I should clarify. I don’t like bad surprises. Good surprises? Love them. Too bad there are so few good surprises and so dang many bad surprises. For example, finding a $20 bill in a jacket pocket? Good surprise. Finding out your freezer is no longer freezing things? Bad surprise. Both those things happened to me today. The money, which was left over from a trip to the grocery store on Friday was surprising, but not excessively so because I knew I had put my money in my pocket when I went to the store. I simply “found” it this morning when reaching for my gloves. Now finding all the items in the freezer to be in a refrigerated state when I opened the freezer door and the melted zip-lock bag of left-over baby shower punch tipped over and sloshed all over myself and the floor, that was a bit excessive.

While cleaning up the grumble-inducing mess, I thought about how much I dislike surprises. On a scale of 1-10, I fall somewhere around a 12. This level of dislike is a direct correlation of my dislike of being unable to control situations, of being unprepared, of feeling inadequate. And, it comes from a dislike of stress and tension. My dislike of surprises makes for challenges. Mister Soandso has a difficult time ever surprising me with birthday presents, I often read the last few pages of a novel before I’ve read more than a few chapters, and I’m rarely spontaneous.

When you grow up in a volatile environment, there are some interesting effects. Namely, hyper vigilance and anxiety. To this day, I am constantly scanning my environment, trying to keep all surprises at a minimum. And while this makes me a pretty decent defensive driver, it lends itself to grey hair and wrinkles.

So Monday, how about some good surprises?  How about while I’m wiping up all the pooled berry juice in the bottom of the freezer, how about finding something more awesome than spilled peas? I’m thinking that when I pull the freezer out to mop under it, all those missing socks and other mysterious life surprises could be hiding under there. Come on Monday, you can do it. Surprise me!

But smells are very, very powerful things indeed.

Remember your first “true” love and how s/he smelled? Fresh sheets on your bed? Tide detergent? Pipe smoke? Rubbing alcohol? Vomit? Booze on someone’s breath? Lifesavers? Cotton candy? Old Spice aftershave. And so on.

They say that the first thing you learn is the smell of your mother. They also say that absolutely every memory you have is attached to an emotion, and a good percentage of those emotions can be accessed by a smell.

These things are good. Really they are. It is all part of how we survive this thing called life. You sat next to the fire, you smelled the burning wood, you touched the flame, you burned your hand. The smell of a wood fire, for the rest of your life, is going to have a bit of a “careful now!” aspect to it.

I was thinking all this and more the other morning as I made my son his lunch. Biggest is quite a picky eater so lunches are a bit of a challenge. But both he and Littlest love, as in ginormous love, Top Ramen. So I send him a thermos of Top Ramen at least once a week.

It was still pretty dark but the sunrise had started to bleed pinks across the horizon. I knew this because as I stood at the sink, ready to pour the Top Ramen into the awaiting thermos, a squirrel darted across my power line and startled me. The blur of squirrel against the morning sky, and the wafting smells of boiled Top Ramen transported me.

Cleaning up the mess, the distinctive smell of Top Ramen took me back to the dorm room of my freshman year.

Until that moment, I’d never really thought about how distinctive the smell of Top Ramen is. It will always smell like college to me. It will smell like a lack of sleep, of fear and being startled, of books and Bic ink, of stale beer spilled on floors. It is the smell of anticipation of what might be and the remorse of needing to let go of what was. Top Ramen, for me, is the smell of growing up.

For the record, Biggest likes his Top Ramen soupy. Littlest likes his mostly drained and tossed with shredded cheddar cheese. And Middlest thinks its disgusting and would just like an apple and a tortilla with Nutella, thank you very much.

And me? I like my Top Ramen to stay tucked away with my other memories of college.

You’d be right.

Especially if you’ve noticed that when something is bugging me, I’m most likely to approach it sideways with my eyes squished shut. This has been a long-standing approach of mine. As a child, I didn’t ask for a second cookie, I raved about how scrumptious they were. If it didn’t work, I’d start complimenting the baker on how fetching her/his hairstyle was that day. It’s the passive-aggressive person’s approach to problem solving. It’s worked to some extent all these years, why change now? Aside from boring my readers to tears, of course.

