During
my twenties, I knew I lacked the maturity for motherhood. At almost thirty, no hint
of an imminent transformation presented itself. I finally made decent money and
planned a trip to Jamaica. My restless husband awaited my decree of
readiness. One night, after several glasses of wine, I said okay. The next day
I changed my mind, but it was too late.
A
doubtful contender for motherhood, I visited the parenting section of the
library frequently. Little by little, I came to terms with my changing body and
gained confidence in my future parental abilities. I cancelled the trip to
Jamaica and assured myself I could manage children as well as any other
administrative position I’d conquered. Besides, surely I’d be blessed with a
daughter. Had I not done my time playing army and touring car dealerships as
the sister of three brothers? My mother, eager for a granddaughter and more
female companionship, mailed me a tiny pink sleeper laced with dainty rose
petals. I fingered it daily while daydreaming of nursing Meg, as I would call
her. I envisioned a lifelong friend.
When the leaves fell in late October, I pulled a
light blue sleeper from the third drawer of the dresser and buried the pink one
under the stack of yellow and green. I dressed my newborn son, Jacob, in the
blue sleeper and nursed him as he melted into my heart.
In
stores I closed my eyes to the little girl dresses, Mary Jane shoes, and Easter
bonnets and instead purchased jeans, cowboy boots, and baseball caps. I
bypassed the dolls at the toy store and walked directly to the fire trucks.
Each afternoon of my second pregnancy, I
pushed the stroller down to the beach at the end of my street and sat on the
break wall while my little boy threw rocks into the ocean for an hour -- or
two. Caressing my growing belly, I watched his tossed stones disappear into the
sea and pictured him walking beside a stroller carrying his baby sister, Caitlin,
dressed in the lacy pink sleeper.
When the trees budded that May, Jacob
walked beside the stroller from which his new brother, Jordan, smiled upon the
world, and me, who loved him in spite of his male equipment.
As the years passed, my days of peaceful
walks and dreaming the time away disappeared.
“Will you pitch to us, Mom?”
Dirty dishes and clothes baskets filled
with grass-stained jeans played second fiddle as I took my pitching position in
the middle of the front lawn. I covered first, second, and third base, too, as
the small feet of my sons and the neighborhood boys further etched the base
paths into the grass, so unlike, I imagined, the lush lawns of houses with
little girls.
We visited parks and nature trails, where
my two free-spirited sons swung from the highest heights on jungle gyms and
made forts of brush and mud. I scrubbed dirt out from under fingernails and
plugged my nose after trips to the mudslide. At the pool, one son scaled the
fence in hopes of petting the puppy running freely on the other side while the
other discovered the diving board, without my watchful eye. At the library, one
picked out books on dinosaurs and rocks; the other chose stories of Vikings and
war ships. Though I read them Black Beauty, Island of the Blue
Dolphins, and Trumpet of the Swan, they preferred Hank the
Cowdog, The Indian in the Cupboard, and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
On Sunday mornings, one boy sat on each
side of me in church—at least, initially. On more than a few occasions, one or
both spent part of the service out in the hall with strict instructions not to
further misbehave or I’d have to kill them in front of God and everybody.
As I cooked up play dough, my swollen
middle brushed against the front of the stove. Once again, the rose-petal
sleeper took a prominent place in my thoughts, and I added a touch of red food
coloring to the mix. I watched as my sons molded the light pink dough into cars
and guns and snakes. While I collected wild flowers with Jordan or coached
third base at Jacob’s baseball practice, I mused about the new life harbored in
my womb and prayed for a little girl named Michaela. In my thoughts I took her
to dance class and braided her hair.
After the Easter bunny came that April, I
placed a sky blue sleeper on Ian, my new son, who smiled at me for the first
time on the night of his birth. I passed the little pink sleeper off to the
lady down the street.
When my father in Wisconsin cleaned out
his basement, he shipped me six boxes of Barbie doll furniture that my
grandfather had built me in my childhood. I stuffed the boxes in the attic for
a granddaughter to play with someday. Maybe.
Jacob, Jordan, and Ian grinned when I
walked into their classrooms to help or pick them up. They hugged me after I
tended their scraped knees and mended their broken hearts. They instinctively
reached for my hand when we crossed streets. Sometimes, they kept their hands
in mine well beyond the crossing.
As time went by, I drove to six baseball
practices and six games a week. My van smelled like a locker room. I camped in
a tent in both the heat and the cold. I sat through three sets of guitar
lessons and I ran laps with all three sons during the weekly three-mile physical
education marathon.
