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Water |
June 24, 2009 |
Monday, June 15, 2009
Today is Maxine’s first day at Kindergarten. Goodbye Playschool. On the other hand, it’s Maia (1.5 y.o.) who started playschool today, two hours a day, three times a week. Officially, her first day of school started last week and I TOTALLY forgot all about it. Yup, I was that mom, bury me alive like a naughty Vestal Virgin.
Two years ago, Maxine’s first day in playschool was all documented and recorded meticulously.
September 17, 2007, Monday will always be a special day to me. It was the Bear’s first day of playschool, and the night before, I got butterflies just thinking about it. When I woke up the next day I got the first-day-of-school-stomach and I wondered if I was the only mommy who was feeling this way. I found myself as nervous for the Bear’s first day of preschool as I was for my first day of work in the corporate world. So we went to the new school as a family and dropped her off without fanfare, the daddy with his camera and extra lenses, the mommy with the videocam and the caregivers with two pink backpacks filled with snack and extra (extra and more extra) clothes and shoes…
But with Maia’s first day, I put the camera on automatic mode because it’s just impossible for me to remember the crash course Merl gave about aperture, iso, shutterspeed and what-hoojamaflip there is in a bigger camera, then handed it to the nanny. “O Ate bahala ka na magpicture kay Maia, gandahan mo ha.” Then I left in a hurry to bring Max to her school which starts thirty minutes later so I’m like doing a slalom race in the main road at rush hour. I’ve learned the awesome art of delegating. Just. Like. That.
I didn’t even feel those butterflies on Maia’s first day of school.
Everything is so different with second-born. For all the worries with my first born, however ill-placed and illogical, the second born is just completely opposite. Maybe subconsciously I’ve come to realize that it’s simply too exhausting to keep up the nervous anxiety. Even during pregnancy, the first one was all healthy and organic plus classical music. While the second one was BigMac and Starbucks plus trash TV.
With second in school I can now squeeze in a bath without a baby lobbying outside the bathroom door. Or a child-less trip to the grocery maybe? Grab the book I’ve attempted to read ten times already and couldn’t go past preface. Relax in a coffee shop? Have a good online chat with friends I haven’t seen for years? Possibilities abound! I am now drooling as I think of more. Moms are eagle-eye with first-borns. But with the second, the mom sees o-p-p-o-r-t-u-n-i-t-y.
I figure, people are like molecules. In gases, the molecules are constantly moving and far apart. Super busy couples with no time for their marriage and children are gas molecules, before they knew it, their relationships with each other have disappeared into air and it is just difficult to have it back. Solid molecules on the other hand are locked in position so close together making the object hard, and these are like couples who breathe on each other’s necks and the relationship is just so lifeless and suffocating. On the other hand, liquids are in between, the molecules are close together, but they can move or flow. They are like couples who balance their time with each other, with work and kids, and having me-time to unwind and be their own individuals that make them more interesting to each other as the relationship mature.
So I’m water… keeping it cool, taking the path of least resistance. I’m like water, as I’m led to all these different opportunities, taking the shape of anything that comes, unbounded. I move around obstacles and I try to join with other streams – those people who will make me stronger. I am patient and still and can carve my way even through stones. And when trapped, water makes a new path. I’m like water as I have no form, yet I can take on all forms. Because I can fit into different personality types without changing my form. But then, like water I am frozen and fragile in the cold, I take the easiest path and I shed tears easily.
Possibly, even Maxine is enjoying her freedom now than when she was only child. And I noticed Maia is a happy, confident, and not-clingy baby compared to big sister when she was of the same age. The latest addition to the family will always be more fortunate because the parental flaws dissipate and thin-out. I now spread myself evenly to each kid, the husband, the home, to myself, like water molecules constantly moving in relation to each other. I’m still a stage-mom, though.
I’m more fluid now. But what’s most important is that my spirit overflows! Now I’ve finally understood what taking the path of least resistance means no matter how complicated the words are. It’s simply to let go and trust.
