Mamalove | Bethany Bassett

Tag: Mamalove

4Mar

Heirloom

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 7 Comments

Yesterday, the resident princess woke up one year older. She bounded out of bed, thrilled as any newly minted five-year-old and radiating enough energy to make her tired mother see stars.

Our pre-breakfast interview went thusly:

Me: “What is today?”

Natalie: “TOMORROW!” ::begins jumping up and down::

Me: “Uhh.. and what is tomorrow?”

Natalie: “My birthday! It’s my birthday! AHHHHHHH! I’m FIVE!” ::throws a balloon over her head repeatedly::

Sophie: “Sophie’s a five.”

Natalie: “And I have one heart balloon and other balloons, and I even got a heart balloon that’s the color green!”

Sophie: “Mine’s a purple.”

Natalie: “I want to do all kind of things today! Mommy, you know, I can look up and down and left and right, and I can do lots of jumps!” ::demonstrates:: “I can jump on one leg! Watch! I can do it with one leg! You know I like pink all the time?”

Sophie: “Orange balloon.”

Natalie: “I can do it so well now, but not when I’m four. Only five-year-olds are good at things. Just now. You like my long legs? My birthday! My birthday! You know? You’re probably right, it is my birthday. Woo-hoo-woo-hoo! You see the heart on my head?”

Sophie: “The color of all balloons!”

Me: “What are your favorite things to play with?”

Natalie: “A colorful piano, the pirate Legos…” ::goes to investigate:: “I can see a monkey, a shark, an alligator, a skeleton, lots of pirates with fish, there’s LOTS of pirates and a mermaid and a king, and I like ballet and my little toys and computer games and Super Mario Brothers.”

Sophie: “And Wii ‘ports!”

Natalie: “Mommy, you know I’m being good? You just know that I’m five now? When I go to sleep, I don’t suck my thumb anymore.”

Sophie: “Sophie’s sucking the thumb.”

Me, trying to stick to the script: “What can you do now that you’re five?”

Natalie: “Play with Barbies and open presents and play with some other toys. Oh, reading! I just know how to look at the pictures on my own, okay, Mommy? I can just look at my pictures. You see? I’m going to look at these pictures. Wow. Look at these letters, wow! Hey look, here’s my number that I turned!” ::points to the page number:: “FIVE!”

Me: ::nods and smiles while backing slowly toward my warm bed::

I was under the weather all day—as in, I couldn’t manage to lift my outlook above the low-lying clouds—but I loved watching her luxuriate in the occasion. It’s not every day a girl gets a custom-made pink layer cake and is finally allowed to use scissors at school. All the same, my mind would only grant that she was twenty-four hours older than she had been the day before, that the date was less worthy of celebration than the girl herself. The difference between five years old and four-plus-364-days wasn’t enough to coax awe, much less jumping jacks, out of me.

However, my stoic perspective lasted only as long as the tissue paper on her second present. It was a ring—a dusky pink jewel set in a gold circlet, misshapen from its former career as my fifth birthday present.

Natalie tried on the ring, admired it for approximately three seconds, and put it back in its scuffed velvet box. Oh, I thought. Knowing the kid’s adoration for all things pink and sparkly, I had assumed she would love my little heirloom… but she was more excited about the 49-cent pencil sharpener in the next package, and I wasn’t offended. I was jolted though. Watching my daughter twirl the ring in the kitchen light reminded me of the day I had gotten the ring. I remembered it. And the true weight of five-years-old landed squarely on my consciousness: She’s crossed the threshold from impression into memory.

The realization hummed in my background the rest of the day. Twenty years from now, would Natalie remember me sitting down to draw princesses with her? Would she remember me leaving the table to clean? Would she remember my frustration over the confounding Disney Wii game? Would she remember me leading her into the pages of Little House in the Big Woods and illuminating mysteries like venison and headcheese? What about me picking up my computer as a respite from several straight hours with the girls? Or me kissing the grumpiest part of her neck until the giggles burst out at bedtime?

