I began writing my first book, “Mitten Strings for God,” the year Henry and Jack were eight and five. My husband and I were right in the thick of it, parenting two small children. We were busy, exhausted, finding our way, certain that everyone else must be better at this than we were. I remember struggling to accommodate and care for our two boys — so very different from each of us and, miraculously, complete polar opposites of one another as well — and wishing these two single-edition models had arrived with instruction manuals of some sort, so we wouldn’t have to flail about so day after day, trying to figure out what they each needed and how best to give it to them.
Looking back now, I wish I hadn’t been so afraid. I wish I’d trusted myself more. I wish I’d believed that I already had what it takes to be a good mother, rather than constantly berating myself for not being smart enough, or patient enough, or wise enough, or loving enough. I wish I’d had more faith in my kids. Faith that they could survive their bumpy, perilous journeys on the road to young adulthood and be stronger for the bruises endured along the way. Faith that, no matter how crazy or irrational or clingy or tearful or restless or angry or oversensitive or afraid they seemed at two or five or eight, they would eventually get it all sorted out and grow up and be fine. I wish I had laughed with them more and worried about them less. I wish I’d allowed myself to sleep more deeply during those years, rather than staring at the ceiling so many nights and promising myself that I would do better tomorrow. I wish I’d known, really known then, the way I think I know now, that every moment is precious, that life is short, and that it’s all good, even when it’s not.
Writing was a way for me to remind myself, day after day, what really mattered. In order to write, I had to gaze at my children with clear eyes; when I did, I was blinded by their radiance. In order to write, I had to become utterly quiet and still; when I did, I was amazed by the beauty that was my life. In order to write, I had to look into the truth of things as they actually were. When I did, my heart cracked wide open. What I saw, again and again, was the breathtaking miracle of our existence together: two children held in the sturdy embrace of two parents who loved them with a depth and a passion that I never did find adequate words to express.
A couple of months ago, when the boys were both home for a weekend, we watched some old home movies of the two of them cutting up in the back yard, playing catch, impersonating their favorite umpires, goofing off and being funny and adorable and heart-wrenchingly young. There was footage of Jack impishly plucking herbs from the garden in the back yard and eating them straight out of his hand. A serious young Henry at the piano, playing his very first songs. I put my arm around Jack as the video screen went blank and jokingly said something like, “You see, you guys did have a good childhood.”
“Mom,” he said back, with rare seriousness, “we had a perfect childhood.”
And that is what I am thinking about now, as I consider a batch of fresh challenges, the challenges that come with the territory of being eighteen and twenty-one. Or, perhaps I should say, with the territory of being the parents of an eighteen and a twenty-one year old. Maybe it is all perfect just as it is, even if perfection isn’t easy to see in this moment, from an inch or two away. Maybe, years from now, we will look back on this early spring of 2011 and recall not the worries about the lack of summer jobs, the hazy plans, the shortage of cars and money, but rather, perfection. The sweetness that is the essence of life, even when it’s not as simple and straightforward as we might wish.
My brother and his wife have had a tough winter themselves, with a two-year-old who’s just had tubes put in her ears after months of infections and courses of ineffectual antibiotics, and a four-year-old who, in his first months of nursery school, has caught every bug that’s come down the pike. Ask them to describe what life has been like in their house of late and “perfection” is not a word they’d be likely to use.
And yet, that’s the word that occurred to me, when they sent along this photo of Angelique and Gabriel. Just one wild and crazy moment in the midst of yet another ordinary day. Just life as it is, captured, even as it turns into something else. Perfection.
Thanks so much for this post, Katrina.
I’ve learned to see the present moment as the perfect teacher, but I don’t often think of the present moment as “perfect.” But it is. It really is.
Thanks so much for drawing my attention to this fact.
I find the same thing to be true. I am a very different mother to Sam, my tail end baby, than I was to his oldest siblings. When they were ten and nine, I was also mothering a five and one year old. I felt like I was juggling all the time.
Now that my baby is ten, I find so much more time to relax and just ‘be’ with him, to snuggle and be silly. Even with the sometimes chaos of his older teen siblings, I let all of that go, and just relax in my role as his mother.
I dont know if it’s something I could have found a decade ago, in the thick of things. I think you almost have to go through the trenches to learn the lesson.
Great post, and great picture. I always love your columns, Katrina!
Judy
Great post! I too have a pre-K kid who has caught EVERY bug this year, we are on our 3rd virus/bug and I was feeling overwhelmed. Reading your post was just what I needed. Thanks!!
Thank you Katrina for your blogs. I am enjoying each and everyone. They always come when I need them. Living in the present moment is challenging for me now as my husband is looking at a job opportunity that will move our family of seven across Canada. The thought of moving 5 kids and a big dog is overwhelming. The challenges are great yet the adventure is exciting too. We are weighing all of our options and making a decision this week. These are exciting and stressful times yet if I do not live in the present my kids dinner does not get on the table, the lunches don’t get packed, the dog does not get walked and everything falls apart. So thank you for the message, it is all perfect in a messy way.
Debbie
Blinded by their radiance. Amazed by the beauty that was my life.
Yes, yes, and yes.
