Today is Mothering Sunday in the UK. This took us by surprise, without the prompting of retailers we didn’t have a clue it was coming. So no cards, breakfast in bed or flowers for me. I don’t mind, Dave has taken the whole lot out for the morning allowing me a few precious hours to myself to do what I want to do. That is bliss beyond comprehension, just a few hours to not have to wipe a bottom, separate a mass brawl or have my ear drums assaulted by a squawking recorder is really special.
There is a Mothers Day competition being run by a British Company MamaBabybliss, which has challenged mothers to write about their ‘me’ time, how they pamper themselves. Apparently 93.6% mothers long for more time to themselves.
How I identify with this. But, I do find it wildly annoying that everyone presumes that when I get half an hour to myself what I really want to do is to lie in a perfumed bath having a manicure. That's not to say I don't love a long hot soak with a good book, I do, but I can do it with the kids in my life. In the evenings, once everyone is in bed there is a whole load of stuff that I can do. I can have a glass of wine. I can go out to a restaurant with a friend. I can read a book. I don’t have enough time to do it as often as I would like, but I can do it, particularly when I decide not to care that the house looks as if a bomb has hit it.
No, what I miss, and what I really long for is the stuff that I can’t do any more. I long to ski really fast, just edging towards being out of control, down an exposed mountainside, wind and cold biting and fingers turning white. I miss the feeling of being really fit and going out for a run on a beautifully crisp day and having one of those days where it all just clicks, the legs feel great and I can luxuriate in the feeling that my whole body is just as it should be, my muscles working just so. I also miss going out for the day with no fixed plan and just seeing where we end up, spontaneity leading us to places we would never normally go and getting lost and not being able to find somewhere to stay and being starving before all is resolved and we have a story to enter the family history books.
But, given that a weekend on the Sarajevo ski slopes is out of the question, I’m not fit enough to go for an enjoyable run and spontaneity always leads to me not having enough nappies and grizzly children in the back of the car, I've settled for listening to The Archers Omnibus followed by Desert Island Discs on IPlayer, and you know what, it is a very pleasant way to spend my Sunday morning. I’ll save my long hot soak for this evening when I’ll be one blissed out Mummy.
****** UPDATE******
The boys and Dave came back from their walk shortly after I'd posted this post. They burst in full of pride and excitement and clutched in their hot little hands were a bunch of plastic flowers, a Beethoven CD full of Mozart's music and the Wall-E DVD. The best that Tuzla had to offer at short notice. I am genuinely thrilled. All the adreline inducing ski runs in the world don't match up to my plastic bunch of roses presented by two beaming little faces.
Sunday, 22 March 2009
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3 comments:
I agree with you, more than anything else, I long for alone-time at random. A cold, rainy Saturday alone with a fuzzy blanket, several books, old movies and a couch to sleep on.
But it is what it is, right?
Happy Mothers Day!
An afternoon, in fact even an hour, sitting in a cafe reading a book. Sitting in the airport without having to chase down a toddler (gone are the days where I supped champagne before take off). Lying on a beach listening to the waves lapping. Or reading a whole copy of the Economist from start to end.
I have started to multi-task so effectively now that the latter I still manage, but while having a bikini wax during a lunchbreak at work.
Hang on to those evenings. I used to love what I called "the 7.30 moment". As the children get older, the evenings get shorter. It's not going to be long before I need more sleep than my oldest.
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