Author Archives: Jennifer Butler Basile

motherhood

Anger is an Easier Emotion

I just sent my first born to college. 

It went surprisingly well. 

That may be because I am as good at denial as she is. 

In the weeks leading up to go-time, there were details to attend to, failed fill-ins re her often late-night plans to yell about, dorm accoutrements to pack.  The day before and day of move-in, it was all hands on deck, shuttling things downstairs, out the door, and onto the roof of the car. 

Even on campus, it was fine, fun even.  Setting up a fresh new space.  Her younger sisters scouring the bookstore for swag. 

Then it was time to say goodbye. 

Her face shifted as rapidly as her eyes did when I suggested she walk us out.  Her eyes stayed steady on us as we crossed the pedestrian bridge, each of us turning and waving every few steps.  But as we walked parallel to the drainage ditch between us, her eyes went to her phone as I looked one last time. 

I knew she was trying to focus on something other than the tears in her eyes.  I knew she was trying to ‘act normal’ as she moved past the others buzzing around the dorm entrance.  I didn’t bother trying to act normal as I trailed along behind the remains of my troop.  I stubbornly willed my next two oldest to stop peeking backward glances to gauge mom’s reaction.  I angrily cursed the still-smiling parents who stole a glance as they moved past us in the opposite direction. 

The ride home was empty.  All of us spent.  In every sense.  The youngest’s feelings coming out as rage when she couldn’t hold the box of cheesy marine-life I’d brought for fortification. 

That first week, her father and I endured many unreturned texts.  We had dire questions about logistics and deadlines.  She had a ‘tude when I called her on it during a video chat.  But at the end of the week, she admitted that maybe she didn’t want to talk because it would remind her how much she missed us. 

I had wondered if that was the case.  I wasn’t trying to make myself feel better; I was actually able to apply some psychology to this very personal experience.  Because I’d already applied anger. 

How can she just ignore our texts?  She’s talked to her sisters, why can’t she respond to us?  We need to know she’s submitted that very important thing.

When we finally came to some sort of consensus at the end of that week, I balanced my managerial texts with silly mom ones.  And she called me for a question about laundry settings, but continued to talk well after she’d received her answer. 

While the overwrought laundry fairy in me was incredulous at her query, the part of me that missed her terribly was tweaked.  She still needed me.  She needed to talk out the goings-on of her new weird days and perhaps get a little encouragement.  But how did I support her without giving unwarranted advice?  How would I validate her struggles without making her dwell on them?  I certainly didn’t want to dismiss them. 

We talked and laughed and I felt ever more acutely the shift into a new sort of relationship.  One I’d had glimpses of, interactions with, but felt more solidly on this side of it with her on the other end of a line stretched farther than it ever had yet. 

And it scared me to hear my mother in my voice, in my responses.  The gentle way she listened to my adult woes, the unrequited caregiving brimming in her intonation, the help she wanted to give but knew wasn’t her path to tread. 

My heart ached at the way I’d inadvertently pushed her away because I now knew it was my turn.  In the long chain of mother and daughter stretching backward, that phone call that started with a question about colors and whites added a link going forward.  And even though I knew it was time, I didn’t want it forged.  Somewhere between denial, anger, and acquiescence, it had happened without my realizing. 

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Perspective

O’s Wide Open

There are cheerios in various states of being scattered all over the floor. 

Ground into the rug, skidded across the tile, tucked underneath the sofa. 

No, I’m not describing my own home floors, though we do still find errant Cheerios from time to time.

The mini oat rounds I spy today are surface-decorating the service area of my local car dealership. 

A little toddler, whose peals of laughter were as prolific as his breakfast cereal distribution, has covered nearly every square inch of this place.  He has brought employees out of their offices, joy to the face of an elderly woman sitting solo, a smile to the gruff service advisor. 

He has also brought his mother continual and constant cardio.