So what precisely is bugging me to the extent my knickers are not only bunching but knotted? A while back I ran across a blog post about chronos time versus kairos time and the experience of receiving unsolicited advice as a parent. Specifically about receiving the advice to relish these fleeting moments of our children’s lives. Those blithe statements to enjoy this moment because he/she/they/it will grow up before you know it, yada yada yada. That kind of advice. So I read the post and a few of the comments and then I had to put it away. I had to walk away because I needed to chew on it for a bit, like how a dog worries a piece of gristle.

I had to worry on it because I know I’ve dispensed some variety of such advice and suddenly I had the horrid fear that there were people sitting in parking lots cursing me and my pathetic motherly existence. And if you’ve read this blog for more than a sentence or two, you have probably picked up on the fact that I’ve got more issues than Newsweek, the first of which being a lack of self-esteem.

Never would I dream of upsetting a parent by inferring they need to appreciate the day-to-day intricacies of parenting more. And yet, had I? Even more to the point, should I do it again?

It’s been 11 years and 8 months and 6 days since a screaming inhalation made me a mother. And those 11 years, 8 months and 6 days have passed in a way Doctor Who is surely proud of…both extraordinarily fast and painfully slow. To be more clear, the good parts have hurtled past me so fast it was like watching 1983 Hollywood special effects. And the bad parts? Not only interminably slow but on repeat, showing me the darkest moments of my parenting life over and over again.

Because that is how time can be for us. It is elastic and capricious. And nothing we can control. But what we so easily regret.

So all those grandma types, telling you to enjoy your little angel because in no time she’ll be all grown up and gone…they are really warning you to live this life with less regret. To parent with less regret. To be..with less regret.

I had lunch with a friend who has an infant. I told her about one of my greatest parenting regrets. We both chuckled over my parenting psychosis of sorts, but it so clearly represents a huge aspect of who I am and therefore who I am as a parent, that my chuckle was a bit heavy on the self-conscious side. This is the story I told her.

I regret not letting my babies be naked enough.

When Biggest was born, I was admitted on a perfect spring day and discharged three days later to 100+ heat. Minnesota can be wacky like that. But our air conditioner was a bit flummoxed by the heat wave and died. Right when we needed it most. So Mister Soandso and I brought Biggest home and after walking in the front door we just kept going on down to the basement. The next day, after changing one of those freakish new-born diapers, I sat in the rocking chair, put him up to my shoulder and proceeded to pat his naked and down-covered little back. What was supposed to happen is he would burp up all that noxious gas making him a crabby-pants. Instead what occurred was a loud slapping noise.

Now, before you get the DHS on speed-dial, let me assure you, the noise was only loud in my head. But it was so loud in my imagination, it freaked me out. And into his onesie he went. That kid wore a onesie/tee-shirt until he got old enough I could no longer ignore his protests. Talk about one of those crazy-mom-badge moments. But what was really crazy is that Middlest was a onesie wearer as well. I rationalized that since snow flew only weeks after her birth, she needed that extra layer to keep her warm. In reality, what I was layering my babies against was any stray chance I might hurt them in my new-parent idiocy as well as paranoia.

So when Littlest came into my life, my surprise baby, I promised myself I would let him be naked more. I would set aside my fears that I was actually hurting him when I patted him on his bare back. I would suck every mom-bliss moment dry since I would never have another baby.

And I did better. Not a lot better, but better. I coaxed myself to not flinch, to trust in myself as a mom. To not regret any part of being the mother of a tiny, sickly, screaming and never sleeping infant.

Yeah, I was pretty insane. If I could go back to that day 11 years, 8 months and 6 days ago, I would bring home Biggest, take him out of that photo-perfect outfit, and lay his naked but for a diaper on my naked but for a tres chic nursing bra chest. And I would soak up every second of that moment. But I can’t. And I so regret that.

I regret that in the years and months and days between becoming a parent and being the parent I am today, there were so many instances where if only I could have just got out of my own way, the way would have been so much more than it was. How many times do we all do that? Get in our way. Lots. At least that’s what I feel like some days.

Someday, I assume, all that will be left of me is the memories people have of me and a hunk of metal somewhere. On that metal will be my name, the date I was born and the date I died and in between those dates will be a dash.