It’s a sobering discovery that my parenting from here on out is being archived rather than evaporating with the moment. (Frankly, it’s terrifying, but that may be only because my brain hasn’t taken its Valium yet.) I have about twenty hours’ total experience raising a five-year-old, and I’m guaranteed to botch the job over and over again as I figure it out. Will enough standout parenting moments cancel out the flubs that go on record? Can my core-deep love make up for my core-deep imperfection?

I certainly hope so, because otherwise… ::starts backing slowly toward my warm bed::

8Feb

Heart Extension

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 8 Comments

Dear girls of mine,

I saw today that the younger sister of one of my high school friends just had a baby. She’s in her early twenties now—no longer the bubbly little girl I remember—and is unmarried. The father scuttled away upon hearing she was pregnant, and she’s now raising her darling little daughter on her own with more intention and joy than I see in most parents. She’s also terrified… but fiercely in love with her baby and determined to view the situation as a the most beautiful kind of gift. Life. Dimpled wrists. An extension of her heart to cherish.

What broke my heart is the way others have responded to her, particularly her own family and their Christian compadres. They have told her she has no right to celebrate this new life, that she had no right to take gorgeous maternity pictures or keep the baby or think that God loves her in spite of a surprise pregnancy. They followed standard etiquette for conservative types and abandoned her to the “consequences of her actions.” (Such a stone-hearted phrase, that; it practically comes with its own gavel and Arctic wind.) Instead of congratulations or compassion or newborn diapers or listening ears, they offered scorn. And this in the name of a Jesus who told a woman caught in adultery, “Does no one condemn you?… Neither do I.”

Thinking about their reaction makes me furious until I consider how marginalized and unloved someone would have to feel to treat others with such supercilious contempt. Graceless actions come from graceless hearts, and I suppose this girl’s family deserves pity more than hate mail. All the same, I hope they one day realize what they missed out on.

(Like this

and this

and nibbling soft cheeks and snuggling a tiny, trusting person to sleep and receiving slobber-kisses and celebrating milestones and building a relationship and getting to watch a precious new story unfold.)

However, the words weighing on my heart right now are for you. I want you to know that your dad and I love you. Unconditionally. This means our love stays even if you reject us, commit a crime, join a cult, scribble with bright green marker all over the newly painted walls (to use a hypothetical example), or come home from high school one day with a positive pregnancy test. And while we hope your eventual families grow out of the same deep commitment that started our own, new life will always be welcome here. You will always be welcome here. No matter what mistakes you make or what curveballs the future throws, you will have two sets of arms ready to hug you… and any little ones you bring into the world. (No matter the circumstances. Really.)

My friend’s little sister is right; children are the very most beautiful kind of gift.

I love you to the moon, to the sun, to the farthest reaches of uncharted future and back,
Mom

6Nov

Tomato Tomahto

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 4 Comments

One needs quality time to feel loved;
the other needs snuggles and kisses times a gajillion.

One gobbles up the green and leafy;
the other is part T-rex.

One shrinks back shyly when company stops by;
the other races to give out hugs.

One is potty trained;
the other is… not.

One plays happily by herself for hours;
the other needs social interaction like air.

One knows what she likes and sticks with it;
the other likes to try what’s new.

One has a tan all summer long;
the other blushes under SPF 750.

One prefers the color pink;
the other prefers orange and lellow and green and lurple and red and blue… and pink.

One wants to know the hows and whys;
the other wants to make everyone laugh.

One has inherited my bookworm tendencies;
the other shares my chapstick habit.

One is a sweet-hearted, bright-eyed, laughing, singing, twirling, glittering fairy princess at heart;
the other is too.

26Aug

Exclusive Access

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

Car Lingus – Part 2 (Part 1 here)

My husband’s boss works consistent 90-hour weeks and sees vacation as a time to cram in even more hours. He will fly to the United States for a meeting and then fly back in a single day, and if he’s running late to a social event, he just might rent a helicopter. He also likes to pull over rude motorists using his fake police light. The man’s interpretation of rational is on a different planet than ours… but even he thought we were crazy for attempting a drive to Ireland and back with two small children and a trunkful of camping gear in tow.

