Parenting – Page 2 – On the Horizon Line

misadventures in modern parenting with snow angels

How to be a grown-ass woman

My mujer mojo is missing in action.

The title of this post makes it sound like I’m going to tell you how to be a responsible female adult. Instead, I’m trolling for your ideas on the subject.

First off, an explanation. I spent a fabulous three estrogen-soaked days with a couple of stellar lady friends last weekend. We convened with a 5-week-old and a 5-month-old in a wood-fire-heated cabin near Sand Point and proceeded to settle in. We chatted. Cooked. Cooed at babies. Changed a LOT of diapers. And we walked in the snowy woods, drank dark beer, and debriefed what it means to be a mother. One of my friends remarked that she recently got called out for not behaving like a “grown-ass woman.”

Back in my own homestead, this term shot into my sleep-deprived brain during a mid-night awakening. I started ruminating on what, exactly, characterizes such a woman. Was I a grown-ass woman? More importantly, do I want to be one?

I certainly feel a lot more grown-up lately, though in a tired sort of way. And I definitely notice my ass more, now that I run up and down the stairs to wash diapers, and squat up and down to pick up my big baby boy. But I might feel the least womanly that I’ve ever felt. Becoming a new mother seems to have neutered–or at least muted–my gender. My boobs are utilitarian. My hair is limp and dull. My mujer mojo is missing in action.

That’s why I’m putting it out to all of you wise readers. Does being a grown-ass woman mean waving bye-bye to my pre-baby mojo, or does it mean I have to get it back? And how, exactly, do I get it back?

Neutering aside, here are a few more reasons why I’m pretty sure I’ve become a grown-ass woman:

I put my child first.
I can touch poop without making jokes or gagging uncontrollably.
I appreciate my family and friends more than ever, and strive to help them as much as they help me.
I worry about getting injured or dying, which makes things like snowboarding or flying in helicopters less appealing.
I still want to have fun, escape reality, and do reckless things (even though #4 gets in the way).
I wash dishes when they’re dirty (eventually).
I’m willing to make sacrifices and compromises.
I totally hate making sacrifices and compromises.
I can have serious conversations about important topics.
I can make snow angels or play balloon wars.

This list tells me that being a grown-ass woman is an oxymoron, a contradiction, and often confusing. What do you all think are the qualities of a grown-ass woman?

Parenting, Traveling

A Quick Exit

I was just looking for a little more space. And yeah, a quick exit would have been nice, too.

“Ma’am, you can’t sit in the emergency exit row with a child,” the flight attendant informed me. With my arms full of wriggling infant, coats and snacks, I headed back toward a cramped window seat. I wasn’t sure which felt worse: being called “ma’am,” or being denied the luxury of the exit row for the next dozen years.

As I settled myself and Talon in for the short flight from Portland to Missoula, I glared at the back of the business-suited dude who slipped into the emergency row after me, glued to his iPhone and clueless about what was going on around him. I would definitively be more effective at opening the door and pulling the ripcord on that inflatable slide than he would.

It doesn’t really make sense, when you think about it. Aren’t mothers of small children exactly who you would want opening doors in case of disaster? I guarantee that mothers of helpless infants will have the exits ready for immediate departure in record time. Instinct kicks in, and we will kick down doors, take out predators, and protect our offspring at all costs. The other passengers on the plane would greatly benefit from this mama-bear instinct, meaning they should actually pay mothers to sit in the emergency exit row.

You with me?

To be fair, my snit on the airplane was a bit more existential than simply wanting more legroom. As I breathed through the claustrophobia of sitting with a hot baby in a tight corner, I was also breathing through the claustrophobia of feeling like I wouldn’t have any quick exits to anywhere—emergency or otherwise—for the next several years.

No more spur-of-the-moment road trips or impromptu jaunts to Mexico. No last-minute bike rides, ski trips, or parties. Goodbye to simply walking out the front door when life gets overwhelming. The full weight of motherhood settled around my shoulders, leaving me slightly angry, extra sweaty, and mostly petrified.

But then Talon giggled, and the urge to flee subsided like mist under the sun (at least until he started screaming inexplicably during the last ten minutes of the flight).