She laughingly accused him of throwing the Os as a distraction so he could run the other way while she stooped to collect it.  She was laughing, but she wasn’t kidding.  He was a cunning little cutie. 

There is nothing quite so invigorating to a space and/or group of people as a small child.  

Except perhaps a puppy – which we also had at one point when a neighboring businessman brought one in.  I’m surprised emoji hearts and stars didn’t start exploding everywhere when the two met. 

What is it about young life that inspires camaraderie and conversation? 

Is it the lack of pretension?  Motive? 

Or are we the ones with motive? 

Eager to feed off that pure joy and enthusiasm for life.  In simple pleasures.  Living in the present moment. 

To ‘borrow’ that parent’s precious one for just one moment, one brief interaction, since we are so far removed from the sweet innocence they possess.

I’m sure the mom doesn’t feel the innocence every day.  She does not soak in the wonder. 

And I don’t say this as a criticism.  I say this as a lived-in fact. 

The relentless running after, keeping out of harm’s way, perpetual picking up after – floods our senses when caring for a young one is our reality. 

And I’m not becoming one of those old grocery store ladies who say, ‘savor it, it’ll be gone before you know it’. 

As I said, I’m still picking up the occasional Cheerio.  But I’m picking my little one up a lot less. 

I’m one of the ones who want to soak in the wonder and the up-turned eyes. 

And there’s nothing wrong with that. 

The service areas of our car dealerships – and our world in general – could use more of that. 

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motherhood

Telling the Truth about Motherhood

The other evening, as I lay in my seven year-old’s bed waiting for sleep – hers, though my own comatose mini-nap usually comes first – an unexpected thing happened.

No, it wasn’t my questioning whether I should still be or have ever even started lying with her before bed without: a. spoiling her, b. impeding her sleep progress, c. prolonging this nighttime ritual until we’re both old and gray. That’s been a constant since she first balked at sleep as an infant.

As they usually do, an important revelation snuck out in those twilight murmurs.

“When I grow up, I don’t want to have children.”

My heart instantly hurt for so many reasons.

Sadness for her, that she wouldn’t experience the wonder that is mothering. The fierce, warming, all-enveloping love that it is to raise a little human into a big one.

Regret for me, that I somehow portrayed motherhood to my children in a poor light. That I did them a disservice by not loving it enough or not showing them enough love.

But even as I type that, I can’t believe that I don’t show my children enough love. Surely, they know they are loved. Does my fault lie in my sometimes less-than-joyful servitude?

As beautiful a sentiment Mother Teresa of Calcutta shares about washing the dish because you love the person who will use it next, that doesn’t make me more likely to wash dishes or to do so without complaining. Perhaps you’ve seen the list of things your mother never told you.

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While many of these ten things are true on some level, I cannot subscribe to this level of subterfuge. Sacrifice and selflessness certainly have their place in parenting, but to sacrifice to the extermination of self is something for which I cannot get on board. Perhaps that means I am not destined for sainthood, but I also believe God created each of us as a special, sacred self to be celebrated – not obliterated.

I also feel it is disingenuous to serve with a smile when anger and resentment broil below. Why can’t we be authentic with our partners and children about how hard this path is? How we serve with love, but also appreciate being appreciated and, even more, equal distribution and support.

By speaking truth about my struggles in motherhood, I hope my daughters will see the inequalities in expectation and systems of modern motherhood. I also hope they will realize the hard-earned worth of fighting for a connected, loved, valued family.

Because while I stand as a symbol of the greater mantle of motherhood for my children, I am also human.

I hope the toil I am totally transparent about will not dissuade my daughters from becoming mothers themselves, but make them realize there is no perfect ideal – except perhaps love.

I also hope that my seven year-old’s proclamation didn’t stem from Cookie World C’s unnecessarily medicalized version of a plastic horse giving birth she viewed earlier that day.

In any event, I have some work to do, but tomorrow’s another day . . .

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