Being a working mom, sometimes is strikes me as so strange how different my two worlds can be. My greatest joy and satisfaction comes from my primary role as a mother; and it seems that as much time as I can spend with my girls, it is never enough. They grow so fast! And yet, there are those days where I can’t wait to get back to work again. For the most part I love what I do and that is why I continue to work; but scientific research can be quite frustrating because a great deal of the time things just don’t work out the way you hypothesize, and sometimes you just get in a slump where nothing seems to work and everything is going so slowly. I am in one of those slumps right now. I go from home, where everything seems to be moving in fast-forward, to work- where everything is in PAUSE. Maybe even in slow rewind. That’s why I was so happy last week when my mom brought Juliette in to have lunch with me one day. Juliette loves to come see me at work and seeing how happy and excited she is just makes it that much more fun for me. I’m sure my mom and I were walking around with huge smiles on our faces.
After circling around a few times in search for a parking space, we ended up in the parking garage, and Juliette got a big kick over walking through the tunnel to the hospital. We went to the cafeteria to buy lunch and then walked over to my lab so Juliette could see my desk. By the time they left I had pizza stains on my pants, potato chip shmeg on my shirt, and a nice big happy face drawn with yellow highlighter on my desk blotter. The daffodils Juliette gave me are still in the dixie cup in the corner, but they are droopy and brown and maybe after I finish this post I will take a minute to finally throw them out. When you aren't supposed to have children in your workplace, these little pieces of evidence make it hard to disguise the fact that you are breaking the rules. My old boss was very lenient about it- mostly because he had his own daughter in lab with us quite often; we used to keep her busy by putting different colorful dies into water in test tubes, giving her some droppers, a lab coat and gloves, and letting her wreak havoc on her own little bench. Soon enough, the white lab coat wasn't white anymore and all the test tubes were filled with brown water. It used to be a bit of a chore, this 'babysitting', which probably explains why I was Natalie's least favorite; but now I look forward to the day when I can entertain Juliette in such a fashion. When I picture watching her grow into the lab coat and gloves, it makes me smile. My new boss isn't quite so understanding, however; the only thing he ever said was "Don't get caught" which made me think, first, I just did get caught, and second, no colorful dye mixing experiments with Juliette in the near future. Isn’t it funny how, when I think of my work interfering with my family I get so protective of my family- and when I think of my family interfering with my work I get so protective of… my family? Two worlds collide, and the 3 year olds’ wins.
Later in the week, my mom came for lunch again, but this time she brought my dad with her. It's rare to be able to sit down with my parents for a quiet and leisurely meal. Usually we are at one house or another, for a holiday or event, or at a restaurant surrounded by others.
While we were relaxing at lunch we chatted; I mentioned to them that I had just written a post about how afraid I get sometimes for my girls and told them that they should read it and then read my brother, Mike's, comment, which was so touching it made me cry. And out of the blue my dad informs me that he and my mom used to be worried all the time. My mom nodded in agreement. What! I never knew. And I have to give my parents credit for that- for letting us live and explore and be free despite their worry. Because now when I think back on it with my mommy perspective I realize that my parents had plenty of things to worry about. When my brother was just a baby we lived in a house that had a huge pond behind it. I always thought of it as a lake, and I'm not sure what the difference is, but technically it is a pond. And I remember playing in and around that lake- completely out of sight of our house- all summer long. How did my mom stand it? Not to mention the pool in our backyard; pools fill me, as a mother, with fear; and yet my mom- who has a fear of swimming herself- managed to deal with it for years. Now I know why she has so many gray hairs! Then my dad reminded me of the time we were fishing in the Race- the place where Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean meet-in his relatively small fishing boat. The boat was rocking and rolling. I had hooked a big fish on my line and we were battling it out- I was determined to get that fish in the boat; the fish was determined not to come out of the ocean; and my dad was simultaneously trying to keep the boat steady and keep me in it. He tells me “Every time we went out on the boat I envisioned you falling overboard; and then you almost did.” At this point I protest that I did not fall overboard, I was in perfect control; dad just continues “when you imagine the worst, you get mentally prepared for it and so when you are faced with the reality you can you act without thinking about it.”
Hmmm. I never thought about it that way before. In a strange way, hearing that admission from my parents makes me feel better. And it makes me appreciate them that much more.
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