Often times, I serve my son natural fruit beverages that I make in my blender; he also eats Lucky Charms coated in artificial flavors which are stuck into my dirty floor.
Occasionally I wake up before my son, bath and get dressed in something besides sweatpants, appearing halfway acceptable if I should proceed to leave the boundaries of my home; occasionally I opt for stretchy waist trousers, use deodorant rather than a bath and cancel any programs that need me to walk through the front porch.
Often, I sit down on the ground and read books gather block towers and sing the Itsy Bitsy Spider; sometimes I cannot be bothered because I am bored with entertaining a baby for 10 hours every day.
Occasionally I rush upstairs and take my son from his bed the minute I hear him awakening from his sleep; sometimes, I just need three more minutes of rest, so I make him wait it out while I rest at the kitchen table doing nothing.
Sometimes when my husband comes home from the office, the sink and dishwasher are vacant, the floor is vacuumed, and dinner has been prepped. Occasionally, the dishwasher and sink are falling to Leaning Tower balances, the floor is filled with crushed up Goldfish and I beg him to please order takeout, despite it not being in the budget, so I do not need to cook one more damned meal this week.
Sometimes, I put away my phone and concentrate my attention entirely on my son and; sometimes I get caught up in reading posts about being a mother while ignoring my child wholly.
Sometimes I lay my son on the bed for a rest, and I am scarily productive: blog articles are written, laundry folded, dishes washed; occasionally I bring my son to bed with me, and we sleep for an unfruitful two hours, waking up to a heap of unfinished to-dos.
Sometimes I do not give a flying f$*k what each other mother is doing because I am confident in my own new motherhood; sometimes I cannot help but compare my thighs into those on the skinnier mom in the checkout line or get insecure over the family holiday to Jamaica another mother can afford that we may not.
Sometimes, I feel fortunate that I get to stay home with my son every day; sometimes I want someone wanted me for anything more pressing than or cutting bits of food into bite-sized bits or unearthing a block that’s trapped under the coffee table.
I am a mommy of contradictions; at any given time, I am an unconventional mother to my son than I was just minutes before. I’m inconsistent and flawed, inept and competent, a thousand distinct colors splashed on the same canvas.
But, even in my moments of incompetence, of laziness, or just plain not-getting-it-right, I am forever a good mother. And so are you.
Now if your child eats red dye and you notice a Facebook talk about Ryan Gosling more intriguing than your infant, and you lose your temper as someone walked in on you in the bathroom many times in a day. Even then, you’re still a fantastic mom; you are just not a perfect one. But everybody gets it perfectly right…sometimes.
