate sharing, drive to preschool, do funny dances, show you how to hold a crayon, monitor glue usage, dump sand from shoes, and I could go on with my to-do list for the next 107 years.

But then there was that first time I offered a hand and you refused it with a nonchalant, “I don’t need any help.” What? You don’t need me?!!! I remember standing idly by as you did whatever it was you didn’t need my help with, not sure what to do with myself, and I’ll admit it here – fighting back tears.

I won’t say you made me whole or that you completed me because that’s another of those parenting clichés and it’s also not true. Let’s face it – I had my own thing going on before you came along and I never felt empty. But I will use another cliché and say that you have made me better. I am definitely a better person for having you both in my life.

When I look in at you at night, I am struck by how absolutely perfect you both are and I often just stand alone in the dark of your room, watching you sleep, your soft faces bathed in starlight. If someone had ever told me that I would spend a fair amount of my time watching other people sleep, I would have enumerated a never-ending to-do list as evidence of all the very important things going on in my life. But now, watching you both sleep is something that I could do, quite honestly, for hours — without a care about any other seemingly important thing.

So to you my boys on this Mother’s Day – thank you. There are times when I am at my wit’s end and my patience ran out, oh, around yesterday, so it may not seem like it, but my love for you is as wide open and far-reaching as the never-ending Montana sky. We are just small specks in this great big universe that we call home, but you are the two most spectacular stars. I could see your light from a billion miles away. I love you. Mama.

Words to Live By

Look Closely Now

Me: Do you see that spot?

Doc: What spot?

Me: That spot on my nose. And I have one by my eye too.

Doc (leaning in and squinting): Oh yes, I see them now.

Me: Is that skin cancer?

Doc: It’s not skin cancer. But it’s worse than skin cancer.

Me: Worse than skin cancer? Holy sweet Jesus – what is it?

Doc: It’s an AGE spot – a spot you get when you are officially old.

Me: Thank you for giving me a heart attack and calling me old, all nearly in the same breath. Do they teach you how to do that in medical school?

Doc: No, that’s just something I learned from my teenagers.