Retire

Who I am has been harder to find than the other sock from a star-crossed pair. 

It’s taken so long to be the woman I was meant to be.  It’s taken several lives and more than a few lifetimes.  Every incarnation gave me someone new.  Every moment gave reason to pause.  That stolen laughter.  Bittersweet tears.  Burn of wanting something else. 

There is nothing that could ever compare with the utter ecstasy of holding my newborn baby. Smelling that smell, feeling that primal mother-lust,  knowing that the world was right.  There is nothing that could ever compare to watching them grow.  Knowing that I would be the one to see their days unfold, watch how they make their way in this world and get drunk on their every emotion.  Being part of their energy, feeling the wave of warmth as they send it out into the world. Knowing I started that ripple.

But for me it was like getting high from second hand smoke. That nicotine rush when you already have your own share in your system. Living vicariously through their every movement was dangerously addictive.

I was grateful I was able to be there.  So truly honored to have seen what I have seen.  To have been there when they needed me.  But as grateful as I am that I was able to be there, I am just as grateful that I was able to take that step back.

For every moment that is theirs, there was one of my own that paled in comparison.  For every achievement of theirs that I have basked in, there was an achievement of mine not realized.

I am convinced there is a balance.  I am positive that it is out there somewhere.  For years I have been telling others and telling myself that you can have it all, you just can’t have it all at the same time.

My children needed me at home for a short while.  The rest of the time was gravy.  I have referred to it often as “my retirement”.  I have worked since I was 13. I have worked a weekly schedule all of this time.  The longest I went without was after Samantha was born and that was 3 months.  Even then, I’m pretty sure I temp nannied.  I called it my retirement, not because I didn’t work, but because I knew my position was not forward moving.  It was frozen in time.  In a way, it was like a vacation. 

Children need a slower pace.  They need to have that time to develop instead of being pushed.  They need time to discover and explore.  They need time to create.  They need time to become. 

I have spent a decade watching my children and other children I have fallen in love with become who they were meant to be.  I have spent a decade basking in their glow.  Good, bad or indifferent I absorbed all they had to give.  And it was like riding a human tidal wave.  With the most honorable of intentions, I simply enjoyed it too much to let it go.  It was addictive.

I know that the world will keep spinning.  I know that the sun will still rise.  I know, that my children and the children I am honored to know, will keep moving forward.  I believe firmly that they will accomplish great things.  Not because I had such an influence on them, but because I know firsthand what possibilities are inside of them.  They will continue to laugh and they will continue to cry.  They will have challenges and successes and they will create and discover and they will continue to become…  And I will be here watching from the sidelines.

The difference is that now, for the first time when I think of the future, I can actually see one for myself. I don’t know what it will be, but I do know that it will be mine.  I owe it to myself and I owe it to my children.  Being someone else’s entire world is an exhausting responsibility.  It’s their turn to retire.