(He wasn’t even factoring in the rain that awaited in every single country, every single DAY of our trip.)

I’ll admit it was disconcerting that a man who drinks fourteen espressos a day thought our vacation plan was madness, but many of our best family memories are a result of our spontaneous (and possibly deranged) travels. Day 13 of this trip was no exception.

We had a tentative outline of a plan for the day:
1)      Take ferry from Dublin
2)      See sun for the first time in a week
3)      Revel, tan toes on dashboard, etc.
4)      All fall asleep except Dan, who would
5)      Drive us to Cardiff, at which point, we would
6)      Try to find obscure campsite we looked up online
7)      Eat, sleep, continue homeward

We made it to point 3 ½ before the Welsh landscape outside the car started punching our eyes out with its otherworldly beauty. It was like Tolkein’s imagination come to life or God’s favorite mystery novel, or maybe the moon. We passed short stone walls holding up craggy green mountains dotted with sheep and shale alike. We glimpsed rock formations plunging into rivers and secret clefts lined with dusky purple heather… and then we spotted the waterfalls. Did we really have any choice but to pull over, wake the girls up, and go mountain climbing? (No.)

Natalie may be young, but I hope that afternoon will sparkle as much in her memory when she’s 86 as it does now. It didn’t matter that we were wearing completely the wrong shoes or that the wind whipped our thin jackets into batter; we were having an adventure together in some of the most enchanting landscapes on earth. We were mountain goats. We were cavemen. We were Sacagawea, Yeats, and Aragorn all at once. Dan picked bouquets of heather for us, then went off to scale a cliff while the girls and I sang “Old MacDonald Had a Waterfall” into the blustery sky until we were dizzy. It was perfect.

In keeping with the impulsive theme, we blew off our original plan and followed a campground sign near the adorable town of Betws-y-Coed. Can I give a shout-out to spontaneity right now? Because that is how we ended up pitching our tent in the sloping green of a Welsh sheep farm with Snowdon Mountain sneaking peeks at us through the clouds. It was far beyond what I had imagined when I added camping in a national park to Ye Olde Life List, far more breathtaking, epic. I’m starting to think of spontaneity as a members-only club that has exclusive access to all the magic in life. (You may not think sheep are anything magical, but don’t tell that to your toddler.)

The next day, after breaking camp in the sunshine and driving off in a thunderstorm, we made our way to a place with a different kind of enchantment, one whispering of human effort and mystery. Stonehenge was smaller than I expected at first… but it grew in my mind as we followed the giant ring in the earth, learning about its mythology. My spine has a special thrill reserved for secrets of the universe—impossible ancient architecture, symphony notes in space, the concept of eternity—and this cluster of tall blue stones reverberated with the magic of un-knowing.

We wandered into the surrounding countryside, having conversations with mistrustful cows and swinging on barrow gates. Time evaporated there under the rolling English skies; we could easily have drifted through the wild grass until we turned into barrow wights. Of course, then we would have missed our train across the Channel, an unspeakable horror to the tune of €120. We turned toward home, making the 1500 kilometer drive without incident and then holding a joyful (if not exactly conscious) reunion with our pillowtop mattress. However, I think a part of me stayed behind to haunt the island—clambering up Welsh outcroppings, holding trysts in Celtic forests, and tip-toeing around the mysteries of my British ancestors.

I guess this simply means I’ll have to go back again. Preferably soon.

24Aug

By the Spoonful

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

Car Lingus – Part 1

It caught me by surprise every day of our crazy vacation. Slipping up behind me like boys in college used to do, covering my eyes and whispering, “Guess who?”, the realization that we’re seeing the world startled me into an aching kind of gladness. It’s the same ache that grips my chest at concerts and symphonies, while reading a perfect novel, during twilight Mass at the Notre Dame—when a trickle of fulfillment finds its way into my deep, deep need for beauty.

