How Did I Get Here?

Today I volunteered at my daughter's school. They were testing all of the children's hearing and vision. I wasn't sure what I was going to do. Maybe I would shuffle the kids from one line to the other. Give a "quiet down" look to any kid that started to act up. But test their vision? Don't they have more qualified people than me?

I'm not stupid, but it is really hard to see myself as competent enough to assess someone's vision. Maybe it's because inside I'm still young and inexperienced. I forget that I'm an adult. I forget that I'm someone's mother, even if that someone is standing right next to me.

Last year I volunteered in my daughter's art class. The woman running the class was speaking to the students when she mentioned her age. She was 36 - my age. I stood there, shocked. Surely she couldn't be the same age as me! She was mature, knew what she was talking about and she was an ADULT. I think that was the first time it really hit me that I'm an adult too.

When I see a doctor and they are close to my age I start to freak out. If they are my age they are WAY too young to have the responsibility of any one's life! I still can't believe that people I went to college with are nurses, lawyers and teachers; or they have jobs with VP and Director in their titles.

Am I the only one who looks around me and can't figure out how I got here? How did I go from being the kid in school to the college student to the married woman to being some one's mother? It happened over the span of decades, but it was so fast that my brain hasn't caught up to my aging body.

In my head I'm still that goofy kid. I still like to make up songs when I'm bored. At six my daughter still thinks that is fun. I'm sure in the not-so-distant future she will scowl when I do that because she is standing on her tippi-toes and stretching up as high as she can so she can touch adulthood sooner.

Sometimes I think that I can't be the only one who feels 18 inside while the outside is slowly morphing into my mother. But to not be alone in this feeling is kind of scary because that means all of those people in whom I trust my life are freaked out teenagers inside. Is that stoic airline pilot wondering how he went from paper airplanes to being responsible for hundreds of lives? Is there a surgeon that stands over his patient, ready to cut, wondering how a kid who used to eat paste can now put his hands inside someone's body?

I shudder to think about such things. So I'm going to tell myself that those people, those with so much responsibility, are a little older inside than I am. They were always surgeons and airline pilots inside. I can't picture those people doing keg stands in college or making out with some stranger in a bar. No. I need to picture those people - those responsible people - as diligent students who enjoyed a discussion on Chekhov and never understood what the big deal was about partying.

Unfortunately for all of the kids at my daughter's elementary school, those people weren't available today. They got me instead. I pointed to the eye chart, watched them point which way the E was facing and did my best to get it right when I said, "Yup. 20/20." and sent them on their way. But if I'm the only thing that stands between those children and blindness, I hope they are good with white canes.

I like you, I really like you...

Most nights at about 9 pm my husband and I convene on the couch in our living room. He watches whatever riveting science show he's recorded and I lay on the couch next to him and read. Most nights I'll fall asleep and my husband wakes me up when he goes to bed.

The other night I was laying there with my eyes closed, but was having trouble falling asleep. Then I heard the sound go off of the TV and what sounded like a giggle. I opened my eyes in time to see the back of my husband as he tossed a stuffed animal back and forth with our daughter.

It was now about 11 pm and I'm kind of a hard ass when it comes to sleeping. I really don't allow any BS at night and get mad when my daughter gets out of bed for no good reason. Bleeding, vomiting, etc... are exceptions.

My daughter knows this so if she is sick she usually comes to me, but all other excuses usually necessitate her going to Daddy and praying that I don't wake up. Mommy doesn't play when it comes to night time shenanigans.

So on this particular night I opened my mouth to tell our daughter that she needs to go back to bed, but saw my husband put his arm around our daughter and start walking her down the hallway towards her room. There he was smiling and looking down at her and she was smiling and looking up at him.

And both of them were beaming.

Tears sprang to my eyes.

I've heard the saying that to have a child is to have your heart walking out of your chest for the rest of your life and I really believe that to be true. But to truly give your heart to a man and for him to cherish it is yet another thing.

To see the two people that I love the most in the world looking at each other with such love was almost too much to bare. It was so beautiful to see the love my daughter has for her father and the love that she gets in return.

They say that the most important relationship a girl has with a man is with her father. This is the relationship that all others are compared and modeled after. My daughter may not be able to articulate it right now, but the look on my husband's face said it all.

He loves her, he will protect her, and she is the most important thing in his world. And the biggest thing that I saw as they looked at each other was that he liked her as a person.

We all love the people in our families. But we don't always like them. Love may not be a choice, but like is. My husband and I tell each other that we love each other a lot. However, we save the biggest complement for more poignant moments. When we tell the other person that we LIKE them an awful lot, we know we are doing pretty damn well.

After 10 years together and 6 as a family of three, I can honestly say that I LIKE my family.

And that night my family gave me the gift of seeing their love and like for each other. After seeing their blatant display of affection I closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep so they wouldn't know I had invaded their special moment. It was hard laying still while my heart was so full. I know it is cliche, but I honestly could not think of a better way of describing it than my cup runneth over...