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mae@ilovebabinski.com |
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June 4, 2009 |
This is a terrible, terrible week. I lost Maxine in the mall. One second she was there and the next she was GONE. I couldn’t even pray. I was just hysterical and shouting my lungs out calling her name. Who cares if others think I’m a lunatic. “Asan ang bata dito! ASAN ANG BATA DITO!!!” I was shouting at the poor saleslady. It was the worst fright I ever got in my life I thought I was close to getting a heart attack. And all the while I thought the scariest part of my life was when Queenie and I cheated on a Fil exam and our gay teacher who obviously hated us like vermin scared the hell out of us that we’d go to the Student Disciplinary Tribunal.
Oh God, oh God, oh God… I climbed up the stairs by two’s, by three’s… Terrible things ran through my mind. I reached first floor as if I had wings. Then there she was with the security guard, she was seen in the main door leaving the place. I hugged her. SO. TIGHT. She could have popped. “Max, Mama was so scared I thought I’d never find you! Thank you Lord.” It was sheer terror that lasted for hours.
And then the next day it was Maia’s turn. I looked away for literally a few seconds, and when I looked down for her to try on a dress, she was missing. It was the same spinning, floor-dropping, shaken world effect feeling that was still so, so familiar to me. I shouted. No sign of her. I felt like fainting. Five seconds… Ten seconds… Thirty. And then yaya found her. I vented out my anger at the helpers which I never did except for this one. I was just WTF’d at the helpers for not doing their job, and WTF’d at me for being so assured. I seriously wanted to throw-up from too much fear.
When the kids started to walk it has just been so challenging to get them to sit on the grocery cart or stroller or stay beside you. This is the reason why we thought of producing a safety string (one wristband for the mom and one for the child that are connected with a stretchy cord) for Babinski Baby because Mama Charlene also had tragic experiences on this with her Jabez. We named it Tug-of-Love .
The thing I like about safety strings is that I gave Max more autonomy as she walked at her pace, walking a little in front or behind me, as opposed to being dragged along at my pace, which helped her sense of independence. But I don’t use it anymore. I have been uncomfortable with it since hearing side comments from single people or those with older children who have “toddler amnesia” and have forgotten how it is to handle a toddler. Like as if it’s better to just have your kid run loose thirty feet ahead of you. They gasped and gave me the eye roll to show disapproval why the kid is on a leash like a puppy. Umm… yeah, when does protecting your child by having them close to you instead of letting them run wild where just about anyone can snatch them up and run off with them make you a bad mother? And this one is around her wrist and not her neck for gahdsakes. Why would someone harass a mother who is taking good care of her child? Nevertheless, I was still affected.
Which reminds me, Max would always tell me, “Mom, pretend I’m a dog, arf arf…” as she licks icing on a cake or slurps her soup straight from the bowl. “Mom, you rub my tummy and pretend I’m a dog, arf arf…” then flips on her back waiting for me to give her rib-tickles. And Maia, who always, always stay beside the dogs as if they are her dogs in the house, woof, woof, woof, woof, or lie down on Rex’s stomach like a giant stuffed toy. Which bothered me just a little bit after I read about the feral girl Natasha who grew up with cats and dogs and acted like cats and dogs. But these super darling animals are part of the family unit now. It just amazes me how they protect Max and Maia on walks in the park, never leaving their side, growling and snarling while baring their teeth at strangers who attempt to approach the kids, I imagine Britney’s bodyguards. A good alternative for a safety string though, how I wish I could bring them everywhere.
But then but then but then… with what happened to me, I pledge to use the safety string aka Tug-of-Love from now on in crowded places. Plus I hate retracing my steps, feeling terror, using telepathy, turning chalk-white, hate the feeling of my whole body shaking and heart racing. I would rather displease a few narrow-minded, nasty people than spend a life time of regret from the lost of a child. It’s something to think about. I suppose all I can do is let the judgments of some people slide by without reacting to them. I will learn to cultivate compassion on the odd occasions. Arf.
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mae@ilovebabinski.com |
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