This was a trip for slurping beauty by the spoonful from the moment we drove off into the sunrise three weekends ago. That first day brought us through the Dolomites (“Elephant hills!” exclaimed Natalie in a fit of Hemingway) to the Austrian Alps—a fairytale panorama of glittering green mountainsides frosted in clouds. “The hilllllllllls are aliiiiiiiiiive!” I didn’t sing, though the untamed nun in me was quite tempted. Even more enchanting than the mountains were the cozy valley villages with their honey-and-cream houses, traditional red steeples, and flowers—flowers bursting from every window box, flowers spilling out of every garden gate, flowers brightening the woodwork on every balcony, flowers bringing extravagant glory to every street corner. Not even the downpour that evening could dilute the splashes of color.

I would have been content spending the rest of our vacation (and/or lives) eating Edelweiss cheese in a Hansel and Gretel cottage, but thankfully my husband convinced me to get back in the car. Our second day brought us through Pennsylvania fields a very familiar-looking stretch of Germany to the old world sophistication of Munich. Dear friends (hi, Heike!) walked us through downtown where beautiful buildings towered overhead and at least three H&Ms were always in sight. We had the distinction of being refused service at the Hofbräuhaus by a grumpy waitress in a dirndl, but Munich redeemed itself by offering river surfers, stark naked frisbee players (octogenarians all, unfortunately for our eyes), and pretzels and pints at a welcoming beer garden to end the day. Honestly, the city’s natural beauty paled in comparison to the loveliness of spending a day with people we adore… but that’s how it should be, isn’t it?

Our next destination was Folkestone, England, which we reached after driving through the farmlands of no less than five different countries in one day. (I like to think this makes us half superhuman, or quarter at the very least). The long, oh so very long trip in the car was worth every minute when we pulled into our campsite and looked out at this:

With the sunset rolling in across the Channel, Dover’s famous white cliffs gleamed like wild candles. We forgot about supper and walked along the shore, our hair waltzing with the wind, and befriended snails in every tide pool. On the four-year-old’s imperative, we pretended there were pirates in the water—an imagining colored in the next day by finding out there had been pirates only a week before. From then on, it was pirates as we browsed the shopping district and pirates as we explored a leery-eyed graveyard, and two very small pirates nearly burst with “Aarrrr”s when we found a sunken ship playground near the beach. Mutinous Mommy even found treasure by accidentally discovering Charles Dickens’ house during an uncharted ramble.

The next leg of our journey took us on a ferry cutting through the wide swath of deep blue water between Great Britain and Ireland. My first impression of the Emerald Isle was traffic, ack!, followed by brr, followed by brrrrrrrrrrr, followed by why didn’t we pack the winter coats?, followed by thank God our tent is so small that we HAVE to share body heat all night long. Sophie woke up in a pool of rainwater one morning, I routinely lost feeling in several extremities (including my head), and we may have resorted to ramen noodles for supper… but the silhouette of cloud banks over impossibly green grass was a beauty worth shivering for. (Plus, there was Smithwick’s on tap.)

On Day 13, we finally boarded the return ferry to start our long trip back home, little knowing that the most soul-thrilling beauty was still ahead…

(On to Part 2…)

28Jul

Fishbowl Invitation

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 6 Comments

These summer days have been custom-fitted with a fisheye lens. We unpack, we clean, we eat salad, we sleep in puddles of melted motivation. Our priorities have adjusted to the demands of changing homes, not to mention the brick-baking heat and the reality of two girls at home, and the hours arch and flex strangely. My writing time keeps slipping outside the bubble where it waits, nose to glass, to be invited back in.

I see it, of course. Each day shifts through a hundred nuances I wish I could bottle and share or weave into a Ray Bradbury book. I’d love to invite each of you up to our balcony at dusk, when the fading sunlight plays alchemist on the city. We’d pick mint for our mojitos and debate in whispers over the exact color shimmering off the buildings below. Orange? Pink? Mother-of-Pearl? Enchantment?