The dash is where all the good stuff is–hidden in the simplicity of a small, thin line. All my good times and not so good times. All the times I danced around my kitchen and squirted whipped cream into my kiddos’ open mouths. All the times I pulled them onto my lap and asked them about their days. All of those moments…the moments I usually forget. Because what I more easily remember are the times I’ve yelled over socks balled up on the living floor, or toothpaste chunks in the sink, or vomit in my hair. Those are the moments I regretfully remember most easily. Sure they are in that dash as well. But they are not the dash in its entirety. Not by a long shot.

The dash must be made of the good and the bad. For without one, the other does not fully exist.

And I think that that is why those sweet grandmothers and parents of not-so-little-anymore kids caution parents to enjoy these moments with their small children. Parenting, being a relationship, is made of all the realities of co-existing with someone. And too often what we focus on during the act, is the negative and in hind-sight is the positive. We are so close to the action at the moment that it is hard to see the experience fully. Which, of course, changes how we look back upon it.

The dash requires both. And a dash with less regret is the best.

So I think I may have finally found my way around this “beginning of the new year and slightly obsessed with time” place I have been of late.  I think I have finally put my finger on my worry for this year–this year my children have reached milestones before I was ready for them to get there. I have finally recognized how much I regret that in the fullness of parenting, it seems impossible to experience it all.

And yet, that glorious dash provides testimony of life’s full experience.

May this day, and all the others, fill each and every one of you with experiences full and rich. And absolutely free of regret.

My daughter was born on a beautiful Sunday in October. The sun was very bright against that Minnesotan blue sky, framed by leaves caught fire by the season. It should have been the most perfect time, but it wasn’t. And it wasn’t perfect because of the path I had been following, always following towards a place in the distance, drawn toward it the way an artist draws a road wide in the foreground and closing in upon itself on the horizon.

And eight years later, I am still on that path that squeezes itself into the smallest of spaces. I know this because my house is in shambles.

I am editing a short story I plan on submitting. As I told someone, I don’t know if I am making it better or just different, but I have had my butt in the editing chair for a good chunk of time these past few days. The deadline submission date draws near and so I have both internal and external pressure to work late into the night. And when I am working late into the night, I drag myself back into the land of the wakeful too few hours later and stumble through all the things I must do as wife, mother, employee, friend, human. Last night that stumbling did not include cleaning the kitchen.

This morning as I tried to make coffee and school lunches, while feeding children and pets, I thought to myself, “I CAN’T KEEP DOING THIS!!!”

And that is precisely what I thought eight years ago as I contemplated returning to work with an infant, a three year old, a husband, and a job that took way too much time to do right.

Eight years ago, the energy it took to spin all the plates was too overwhelming. So that spring I quit. I turned in my application for a personal leave and moved away from the life and career I had worked so late into the night to create.

When I went to graduate school to become a teacher, I made a promise to myself that the day I couldn’t give 110% to my students was the day I needed to leave the classroom. For 10 years I did that. But I also gave to everybody else. I never missed a family function, I rarely skipped church to sleep in, I was the person others counted on. I kept all the plates spinning through sheer willpower and lots and lots of coffee. But the house of cards I was stacking began looking rather shaky.

Mister Soandso and I waited a fair bit to have our second kiddo mostly because we were so sleep deprived dealing with the non-sleeping Biggest. Although he napped for 2-3 hours every afternoon, it took at least 45 minutes to get him to fall asleep. Every night, another 45 minutes to get him to sleep was a “good” night. A bad night was 2 hours. But time was wasting right along with my fertility so we checked calendars and counted paychecks and decided the time was right.

And it was for 8.5 weeks. But one morning I woke up and my boobs didn’t ache. By that night the spotting turned to bleeding. And then it was over. I lost a baby and a dream. A plate came crashing down–one that couldn’t be put back together.

I gave myself time to grieve, to rail against things, and then I added more plates, stacked more cards.

I got pregnant easily and quickly with Middlest. I worked every day, graded papers until midnight or two or dawn. I went back to graduate school that summer and collected straight As. I went to the grocery store and read stories to Biggest. I spun plates.

The day I knew I couldn’t continue like that, I was nursing Middlest in the front room, watching the snowflakes make the snowbanks white again. It occurred to me that Biggest would be starting kindergarten in only a year and a half and I couldn’t remember much of the blur between the last time I’d nursed him and that moment. Thinking back over his short life, holding my infant daughter, I wanted to slow time so that I could enjoy their lives. Enjoy my life.