I don’t think I’ve read a post (or book) of yours yet that hasn’t made me cry on every single page. Thank you, so incredibly much, for tugging me back, over and over, to right now.
xoox
That it’s all good, even when it’s not.
Katrina, how do you do that? It’s magic, how you write. Thank you! Awesome picture too!
Pamela
It really doesn’t matter how old your children are, you always want the best for them and you always think you are doing something wrong.
Loved your book and love reading your blog! You always touch me some way!
My brother’s mantra is “they didn’t come with instructions.” Yet, they grow up in spite of us.
We recently had a conversation with our twenty four year old about his childhood, and to my sheer surprise, some of his happiest memories are those moments that you, Katrina, have so often called “ordinary.” I’d like to think that each stage of life comes with it own ordinary moments, and that with any luck we will have learned from our wistful reminiscences to savor them while we can.
Thanks for the constant reminders to live in the moment, Katrina, and thanks for sharing such an adorable photo!
Katrina
One of your best posts ever. Loved every word. Being Good Enough is perfect. This would be my wish for every young mother in the thick of the craziness where you are grateful to just go to the bathroom alone. If you’ve really been present for your kids, they will look back on their childhood with only the fondest memories of a perfect childhood.
Tracy
I search my blog list daily to see if you have posted something. I treasure your books, and am actually attending a baby shower on Saturday for a dear friend’s daughter-in law. I am giving her “Mitten Strings for God” as my gift. I have shared it with my daughter as she has just had her first child, a daughter. I remember this exact feeling that you’ve shared….going to bed, feeling like I needed to try harder, to be better, instead of really appreciating what we’d accomplished or enjoyed that day. I always felt like it wasn’t enough. Thank you for opening my eyes, and helping me to share that with the next generation! Your boys are so beautiful. Love the pic of them on the piano!!!!!
That picture brought a wide smile to my face… not because of the subject matter, but because I can imagine the cacophony going on while it was taken, and how easily one can block it out by stilling it into a photograph. That is, in my opinion, what makes it perfect, even when it is not 🙂
As usual your words are poignant and honest. I truly can appreciate in raising 5 boys to be kind to myself too as a mother (by not worrying and beating myself up so much). I am very much trying to not analyze, dissect, measure, as much and instead remember, love, relish the joy including my part in it all. Beautiful post, thank you.
So lovely and essential, coaxing us back to the present moment—to the ongoing realization that that not only is it all here now, it always has been (maybe even always will be, in some transcendent way).
The evocative picture invites us to fill in the music ourselves, the wave that links all our discrete moments in captured time.
What a touching and poignant post.
This line was especially pertinent to me:
“The sweetness that is the essence of life, even when it’s not as simple and straightforward as we might wish.”
Bravo and well said.
After just having had one of those nights “staring up at the ceiling,” it was so reasuring to read Katrina’s words and then to see the shared sentiments of other mothers. My son is almost 16, my daughter 14. Their teenage challenges differ from their toddler and baby challenges, but by now, I think I know that they will be fine. I need to remember that “every moment is precious…it’s all good, even when its not.” Thank you for those words!!!!
Thank You for sharing…
your writing is so honest and inspiring.
Raising 2 teens right now, I need all the help I can get! It is amazing how a few words can change my frame of mind, so thank you.
Mary Lee
gorgeous as always, and true.
I swear, every single time I read one of your posts, I get the chills. This one struck particularly close to home. I have to admit, I feel like I wasted my kids’ babyhood with worry. I was so caught up in what I was supposed to do and not do — don’t introduce the pacifier, don’t co-sleep, wean from two naps to one, etc. — I feel now like I studied their lives instead of living them.
Oh the regret.
It’s not too late. They are 6 and 9 now. And while I may have missed their infancy and toddlerhood, I do now try to live every day and absorb at least some of it with them. And I keep the mantra, “this too shall pass” top of mind every time I am felled by worry.
I wrote about “perfection” today too in my blog post entitled “Happy Birthday Jeremy.” I hope you read it.
http://www.joyoflearningnow.com/?page_id=24
Oh, I love “wild and crazy moments in the midst of yet another ordinary day.” I’m enthralled with our four-year-old daughter right now…
Thank you for this…xo
Such a lovely post. Thank you!
Your writing is calming to me…a kind of writing-meditation that calls me to turn inward, to listen and reflect and trust the internal rhythm of my life and life around me.
I look forward to reading another book from you, Katrina Kenison. I hope it’s in the works.
i remember running on nerves when my two were young. i zipped by alot of moments. every moment was new to me. and still is.
I love it that your son said his childhood was perfect. What an affirmation of your parenting. So generous of him to speak the words aloud.
my heart is exploding open with gratitude to you for this gift right now, especially as i struggle with the angst of ‘not enough’ as a mama. thank you for inviting me to be more fully present and notice the perfect that is.
Tears are just rolling down my cheeks as I read this. I *think* I know this, and yet I don’t — all at the same time. Earlier today I was thinking, All we can do is be better than we were. But I need to remember, more, that better and worse aren’t really the important measures in a messy life with little children underfoot. Allowing myself to be in it, really in it, as you describe here, is really what it is about. Your words this afternoon have been just what I needed.