I’d have a printout of my thoughts from the day ready if conversation began to lag. You could read how absurdly long it took to get myself and the girls ready for a morning walk to the park and how, by the middle of our steep climb back, I would cheerfully have exchanged my children for a day at the spa. Before you had too much time to judge, you would read on to where Natalie hung socks on the laundry line with me while we sang “Old MacDonald” (and Sophie occasionally interrupted her own “E-I-E-I-O” to point at the sun and shriek “THE MOON?”) and how love for these two girls of mine pulsed against the confines of my sanity. You would read how NieNie’s latest entry pulled my heart into pieces and how a line from Elliot Smith brought back the thrill of diving into the blogging world seven (seven!) years ago.

You would get a little dizzy from the way my mind flits from friend to friend, the way I still miss my best friend at age six, the hopes I hold for current acquaintances. You would reach the paragraph with all the secrets, at which point I would decide it’s time for a chocolate-whiskey-and-beer cupcake and four consecutive rounds of Balderdash. Secrets are secrets, after all. But this is my wish-upon-a-star in writing—to put myself in words and invite you to share.

So in lieu of an Italian balcony blogfest*, here’s a question for you: What would you like to read more about? Any pressing inquiries you’d like to see addressed? A topic that’s been on your mind lately? Something you’d like to know about me? Glassy-eyed summer days or not, this blog is ready for some friendly conversation. (Cocktails optional but recommended.)

~~~

*As lovely as the idea is, teensy matters like distance, time, and money make it unlikely. Annoying matters, those. However, if you’re ever coming through central Italy, do let me know, and we’ll try to make some magic happen.

9Jun

Stay-at-Home-FEMA

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 8 Comments

“So,” asks the nice lady at church, “Have you found a job yet? Are you working?”

Huh, I think. There’s no shame in being a stay-at-home-mom, but I always feel guilty admitting to it, as if I’m not pulling my weight in adult society. I don’t want to answer until I’ve shown her my résumé, issued a disclaimer in triplicate, and introduced her to someone’s toddler. Specifically, mine.

Because, have you met Sophie? This sweet baby of mine has a personality that is one part movie star, two parts hurricane, and fifteen parts trouble. She is the reason I am a stay-at-home-mom rather than a stay-at-home-writer or a stay-at-home-gadabout.

And this is her afternoon schedule:

Climb onto the bathroom shelf; dump out all the Q-tips
Spill an entire sippy-cup of water all over the kitchen (how?!); repeat
Get into the drawer of pony-tail holders; scatter across the bedroom
Get the candles off my bookshelf; eat one
Take off her pants and speed-climb onto Natalie’s bunk bed; pee on it
Steal my makeup; randomly decide which to apply, which to toss, and which to taste
Climb onto the kitchen table to get into the bag of cookies; take a bite from each
Turn on MTV; dance
Get napkins out of napkin holder; strew about kitchen
Unfold clean clothes; place in laundry basket
Dump out all the Q-tips again; pee on them
Scream with joy until someone gives her an ice cream cone; eat it from the bottom up
Sift through the trash; redistribute around house
Dump out all the recycling; redistribute around house
Steal my Microplane zester; lick
Unpack the lower section of the credenza; run around with a casserole dish
Ride her dump truck backwards into the kitchen; start the microwave
Climb into the bathtub; wander the floor in wet socks
Rearrange furniture so as to reach kitchen counter; dump out bag of sugar
And pee on it
Climb on top of the table at which Natalie is coloring; color arms and mouth
Do three sit-ups next to me; sit on me for the remaining thirty-seven
Run around the house with a limoncello glass; if anybody notices, throw it

19 months is adorable and horrifying, and I’ve never worked so hard at any job in my life. I thought teaching was a challenge, but it’s nothing compared to planters overturned on the rug or chocolate smeared across the wall, floor, and hair of a giggling girl. Or potty training. By the end of a normal weekday, our house is petitioning for disaster relief funds and my mind is curled up in bed sucking its thumb. If I’ve managed to edit an article or make it to the grocery store or shower, well… that’s just icing on the supermom cake.

“Well, are you working?” the lady presses.

“No,” I smile. “Not right now.”

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