The point? It’s normal to feel trapped in an airline seat. And to want to flee when confronted by a massive life change. Most of the time, though, my visions of quick escapes include taking my baby with me to beaches, mountains, or even parties.

It’d just be a lot more fun to bring him along on those escapes if they paid us to sit in the emergency exit row.

Parenting

Trimming wee talons (and other tales of time)

Cutting our kid’s nails is kind of like wrestling a small iguana, except iguanas don’t drool.

Back when I had a 9-5 job and no kid, I always knew what day of the week it was. I was also way better at watering the plants regularly – once a week like clockwork. And I used to remember whether it had been one or two weeks since I’d washed the sheets (or even three).

Our plants are barely hanging on. The sheets are rarely clean. I can’t tell you the date to save my life. But our baby has given me a new way to mark the passing of time: by the rapid growth of his sharp little fingernails. Instead of a calendar, I now measure time in nail clippings. The passing weeks are quantified by the small snippings of dead keratin that fly into the cracks of the couch, never to be seen again – just like all the many moments that passed while my child’s nails grew long.

When we finally agreed on his name, I had no idea how apropos ‘Talon’ would be. His little claws sometimes seem like an animate part of him. They dig reminders into my breast when too much time has passed between trimmings. I appreciate the claw marks. They are a physical indication of the quickly fading months of his infancy, vivid hash marks that tally the blur of diapers, smiles, coos, and tears (mine as well as his).

The act of nail clipping is a rite of passage in itself. I cried in fear the first time, holding him tight and averting my eyes while Rob braved the miniscule nails, already so long at birth. And I cried in commiseration the second time, when Rob accidentally nicked his thumb, unleashing Talon’s first howls of pain. After a couple of months, I finally felt confident enough to clip his nails on my own.

But, like all things with parenting, as soon as I said to myself, “I’ve got this thing down,” the kid proved me wrong. Now Talon bucks and protests when I try to trim his wee talons. It’s kind of like wrestling a small iguana, except iguanas don’t drool. If I get two nails at a pop if I call it a victory. It’s a test on my perfectionist tendencies, a challenge to my need for symmetry.

To be honest, I don’t mind Talon’s jagged, imperfect edges. They ground me in the present, especially when the fingers behind those nails reach for my hand and hold on to my heart.

P.S. Check out the new “look” on our website, and let me know what you think!

Parenting, Reflections on Life

The falls are still scary

“I’ll always take care of you,” I whispered to my sleeping son. And as I tiptoed out of the room, I thought to myself, I just hope you’ll always let me.

Talon had just finished a massive crying jag after his first big scare. Our glider rocking chair tumbled over accidentally, sending Mr. T on a roller-coaster drop as Grandpop flew forward with him in tow. The baby was safe and uninjured, but let forth a new type of bloodcurdling scream that rang with fear.

I sang and soothed and patted and rocked. As his jerking gasps subsided, I breathed my own sigh of relief. Crisis averted. First of so, so many.

That night, I thought about my own parents. I remembered the times I needed them to take care of me, physically, financially, emotionally. And, with twinges of guilt, the many more times I refused to let them help. Now that I am a parent of my own, I get the need to coddle and pat. To hold and sway. To do anything and everything in your power to make your child happy and whole again — even if your child is bigger than you.

I feel blessed to have parents who will always take care of me as best they can. Not only will I now let them, I’ve realized that I desperately need them to soothe me through the falls that are part and parcel of being human. My screams may be quieter than my son’s, but the drops are no less scary.

Parenting

A dozen pounds of drool

“This baby is a daily reminder that I can’t control the universe,” said my friend, Hilary, last week as she frantically jiggled the newborn slung around her chest.

I nodded. It’s humbling, we agreed, to give up control. To say goodbye to who we were and hello to the new person named ‘mom.’

“I just wanna get drunk again,” jokes another friend, downing her coffee. Yup. Me too.

I started a coffee group a few months ago to get Talon and myself out of the house. A revolving group of new mamas meets weekly to remind ourselves that sleep deprivation, poop explosions, and sore boobs will pass. But for now, they are the new normal.