Like many parents thinking about staying at home with their young children, I somehow thought that by removing my “career” plate, it would make spinning all the rest easier. One mom-friend of mine said it best, “I thought when I stayed home I would be the kind of mom who would bake chocolate chip cookies for her children, but all that happened was I could not longer afford to by the chocolate chips.” What we think will be the salvation is really only a change. Spinning eight plates instead of nine isn’t necessarily all that much simpler.

I’m still spinning too many plates, trying to figure out how to stack another layer of cards on my shaky house. But now it looks like me running from one plate to another, just managing to give it a spin before it topples over. I spend my days running from one part of my life to another. And if something takes more time or energy than usual, some plates fall.

Thinking about the retired folks I know, not one of them lazes about all day. They seem as busy today as they did when they were working. And yet many of them look happy, stable. Perhaps the secret is not in trying to rush about spinning all the plates, but in finding your peace–as long as you spin the plates often enough, they will keep from crashing to the floor.

I’m not going to edit this one. I’m just going to push publish and send it away. Today there’s too many plates to wash, socks to fold, chores to do. But it was good to get it out. To take the time to grieve what I can’t always do because there are only so many hours and I have only so many resources.

To take a tiny moment as the water runs from hot to tepid remembering why I knew I couldn’t go on like I had before…because I want to teach my children that even more important than clean dishes or socks is that extra moment taken to hold someone close and just breathe. Doing just that shores up our breaking points, stills our houses of precariously stacked cards. Today, I take the time to breathe.

Biggest was born with what is considered a congenital abnormality. In the big picture, it is nothing more than a nuisance, but it is still something that my gene pool gave him right along with a cleft-ish chin and a mono-brow. During the months I was pregnant, I worried constantly about ventricle holes, cleft palates, extra chromosomes, missing limbs, you name it, I obsessed about it even though there was no real reason to. It is fair to say that I worried because it made me feel that I was in control of something, even though that was a bald-face lie. Ask any parent and they will sadly admit to being more along for the tumultuous ride rather than firmly gripping the rudder of that particular ship.

But never, not once, did I worry about ichthyosis. Now, if you know your Latin roots and you dredged up “fish scales”, you’d be on the right path. As it stands, Biggest’s genes dished him up the most mild of the ichthyosis family of disorders. And for that I am so blessed. After all, the other end of the ichthyosis spectrum is typically fatal.

Ichthyosis Vulgaris means that he has dry, flakey skin. To the extent that in the winter, the skin around his waist peels off in huge half-inch flakes and his limbs look rather giraffe patterned year-round. But it’s just dry skin. And we do lots and lots of maintenance and care to try to keep his skin from getting too inflamed, too painful, too itchy, too at risk of infection.

And yet he still hears, nearly daily, “Dude! You have nasty dandruff!” or “Gross, your skin just landed on me!” or what ever that day’s selection happens to be. Luckily for Biggest, he has a pretty good sense of humor and place in the social pecking order so the teasing is mild enough that it hasn’t turned into bullying.

Yet.

My tiny baby, who I worried over for all those months before ever holding, and who I rubbed creams onto for all those years, is out of my protective care more and more every day. The number of people who have access to him increases every year, but the number of people who adore him and his peccadillos isn’t necessarily keeping the same pace.

And yet, I know I am oh so blessed to have only this to worry about. All I have to worry about is if he’s going to be teased about his skin condition. A condition that will never take his life and should improve with age.

These past few weeks I have heard of so, so many people who are loosing or missing someone who makes their sun shine. My heart aches for them. And my mind worries.

Because there is no prenatal vitamin or healthy diet I can take that will protect my babies out here, in this world filled with dangers as subtle as bullying or as aggressive as cancer.

If only there were a cream I could carefully rub into a child’s skin that would protect their lives, their hearts, and their spirits. I suppose the only thing I can hope for is that my babies develop a thick enough skin to diffuse any torment passed their way by bullies, as well as long and healthy lives. If daily doses of mom-hugs and tucking them in and telling them I love them doesn’t do it, I guess I’ll just have to put my faith in that daily vitamin I give them.

Time to set aside this missive. I need to go worry about something else for a bit, most likely if the dog has been stealing the cat’s food again.