Never did it occur to me that every mom
didn’t have fourteen boys playing basketball in their driveways, three more
upstairs building Lego contraptions, and two others wrestling on the living
room rug. I rarely noticed the looks of sympathy as I walked through a grocery
store with three boys screwing up behind me. I traipsed through natural
history, science and industry, and air and space museums. I smiled and thanked
the man at the art museum who gave me a discount when I showed up with my three
boys and a couple extra in tow. Rain at Yankee Stadium and Fenway Park didn’t
faze me; I had remembered the rain ponchos.
I taught my boys to cook, to garden, to
use chlorine bleach in the white load, to chew with their mouths closed, and to
write thank you notes. I didn’t say a word when, out of the corner of my eye, I
spied them crying while I read of the dog’s death in When the Red Fern Grows
or when Beth died in the movie Little Women. If they noticed they were
the only boys in a theater filled with weeping mothers, daughters, and
granddaughters, they never said.
Despite my efforts to incorporate less
stereotypically “manly” things into their lives, some classic “male” attributes
remained constant. I repeatedly explained that it wasn’t necessary to fart,
burp, or discuss bodily functions at every meal. I often found myself drawn
into races down ski slopes when my first choice would have been a leisurely
run. And I was talked into skipping Phantom of the Opera for tickets to
the Alamo Bowl.
I did, however, pass on boat shows,
rattlesnake roundups, and paintball games. I was often alone, sometimes
gratefully, while my husband taught such skills as oil changing, lawn care,
carpentry, and car washing. (Apparently, there is an art to the latter.)
Sometimes, I was present, but still alone, like when on a hike we came upon a
waveless lake amid hills engulfed in a quiet fog. Not fifteen seconds had
elapsed before my family of men broke the serenity with a boisterous game of
rock skipping. Then there were the countless times when a lovely dinner at a
restaurant turned into a sports event. A tightly folded paper napkin works
great as a mini football. Thumb-tips placed together with index fingers held
upright? Goal posts, of course.
On days when the testosterone flew too
wildly about my house, I planted myself on the doorstep of a friend with
daughters only. No one there played soccer with balloons in the living room or
washed the car with the best bath towels. No one there tromped through the flower
garden in search of errant golf balls or leaped over four full steps of clean
clothes in need of a trip upstairs. No one there disregarded what I had to say
simply because I didn’t have a penis. In the company of those of my gender, I
filled myself back up and then headed home to my household of men.
When Jacob turned eighteen, my heart
turned over. Watching him one Friday night as he laughed with his friends at
the high school football game, I questioned whether I could survive not seeing
him everyday after he left for college. When I noted the confidence in Jordan
as he led his scout troop, I marveled at when he had grown up to become such a
fine leader. When Ian, with the aroma of too much cologne trailing him as he
paced the kitchen, asked my opinion regarding a girl at the sixth grade dance,
my eyes flooded. How quickly my years of raising boys had passed. What would
become of me when they left to build their own lives?
Over a bottle of wine -- or two -- I laid
my heartache on my husband. Certainly our sons will marry and go off with
their wives’ families forever. That’s what men do, isn’t it? Who will carry on
the tradition of making Swedish coffee bread at Christmas? Will any of them
invite me to Christmas dinner? Surely their wives will hate me. If only I had a
daughter. A daughter would never leave me out in the cold. She would be my
friend for life.
On a day when my future plight
particularly depressed me, my youngest son came into the kitchen, where I
stared out the window at the leaves fluttering from the trees. He stood silent
beside me for a time before touching my arm and saying, “You want to come out
and shoot baskets with me?”
I looked at this boy, his concern for me
engraved on his face, and I figured it out. How silly of me to have thought I’d
be alone after raising three kind, caring men. The rock-skipping and other
male-exclusive events I’d silently observed had prepared me for the changing
unity of our lives. Standing aside didn’t mean being apart. They had always
known I was there. Now I knew I always would be, too. Family -- and friends --for
life.
As I pulled my hair into a quick ponytail
and followed my son outside, I also decided that there had been a reason I
wasn’t blessed with a daughter to dress in the pretty pink sleeper, way back then.
Someone knew I’d be much better at shooting baskets than braiding hair.
I thought of this long buried away piece recently, for come July that oldest son of mine and his wife are having a baby. Yup, I'm gonna be a grandma.
My husband and I have a few projects going to get ready for second son's big wedding shindig in June. While putting new boards on the picnic table, we also dug around in the attic for a few things. Found this stuff and we're working on getting it back in good order.
So here is the question. Am I going to need toys like this for that new grandbaby?
Or will I finally get to pull out those boxes of Barbie doll furniture?
