Great Expectations

When my children were small, I was continually amazed by the fact they listened to me. Not all the time, of course, but when I told them to stop doing something such as trying to tie-dye the cat or to start doing something such as brushing their teeth, generally they did as they were told.

That they obeyed me always came as a surprise because I would think, “Why are they doing what I’m telling them to do? Don’t they know I can’t make them do anything? Don’t they know there isn’t a backup plan? Don’t they realize that I have no idea of what I’m doing?”

Thankfully they didn’t, which looking back, makes sense. I was their mom and the adult they hung out with the most and, of course, they believed I knew what I was talking about. If only new mothers could realize how much power they are about to wield. Moms make Wonder Woman look like a wimp.

My husband and I were married for 10 years before becoming parents. They were 10 good years, filled with “Why not?” moves to other states, jobs and adventures. We generally did exactly as we pleased, exactly when we pleased, and it was fun. But as our 20s began to recede, I found myself longing for something I couldn’t quite put my finger on, something elusive but that felt elemental. And then I realized what I was missing: I wanted to be a mom.

Around that time the first line of the opening monologue of the old “Star Trek” television series kept running through my head. “Space, the final frontier.” That was how I thought about motherhood. Motherhood was the final frontier to me. It was uncharted territory I wanted to explore.

When our first son, Joe, arrived a week before our 10th anniversary, we were ready. Still, going to the hospital as a couple and leaving as a family was a little shocking. I kept looking at our new baby, small, safe and snug in his brand-new car seat, and wondering if we had a clue what we’d just gotten ourselves into. This wasn’t a puppy or a kitten. This was a tiny human being, and we were 100% responsible for him for the next 18 years. Gulp. (More about the “18 and out” fantasy later.)

Joe was an easy baby, so easy that we had a second baby a couple of years later, our son Hank, and poof! Our family was complete. As Shari Lewis used to sing on her old “Lambchop” show, those were the fairy tale years. When I look back on them now, my memory colors the light a kind of shimmering gold and it seemed as if we were all always smiling.

We weren’t of course. If I dig into those memories a little deeper, the shimmering gold light recedes and I’m able to remember how quickly, like within a day, it became apparent that being a mom was not all walks in a sunny park pushing a stroller, sipping a latte and humming Barry Manilow tunes. Being a mom wasn’t endless Mommy and Me playgroups. There were dirty diapers and stomach bugs and never enough sleep and exhaustion that finally illustrated what being “bone tired” truly felt like.

But what really got to me was the slow realization that there were no breaks. Ever. No time off for good behavior. No matter how many silver stars you collected for potty training, shoe tying or multiplication tables, the only time you got to yourself was during “Barney,” and that wasn’t guaranteed.

Let’s face it: Being a parent is a relentless 24/7 proposition unless you’re rich enough to have live-in help and even then, you’re not off the hook because no matter what, having a baby makes you the parent of record and there’s no escaping that label. You are the mom, the end of the line. To paraphrase Harry Truman, the buck stops with you and your spouse, not that most parents would want it any other way. Still, that youare-completely-responsible piece of the uncharted territory took some getting used to.

It is said that new moms think newborns are the hardest phase of motherhood, which is logical since they’ve never experienced anything else. Mothers of school-age children think those are the toughest years, what with getting the kids to school on time and dealing with all those play dates, not to mention fifth-grade math homework. Mothers of adolescents know those are the hardest times, and it would be hard to argue with them. I still cringe whenever I smell Axe aftershave as it brings back instant anxiety as I recall our boys when they were teenagers, piling on the Axe before getting behind the wheel of the family car and disappearing to God knows where on many a summer night. Those were the nights when sleep was completely evasive until the Axe-wearing adolescents arrived home safely.

How about mothers of fully grown offspring? Well, they have been raising their kids long enough to have finally accepted that it never really gets better. Once a mom, always a mom. Or, as a grandmother I once knew used to say, “You had it, now you’re stuck with it, so you’d better do your best raising it.” A bit blunt, but accurate.

Which brings me back to the “18 and out” fantasy. You can tell yourself, “Once they are 18 and adults, I’ll get my life back and I can stop worrying about them.” Many parents think that, and some manage to adhere to it, but most of us can’t because we discovered five seconds after giving birth that “worry” is the invisible middle name between “parent” and “hood.” From the early days when worries revolved around babies putting everything and anything in their mouths all the way to that magical 18th birthday when a fairy doesn’t appear after the candles on the cake have been blown out to wave her magic wand and release you from your parental duties.

Those worries simply never go away. They just morph into different shapes. You’ll worry about grades when they’re in grad school and mates when they start thinking about marriage. You’ll marvel at how you thought your child would turn out as opposed to reality. And you’ll wonder sometimes where you went wrong and other times what you ever did right to have such a great kid.

The way I see it, time is the culprit. It has a way of tricking you into thinking that things — good or bad — will last forever, which explains why it’s so hard to break the worry habit. It also explains why it is easy to put things off until tomorrow, and then regret that decision a few decades later.

When your baby is small, you lull yourself into believing he’s always going to be the same adorable size, sitting in his highchair with pureed peaches stuck in his hair. Believing that, you can tell yourself that you have plenty of time to put off plucking him out of that highchair and rocking him until he falls asleep in your arms. You can do that tomorrow, but right now you’d better toss another load of laundry in the wash and maybe attack the dust bunnies under your bed because you have all the time in the world to enjoy your baby. Right?

Then suddenly your baby is a toddler then a teenager then … gone. And you’re left at home wondering what happened, why time went so quickly before you could read one more story, listen to one more tale about school, and tell your child everything you wanted to tell him, needed to tell him, like how to pay his taxes and make spaghetti sauce and pick out the perfect present for his latest girlfriend. The things you meant to share, but somehow didn’t get around to.

I wouldn’t call time a deceiver. Time is simply time. We deceive ourselves. Who knew, no, who believed time goes on without our permission? Who knew we weren’t really Wonder Woman who could control everything, even time?

Now, as an older mom, I know. I was never Wonder Woman, not even close. The mugs I got on Mother’s Day saying Best Mom Ever were given to me by children who didn’t know any better. Children who loved me when I woke up cranky and loved me when I was at my finest. That’s another little secret of motherhood: Your kids will always love you no matter what. In that respect, they are slightly like puppies.

Once when I was pregnant with Joe I got on the elevator with another pregnant woman. Turned out she was expecting her third baby. Hesitantly, I asked her, “Is it as hard as everyone says? Birth and being a mom? Everyone says how tough it is.”

The elevator stopped on her floor. Before getting off, she said to me, “It’s tough but what no one ever says is how wonderful it is.”

And she was right. I think about new moms today raising children in a world that has changed so much since I had my kids. Talk about new frontiers. I thank God I never had to deal with social media and cellphones and the internet when my kids were small. But the new moms will make it, and their kids will make it and the moms won’t be Wonder Woman and their children won’t be Baby Einsteins. But it will all be OK. It will be more than OK.

It will be wonderful. MM