Without these friends and my super-supportive family in town, I wouldn’t feel whole these last six months. They are the backbone and muscles that keep me strong when things seem to slip out of joint.

Returning from our travels left both Rob and I in a bit of an abyss—a wide space where anything might happen, but nothing feels concretely possible. Should we stay in Montana? Find salaried jobs or strike out with our own businesses? Will we ever sail again? Can we live the life we planned now that a kiddo anchors us in new ways?

Sometimes, too many possibilities are crippling. A privileged first-world problem, for sure, but one that can cause real stress.

The most interesting part about giving up control to a dozen pounds of drooling, squirming baby is that it limits the stress of endless possibility. Parenthood undoubtedly brings different kinds of stress, but it also gives clear direction on which way to point the sails each day: care for the child. For now, I can smile at the baby, feed him, change him, and try to loosen my hold on the existential questions that I sometimes grip too tightly.

Parenting, Reflections on Life

Living Luxuriously in the Creases

“I had plenty of time

when my daughter was a baby,”

my friend tells me.

“It was just lost in the transitions.”

She means the transitions

between eating and sleeping

between dishes and laundry

between what was and what is.

Motherhood means dwelling within these transitions.

Residing in the space between one necessity and the next

nodding to the time that slips away

and surrendering all expectation.

Inefficiency is the name of the game

a game that moves at its own speed, just as

yellow leaves fall slowly, inexorably into the creek

and the creek flows slowly, inexorably into the sea.

I wallow in the throes of inefficient adoration

the crinkle of a brow

the grasp of a hand

the gurgle in a breath.

I used to minimize the transitions

to live more fully in the spaces before and after.

Now I linger luxuriously in the creases and joints that

link what I used to call ‘real life.’

The time that is lost while I linger in the transitions

is simply an exhale of breath

an internal rotation toward accepting

the beauty of the present moment.

Parenting, Traveling

Will our baby have the travel bug?

bri and talon in black and white smiling “Awww, so cute!” an acquaintance remarked, stroking Talon’s fuzzy head while we waited in line at a local coffee shop. “Aren’t you glad you got traveling out of your system before the baby was born?”

If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me that question lately, I’d have been able to buy my cappuccino. I know my friend meant well. But anyone who’s set off to explore the nooks and crannies of the world knows that you never “get it out of your system.” Travel is a virus that stays in your blood – kind of like hepatitis or certain strains of malaria. It lurks at the edge of your daily routine, waiting for just the right moment to surge forth and overwhelm you with the urge to pack up and go.

I bit my tongue and smiled pleasantly as I paid for my coffee. Then I took my baby to a corner table, where I vowed to him that my travel bug is dormant but not dead. Talon gazed solemnly at me with his wide eyes as I promised him future trips to new horizons.

That afternoon, I walked with my friend, Amy, through the yellowing cottonwoods in Greenough Park. She’s taken her two children to live abroad several times, to Spain, Brazil, Mozambique. We talked about the transitions to and from these adventures, and how to manage the virus that flares and recedes in our blood. Amy told me that her personal travel bug follows a recognizable pattern: it takes a full year to settle back in after returning from abroad. And a full year after that before she starts yearning again for distant shores.

My friend, Ali, is leaving tomorrow on a nine-month international adventure, her route as open as her heart. I went over a few nights ago to cull through her already small pile of potential packables, helping prioritize what she’ll need for a trip that includes farming in Italy, trekking in Nepal, touring through South Africa and lounging in Bali. We both cheered when the pile finally fit in her small backpack. I lifted it appraisingly, and felt the travel bug nip at my heels.

It was a gentle nip, considering that Rob and I just recently unpacked our own international backpacks. But it was sharp enough to keep me awake after Talon’s 3 am feeding, my mind spinning through potential (and affordable) travel options with an infant. Could we make it through the long flight across the Pacific to visit our friends in Tonga? Maybe we could camp for a month in Baja. Where might I find a friend with a sailboat that needs looking after in February?

Then I pushed pause on the travel scenarios scrolling through my sleep-deprived new-momma mind. I made a resolution that had to be enough for that night: we will take our child abroad some day, somehow. We will take him on buses and boats and bikes. We will give him the gift of new cultures and new vistas. And – in time – we will see if he inherited the yen for exploration that courses through the veins of both his parents.

