Wednesday, April 18, 2007
April 3rd, 2007
It’s been a year…
One year ago Nate and I returned from Guatemala with our daughter. We touched own at SFO to the open arms of Andrew, Julie, Audrey and Ben. Lotus was wearing a fussy vest and a wide-eyed expression. A year and a million lessons later and here we are.
In the past year I have been awed, exhausted, overwhelmed, amazed, frustrated but mostly my heart is bursting with love. I have watched first steps, heard first words and been hit in the face for the first time since high school soccer.
I have had to realize that it’s not all about me, that accomplishments and completion of tasks are relative and raising my child is an ongoing process with no clear end. I figured out that I no longer have weekends or vacation days. That she doesn't care that I just want to send one more email and neither should I. I still can’t figure out what my life was like before Lotus, but I remember always saying I was busy and stressed out.
During the past year I have met amazing moms and a few annoying ones. We have seen lots of friends and family and made great new friends. We have had playdates with all sorts and types of families. I have played at more parks, gone to music classes, kids museums, gymnastics classes, and swimming lessons. I have read the same seven books over and over and tried to never play “kids” music in the house. (Yeah, she dances to highly inappropriate songs, but she doesn’t know what it means yet)
The first few months I would panic if we didn’t have something to do or someone to see. I was positive I would actually die of boredom, while at the same time be inexplicably exhausted. Now we take each day as it comes and sometimes if my only accomplishment is that she is alive at the end of the day I can be okay with that. Usually we are so busy laughing and living. But not a moment goes by that I am not tripped out by the experience taht is Lotus Maria
And Lotus Maria, she’s so beautiful, and so smart and I can’t believe we get to raise her. Her laugh is infectious and wicked. She is fierce and full of fire. She gives the greatest love with the most obstinate demeanor. And I hope one day that I will meet and hug her other mother and try and disentangle the age-old argument of nature vs. nurture, because there is so much of her behavior that is we. Could it be possible that in another country there is a woman with a life so different than mine, but is so like me to bear a child so like us? It seems improbable and yet very likely that fate brought our family together across countries, timezones and cultures.
My only sadness is that my mother never got met this amazing being. Being a new mom without a mom seems to go against nature. And though on good days I know she is with us in spirit and on bad days, when I want to wring the necks of people who complain about their living, breathing mothers, I feel ripped off. I just hope on the days my daughter has me beat and I am running around the dining room table trying to grab some dangerous item from Lotus’ grip that my mom is laughing heartily where ever she is
So here’s to our first year and to many more to come.
