07.06.11

Dearëst Zoë,

I have mama envy.  I read a lot of different blogs from other mamas.  Originally, the idea was to gather inspiration to use in our lives.  What it's become is yet another way to flog my flourishing sense of guilt and inadequacy even further.  I think I'm going to have to go on a blog ban for a while, at least until I can stop comparing myself.

The key is to be more realistic about what I am able to accomplish.  Working full-time, going to school part-time and being your mama in over-time is a lot of demand on my time and attention.  Not that I'm unwilling to give it, you understand.  Being your mama is the joy of my life, even when it's exhausting at the same time.  On the same hand though, I don't necessarily have the time or energy (especially the energy) to be The Perfect Mother who makes everything from scratch, including your underwear.  I'm not even sure I'm interested in being that down-home.  I admire it in others, but I don't think it's for me. 



We also need to talk about my compulsion to cook and bake with organic only, gluten-free, fair-trade imported from some small, obscure village in Sri Lanka ingredients.  I honestly can't afford to feed you that way.  It's not your fault.  It's not as if you ever demanded coconut-flour pancakes with lingonberries from Sweden.  It's just that at some point I picked up the impression that in order to win The Perfect Mother award, I would have to jump through all these ridiculous, and in my situation, unrealistic, hoops.  I feel guilty when I don't buy $5 free-range chicken eggs, even though I know most of them live no better lives than battery hens.  I feel guilty when I don't buy you $6 a gallon synthetic hormone free milk.  I feel guilty when I buy you Crayola instead of the coveted Stockmar.  Somewhere along the line I fell for the line that in order to be the best mom, I had to spend, spend, spend, get everything right and do it all perfectly.  I feel paralyzed sometimes with the realization that I will never be able to provide you with The Perfect Mother.  I apologize to you now for the mistakes I know I'm going to make and the needs that will go unmet.  I just hope that when you enter therapy in the future, your therapist isn't going to condemn me wholesale.

What we do actually need to work on in our household is building a little more structure into your days and weeks.  I've read over and over that structure is something that kids love and it gives them security.  We've been free-wheeling it since you were born and it's not working out ideally for me either.  I always feel like I'm running behind the wagon, trying to chase my day down and making desperate grabs at productivity.

I would like to start working on the alphabet with you.  I thought we could take it a letter per week and try to tie in all our games, books and activities into that particular letter.  On top of that, I really like assigning a particular activity to each day of the week as they do in Waldorf curriculum so here is our working schedule:

Monday - Baking day
Tuesday - Out and about day
Wednesday - Music day
Thursday - Crafts day
Friday - Housework
Saturday - Play date
Sunday - Church

We may have to tweak this as we go along, but for now, this is what we're going to work towards establishing in our house.  I hope that the structure proves to be comforting to both of us.

All my love,

Mama