Parenting, Pregnancy

Rebirth

All good stories start with water. With a flow, a rush, a release. So did you. You were made on the sea, in nights full of stars and gently rocking boats. You were made when laughter was simple, and music echoed through it all.

Here is what I want you to know:

There will be laughter and music and light and love. And there will be storms and pests and trials and droughts. Nothing is perfect. Plans change. Life happens when you’re not looking. Read the rest here.

This story appears in Mamalode, where I earn a few nickels for every view. Thanks for supporting my writing.

Parenting, Pregnancy, Reflections on Life

Meet Talon Randall Roberts

Talon Randall Roberts reached into the world with a hand wide open, ready to catch his parents’ hearts. Our little dude arrived on August 14th at 12:44 pm, weighing in at 6.9 lbs and 19.5 inches long after a 12-hour labor at the Missoula Birth Center. Although his passport won’t show it, Talon has already visited Tonga, New Zealand, Thailand, Myanmar and several choice spots in the Pacific Northwest. Check him out:

Day 3: Talon’s first visit to Rattlesnake Creek.
Day 1: Being born ain’t no picnic. Day 6: Still a tiny peanut.

Day 4: Just chillin’.Day 7: A week-old birthday party with his new friends, Everett and Dawson.
A lot of sleeping to celebrate their first play date.The carseat that swallows Mr. T. Day 2: Daddy is comfy. Day 2: Figuring life out.Day 3: Welcome to Montana, kiddo.

Parenting

On Missing My Sister

I started the countdown to Tonga a few days ago. Less than five weeks!

Yes, I know, I can hear you. You couldn’t be thinking it louder: “Really? You’re taking a month-long vacation—with us—and you just started that countdown right now?!”

Seriously. And part of the reason I haven’t started it until now is because I miss my big sister SO much. And starting that countdown before now would have meant that I admitted that fact to myself. I have been trying so hard to be strong, to be independent, to sweep this gap in my life into the recesses so that I can pretend it’s less hard than it actually is.

Because.

Because I refuse to give you any excuse to feel guilty for taking the opportunity to go on this incredible, amazing, mind-opening, soul-searching, identity-defining adventure with the love of your life (yes, I know you well enough to know that you feel guilty about leaving sometimes – and you NEVER, EVER, not in a million years, should. But you do, and I have absolutely refused to contribute to it — until now, obviously. Oops.)

Because admitting the extent to which I miss you would mean that maybe I’m not as independent as I would like to believe, that I’m not as strong as I think I am, that my identity involved more than just being “your sister” in this town of people who knew you first and know you better.

Because admitting it without an end in realistic sight was, frankly, too hard.

But here’s the thing. You help to define me. A really big part of me. And when that part is so far away, being your sister is sometimes all that I want to be.

So I started this countdown on a day when the Missoula Sunday Blues got to me – big time. A day when the 60-degree, hyper color days of a fall morning turned to a cold, dark Montana winter afternoon in the space of a few hours, when a perfect storm of inconsequential, small events coalesced into a lonely evening when the only thing I wanted was to talk to my big sister.

So I finally stopped trying to be strong—I’m sure no one really believed it anyway, if they know us at all —and allowed myself to look forward to that day in December when we meet in a tropical airport unintentionally wearing the exact same outfit (how embarrassing).

Because it’s close enough now, not an inconceivable 6 months that you haven’t been here to tell that hilarious thing to that only you would appreciate, to talk about our days, to plan the next adventure, to walk next door with the dog in tow when I need you.

What’s funny is that right now, I can’t picture us in Tonga, because all I can see is your living room with Rob hanging the projector sheet for a movie, cramming into the sauna, your kitchen with the candles lit and dinner on the stove.

Because your Highland house feels like home. But when I land in Vava’u, I have no doubt it will feel like home, too. Because we’ll probably be wearing the same skirt. Just sayin’.

For now, though, I’ll content myself with wearing a wetsuit with a lei for Halloween and toting a sign that says “Tonga or Bust.” You should feel free to wear a down coat with a hat and gloves. You know, because you probably miss that.

Less than five weeks!