This year I threw a little 'Cuppa' party, which was pretty fun... Although I discovered that when it comes to my friends, if you ask them to wear a hat, they won't; whereas if you say 'Don't bring a present', they will. I guess we're all getting to the age where we do what we like instead of sticking to 'the rules'. Or maybe we just need better reading glasses.
Anyways, Dan gave me a book of poems by Sarah Dunning Park. It's called 'what it is is beautiful' and the byline is honest poems for mothers of small children. Bingo!Here's a taste of one of my favourites:
RX
It hit me,
helping my listless kid into the backseat
And then reaching, tissue in hand,
To swipe at her sister's runny nose:
It's impossible to stop.
Her incessant stuffiness, yes, and that junky cough that won't quit --
but even more, it's impossible to stop
This cycle of constant motion.
I thought all this
while shifting into reverse
and tapping at the map on my phone
and passing a sippy cup to the back
and unwrapping a piece of red candy
masquerading as medicinal balm
for my sore throat.
The sloughed-off wrapper landed softly
among the library books beside me,
but the lozenge's marketing slogan
kept looping through my head:
The show must go on,
it urged, or perhaps warned,
since I felt a sense of deep foreboding
that our show was teetering
on the brink of collapse.
Do you like it? I just love how her mind works, possibly because it's a bit like how mine works (I love that we have so much in common!!!) And I think she does well at being honest & real about the challenges of motherhood without being a martyr or overly sentimental.
In case you're wondering, the poem does have a happy-ish ending. Basically, the mother imagines that in a bygone era a kind doctor would come to her house and prescribe the treatment (RX) she needs for her soul - to slow down.
So, here's to finding moments of 'slow' in the midst of life's chaos and busy-ness. And to birthdays, that remind us of how we're getting older but hopefully wiser and quirkier and still loved, quirks and all.
