CHOCOLATE-FUELLED THOUGHTS
Motherhood: A Worthy Nonsense
If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results, then mothers are exactly as crazy as their kids think they are. From the moment the line turns pink on the pregnancy test, mothers operate at the highest levels of optimism. “Maybe this time, the smell of my husband’s toothpaste won’t make me feel nauseous.” “Maybe these jeans will fit just one more time before I have to switch to maternity pants.” “Maybe this baby will be born before its due date…”
And that slightly off-kilter hopefulness is what sends them careening into the early years of motherhood, hoping that this time they’ll find two matching socks in a load of laundry, or this will be the time baby sleeps through the night or the child will sit quietly in his car seat, or wear the outfit, or eat the cheese, or [insert whatever totally logical request a mother lays before her child in almost near certainty it will be rejected, but she tries anyway.]
We, mothers, are lunatics fueled on cortisol and optimism. We don’t always expect to win our battles, but we fight them anyway because it’s the right thing to do.
I received the following text from my son, who puts his own socks on now, but I’m not sure they match any more than they did when he was two. He’s across the globe this Mother’s Day, so his text arrived at 1:40 am. And, because I am a mother, his number is set to “always disturb,” and my phone helpfully read it to me out loud, waking me from my slumber.
He said, “Happy Mother’s Day! Thanks for putting up with all of the nonsense that comes with twins and 7 children. You did a fantastic job.”
I replied, at a much later, more sensible hour, “You are all a worthy nonsense. Please come home safe and soon.”
Because, even now, when my kids dress themselves and travel worldwide without me, motherhood is full of worthy nonsense. Tracking them on Life 360 to “trust and verify” that they’ll always be where they said they would be, hoping just once they don’t step over the bag of garbage but pick it up on their way outside, begging them to get a job, get a haircut, put gas in the car, and make good choices. And the really crazy part is, I can feel eighty different kinds of irritation at a teen for multiple infractions, but I’ll still send her silly gifs, cook his favorite meal, and be utterly thrilled just to see their faces walk through the door at the end of the night.
From the outside, it doesn’t make a bit of sense.
Hardly fiscally responsible.
Obviously not great for my health.
Guaranteed to break my heart into millions of pieces again and again and again.
But any parent, mom or dad, will tell you that the minute that baby is in your arms, raising kids becomes the most worthy bit of nonsense you will ever attempt.
Nobody gets it perfect, except the God who invented parenthood and showed us all The Greatest Nonsense ever known in the Gospel. He allowed the sacrifice of His perfect son to cover the penalty owed by rebellious children who rejected Him repeatedly. His solution to the world’s sin didn’t make a lot of sense from the outside, either. But that nonsensical, dogged pursuit of His wayward sons and daughters is just the sort of thing that gives me hope to keep pursuing my own bedraggled, hormone-ridden children no matter how many different directions they scatter.
It’s the ultimate exercise in optimism.
I may gain more skills or accomplish new things in my life, but there will never be a more worthy, ridiculous pursuit than the one I have now and always: Mother to Sam, Ian, Adam, Ellen, Willa, Mira, and Finn. It’s silly, exhilarating, terrifying, exhausting, infuriating, hilarious, and humbling. But it’s a worthy sort of nonsense.
And they’re worth every bit of effort.
Taking Seven Kids Out West Went Just Like We Planned… Mostly
We playfully called it our “Kill the Van” trip. We didn’t know how true that moniker would become.
With two sons heading off to college in the fall, we spent all last spring planning an epic trip Out West, one last “fling” in our 12-passenger van. I researched, planned, and even employed a spreadsheet to keep our itinerary straight. One of the items on our plan included bike riding around the Grand Canyon.
Our First Mistake
Two days before we left, we realized my strategic error. We forgot to teach the baby how to ride a bike. Now, when my “baby,” who is ten, was an actual baby, he had a running bike. But somewhere in there, the rest of his siblings outgrew their bikes or left them in the rain too long, and he never inherited a bike with pedals. And then we forgot about that particular milestone because there were 440 other milestones to be achieved.
I sent my husband and the baby to Walmart to buy a bike he could practice riding. Unfortunately, it rained excessively before we left, so he didn’t get much practice time. In desperation, we strapped the bike to the back of the van and headed out.
Do you know the feeling where you start to sense something isn’t going to go as planned, but you don’t want to believe it yet? I should have known when we got to Dallas, and the friends we planned to stay with came down with strep. We scrambled for a hotel, fed the gang In’ n Out Burger, and told ourselves, “It’s fine. We’re fine. It will all be fine.”
And it was.
Until somewhere between Amarillo and Albuquerque, when the “check engine” light came on.
Change of Plans
My husband found the only Auto Zone for 100 miles and veered off our course. We were actually on Route 66, in a town that could have doubled for Radiator Springs. We purchased an “error light decoder ring” or something and determined that the prognosis for our van was not good.
I got on the phone with the nearest Nissan dealership and employed my southern accent and the desperate voice of a mother of seven to get them to agree to help us the Friday before Memorial Day weekend. This meant another change of plans.
Meanwhile, the baby conquered his bike riding skills after two nights of practicing in hotel parking lots. He finally nailed it in the Tex-Mex restaurant in Albuquerque, right next to the dumpster. Classy boy.
When we left behind our van and rented not one but TWO vehicles, we also left his bicycle behind. That was all the practice he would get before we made it to our first real destination, The Grand Canyon.
As you can imagine, the bike they gave the baby at the canyon was totally different from his bike. It had brakes on the handles and was just a smidge too big for him. He gamely climbed on and wobbled his way to the trail. The rest of my kids careened off, madly pedaling their way around the biggest hole ever in 50 mph winds. At this point, I remembered I’d only recently recovered from 4 broken bones and why in the name of all that was holy had I planned something so dangerous????
I drove like a tiny grandma while the wind whipped us fiercely and picked up my bike a time or two. A bus scared the baby, and he drove off into a ditch (not The Big Ditch, fortunately).
Husband and I were a bit tense with all the near-death experiences circling us, but we managed a few moments of that Sacred Holy when you stare at something wondrous with all of your people beside you. Worth it.
We headed North through Utah toward Colorado. Meanwhile, I fell in love with my rental car and announced my intentions to divorce the van for this tiny SUV with CarPlay capabilities. We also fell in love with the intimacy of traveling by small car in a small group.
Nobody Expects Snow in June
We arrived at our Air BnB in Colorado in a light flurry. No big deal. It’s June 1st tomorrow. Just a bit of moisture…
Pro Tip: When booking lodging, always check the elevation. I inadvertently booked us about 10,000 feet above sea level, where the snow still falls, even in June.
We also had a feverish kid on our hands. Husband took the first shift, and I drove the others down our mountain where it was dry and sunny. We had a marvelous visit to Pike’s Peak, my favorite thing ever. There were no bike rides, somebody else drove us up the mountain, and the view was… breathtaking.
The next day, I took sick kid duty and Husband tried to take the kids to Rocky Mountain National park. The “unusual for this time of year” snow nipped that in the bud, but they took a short hike before returning to the snowy infirmary. They settled for a snowball fight in our yard and later deemed it their favorite thing about the trip.
Pro Tip: Skip the tour bus. Rent a place with a yard and snow.
We returned to New Mexico for our errant van, all fixed up and ready to rumble. I kissed my rental car goodbye, and we headed home. Because we had a sick kid, we had to cancel all other plans and head home. But that wasn’t such a bad thing. We’d accomplished what we set out to do. We’d seen the big ticket items. We’d bonded and laughed and adventured.
And, we really did kill the van, just like we said we would.